After revealing last year that it would cease making smaller web-based games like Minotaur China Shop and Jetpack Brontosarus in favor of a full-featured rendition of its free-to-play sensation Off-Road Velociraptor Safari, developer Flashbang has now pulled the plug on the project.

"We are suspending development of Off-Road Velociraptor Safari HD/64 with no plans to resume development in the foreseeable future," Flashbang's Mathew Wegner revealed on the company's blog. "It was a trap to pursue the 'HD' expectations... It narrowed our possibilities instead of expanding them. We were spending time on normal-mapping our rocks, a very dangerous thing indeed when your team is 3 people." Read more »

Unity Technologies has announced that the limited version of its 'Unity' game development platform previously sold for $199 as 'Unity Indie' will now be available free.

Now simply called 'Unity,' the free engine and suite naturally contain fewer features than the $1499 Pro license but still offer plenty for budding designers and developers to tinker with. You can nab the suite in a 163MB download from FileShack. Read more »

Flashbang Studios, the creators of the web-based hit Off-Road Velociraptor Safari, has told Shacknews that it plans to further develop one of its games as a downloadable console title.

"We're in a financial position to make whatever games we want, so we will, and we want to see which of our ideas players enjoy," said Flashbang Studios founder Matthew Wegner in an interview with Shacknews. Read more »

I love Flashbang Studios.

This small Tempe, Arizona-based studio combined my appreciation of both dinosaurs and safaris into a brilliant time-waster in Off-Road Velociraptor Safari.

True to their collaborative spirit, Flashbang tag-teamed the first batch of my inquiries. On the second page, I go one-on-one with company founder Matthew Wegner, where we talk about everything from the state of web-based games to Flashbang's plans for console development. Read more »