A test! A test!

Crossposting is the best thing ever, and I love redundancy. Will this miraculous little tool let me crosspost to facebook, LJ, AND blogger all at once? Stay tuned for MYSTERY


Testing to see if LJ cuts still work

Quotage

(On BoomBlox)

Lisa: "I like how it vibrates your wiimote just a bit when it's your turn."

Maria: "It's so you can play this game if you're blind."

-----

Maria: "I don't have any programming skills, I just think of the ideas. That makes me the designer."

Scott: "I don't have programming skills either, what does that make me?"

Maria: "That makes you a playtester."

Soul Bubbles

One of the awesomesauce people I met at Project Horseshoe was Olivier Lejade of Mekensleep. When he told us about his company's game, Soul Bubbles, on the van ride to the conference I became instantly intrigued. It sounded cute and fun, and the more I got to know Olivier and his cleverness, the more I was curious about investigating his design work. One Amazon gift certificate later, I finally got a copy into my DS.

The game is delightful and super-elegant, and I'm really enjoying it! The world of the game is very strange: You act as a spirit herder, putting spirits in little bubbles and blowing them around to transport them, using the bubbles to solve puzzles to make your way through the level. But the weird concepts are very smartly introduced, so that by the time you start herding spirits, all the weird stuff feels natural.

Part of the delight of this game is simply the core interaction: using the DS stylus to blow around a bubble, slice it into smaller bubbles to squeeze them through small spaces, bouncing bubbles back into one another and combining them back into one big bubble, etc. The interaction makes wonderful use of the stylus and touchscreen and is a perfect fit for the DS.

Above all, Soul Bubbles just feels very, very polished. Everything is "just-so," and is not bogged down with too many features. It is very simple, but very polished, very elegant, and very fun! All the better, too, for my poor DS was stowed away and gathering dust, only coming out for long travel trips. Now I have a reason to tote it around with me more regularly.Huzzah for awesome games! Well done, Olivier :D

Decemberball

I adore the Tuesday Night Ballers, and I often think of them fondly at various times in my most recent adventures. The times when we are able to get together have been more and more adventurous as time goes on.

Tonight, everyone was "on," and it was brilliant. Not 2 minutes would pass without laughter or wit or some clever exchange sparking another clever exchange. I love them all! Scott, Will, Ian, Brendan, Maria, Matt, Kyle, DC, Beth, and I had dinner at the Mayan Gypsy and launched the night with much gaming.

Reviews!

Left for Dead - I'd watched this played but never got a chance to play it myself until tonight. Kyle and I played while the others experimented with some new board games. I'll give you an impression of Lisa playing this game: "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEGETITOFFOFMEGETITOFFGETITOFF!!!!!!!!!!" It got to the point that, later in the night, Maria tossed a container to Beth and I shrieked in terror. This may be too stressful for me to devote too much time with

Pandemic - a cooperative board game about fighting off spreading diseases. I didn't play this one, but it seemed quite challenging. I'm all about cooperative board games!

Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game - This game is kind of like Shadows Over Camelot, where the traitor is a Cylon, and doesn't know it. It's not just a skin, and has its own mechanics, but again, cooperative board games where you fight against the game are fun times!

World of Goo (Wii version) - I hadn't gotten a chance to play this cooperatively on the Wii, and I was surprised how co-op play so dramatically changes the dynamic of the game! Playing cooperatively is really, really hard, but incredibly fun. I recommend it!

Raving Rabids TV Party - zomg, such a good party game! A good spectator game at that! The skiing game where you have to sit on the balance board and steer reminded me of way back in the day, when a group of friends and I played Crash Team Racing by sitting on a DDR pad. Good times all around.

The Big Idea - This card game is awesome. But it's MORE awesome when you play after 2am so everyone is prone to giggling and silliness. Liquid Cardboard! The future is now!And the fun doesn't stop there! Tomorrow (today?) D Flo is in town, so the fun times will continue all. Hooray for good friends!

Simultaneous Attraction and Repulsion

Yesterday, Jesse and I were chatting about a Civil War game he picked up out of curiosity. We were speculating on what a Civil War FPS might be like*. Jesse figured a lot of bayoneting, and I figured a lot of gangrene.

"Oh!" I said suddenly, "what if there is an amputation mini-game with a hacksaw?"

IMMEDIATELY after the words fell from my fingers, I recoiled in horror. UGGGH!! Ew!! EW!

"Undo, UNDO!" I shouted, but alas, once an idea is birthed into the world, it cannot be forced back from whence it came. It is here to stay.

Even though I shuddered at my horrible idea, it kept coming back up in conversation, both then and again tonight.

At one point I even said, "I want someone to make a BVW World about it. NO I DON'T!"But it wouldn't leave my brain! Imagine the sound design on that. Bits of bone.....no..ew...EWW!! UGGH!! STOP IT.

Jesse laughed and said that there's no word yet for those mysterious things which attract and repulse at the same time. And he's right. Attempting to google it only brings up some science journal article titled "Independent functions of slit-robo repulsion and netrin-frazzled attraction regulate axon crossing at the midline in Drosophila." Which, of course, is not helpful at all. Do scientists publish these things and then giggle behind our backs? Netrin-frazzled, indeed.

Anyway, my poor, horrible Civil War FPS amputation mini-game may as well get logged away on my great list of ideas. Perhaps writing it down will cast it away for good. And who knows, perhaps it will come in handy someday. Poor little idea. Uggh....*shudder**apparently it's pretty terrible.

Semester Recap

This is a slightly abridged version of my most recent posting to my mailing list, so I apologize for repeats. My fall semester project was a HUGE success. The experience we created for the line for the BVW show was incredibly well-received, and people waiting enjoyed themselves (and felt like the time went by very quickly, which was one of our most basic goals!).

 To catch people up, we decided to use Megaphone as the software platform for our games. Basically, you dial a local phone number and, once connected, can control things on the big screen with your cell phone acting as a game controller. In addition to mini-games, we filled our our experience with videos and factoids and break times, all themed for the BVW show. The games worked and people played them, and the people in the two competing lines really got into it, cheering and sighing depending on how their team did with each game.

 One interesting last minute idea was our crude version of a "virtual host" for the experience. Whenever the web camera breaks were on, I opened up Notepad and typed messages to the audience. They LOVED it. If I typed "hello," the guests would wave at the screen. If I typed sassy comments, they laughed. I even got them to do silly things in line, including the wave and an impromptu dance competition. It was a fantastic success! All in all, the experience went really well. We did have one issue with our phone server crashing at the end, which means people didn't get to play our final game, but we glossed over it and no one knew the difference.

Here's a video clip of footage from the day of the show. All the music was composed by my teammate, Soo, and was the music we used in our games. If anyone is terribly curious and wants to watch our final presentation, it's posted on the project website here:


 https://sites.google.com/site/getinlinepublic/process/finalpresentation 


 So, since I'm doing an internship for the spring semester, that wraps up my official graduate school experience! I'd say it's an incredibly positive way to close off my ETC education. As for now, I've been enjoying my last school break as much as I can muster. I'm already enjoying being back in Louisville for the holidays by being as sickeningly lazy as possible. It's wonderful!

Organization

Today I fell into the Flow, this time regarding the tidying of my journal. It has mostly been going back through old posts, tagging things, and correcting image links. However, some of you may recall that between the end of 2004 and 2006, I went away from Livejournal for awhile and self-hosted my journal, then decided to return to LJ in the end. Back when I did this, I'd changed hosting plans for my website, and in the process lost all my on-site journal entries through a mishap. I wasn't overly distressed, however. I knew that if I gave it 6 months or so, the Internet Wayback machine would have the archive of my entries available. It wasn't until now that I got around to digging up my old entries and transferring them to LJ, but I did today. For any who are interested in seeing them, they are under the tag "lost entries," (first post at the bottom). I have to pick up tagging and image link correcting from the end of 2006, but the transfer of posts was the biggest hurdle to get over. Going back and plugging along through my journal has been incredibly insightful! I'm glad I started this blog when I did.

Burbank, Gears, Insomniacs, and Adventure!

First of all, I apologize to Cynthia and the LA ETCers whom I did not get to visit with on my trip to Burbank this weekend. As always, I figured I had more time than I actually did, and my stay was packed pretty full! After arriving and hugging and feasting and post-travel napping, I spent Thursday evening with Drew and Josh, re-acclimating to Gears of War by playing Horde mode. For those of you unfamiliar with it, in Horde mode you are placed on a multiplayer map, and must defend yourselves and survive repeated waves of enemies. It was fun, I will admit, but the nervousness associated with camping and defending a single location, waiting for the enemies to come to you, was EXTREMELY stressful. In the long run, I ended up leaving the Horde defense to Drew and Josh and watched, which was entertaining but not so stressful. I did, however, thoroughly enjoy playing co-op campaign in Gears of War 2 with Josh the next day. My biggest flaw in this game is that I am essentially useless with the Lancer's chainsaw bayonet, and when any enemy comes within an arm's swipe of me, my default strategy is to scream "GET IT AWAY FROM ME!!!" and flee towards my partner (who, usually, is much more adept with the chainsaw than me). Once I picked up a sniper rifle, though, I was all set. I will always be a sniper at heart, I think, when it comes to shooters. Josh and I didn't make it through the entire game, but got a decent way in. We were balancing our Gears day with cooking, which was awesome. I haven't gotten many chances to do a lot of cooking while in grad school, so I wanted part of my mini-vacation to consist of at least baking bread. We baked bread, made mango chutney, and roasted a chicken for a lovely Friday night feast, and I felt satisfied in having gotten to cook and having nourished another human. My love of cooking, afterall, is rooted in feeding others. On Saturday, Drew, Katy, Josh and I visited the Museum of Jurassic Technology, which I will not even attempt to explain here. It is simply a place that one must visit to comprehend. Nonetheless, it was awesome. That evening was the Insomniac Christmas Party (special thanks to DBang for getting me in) so I got dressed up all fancy-like for the occasion. My outfit had been pre-approved by the Get In Line team for maximum fashion, and I'm happy to say that I mingled all night in my fancy shoes without walking like a velociraptor once! The party was wonderful, as I got to reestablish bonds with all the Insomniacs I'd worked with over the summer. Many were surprised to see me there, and all were pleased, and there were many hugs all around. On Sunday, Drew and Josh and I went to the La Brea Tar Pits. I'm happy to say that we successfully located a new-forming pit that hadn't been bordered off yet, and poked it with a stick. This was the primary purpose in visiting the pits, but visiting the museum was fantastic. They had recently uprooted a mammoth, and the people in the observatory area were working on the skull. This was pretty exciting, as generally they are sorting out mouse toes and other such tiny work. Sunday evening was spent in the laziest of fashions, with board games and more Horde mode and food and cake. It had a slightly melancholy feel, as I had such a wonderful weekend and miss Drew and Josh SO much! I will be sad to say goodbye this morning, but grateful for my fantastic visit. Alas, my beloved Insomniacs, I miss you so! This trip was a Christmas gift well-spent.

I has a hunger

Let's be honest. For a long time now, I've been scraping by on other people's consoles, nibbling at new video games as a good-natured jackal might nibble bites of other kills, and have been happy doing so. I've sustained myself as such since, well, since Halo, I suppose, and fun times on the XBox back at Rhodes 2 in undergrad. There have been a smattering of purchases here and there, but for the most part I've been scavenging. It's been frugal living, and for a long time it's been quite an acceptable means for me to absorb enough gaming to keep myself going. However, things have been changing. I've grown hungry to own my own games again, and to feed off of my own consoles. With the recent wave of November releases, I become restless and jealous every time I read a twitter or a status update about some such game that some such person has been enjoying. It makes me twitchy and antsy and fuels a desperate hunger to play and learn and consume and shove games into my brain as I do so often with books. Can I hold out against this craving? Should I? I haven't felt this way, really, since back when I purchased my Playstation 1 in high school, which is pretty much when I began sustaining my gaming crave with my own money. It began in a similar way...I remember scraping by on the consoles of friends, playing what I could on visits, and slowly growing hungrier. Then Spyro the Dragon came and I was like "okay, that's it," and I happily devoted the meager income of a high school student to support my gaming hobby in full with a fresh new console. I suppose, if I'm going to be a game designer, I could write off the investment cost as research and not worry about it. Still, it's so much money! Even if I became a devoted GameFly user, I still have to get the consoles and a TV to play them on. I think the best happy medium would be to take advantage of the ETC library and lounge in the time I have left, but students on co-op can't borrow games from the library, so I'd have to have someone else get them for me. It is not quite the same, I know, but it might help sate my appetite for a bit longer. We shall see!

A Poll

Internets, I need your help! I require input for decision-making. Do I... 1) Go to Gamestop tonight to pick up my pre-ordered copy of WotLK and see all the fun costumed people and bask in the camaraderie of nerd-ism and have fun and a party. or 2) Go to freakin bed and pick up WotLK tomorrow because I'm tired as hell and I won't install it tonight anyway. Discuss! Edit: After handing over my decision to the coin of fate, I went along. It was quite well organized and they gave us free pizza! No one dressed up in crazy costumes though. I still haven't installed it, as I went to bed immediately upon my return.

Why Highlander the MMO will be AWESOME

So here's another thought tangent that came out of Horseshoe, even though it was not directly connected to a workgroup. Back in Bandology, we often joked about how we were going to make Highlander the MMO, and how it was going to be AWESOME. It was entirely a joke, as the "there can be only one" nature of Highlander doesn't really mesh with the concept of a massively multiplayer game. OR DOES IT? Yes, Highlander the MMO would be a fun game, and this is how... It would involve a couple pieces of trickery: 1) The game would reset frequently, and the run of the game (essentially, the race to become the only one left) would be short. I'm thinkin, like, a week. Not only this, but the time frames would be staggered. Thus, you could easily join again when it's at the beginning of its run, somewhere in the middle, or towards the end. It wouldn't always begin on Monday and reset on Sunday, the shards would be staggered. If the players got down to the One before the end of the week, it would reset early and be swapped out with another shard that was scheduled to start at the new time. If the run reaches the end of the week before only One is left, the world ends. There are no leaderboards or second or third place or whatever. ONLY ONE. 2) We would plug the game onto another existing MMO. The Highlander players could move about the world and interact with the other players, but their game objectives would be separate. The purpose of this parasite model would be such that the Highlander players could exist in an active, populated world where the normal citizens had different objectives than their own. That would solve the problem of the ONLY inhabitants of the world being immortals, which would kind of kill the luster of the role. Plus, this would make it feel like it'd make sense for the world to be as big as it needs to be for all the immortals to go hunt each other down. Jesse says I should make it a Second Life mod. Those are the tricks, next comes hashing out how the gameplay would work. What happens when you behead another character? Do you absorb all of that person's powers? If so, we'd have to think of a way to make it possible for a "new" player could behead someone who'd been playing for a couple of days. PLUS, we'd have to make that feel fair to the "older" player. It would need a great many more verbs than "behead." Then you'd have to figure out combat or whatever. Anyway, I'm intrigued, and maybe I'll try and come up with something. I'd want to see if I could find a way to playtest those big ideas first. Is the parasite model even possible?? Highlander the MMO, here we come!

The Poker Game

First off, Project Horseshoe was an AMAZING and insightful experience and I'm so glad I came. But I'll write about all that later. First, a story....

When I came to Project Horseshoe, I was delighted to find that James Ernest (creator of Tuesday Night Basketball favorite, Give Me the Brain) was also an attendee. He'd visited the ETC recently and seemed like a cool guy, and when a student at the ETC seminar had posed the question "What is your favorite card game?" he answered "Poker" without hesitation. When talk of the game came up the first night of Horseshoe, I lamented that I was terrible at Poker, because I can never remember what beats what and I have a horrible Poker face. James' eyes went alight, and he exclaimed that this was a perfect Poker combination and that I would probably do quite well at the game.

Needless to say, I was dragged into the first night's game of Texas Hold'em, which was not for money since it was a training game for me. The other players included a smattering of designers who were, more or less, serious Poker players, but they were happy to help me learn the ways of the trade. With James on one side of me and Scott Brodie on the other, they coached me along as I bumbled through the rounds. The whole table was apparently trying desperately to let me win (so that I would be fond of the game and want to play again), but it was a trying effort on their part.

After the game, James continued to coach me by dealing out hands and having me analyze the cards and figure out which hand would win and asking me mysterious questions with Poker lingo that I didn't quite get. The subsequent days, the other players assured me that once I learned the game, I could play professionally and pay off my student loans. I was mystified by this show of faith, and observed games and tried very hard to learn.

By the last night, I felt like I still couldn't remember what beat what and still had a horrible Poker face.

Still, I sat down to observe their tournament (not daring to join, not when money was on the table). I watched closely to try and guess what cards would make a winning hand, and trying to figure out why whoever won a hand won. As the night waned on, Victor Jimenez grew very sleepy, and kept making ridiculous bets hoping to go out so he could go to bed. Unfortunately, he kept winning the hands.

I joked that I would happily sit in for him and would quickly lose all his chips, and after a pause, he agreed. I bumbled and back-tracked but he insisted I join, and the other players were fine with the swap, so I nervously took his place at the table, not too thrilled about losing another person's money.

I played as best I could, always checking regardless of my hand because raising involved math and I didn't want to fool with it (math is hard!). I folded more often than not, nervous since it was a real game, but I was brave enough to play a few meager hands.

The game finally came down to 4 people (the payoff was going to be for the first three places, so just one more person had to go out for the game to end). At one hand, James put everything in, one person called, I was next. I looked at my hand.I had a 6 of hearts and 7 of diamonds. On the table were 3 other diamonds, one of which was an ace, and some hearts or something. "Let's see, I have a diamond," I thought, "and there are some diamonds on the table, maybe the next flop will be a diamond! Who knows!"I called. I learned later that this was a very poor decision, especially when someone was going all in with an Ace on the table. But, I was merely excited that I remembered that flushes existed! (I always forget about the flush, and I always forget whether it beats a straight or not) So, I was proud to show that I had learned something and was acting on it. The last person folded for an easy guaranteed 2nd or 3rd place.

The last flop was a diamond and we showed our cards. After a moment of stunned silence, it became clear that I won the pot, thus winning the entire game. Something about a "flush on the river." James lost altogether and I won first place, and there was a riot of laughter and disbelief, while I looked around hesitantly and said "Did...did I win? Was that a good decision?"

Dustin Clingman informed me that no, it had been a terrible decision, but I had been damned lucky (he said this with a grin, having won second place). James was silent, and I think his eye twitched once or twice. Everyone else was laughing.

I trotted over to find Victor with the winnings, and he guffawed in disbelief, running back to the table to heckle the others that I'd actually won. He took his initial buy-in and then let me keep the winnings, which I was embarrassed about but thankful.

James told me that I had to use the winnings to buy a book about Poker so I could continue my training, and I agreed (though I'll likely spend it on food, don't tell). In spite of my having beat him out of the winnings, we are still friends.

So, shall I start my trade on the professional Poker circuit, using the winnings to pay off my student loans?? Probably not. I still can't remember what beats what and I still have a horrible Poker face (though confusion is apparently as good as any bluff).

Things are good

I am in a startlingly good mood today, and I am unsure of exactly why.

Part of it, I think, is that I am so excited about going to Project Horseshoe this weekend that I can barely stay in my seat nor stay focused on any one thing for too long of a time. I have a feeling that it will be something like a Game Design retreat, and I am oh-so-excited to see Insomniac Drew again. I was also delighted to see that James Ernest and Nick Fortungo will be attending, both of whom recently visited the ETC. Plus, I'll hopefully get to visit with Bryan Cash while in Austin!

My good mood could also be attributed to the fact that Resistance 2 is coming out, and though it probably marks me as an excitable young whelp in the industry, the launch of my first credited title does have me dancing and skipping and giggling in anticipation. First steps!

It could ALSO be attributed that my WoW friends have finally managed to do a full all-guild Karazhan run (with the addition of one helper), and will hopefully do another one this week. Granted, this was enabled partly from the nerfage, but it fills me with joy and love to be able to play the big instances with friends. I think I've given up on the notion that I am a casual WoW player, and will move it over into the "hobby" category. It is just such a fantastic means for me to nurture my friendships with those people I love who are far away from me!

Perhaps it is the weather. Who can say!

Elections and such

So, the presidential election is all fine and well, but I always feel it is important to be informed for the smaller, regional/local elections that happen as well. This year is particularly difficult, because while I am now a Pennsylvania resident, my heart is still in Kentucky, and so it's tough to turn my gaze to this state instead of the one I'm interested in. Sites like this and this are handy for finding out who these people even are and what their schtick is, but any research tips are certainly welcome.

SCIENCE

Here are two pieces of technology that I think are fancy and magic. This touch-screen foil product is a transparent foil that you can apply to the back of a window and then plug into a CPU. Put a rear-projection or LCD monitor behind the window and ta-da! Insta-touchscreen! Heliodisplay is even more magical. It uses compressed air to create a projection surface and infrared to detect if you are touching the display. Check out the free-space interaction video. MAGIC.

Halloween Studio Crawl

Last night was prowling about in the local Goodwill trying to figure out a costume for tonight's Studio Crawl. I have been mildly depressed lately that I haven't really built a good Halloween costume in ages, and was poking about the aisles hoping to be inspired. I began thinking about props I could use, and my bright green parasol came to mind. It was bright green, it was Asian in design, and suddenly...that was it! I would go as an Eastern dragon and tote along my parasol! I was quickly galvanized to scour the Goodwill for any bright green article of clothing I could find. I put together the costume last night and the headpiece this morning. For the headpiece, I used a ball cap and created a dragon face on top with foam and feathers and the like. The bill acted as the dragon's snout, and I was quite pleased with the whole outfit! I even made three-claw gloves out of some purple mittens (it was nice to fire up the sewing machine again). Pictures to come soon, I'm sure. Anyway, I joined up with Edmundo, Carlos, and Rich, and we invaded Schell Games as the League of Awesome. Rich had put together a fantastic steam punk time travel monster-hunter get-up, with a brass-plated gauntlet, a steam-powered shot gun, and other such fun gadgetry. Carlos was a mime, and Edmundo was a classic Frankenstein monster. The details in their costumes was delightful, and the Studio Crawl was great fun. There were other such fun costumes from other IGDA members at the Crawl: Beast in scientist garb, Michael Cera's character from Juno, a Tonks and Lupin duo, and a FANTASTIC Phoenix Wright getup (the guy just modeled his hair out of flat fun-foam, it looked great!). All in all, a great night, and a refreshing one at that. Having a venue to go all costumed up is just the spark I needed after several years of dull or effortless costuming on my part. I feel very much in the Halloween spirit.

Clean clean clean

So, remember back when I said I was going to get rid of something every weekend? Yeah, that didn't happen. I should have known the hectic ETC schedule would get in the way. BUT, I have been making some progress. I disassembled my desk and moved it to the basement, and yesterday I did a massive room-cleaning spree. After 4 bags of trash and 1 bag destined for the Goodwill, I am feeling lighter already. Among purged items include 2 old motherboards, a pair of snowboots that I never ever wear, even when it snows, various trinkets that didn't live up to the sentimentality test, and the like. Next on the cleaning agenda: THE CAR (horrors)

The Wedding

Let me tell you my favorite thing about Kyle. Kyle is a good and clever friend, and it was always great to hang out with him at Basketball (or drag him into Game Jams), but there was always one thing that stood out to me about him.

If Kyle was over and we were playing games or watching cartoons or whatever, sometimes he would get phone calls. You could always tell when it was Angel on the phone.

You see, when he answered the phone to Angel, there would be a sudden, overflowing explosion of love radiating from the entire being that was Kyle. It happened as soon as he said "hello," and would continue to pulse and consume him and anyone lucky enough to be in the same room. This was great, because you would get a wash of residual love, because clearly there was SO much love that it simply could not all fit inside of Kyle, so it would overflow and fill the room and touch anyone that happened to be nearby and stir their hearts. This is the best thing about Kyle.

So, I was honored and excited and pleased to be present at Kyle and Angel's wedding. The whole feeling of the weekend was of intimacy and love, and all of the lucky guests got to absorb a part of that.

I mean, seriously, check out this series of images when Kyle and Angel first see one another on their wedding day. Can you not feel it?

So good! I am so happy and so excited for Kyle and Angel and the rest of their life together. I foresee many good things, and hopefully their infectious orb of love will follow them wherever they go and touch anyone they meet.

Ian is getting his degree in Marine Biology

Ian: "I saw a manatee once, but I thought it was a shark so I ran away." Kyle: "How old were you?" Ian: "It was a couple of years ago."

Of illness, WoW, and weddings...

Project work at the ETC has been advancing at a steady yet exciting pace. I am finding myself facing a HUGE game design challenging: designing an interactive gameplay experience that can sustain an opt-in audience for 3 hours. Eek! Challenging, yes, but I can do it! If you're curious about my project this semester, you can read up about it here: http://etc.cmu.edu/projects/getinline

Progress has been impeded slightly by a few days of illness on my part. It's been a strange sickness, with fever dreams and dizziness. It's like having the feeling of having slept on a boat, and getting that leftover dizzy off-balance feeling even while awake. Bleh. I have been dutifully sent home and to bed day after day by my producer, advisors, and professors. I am TERRIBLE at being sick. I feel so guilty that I can't be contributing! It's a silly thing, I know, and logic brain knows...it's emotional brain's fault.

WoW has become much more exciting of a hobby since I nosed my Insomniacs into transferring their mains to my realm, and since some other ETC guildies were able to transfer their mains (the PvE -> PvP transfer enable was the best ever!). We are preparing for a guild Karazhan run, which will be the most fun ever! It's almost like we're a real guild, albeit a casual and super low-key one.

 I am hoping my sickness subsides soon, for Kyle and Angel's wedding is but a week away! How exciting!! It'll be nice to spend time with the ballers on this happy occasion. I miss them terribly!

Oy

I'm going to get in trouble for this, I just know it. I'm going to regret it! But http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8uGenNjOAI Now now now, before people get all in a defensive hissy or go on a Palin-bashing-fest. My conflicted amusement and deep sadness over this has not so much to do with the Republican party, but with people in general (for this certainly happens all over, not even just in politics, but ALL OVER. This is just what people DO. It is the natural way of humans). Sometimes, I hate everyone. Then I remember to stop paying attention and it goes away after awhile.

Ponder time

Interesting... Why Strong Female Characters are Bad for Women Thoughts?

Purge Log: Week 1

The best way to stick to a goal is to keep people posted on it!

Today I got rid of my printer. My poor old laser printer kept me running all through undergrad, and even when it started gobbling paper and getting jammed such that I had to feed paper through it one sheet at a time, I still held onto it. 8 years in the running isn't bad for a piece of technology these days, and the poor thing was in dire need of retirement. May its recycled parts rest in peace.

I also donated a way a large stack of books, including (though there was much inner debate about this) my Dragonlance novels. I'd given them a read-through last spring, and found that I'd outgrown them, which made me quite sad. Hopefully some youth will pick them up and enjoy them as much as I did when I was young.

Back in Pittsburgh

My first thought as I unpacked my Corolla's-worth of belongings from the summer and piled them into the middle of my room, looking over all the stuff I'd left behind and done perfectly well without, was this: "I own too much stuff."

In the past few years, I've often made notes about the purging of stuff, how I'd like to own less, how I need to get rid of things I don't use, and the like. But this being my final year of school, I've decided that I need to take action in order to rid myself of excess belongings.

My goal this year is to get rid of at least one thing each weekend, be it big or small, thrown away or donated, or whatever. Some things will be easy (my old desk, for example, will be easy to disassemble, set out in a box on my porch and say to craigslist, "Free desk, first pickup gets it." Other things, however, will prove tricky to get rid of.

I have, for example, a large number of art supplies crated up in the basement. This is everything from oil paints to casting materials for mask-making. Part of me wants to keep it, as art supplies are an expensive start-up and generally last pretty long. But another part of me looks at the last time I was able to devote time to an art project (in undergrad, really) and thinks that perhaps it would do better as a donation to someone who has chosen an artsier path in life.

I've gotten better about detaching myself from sentimental belongings, and before the summer I did manage to gather up a good number of old stuffed animals for donation. But I have, for example, a dresser given to me when I was young and a couch that once belonged to Nancy. These things, I suppose, I should hang onto. My bed, however, I could probably do away with, having found that I can sleep perfectly well on a Japanese-style futon. And let's not even get into my kitchen stuff, yeesh!

If anyone has tips or advice for getting rid of belongings, please share!

You insult D&D, you insult me.

I yoinked this from Ursula's blog. Normally I don't put a toe in the waters of political conversation, but this just weirded me out.

What a weird choice for the McCain campaign to insult gamers in this way...

I don't think I've ever been so personally affronted by a politician before! This was probably a big mistake on his part.

House Cats

Hey, you guys remember that post I made awhile back about the animated short on Nickelodeon, identified by Steph to be "House Cats" by Peg McClure? Well I found it! Watch and enjoy.

(Edit: This clip has the beginning missing, but better than nothing)

Fun Facts

Did you know that I have had illustrations published in two places?

The first is in Brendan Adkins' fine collection of short stories, Ommatidia. Even if you haven't been following his 101-word short story project at Anacrusis, I highly recommend this book as a fun and swift read, full of variety and intrigue. Seeing the stories in print adds a sort of magical quality to them, and if you are looking about for a new book to purchase, I'd suggest you give it a chance.

The second is as card art for Jesse Schell's Deck of Lenses, a compliment to his book, The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses. I illustrated one of the lens cards in the deck. The book and the deck are both fantastic tools for the aspiring game designer, or really a designer of any sort. Perhaps you should investigate!

Thoughtful

Sigh.

I'm sitting here for my last night in Burbank, feeling thoughtful and reflecting on the summer. I have overcome fears, tried new adventures, gained confidence, and grown as a person all in one summer. I suppose that's what summer excursions are all about.

Still, the time has flown, but I guess that's just the nature of time. I've established bonds with new people that will be nourished into strong friendships, and oh how I will miss those people. I feel changed, like I have stepped into something new that is good and exciting.

I'm not sure why I feel so wistful, but it's probably just the side effect from things changing again. Tomorrow morning I'll set off to drive back across the country. I am looking forward to recharging with friends and family (and food) in Louisville, before trekking up to Pittsburgh to start the new semester's work.

I will miss my luxurious weekends of sleep and WoW. I will miss my wonderful designer friends. I will miss my roommate's cat.

More adventures to come, as always.

End-o-summer

This is an abridged cross-post of one of my mailing list postings. Hope the repeats don't mind!

So, last Friday was my last day at Insomniac, and there were many tears upon my departure (mostly shed by me, of course). Before we left, Ted took the interns to lunch as a farewell and so we could ask him any lingering questions. One thing he asked each of us was, "What is the biggest thing you'll be taking back with you from your summer at Insomniac?"


For me, the answer is confidence. I am SO much more confident in my abilities as a designer than I was when I first decided to go the game design track. I know I can do this, and I know that making games is the thing I want to do. I also feel like I have a better understanding of the scope of my talents and how much of an asset I am to other people. It's always been something I've had a hard time recognizing in myself.

I can't wait until the game comes out this fall! I was talking with Drew about how I'd be curious to see how much of the level would be recognizable to me in the end (after all, there is much iteration to be done on the work I've done, and I spent the last week passing off my work to another designer to take over after I left). Drew smiled at me and said that the whole thing would probably be quite recognizable :)

I also learned that I will get a free copy of the game when it ships! Sweet! If only they'd give me a free PS3, ha ha ha. I'm definitely going to have to drop the money to buy a PS3. I mean, I'm not only excited to just see my level, but I'm excited about the game as a whole! It's going to be so much fun!

Sigh, I'll miss my designers, and I'll miss Insomniac, but this was a summer well-spent, for sure! One fun thing: Insomniac's community person interviewed me about my internship to post on their news blog. You can check it out here:

http://insomniacgames.com/news/news.php


I'm still in LA at the moment, spending the week at SIGGRAPH. There's a lot of ETC people around, and it's been pretty casual. It's a nice, relaxing way to close out my time in California.

Wish me safe travels on my cross-country drive at the end of the week!

End-o-summer

This is an abridged cross-post of one of my mailing list postings. Hope the repeats don't mind!

So, last Friday was my last day at Insomniac, and there were many tears upon my departure (mostly shed by me, of course). Before we left, Ted took the interns to lunch as a farewell and so we could ask him any lingering questions. One thing he asked each of us was, "What is the biggest thing you'll be taking back with you from your summer at Insomniac?"


For me, the answer is confidence. I am SO much more confident in my abilities as a designer than I was when I first decided to go the game design track. I know I can do this, and I know that making games is the thing I want to do. I also feel like I have a better understanding of the scope of my talents and how much of an asset I am to other people. It's always been something I've had a hard time recognizing in myself.

I can't wait until the game comes out this fall! I was talking with Drew about how I'd be curious to see how much of the level would be recognizable to me in the end (after all, there is much iteration to be done on the work I've done, and I spent the last week passing off my work to another designer to take over after I left). Drew smiled at me and said that the whole thing would probably be quite recognizable :)

I also learned that I will get a free copy of the game when it ships! Sweet! If only they'd give me a free PS3, ha ha ha. I'm definitely going to have to drop the money to buy a PS3. I mean, I'm not only excited to just see my level, but I'm excited about the game as a whole! It's going to be so much fun!

Sigh, I'll miss my designers, and I'll miss Insomniac, but this was a summer well-spent, for sure! One fun thing: Insomniac's community person interviewed me about my internship to post on their news blog. You can check it out here:

http://insomniacgames.com/news/news.php


I'm still in LA at the moment, spending the week at SIGGRAPH. There's a lot of ETC people around, and it's been pretty casual. It's a nice, relaxing way to close out my time in California.

Wish me safe travels on my cross-country drive at the end of the week!

Even more summer time quotage

Josh: "Do they teach you about dual harmonics at the ETC?"

Lisa: "Um, can you give me a context?"

Josh: "Well, it's like a harmonic, but there are two of them."

Even more summer time quotage

Josh: "Do they teach you about dual harmonics at the ETC?"

Lisa: "Um, can you give me a context?"

Josh: "Well, it's like a harmonic, but there are two of them."

Monster Comics

The last bit of this story arc, hooray!

Titanosaurus Visits Monster Island

Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7

Another fun quote

Cheng: "That zone has, like, 5 people working in it."

Josh: "That's hyperbole, it's really only like 4."

Resistance Trailer

Yesterday at work, we all crowded into the conference room to watch the Sony bit at E3 to see them show the Resistance 2 trailer. It was very exciting!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=dIfX1tIut2M

The best thing about this was being able to see a vertical slice of how awesome this game is going to be, it made me very excited to get back to work. I'm going to have to get a PS3 when this is all over with, so I can get the game and show it to people and say "hey, hey, see that setup? That one there? That's mine!"

Best internship ever.

Mooore

I'm unstoppable!

Titanosaurus Visits Monster Island, Part 3

More monsters

This was going to be a 2-part story, then it turned into a 4-part, but it may end up being longer still..

Titanosaurus Visits Monster Island, Part 2

More Monster Comics

So the giant monster comic thing apparently triggered something in me. The ideas were pouring out of my brain so quickly that I had to run around with a bucket to catch them all. It's fun to feel this way, I haven't been on this much of a drawing frenzy in a long time!

T-saur Visits Monster Island, Part 1

Expect more to come.

And another amusing quote:

Colin: "In Fish Hell, I take care of you. In Fish Heaven, Lisa takes care of you."

Quotes!

Some amusing summer time quotes...

Josh: "What do your parents do? Wait wait, I know...your dad is an engineer and your mom is a professor."

Lisa: "No..."

Josh (ponders): "Okay, your dad breeds and raises unicorns and your mom teaches them to read..."

-----

Gabe: "Don't you sass me!"

Lisa: "I'll a-sass-inate you!"

----

Jesse: "pinky swear NDA!"

----

Chocula, from 2 bays over: "DAMMIT LisaTheIntern!"

Lisa: "I'm sorry!!"

Chocula: "......don't apologize for killing people!!!"

Mon-stars!

Recently a friend and I were discussing old school giant monster movies, and how we were both fond of them as children. I was a big fan of Godzilla and Co. Having forgotten the name of my favorite monster (though I remembered him quite fondly), I did a bit of internetting and figured out his name. Can you guess who?



Titanosaurus!





I loved this guy, and I always felt terribly sorry for him. He was a shy aquatic monster, minding his own business, and he kept getting mind-controlled! In fact, his movie represents the very thing I disliked about giant monster movies, in spite of loving the monsters. I was always frustrated that the monsters were always fightin each other. I wanted them to make friends, and then go cause mischief. This was never the case.

Titanosaurus had a particularly bad case. I was absolutely convinced that the humans in the movie and Godzilla were going to try and help T-saur out, by getting rid of the stupid mad scientist that was mind controlling him. I was CERTAIN that the giant sonic ray the humans built were going to disrupt the mind control waves, and T-saur would be free.

But no. They just used it to weaken him enough so Godzilla could kick his ass. What jerks! And Godzilla, come on, what an ass-face thing to do! The whole matter soured my relationship with Godzilla. Giant monsters should stick up for one another. They may as well have MCed poor T-saur off a cliff. Jerks.

Anyway, it was the point where I gave up hope that a monster movie would ever turn out the way I wanted, so I gave up on them. Still adored the monsters, though!

Have some more old monster movie silliness...

Gamera vs. Guiron, Redux

Insomniatmosphere

Insomniac is a very pleasant place to work as far as team atmosphere goes. I love Fridays, because on Fridays lunch is brought in, and everyone eats together. I know many companies do stuff like this, but often times it's just sort of "oh yay, free food," grab your stuff and go.

Here, it is like a family reunion, as everyone quite playfully grabs their food and perches on every available surface to eat together. Warm little pods form as people pile onto couches and overflow to sit on the floor, gathered together to chat and eat.

I've been trying to nose out different pods each Friday so I can get to know the whole company, and I'm always welcomed in without hesitation (in spite of the fact that I can't remember names for crap let alone whether someone is an artist or programmer or designer or what).

It's an extraordinary compliment to the hard-working nature everyone here has exhibited so far. It has a very "work hard, play hard" sort of feel, and I am every so grateful to feel so at home. What a fantastic internship!

Last minute adventures

Last minute plans always have a fun sort of edge to them, and last night was no exception. Graham had only just remembered that I was in LA for the summer yesterday and dropped an email inviting me to a show they were playing last night in Hollywood.

You all must by now know my adoration for Bryan Scary and the Shredding Tears, so of course I planned to go, and attempted to wrangle any other last-minute adventurers I could. Happily, Josh agreed to go with enthusiasm (he did a small bit of modeling on the music video, and claims to have had Imitation of the Sky stuck in his head ever since).

So we ventured down to Hollywood and managed in to see the Tears. They were fantastic, as always, and the sound system was great! (By that I mean you could actually hear Scary above the instruments)

Afterwards I got to chat with Graham for a good while, which was nice. Graham is one of those people who I'd love to be better friends with, but I only get to see and talk with him every now and again. He and Scary are going to be in town recording for a bit, so we resolved to get together for some quality hang-out time.

Hooray for being social on a Wednesday night!

LA Week 1 = success!

Well, my first week in Burbank has wound to a close, and I'd consider it a success so far.

Insomniac is great. It's a very busy time there, so it's going to be challenging but fun. My supervisor and mentor are very kind, and the whole team is very friendly. Due to the NDA, I can't talk about what I'm doing. But since it's been announced, I CAN say I'm working on Resistance 2, and I can say that this summer is going to be awesome fun and learning.

Meanwhile, I've been being social as well. My roommates, found randomly through craigslist, are very cool. One of them has a cat, which will make my summer all the better!

There are also lots of ETC alums and ETC first-years doing internships in town, so plenty of people to hang out with. On Friday, the alums took the first-years to Santa Monica for a welcoming of sorts. There was dinner and bowling. Photos follow...

http://picasaweb.google.com/wertle.dragon/SantaMonica

There's also been Rock Band with Rob and Evan, and exploring adventures and bike rides. So far so good!

*Yawn*

I am now bedding down a mere 2 hours out of LA. Tomorrow will bring me to Burbank and the beginning of the summer festivities, and for now I'm trying desperately to stay awake and adjust to the new time zone. It's difficult work.

Staying in hotels always brings out the weirdest of dreams. I learned a long while ago that, when explaining dreams, they are never as exciting to your audience as to you, so I will try and keep this brief.

Predictably, the dreams were smattered with ETCers. There were zombie monsters in something that felt like a play that turned into a reality. There was a secret Disney lab which we invaded. There was a swimming pool with layers, and a picnic table amidst a battlefield.

Everyone was wearing the most ridiculous outfits...Andy was a ghost. Brian Evans was dressed very much like Rambo with the exception of a collared, button-down shirt beneath his ammunition harness. Jesse wore two pairs of engineering goggles, one over his eyes and one propped on his forehead, along with a lab coat and a pair of dish gloves that we were all supposed to believe were official science gloves. We were searching for Bryan Cash, who may or may not have been turned into a zombie monster.

There was much activity. Betsy McIver stabbed a zombie monster in the eye with a screwdriver. Vimal kept bounding in and out of existence with tutorial-like advice. There was a faculty decree that banned all animal migrations, with the exception of migratory fish.

I was FURIOUS about this, and put up a rebellious protest.

Certainly, I am purging some weird stuff from the school year...

Adventure!

Well, it's the second night of my cross-country drive on the way to my summer internship in LA. So far so good!

I've been trying to keep a frequently-updated Twitter log of my adventures, for anyone interested in micro-updates.

Thus far, my father and I have finished the first two Harry Potter audio-books, and it appears we'll finish off our trip with the third. My dad really enjoys them, which pleases me, because I figured he would. I also knew I'd never get him to read the books merely by suggesting it; I had to trick him by trapping him in a car and forcing him to listen to the story. It's all worked out, though, as he claims he'll be excited to read the rest of the series upon returning home.

I realized, in listening to the stories, how the releases of the Harry Potter books are convenient landmarks in my own timeline, as I associate them with specific points in my life. It was an interesting thought, and at some point I might make a media-referential timeline of life events, relating significant moments to particularly memorable media for me at the time. May be a fun experiment.

At any rate, the drive continues tomorrow. I should be in Burbank by Sunday with no problems, if all continues well!

Spring Semester Photo Journal - Abridged!

I posted about the fancy camera I got for Christmas, and I do enjoy using it! However, I'm really bad about sorting through and posting photos after I take them. So, every now and then, I dump all the photos off my camera to clean them up.

Here are a few shots from this semester's photo dump. Take a look, you might be in there!

http://picasaweb.google.com/wertle.dragon/PhotoDumpSpring08

Bandology

This is cross-posted to my Mailing List. I normally reserve these longer, more in-depth updates to my mailing list, so if you feel like you've been missing out, please feel free to join!


Wow, I can't believe it's taken the entire semester before I ever wrote an update about Bandology! That's how things go, though, I suppose. A little background first: At the ETC, each semester you do a project course, which means you are put on a project with a team of people and that's what you work on for the entire semester. Some projects are client-based, meaning the ETC is building something for some outside organization. Others are student-pitched, which is basically the students saying “Hey, we want to make this!” and then doing it.

At the end of the Fall semester, my friend and head TA approached me about joining his team for Bandology, a continuation of a student-pitched project from the spring before. I was delighted! Here is a picture of my AWESOME team...Andy, Joe, Edmundo, me and Carlos.

http://tinyurl.com/5zqnp7

Bandology is a massively multiplayer online casual game about being in bands built by my team. We spent all semester setting up the technical foundation and pipeline, and iterating on designing the core game. The big experimental gameplay mechanic we were exploring this semester was the idea of Asynchronous Cooperative Gameplay.

It sounds fancy, but the idea is very simple. We wanted to make an online game where you play in a group, and where everyone feels like they're helping the team, but where people aren't playing the actual game at the same time. This spawned from our own experiences as busy graduate students. We all love games, and we love online games that you play with friends, but doing something together in World of Warcraft requires a lot of juggling of everyone's schedules. Our goal was to make a casual game that people could play on their own time, but still feel like they were contributing to the gameplay of their teammates.

After a semester of vast gameplay iterations and design work, I think our experiment is a success! Our biggest challenge has been explaining this Asynchronous Cooperative Gameplay idea to other people, for as Jesse pointed out midway through the semester, explaining experimental gameplay ideas is HARD.

I could explain more about how our game works, but it'd be easier if you just signed up for playtesting :) The game itself is a casual puzzle game, so don't be scared to give it a shot. Our beta test is coming up, so we'll need playtesters!

So, that's what I've been doing all semester, and it has been a joy, mostly due to my AWESOME teammates. I have been spoiled rotten by having such a wonderful team. We worked really well together as a creative entity, and I will miss my teammates terribly. As far as what I've done on the game itself beyond design, I did a lot of programming on the character system (loading characters, controlling animation, building the customizer, etc.)

A shout out to Dr. Shannon and the Centre CS department: one fantastic thing about working on this project was how well-designed the foundation of the game was. There are 3 programmers on my team: me, Carlos (who did all the gameplay programming) and Edmundo (who did all the web backend programming), and from the beginning we made sure to set up the system in a totally modular way. It made things a joy to work with, as we could each code away without getting in each other's way. Beyond that, this was an invaluable experience in design iteration and playtesting; a semester well-spent!

But, as things often happen at the ETC, the work is not yet done. Our goal with Bandology was to get 100% of the very basics complete, which we did! But an MMO has many features, and there is much to be developed. Our next milestone is to submit Bandology to the Independent Games Festival, around October. Weee!

Stay tuned for another big update about Game Design class. In the meantime, I am preparing for my summer internship at Insomniac!

Animation

Hey Internet, I wanted to show off some of my classmates' work, and get you guys to give them some feedback.

This student group worked this semester to create a 4 minute animation addressing issues that come up in working in cross-cultural environments. In particular, it talks about language barriers. It's done in a "Creature Comforts" documentary/interview sort of style..

Please watch it and fill our their survey so they can polish it off...

http://www.etc.cmu.edu/projects/cultural/finalCut.html

I'm very proud of them, I know they worked their asses off to put together this animation in such a short time, and I think they did a great job!

A Sad Day for Tears

I know that I don't have as much pull as some when it comes to asking for financial help from the internets, but my friends are in a pretty dire situation and I am asking for help for them.

Bryan Scary and the Shredding Tears, a fantastic band and great group of people, were on tour on the west coast when their van and trailer were stolen (including all of their musical instruments and equipment). They are now stuck in LA, and are trying to get home. This is a particularly devastating setback for them, as things were starting to seriously look up with the release of their second album, and it pains me to see such sucky stuff happen to such wonderful people.

If any of you internet folk have money to spare for helping people out, and would like to donate some dollars on my behalf, that would be considerably awesome. There is a paypal donation button on their myspace page:

http://www.myspace.com/bryanscary

The saddest part of this story, to me, is that poor Bauer lost his 42 year old drum set that belonged to his grandfather. Alas, sentiment cannot be replaced, but some spare bucks can at least get them back home!

WoW Geekery

For a long while, I've had my eye on a hawkstrider mount for my mage in WoW. The pink and purple plumage on the silly chocobo things would match my troll's hair so well! Well, after much effort, I finally obtained my oversized chicken.

But, something peculiar happened along the way. Somehow, I managed to get good at PvP. Go figure?

WoW Geekery

For a long while, I've had my eye on a hawkstrider mount for my mage in WoW. The pink and purple plumage on the silly chocobo things would match my troll's hair so well! Well, after much effort, I finally obtained my oversized chicken.

But, something peculiar happened along the way. Somehow, I managed to get good at PvP. Go figure?

Mute Math - Typical

I really like this video a lot.

Mute Math - Typical

I really like this video a lot.

Insomniac! (double meaning!)

I signed the offer and faxed it away on Monday, so it's official: I'll be spending this summer at Insomniac Games as a game design intern.

I am EXTREMELY excited about this internship! Insomniac has always held a special place in my heart, as it was Spyro the Dragon which nudged me back into console game obsession in high school (my Playstation was my very first console which I purchased with my own money, aww). The Ratchet and Clank series has also captured my imagination, and I'm always a little wistful that I never have time to devote to any of those games like I was able to with Spyro.

Anyway, this will definitely be a big exciting adventure of a summer, and I'm looking forward to it! If anyone has tips on finding temporary living quarters in LA, I'm all ears.

On the topic of insomnia, I seem to be suffering from it. I've had trouble sleeping as of late, which I've blamed on a number of things (mostly the weather) and I've tried to alleviate it through a number of means. I rearranged my room (moving my bed has always helped sleeping issues in the past) but to no avail. I even tried sleeping on the couch, remembering the time that Scott mysteriously couldn't sleep in his own bed, and so slumbered on the couch for a long while. Today, I didn't even take any afternoon naps!

I'm not sure what the deal is. Perhaps I am nervous about this summer? Perhaps I am merely stressed out from project work? Perhaps it truly is the weather? Hmph, I just wish it would right itself!

I did make myself useful in these past wee hours by cleaning and purging my belongings. I'm hoping to get rid of a good deal of "stuff" so I won't have to deal with dragging it to California and back. I did wind up with about four bags of Goodwill fodder, so that's a start.

As long as I'm seeking advice, if anyone has insomnia cures or tips, I am listening!

Insomniac! (double meaning!)

I signed the offer and faxed it away on Monday, so it's official: I'll be spending this summer at Insomniac Games as a game design intern.

I am EXTREMELY excited about this internship! Insomniac has always held a special place in my heart, as it was Spyro the Dragon which nudged me back into console game obsession in high school (my Playstation was my very first console which I purchased with my own money, aww). The Ratchet and Clank series has also captured my imagination, and I'm always a little wistful that I never have time to devote to any of those games like I was able to with Spyro.

Anyway, this will definitely be a big exciting adventure of a summer, and I'm looking forward to it! If anyone has tips on finding temporary living quarters in LA, I'm all ears.

On the topic of insomnia, I seem to be suffering from it. I've had trouble sleeping as of late, which I've blamed on a number of things (mostly the weather) and I've tried to alleviate it through a number of means. I rearranged my room (moving my bed has always helped sleeping issues in the past) but to no avail. I even tried sleeping on the couch, remembering the time that Scott mysteriously couldn't sleep in his own bed, and so slumbered on the couch for a long while. Today, I didn't even take any afternoon naps!

I'm not sure what the deal is. Perhaps I am nervous about this summer? Perhaps I am merely stressed out from project work? Perhaps it truly is the weather? Hmph, I just wish it would right itself!

I did make myself useful in these past wee hours by cleaning and purging my belongings. I'm hoping to get rid of a good deal of "stuff" so I won't have to deal with dragging it to California and back. I did wind up with about four bags of Goodwill fodder, so that's a start.

As long as I'm seeking advice, if anyone has insomnia cures or tips, I am listening!

My Little Dreadsteed

(x-posted to )

A billion years ago, someone posted a picture of My Little Dreadsteed, and I thought "that's awesome! I want to make one of those for my warlock friend!" and everyone said "You should!" and I said "Okay!"

I actually finished most of this a long time ago, and then it came to rooting the mane...zomg, I don't see how those MLP customizers do this on a regular basis!! Anyway, it's done, and my friend squealed in delight upon giving it to him...

My Little Dreadsteed

(x-posted to )

A billion years ago, someone posted a picture of My Little Dreadsteed, and I thought "that's awesome! I want to make one of those for my warlock friend!" and everyone said "You should!" and I said "Okay!"

I actually finished most of this a long time ago, and then it came to rooting the mane...zomg, I don't see how those MLP customizers do this on a regular basis!! Anyway, it's done, and my friend squealed in delight upon giving it to him...

Spring Break (woo)

Back in the Bandology office after Spring Break. It wasn't particularly much of a break, but that's okay. Several things of note happened...

1) Will and I made amazing headway in the Bryan Scary project. I'm very happy with where we stand right now, and I know we can finish the video in time for their album release. I KNOW we can! It's just going to take continued and consistent work.

2) I started playing Urban Dead again. I'd played often when Kevan first came up with this gem, and had great fun, and then just sort of fell out of the loop. It's a good time to start playing again, for the zombies have more of an upper hand than they ever have! It makes playing a survivor rather exciting. I have a zombie character as well, in the temporary Monroeville map, but being a low-level zombie is not much fun. I only managed to find a horde once, and the rest of the time it's been shambling around alone, getting knocked down by survivors left and right. I enjoy playing the survivor much more.

3) I picked up one of my WoW alts, a hunter, and decided that I want to learn how to kite. Kiting is tricky business, and difficult to do well, and I want to be able to do it! There was also more WoWing in general during spring break: an instance here, a battleground there, a round of WoW-and-go-Seek to top it off...Good fun times

Now, though, it's back to work! We're at the halfway point with Bandology this semester, and there's still so much left to do!

Spring Break (woo)

Back in the Bandology office after Spring Break. It wasn't particularly much of a break, but that's okay. Several things of note happened...

1) Will and I made amazing headway in the Bryan Scary project. I'm very happy with where we stand right now, and I know we can finish the video in time for their album release. I KNOW we can! It's just going to take continued and consistent work.

2) I started playing Urban Dead again. I'd played often when Kevan first came up with this gem, and had great fun, and then just sort of fell out of the loop. It's a good time to start playing again, for the zombies have more of an upper hand than they ever have! It makes playing a survivor rather exciting. I have a zombie character as well, in the temporary Monroeville map, but being a low-level zombie is not much fun. I only managed to find a horde once, and the rest of the time it's been shambling around alone, getting knocked down by survivors left and right. I enjoy playing the survivor much more.

3) I picked up one of my WoW alts, a hunter, and decided that I want to learn how to kite. Kiting is tricky business, and difficult to do well, and I want to be able to do it! There was also more WoWing in general during spring break: an instance here, a battleground there, a round of WoW-and-go-Seek to top it off...Good fun times

Now, though, it's back to work! We're at the halfway point with Bandology this semester, and there's still so much left to do!

Wanted: Cloud-drawer

Attention internet!

The Shredding Tears music video project is in dire need of a member with the following credentials:

1) Has Flash
2) Can draw clouds

A number of our aeronautic scenes are sitting one step away from "done" due to the fact that we need convincing clouds in the sky. Our lead artist, Will "I can draw clouds" White is too busy cranking away the animation work to render us out some good Flash clouds.

If you have the above credentials, and the thought of sitting and drawing a bunch of cloud formations per our specifications makes you say "huzzah, that sounds like fun!" or "you know, I need more clouds for my portfolio anyway..." please reply!

I can't offer anything in terms of payment, except that you'll be credited on the video. Reply if interested!

Wanted: Cloud-drawer

Attention internet!

The Shredding Tears music video project is in dire need of a member with the following credentials:

1) Has Flash
2) Can draw clouds

A number of our aeronautic scenes are sitting one step away from "done" due to the fact that we need convincing clouds in the sky. Our lead artist, Will "I can draw clouds" White is too busy cranking away the animation work to render us out some good Flash clouds.

If you have the above credentials, and the thought of sitting and drawing a bunch of cloud formations per our specifications makes you say "huzzah, that sounds like fun!" or "you know, I need more clouds for my portfolio anyway..." please reply!

I can't offer anything in terms of payment, except that you'll be credited on the video. Reply if interested!

GDC Summary

So at the end of the day, I went to Ubisoft to meet up with my mentor for the last time. Joe came along too, such that I wouldn't have to walk by myself.

The greatest thing about winning this scholarship was definitely the mentor program. Chris is such a nice guy, with lots of industry experience, and is completely devoted to helping young people coming into the industry from an education route. I'm certain he's a person I will keep in touch with! Joe and I thought it would be awesome if IGDA had a mentoring program beyond the GDC scholarship, because it's such an incredibly helpful opportunity to have a mentor; someone with much more experience than you that you don't have to worry about impressing, but instead are able to ask questions and come to with stories and concerns.

The first thing I'm doing when I get home is writing my mentor a nice little thank-you card. I imagine that Chris would be the sort of person who would love to bring Ubisoft to the ETC in a similar way that many other game companies do, though his schedule as a producer is so busy that this might not be a possibility. Even still, I feel very grateful that I have this awesome person to go to for advice and help whenever I need it.

It seems Andy wasn't the only one to catch a cold at the IGDA party. We're sitting in the airport and the Schell Games crew showed up, towing a few sniffling, coughing, sore-throated members of their own. We're all on the same red-eye flight back to Pittsburgh, so that's pretty cool.

In closing, I'm really glad I had the opportunity to come to GDC. It was exhausting, yes, but a fantastic and worthwhile experience that I will not take for granted!

GDC Summary

So at the end of the day, I went to Ubisoft to meet up with my mentor for the last time. Joe came along too, such that I wouldn't have to walk by myself.

The greatest thing about winning this scholarship was definitely the mentor program. Chris is such a nice guy, with lots of industry experience, and is completely devoted to helping young people coming into the industry from an education route. I'm certain he's a person I will keep in touch with! Joe and I thought it would be awesome if IGDA had a mentoring program beyond the GDC scholarship, because it's such an incredibly helpful opportunity to have a mentor; someone with much more experience than you that you don't have to worry about impressing, but instead are able to ask questions and come to with stories and concerns.

The first thing I'm doing when I get home is writing my mentor a nice little thank-you card. I imagine that Chris would be the sort of person who would love to bring Ubisoft to the ETC in a similar way that many other game companies do, though his schedule as a producer is so busy that this might not be a possibility. Even still, I feel very grateful that I have this awesome person to go to for advice and help whenever I need it.

It seems Andy wasn't the only one to catch a cold at the IGDA party. We're sitting in the airport and the Schell Games crew showed up, towing a few sniffling, coughing, sore-throated members of their own. We're all on the same red-eye flight back to Pittsburgh, so that's pretty cool.

In closing, I'm really glad I had the opportunity to come to GDC. It was exhausting, yes, but a fantastic and worthwhile experience that I will not take for granted!

GDC Thursday and Friday

So I fell behind on my daily updates, whoops! Thursday was largely uneventful. I worked the career floor and talked with a lot of different companies. I went to one panel about the Future of MMOs, but it grew so snippy and snarky that I decided to duck out early, especially after learning that Andy had met up with Bryan Cash on the expo floor. <3 Bryan Cash!

We had a lovely lunch, but the rest of the afternoon was lost to me. I had forgotten to take my medicine the day before, and so was quite exhausted and in a lot of pain by the afternoon. Andy, growing more and more ill by the day, was also ready to turn in, so we went back to the hotel and had a very restful evening.

Today was much better (and I kept my exhaustion in check with a Mt. Dew). I saw two very interesting talks: one about Entrepreneurship and Pandemic, and one which was an Expo of start-up companies (none of which were game companies, but which had some innovative tie to the game industry: patch clients that doubled as social networks, microtransaction management services for MMOs, and the like).

After lunch, we hit up the career floor to watch Andy impress the crowd with his Guitar Hero skills, and then the expo floor again to play some of the Independent Game Festival games. For now I'm relaxing and considering attending the Portal post-mortem. At 5 I'll be visiting my mentor at Ubisoft, and then the lot of us ETCers will be flying back to Pittsburgh on a red-eye.

All in all, I'm very glad I came to GDC. There was much to learn and many people to see, and I feel it was well worth it, and am thrilled to have won the scholarship. I am, however, exhausted to the core of my bones. So many people! I am drained and dry, but still excited to get back to the ETC and apply what I've learned to Bandology. I will, however, likely need a full day of sleep to catch my brain up, and another full day of emailing follow-ups to everyone I've met at the conference.

Hooray for GDC! Hooray for Lisa Brown: Game Designer!

GDC Thursday and Friday

So I fell behind on my daily updates, whoops! Thursday was largely uneventful. I worked the career floor and talked with a lot of different companies. I went to one panel about the Future of MMOs, but it grew so snippy and snarky that I decided to duck out early, especially after learning that Andy had met up with Bryan Cash on the expo floor. <3 Bryan Cash!

We had a lovely lunch, but the rest of the afternoon was lost to me. I had forgotten to take my medicine the day before, and so was quite exhausted and in a lot of pain by the afternoon. Andy, growing more and more ill by the day, was also ready to turn in, so we went back to the hotel and had a very restful evening.

Today was much better (and I kept my exhaustion in check with a Mt. Dew). I saw two very interesting talks: one about Entrepreneurship and Pandemic, and one which was an Expo of start-up companies (none of which were game companies, but which had some innovative tie to the game industry: patch clients that doubled as social networks, microtransaction management services for MMOs, and the like).

After lunch, we hit up the career floor to watch Andy impress the crowd with his Guitar Hero skills, and then the expo floor again to play some of the Independent Game Festival games. For now I'm relaxing and considering attending the Portal post-mortem. At 5 I'll be visiting my mentor at Ubisoft, and then the lot of us ETCers will be flying back to Pittsburgh on a red-eye.

All in all, I'm very glad I came to GDC. There was much to learn and many people to see, and I feel it was well worth it, and am thrilled to have won the scholarship. I am, however, exhausted to the core of my bones. So many people! I am drained and dry, but still excited to get back to the ETC and apply what I've learned to Bandology. I will, however, likely need a full day of sleep to catch my brain up, and another full day of emailing follow-ups to everyone I've met at the conference.

Hooray for GDC! Hooray for Lisa Brown: Game Designer!

GDC Wednesday Afternoon

So, we didn't make it to Ubisoft this afternoon, but that's okay. Instead, my mentor and I walked the Expo floor, and it was great fun times! There were some interesting setups, yes, but mostly we just had fantastic conversations about this and that and the other. My mentor is brilliantly easy to talk to.

We ran into Brenda, and I introduced the two, and we had an intriguing conversation about improv acting and its role in the industry (and in all industries! Everyone should take an improv class, in my opinion). We also had fun scoping out our favorites of the Independent Games Festival (go World of Goo and Polarity! Also? AudioSurf is FREAKIN AMAZING).

This evening I spent chillaxin with Andy (who is a bit sick, as are many people, I blame the IGDA party!). We watched Robot Chicken and MythBusters and a fantastic show about sea critters (if I see a cuttlefish on TV, I can't resist) and have a lovely time. We finished off the evening with a great Bandology meeting, and I'm excited about my return to school and the work I'll be doing.

Looking forward to another exciting day tomorrow!

GDC Wednesday Afternoon

So, we didn't make it to Ubisoft this afternoon, but that's okay. Instead, my mentor and I walked the Expo floor, and it was great fun times! There were some interesting setups, yes, but mostly we just had fantastic conversations about this and that and the other. My mentor is brilliantly easy to talk to.

We ran into Brenda, and I introduced the two, and we had an intriguing conversation about improv acting and its role in the industry (and in all industries! Everyone should take an improv class, in my opinion). We also had fun scoping out our favorites of the Independent Games Festival (go World of Goo and Polarity! Also? AudioSurf is FREAKIN AMAZING).

This evening I spent chillaxin with Andy (who is a bit sick, as are many people, I blame the IGDA party!). We watched Robot Chicken and MythBusters and a fantastic show about sea critters (if I see a cuttlefish on TV, I can't resist) and have a lovely time. We finished off the evening with a great Bandology meeting, and I'm excited about my return to school and the work I'll be doing.

Looking forward to another exciting day tomorrow!

I am a Game Designer

This morning at GDC, I made a career change.

Now, don't misunderstand, this wasn't an on-the-fly decision. It's something that's been bubbling and building for a couple of months now. Last night, Tracy and Andy tipped me over the edge by suggesting I would probably get the most out of a design internship this summer versus any other type.

This morning I went to talk about High Impact's production process, given by one of their lead designers. I had a moment of recognition that truly, I was sitting on the wrong side of the court. After the session, I plopped down, pulled out my laptop, nudged Jesse online and said "I think that maybe I should be looking for a design internship and not a production internship."

He responded, "I think you might be right." I could almost hear him smirking through the internet, the knowing smirk of someone who's known this about me for a good while, but was nudging and waiting for me to figure it out on my own.

Commitment! I spent the next couple of hours sitting on the floor of the convention center, frantically rewording my website and reworking my resume. Andy stopped by between sessions to sit with me and help revise my resume. Jesse stopped by to sit with me for support. A smattering of other ETCers stopped by to see what I was up to, and when I relayed my sudden career change, responded with, "Well, DUH!"

Why does everyone else figure these things out about me before I do?? Nevertheless, the changes were made, and I'm ready to hit the Career Expo tomorrow with my new goal. Huzzah!

Other highlights today included a big Bandology lunch (with past and present members alike), then a session given by Bungie on Matchmaking in Halo 3. It was extremely informative, though now I have Fiddler in the Roof stuck in my head.

Now I'm chillin and waiting for my my mentor, such that we can go adventure at Ubisoft. Huzzah!

I am a Game Designer

This morning at GDC, I made a career change.

Now, don't misunderstand, this wasn't an on-the-fly decision. It's something that's been bubbling and building for a couple of months now. Last night, Tracy and Andy tipped me over the edge by suggesting I would probably get the most out of a design internship this summer versus any other type.

This morning I went to talk about High Impact's production process, given by one of their lead designers. I had a moment of recognition that truly, I was sitting on the wrong side of the court. After the session, I plopped down, pulled out my laptop, nudged Jesse online and said "I think that maybe I should be looking for a design internship and not a production internship."

He responded, "I think you might be right." I could almost hear him smirking through the internet, the knowing smirk of someone who's known this about me for a good while, but was nudging and waiting for me to figure it out on my own.

Commitment! I spent the next couple of hours sitting on the floor of the convention center, frantically rewording my website and reworking my resume. Andy stopped by between sessions to sit with me and help revise my resume. Jesse stopped by to sit with me for support. A smattering of other ETCers stopped by to see what I was up to, and when I relayed my sudden career change, responded with, "Well, DUH!"

Why does everyone else figure these things out about me before I do?? Nevertheless, the changes were made, and I'm ready to hit the Career Expo tomorrow with my new goal. Huzzah!

Other highlights today included a big Bandology lunch (with past and present members alike), then a session given by Bungie on Matchmaking in Halo 3. It was extremely informative, though now I have Fiddler in the Roof stuck in my head.

Now I'm chillin and waiting for my my mentor, such that we can go adventure at Ubisoft. Huzzah!

GDC Tuesday Afternoon

Well, I'd intended to go back to see another session, but instead I spent most of the afternoon sitting and chatting with Drew and Activision Jason, and later, Brenda. It was a fine chat about the history and motives behind GDC, the role of educators in the conference, and my curious foray into Game Design. ETCers and other industry folk joined and left our table in a steady stream. This was a much preferred environment for me compared to a packed session, especially in my sleepy state.

After a leisurely dinner at the food court, we returned to our hotels to prepare for the giant IGDA party being thrown tonight. I promptly fell asleep. I doubt I will be scorned for skipping out on the party, nor will my absence likely be noticed (they are expecting 2000 people to attend). The fact of the matter is, I'm exhausted, and the conference proper hasn't even begun yet! I need to rest up if I intend to survive the rest of the week at all.

I blame the large amount of people, which quickly drain away my energy. Andy says I should just pretend every person at the conference is actually a dog, since puppies seem to give me so much energy (Brenda agrees, thinking it would be extremely fun to think of what breeds people would be). Activision Jason says that creating a defensive energy bubble around oneself is a learned skill, and that I merely need to work my way to 375 (how I grind this skill, I have no idea).

For now, I'll call it an early night. There's a session at 9am tomorrow that I really want to go see, so an early bedtime won't hurt in the least!

GDC Tuesday Afternoon

Well, I'd intended to go back to see another session, but instead I spent most of the afternoon sitting and chatting with Drew and Activision Jason, and later, Brenda. It was a fine chat about the history and motives behind GDC, the role of educators in the conference, and my curious foray into Game Design. ETCers and other industry folk joined and left our table in a steady stream. This was a much preferred environment for me compared to a packed session, especially in my sleepy state.

After a leisurely dinner at the food court, we returned to our hotels to prepare for the giant IGDA party being thrown tonight. I promptly fell asleep. I doubt I will be scorned for skipping out on the party, nor will my absence likely be noticed (they are expecting 2000 people to attend). The fact of the matter is, I'm exhausted, and the conference proper hasn't even begun yet! I need to rest up if I intend to survive the rest of the week at all.

I blame the large amount of people, which quickly drain away my energy. Andy says I should just pretend every person at the conference is actually a dog, since puppies seem to give me so much energy (Brenda agrees, thinking it would be extremely fun to think of what breeds people would be). Activision Jason says that creating a defensive energy bubble around oneself is a learned skill, and that I merely need to work my way to 375 (how I grind this skill, I have no idea).

For now, I'll call it an early night. There's a session at 9am tomorrow that I really want to go see, so an early bedtime won't hurt in the least!

GDC Tuesday Morning

Today was the day of scholar activities, and I am quite worn out! In the morning we all met up and went over to Three Rings Design for a tour. This was great, because it was one of the companies I wasn't able to see on the West Coast Trip. Three Rings is a fantastical place, visually, and their company model is one I am fond of. They were very friendly and open, and are giving all the scholars alpha test accounts for Whirled.

Afterwards, we met up with our mentors, which was the most exciting part of the day for me! They matched up each of the scholars with an industry professional in the line of work we were interested in. Mine is a producer at Ubisoft, and is really cool. We wandered off to figure out our schedule for the conference, and had a fabulous conversation about production and the game industry in general. He's going to arrange a tour of Ubisoft for me (the studio here is mostly a publishing house with a small development team).

He set off to another meeting and I wandered about until I found Carlos, who is also doing computery sorts of errands. Tonight is the big IGDA party, which I may go to, but am sort of dreading. Large gatherings of people drain me to the bone. But who knows, it could be fun!

For now, I think I'm going to go seek out that bean bag chair lounge again...

GDC Tuesday Morning

Today was the day of scholar activities, and I am quite worn out! In the morning we all met up and went over to Three Rings Design for a tour. This was great, because it was one of the companies I wasn't able to see on the West Coast Trip. Three Rings is a fantastical place, visually, and their company model is one I am fond of. They were very friendly and open, and are giving all the scholars alpha test accounts for Whirled.

Afterwards, we met up with our mentors, which was the most exciting part of the day for me! They matched up each of the scholars with an industry professional in the line of work we were interested in. Mine is a producer at Ubisoft, and is really cool. We wandered off to figure out our schedule for the conference, and had a fabulous conversation about production and the game industry in general. He's going to arrange a tour of Ubisoft for me (the studio here is mostly a publishing house with a small development team).

He set off to another meeting and I wandered about until I found Carlos, who is also doing computery sorts of errands. Tonight is the big IGDA party, which I may go to, but am sort of dreading. Large gatherings of people drain me to the bone. But who knows, it could be fun!

For now, I think I'm going to go seek out that bean bag chair lounge again...

GDC Monday Afternoon

The summit talk after lunch was all about revenue models for Free-to-play games, and was very interesting. It was also very popular, and the room was so crammed full that I had to escape afterwards for a re-charge.

Wandering about, I found that the convention has a bean bag chair lounge in the middle of the floor outside the exhibit hall! Brilliant! I chilled out for awhile, soon joined by Tracy, Edmundo, Jake, and Alyson. I decided to sit there on a bean bag and work out what talk I wanted to see in the afternoon, and promptly fell asleep. Doh!

Upon waking, I walked back with Tracy and Jesse. There's a big, glass-enclosed carousel outside the convention center that looks very fun, and Jesse and I resolved to ride it before GDC is over. "I will have to schedule a time this week to ride it," I said.

Jesse turned to me with the most incredulous, laser-eyed glare he could muster and scoffed, "I'm not scheduling when I ride the carousel." I barked back in defense of my inability to be spontaneous, and Tracy berated us both on the silliness of a glass-enclosed carousel to begin with. It was all in good fun, of course. We parted ways with Jesse and returned to the hotel.

Tonight, I met up with the other GDC scholars for dinner at the food court. There are an abundance of interesting people, and many a business card was exchanged. One girl is going to be a first-year at the ETC next year, so I am determined to get her properly introduced to Jesse and Drew.

Yay networking!

GDC Monday Afternoon

The summit talk after lunch was all about revenue models for Free-to-play games, and was very interesting. It was also very popular, and the room was so crammed full that I had to escape afterwards for a re-charge.

Wandering about, I found that the convention has a bean bag chair lounge in the middle of the floor outside the exhibit hall! Brilliant! I chilled out for awhile, soon joined by Tracy, Edmundo, Jake, and Alyson. I decided to sit there on a bean bag and work out what talk I wanted to see in the afternoon, and promptly fell asleep. Doh!

Upon waking, I walked back with Tracy and Jesse. There's a big, glass-enclosed carousel outside the convention center that looks very fun, and Jesse and I resolved to ride it before GDC is over. "I will have to schedule a time this week to ride it," I said.

Jesse turned to me with the most incredulous, laser-eyed glare he could muster and scoffed, "I'm not scheduling when I ride the carousel." I barked back in defense of my inability to be spontaneous, and Tracy berated us both on the silliness of a glass-enclosed carousel to begin with. It was all in good fun, of course. We parted ways with Jesse and returned to the hotel.

Tonight, I met up with the other GDC scholars for dinner at the food court. There are an abundance of interesting people, and many a business card was exchanged. One girl is going to be a first-year at the ETC next year, so I am determined to get her properly introduced to Jesse and Drew.

Yay networking!

GDC Monday Morning

So for today, Bandology split up between the Casual Games Summit and the Worlds in Motion Summit. I went to the latter, which is about virtual worlds and massively multiplayer experiences (as Jesse says, "it sounds like a girl came up with the name to that summit," at which I shook my fist threateningly, at which he smirked).

I picked the summit to learn what I can about MMOs to apply to Bandology. What I discovered, to my surprise, is that there exists in this industry an animosity between "virtual worlds" people (Second Life, Social Networking experiences, etc.) and "mmo game" people (WoW, Club Penguin). This startled me, as I'd never perceived the friction between the two groups until today in this room!

The first two speakers were so-so, but the third guy from GoPets () gave a great talk about Game Interface over User Interface. I think I absorbed a lot of Bandology-relevant tidbits from that talk.

For now, I must finish my lunch and head back to the summit. Stay tuned for more!