peng ink

Sin(Surfing) (200): Deleted it. It looks like Line Rider on an Apple IIe. Yuck.

-Forum Guy

Line Rider on an Apple IIe? Fuck, I wish!

If you told me a year ago that there would be a sequel to No More Heroes, I would have believed you. That’s because the game hadn’t been released.

But since its release, word has it the sales haven’t been so good. As the story goes, on launch day in Japan Goichi Suda held a game signing at an Akihabara game store. After 20 minutes passed and not a single purchase had been made, a member of the press took pity and bought the first copy. As often happens in the Bizarro World, western sales have reportedly been much better, but enough to warrant a sequel? It’s a Christmas miracle!

I have an immense respect for Suda51. Not only does the man have the balls to make a game mainly for an audience an ocean away, but to put whatever he wants into the game, down to the cat petting mini-game, sensual waggle motions, and 4th wall shattering wiimote speaker segments. Nothing is beyond the guy, I mean he’s got NUMBERS in his name for crying out loud!

First real job. First day of work.

Tomorrow.

As we can see, Mr. Schafer did not pay enough attention to the source material. Guns? Katanas? Space colonists? Eddie Murphy look-alike? Sounds like a recipe for success! Take note and you’ll have a platinum seller on your hands in no time.

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“Heather Kelley, Rod Humble and Gregory Peng — all experienced game designers — give a look into the process, people and resources involved in creating a video game. Aside from a game’s plot, art and music, they argue that game developers offer an artistic statement in controlling, through “rules,” the way a player interacts with the game’s environment, characters, and what they have to do to win.”

WARNING: I am ask to define an art game, as well as what indie means. Tread at own risk.

Trying to get a job these days is strange. Everyone’s got a role for you to fill. “Hey, I can do that!” I think to myself. “Sorry, we’re looking for somebody more senior,” they return.

Rather than simply filling a role, I’d like to carve my own niche in the games industry. The games industry, however, is averse to carving, running away as soon as I draw near. Maybe one day I’ll get tired of chasing, and take out the “indie axe of mightiness” and chop a hole so big, a manbaby could fit inside of it. But until then, the resumes go out on Fridays.

GDC was amazing. So amazing that attempting to describe it might cause the writer to undergo convulsive seizure due to overexposure to awesome. I dare not tread those waters.

In my opinion, what do I think defines an indie game? One word: heart.

I’m talking about the pulsating organ within your chest that fills arteries with warm blood. In other words, Indie games are all about warm blood. That’s why people are always talking about the Indie Spirit; one sip of Indie Spirit and you’ll feel warm all over. This also explains why a few commercial game companies are able to make games with heart. It’s because they have the Indie Spirit!

Somehow I landed myself the CA position for GDC, leaving me speechless flabbergasted fühlen fantastisch.

Lest I miraculously get a chance to be a CA at GDC, I’ll likely have to make some sort of decision amongst the remaining pass options. Looking at the options, other than the fact that each of them is a financial equivalent of a kick in the balls, these passes otherwise share little in common, catering to the fact that we as developers are segregated into our own little niches. By skipping over the parts of game industry that don’t interest us, we save a bundle. What a great deal.

Or is it? I for one don’t like that we have to choose between the indies and the professionals. By separating these two groups in the most effective way - that is by instating both a monetary and temporal barrier - we arrive at a suboptimal situation: main conference goers will miss out on the ragtag indie gamedev insights and methods, while the indies can only sit outside closed doors and imagine what juicy industry secrets are being discussed. And the students? Well they can more or less stand in the hallways and hope to “network” with random passers by.

While I’m not proposing some sort of communist distribution of passes, surely there must be some better arrangement that lets us get a slice of both worlds for less than the cost of a shiny new laptop?

Yesterday morning I got the call. This summer I’ll be interning at Electronic Arts Los Angeles as a Technical Designer.

What do you want to be when you grow up? How many people can say that their current employment accurately reflects their childhood aspirations? The amazing combination of events that brought me to this point, successes hidden under the guise of failures, mistakes that opened opportunities, and the all nighters that tied them all together… it’s been quite a ride. But I’m there. The industry barrier is broken.

An entry level design position? Did such a thing exist ten years back? Until two years ago, when a colleague proved me wrong, I didn’t even think it was possible. I expected to break in as a programmer, work my way through the ranks, and finally obtain that coveted “game designer” job title after half a decade at the bottom. Of course, my conception of what a game designer actually does was quite a bit off, but the fact remains, I’m five years early.

For everyone who dreams of breaking the barrier I have this advice: Don’t sit on idle hands, start developing games now. Though my life is consumed by it now, looking back I wish I had started even earlier than I did.