Distinction Of Irrelevance

Viko

2011-03-06T02:59:00.000-08:00

Quick painting i did which i plan to turn into a pure diffuse char, done on a lunch break

Oh times are a changing

2011-03-06T02:43:00.000-08:00

Well it sure as hell has been a while, according to the last post since November 2009 o_O was long enough to read that post again and not recognise a single bit :P

Well its time to get back on the wagon, Uni is done and dusted, job at Outso is going well! and recently been spending every moment i have doing personal work :) (well as much as i can without upsetting the misses XD )

So as with all art, its made to be viewed, that and with all the Art dailys I do at work think ive had enough practice to maybe manage to keep some succession of posts on this old blog ^_^

Finally bit the bullet and started working with colour in my renderd drawings, Il always love the greyscale, simple but sweet, and colour is a bit of a sscary animal, but you cant get anywhere unless you try!

Heres some of the pics ive done, alot of the ones ive done whilst at Outso fall under NDA though ¬_¬

Infinity Ward

2009-11-19T06:56:00.000-08:00

I wonder sometimes what companies are thinking of, what kinda plans these guys have hatched, and how they really never did their numbers.

When they decided to not include dedicated servers, no offline playing, or anychance of mods, did they expect their autiance to sit quiet?

Numbers are an important factor of every day life, and deligation of control is a very useful tool when handling large numbers of people.

Deligation in servers translates to dedicated servers, user made servers etc, where individuals and groups of individuals can control and look after their servers, like clans etc.

So instead IW made IWNet, a single entity to control the masses. They upset the modding comunity, the clans community, and PC gamers in general........so what do they expect.

Within days their IWNet was hacked, and even now a week after release it still having issues, not only that but the hackers have managed to leak Viruses into IWNet infecting people who join games.

Now i dont agree with viruses, but they had to be prety cock sure to rip out all that is PC from a game, and then sell it to us at a higher price, this cockyness will bite back as it is now, and is ruining a potentially good series.

For future reference, dont anger a very able hacking community, because theyl shit you up

Art mode

2009-10-25T08:03:00.000-07:00

think part of this tech week im gona artify my blog, its way to bland!!!

i might propose an add on to cam lessons, have a 3ds Max help session or something to help ppl tackle that horrid yet awesome program!!!

Tech urge

2009-10-18T07:25:00.002-07:00

I was never really very aware of it at first, and when I was I thought that it was just me, but the tech urge, well, it’s in all of us
Is it a coincidence that on the very same day, me, mitch, bexs mum and bexs brother were all looking into new phones? Even bex is drooling over a new phone, but her gaze is entirely swamped by the thought of a intuos 4........*drools*
All I know is that I seem to get an urge for new tech about once a year, and it’s such a strong feeling it makes me worry, as if u can’t last a day without going and buying this particular piece of tech you’ve seen
Last year was a new mp3 player
Year before a new pc
This year, a new phone, but to b fair my phone is really dying one me, but that still doesn’t disguise the fact that within 2 days of me getting a random idea about a new phone, that i am now currently on a contract with a blackberry phone.....
And wtf is going to happen next year, I literally have a working piece of tech for everything I do......I’m worried for next year, something better break lol
I guess this means I’m materialistic, I’m not even sure if that’s a bad thing or not, were so hooked into the world we live in, we can’t just buy a piece of tech an keep it, nothing is built to last too long, and even if it did, technology is moving way to fast

Fuck you money!

OOOO a good start

2009-10-18T07:25:00.001-07:00

Well we can all suggest that the next year will be different, that things will change, but with a lingering doubt of what the future holds....

.....and it seems all is well  everyone is working hard, and working well, seems like everyone is in the groove, which is fantastic
Finding it a bit weird though i am, without the Chris side of things it doesn’t seem right, even though were working on our final project im still getting major urges to do some 1 week projects on the 2d side.
Bex and me were thinking of even doing some canal pictures, blast from the past or what, would be a good test to see exactly what has changed or not changed in our time here at DMU

Whats your trigger

2009-04-07T06:30:00.000-07:00

Today im going to give Relentless a go...(stupidly high caffine drink)...ive always been one who knows the power of sugar, yes i know its bad to run on sugar highs but its my trigger.

Any kind of artist will know of triggers, special things you do to help flip the brain to the Right side and fly into art land.

With me i work best with a 2ltr bottle of coca cola and a box of maltesars = off my tits sugar rush.

Thatl keep me going for an entire day straight of painting, eat at the computer aswell but by the end of the day im a bit of a zombie, i can literally feel the switching point, the point when my body goes back to normal, its no gradient, its instant!

But its interesting to see how everyone is different, Del says he works best in the morning, and Mitch at night......it made me realise, im a night person too, but not really for the time, but the light.

Last year and preceeding that i would quite happily paint away, but this year its been quite difficult and i cant trigger into that mind, but during this talk i realised, my room in the house im in this year it quite bright, even with the blinds closed.....could it be that ive been failing with my painting because of light levels???

can i control the trigger, and stop abusing the sugar technique?

should i even try, i duno

But ppl who are reading this, post a comment tell us all what your trigger is ^_^

Reflections

2009-04-05T12:16:00.000-07:00

Well I guess the best place to begin is the group project, damn I could probably speak about this forever, but not neccessarily for the right reasons :P

Well it definatly was a challange, and regardless of the bits that happend in between the beggining and the end, the end result isnt that bad, and could quite easily become fairly successful.

Even if people keep their view to leave it dead, it was definatly worth while, if anything just for the verification of who I am and what I can do.

I would say that on a production level (assets etc) I wasnt in any way producing what I could, or what I should have been, my time and effort was to plan ahead and dodge the short falls which were inevitably going to happen, keep the falls shallow rather than HUGELY DEEP :P
Ive had to fight with myself, seeing what I have model wise and judging myself by that, its difficult to feel good about all the work that you physically cannot show, keeping your cool has never been difficult for me, but that doesnt mean that during the project i havent wanted to give people the "commen sense backhand attack", you kind of assume that people have a similar mind track to you, its only when people prove otherwise that you realise that some traits you have are actually special.

But I have a new found respect for the tutors, not that I never before hand, but more a case of understanding the more minor issues, and even though they may be minor they carry the same weight as any of the major issues.

You can lead a horse to water, but you cant make it drink

that pretty much sums up the entire project, Ive always been a person who over thinks, it took me a long time to keep taps on it, and not get caught up in thought loops which inevitably end up in unproductive projects.

But its not perfected, i definatly got caught up in one!

Communication - There wasnt any, regardless of my efforts, there wasnt any, if you read this gang, you seriously need to pay more attention to your communication, I know its a tricky one, if we generalise our class by our course, were all ghostly pimply geeky nerdesque people who nasal giggle to each other and piss our pants when were anywhere near a girl who smells like roses.

But the sad truth is that the majority of people on our course can quite happily chat to one another to some extent, but when it comes to communicating proffesionally are terrible!!!

Attendance - This one closely ties in with communication, we set out to meet up each and everyday between 11-12 to keep tabs on each other, look through work and chat about what assets need to be done, wether assets needed fine tuning etc etc
First couple of weeks were O.K. with only 1 or 2 being gone here or there, there were issues but nothing that couldnt have been sorted.
11-12 is fair, you get time to lie in and when you leave around 1 you have the whole day.

But that obviously wasnt what people wanted to do, after being in each day between 10-11 until 2/3 usually, i eventually got fed up, at the time the computers were being a big pile of wank, thank you so much Novell Client for shitting on our Pc's!!!!!!

So around week 5 I broke, didnt come in for an entire week because why waste my efforts, that period of time kind of lingerd afterwards, i lost my interest entirely, and have only recently fixed my sleeping pattern back to normal!!!!

BUT

Them not coming in technically shouldnt have been an issue if there was communication, an online asset list, online art bible and tech spec, Blog, MSN to chat, email........everyone can be used without having to be present in the labs.

my brains is fried a bit to do with this ill update it tommorrow probs

Hand helds are the future!!!

2009-04-05T06:07:00.000-07:00

Well the game developers conference was interesting, with one major thing sticking out in my mind being the Onlive!

I could see what the future held, why sell people disks, when they can "share" such disks in and around anyone they know.
The whole pirate scene with torrents, irc and all manor of "sharing tools" will never be silenced, the idea of hacking and breaking the rules is really enticing, weve all heard of "sticking it to the man" thats what it all kinda boils down too.

So the idea of disks and consoles are where pirating was born, the more advanced the security, the more advanced the console, the more thrill and excitement these bedroom hackers get from lol'ing at Microshit and Sony etc. The fustration they must feel when there prize and joy, which costs them so much to develope, is playing megadrive games ^_^ (love my psp XD)

So the obvious solution really is the buisness that we ourselves as game artists are going towards, soft products!

Why make a disk, then have to make one after the other for every consumer who requests that product, when software can be made once, and sold indefinatly via the internuts.

So the principle behind Onlive is we dont touch the console, we dont even touch the game, you no longer buy the actual game really, nor do you buy the console, you buy access.

Its all sitting at the other end of the cable but your account lets you access whatever, gone are the days of console only games being a bastard, you wona play both xbox and ps3, sure, its fine, but something tells me that it wont be that easy once this all kicks off.

But the fun thoughts behind this is what this Onlive will effect.

Consoles -
Well up until now the idea has been to make something that will play hard, play well, and look suuuuuuupppper SHINY to wrangle the consumer into buying their product

"ooo we can do this, on an they cant on theres"
and so started the fanboy rivalry, weve all seen it, an lol'ed hard at the patheticness

and the biggest concern, being cost efficient to produce and distribute (thats what you were meant to be thinking of Mr and Mrs PS3 developement team)

So now one of the biggest elements will fall off the table, thats alot of £ to put somewhere else, these "consoles" if we will call them that from now on, can be super machines if they want,
they dont have to be pretty,
they dont have to fit under your tv,
they dont even require much thort when it comes to cost effectivness, you can now buy the bigger shitter looking components, who the hells gona see them?

So no doubt the generation preceeding the Official kick off of this kind of hardware will shit pure gold onto your screne ^_^

Developers -
Weve all heard the percentages, developers get bout 8% i think it was from a game, so yeah they will make profit generally, but its not really anything to brag about.

They tread a fine line, and the most plausable way to stay alive is to stay safe, safe being FPS drivel and shitty other things which have been made to death...O BUT DONT SAY THAT, THIS FPS NOW HAS BULLET BENDING, THATS SO MUCH DIFFERENT TO BULLET TIME HONEST!!!!!

So.....could this be........inventive games........ARE GONA HAPPEN :O :O
Its going to be TOTAL SHIT

Sorry but with most things you aint gona start shitting gold right away, its on our shoulders to go in with new minds and help this industry, can you imagine what these developers will look like.

Bleeding fingers, ghostly face, knowing exactly how to make FPS drivel and the rest of the tosh the public ask for......then magically

YOUR FREE, YOU CAN BE CREATIVE AGAIN

*insert blank faces*
(millyseconds later)

Aliens with 7 arms instead of 6

* MONDOOOO OSLAP *

Itl be exactly the same as every 1st year organic/reef/other character project, the usual ideas, coming out in their usual ways, but BUT BUT BUT itl get there in the end, I just hope they realise how to make good fun exciting games in my life time

I double hope i get to make them XD

Hand Helds-

I recently purchased a psp, probably for the wrong reasons, but damn am I happy I got it!!!
Technology gets better this much by that time yada yada yada weve all heard alot about it, weve all definatly seen it, "TOP OF THE RANGE LAPTOP..(counts 2 seconds) THE NEW TOP OF THE RANGE LAPTOP"

The psp can emulate all the way up to n64 and megadrive.....*does shifty eyes* not sure how i know that but IT CAN!!!

So no doubt when the psp2 or whatever comes out itl be in league with Xbox an ps2, now the graphics an such on them aint bad, but itl look awesome on a handheld.

So is this the future of "consoles"?

WIth Onlive technically killing the Home console market, will all that shiny development money go into hand helds, will the extra money from games sales on Onlive go into hand helds?

With hand helds also having Wifi, and every other shop and or store having free Wifi, doesnt take a genious to link Onlive and hand helds also :P donwload the game, get a weeks activation or sumet = oooo

Weve came to the world in an awkward stage regarding the games industry.

Graphics was the thing that made a game up until a few years ago, then it just became more an more pathetic, games arent even really seen as art, being a game art student = rolled eyes an looks of disgust.

Will there be day when our ninja max skills will get chicks XD??"?!?!?

I think when Onlive and co start up, and real creativity hits the developers, that is our time to shine, to be seen as artists, weve got to shake off all this baggage we have lumberd with our "genre" of work.

and wev all gotta hack our psps to play mario........ ^_^

Blitz

2009-03-19T11:42:00.000-07:00

Well it was a definate awesome event, wasnt exactly taken by the "critique", they just looked through work and never really said what was good or not :(

but the walk through the Blitz "labs" was awesome, got a definate feeling of "level", the bottum floor was smelly :P and the top had tonnes of awesome, and Jollian Webb (spelling) which multiplies it by ten bajillion.........i was told he drank vinegar to get the expression correct for trusim o_O an put his hand in boiling water to get the pain one correct...........

now thats hardcore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But the most shocking thing on that day was the actual percent these bleeding game artists actually get......3.50 froma £30 game.........WTF

No wonder people are migrating to things like steam and direct to drive or D2D.
Avoid alot of these rediculous costs, 20p for a dvd disk.........so xbox and co charge $5 for a disk because its "Microsoft", blood money those bastards, as if they dont have enough money.........same goes to PS3..............even though they have no money......stupid ps3

btw, sony, please dont go out of buisness, i like the psp :P

Oooooo real art

2009-03-19T11:18:00.000-07:00

Was awesome to see senor Paul Wrights work, especially in the flesh, seeing nicely arranged bubble wrapped art ready to be shipped was cool in its self,

but the easel one one side of the room, with ten bajillion messy tissues from correcting the oil paints, and it was "clean" by his standards :P

but hes a cool guy, very tempted to go to one of his workshops, just to talk about tone an colour with him, find out how he goes about things, theres seems to b a very basic theory behind it, but he just applies it well!!!

Paul Wright

2009-02-15T06:30:00.000-08:00

So for Chris's project its painting in the style of an artist, an artist whos pics we can actually go and see.

Shockingly I was actually quite up for this and so after some searching, I came across a Paul Wright.

I liked his style because it was so blocky, I knew I wouldnt be able to handle clean painting, it just doesnt work with me. Colour wise its really varied, he gets alot of interesting colours into the face and yet they all match.

So after some hunting I got his site and sent off an email to find out if theres a way to see his work and chat about his style.

After doing that I researched some more, it was around that time I started to worry :P i found that he had been on the Rolf Harris Star Portraits program, and had been shown in all sorts of popular exhibitions and such, it was then that I thought that getting an email back is the most id get....

BUT

seems im going to meet him in his studio next week.....which is awesome, an actual art studio....ive got all kinds of pre-conceived ideas of what will be there, but i shalt see ^_^

Paul Wright

Blitz

2009-02-06T08:15:00.000-08:00

Illness created a mood, fed up, but got a email saying been accepted by blitz for the open day.....now my minds messed up ¬_¬

Sculpty

2009-01-31T16:59:00.001-08:00

Initial sculpt gif

Mid sculpt gif

Final sculpt gif?

Doubt at first, but persistance prevails!!!!

2009-01-19T14:32:00.000-08:00

So I wasnt sure exactly how this day would end, first Chris lesson, had my doubts, wasn't sure if I would feel empty like I did last term, but, I've never done so much random doodling!!

Surprising how even a mild amount of direction can fullfil some little tick box in your head that opens the door to drawing an painting fun, interesting person Chris says, my answer,
is a boxer,
was going to draw a fat leotard wrestler, and still will, but after skimming Flickr I found one guy in particular in an old vintage picture line-up, reminds me a little of Gary Oldman in 5th element! Purely from a hair point of view :P

which inspired this little developement cycle, there are more pics, full body an such, but they aint ready, well neithers this but you get the idea :P

2009-01-17T05:35:00.000-08:00

First couple of days was a bit rusty :P no one sees that XD doodled this guy whilst watching the new episode of 24, hes some Presidential person in the show.

After a chat...with.....a person whos i cant remember it being at present, saying how people throughout the course have found how they like to work, they have there whole painting process setup so they can churn out the goodness.

Thats when i realised I dont have one, it can take me hours to get the colours ready for a painting, it can take 10/20 mins to get the flow of the picture sorted....but taking that in mind I relooked at a book on portraits, and the technique it shows really works for me :) so practice i will!!!

Quick texture test on a tiles thing i made for my environment, seems the unreal engine likes to boost th specular :P mmmm jelly tiles

this is a 256 diffuse/spec/normal

bizarro fun

By deviantice at 2009-01-17

Personal Promise!

2009-01-12T15:37:00.000-08:00

2 pages a day....2 simple pages of a sketch book a day, minimum, doesn’t even have to be anything thought provoking, or even anything that makes sense, but I need to!

The slump bug, that bastard, many caught it, some didn’t and many never realised they did!
I was one of the blissfully unaware up until before the Christmas holiday, reassuring people, giving them a boost....then I looked at what work I had in front of me, the balance was missing!

I've been hiding in Heather work, neglected the reason I got into art, drawing....painting not so much, originally didn’t like it :P but its now a top priority!!!
Apologies Chris, not sure what happened, but it did, but I'm aware of it now, and I'm so going to kick its ass!!!! With a clown shoe lined with blades!!!

Act of learning

2009-01-12T15:09:00.000-08:00

Well I've had one of those moments, it can sometimes take a day of being totally out of it, then coffee, and a long shower to trigger them, but i managed one, a realisation.

Like Sir Powell has mention in the past, you've got to look for information, we've got a brief situation to absorb all we want, but so far I don’t feel like I have!

Was chatting to Mike of the Kelly, and we were wondering about the time we have, how at the moment our efforts are to finishing projects opposed to actually learning.
Too caught up in deadlines to fully play, and I don’t mean "Play" in the stupid variety, I mean the creative play that we as artists do!

I’m envious of the 3rd years time scale last year, think it was 12 weeks or so for the self portrait? I may be wrong, but it was definitely longer that 3 weeks :P
I understand the reasoning’s of it not being that long this time round, but just the thought of all the possible fun that we could of had, learnt rigging to a fair degree, different variants, endless possibilities, I personally was looking forward to making a variety of me to ride my Pirate Runner vehicle, but the way things panned out, it was a no go.
Interestingly though, I actually want to know how to texture environments properly, I love building things, working things out, but I’m just missing the texturing element of environments, and hey, may even grow to like making trees.........but maybe I shouldn’t go as far as to say that :P

Personally I feel close to being at a level I'm pleased with, I'm nowhere near what I want to be, but close to a standard I would show to people, this is what is fuelling me at the moment, I really need to contact people, start the networking, and so does everyone else, this is the second year after all!!

Error of our ways

2009-01-12T14:58:00.000-08:00

So a lot happened during the first term, the good, the bad and the evil.
I find myself sitting in position I really don’t like, work is there but nothing final, nothing I can hold my hand up and say I’m proud of.

From this day forward is time for the old Phil to come back, but a more active version, sod this year group lethargy, let’s all make an effort, forget reminiscing of the old times, like I learnt back in 6th form, trying to be what you were before one of life’s events is impossible, you’ll chase it your entire life without success,
and, if by chance you do manage to get a hold of it, you'll feel incomplete, wronged, because it will be at that point you realise that you could of been better, and you have sacrificed all those new possibilities by grasping the past to much!

So boys and gurly, MEN AND.......BEX, lets sort ourselves out, I’m trying to sort a group meal to celebrate the finale of the first semester......and, well, I want all you can eat Chinese :P and to see all your ugly mugs XD

Time for a change

2008-12-30T05:53:00.000-08:00

Even if people didnt catch the "slump" people at least felt it through those who got hit by it, the course itself felt as if it shifted, im sure the tutors have heard enough about this "new lab" but socially this lab stinks.

I really would love to get that old work regime back......the gang of us that would always be in, workin together, playing together and working some more, but the way things are it just isnt going to happen!

As Mike said, its almost as if people have fallen out, we havent, or have we?
Have people woke up slightly, realised the idea that we are all in competition, and seen that although we are friends the fight for jobs has already started?

Im sure it isnt but without the work ethic in the labs like last year it only leaves that competition side in the light, ist sad really, it was awesome, i sympathise with the first years, maybe thats why the year seems disjointed, if the rock solid foundations we made with each other crumbled, how can a group....how can a huge group pull together to fight this industry we call GAME ART?

Bradgate.....

2008-10-11T15:40:00.000-07:00

Well it was fun to go on a little mission, seein deer again was cool, little rock climbing, which never happend ;) , was also cool, but i really wona go there for a sunset, shame the buses only run till 5 ¬_¬ guess well have to wait for the old winter night times for that kind of action

GAH

2008-10-11T15:37:00.000-07:00

Juggling the different aspects has been tricky, having to re-learn the whole balance issue to do with max an drawing, so easy to lose hours faffing with a vert or two...¬_¬ but i do love the old max :P

Year 2, ooooooo im shakin in my high tops

2008-10-11T15:27:00.000-07:00

Well this is final start on the blogging front again, damn its dificult for me to do this whole "diary" type thing, isnt in the blood

Heres some sketches iv randomly done, trying to get a page or 2 a day done even if it aint chris work related, i apologise in advance for the fact a general theme on the ppl i doodle will show up :P but hey, she looks good ;)

ARRRRR

2008-08-25T13:00:00.000-07:00

Had no shifts today, an i realised this pic was due by midnight, so i dedicated a day to getin this wrinkly so an so finished :P i even zoomed out an lost some detail just so i could fit in the saggies XD shes actually twice this resolution, i may of got a little consumed with the zooming in at one point :P

Little Update again

2008-08-21T03:13:00.000-07:00

Yeah the ears wrong i know that, lots of stuff im going to do to this, but Painter is AWESOME
Thanks bex for reminding me of it, an thanks gnomon DVD for the tutorial for the program XD

GAD DAMN BLOG

2008-08-20T09:27:00.000-07:00

why is it so hard for me to get into the rythm of posting on my blog..... gah :P

anyways heres some pics of my pirate old biddy in the making

hmmm

2008-08-11T06:41:00.001-07:00

not what i had in mind, not really sure what i had in mind, but heres a quick paint up of an earlier sketch

2008-08-11T05:06:00.000-07:00

the back view had a bit more reference used, lots of subtle shadows an such to understand, that an also male bums......thats what they look lik eit seems, dont usualy go out of my way to look at them *mmmm woman ass* oh sorry lost myself then :P

Anatomy doodles

2008-08-11T04:06:00.000-07:00

ok ok so it aint colour work, but anatomy is fun XD some sketches with light reference, trying to slowly get more muscle understanding, an i may go a bit more flabby with them :P mix it up a little

Playing

2008-08-11T02:20:00.000-07:00

yeah iv been out of touch with the whole painting sides of things, this house is way too busy and compact to have any real free time ¬_¬

BUT we did start some speedpaints the other day and iv been doin dome photoshop doodles :P the doodles aint quite up to the standard of bex's awesome colour works, BUT I SHALL GET THERE

Bizzaro Head Sketches

2008-08-03T06:06:00.000-07:00

O yeah and these were the quick head concepts :P

Bizzaro Superman

2008-08-03T05:59:00.000-07:00

Started this guy a week or 2 back, i should really get back into him, but I dont hink i know anatomy enough to be able to pull of a superhero/villain character well,
the clay workshop in my room next year should help with that XD

this aint the most up to date pic of his face, but i cant be botherd to get it LOL

NO you wont see what iv been doing, Yes il post what i do from now on :P

2008-08-02T04:01:00.000-07:00

Title says it all really, dont know why ive always been so reluctatnt to post anything that I do art wise, guess I find it difficult to shrug off the self taught mind frame.

But taking a leaf out of REBECCA GREENS book, I'm going to post a hell of alot more of my work up on the Ye Olde Blog, which to this point is anything more than nothing LOL

Going to set up a link box to your blogs too, just because I'm getting fed up of having to go through the speed paintings page to get to them lol, I WILL BE MORE ACTIVE IN BLOGGING

well, lets see how this pans out :P

Week 16...............The L33T Culture

2008-04-11T14:56:00.000-07:00

Although I’m in and around Game cultures, I wouldn’t say I’m a permanent resident, yes I know people that I only know through games but I’m no die hard.
Even when I was into WoW, emphasis on the 'WAS', I never lived it if you know my meaning, but that’s not to say I didn’t enjoy it or understand it. I’d play on WoW just to chat with people, or id help the lowbies with quests even though it wouldn’t do anything for me, trade a G or 2 randomly with a level 12 was always fun, try an see how many "OMG"'s they put in the chat, and some were blatantly ignorant twats!! But I didn’t care, wasn’t giving it for a response, just for the hell of it.

The inside jokes within games have always been hilarious to me, Counter Strike source especially, "F10 for h4xs" followed by several *joeblogs has disconnected* (for the CCS newbie’s, f10 exits the game) I guess that’s what distinguishes you within the culture, if you fall for these things or don’t understand then you not a part of it and are quite readily ridiculed in a way.

But then do you have o be active continually within these cultures to be in them? Or does it just take knowing the "talk" to be a part of it?

*lol omg newbie is in the Microcrap Word Vocab :O*

When I was reading through the links I stumbled upon something which hasn’t affected me, but still shocked me, the Slashdot article "Voices from the HellMouth" that talks about the aftermath of the Colorado massacre in Littleton. Where in a way Gaming culture was outlawed, expulsion an suspensions galore, if you play violent games.....America, your psychotic, let’s go on the assumption that these Gamers and recluses are a threat, what the hell is provoking them an making life harder for them going to do?!?!??! What do you think the preppies and jocks are going to do?
Band wagon, jump on?

*and wtf Microcrap Word has loll (laugh out loud literally) but not lol in its vocab......who the fuck says loll??!?!?*

Week 15.............The big shiny world that awaits us

2008-04-11T13:53:00.000-07:00

is gruelling, I’m not scared by the concept of hard work but the awesome talks we had with people from industry all had a certain ring to them..........this is a ring made from razors that drains you of your soul!!!

Not one of them said "ooooo its great being a game artist, ooooooo easiest job ever" but that isn’t what I’m looking for, otherwise id still be in the corner shop job I had during college but full time :P
Even though they may not of secreted happiness with every word about the industry they still liked their job.

One interesting point about the industry is the way different countries vary with it, when Mathis was over we got talking about how the industry is different from place to place, he has the exact view of the English Game Industry bleeding their artists dry, with characters within a couple of days and such, where as the more prominent American Game Industry will quite happily give you a week or 2 to do a character if it means you make something that has had several hits on the awesome button. But then with most things America seems to be prominent, films are flooding out of Hollywood and we squeeze out a few gold nuggets now and then.

But the same story rears its head, graphics are so good we need something else, and small time game companies not only now have to compete with leading Game Companies with money to spew at graphics, but now increasingly more money will be lathered over some unsuspecting intellectuals to make a game actually interesting.
So does that mean the end of small time companies?

Actually no, because one thing of interest when Mathis did that "official" talk thing, with the vast supply of cakes, with freeness that I didn’t abuse :P
It’s the small time companies that produce the interesting things, then big companies eat them, one prime example is one of the biggest games of the year, that even the great zero punctuation couldn’t dislike, not even partially ->

Portal, which I might add, Mike has so gracefully joined the Portal fun train, 10 years later, god Mikealaleal catch-up an stop whizzing off to Amerrycana!!!

But yeah, portal like other games within Valve were created originally by modders of the original Half-life, the "bedroom coder" of a sorts and because Valve left them to their own devices, this pile of awesome was created!!!

So all you people with no lives hiding with your awesome ideas please be eaten by a company, but not EA, because that will cost you your soul!

Week 11.............. Gameplay

2008-04-10T15:15:00.000-07:00

As time rolls on and we study the world of "Games" we keep getting all these unknown factors, and I’m starting to think the entire industry is built upon personal opinion.

But Gameplay, well I think the wiki has got it wrong, "used to describe the overall experience of playing the game excluding factors like graphics and sound" how can you say graphics and sound aren’t apart of gameplay? Are they just saying this because graphics and sound sit quite nicely in their own distinct groups which can be easily depicted as good or bad?
because in all fairness if graphically alone you provide inconsistencies, or elements of bad level design that "Pop" the player out of the games "World" then surely that taints the "Gameplay".

It’s like the Game Art Director......he’s got fingers in all pies, even though graphics and sound can disrupt "Gameplay" its a disconnected relation at times, because you can have the most mind blowing graphics and scintillating sound, and then a game that’s so impossible to comprehend, or so insanely.......well......shit!

The bloom factor has had people dazed for a while but it seems to b wearing off, hiding bad "Gameplay" with awesome graphics or in copious amounts of bloom was successful but people I think are starting to realise there’s meant to b something behind that glaring screen.

Well 2 a night will have to start tomorrow seeing how I started late today, so part 2 tomoz

The shameful return

2008-04-10T14:38:00.000-07:00

Yes its been months, and yes it is shocking, but no u dont get to "punish" me!!!!

Because i shalt win the war against this blogg by doing 2 official bloggs at least a day hence forth.....id love to b able to have good excuses for my distinct lack of words being in my blogg, il blame the incubation period of glandular fever,
which is up to 40 odd days il have you know :P so yeah, erm my kinda....excuse..........is that......well at least 6 weeks are acounted for,
2 weeks drugged up and in hospital, an 4 druged up at home, cant argue with that now can u mike

ok maybe you can, but you never had to deal with waking up at 4am and noticing a half naked old woman sitting in your bedside chair watching you sleep........i wish that had been one of the halucinations, but no, she escaped from somewhere ¬_¬ *erases memory*

The Tutors Vandalise and go to crack dens!!!!!

2008-01-19T03:17:00.000-08:00

Well in keeping with the mechanical project, which has gained some new members, that i will not mention, because when they heard of the deadline they scatterd :P

Me, Simon and Beci organised a photo hunt, so on friday we snagged our cameras an went on a mission to find reference an textures for the mechanical aswell as anythin else we find........an whilst we were in the middle of no where, after passing the hobo den, non other than Chris an Mike turned up, looking very shifty :P (hahahha) personally i think they were stalking us, even though they tried to pass themselves off as vandals :P

But that trip was awesome, i saved both simons an becis life on our trip, after that flooding the other day, there was reallllly slippy silt everywhere, an mike an chris turned around at the right time, because just after that it became the muddiest path ever o_O

Beci slipped about 5 times in succession.......but to my disapointment never went face first in the mud.......dang!!!!

an i went surfing on a floating log :P (picture to come XD)

OMG WOW.........but man your crazy!!

2008-01-19T03:05:00.000-08:00

Wind Powered Walking

yeah the guys a genius, but this video gives you a deceptive view towards him, hes actually a fruit loop :P not that its a bad thing to be one, but he wants his creations to "live on the beaches" and use tubes he has on them to "eat" etc.

In all honesty if i had created those things id be unsure of wether they were real, the movement is awesome.

Thanks Mike for showing me them, ive passed it on to a few ppl an all have gone :O NO WAI!!!1!!1
Im looking into movement as a side project, after the presentations I never had a Chris project, and i remember him saying that well be doing a mechanical project at some point, so i started researching an doodling.

One small snag though, i mentioned it to chris, now he expects a finished project from me an simon by tuesday....well im screwed LOL

Mechanical is difficult though, im a bit of a perfectionist, so the idea of lots of litttle parts boggles my brain, and im a problem solver, and so far ive only worked out the legs to my character because im figuring out exactly how it would move even though il never animate it.....ah well :P

Week 10................Ima character, aint i fancy

2008-01-08T13:25:00.000-08:00

It’s difficult to say what makes a good character, what makes them interesting, what makes them real? Because my actual reflex answer is to do with realism in speech and body language, but then that’s just describing real life interaction, the interaction you see in the cinema, and as ever the game industry sits in its unknown void where no one is sure what exactly works, or even why it works, but when a little nugget of heaven lands on their desk, they milk it dry with as many game titles as possible!

Because if I was asked what I would want to see in a character to make them interesting, I would exclaim

“well you can’t have a character without having a back story, something that’s interesting but unknown, that is unveiled or at least hinted at, interesting characters are usually subtly teasing you, you wouldn’t call it teasing but it is”

Each character serves a purpose, whether its the unnamed guy who gets blown up or ran over within 10 seconds of seeing him or the main love element, they all have to balance out, you can’t have every character you see get blown up, you can’t have every character be the hero, there’s a system, and the general public like the system because they understand it.

The usual Mario-Bowser-Princess situation is a well known one and with most films if you look at them closely enough you will see the systems and not only will you see them, but if you look back through old films you’ll recognise them, its repetition!

But thinking all this through in relation to games, it seems almost impossible, a high relation to graphics, animation, sound and gamer interaction......but then I pause, wasn’t my favourite game of all time due to its amazing immersion, loving the characters and situations..............wasn’t that Final Fantasy 7!?! One of the ugliest games I can think of? Yeah it was......so what’s the missing element?

Well it was text based, they never had what all these current games seem to rely on, and when a game does use text it gets flamed by the press an users because they don’t think it’s now an next gen enough, but with FF7 and all those other old games, you weren’t spoon fed the realism, you weren’t spoon fed the characters and situations, YOU made them, imagination had a part to play in those days where as now people expect to be given the imagination and that is where the divide comes into play, recent games are struggling to immerse the player, graphics aren’t the big seller they use to be an the people with the cash are wanting the game to hold their hand and give them fun, the numb brain pressing buttons because it feels its advancing or learning, but however good a character is, however interesting the story, it all depends how open minded the individual is.

Week 9..........Game Tech

2008-01-08T12:42:00.000-08:00

Even though technology has hastened an provided us with all kinds of disks an gadgets to interact with computers an consoles, when it comes down to choosing the easiest to use, you cant help but dodge all the current generation technology and jump back a few steps.

Although personally at the moment my favourite console has to be the 360, good mix of graphical power and design, I have to chose the good old Mega drive, yes its clunky, game cartridges are the most ineffective use of material to store games BUT it was easy to use purely for the fact it was clunky and used cartridges. With modern technology your completely at the mercy of the machine because any one of the bazillion resistors/capacitors/transistors could die at anytime an then your screwed, but Mega Drive tech is so old and steam pump that it makes it indestructible :P but then back in those days things were made to last (oh god old man talk !!! :O)

If the game didn’t work you would crank the cartridge out blow hard into it and chuck it back in and hey presto, one working game but now the slightest scratch an your game is doomed, not to mention making sure you console is sitting at the right angle for fear of it shredding it up with the laser!!

The controllers were simple; u can’t really go wrong with a D-pad and 3 buttons, except after Track and Field and the excessive button hammerings and again, when something is made out of nails, rope and wood nothing can really go wrong, but with high tech stuff like the 360 and PS3 you pretty much doomed if you think that controller is going to live through a brief tantrum after you died for the 11th time against some 10 year old from Uzbekistan.

The PS2’s controller is a win in my books, even though I don’t really like the PS2, as far as ergonomics go it had it all, plenty of buttons to map out those not so simple games, easily accessible an well positioned, Microsoft’s attempt was close but no cigar.
It may be my favourite console, but seriously, I cannot stand those piddley little shoulder buttons, when you rely lots on the big hefty good triggers, having to navigate up to some hidden shoulder button is irritating, the PS2 at least had them both as shoulder buttons so you know what to look for, top button or bottom button, not huge trigger an ickle button o aren’t I so cute.....NO!

Just because

2008-01-06T15:38:00.000-08:00

My brother linked me these vids, the sandcastle one is especialy interestin

Week 8..............Stories (milk an cookies not included)

2007-12-27T09:23:00.000-08:00

Personally I am a story lover, like I said in my brief gamer history, the first game to truly rope me into games was in fact Final Fantasy 7, which I still love to this day....yeah I said the word love in relation to a game, call me what you wish :D
But back on topic, story is what sold that game to me, I never knew what I was letting myself into but the game wasn’t pinnacle on the story, I’ve played other games in the series after that one and even though the stories were great, the game play destroyed it, with linear play and the loss of free roaming. I guess if you want a story to be immersive with a linear construction, you should go into movies, because a game has to be involving in how it’s told, as well as how you play it!

The fact that the current generation of Game Developers seem to be completely buzzing off the idea of graphics, the space on the disk that was used for good game play and actual story seems to have been marginalised in place for bigger more intensive ways of making things glow. Don’t get me wrong, I really do like shiny things, mindless and even repetitive, but when you can see they are trying to palm you off with an “IMMENSE STORY” when actually it’s a bog standard story of guy meets girl, girl is abducted, girl turns out to be a boy, kind of story with immense glow to hide the fact that it’s a shambles, it wicks me off immensely!!

I don’t think a story has to be present within a game, all you need is a direction so that the consumer can follow it without any confusion, “ya what?!?!” moments are really not good, like in films when the paper boys bike blows into an awesome explosion when it hits a nearby lamp post, what.....why??!?
The problem is that stories are becoming increasingly ignored by the general public, most gamers are just click happy absent minded fools, all you need to do is check the Xbox and PS3 forums, “i liks dis game cuz its shiny a has the word “awesome” in teh titl” but when they do eventually “wake up and smell the coffee” there will be another generation below to line the pockets of the tedious game developers.....OH GOD I THINK IVE BEEN POWELL’ISED!!!111!!1!

Week 7.......Game Art Directors o__O

2007-12-04T13:00:00.000-08:00

One thing I found particularly interesting about the lead environmental artists talk, apart from the technicalities of making a game, was the actual end part, where we heard about the actual positions available within the company.
It is a bit embarrassing to say, but I hadn’t thought that far ahead :P I knew I want a job involving creativity and problem solving, but I had no idea of what jobs were there to offer!

So after last week’s blog, it came as a surprise to me that the Game Designer isn’t actually the head guy, the Game Art Director is, now I figured that there will always be a higher up pocking there poor little staff about with a stick, but after reading through one of the links I found that in fact it’s the Director that did what I thought was delivered by the Game Designer.

But ignoring my ignorance, I found myself feeling drawn to such a job, it scares me a bit to think that so much responsibility would rest on these 3ds Max weary shoulders :P but the broad talent that’s required, and high calibre at that, made me motivated and gave me vigour, I don’t know if I have vision as of yet, but I am not exactly about to walk straight into a job like that now am I so we shall see.
It seems though that the actual title “Game Art Director” is in fact a bit of a grey area, like most things in the Game Industry nothings a definite. The title is more commonly used in Japan, and titles like “Executive Producer” or even “Producer” / “Designer” are more known titles over here in the West......Executive does sound rather good though :P

Like Film Directors there in charge of the overall visualisation of the work, the composition and overall feel, but they also do provide content towards the game, Shigeru Miyamoto is credited as the “creator” of characters like, Mario, Link and even Donkey Kong but after the talk with Ben Mathis, it seems these directors are ill placed in their position, being friends of a higher up, who only make decisions to certify their “rank” in the team.........the bastards!!!
It kind of ruins the whole creative aspect of the game if you impose yourself upon the designers, I agree they need to keep it to their “vision” but you need to be open minded an try things out, but the catch 22 of the situation is the fact that experimentation is a big NO, as any failure can cause bust in any major titles, which I guess is why the inventive games are always started but eh small guy, who is then devoured by the company once it’s a success. A recent example is the latest expansion provided by the Valve team. The Orange Box has one game in particular that has caught everyone off guard, Portal, which itself was started off as a user made mod for Half Life

Kiss my rifle

2007-12-03T15:42:00.001-08:00

Thanks to an awesome vid Mike showed us the other day, i was inspired to model the gun and in no way was it because i got pissed off with my Mauzer model ;)
5 hours an 40 mins, or ther abouts, was tryin to do it in the same amount of time as we did with our gun speed test the other day
oh an 1606 polys ^_^

and also the infamous video

Week 6 Game Design

2007-12-03T12:38:00.000-08:00

Game designers arent realy a specific role, yeah you need to meet specific criteria to get the job but as a role, your never really in a specific field.
They can cover elements of programming, modeling etc as they need to be in every field to pull together their design, yes they arent the only ones who make decisions, group crits an evaluations happen on a daily basis, but they are usualy the ones to come under fire if a game flops, the main element of the game is pinicle on the point of it having a good design, the most amazing graphics an intense story cannot cover up bad design, back tracking is a major trick thats been used in one particular next gen title *coff coff* halo 3 *coff coff* were although it is a very good game, the back tracking is a complete failure, and although it may be due to the higher ups in Bungie makin cuts on costs an expecting more gametime no matter what, these antincs have not done them any favours!

Weve came to a point where game designers are even more important than ever, where as in the old days of Ultima Underworld where the games design was balancing on technology, and limitations therin, now graphics are fairly common, and so the drive is how you tie up the graphics, story, sound and actually invent good gameplay.

Its true that the mechanics of games seem to recycle, mike was quite right in sayin that Fear in all essence, is infact a shiny version of Pac-Man, but then arnt the concepts for anything the same, a game designers really limited in what he can actually bring to the table.
He could have creative genius, but unless he has an able squadron of team members, then its not going to go very far, and the main deciding factor is money, you cant experiment too much because failure isnt an option, so reinventing that which is known to be good is sumet that is abused intensly, not mentioning any developers at all........... EA GAMES YOU DICKS!! frigin sports crap!!!

But unlike most aspects of the games industries work force, designers are usualy fairly specific in their role, unless they have an expansive understanding of various game genres, an FPS designer would not be able to walk in an produce an RPG, these aspects break down further with region, an RPG in the UK has an entirely different feel from a Japanese one as their compensating for a totaly different demographics.

Humanity an technology

2007-11-13T15:01:00.000-08:00

Today was yet another awesome delve into the ideas surrounding human evolution an how technology will, and is, affecting us.

I found myself completly freaked out in a way by the fact that people live their lives through the internet (dont get me wrong, my spare time is fairly heavy in the internet), but the story of the two who met through the internet, had their first date online, an ultimatly got married, it wasnt as if i thought of "what???!?" it was an actual feeling, but why?, in all aspects this is a great thing, two people are now happily married (as far as we know) so why do i retract from this thought.

For all intensive purposes they are entirly free to do as they wish, why should that shy girl who plays WoW socialise in the real world?, is their a guide book on how to live your life that i missed? people dont question the people who go off to be park rangers, who live in their little huts in the middle of no-where! but since the birth of the internet all those little rules that hide in peoples subconcious are becoming questioned. These kinds of thought always relate me back to the idea of religeon, DONT CLOSE THE WINDOW, i aint a religeous nut or anything, it just relates to a quote from a favourite film of mine,

Dogma - "You can change an idea. Changing a belief is trickier. Life should be malleable and progressive; working from idea to idea permits that. Beliefs anchor you to certain points and limit growth; new ideas can't generate. Life becomes stagnant."

People believe you have to socialise in person to be human, or to be accepted by the mass, its kind of like how the Man is the bread winner, and the Women is the House wife, why?, these things have been built up over the years but people dont think about it, ive been conditioned, but i know i have and i chose to be the way i am.
Had a little talk with a certain person (you know who you are) about why men generally offer to walk women home, to the train station, offer to lend a hand with lifting.
My instant reaction is mild shock to someone opposing a kind offer, but i still understand that in a way this offer is making them out to be unable or inadequate, and even though people can justify it with relation to modern times an rape and how males are naturaly built more than women etc, i still stand by my offer even though the person rejects it. Women are the future in my eyes, no amount of technology can change that, an thats something that is engraved, it isnt just about personal view, or social views, i feel its instinctual.

So why isnt it instinctual to want to socialise with millions of people around the globe using the internet? why is it frowned upon to spend hours on an internet community where you can meet people who all have equal interests to you? just because it isnt in person does not make it wrong!
One very easy example is my dad, hes forever frowned at me and my brothers and our computer usage, even when i exclaimed

"but im not playing the game at the moment, im just chatting to people i know on it"

he would still relentlessly object,the birth of internet games, especially MMORPG has developed the idea of a game far past what was previously known, you can technically be playing a game, but not using it for what you actualy paid those original pounds for, your not using the graphics so why wouldnt you just use MSN Messenger or Facebook? but thats another rant
back to wher i was, there was a big turn of events as my dad too is rigged into the internet community now, MMOGG, whats that u ask, Massively Multiplayer Online Golf Game, its interesting how a person against technology can be converted through a common interest an so his subconcious rule has been broken, so will this happen to the mass's, will technology be accepted as a major part of life?, is it already an people dont want to admit it? or will people not have a choice, especialy when it comes to technical innovations within medicine!

That video covered part of this, to do with clinicly depressed people, and how "cork screws" and "wires" + Brain = happy people (thanks mike for that thought) :P
Artificial implants are happening, and although it is pretty much in the dark ages of its actual use, people are going to be put in the situation of death or technology?

Week 5 review the reviewer

2007-11-13T14:08:00.000-08:00

I stopped paying attention to reviews a long time ago, because ultimately you get the feeling that there may be some paper that smells so distinctly similar to money in their back pocket. Not just that but like the talk we had one wednesday, can you actually review a game, what are you relating it too? Its kind of like saying Lord of the Rings is better than the matrix, you cant compare, although they are both epic films, their not the same thing! Which is the better game, Sonic the Hedgehog, or Crysis?

Zero Punctuation seems to be a new breed of reviewer, at first i didnt think much of him as a review of sorts, shits an giggles are all great when someone has more than enough to say against something, but i never really respected his opinion as one that would ultimatly affect my decision to buy or not. But as i went through his reviews i realised he isnt just playing these games an slandering them, he actually has a depth of knowledge behind these things, relating to the company, the predacessors etc.
That an he had nothin to say against Portal, the most awesome thing ever ;)

Kieron Gillen, wow, cant believe how intersting that story was, that shows the power of reviews, but, that is not the norm, if anything it shows a good example of how to abuse the reviewers to get face time on mags, but ultimatly it comes down to the reviewer an as he so wisely stated, game reviewers are stupid because they dont have time to think and i have to agree, it only takes moments of reading a cross section of reviews to realise its the same murmer of "BEST GAME OF AWESOME EVER" (yeah i know its bad english) or the typical "meh" if it isnt puring bloom into your eyes an out your ears.
Thought this quote was cool "They knew I had a big mouth, a suitable attitude and a desire to talk nonsense about shiny new things" haha honesty at its best!

But in the end game of reviews, their dieing out, the internet an technology is getting to the point where its getting faster an faster, and the selling point of "FREE DEMO" isnt that attractive when linked with the £5 cost (and climbing) and bumf found within, when with our forever increasing bandwidth we can get that game demo, within minutes, find those reviews, within minutes, and ultimatly do that morally challanging thing of "aquiring" the game to test it out in full, within minutes :P
Direct to Drive or D2D is a prime example of how the game industry is following in the foot steps of the music industry, you aint going to beat the internet and the hackers/crackers/an general unmoraled youths, the future is digital, cheaper, faster, more user friendly and so guys like Zero Punctuation, people without others holding your contract in their hands when your typing a review, will pop up more an more and will be prefered.

Week 4 now were talking!

2007-11-13T13:25:00.000-08:00

Since the "great game crash" (yeah sounds almost historical, well it is, but i mean, like "great wall of china" style ;)) there hasnt really been any major developements within the actual industry, yes Sega droped out the console war, but in all fairness their games were ace, but your dreamcast sucked schlong, sorry guys!
an microsoft......*exagerated gasp* joined the market, which were all thrilled about, yeah yeah you make great games, an your consoles are powerful, but no one is happy your their, we all know your going to shove Vista of some sort into any possible future console, an you will forever break that which we call consoles!

But currently were in a very interesting position, ive always referred to it as the "Great Divide" amongst friends when we have chatted, the games industry has forever strived for realism, creating intence immersive games that disconnect the player from that which is norm. But graphics are getting to the point where it is starting to take a mild step to the side, for years ive frowned at these games companies, churning out these games that are "new" "best game ever" etc, when actually its the last game,
BUT WITH FLUFFIER EYE BROWS!!!!
so im actuallg glad weve hit this mid point, graphics will forever shift in some direction, but now that this high definition technology is freely available its the gameplay and story that are selling pionts!
But another deciding factor in the graphics market is the cost to form these things, production times are getting longer, this realism comes at a cost, technology is moving faster an faster by the day, and with this comes the temptation to use it to the full, which is impossible, the human power behind these things is inadequate, so i wouldnt be surprised if graphics hits a halt, or a slow pace, compared to the current.

AND with the incredible introduction of the WII, the way you play is brought into the equation.

With chris's classes weve delved into the whole idea of the connection between life an technology, wether it be remote controlled rats or monkey pong players, and the WII is the first step towards something very similar, its something that in my mind is going to start a chain reaction, its all well an good having realism within a game like Call of Duty 4 etc but ultimatly your using a mouse/keyboard/controller, an interface that people accept an one that the brain can easily muscle map, but with the WII your entire body becomes a possible interaction device, you can look forward an see the possibilities, they laughed when they saw the Star Trek tricorders "yeah like that will ever happen" yeah BT shame on you, gues who missed out on mobiles hey ;) but look what we have now, human nature is to find some goal, an whatever cost we seem to make it. The way they use GPS to show your location in cars etc, why not have that in a virtual reality headset, in a indoor paintball arena, where all the obstacles are mapped out in the game that is shown in your helmet, you see a block, an you touch it, but touch the box in real life (could be textured), would your brain understand the difference between the two after prolonged exposure to this disconnected realism?

Week 3

2007-11-13T12:21:00.000-08:00

OK first off, im going to take a stand and make sure i actually spell things without the txt chat, so the usual internet chat, lol brb OMGWTFBBQ etc is forever trashed, well, only on the "official" blogs, random ones are free reign ;)

In between the time I spoke about in my last blog an the current topic there were a few major things that shaped the time frame im going to talk about.
The rise of arcade games in 1971 with Computer Space was prety major, and the infamous Pong reared its ugly head around 1972 (yeah not really a fan :P ) and Atari was founded! Shortly after in 1975 pong was leaked into peoples homes.

This little period was major as you saw the movement from million dollar industrial sized monstosities to the ever famous arcade pods, which in itself caused quite a stir, especially seeing how 100yen coins almost became extinct when the arcade machines decided to breed like rabbits an swollow up japan, when japan gets going on something, it reals does hit it hard :P
You also see the movement to home computers, but that never fully took off until the the 1980's with the invention of the Commodore 64, Apple II (more USA based) and the ZX spectrum, all of which i have no idea about :P its fairly interesting to read about these things because i was never fully interested in the whole computer scene until around the mid 1990's.

The 1980's were kicked off with those major consoles of the time but took a major stumble in late 1983 with the infamous CRASH of the game market ( there was a smaller one a few years back but this one takes the biscuit )

Pac-man, another old favourate that I dont realy care for and im quoted as to describe it as "meh" at best, well it seems the owners of the sed game got a little cabin fever an decided to make more pac-man cartridges than actual consoles.........now either Mr Joe Blogs got a little playful with his calculator or those guys were really blind with their thirst for money! madness.

A few companies didnt have the cards to stay through the crash that lasted a couple of years, but my personal favourate Nintendo swooped down an picked it back up with the good old NES in 1985, an people moaned at the WII, its nintendo guys, no worries ;)

An interesting thing I picked up in my findings is something to do with Final Fantasy!! Seems Squaresoft were in trouble an FF was their "final game".........well guys have to say, for a "Final Game" you did pretty well for youselves, because Final Fantasy ROCKS!!!!!!

But the majority of these games throughout this period were single player orientated, yeah sure they can go around the arcade with their mates, but ultimatly the only interaction between you an your friends, are fists when you get knocked off your 1st place position :P their was indeed room to play multiplayer with the early machines, but it seems that it never really kicked off until the internet reared its head and Doom in 1993 opened peoples eyes when they realised......"i can plug these pcs together an kill you all i like...... OH MY GOD REALLY :D"

Beetorior?

2007-11-06T18:49:00.000-08:00

Did some quick character doodles when i got back from chris's session, me an cameran googled random things like "animal, insect, beetle" an whatever picture caught our eye we used as a reference for makin our "organic characters"
heres one of them which is partly shopped witht he rest to follow when ive actualy had some sleep :P

Wild West Water Cooler

2007-10-25T16:26:00.000-07:00

Had some funny talks with ppl about different types of water coolers :P alien ones where its an eye that you poke an it cries cold water etc.....no no these ideas were not drug induced lol
well i thought id go the other way, an make a high poly old style cooler, heres a screeny!

-: EDIT :-

ok the texture is prety much sorted, grabed random photos of wood panneld fences for some rough an ready wood textures! barrel needs to b mapped properly, looks a bit spazzy an however much i like that hazard sign :P i need to replace it with sumet more wild westy!

FALCON PUUUNCH

2007-10-24T05:11:00.000-07:00

After finding an awesome facebook group
"No I Don't Want a Fucking Leaflet I Just Want to Walk Unmolested to Lecture"
i made a little gif for them :P bit of fun, funny how youre always alot more creative when your meant to be doing something else :P
(falcon punch is a link to a game for the non-understandy ppl)

Week 2.....Continued

2007-10-18T10:45:00.000-07:00

Well my history with games is alot less sworded than the beginning of computer games,
and its all his fault

The Mega Drive was the first console I ever had, at the ripe old age of 5, an from the looks of things in that picture, hes lost a few pounds, GO Sonic :P My dad continually references me back to those days, if i ever find something difficult he remarks "Well phil you remember when you couldnt complete the first level on Sonic, but you kept trying till you could" but then the very next day would bitch at me for playing on the computer.....nice, actualy on a side note, hes recently been gobbled by the internet game community, he found a MMORG golf game, so now my brothers bitch at him when he doesnt pick them up because hes "busy" nice one dar!

But after the days of Sonic, its kind of a blur, nothing really i can remember apart from desert/jungle strike

The next game which entirly rocked my world was Final Fantasy 7, first ever game I played that was an RPG that funily enough i couldnt stand for 5 months.
I got it for christmas randomly, dad said it was popular, put it in........turned it off. But one very bored day i stuck with it and that officialy was the first day that games became something major to me.

Up until then i think games were a mere distraction for times of boredom, but FF7 changed that, i was realy envolped in the story, id never been a book person so this was my first connection with an actual fantasy world that you follow an interact with. Since then ive played various genres of games, spanning from RPG's like FF7 to Blast everything in sight like Serious Sam! No one game kept me interested in gaming, they all had their uses, like music, sometimes you need some classical, yet other days its System of a Down, but until i was 16 I wouldnt have called myself a competative gamer, i didnt use games to socialise, it was a personal thing.

Then Counterstrike happend, all of a sudden I found myself being naturaly good at FPS when i played against my friends in a video rental shop we knew, it had a LAN setup in the back :) After that although i did play all sorts, FPS was my main intermediate, an clans became a social angle to it aswel, this all coincided with us getting a PC that could actual handle something more powerful than minesweeper, and our introduction to the internet at home! even though we did have to use GAY O L

But the msot recent game ive played, and also my most enjoyed game of th present day, is something even the most hateful person ZERO PUNCTUATION cant touch

An amazing puzzle game with a big twist in the middle which completely caught me off guard, an with such good humour too, Zero got it right when he said, "its a short game, but thats not a bad thing, it means it doesnt out stay its welcome" an it provides a challange, the extra challanges at the end are difficult and are worthy head scratching material!

Week 2.....The Beginning

2007-10-18T09:40:00.000-07:00

Well it seems that the corporate types were dumb enough to dismiss the early idea of having an interactive game, well bet you guys are regreting that now! Ralph Baer thought it would make his "best TV ever" stand out even more from the other companies, an sure it would have if it was followed through, but at the same time a host of other creative people like Willy Higinbothem and Steve Russel were sitting unawares to the potential they were about to unlock.

As always in history, one person says they were the first, then all of a sudden 10 more people are shouting "OI BIATCH IMA HERE FIRST" but without proper proof we can only go with Willy's "tennis for two" in 1958, which surprisingly is just a bit smaller than the current PS3 and looks better too!

It was designed for visitors days at BNL with the intent to "liven up the place" good one Willy! Its great he got to invent the first Computer game with the intent of fun, opposed to Baer who's intentions were legit, but with the ultimate goal of money, Willy didnt even patent his warez, good ol Willy!

It took them just 6 years to realise theres money to be made in them there virtual hills, an so Sanders Associates applied for the first video patent in 1964, which was then intern bought out an abused by Magnavox.
One thing that i learnt from my research that confused me profusely at first, is the fact there is a difference between "Computer Game" and "Video Game" how mads that, seems "video Game" is defined as "A video game is defined as an appartus that displays games using RASTER VIDEO equipment: a television set, a monitor, etc" where as a computer game is more leaning towards anythink else, like Willys Tennis for two.

The other thing i have learnt, is history is confusing as hell!! as mike has said there hasnt realy been a decisive "HISTORY OF TEH PUTER G4MES" an all these different sites hand out different notions of what was first but digital versions of tic tac toe are not my idea of the first computer game, thats just digitising something, no variables at all, if you watch this stream of Tennis for Two, youll see the interaction and variables

<- Watch this

but i could rant forever.....so dont dare me!

Damn the zoom button!!!!

2007-10-18T06:00:00.000-07:00

Ok last night i got a little fed up of doin the work im meant to do :P so i decided to work on some commissions that i still have floating around, but being a bit of a perfectionist i kinda zoomed in an got all crazy tryin to get things detailed.......then when i zoomed out i realised that the bit im workin on is barely seen as its so small compared to the rest of the image ¬_¬

Steph detail by *Deviant-Ice on deviant ART

did tassly things in his shoulder pads an stuff, then rememberd hes this big ->

Steph by *Deviant-Ice on deviant ART

Week 1.........yeah that worked out

2007-10-17T09:07:00.000-07:00

So after getting around to reading the stuff im meant to have done, well i say read, more like, skim down to the bit where it has easy numb nuts guide to the task, you know, 1: 2: 3: stuff,
( sorry mike, your task bumf is filterd as spam in my head!) i noticed that this stuff is meant to be my first blog entry....."Write your first blog entry - a short commentary covering the following questions:" ah well, id say il make sure i do it correctly next time, but no point in creating false hope hey ^_^

GAH damn why did your blog have Zero Punctuation on it, yeah its hilarious, but i it just me who finds ther brain decides that it wants to try an think at the speed he talks @_@ *brain drips out if ear*

well anyways, back to the essay killer, well after a parusal of the blogs here present i realised its going to be alot more fun than i thought, because honestly i thought the "blogging" thing was just a clever way to say "essay in disguise wielding hammer" but no, seems this course is gona be good, even though the 2nd years kindly exagerated the idea of "enjoy your first year, ITL BE YOUR LAST" and that too was pushed forward by the blogger who's brain is leaking, who btw, should be commended, mike......your words have hurt dearest drain leaky “stick to his early work though, as his new stuff isn't as good”
shameful comment, shamefull :P

As for the blogs i dont think i can honestly diferentiate between "objective or personal" with regards to bloggs, because in all its mainly a mix, but thats the idea, blogging is alot more human than essays, they kinda lean towards robotic murmurings opposed to this more fluid varient, the theory of fun blog, well i didnt even bother to skim it realy, suposidly its the thing to read so says it, an im sure mike and co. will nudge us with sticks towards it but with all the quotes an links and messy lookin organisation i realy didnt know where to start, its seems alot more formal with respect to the other blogs, with fun being the main lapse in it, which is ironic seing how its the "theory of fun"

The 2 blogs i did have a good look at are brain leakys an the not so scary duck, because from the word go you can tell its gona b a bit of fun, an they do deliver.

But im guesing fun isnt the only thing on order, leaky does have alot of information an debates, was reading one to do with finding things cool on the pure basis of their japanese'ness'ness'ness, an i kno about that, had friends who were just too into that kinda thing, you know the drill, smile an nod an walk away slowly. Leaky seems to of got the hang of blogging, even though he hates the word "blog" it seems, but im prety sure im immune to stupidity, google, youtube, facebook, they all have mad names but the internet generaly numbs you, a slight mispelling of anything normal, an then all of a sudden your looking at god knows what an you tilt your head thinking "hmmm whats goin on her...............OMG NO MY EYES" yeah, that WAS my innocence.

But yeah, blogging, it shudnt be a problem, but i havent got around to doing the actual research aspect yet, here comes week 2 bloggin awesomeness ¬_¬

Epic Gif Collection

2007-10-15T16:57:00.000-07:00

Random yes, but what do you expect the fruits of the internet to be :P

AAA BLOGGER GO TO HELL!!!!

2007-10-11T14:23:00.000-07:00

Ok im sure the tutors an every1 love the idea of no essays, i do too, but WTF google blogger W...T...F
"hi im google blogger, please create an account"
*types my hotmail account into email section etc*
"hi everythin is in order, your account is created"

so i thought to myself, "ah cool, done deal",
"please sign in"
"im sorry sir, you need to sign in using a googlemail account"
"erm.......but i signed up using a hotmail account"
"im sorry sir, you need to sign in using a googlemail account"
"BY THE LIGHT OF THE MOOOOOOON!!!!!!" (aaa WoW jimmy gotta love him) ((yeah i said WoW, dont go all mike on me an get your angry WoW hating sticks and manga hatred t-shirts))
......
...
.
erm, what? ¬_¬ looks like im using a different name then :( but this one aint so bad

Distinction Of Irrelevance

Viko

Oh times are a changing

Infinity Ward

Art mode

Tech urge

OOOO a good start

Whats your trigger

Reflections

Hand helds are the future!!!

Blitz

Oooooo real art

Paul Wright

Blitz

Sculpty

Doubt at first, but persistance prevails!!!!

Personal Promise!

Act of learning

Error of our ways

Time for a change

Bradgate.....

GAH

Year 2, ooooooo im shakin in my high tops

ARRRRR

Little Update again

GAD DAMN BLOG

hmmm

More

Anatomy doodles

Playing

Bizzaro Head Sketches

Bizzaro Superman

NO you wont see what iv been doing, Yes il post what i do from now on :P

Week 16...............The L33T Culture

Week 15.............The big shiny world that awaits us

Week 11.............. Gameplay

The shameful return

The Tutors Vandalise and go to crack dens!!!!!

OMG WOW.........but man your crazy!!

Week 10................Ima character, aint i fancy

Week 9..........Game Tech

Just because

Week 8..............Stories (milk an cookies not included)

Week 7.......Game Art Directors o__O

Kiss my rifle

Week 6 Game Design

Humanity an technology

Week 5 review the reviewer

Week 4 now were talking!

Week 3

Beetorior?

Wild West Water Cooler

FALCON PUUUNCH

Week 2.....Continued

Week 2.....The Beginning

Damn the zoom button!!!!

Week 1.........yeah that worked out

Epic Gif Collection

AAA BLOGGER GO TO HELL!!!!