kedaunglandlord

Time to work on Part 2 of Britney's quest. Also, I changed the "On Air" thing a bit. It now shows a preview of what I'm streaming (in theory). You can even watch it from there, though I wouldn't recommend it, because it's fucking tiny. You can click on the video, or either of the links, to tune in with a bigger window. Oh, and today is laundry day, so expect me to have to deal with that a points.

Let's just pretend Friday didn't happen and move on. I don't want to talk about it. Working on Cursed today. As promised, I'm working on the Brittany mission, which I hope to complete within the next couple of days. I might only be working for a couple of hours before cleaning duties kick in, but if I get into a groove, we'll see what transpires. EDIT: Well, part one (calling Britney) is done. Part two is interacting with her at the apartment, which I'll do tomorrow. Part three is dealing with completing the mission (for good or for ill), with Maria's return. There is an additional part, which is dealing with Britney after  the mission (she can be removed from the game if you do things a particular way, but she can either be a drinking buddy, fuck buddy, or friend otherwise), and in the interest of actually completing  content, I'll do that before I move on to anything else, but I can release a new update after part 3 is done.

A week ago very few people knew what FRONTIERS was. A few playtesters (all onsite), maybe a couple hundred folks I'd reached out to personally or on the gamedev forums, and my wife. I posted my trailer thinking hey, maybe I'll double that. Now I don't even know how to estimate. A hundred thousand? YouTube alone is cooling off at around seventy thousand. That's not to say they everyone who saw it gives a shit, but the logo has touched their eyeballs. I still can't process it. And it was mainly due to one article. ONE Rock Paper Shotgun article that I had no idea was coming and suddenly the trailer was getting waaaaaay more attention than I was ready for. The internet is INSANE, man. And the craziest thing of all? 100k is small potatoes. Spuds, really. Look at the views and visitors that some Indie games are working with. It can be millions of people. How the hell do they handle it? I know at some point I'll have to at least try and court that level of exposure...

EDIT: All game files have been uploaded as zip files. If you've been having the "unreadable" error, try downloading now. No, not de com pression. Although, I guess, sudden decompression... Anyway, it's been a rough couple of weeks. Had a couple of job prospects that didn't really pan out for whatever reason, despite what I thought were good interviews, so I'm still looking. Might have to work at McDonald's at this rate. Wouldn't that be fun. But no one cares about that, so here's the deal: not going to be working on anything again today, but tomorrow, I will be. The only way to get out of depression is to crawl out of it, right? So, I have to force myself to do so. So then why am I not working on something today? Because I looked at my email box and realized that I am an asshole and haven't answered emails since January . Which is such  a dick move. I'm going to go through that backlog and reply to everything , whether it's out of date,...

  I thought I would pass along some shots of the Eisenkern APC. When last you saw the design it was pretty much a roughed in hull, the final version received more details inside and out. This kit will feature see through window sections so that you may view the interior, movable quad ‘Scorpion’ weapons system that provides enough arc, azimuth and elevation to clear unwanted guests from your doorstep. Linked and movable front suspension, doors and hatches that you may leave open or closed (Due to the scale I could not create full working hinges on the smaller doors and hatches, you may need to decide if you want to glue the smaller doors in the open or closed position, the larger rear hatch has full hinges). The Kickstarter backers will receive the full crew compliment, 10 riflemen, driver and gunner. I won’t know if we can include the ten riflemen in the general release until we know how many sprues we will need to complete the kit.   I was able to shrink the vehicle down a ...

FRONTIERS is about exploration, and exploration is largely about mystery. And mystery is about guessing without knowing. It's about sensing the shape of things - it's that lump under the blanket in the garage. Is that a handlebar? It sort of looks like a bike but what's that blob near the back? Wait, did it just move? The game knows what's under the blanket but you don't. And long as that tension exists you want to keep guessing / playing. Take away the blanket and suddenly it's just a raccoon sleeping next to a rowing machine. Sure you get that momentary thrill of discovery but there's no reason to keep looking at it. A few months ago I realized that this is going to be a problem. Here's why: Dramatic vs. Backstory Mystery Mystery comes in two forms, dramatic mystery and backstory mystery. I completely made up those terms so if there's a third form, whatever. It's not relevant to this problem. Dramatic mystery is about plot resolution. Who's...

Just a heads up, now that I've got an offical FRONTIERS page up and running I'll be posting fewer promo bits here & sticking more to personal thoughts.

Some time back I sent Dennis over at Bruckenkopf the last release of DreamForge kits.   For those of you that don’t know, Bruckenkopf is a premier gaming site over in Germany, they host discussion and review covering all aspects of the hobby. Google translate makes quick work of the site for those of you such as myself, who barely speak our native tongue :) Last week I sent Dennis an email, asking if he had an opportunity to review the kit, he let me know it would be up in time for the German gaming events circuits that are now making their appearance. I just wandered over, as I am apt to do, and I was blown away by the review they posted on the Crusader. They said this would be the most comprehensive review in their history… they did not exaggerate… Over 100 pictures and a wall of text, explaining the assembly and his thoughts, good and bad on the Leviathan Crusader.     Here is what Dennis had to say in his closing remarks (translated by Google) We strive to c...

Some gameplay videos for your enjoyment. Just a few tidbits to whet your appetite for the proper trailer I'll be releasing in a week or so.

The Leviathan Mortis is now production ready! This was actually the first of the new generation of Leviathan I designed back in 2002... I still have a soft spot for the Mortis. Unlike the old resin kits the fingers and scythe will remain completely poseable. Just like the Crusader, the Mortis is highly dynamic, arms move, legs move, waist moves.... great fun and ready for some smack down. When will this hit retail? About 3-4 months, we hope... We will not make this available until all the Kickstarter backers have been shipped and are well on their way. Stay tuned for updates! Cheers Mark

...the more different they feel. Ha! Gotcha! Last week was a rude re-awakening to the world of gaming. As I often complain, my day job has kept me out of touch with gaming & gamers for years, so I asked some developers for a little help in getting reconnected. They obliged with an avalanche of websites and videos and articles. And holy crap things have changed since the days of five foot ten packs. Alright I'm not that out of touch. I do the Steam thing like everyone else. But what surprised me was how early indie games show off their barely-alpha gameplay, and how willing online reviewers are to not only play them but treat them with kid gloves. Last past week I absorbed roughly 2,561 hours of YouTube let's play videos and I saw dozens of early, early alpha builds with temp art, no menus, sometimes even no animation. And yet even the snarky, quick-to-judge reviewers were happy to ignore crashes and broken features. Not that this is a bad thing. Just weird. It's clear ...

New TTF version, v8, which actually gives you some gameplay in the third trial, so you can see how it'll play out. It still stops once you get into the club (or should?), but at least now you can see what it looks like. Oh, and there's a lot of variation in that one interaction with the bouncer. I also uploaded both TTF and Cursed to two more sites: 4Shared and Rapidshare, since it seems that Mediafire may in fact be breaking downloads. If you get the "RAGS file is unreadable" error, try another link. They're all on the right if you scroll down a bit. Edit: There was an issue with TTF. Fixed and re-uploaded. Sorry about that.

Fun story: my wife asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday today, and I was forced to admit that I had forgotten it was my birthday. Apparently, turning 30 is no big deal? Anyway, nothing else to do on my birthday but code. So that's what's going to happen. I'm hoping to get an incremental update out for TTF today: not a lot of new content, but since it hasn't had a release in two years, any news is good news, right? Also, it appears that that "RAGS File is Unreadable" error might be because Mediafire keeps screwing up the download. So I'm going to upload to 4Shared and maybe another site (if I can find one that's free) in the hopes of correcting that. Later today.

Plenty of things to do today, so of course I'm going to brush them off and do something with Trials. Just FYI, I will be pausing frequently to take care of laundry and dishes as they finish their cycles. I'll leave a note when such things occur.

I hate my day job. No, that's crazy, I like my day job. Right? I have a lot of freedom, the pay is good, I'm blessed to be working in a creative field, and my colleagues are wonderful people. Plus I'm lucky to have any job in this economy. Only an entitled brat would complain. But seriously, I hate my day job. I can sit in a chair for 12 hours working on my game and walk away feeling refreshed and full of joy, but put me in the  same chair  for the  same amount of time  working my day job and I walk away feeling like I've been sucking face with a Dementor. Okay maybe 'hate' is too strong a word. An indie developer's day job is like a really tall friend who sits in front of you at a movie - you love the guy but goddamn it, move your fucking head! Except he's paying your half of the rent this month so there's no way you can say that out loud. And you need him to pay for gas on the way home, so you can't even politely leave the theater. Instead you...

Many of you have seen unpainted or primered shots of the Stormtroopers. Since the release there have been many talented painter working their craft. These are the first set painted for DreamForge-Games. Most miniature companies will not release a product until it has gone off to the painter and they have some nice shots for advertising…. Oh sure, I could do that... but Kickstarters have a way of turning the ‘proper way of doing things’ on their heads. That’s a bit of an excuse really, if you follow my blog you know I never paint things up :) Here are a few shots from a very talented painter that is working on some marketing paint jobs for me.               What about stage 2 you ask? I was hoping we would make some of our lost time up from stage 1 but it appears we will not…. I have seen the Mortis in its component parts but I am waiting on shots of an assembled Mortis from China. The 15mm Crusader is basically completed, I just need to rework th...

I only have time for a couple of hours of coding, but that's still two hours more than I've been able to do for the last...what? Week? More? I don't have any concept of time at this point. We'll see if I can find my notes and make any kind of progress here. Edit: Well, it took half an hour to find my fucking notes (hate moving), but eventually I was able to get some work done. The bouncer at the beginning of the third trial is by far the most complicated character in it (except for the last two, but eh), so he's taking a while to get done. ...I miss the days when I could spend 4-6 hours working on games and not have to worry about shit.