I have worked some soul sucking jobs during my life. I would even go so far as to say soul crushing. Yet, when I look back at those days I remember them with a fond disassosciation. The bonds that were forged back then were lifelong.

However, even during those soul crushing times there were things to look forward to. The work was interesting. I even developed a bit of a love hate relationship with the sports of Cricket and Rugby. The games we turned out even had some aspects to them which were actually fun.

After I finally got out of there I vowed not to work like that ever again. That work would be fun, and if not fun at least challening and rewarding. I promised myself that I wouldn’t wake up every day thinking ‘Fuck. Do I really have to go?’

Work is starting to get that way again. I don’t care about the product I’m working on at all. I can’t even refer to it as being a game without uncontrollable spasms of horror. It can’t even really be classified as entertainment.

If I wanted to just make software, I wouldn’t choose to do it at a game company. Plus, I would choose to make something interesting.

So far all of the technically interesting work has been cut due to capacity. There in lies the problem. You see, I like to solve puzzles.

I need something interesting to do. Something to hold my attention and keep my mind turning. I’ve had about two days worth of interesting work in the last three months.

Does anyone out there have something interesting for me to do? Gears of War 3? HALO 4? Google? I need something like that. Something fun. Something I myself would play or do.

It might be time to dust off the resume again…

Work is a use case for insanity these days. My team is slowly ramping up to five people. I can’t remember the last time it was bigger than two; and that’s including me. Plus it has been about five years since I’ve been a true lead. So I’m still readjusting.

I had forgotten how many more meetings you have to go to as a lead as well. It’s just crazy! You simply can’t be productive if you’re not at your desk.

Due to all of this I’ve been much more stressed than I have been since the old HB days. I need to rediscover the secret to pushing work out of my mind when I walk out of the office.

The scope of this year’s project is unparalleled to anything I have ever done in the past and is simply too daunting to be pushed aside. When something begins to blot out the sun; it’s hard not to focus on it.

I can still remember when making video games for a living was fun. I miss that feeling. When it was us against the world! Now it feels more like me against bureaucracy.

No, I didn’t get an iPhone. I looked at them, and yes they are cool, but I like mine even more. I ended up getting an HTC Magic; one of the phones running Google’s Android OS. It fits well since my life is basically Google-powered anyway. Everything has worked smoothly and intuitively right out of the box.

Since getting the new phone and literally having the internet at my fingertips I’ve been going through a phase that I can only compare to when I first got internet access 12 years ago. I’m up until ridiculously late every night just surfing the web, listening to internet radio and watching YouTube.

It is also my first GPS device. GPS + internet is very cool and filled with possibilities! Some of the “augmented reality” applications are very cool. One example is using the GPS+maps+camera to overlay the map data on top of the live camera image using the GPS data.

Well hopefully this post works

I hate times like these. Going from something great to something terrible.

On the plus side, it means that I got my compensation time a little earlier than planned and I have enjoyed having the week off. We headed over to Salt Spring Island for the long weekend, and it was fantastic. They have one of the top rated Farmer’s Markets in Canada, and it definitely lived up to the billing. We love food, and it surely delivered.

We also had fun touring around the island. I think I could have stayed there forever. It reminded me a lot of small town life, and how in some ways I really miss that. I miss being in a community of friendly people where strangers say Hello on the street. A place that isn’t over run with the homeless. Most importantly, a place where life is a little more relaxed.

Once again, the thoughts of running my own studio have drifted back into my mind. It is pretty much a given that at some point I will end up working for myself or starting a company either myself or with others I know and would love to work with again. Being a low paid cog in a multibillion dollar machine can be a little depressing at times.

Enough of that, time for some pictures!

In addition to the Market, the view and the farms; we also found a great little restaurant. The kind of place we wish we could find around where we live. If you are ever in Ganges on Salt Spring Island I whole heartedly recommend that you should stop by Auntie Pesto’s (their homepage is under construction, so this is a link to the Salt Spring Island Chamber of Commerce site that has the pertinent details for the restaurant) for a bite to eat. I have never encountered such a perfect balance of quality, portion size and value. It was so good, we went twice and nearly trekked our way there for a third round with their menu.

And now it is time for a couple of days of dedicated gaming before making the return to the grind.

Work has been… odd to say the least. There have been a lot of organization changes in the last month. This all leads to uncertainty for everyone as to what product they will be working on next. There are some great opprotunities career-wise, but they don’t sound like fun. There are also some fun sounding opportunities, but they won’t necessarily be good career-wise. I guess we will all just have to wait and see what happens.

We’ve been watching some movies lately. It has actually been quite a while since we spent much time watching movies. Generally we stick to the longer, more involved, plotlines of good television shows. (Speaking of which Torchwood – Children of Earth was absolutely fantastic and you should go watch it right now if you haven’t already seen it.)

However we have managed to have a run of good luck with some quirky, yet excellent, smaller films. In no particular order:

Franklyn (IMDb)
- An interesting split narrative. Essentially one story is taking place simulatneously in two different realties and time periods. Pulled off quite well.

The Fall (IMDb)
- This one is by the director of The Cell. I’m not sure I need to say too much more. The bulk of the film is a story told by an injured stuntman told to a little girl as seen through her imagination. It is well crafted and well acted. I’m not sure how the world managed to miss this film.

The Science of Sleep (IMDb)
- A quirky french film about a man who often gets reality and his dreams mixed up; and how that complicates both his work and his personal life.

After watching those movies, which were all basically independent films, I started thinking more about all of the movies made around the world that don’t make it to North America. I miss the days of my youth when so many of the Asian action movies would make there way here.

So, I started looking around for some Top 10 lists for various countries. Japan, Korea, France, even good ol’ Canada. And much to my delight I discovered that martial arts action movies (which have slowly been dying out in North America) are still very much alive over seas. Just to be clear, I’m not talking about epics like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (IMDb) or John Woo’s latest Red Cliff (IMDb). I’m talking about campy, over the top action like Crows Zero (IMDb) and Marine Boy (IMDb); or what people like myself would call “fun” movies.

Along the way I found some pretty cool sites for Asian movie reviews such as:

• Koreanfilm.org
• HanCinema The Korean Movie & Drama Database
• LoveHKFilm.com
• Midnight Eye – The latest and best in Japanese Cinema
• JAPAN CINEMA

It is indeed good to know that there are still good, bad action movies being made out there. Even if I do have to watch them with subtitles.

That kind of situation is never good for team morale.

Regardless, that period is behind us now. I am now on the last day of a three day weekend and I am finally starting to feel like a normal human being again. I know the push to all of the milestones between now and beta will be tough, but at least we won’t be getting heaps of new features piled on us.

Alpha to Beta is one of my favourite parts of a project. It is the home stretch of the project. The point at which you are just fixing bugs. Grinding away at them until you finally hit zero and then scrambling to keep them at zero.

As much as I do enjoy this part of the project, I really can’t wait for the whole thing to be pushed out the door.

As for my Wings? I’m disappointed. I’m not disappointed that they lost. That I can accept. I’m disappointed that they didn’t play last night. Other than about two minutes in the second period and maybe another two minutes in the third period, that wasn’t my Detroit Red Wings team that I have come to know and love. I understand that most of them are injured. I understand that they had a long hard road to the final. In the end though, they just didn’t show up. It resulted in what has to be the least exciting game seven I’ve ever seen.

I am also disappointed by the officiating that took place in the final round. It was bad for both teams. It was bad for the league. That game last night was a return to the clutching and grabbing style of hockey we got used to in the mid 90’s.

I enjoyed the officiating in the first three rounds of the playoffs where they didn’t call every little thing like in the regular season, but in the final round they simply put the whistles away. It was a disgrace to the league and to the sport. I always hear the line “they don’t want a playoff game to be decided by officiating and power plays”, but I don’t understand. Isn’t that how the other 82 games a year that each team plays is decided?

One other disappointing thing for the league, is that because of the way the game was being called it went from what should have been one of the best match-ups to watch in this years playoffs to one of the worst. It couldn’t hold a candle to the hockey that I saw played in the previous three rounds.

You can’t structure the rules and the enforcement of them to let your stars shine, and then turn out the lights during the big show and plan to draw in more fans.

I’ve watched a lot of the NBA playoffs this year as well. They haven’t changed the officiating in the final. Just the other night half of the Laker’s starters were on the bench in the first quarter because of foul trouble. That’s the way it should be.

If the rules are going to be different in the playoffs than they are in the regular season, how can you possibly build a team to be great at both?

I also have to say that the scheduling this year has been atrocious. I miss the days when the playoff games were every other night. Again, it is just crazy to schedule back to back games in the playoffs, and then to turn around and have massive breaks between games of three and sometimes more days. It causes a loss of momentum for fans. You never know when the next game will actually be. I understand that sometimes the arena has been scheduled for other things; but honestly, aren’t those arenas normally built for the professional sports teams? Is it too much to ask them to keep the schedule clean for the few weeks that the playoffs last? I definitely don’t understand bowing to the schedule of NBC who doesn’t even pay to show the NHL playoffs.

Here’s hoping for an exciting off-season starting with an exciting draft.

Go Wings! Go!

I could blame it on work, which has been ramping up as we head toward our milestone on Tuesday. I could blame it on the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs and how they have consumed my evenings and weekends. I could even just blame it on being busy.

But I’ll be honest here, that just isn’t the case. In fact I have started several, but just like a goal scorer going through a drought in hockey, I’m lacking finish. This one is going to get done.

E3 has come and gone. For those who don’t know, E3 is the most hyped part of the video game industry. Everyone saves up all of their big announcements, gathers together all of the gaming press and a few industry insiders, throws some crazy parties, and then in a rush announces everything. The big theme this year was motion.

Nintendo broke open the motion market, and with it the casual gamer market, a couple of years ago. I’ll admit I thought it was kind of cool at the time. To me though, the Wii is more of a novelty than anything. I have yet to find any consistently compelling gameplay on the Wii. I feel that it lacks good titles because the Wiimote is so gimicky. If I were a kid the Wii would be my favourite console. It would be an excuse to leap around and act crazy. As an adult (with a downstairs neighbour who complains about the cats running across the floor) it isn’t really an option, even if I wanted it to be.

This year both Sony and Microsoft announced their motion solutions. Sony with their higher resolution controller similar to the Wiimote(althoug the Wiimote is pretty good with the Wiimotion Plus add-on) and Microsoft with their controllerless Project Natal.

I have to say that this current direction in video games while cool from one vantage point is also concerning from another. Part of the reason I play video games is to relax. Like on a hot day like today, I just want to sit there infront of the fan and kill zombies, do parkour, play some professional hockey and maybe, just maybe, take on the roll of a Gear and kill some Locust. I don’t want to run in place, dodge and weave, hack and slash. That’s too much work!

While sometimes that might be fun to do, I just can’t see doing it for a marathon 3-5 hour gaming session. Can you imagine playing Zelda when you had to be standing up swinging a sword for 27 hours? Not to mention the fact that there isn’t really enough room in my living room to play most of the games as they were demoed.

I do see the good in it. I see that one day my children could stay in shape by playing video games. If those kids were anything like me though; they’ll stop playing games and go read a book.

As a friend of mine put it the other day “If I’m going to be active, running around the room, waving the controllers, throwing elbows and hip-checks; I might as well just go play real hockey.”

The other impractical side of it, and I mean this seriously, is that I could never develop a Project Natal game in my 6′ x 8′ cube. Especially a multiplayer game.

There is still one other thing about this whole shift that sort of bothers me. Personally, I don’t want to be tied any closer to my avatar in most of the games I play. I don’t want to be that character in the game world. I don’t want to be tied so closely that the swinging of my arms performs a decapitation. That the 1:1 motion mapping and trigger action results in me killing people in the game world. It’s a game, not reality. Games are currently about as real as I ever want them to be. I would never want to play a photorealistic WWII game, or a photorealistic operation game. At that point it starts to become the real thing. It starts to become something that I don’t want to be desensitized to, and it most certainly becomes something that I don’t want to feel that I am really doing.

Once again I have to stress, there is some great potential for games here. Tennis and Boxing are great fits for this type of motion control. Personal trainers and exercise games are another great example. Games that are quick and don’t have to be played for hours to get to a save point.

Don’t forget people, games are meant to be an escape. They are meant to be fun. Just like movies, music and books. Once something starts to become too much work, it tends to stop being fun.

Now to bring things to a conclusion I would just like to say that it will not take 39 days for my next post, and Go Wings Go!

My view is still spectacular, but my desk is much smaller. We have all been reduced to 6′ x 8′ “cubes”. I use quotes, since we really only have two walls. Heck, I only have one, because the second one is the window. (6′ x 8′ is not a lot of space for someone from the prairie)

My nearest cube-mate and I can’t both push our chairs back at the same time without threat of bumping into each other.

This is quite a big shift from what we had just a few days ago. Those few days ago we had probably the largest “cubes” in the studio.

None of that really matters. The job is still the same. The good and the bad.

Performance reviews are over. I’m still waiting for the final word in which we will work out what I need to do for career advancement. The craziness of how advancement is measured may actually require me to spend at least one year doing something that is outside of my field of expertise. This seems like an odd path for advancement. It seems to me it will hurt the company more than it will hurt me for that time. Wouldn’t you always want your experts working in the area they are experts in?

I’m sure that someday when I end up being driven insane by the politics of daily business life I will end up trying to start my own company. Just what kind of company that might be still remains to be seen.

I have a lot of crazy ideas, driven by a lot of different desires. I enjoy way too many things. From high level design to low level bit twiddling optimization. I like making games and software. I even enjoy web programming to a certain extent. Ultimately I just enjoy making things that appeal to me. Things that I consider to be fun, useful or interesting.

In other news the lady that lives directly beneath us is the bane of our existence. She complains about how loudly we walk around on our floor in our sock feet, and she complains about the noise the cats make when they chase eachother around.

Then again, she is also the reason that our building gets frequent notices posted requesting that people walk more quietly down the stairwells. I think the Strata should chip in and get her a pair of really good ear plugs.

Now it appears that our bathroom might be leaking (we don’t know where or how or if she is just as I mentioned crazy) down into her unit. We actually went down and looked at the tiny spot on the ceiling above her shower and we were like (Wow, how the hell would anyone ever even notice that?) So yay… more money needs to be spent that we don’t have.

I’m not sure that there is ever enough money, which is too bad. Hopefully my side project will take off and generate a little bit of extra money. I’m not expecting anything from it, but I do like to hope.

I want to go home for a visit sometime. I want to take a vacation. I want a new computer. I want a new TV.

I’ve been tracking down a bug at work for over a week now. A crazy bug driven by an amazing intersection of systems and intermittent events within them. The end result is what is commonly referred to as an off by one error.

The trick here is that it is only an off by one error, some times. When crunching raw numbers it should happen 50% of the time. Due to the actual way in which events occur it happens more like 10% of the time in practice.

I think I have now figured out how to detect when all of the events that need to take place actually take place and compensate for it, but seriously, it is just crazy.

This is all a result of taking what is a fuzzy system designed to be the source data for doing a lot of approximations; and then asking it to provide incredibly precise and accurate results.

I can’t wait until this is sorted out and I can get back to some real work. The work I enjoy.