Posts by AlexM

  • Cyberpunk 2077

    Quote from ┌HP┘

    17 hours ago, ┌HP┘ said: Heh, ikr.

    Back in 2007/2008 I was working on a PS3 title, we had a third party studio doing Q&A for us, after the studio said the game is good to to, we sent it to Sony, it didn't pass certification, then we tried again for a second time, it didn't pass either and to send the game again you needed to pay a substantial fee, this nearly caused the studio to shut down, since it only got approved the forth time we sent it.

    Point is... their certification department is historically known for being very strict and with very high standards, specifically to prevent shit like this, so I don't know wtf happened here.

    I've experienced the opposite during the late ps3/ps4 era. TBH I've been on both the super strict end and the super lax ends of the stick. Obviously I can't elaborate but lets say the approval process really depends on the publisher/dev/game that's being reviewed.

  • Your GOTY list for 2020

    reserving this spot ?

    • Nioh 2
    • Spelunky 2
    • Rish of Rain 2
    • Gran Blue Versus
    • I assume Demons Souls if I could get a hold of a PS5
    Quote from DMU222

    23 minutes ago, DMU222 said: I've mostly been playing older games (as in not released in 2020), but I think an amazing game that took up a fair bit of my 2020 is Risk of Rain 2. The gameplay and atmosphere is fantastic and it seems to have been overlooked by a lot of people on here. I guess Half Life Alyx and Townscaper are also great.

    I agree. RoR2 is so @#$@$ing good. I have to really watch myself when I play that game or else I lose the whole day haha

  • Mapcore Job Census

    Quote from blackdog

    6 hours ago, blackdog said: Oh the guys of the ship breaker game, and they got three more projects underway? :o Congrats @AlexM!

    Did you get bored of the medical stuff?

    Gosh just looking at the pictures on the website I get strong BC feels ?

    Yeah 3 more projects plus homeworld 3 I think. The studio is quite large and is still 100% independent. They have some awesome benefits such as paying you to do research and prototyping a certain amount of time per year. There's about 10-15 of the best people I've worked with across a bunch of studios that all ended up here which is one of main reasons I joined. Some of my favorite managers, one of my programming mentors and a whole lot of other great people.

    For the medical stuff, there's a bunch of reasons but the main thing is I finished my 2 year surgery simulation/training project and it was a good time to move. I try to never leave a company mid-project so that I have the smallest impact when I leave.

    If you're even in BC again give me a ring :)

  • Mapcore Job Census

    Starting as a senior technical artist at blackbird interactive next week. I'm excited to move a bit more towards the art spectrum. Holy shit DCC's have improved in the 10 years since I actively used them. UV unwrapping is so much easier now.

  • Chess

    I've been playing a lot of 5-0 blitz. It's great since games can't really go over 10 mins. Basically each player has a bank of 5 mins and it drains during your turn. You lose if your bank runs out of time before someone gets checkmate.

    Kind of like action chess :D

  • What's going on with your life?

    Quote from TheOnlyDoubleF

    3 hours ago, TheOnlyDoubleF said: Voilà le lien vers le podcast : https://open.spotify.com/show/6nyuHat61…iT22MZz_6pZHiYA ;)

    I would not hesitate if the French Government was giving away houses in the countryside ahahah.

    I had some sort of alternative idea too. When I left ubisoft, my plan was to build a place outside of a big city where I could have a small game dev team but also space to have additionnal people working there like local freelancers, etc. A coworking place next to our game dev studio, and possibly welcoming some kind of game art residence there in greenlands. Sure the place would have a common food forest and a crop garden for people working there.

    That sounds amazing.


    Quote from blackdog

    1 hour ago, blackdog said: That's fantastic! I'm surprised they have houses to give away really, thought it was hard to find as they seem so squished together in cities. You talking about apartments or other sorts?

    Italy has been doing this as well for several years, or better said, local municipalities that have become progressively deserted due to youngs moving to cities. I think in most cases you have to pay a nominal fee, maybe just some law loophole, but we are talking of €1-2. The catch is that in most cases you have to turn them into businesses, cos they are of course hoping to revive those areas with these operations.

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    I'm pretty sure I've seen the same sort of deals in past years in central Italy, and I think the occasional "train crossing house" goes on sale (I believe is where crossing operators used to live as they had of course to be on-site to do it).

    ~

    @TheOnlyDoubleF the idea sounds amazing, throw in an Airbnb for game jams :D anyway was great to see your face on your facebook updates during the cycle. Grand adventure, well done!

    The thing about those 8 million houses is they are in very small towns. Very little of the free stuff is in the city. My understanding is that part of the reason this program exists is there were people who died who were the last of their bloodline so the property went to the government. The other motive is to bring people back to small towns that are losing population. I guess there's some similarities to Italy's program.

    About a week back, we did see a listing where you can inherit a large onsen ryokan (traditional japanese hot spring inn) but part of the deal is you have to agree to run it for at least 5 years.I wouldn't be able to pull that off :D

    Btw : love those Kirsten Dirksen videos!

  • What's going on with your life?

    Quote from TheOnlyDoubleF

    8 hours ago, TheOnlyDoubleF said: I burned out too while working on Riders Republic at Ubisoft Annecy last year. I can rely and say that not having a full time job is nice ahah. I've had kind of the same recovery moment after the burnout, covid madness and political insanity in France, climate change depression, breaking out with my girlfriend, family member's illness.... Life shit.

    But it's cool, I took time to build new courses for my level design lectures, I finished to write my game career book and signed a contract with a french book editor, I have time to read (I read the Ants trilogy from Bernard Werber, Karl Marx's misery of philosophy (and soon others), and bought many other things like Proust, Balzac and more classics) and exercices more. More importantly, I ride around France during two months by bike, visiting, riding and camping, meeting new people and way of living. That was a energizing adventures for sure. Will do again.

    Now, I have regular lectures in game schools for level design, I've started again my interview podcast of game devs (only in French sorry). The main question now is what do I do? Do I take a new job in a company? There are plenty of opportunities for technical design positions. Or do I go freelance as my heart is telling to? Am I able to work remotely? Am I not already too lonely? Should I live in a big city to benefit of culture and plenty of chicks? Or should I go and live in the countryside to get the garden I need, green lands and space for a dog? Wouldn't I be too lonely ?

    I'm really fighting with myself on those questions. My heart would like to work a third of my time on freelance mission, a third on lectures, and a third doing what I want but the impostor syndrome is challenging my ability to build a freelancing business on level design and tech design. Yet, I have an int for a potential client working on serious games and requesting assistance on UE4 stuff, may be that could be a good start and try for this way of life.

    It sounds like you've really been using your time well. Spending 2 months biking around France sounds amazing! Balzac also sounds really interesting, I should read that some day. Maybe in French.

    Post a link to the podcast! Quand j'etais un enfant je pouvais parler plus Francais que Englais m'est je n'avais pas parler Francais chaque jour pour 20 ans alors c'est jours mon Francais est merd :D

    I'm also heavily struggling with the city vs country thing. My partner is Japanese and the Japanese government is currently giving away 8 million houses, sometimes they even give you extra money to renovate them. We've thought a lot about maybe moving there and possibly having some sort of cafe or business. Either way, Japan is WAY cheaper than Vancouver. Since I'm a programmer I can pretty much work from anywhere and stuff is relatively cheap in Japan compared to where I live.

    I'm Looking forward to seeing what you decide to do :)

    Here's an example of a cafe started by some game developers close to Tokyo. They run the cafe and work on their games at the cafe at the same time. Sounds amazing https://picopicocafe.com/index_en.html

    EDIT : I found some more photos of the cafe with people in it https://placehub.co/articles/2911580594

  • What are you playing now?

    Playing spelunky 2. Supper addictive. Also great co-op!


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  • WIP in WIP, post your level screenshots!

    You might consider making a dedicated thread of your map with screenshots to get more traction.

  • Console Warz, 2020

    Right now I'm pretty much buying the PS5 for the demons souls remake. It's like my favorite series. Hopefully there will be a bloodborne2 or something too.

    With the way MS is going this gen it will be interesting to see how many console exclusives end up on PC as well.


    That said PS5 is sold out everywhere I've looked so I guess I probably wont be playing it until next year.