I am Doomed
I found my original Doom II disks at the bottom of an unpacked box the other day and had ago at playing it after like 14 years and it was amazing how fast it all started coming back to me. (See me playing though the first two levels)
At first I was like OMG I don’t remember it looking this crap… but after you get into it you forget about what it looks like. (See me playing the first 2 levels) I only ever played the shareware version of the original DOOM, I never bought it, but it looks identical to DOOM II so I guess it was just a different set of levels?
It was this game that first got me into moding when I started to look into how people were producing all the total conversions that came along.
Asteroid Wars
One of the other ideas for a game that has been milling around in my head for a very long time is Asteroid Wars. The basic concept is that large mining and production corporations are just becoming autonomous and akin to mini nation states with many self sustaining colony’s and have recently started warring each other like the tribes of old.
Basically its a long winded multiplayer RTS that can take weeks to play out. The idea mainly comes from things like VGA Planets and Carrier command, but I am also aware of games like ‘Time of Defiance’ but this would be my take on it.
I have twice written the whole framework for this and even constructed a full scale solar-system with multiple asteroid belts and spent ages creating a seamless scaling camera view, so you could be building things on the surface of an asteroid one moment and then zoom out to see the whole of the solar system the next in one fluid motion.
But as always I get bogged down in detail, I spent ages learning the physics behind orbital motion and the whole solar system became a full scale simulation that was really unnecessary.
If it do attempt this again I really need to just concentrate on a small section of a single asteroid belt and have everything static (like a standard rts map but in 3D) Just a few thousand asteroids.
But I still want to go with the idea of procedurally generating everything, including the individual asteroids mesh/shape so they are unique and deformable.
The main building view would be like the planet view on spore, you are tethered to the asteroid and can spin it around in full 3D, placing building sites anywhere on the surface. And in a way the buildings and population centres would ideally play out a bit like an ‘Anno’ game, in terms of keeping your colonists happy and providing them with the things they need whilst either trading or making war with your neighbours.
I really like the Wing commander or Battlestar Galactica style of space combat Basically WWII carriers and battleships but in space.
But I also like the idea of keeping with real physics and projecting current tech into future tech and imagining what it could be like, where the quickest way of getting somewhere would be to accelerate up-to the halfway point and then de-accelerate again to come to a stop at your destination. Just like the combat in Elite.
I love these pale blue dot videos, Carl Sagan Is one of the people I most admire,
I first came across it way back from a YTMND clip and remember feeling very moved and inspired by Carl’s words, and the plinky plonky piano tune that sounds like a slowed down version of ‘running in the 90s’.
This is another good version with Pink Floyd’s ‘On the turning away’
And This is a video with just Carl talking.
And while I am spamming you with links here is another one, not Carl Sagan but a very interesting insight into our universe non the less, its about the Hubble deep field view.
My love/hate affair with MMORPGs
My first MMO was Ultima Online when I was 17 and I played that for 4 years off and on, I made lots of great friends and my char was ‘Tren Harkingson’ on the Europa shard (if anyone remembers me) I dabbled with Everquest and Asheron’s Call followed quickly by Dark ages of Camelot, but by this time I knew I was falling out of love with MMO’s. I did put 3 years into Eve Online though but that was sporadic with lots of time away.
I realised that I was wasting way to much time playing these games and the only thing that really kept me coming back was the social side of things and talking to people in my guild/clan the games themselves where getting progressively shallower in terms of interactivity with and immersion in the game world it’s self.
I still pick up the newest MMO every so often, Conan, and Darkfall, but they have all been fleeting, I have’t even tried WOW.
What I fell in love with was a persistent virtual world crafted with such attention to detail as to draw you in and hold the immersion, it was dynamic enough that the mob spawns wondered the world and fought each other and you could build your house anywhere you could find room, and player run towns sprung up everywhere. You could herd and shear sheep, harvest crops, play statesman/general, or go on far away adventures collecting rare items. Even most of the tools you used where player craftable. It defined the term ‘sandbox’ for me.
Nothing else since has had the same level of what tends to get referred to as ‘fluff’ and what I call attention to detail since. I am sure its this that captured my imagination, it’s like they created a deep and dynamic virtual world first and then sort to use it as a setting or stage for a game rather than the other way around.
The magic may have just come from the fact it was really the first of its kind and the people that played it were for the most part geeks and nerds that had previously played paper based role-playing games, you could kill someone and steal all of there stuff but it didn’t happen all that often and people stuck together and helped each other out alot more that modern full loot games.
Ever since leaving UO I have wanted to create its spiritual successor, an even more lush, detailed and dynamic world, but I have been biding my time waiting for both my knowledge and the technology to grow to a point where my vision for an MMO is feasible, I think we may be approaching that time…
I am worried that the magic of UO will be imposable to re-capture, the world (real) has moved on, the types of people that play these games have changed, I have changed, but the impression it left on me was so great I think I still need to try.
If anyone is interested in helping trying to create an UO inspired 3D MMO feel free to get in contact, I could use all the help I can get on this one.
It might not work and all the big company’s obviously don’t think it could as each new game they produce is getting progressively more ‘themepark like’ to the extent that games such as Darkfall can now be labled as sandbox.
I want to create a large procedurally generated landscape with dynamic forests and foliage, all the development effort will go into creating the things that players can build and interact with, monster spawns will be dynamic and towns and city’s player built. The term sandbox is overused and has nearly lost all meaning, but that’s what I want to create a true sandbox rpg world.
It still blows me away that men piloted a hunk of metal roughly 477k miles to the moon and back in something with so many mechanical switches.
(Also, something something UX design.)
via history.nasa.gov
When I grow up I want to be a…
What did you want to be… Since the the age of about 8 when I found out about computers and computer games I wanted to be a game designer, that then led to basic hobbyist programming and by the age of 12 or 13 I knew I wanted to be a programmer.
And I am… Which is one of the reasons I feel so incredibly lucky in doing what I am doing, the only job I ever really wanted to do.
I guess I am geeky enough that if it hadn’t been programming it might have been history, archaeology or one of the sciences, I love physics but I am not really academic and my dyslexia held me back in school, literally sometimes.
I will always remember being held back after class when I was… 7 or so when we were copying down something from the blackboard and told I couldn’t go until I had finished, well after what seemed like ages my Mum ended up coming in the class with the head teacher to see what the hold up was, and I had everyone moaning at me for being unable to do such a seemly simple task when everyone else had managed it like an hour ago and had all gone home. Like I was doing it on purpose or just wasn’t trying…
Luckily It wasn’t long after that I was diagnosed with dyslexia and things became a lot easier, though I was teased and bullied all the way though school for having extra help and classes to cope with it, but in the end they really did help and I would hate to think where I would be now if not for all that extra help.
I have written or helped write ‘scan pick and pack’ software, website back-end, order-fulfilment and stock management program, mail-order, site access control, 2D floor-plan designer, portrait photo capture software, card printing software, workforce scheduling, 3D game demos, MMO server architecture tech demos, evolution simulator…
And my hobby is designing games and writing tools and tech demos. The main thing I would love to achive at some point is to complete and publish a working MMO game, both client and server. (Albeit self publish on the web)
The main language I use for games at the moment is C# and XNA but I also use Java and have been looking at project Dark-star, now called project RedDwarf
and have been looking at creating an android game since I now have an android phone.
So is there anyone else out there that always knew what they wanted to do, it seems I am alone in this… most people don’t have a clue what they want to do or even if they do never end up doing it.
Walk with my Dad and his Dog
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Youtube Link
Went back to visit my parents this weekend and went out for a walk, only about 4.5 miles but spending some quality time with my Dad and his new Dog… Well it’s my Mums dog really that my Dad didn’t want to get but now loves.
Again took some pictures and video with the HTC Desire while using tracks to follow us around the walk, the video is fairly naff and the sound quality naffer but the photos are quite good from the 5mp camera, I think I will continue to use my Creative Vado for video in the future.
As well as lots of wind noise, I seem to have subconsciously or should that be self-consciously hummed a little tune each time I pressed record!? Only noticed when editing.
I love my Beyerdynamic 770 head phones
I have had them for ages now, but they are brilliant for listing to music really loudly at 23:30 at night. I am driving them from a B-Tech headphone amp and they have loads of bass, I pick up so much more detail when listen with these than my desktop speakers or ear-buds… But what do other people use for listing to music?
Having said that the ear-buds that came with my HTC Desire are the most comfortable I have ever had and I have bought at least half a dozen of them before now trying to find a decent pair.
I would like to get some decent desktop speakers for my PC as my current Altec Lansing flat panel jobbies are useless, but what should I get?
Everything sounds naff compared to the headphones though the amp and I have just gotten used to wearing my Beyerdynamic headphones at the PC now as they are so good and very comfortable even for long periods but there are occasions when I just want to do without something attached to my head.
Pan’s Labyrinth
Just finished watching Pan’s Labyrinth, it starts slow, in fact it took me a few days to get around to watching it as I kept starting to watch it and getting bored and distracted. But I am glad I did finish watching it as its really quite good and worth watching.
Its hard to talk about much of what I liked about this film without giving away spoilers but I loved the line they walked on, creating this really creepy fairy tale world and then making it seem not so bad and even likeable at points while still looking and feeling creepy and unnerving. And then the twist at the end which I just never really gave much thought too so it didn’t come as a surprise as such more just a sad realisation, but I guess the alternative didn’t seem overly attractive to start with which tempered it somewhat.
I like films that try to walk a thin line, subduing their opinions to an extent ‘sitting on the fence’ that don’t tell you what to think, they just present and let you think for yourself.
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