Archive for the ‘Gaming Industry’ Category

Requiem To First Quest

Thursday, March 6th, 2008

 

Sorry for not posting in a long time, have been wanting to post but somehow time escapes me. Anyway, cleared my major assignments on Saturday and Monday respectively, and now I’m left with just the exams this semester. Hopefully I can score high this semester.

Heard about Gary Gygax’s passing on Wednesday. I think its a really tragic loss to the entire roleplaying community worldwide - his game has helped shaped many in their teens to avoid bad influences, and steer them onto the right path throughout their turbulent lives. I was one of them (though I didn’t really have bad influences, unless you consider the computer to be one) - being introduced to First Quest (a Dungeons and Dragons boxed game) when I was a wee boy 10 years of age. From World of Warcraft to Vampire: The Masquerade, and even Knights of the Old Republic, almost every RPG game is based on his innovative conceptualization ofrole-playing, combined with storytelling and tabletop gaming. With the rise of computer/video games, D&D made the leap into the digital age, and as well as connecting with a new generation of gamers who have never played D&D in pen & paper form before, simplifying certain aspects of the game so that the learning curve for newcomers is eased. The dice used in the games - classic Platonic solids - considered bread & butter of RPG players, and interesting objects to be shown around in class for math lessons by school teachers. Keep on rolling, Gary, and thanks for the world you gave us.

Wollongong is my new school

Friday, June 29th, 2007

Yeah…finally, after waiting for almost one year, today after work I proceeded to SIM to attend the UOW orientation at night. Dinner was a Burger King meal because I thought I would barely make it for the orientation, but a quick look at the time proved me wrong. Anyway, I tried out the Transformers English BK meal…and it sucks. I still prefer the French BK meal, and the Swiss BK meal is too cheesy and mushroomy. Okay, back to the orientation. They gave us a file and a free optical travel mouse with the university logo on it (WTH?).

There were girls there (sigh, which reminded me of a certain someone…) but the ratio is like 90% guys to 10% girls? LOL. Anyway, it was a pretty standard run-of-the-mill orientation, except for the fact that taking bus 61 to Bukit Batok is a killer, cause I wasted half an hour waiting like an idiot there before I decided to cross the overhead bridge to go to Clementi interchange. Oh, and I borrowed Maximum Ride from the library at West Mall, since my friend was raving all about the book, I decided to take a peek in it. Probably going to waste one whole day reading it, LOL.

PLAY! A Video Game Symphony - Singapore Tour

Sunday, June 17th, 2007

Yesterday night’s performance of the SFO with the Maestro Arnie Roth was really wonderful. I especially liked the Super Mario Bros theme and the One-Winged Angel from Final Fantasy 7. Their Metal Gear Solid piece was good also, but could have been better. World of Warcraft and especially The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion also deserve credit. Encore piece was from Shinobi, and the composer for Shinobi was there himself, though he wasn’t performing. Takenobu Mitsuyoshi is a really wacky guy, he was sitting in the audience and later came on stage to perform Daytona USA, and threw a Sonic plushie into the crowd after his performance (after acting like Mr Bean with his teddy while sliding up to the piano). All this for a $65 seat. LOL & ouch. I also had the chance to buy More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy CD that’s available on CDJapan for $40, which is about the cost of the CD available online without shipping charges. Double ouch. Thankfully the ticket had been booked way back in March, so it wasn’t much of a pain.

Oh, by the way, I was accepted into SIM under the University of Wollongong programme. I’ve waited one year to enter this course, and finally they have enough people to start it. Hopefully, I can get good grades in it, though its just a basic degree with no honours.

Week 4 @ ACPE - Flash!

Saturday, March 24th, 2007

Yeah, finally we get started on the good stuff on Thursday and Friday, Flash, and yes, I still detest using this software because I make alot of minor mistakes with it (missing ; ), and event handlers that can be assigned to any item, which is so confusing that you get lost trying to do OOP in it. I finally grasped the basics after two lessons, and am embarking on using FlashSandy to make a game out of it. Hope the framerates are high enough to support what I’m doing…

Week 2 @ ACPE - Maya!

Saturday, March 3rd, 2007

This week was pretty interesting, we finally dived straight into Maya 7. The lessons are so boring that I almost fell asleep during class, but somehow I managed to stay awake by doing stuff that is way ahead of the lessons being taught. I also have this funny feeling that Maya 7 is going to cause CTS and RSI for alot of people working as CG artists unless they use trackballs and keyboard shortcuts - I still remember the late nights I burnt during polytechnic with 3D Studio Max, and it was hell, especially when you’re awake at 3am in the morning, trying to animate your models and figuring out what is wrong with the keyframing.

Finally…the path to my destiny starts now

Friday, February 23rd, 2007

Went to ACPE for first lesson for my Certificate in Game Development today, and it was about Photoshop basics. It was so bad that I almost fell asleep there. Total class size: 6. All guys. Bleh. We’ll see how it goes, shall we? I am guessing that for local courses specializing in gaming, whoever enrolls and starts earlier, wins.

First time at IGDA Singapore Meeting

Thursday, February 15th, 2007

After work, I went straight down to MICA and tried searching for the room in which the meeting was held, and got lost in the MICA building, going to each floor see if anyone was already in some conference or meeting room. I ended up on the second floor eventually, where the meeting was held. Alot of interesting people attended the meeting, most noticeably was the LucasArts delegation trying to recruit people. Also, we had some guy talking about JobberWokky.com, a job searching site for the creative & interactive media industry people, NexGen Studios’ game development status, and a post-mortem on the Codeathon held at NYP. All in all, a very interesting meeting, being the first time attending it.


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