tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71672369350240511042024-03-04T23:44:12.160-08:00Gaming ImperatrixCombining genres and target audiences in crazy new ways.
Adventure Games For Women: Let's Do This! Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger36125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-50052721765052921652013-05-15T22:08:00.001-07:002013-05-15T22:44:26.272-07:00Checkpoint IVCheckpoint IV<br />
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As we leave the eighth week of classes and head into the final scramble to earn our grades and our pride, there is only ever one thing to do: it. What is 'it' you ask? An astute question, and one that I myself found pondering, rejecting, resenting, understanding, and finally accepting.<br />
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For anyone well-versed in Greek and Roman mythology, Nike is the goddess of victory. For all other purposes it is a shoe brand, a shoe brand which borrowed Victory's name align itself with success. But Nike's well honed motto has nothing to do with the Greeks, Romans, Olympics, gods, or even victory itself. The brand's motto is: 'Just Do It.'<br />
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What the devil is 'it' and why is doing it so important? <br />
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Let's apply this to work, education, or creative problem solving. How does one suppose it feels to be in the depth of despair over how to develop a creative product in a very short period of time with no right answers and an unfathomable burden of work to do once 'pretend' answers are guessed at? One assumes it is life draining, frustrating, paralyzing, heart wrenching, and just plain difficult.<br />
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But one also assumes, given a hard working person of quality, pride, and fighting spirit, that anyone in such a position is working very hard every moment of their lives on the project, or at least thinking about it in those rare instances it cannot be worked on. How must it feel then to be told that the solution to one's dilemma, the way to get more work done, the method for solving those difficult problems is to, simply, 'just do it'?<br />
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Last year I downloaded an app called Unstuck. The goal of this app is to help a person diagnose where they were stuck on a project and what they needed to do in order to break free and accomplish what they originally set out to accomplish. Perhaps I was hoping for some insight into the human condition, some psychology or workflow 'secret' that everyone else knew but somehow I didn't.<br />
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Why were people able to complete projects I couldn't, to a level I couldn't? Why was I always frustrated and stressed; how could I avoid falling into huge pitfalls where I spent large chunks of my time solving problems that maybe really didn't need to be solved for the project to have a meaningful impact? How could I think properly and increase my own efficiency?<br />
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After I had answered its questions and gone through its exercises, Unstuck revealed the answer it presumed I had been waiting for: "Just Do It."<br />
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I was mad.<br />
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Earlier in the week, two separate people who I'd talked to about my difficulties getting the work done had both said the answer was to, "Just Do It," and I'd gotten similarly upset on both occasions. <i>What do you </i><i>mean?!</i> I thought in offended exasperation. <i>I've been doing nothing but working! I'm working so much I'm working in my dreams!</i><br />
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For you see, "Just Do It," rather implies that you <i>haven't</i> been doing what you're supposed to have been doing. The sound of those words implies that you were off playing video games, partying with friends, hanging with the BF, or skipping class to visit an amusement park, and that the secret magic answer to your problems is simply to stop goofing off and actually work.<br />
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Add this to a situation in which a person has actually deprived themselves of all games, comfort, companionship, and relaxation in order to slave and slave over their work, and "Just Do It" is an undeserved slap in the face. Anyone might be entitled to be a little mad.<br />
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And yet.... <br />
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Perhaps, one might imagine, the problem is not in the advice itself, but the interpretation of the words. Maybe the problem is that when we hear 'Just Do It' we hear 'You're not trying,' but the advice being imparted to us is something different all together.<br />
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Let's look at each of the words in sequence. The first word is 'Just.' This word has a few meanings, but its connotation includes overcoming some kind of hurtle. That is to say that we use 'just' when we are trying to get past objections and uncertainties and throw down a finalized answer that undermines all opposition and distractions. Therefore we can already see that "Just Do It" implies that something, some kind of antagonist or unpleasant cloud is getting between us and our work.<br />
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Consider how a mother might say, "Just do your Homework," to a child who is playing video games. This is not the first thing she announces when she walks into the room and finds her gaming bundle of joy. Probably she said, "Do your Homework" first, and then the child offered some feedback ("But I'm fighting Dr. Zorgan! But I don't want to! But I did it yesterday!"). It is this obfuscation, this cloudiness, this set of distractions to which she then applies the 'Just.'<br />
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Consider this second example. "Mother, I don't know how to do this problem," says a child, to which the mother responds, "Just do it to the best of your ability, and then come to me when you're done." IN the first example, its easy to see how the word 'Just' could be misinterpretation as a termination of pleasure (And therefore "Just Do It" implies you've been goofing off.)<br />
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But here we see 'just' in a different light. 'Just' is used to banish apprehensions. It clears the way by some means or another, for action to occur. The problem, "I don't know how to do this," is shut down by simple means of the word 'just.' 'Just' negates the stopping points (And everything that follows after 'just' clarifies that no consequences exist for failure to perform perfectly, only failure to perform at all.)<br />
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This brings us to our second word, 'Do.' 'Do' is a powerful word, but it implies some kind of physically manifested action of some sort. When we 'do' something, we create, we instruct, we attack, we bowl, we jump, we fish, we write a paper, we ask a person out, but we don't just sit in a windowsill with our fist on our chin and think for a long while.<br />
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However, I was already not in a thinking phase. I was in a working phase, and work simply was getting done incorrectly, inefficiently, unnecessarily, or just simply not fast enough. How could I overcome this with the word 'Do?'<br />
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Let's look at Nike brand shoes. The name of Nike brand suggests that victory follows in its wake, yet the company motto does not promise victory. The slogan isn't "Just do it and you'll succeed," or "Just do it and your dreams will become true." It is only, "Just do it." And yet the connection of Nike to its motto suggests that "Just do it" and victory are somehow linked.<br />
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They are. Unless you do something, you can't succeed. Nike doesn't promise success because it know there are lots of wrong answers. IN fact, you are going to fail to shoot a basketball a great many times before you learn to shoot it 'right.' Furthermore, in many cases we are looking for 'right' answers, when there are no right answers. Just variations on a theme. And some are more pleasant to us than other; but rarely is there a single optimal solution for any problem.<br />
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"Do" in "Just Do It" Means don't permit paralysis. Even if you must make a decision by flipping a coin, make it. Then stick to it. (This advice itself is problem-rift, you should always be able to quickly evaluate if a switch is going to yield you net profit or failure', but it's very important to realize that if you change your mind you're redoing work, and sometimes when you have a certain amount of work done you need to quickly re-scope and make something different than what you already planned that still meets your needs.)<br />
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"Do It" means you constantly have to act. You need to make decisions and then act on them. You need to constantly be putting yourself into a state of Flow, and minimize frustration between flow states.<br />
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"It." The final word is "It." It deserves a paper all its own. "It" is an undefined noun, genderless. Deciding what "It" is, that is, what you are making, what you are getting into Flow over, what you are carving away haziness and uncertainty in order to fail and succeed over, can be very difficult.<br />
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"It" needs to be simplified, reduced, possible, managed, recorded, and analyzed. Nothing stinks more than getting into a Flow state over the wrong "It"- except never getting into a Flow state at all. "It" needs to be decided quickly, decisively, with vision, and also furthermore it needs to be small and concise enough to be doable, with the core always visible. Before getting into a Flow state, know if "It" is really what you need, or if this is just you trying to make a perfect 'right' choice instead of the one that is going to get your project done.<br />
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Ah. After all that. We can now see that, "Just Do It," doesn't mean, "You've been goofing off and need to buckle down." Rather it means something bigger. Something about banishing fears, accepting the possibility of failure, identifying the core components, and falling into a flow state<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-22715016319530885772013-05-06T22:03:00.001-07:002013-05-06T22:03:19.467-07:00Checkpoint IIIIt's checkpoint III and the stress has begun to roll in!<br />
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As per usual, I'm feeling a sense of general malaise concerning... well, conferring just how <i>vague</i> my game feels to me. That is to say that there is and always has been a lot of <i>work</i> to be done in defining the exact shape of my gameplay mechanics. Not only are there a significant number of technical hurtles to overcome, but those hurtles must be overcome in very programmatic and exceptionally creative ways.<br />
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My experience working with Augmented Reality allowed me to really familiarize myself in working with strange and difficult to define problem sets that have difficult to locate and difficult to implement answers. But, at the same time, the problem set still posed some very rigid constraints, and that greatly helped to get me up and going.<br />
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Constraints? Made it <i>easier</i>? Of course! Human beings don't work well when you give them too many choices. They get overwhelmed by all the potential options, particularly if they don't have any means of evaluating which ones are better, or if their initial assumptions have just been greatly questioned. Constraints give a person a foundation; an unmoving pillar on which they must base their design. Constraints concerning game mechanics, visual assets, multiplayer experiences, item usages, and monetization can all help inform the game design process.<br />
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I can give a few examples of this. For instance, assume two restaurants with menus that have only written titles, no pictures. Is it easier to order an optimal or even acceptable choice from a restaurant menu that has five pages, or one with five hundred pages? What if neither are organized into categories?<br />
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The five hundred paged menu takes a lot longer and a lot more effort (research) in order to understand the range of options available to the customer and select one. In fact the easiest way for them to select an item may be for them to artificially restrict the menu to a smaller number of choices by only reading a few items on each page.<br />
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So it is that I am having difficulty designing my game. With the infinite range of all possibilities open to me, how am I to design a game that <i>wants</i> to do a thousand things, all of which have no definite constraints attached to them? I want to design a game for women, but saying so does not provide unconditional constraints for what I'm about to make. Saying "This game must be a platformer" helps definitively eliminate a huge range of options. But Saying "This game must be fore women" still leaves all options open, provided that they are executed properly. This is to say that the range of possibilities is not meaningfully narrowed down until at least five or six major choices have been made. And how can one know if any of those choices were the 'best' ones?<br />
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Part of answering this problem comes down to the simple fact that there often aren't any 'right' answers, just 'flavored' ones. For instance, the choice to make a first person shooter for women has a distinct flavor to it, and will result in one very unique outcome. And the choice to make a strategic knitting game for women also has a very distinct flavor. Neither is particularly optimal; though both feed different tastes.<br />
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One the problem at hand when speculating what women will want <i>most</i> is that everyone has a different idea than you; and truth be told you are all just speculating. When you specifically go out of your way to speculate that everyone else is wrong, (ie, you're not making a casual game for women and you're making a type of game that's never been successful with them before) you are not setting yourself up for an easy job to support your speculations. It doesn't really matter that everyone else 'going with the flow' is guessing just as much as you are.<br />
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In fact, their idea is the worse idea. If you were making a casual game that satisfied everyone's expectations and everyone already agreed your speculations were correct, you wouldn't be doing anything particularly interesting. Or opening new markets. Heck you probably wouldn't be making much money, either.<br />
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So one supposes that as long as one can quote everything I just said from an authoritative source in the realms of entrepreneurship and business, this argument/support is Thesis-worthy. But still. That's a whole lot of research and quoting necessary when the argument boils down to: "The future of everything inevitably lies in the hands of Research and Development."<br />
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Alright let me backtrack because I do love to rant. I believe I was saying something about just how much the vagueness of my own project was torturing me. The thing is that I worked on Augmented Reality for a very long period of time, and while I understand that doing so was important, I don't always <i>believe</i> myself when I say it aloud. The truth is that I feel I have spent an utterly unacceptably small stretch of time working on the back end of my AI; and that I think my advisers take for granted just what sort of complex creation I'm interested in making. It even came out in my thesis proposal: Everything I've done has been related to AR when what I actually <i>want</i> to do is build an affective AI-driven adventure game that promotes gender equality.<br />
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I need/want/crave/lust-after more time to play with code and game mechanics, and now right after working with AR I've had no time to play and immediately have to work on my Thesis. But I don't feel like I have an accurate grasp on even what kind of game I'm proposing- not really- not how it works, not how it feels, not what it's capable of, not why people want to play it, not why they're going to have fun with it- so how can I possibly research how to improve it or write about how to build it?<br />
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I still don't <i>get</i> it. I want to <i>play</i> with it, and I don't have time. I need time to <i>nurture</i> it, not just think. I'm exhausted by thinking, by planning. I need to <i>tinker</i>. And for God's sake, I don't want to tinker with AR anymore!<br />
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There, I've gotten that out of my system now too. The truth is that this point is a constant weight on my mind, a great burden, a source of suffering.<br />
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But let's break down my suffering and look at the truth. The truth is that I'm paralyzed. The truth is I don't know where or how to start, and that everything I put forward as a starting point seems hollow an ineffectual at capturing what I want. The truth is: If I <i>knew</i> where to start, I would <i>make</i> time for my game. It isn't that no one's <i>allowing </i>me to play; its that I haven't come up with the very first toy I want to play with. And that scares the hell out of me, because I'm midway through writing a thesis paper and 2/3 of the way through my graduate program. Playing with Augmented Reality was easy by contrast; I knew what the end form had to look like. This? This really don't <i>get</i>. And no amount of research or writing or drawing seems to be helping me get it.<br />
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Firstly, I'm paralyzed. Secondly, I'm exhausted. I'm exhausted by just how many times I've sat down and written out diagrams and explanations of my system. I'm exhausted by the sheer number of times I've done the same work over and over again in ever-different ways. I'm exhausted by the idea of sitting down again and working from the ground up all over in the newest draft- which I probably will get distracted from halfway through and never finish- and I'm terrified and exhausted by the possibility that the answer just might not come to me.<br />
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However I think that I know what to do now. I think I realize where I have to go next. The teacher feels like I need to be working on my thesis because I need to be able to think like a master's student. I get that. I understand it. I need to research. I need to grab sources. I need to organize my thinking process. I need to keep a journal. I need to track my progress. Okay. I do get that. And he's right that I need to work on the form of the research thinking, on the methodology, on the testing, on the citation.<br />
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At the same time, it is unacceptable that I go any further with my work without having something to implement, test, and iterate like Augmented Reality. It is unacceptable to continue onward without relieving some of the pent up stress, anxiety, uncertainty, fear, and paralysis surrounding the form of my game. It's impossible to go on without addressing these things; It simply can't happen. This paralysis and fear is giving me excruciatingly painful writer's block, it's stuffing up my thought process, and its making me second guess myself at every turn. As a result of this not-tinkering, I have been creatively handicapped and I can't think. I'm <i>suffering</i>.<br />
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What I need to do right now is make choices; even if they're guesses. And to make those choices, I need to narrow down the options. I did a lot of research leading up to this point and a lot of thinking; I've absorbed a lot of information and even though I'm not going to use it all properly the first time, I need an initial base form off which I can iterate. I need to set the bounds for a work I can complete, test, and evaluate in a year's time. I need it feasible and on the ground instead of in the clouds. I need to be able to reach my hands around and inside its shape and feel it completely such that I know every part of it. I need an intimate knowledge of my own design that I don't yet have.<br />
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In sum, I need to take charge of my time and use not just to 'get work done,' but to work creatively at all times. I need to write, read, implement, test, tinker, and enjoy. I need to alleviate the stress; remove the bottlenecks, so as to let energy flow more smoothly. And part of that is in accepting that I need to be able to do multiple tasks at once and to manage my time for all of them; and if I <i>can't</i> or I think I'm bad at it, then I need to learn. Starting now.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-38422543127308226872013-04-24T22:12:00.006-07:002013-04-24T22:12:52.587-07:00Checkpoint IICheckpoint II is our midterm 'review' of our thesis progress. My biggest concern at the moment is that I am behind with background research. After reviewing my research progress for the last few days, I have come to the conclusion that it is specifically the <i>nature</i> of the background process that is causing me headaches.<br />
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For example, I have considered the fact that I work best when 'free writing' and then retrospectively researching. That is to say that I work best when I have a 'story' to tell, I define the beginning and end of the story to scope myself, and then I write freely what my ideas are and what points I want to bring up and prove. After writing, I review the document I have made and I begin to see areas that need 'proof.' I can look at each of these statements that need 'proof' and answer the question "What was I getting at here? What was my intention?" The answer to that is what I end up researching.<br />
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After spending some time with research papers, I either realize my gut feeling was wrong and I need to go back and alter my approach (which has to be done with free writing, again, because more research will just exhaust me at this disheartening point) or I am able to find references, or alternatively I am able to construct an argument to support myself, but that requires additional writing in its own right.<br />
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This process works really well with me, and it is the means by which I will be able to write my design process, reasoning process, personal research methodology, etc. However it does <i>not</i> work for a field in which all of my preconceived notions are nebulous. Because a significant chunk of my research have either been black and white facts (need citation) or lengthy explanations of whole methodologies and theories which I've never even heard of before, it is impossible for me to free-write and then go back for a 'research pass.'<br />
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And so my research inevitably gets untargeted. Because I can barely articulate where my research begins, much less imagine where it is going to end, I have difficulty staying focused and on the point as to what's really relevant to me. Do I need picture-perfect depression rates stats? Will ones from 2008 work next to anxiety stats from 2013? I start worrying about the big picture. Then I wobble. Then I end up reading very interesting papers about the psychology of dogs. And then I realize I just speant the last four hours researching a statistics question that I just can't find an answer to through all the haze of business, leadership, and investment articles.<br />
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However, as my teacher has told me, I cannot stay on the background forever. Even though my background analysis is incomplete- and in fact does not yet make a coherent argument- I have to let it lie. I need to move on to my reasoning process.<br />
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I believe this shift will help me. By forcing myself out of exploration mode and into 'thinking' mode, I begin asking a lot more concrete questions. Because I'm not allowed to research anymore, I can't say to myself "I don't have a research methodology, I need to go research that." Instead I have to pull out a paper and some pencil and go:<br />
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<i> "Well since I can't research it, I guess I'll have to reason it. So what are my inputs and outputs? My inputs are an interest in women not gaming enough, culture, and the gender gap. So I guess that means my outputs have to measure cultural changes. No no no, that's impossible... Okay perhaps they have to measure cultural perceptions? And then if I really want to change culture, the game has to make the target demographic want to play it. So I have to evaluate their willingness to a) pick up the game b) play the game and c) spread the game. I also have to see if they simply like it."</i><br />
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Wow. After all that, does it look like researching my methodology is going to be such a big, vague, confusing chore after all? Or does it look like I'm going to be a research huntress with a very specific quarry and the means to identify it and track it down?<br />
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The background exploration phase was important to me because it opened my mind to the realm of things I <i>could</i> research (for example, for some reason it never occurred to me to look up theoretical frameworks for how a) games generate emotions other than Flow and sadness/frustration/admiration in players or b) how to use emotions in order to generate long lasting mood effects in players.<br />
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But now its time to free write and reason. If I can't free write it, I have to write out my reasoning process and then spend tiny chunks of time hunting specific answers. If I can't find those answers, I have to alter my reasoning.<br />
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I really think I can do this. I'm looking forward to what I come up withUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-48477368844976171632013-04-22T22:19:00.003-07:002013-04-22T22:19:16.827-07:00Preparing for Checkpoint IICheckpoint II, or the midterm, will be our 'thesis' (our 'written component' for Studio II). I'm not exactly sure what this entails. Obviously it is impossible to have done all the research necessary for writing a thesis paper that isn't to be done until the very last quarter of our masters' degree (which is a year away for me), on a project that we haven't done yet! But I'm assuming that this Checkpoint II will be an evaluation of whether we've done our background work/literature review, our basic reasoning, our criteria for what constitutes a finished thesis, etc.<br />
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Basically, I'm assuming that our teacher is instructing us on the <i>how</i> of writing the thesis. Some of us barely even have a thesis yet! So I believe that what he's looking for is to help teach us to <i>think</i> like graduate students, and to <i>write</i> like graduate students, and to <i>research</i> like graduate students. My assumption is that the midterm Checkpoint II will be a document that shows we're on the right track in terms of thinking, writing, and researching our final thesis project. This will lay a solid foundation on which we will actually be able to produce and evaluate some end implementation.<br />
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Still, that's going to be a hard checkpoint to reach for me. I believe I am one of a minority of graduate students in the major who currently has a very solid grasp of what her current thesis is and what her current thesis project will be. But that just means more is going to be expected of me. My academic inclinations and my very thorough understanding of my topic warrants a document that <i>shows </i>just how much thought I've put into my work. This is a thesis I've already been working on for a year and a half, and which has deep ties to my own experiences of being a female gamer and suffering from anxiety/depression.<br />
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Right now I'm concerned because according to my schedule, I'm already supposed to be working on my reasoning process- the process that will determine what my design principals for the new genre will be. However, I'm currently in a writing phase, and I'm still very much focused on background research.<br />
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It is to my great fortune that I seem to be getting better at researching. I'm less distracted by interesting statistics and information that do not directly support or effect my arguments. And I'm also getting a lot better at hunting down the 'missing links' between my logical reasoning bastions, and getting the data I need in order to support my claims. But at the same time, a lot of the background research I have to do is very difficult to lock on to. Sifting through countless articles on mental illness is something of a chore, but its necessary in order to get the data I need to construct my arguments. On the other hand, sifting through this data also reveals a lot of important factors I need to be thinking about when designing my game, as well as tips for what a well-designed game will actually look like.<br />
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For example, it wasn't until I started doing my background psychology research that I realized there was already a discipline of psychology (positive psychology) that was closely linked with studies on play, and which already understood that the mechanisms in games can be used to promote human happiness. That's a ton of pre-existing data I can use in order to structure my game in such a way as to promote joy. Furthermore researching the gender gap in depression really draws attention to not only what makes women happy, but also the stressors that they face, and the difficulties I'm going to experience in designing products that both fit their busy schedules and also encourage them to take more time for themselves.<br />
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I learned some very valuable things. I should be designing a game that is very <i>moral</i> in how it treats its player. The game should not encourage play outside twenty hours a day, so as to avoid gamer regret and accusations of 'addiction.' The game can and should encourage the player to experience happiness-producing actions outside of the game (recommending that players take breaks, meet up with friends in real life, or which offer praise and incentives for doing things like household chores.) My game can actually help gamify a woman's life, and like games like Superbetter, it can improve both her relationship with the game and her overall mental wellbeing. How could I have known that my main character should reward the player for doing her real-life chores, if I hadn't studied these things?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-60866540372552020562013-04-04T21:21:00.006-07:002013-04-04T21:30:13.282-07:00Studio II:Checkpoint IThe Prompt<br />
Every few weeks in Studio II, students are expected to put together an update to illustrate what they have been working on, and to help ensure that they remain on task. The prompt for Checkpoint I is as follows:<br />
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<i>Present research journal and blog, update on 10 open questions, present</i><br />
<i>written component outline, task list, research method, schedule. Peer critiques</i>.<br />
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<h4>
The Difficulties of Figuring Out How To Research Effectively</h4>
For me, the 'research' part of this blog has taken up the majority of my time. Although I have been working on my thesis and absorbing relative information for a very long time, the truth of the matter is is that I have been researching for the learning aspect, for the creative problem solving aspect, and I haven't paid attention to citing, gathering, and archiving my sources.<br />
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It is becoming more and more apparent that keeping an up-to-date, organized, thorough, and valid research journal is very important. But the task of keeping one has been no piece of cake. I often conduct my research in my off hours and save bookmarks into Google Chrome, which I'm then able to reference later. While my brain aggregates the material I've researched and keeps me focused on the right track, it has no interest in tagging that information with website links, names, or statistical data.<br />
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All of that's not very useful when you need to go back and write a thesis. Heck, even though you successfully manage to learn the information the 'first' time, you have no up-to-date record of what you justified and what you simply guessed. What happens when you have to remember why you made certain assumptions two to three years ago? A lot of times you might go back, second guess yourself, despair that you did certain crazy things, and rewrite half your idea- just to find out that the new revisions aren't justified and you really did know what you were doing all that time ago.<br />
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On the other hand, if I sit down with my research journal in hand and record each and every website I find and visit, and every tiny interesting word I see on every page, soon I have an equally unusable journal filled with nice quotes and reading material, that thoroughly chronicles one exhausting research period of my life, and which is otherwise useful and unsubstantial for basing a thesis on.<br />
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Its very hard to figure out what to research. What keywords do I put in? What exactly do I need to know? When am I justified? How do I find authoritative sources when I'm only 50% clear on what I'm looking for in the first place and I don't know how to phase interesting questions? How is it possible to keep a big picture view of my research process so I don't waste time researching useless things and at the same time explore necessary questions to such a thorough level that I turn up useful information?<br />
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Research can be exhausting. Frustrating. Emotionally draining. And go nowhere for way longer than we'd prefer. But hey, if anyone could do it, we wouldn't be special, right?<br />
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<h4>
"Research Methodology"</h4>
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Research methodology can mean several things. When I have something available to prototype and I want to analyze it for data, I need to apply one of countless different research methodologies to it and to some sample target audience. In this context, 'Research Methodology' is actually something that I have to keep researching!</div>
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There is another usage of research methodology that I would like to discuss in this context. It is not <i>merely</i> necessary to have a strong methodology for when I am gathering and analyzing my own internally generated data; It is also important to have some kind of living methodology in mind for how to gather external research from papers. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So in this context, I need a methodology- or a set of rules, principals, and guidelines- for how to expand my newly budding research journal. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<h3>
My Current Methodology</h3>
<h4>
Delineate Arenas/Areas</h4>
<div>
There are two basic kinds of research that I conduct. The first is exploratory in which I don't really know what's out there and I'm trying to get a greater awareness of the topic. For example, since I am marketing to baby boomers for my thesis project, I ought to know a little bit about the entertainment and leisure worlds of tech savvy baby boomers. Actually, how old <i>are</i> baby boomers, specifically? People conduct a lot of research on what a generation is 'like,' and this can help me get a better handle on my audience. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The important thing to do when conducting exploratory research is to delineate an area for exploration. It is beneficial to set a time span, and to try and numerically limit oneself in other ways. Limit Oneself? Why? I am a bit of a hoarder. I like to gather things. If I don't numerically limit myself, I'm prone to open 100+ tabs of websites that I'll never actually look at, and then waste time archiving the web address of each one of them 'So I don't lose them.' </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It is VERY important not to catalog the exploration in full, which creates a lot of unnecessary clutter. There is a temptation to archive/highlight every interesting quote, or to provide a description of every website. But this process does not usually help you in any way. It is important to go out and find one or two good representatives to landmark the exploration you did, to throw down five or six quotes, to nab a few web addresses, but the most important part of the exploratory phase is this:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Digesting what you did.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Not summarizing each website or paraphrasing each quote. Not copy + pasting walls of 'valuable' text. The important thing is to take an hour to explore, jot down a few observations, and then walk off with your notebook and to try and describe the basics of what you found. The digestion process begins sending alternative arenas of exploration to your mind. You think of additional keywords, draw a circle around the <i>kind</i> of information you've been seeing. You can write down in your notebook, "I found out that there are baby-boomer-generation-specific leisure websites, and that they rarely discuss video games. They are more concerned with books and physical activity. They do provide a lot of tidbits about the technology companies they love, however."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That's a lot more useful than cataloging a whole lot of: "2008 study, 78% of wealth controlled by baby boomer generation, which stands to inherit 14 billion as silent generation parents die."</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
It is very easy to get distracted during the exploratory phase, and its the time you're most likely to end up on a totally unrelated website like Wikipedia studying a totally unrelated question, like what exact temperature does acetylene ignite at, and is it possible that a hypothetically bio-engineered dragon could act as a living blowtorch? Taking frequent breaks is important, because information is easiest to digest in chunks. Breaks also help to avoid distractions by providing natural points for refocusing research.<br />
<br /></div>
<h4>
Forming Questions</h4>
The next part of my research methodology is to start formulating questions. During this phase, it is very important to have some notebook on hand at all times, because questions will come to you while you're eating or trying to sleep, and a good number of them tend to escape you. In fact, I never have my notebook on me, so I have to try and remember all of them, and let me tell you it is an EXHAUSTING experience.<br />
<br />
There are a lot of ways to start raising questions about your project. Once you've explored an arena/area, questions are necessarily going to come to mind. If you've found that most websites don't seem to include the information you need, ask specifically "Does there exist a website of type A, or doesn't there?" If the website doesn't seem to exist, forming a question that will get you to exactly where you need to go can be hard, and it may be necessary to conduct a large series of mini explorations.<br />
<br />
Eventually, however, as a thesis grows and peers critique what you've done, questions naturally begin to flow. "Why did you make this green?" "I feel that green will have effect A on my audience." "Do you have any evidence to support that?" Well now it's time to start forming some questions. What are the effects of green on a target audience? What products already use green and what was their reasoning process? Do other things initiate effect A on the audience? Is effect A needed by the audience? Is it possible that effect A yields some additional benefits that you assumed existed, but that need some proof in order to stand firm in court?<br />
<br />
<h4>
Take a Break; Refocus</h4>
<br />
Taking breaks is the single most important aspect of my research methodology. Without breaks, research goes nowhere for a very long time. And by breaks, I don't mean times in which you stop research and start writing in your research journal. I mean: Go eat. Sleep. Play volleyball. Hang out with someone. Drink a beer. Hunt a snowboarder. Ride a seal. Live, damn you, live!<br />
<br />
Breaks are necessary because the outside stimulus helps form new questions and raise new areas for exploration. Talking to a friend about what problems you're working on can raise glaringly obvious solutions that you've overlooked (why do you have a single equal sign in the if statement? *asks the statistician standing behind the programmer, slurping on her smoothie* doh!)<br />
<br />
Breaks are also important for refocusing. The mind starts to wander, jumping from idea to idea and eventually ending up too deep down an unnecessary rabbit hole or so far off topic that nothing of value is being researched. Breaks can either put the mind back on topic, or pull the mind out of an unnecessary rabbit hole and put it down a more necessary one.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Fragment the Question</h4>
<br />
No answers as to the effects of video games on the emotional well-being of middle aged women? Start to break the question down, and ask it in chunks. Do women play games? Do women suffer from depression? At what rate compared to men? Is it true that women have less leisure time? What do they spend their leisure time on? What is the effect of play on depression? In adults? Is there no research on that? Very well then; on children?<br />
<br />
And what kind of play is best for them? Freeform or structured? Is leisure time linked to depression? Can we construct a reasonable, logical pathway that pulls the effects on children and fairly extrapolates them to adults? What pieces are missing? Is there another angle we can come at this from? What constitutes freeform play? If the only existing studies involve physical activity, can we find another study that talks about the differences between physical and cognitive freeform play and their effects on a person?<br />
<br />
Do casual games assist with depression? Violent games? Social games? Role-playing games? Does 'online interactive play' assist with self confidence building? Do women like social simulation more than men?<br />
<br />
<br />
<h4>
Read the Blog Posts of Other Masters and PhD Students</h4>
<div>
Concerned you're researching 'wrong'? Constantly going down dead ends and don't know what's wrong with you? Read the blogs of other graduate students! Don't worry, it's normal to feel disillusioned, helpless and confused! </div>
<br />
<h4>
</h4>
<h3>
My Personal Progress</h3>
<h4>
My Research</h4>
<div>
My research has taken a turn for the better over the last week, with much more getting done than during the initial week of studies. My research journal is currently filled with the results of my first exploratory study, which turned up a lot of interesting quotes and background information but didn't lay out anything substantial to build a thesis on. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
At the end of week one, my exploratory studies began to streamline themselves as I took more breaks and varied my keywords from search to search, focusing on the first few websites found by Google instead of opening countless tabs and exhausting myself.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Perhaps one of my most important finds was a game called Seaman for the Sega Saturn which validated my original game-play loop (something I had been questioning and attempting to rewrite, feeling that it would never be acceptable). Seaman helped me think about my gameplay in another way. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The initial questions in response to my 'thesis work thus far' presentation at the end of the first week helped me move into my second week of research. The questions people had to ask about my research and about my beliefs were very obvious, but I was unable to form them on my own, submersed as I was in my field of study. These questions I was able to fan out into series of research questions.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Lately I've been able to focus on specific areas of exploration and questions to ask, which has led me to some very interesting papers supporting many of the techniques I intuitively assumed would work, and suggesting areas I should focus on and develop further in order to get the greatest benefit from my work.<br />
<br /></div>
<h4>
</h4>
<h4>
Sample Week 1 Research:</h4>
<div>
<i>What do they like?<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Boomers are among the biggest buyers of new technology and new cars. (Especially cars. more than younger folks) Source: AIO<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/advertising/2010-11-15-babyboomers-spending_N.htm<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> Their Source: According to J.D. Power & Associates</i><br />
<i><br /></i></div>
<h4>
Sample Week 2 Research:</h4>
<div>
<i>Does there really exist a significant gap between the genders in terms of leisure time? Yes. Source: </i><i><a href="http://www4.hrsdc.gc.ca/.3ndic.1t.4r@-eng.jsp?iid=52">http://www4.hrsdc.gc.ca/.3ndic.1t.4r@-eng.jsp?iid=52</a>. Aside from physical activity, has depression been linked to leisure time as a whole? This source suggests that non-leisure time physical activity has no effect on depression, posing the possibility that researchers have misdiagnosed leisure time physical activity as stress reducing when in fact the stress reduction component is that women are making more leisure time for themselves: </i><i><a href="http://www.ijbnpa.org/content/5/1/27">http://www.ijbnpa.org/content/5/1/27</a> Must research further. This next source not authoritative but provides good vocab and things to think on for forming further queries: </i><i><a href="http://www.lifepositive.com/mind/psychology/stress/male-depression.asp">http://www.lifepositive.com/mind/psychology/stress/male-depression.asp</a></i><br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<h3>
My Written Component </h3>
</div>
<h4>
More Research Necessary</h4>
<div>
The more I research the more it becomes clear just how much research I have left to do. My written component will end up being the most important part of my thesis project, not just because I have a lot to 'justify' and report on, but also because without this research I cannot possibly hope to product a valid thesis project. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Due to the scope of my thesis, I am currently focusing my written component research on the relationship between my game, women, and the play that will bind them. I want to know everything about my ladies, why they play, why they feel they can't play, the benefits of play, the relationship between play, leisure time, and stress, and so forth.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<h4>
Important Discoveries</h4>
</div>
<div>
I have made an enormous discovery both with Seaman and with the uncovering of data that suggests freeform play is specifically useful for stress reduction. Left alone, I would have assumed that the lack of structure inherent in my game was a gameplay flaw, and that it was something I needed to repair. Now I see that offering optional goals in a freeform playing field is the proper way to go. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
For example, check out this source: <a href="http://www.sodahead.com/entertainment/can-playing-casual-video-games-reduce-depression/question-1523149/?page=3">http://www.sodahead.com/entertainment/can-playing-casual-video-games-reduce-depression/question-1523149/?page=3</a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Bejeweled and Peggle are freeform in that there are not specific 'quests' or 'objectives,' only increasing levels of strategic difficulty. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It would be interesting to see if the game GTA had a stress reduction effect on players who casually drove around vehicles- <a href="http://dailytrojan.com/2011/10/18/violent-video-games-hold-hidden-benefits/">http://dailytrojan.com/2011/10/18/violent-video-games-hold-hidden-benefits/</a> & <a href="http://www.watchmojo.com/blog/children/2008/11/20/kids-play-violent-video-games-to-reduce-stress">http://www.watchmojo.com/blog/children/2008/11/20/kids-play-violent-video-games-to-reduce-stress</a> Oh wait! Be careful that's off topic. But wow, so interesting. GTA is singled out as specifically good at reducing stress and managing feelings. I wonder, is that specifically because of its freeform sandbox component?</div>
<div>
<h4>
Thesis 'Outline' and Expanding on Open Questions</h4>
</div>
<div>
While checkpoint I asks for an outline of our up and coming written component, I know I'm not yet ready to compose one. I'm still working on expressing my thesis and answering some of the important questions encircling it. If I had written the thesis component two weeks ago, I would have focused on the augmented reality aspect of my game, which was in truth more of a skin and facilitator than the core of my thesis. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I have, however, done some work in positing together what my final thesis ought to look like, and outlined some important components in order to keep my thesis online. Firstly, I believe that my paper is <b>argumentative</b> in nature; I am making the claim that my game will help promote leisure time in and reduce stress in women. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Based on this, my thesis statement should be assertive, and I shall make a shot at voicing it here:</div>
<div>
<i>Women suffer from increased depression partially as a result of reduced freeform leisure time. Women should be encouraged to play the game Agon and Alea, which uses a wide variety of techniques to specifically meet their freeform play needs and reduce depression.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This two-pronged thesis statement may need additional work in order to streamline it into a single idea. I am not a psychologist, and I am not interested in discovering the effects of games on female depression sans actually developing a game. On the other hand, there is insufficient research to quickly and easily establish the need for my product without laying some preliminary groundwork. </div>
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<div>
Some difficulty comes about when trying to phrase my thesis in this light. Am I identifying a need, creating a product, and then making an analytical paper discussing my findings (and indeed whether or not I seemed to have been right about the need in the first place)? Am I simply documenting my process, in which case my paper would be an expository or narrative explanation of my reasoning process and my quest for identifying a difficult-to-see need and then trying to meet it?</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Or is my paper truly argumentative in the sense that I am fighting to show that a culture where women do not play games is detrimental to female mental health and that games with freeform play specifically targeted towards women are necessary in order to improve our cultural health?</div>
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<div>
Looking at it, I can see that writing the narrative of my artistic process, from identifying the need to creating the project, would make for a legitimate, sound, and (For me, given my storytelling attributes) easy to write thesis.</div>
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But if I am truly out to change the world, I don't suppose any paper other than argumentative will truly do, mm? In that case, I must reconvene with my peers and mentor in order to pin-point target my thesis before a further outline is possible. I need to make sure I know exactly what argument I'm making, and where the weight of my written material should go and what it should justify, and I need the experience of someone whose already done it and the fresh eyes of those who have no previous exposure to my project.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-74666866943878024942013-01-16T22:02:00.000-08:002013-09-29T23:41:18.972-07:00The "Hit List"Today at SCAD Hong Kong (Savannah College of Art and Design) the subject is the "Hit List." According to the very brief summary in the syllabus, assignment 2 is "The Industry and Hit List (Choose ten companies and decide on a focus.)"<br />
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Now most students operate on a strange form of hearsay. We don't really know much about the world, and to be honest its kinda huge and unfathomable and vague at the moment, so our opinions concerning what our job opportunities are and where we will be happy is built from the opinions of other people.<br />
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And so most students, when confronted with the Hit List assignment, would end up engaging in a process somewhat similar to this.<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Start with empty document</li>
<li>Place studio of favorite game at top of list (Skip this step if suffering from low self confidence)</li>
<li>Place studio of several lesser known artistic games on list</li>
<li>Activision and EA are tyrants</li>
<li>Getting into a Japanese company is too hard because they are too insular</li>
<li>Put Ubisoft and Bioware on list</li>
<li>Realize you haven't filled in the list, just start putting down 'cool' games companies who did games you like</li>
<li>Hand in & move to the west coast</li>
</ol>
<div>
Let me tell you about my class's experience with the Hit List.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
The first thing you need to know is that my professor makes a strong argument for the case that not everyone is supposed to go out and get a job working for a big name company. A lot of students are going to want to try and launch their own studios. Some of them just don't like being told what to do, others want creative freedom, some want to choose the projects they'll work on, and still others will simply have a knack for it. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
From this vantage point, if we aren't interested in getting a job, our experience might be more like taking a look at our 'environment' as game designers. We need to look at everyone around us who a) can help us or b) has a good example of 'how it's done' that we can reference.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Even from this vantage point, however, we're subject to a lot of hearsay, prejudice, and insular research. Maybe now our intellectual steps in leading to our Hit List would go something like this:</div>
<ol>
<li>You'd just be treated like a cog in a big name company, and you'd never be able to make decisions.</li>
<li>Small companies have to do stupid 'snack,' Hello Kitty, and movie promotion games, and basically sell their souls to the devil in order to make money. </li>
<li>If you had to people in suits to financially help you out, you would have no creative freedom and you'd be a slave to the person paying you.</li>
<li>Start off making small apps and iPhone games with help of friend who is interested in going into games business with you. </li>
<li>So fill the list either with: small artistic companies to join, companies you want your company to be like, and/or friends who can help you start your own. </li>
</ol>
<div>
Some of these statements may be true or slightly true; others may be false. Whichever they are, they still stem from an incomplete way of looking at things, and a faulty logical reasoning process. Furthermore, they come from a failure to accurately define that thing inside of us- as game designers- that makes us passionate about games.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
One of the most important things my teacher does for any new student on a graduate level is to question every statement they make. To us it seems antagonistic, passive aggressive, frustrating, and disrespectful in the face of our passions, hopes, and dreams. But the fact of the matter is that while "I'm passionate about video games," seems to be a complete grammatical sentence, it isn't actually a solid idea. You can't figure out where to go with your life, or what's really going to make you happy, with that statement. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
My professor digs at the route of what makes us who we are. Why do we love games? Why did we first start playing them? What emotional, mental, psychological needs do they sate? When we play, what are we really looking for? And more than that, when we create, what is it about games that we're so fascinated with that we feel we NEED to create anything at all?</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
He also forces us to examine our emotional drives independent of our artistic drives. As an artist, a character designer might be fascinated with a certain style of shape, movement, or coloration. But as an individual, that character designer might actually be motivated to go into games because they are interested in group dynamics, culture, or international conflict, and they perceive games to be the proper medium, the proper vehicle, for their expressions. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
When we go out and find jobs from SCAD, we aren't just identifying a neat company and sending in our resume. We are much more active than that. First of all, we don't limit ourselves to big American companies. There are local companies in Hong Kong who have ties all over the globe that come in every week to talk to us students. We print business cards ASAP, develop a network, and soon we know a guy who lives next to Steve Jobs (or did, sniff) and might be able to recommend us to a Scandinavian company working on precisely the sort of interesting problems we most enjoy. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So when we make a Hit List, we aren't just looking for company names. We are looking to do an in depth research-based assessment into the rest of our lives. We are looking at what each company has to say about itself, who the founder is, what the vision of the company is, what idea/theory/artist's-statement holds them united. We want to know who is in charge of each company, what they eat, what they do with their lives, do they travel, are they a member of the NRA, what do they have to say about Starbucks? What company culture is like, and the campus, and overtime?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And more importantly, who do we have to go out and meet who can introduce us to these people and get us a real interview? We weren't researching our environment; we were researching our <i>ecosystem.</i></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
THE HIT LIST FOR ME</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
When I graduate from SCAD, I am probably going to launch my own studio. At least, that's what I <i>think</i> I'm going to do... ehm... To be honest, when I entered this quarter at SCAD, I was something in a funk. Over Christmas break I had realized I didn't quite know what I was doing or where I was going. I knew that I had gone to the right place- that Hong Kong and SCAD were both right for me- but I was caught by the fact that I really didn't have any idea what I was doing with my life.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
The Hit List is specific to the person who writes it. Not just in terms of what companies they pick, but in terms of what they are even looking for. Making the Hit List requires doing a lot of research, and the knowledge available out there to be 'searched' is infinite in nature. It is imperative that the student start with some kind of vision, quest, or dream so that they can limit down the scope of their research. "I'll go wherever the wind blows me," is a good plan B, but it's an attribute of yours and not any way to formulate a Hit List. Not unless you want to find your future job employment opportunities by drawing lots (and then forming a list of all the potential options would take an infinite long amount of time).</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
So in order to do the Hit List, I had to move from 'free bird' to having a goal again. And I had to take a long hard look at how I feel, what I've been doing, what I've been frustrated about, any emotional discomfort I've experienced that might be shading my judgement, and the core of what makes me, well, me.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
I wasn't precisely who I thought I was!</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Good thing I like <i>me</i> better. It took a very interesting struggle. Even though I had no hard facts or data obtained as a result, my entire view on my prospects, my current projects, my future goals, and my own value did a turnabout. I realized that I <i>was</i> the sort of person to open my own studio. In fact, I'm entrepreneurial. I want to start <i>multiple</i> businesses, get each to reach a level of stable success, do something big and new and different with each, and then sell it and start up a new business and repeat. I wasn't who I thought I was at all. I was the problem solving wing of a business partnership; I had it in me to <i>want</i> to be a CEO, and I most likely have it in me to be a good one. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
I didn't truly believe that before this assignment. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Let me show you some of the Hit List I composited with my professor's aid, so you can get an idea of the base I've started with. My goal was to find creative and business talent that might be willing to help me, that I could partner with, or that I could study and ask questions from:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ol>
<li>Two preliminary locations I could mine my teacher for information on: Hong Kong for ease of setting up a new buisness; Canada for business tax credits that can help a new studio in its infant years.</li>
<ol>
<li>Ontario is trying to attract video games. They recently pulled in a division of Ubisoft, but they're offering up to 40% tax credits and tons of support structures for games to move in and currently have only 14% of Canada's industry. </li>
</ol>
<li>Hong Kong Commons (Sheung Wan + Lai Chi Kok) offers cheap office space. http://www.mic.polyu.edu.hk/index.php/create/partners/hong-kong-commons</li>
<ol>
<li>Has an Incubator</li>
<li>Jung Lee, was in American and Chinese Real Estate... corporate Lawyer... Huge Interest in Games. Interested in solving Big Problems like Hunter, Education, and Health. He's overseen a lot of Indie Stuff. He's the incubator for a company by someone else I need to look into (Claus). Studied Columbia University. Helped found the commons. Involved with Pacific Rim Private Equity. Interested in Early stage technological, social, and cross-borders companies. </li>
<li>Brian Ng- still researching</li>
<li>Charlotte Wu - still researching</li>
</ol>
<li>Cyberport (Space) </li>
<ol>
<li>Incubator called Incutrain</li>
<li>Outplace, a very successful publisher group and games company, run by Yat Lee (Grew up in Austria, at the Conservatory he studied Classical music) He may invest, bring you to his company, help you out, acquire your company, etc</li>
<li>Has Creative Microfund and Incubation program</li>
<li>Enterepenuer, Knowledge, Collaboration portals. (& Success Stories to study)</li>
<li>Will help through Seed (Microfund) STartup (Incubation) and Market Growth. http://www.cyberport.com.hk/en/about_cyberport/our_5_centres/entrepreneurship_centre/about_ec_what_we_offer</li>
<li>Lots of discounts, financial assistance, office space (if needed). Peer Group, Consulting, etc. </li>
</ol>
<li>Claus: The founder of 3D Avatar School, currently in Jung Lee's Incubator, he's started tons of creative businesses and done consulting work, he is a great person to meet and ask about how to launch a new studio. </li>
<ol>
<li>Realized games were important to his kids, wanted to investigate them further.</li>
<li>Has done a lot with using virtual spaces to try and make real world results such as virtual world businesses, education in virtual spaces, etc. (Synchronous Communication)</li>
<li>Might be someone I want to Intern with if he has job openings</li>
<li>His investor heard about him through a banker who learned about Claus from a Tedx Conference. </li>
<li>Has surrounded himself with the talent he needs. He has someone on business education, foreign language education, a CTO, a chief of production, etc. Clearly I need to know him better. </li>
<li>Won Hong Kong ICT Award Best Start-Up Buisness (Offered by Cyberport ;)</li>
<li>He likes travel, and recently went on a trip to Sri Lanka where he photographed locals, environments, and elephants. </li>
</ol>
<li>Sources of Money in the Government:</li>
<ol>
<li>Create Hong Kong (CreateHK). Mostly Film, 300 million dollars investment fund in small companies and innovative ideas while employing new people. Jerry Liu.</li>
<li>Invest Hong Kong (Invest HK) Hook you up for free with people, services, makes inquiries for you, helps get things done behind the scenes. Person to know is Wendy Chau for here and Creatieve Industries</li>
</ol>
<li>Innocenter: Free office space for designers</li>
<ol>
<li>Science Park: same management, mostly for health, and has game studios that work with health. </li>
</ol>
<li>If I want to sell in China, there is a single gate keeper, and behind that the market is arguably very big. But then I have to identify who this person is and find someone who knows them. I know some people who know this process (Adam)</li>
<li>If I want to continue forward with Agon and Alea (I do, after some soul searching) then I need to know people who buy products for venues frequented by women. Someone to know might be Joyce Ma. How does she buy? I'd need to know a lot about her and how she makes decisions and postures/positions herself in the marketplace. </li>
<li>If you have selling figured out, then getting a business incubated is easy. You need respect for the fact that the business must grow and that the products must sell to get incubated. </li>
<li>My strengths/weaknesses: It's very easy to get me into problem solving with my skills, and to point discussions towards the skills I already know.</li>
<ol>
<li>We need to make sure this strength doesn't come off as 'afraid' of new topics; I need to show how I am unafraid to investigate areas, stay in those areas of discomfort, admit that I'm not sure, admit that I need to investigate more, and still be able to present a strong plan.</li>
</ol>
</ol>
</div>
<div>
I had to know some things about myself to come up with this list, and also to figure out what to do with it next:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>I have no destination, no perfect studio, and no perfect job. I want to identify opportunities and then explore them, to do and try lots of things. I want to work on many kinds of projects</li>
<li>I want to solve many interesting sorts of problems. The way I solve problems is by injecting life into an area where there is none. I want to turn virtual worlds into personalized make-believe. I want to work with engines of simulation and discover how to pace them and work stories into them. I want to create virtual reality pets. </li>
<li>I want to put myself into many situations with unique constraints and succeed. To always seek out new areas with new boons and new constraints, which need 'life' and to successful work with those constraints and boons to build new life.</li>
<li>I want to observe and learn how to be a successful life-long entrepenuer.</li>
<li>I enjoy tackling a difficult problem, building it up to a stable level, and then moving on to a new problem. (I actually play video games this way. I play until my level of satisfaction under difficult circumstances.)</li>
<li>I will be the vision holder, the problem-solving creative talent that makes a project work. Will be the CEO. </li>
<li>I will require a lot of help. I need to learn, be taught, and surround myself with advisers mentors, partners, and outside experience. I need this to get where I really want to be. You cannot run a company alone, or in a vacuum. </li>
<li>I want to be a polyglot and world traveler. </li>
<li>I want to be able to visit my family at least once yearly.</li>
<li>The cat goes where I go.</li>
</ul>
<div>
This translates into a sort of road map for the future, which I can crosscheck with my professor.</div>
</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>I need to publish small pieces of my own material, with a 3 or 4 man team, so I can begin to fathom what it's like to have one's own company. </li>
<li>I need to get an internship over the summer semester, which will give me the opportunity to watch how someone else does things. To this end, I know that I want to work in an established small to mid sized studio, which makes games and has several games under the belt, and that I want to be mentored by someone high up to be given a birds eye view of the company.</li>
<li>When I graduate, or before I graduate, I will need to go under someone's wing. I need a business partner, and I will likely be going into an incubator. </li>
</ul>
<div>
Which translates into some website requirements</div>
</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>I need to sell myself and my own skills. Myself is: A creative problem solver. Therefore, my website should demonstrate how I solve a wide variety of problems creatively. </li>
<li>To the internship company, I will need to position myself as a high level intern who can handle a lot of responsibilities and a wide variety of tasks, and an interest in discovering what it is that company leaders really do. </li>
<li>For potential sources of grant money, I must show my interest in solving compelling problems, especially because I really am interested in bringing technical jobs to developing economies, working to improve culture (particularly for women), and language and health education through games. </li>
<li>For incubators, business men, and investors, I must show my interest and respect for business, and that I am studying these attributes and sensitive to them when making my design considerations. It is to my benefit that I am interested in making a very wide variety of games (all of which I will be able to make well), because I will be able to pitch myself (and the business plan) as opposed to attaching myself too closely to the game. </li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-30739133749861196992012-11-25T19:21:00.003-08:002012-11-25T19:27:45.977-08:00The Near Death and Restoration of an Acer Aspire OneWhile I was packing to return home for Christmas Break, I was assailed by a sour sensation (I love alliteration too, but that's another story). In Hong Kong I have a power gaming Desktop PC I built from scratch, an ancient 7-year-old Dell Latitude which I'd converted into a Mac using tech magic so that I had a development machine for iPad games (long story), and an iPad2. This was a good setup. I had the gaming, Mac, and portable/mobile note-taking-and-such angles all taken care of.<br />
<br />
But I was going home for Christmas. I couldn't bring my PC. My PC, which not only has all of my games, but also is home to all my windows-only versions of creative software. There was <i>nothing</i> for me to use back in America. We hadn't updated our 'family computer' for the last decade. It ran as slow as chocolate pudding. Ugh. How was I going to game? The old 1990s games that ran on my Dell laptop in the past were Windows only, and couldn't run on it now. And how was I going to do anything neat, creative, or productive? Bleck. I'd just have to hope that Dad had one of the other kids' old laptops lying around, or that he'd let me use his own desktop.<br />
<br />
It's kind of a sin to touch another person's computer- or to ask to share in it- but what choice did I have?<br />
<br />
When I came home I eventually set about looking for my external HDD so I could make a backup of things on the American end of things (also a long story, the HDD is dead /sadface). When I went to pick it up out of my drawer, I realized there was a white tech object in the drawer, maybe ten inches long, five inches wide? What was it?<br />
<br />
Oh my god! It was my tiny Acer Aspire One! I remember you, little guy! Oh my goodness, I loved you in college! You were such a relief after hauling around a massive laptop across a huge campus! And- holy crap! Last I remember, I installed all my old Adobe Creative Suite CS3 stuff on you!!! Is it still all there!?<br />
<br />
I asked for my Aspire One probably halfway through Junior year, for Christmas, and it was a godsend. Some people have no problem hauling around a book full of laptop gear and textbooks. Not me. I was dying with nothing else in my super-duper-padded-comfy laptop backpack but a single Latitude D630. My Aspire One was like a featherweight, and far more convenient and friendly. I took it everywhere. I took notes on it for everything. I left it behind when I went to Hong Kong because of space issues and apartment hunting.<br />
<br />
But there it was, all beautiful and pearly and shiny. I turned it on and it had a bunch of 1990's games all ready for me, and all my CS3 programs. Now an Acer Aspire One is a tiny little cutie pie, so if I wanted to game and draw without straining myself, I would have to hook it up to a monitor and an external keyboard and mouse. But still! It was more powerful than anything else my dad had lying around, and had more hard drive space. Best of all, it was all <i>mine</i>, so I didn't have to invade anyone else's personal computer space to have it.<br />
<br />
There's something I should mention.<br />
<br />
Both my Aspire One and my Dell-Mac have critically ill batteries. They can't be unplugged, or they power down.<br />
<br />
So as I was trying to fix my external HDD (long story, still dead, making clicking noise, probably irrecoverable without making a monetary commitment) I got up to grab a can of cola and eat some dinner. In the process I tripped over my Acer power cord and jerked it right out of the machine, but fortunately the Acer stayed firmly on the table and didn't fall to the ground. Seemed good to me. I came back from eating and settled down to power on the computer.<br />
<br />
Boot Normally. Yadayadayada-<br />
<br />
Bluescreen.<br />
<br />
... Oh. Crap.<br />
<br />
Boot with last settings. Bluescreen. Safe mode? Bluescreen. Safe mode with command prompt. Networking? Bluescreen Bluescreen Bluescreen.<br />
<br />
Oh crap. It's a netbook. There's no CD drive. I can't boot from disk. No! Wait! I know you can boot from a pen drive/USB stick/etc... you just have to set it up, it's a bit of work if you don't buy one straight from Microsoft. Right? I'm sure of it! I start researching on my iPad.<br />
<br />
My Mac can't access the internet and my dad has an old laptop whose CD drive doesn't work very well. I start off on the Mac and try to make an .iso and then an .img file from the original disks using the Terminal and burn it onto a pen drive. I try it all out, but the Acer won't even try to boot from it. Hmm. Poopy. Something's up.<br />
<br />
I'm worried because I only have a 500 MB flash drive my mother lent me for this task (when you are constantly and rigorously cleaning out your drives, repositories and clouds like I do, you might not need more space than that, so I don't even own a bigger Flash Drive back in HK). But then I research the problem on my iPad and realize the Bios may need to be flashed, and that the Acer may have trouble booting from anything other than the HDD without that flash.<br />
<br />
Flash a Bios? Uhhh... Well... I've never done that. Ever. I mean I think I installed a Bios update once on a Dell, but it was safe and secure and part of some regular update... thing I mean... I mean...<br />
<br />
I have no idea what I'm getting into, but I am determined to save my Acer. Because people like me don't just roll over and give up. <br />
<br />
I find some extremely complicated sounding instructions on a web forum that say I need to download a bios update from the acer website, rename several of the files inside, pull them into a flash drive, put the flash drive in the left USB slot on the laptop, and then hold Fn+Esc while powering on my computer in order to flash the Bios.<br />
<br />
See: (http://www.leosquarez.com/acer-aspire-one-bios-recovery-acer-aspire-one-zg5-screen-not-working/)<br />
<br />
Okay. I tried that. Now I try to boot from the USB and... DARN! IT doesn't work! What could be wrong? Maybe it has to do with that 500 MB limit. I ask my dad for a bigger Flash drive, which he supplies, and then I transfer over into Windows. Maybe the different 'ideology' behind Windows will help me overcome whatever wall I hit with the mac. I mean, of course it could just be that I was using too small a device when I created the .iso/.img. But on the other hand perhaps I really did need some 3rd party softward like Ubuntu, and the Mac is internet-less, so installing things is more of a hassle.<br />
<br />
I pull out the laptop Dad had offered to let me use, which has about the same specs as my Acer despite being a whole bunch larger and heavier, and slower (It's running Windows 7 instead of my Acer's trimmed down XP). I start looking for some information online. A lot of guides want me to manually push around files for whom the download links have already expired. That's no good. At last I stumble upon a program called WinSetupFromUSB. It feels like the creators don't speak English as their first language, and their 'home page' is a forum posting, but on the other hand it should be able to take care of everything I need.<br />
<br />
I test out a few XP disks at home, conscious each time that I am using a computer with an 'iffy' DVD drive now, and that if it goes, I will have no recourse other than to retreat to the Mac and send software to it via the 500 MB USB my mum had lent me. Either that or I could try torrenting, since I already have a XP license. I wonder if it matters what service pack I use, or if all of them will get me equal results. It turns out that a SP3 copy is the only kind that plays nice with WinSetupFromUSB. I get all ready to make the USB bootable with Windows XP. I set up my options following an online tutorial and press "GO!"<br />
<br />
WinSetupFromUSB fails from the get go. It tells me can't copy some file from the MBR, which I understand to mean Master Boot Record, and either means that I should be using a different format, or else that the solution I'm looking for is a Fat32 based solution. Eh. I start searching for the error message online, and I come across a forum post. In it, someone is trying to make a USB stick bootable for Windows 7. The replier answers that it doesn't matter what software the user is trying to put on the USB, the problem is with the USB itself. He recommends downloading RMPrepUSB and using it to A) Format the USB stick and B) copy the missing MBR related file over to the USB stick using a button on the RMPrepUSB interface.<br />
<br />
Now that I think about it, this is familiar from when I turned my Dell into a Mac. Back then I had needed a boot loader called Chameleon, and it looked like this 'file' for the MBR was also a boot loader (But it went by some crazy name that I couldn't pronounce, much less remember. I download RMPrepUSB, format the USB stick to be XP/Bart bootable (hey I recognize BartPE, I've used it before! But I digress...) and Fat32, and then I press the button to copy over the MBR special ingredient.<br />
<br />
Now I head back over to WinSetupFromUSB (Even though it looks like RMPrepUSB MIGHT be able to do something similar to WinSetupFromUSB, I'm using a tutorial, and I don't want to wander off the beaten path for no good reason). I put all my settings back in- location, destination, Fixed, GO! This time there's no error. Everything begins to load into my USB stick.<br />
<br />
MUAHAHAHAH, I feel invincible!<br />
<br />
I nab my USB stick when finished, plug it into my Acer, and successfully manage to boot from it.<br />
<br />
Oh god, it's a disaster in there. First of all it looks like the computer can't even tell Windows was ever installed on it. Tutorials say to highlight my partition with my installation and push R to repair. Snort. Snicker. I don't even get that option. When I try to find it, It let's me know why it won't repair the installation, and it won't try and do a clean install over the space without reformatting and wiping out all my data. It tells me everything is so corrupted and broken inside that it can't make heads nor tails of the situation, and it demands a reformat. No! I'd just found files on that Acer that I hadn't seen in years! I need to back them up! And those programs- I don't have the disks for those programs, they're all in Hong Kong!<br />
<br />
I backtrack and go through the recovery console. A few times. In between fiddling with other things. Because I hate command prompts and the recovery console immediately disagrees with me. It doesn't use the commands I learned for Mac and when I type in "DIR"...<br />
<br />
*Shudder*<br />
<br />
I type in "DIR" so that the recovery console will list the contents of whatever folder I'm in. I should start out at C:\ But when I type in DIR, the recovery console tells me there's an error with device enumeration. It displays no information. From top to bottom, my entire drive is inaccessible, broken- in fact it's difficult to even detect the format that data SHOULD be in.<br />
<br />
All this... because I tripped over a power cord?<br />
<br />
I fiddle around with things like FixBoot and FixMBR, but nothing works. The computer claims to be able to fix the boot record with FixBoot, but the C:\ directory still shows nothing, and of course the computer does not successfully boot to windows without a blue screen. How do I navigate to drive D:\, my usb stick? Ugh I'm so un used to the windows command line, and chdir D, D:, and D:\ are all not working!<br />
<br />
I'm told I should use CHKDISK but I tried that out in the very beginning of my list of endeavors and the computer yelled at me to say AUTOCHK.EXE could not be found on the drive or CD ROM and I needed to supply a path to it. What? I try the default path that Google tells me it should be at: C:\Windows\System32 but ah... well if I couldn't find C, why do you think I can find C\Windows or C\Windows\System32? Remember when I tried that DIR command? Nothin'. The internet tries to be helpful and tells me there's a backup copy in a dllcache file, which would be useful, if, ya know, my C drive were accessible. But it's not.<br />
<br />
Dad comes in and tells me to just type in D: into the console, not chdir D:\ and suddenly I can access my pen drive. Only I can't see any folders into which AUTOCHK.EXE might be. There are two directories that start with a $ character, which I understand usually to be temporary, and which yell "ACCESS DENIED" at me anyway for some reason. There aren't any more sensible directories. This is strange, but a combination of the internet and past experience tells me there should be a directory called I368 or some permutation of those numbers on the original disks somewhere that has files and utilities like AUTOCHK.EXE.<br />
<br />
I take the USB stick and plug it back into the windows computer and examine it. Sure enough there's no I### folder on there. I navigate through the installation disks Aha! An I386 folder (I had two numbers swapped, but that's pretty good don't you think?) I drag it over onto my pen drive to sit with all the other bootable goodies. It takes awhile to copy, but at last I bring it over and plug it back into my Acer.<br />
<br />
I turn on the Acer. I boot from the USB stick. I run the recovery console. I run CHKDSK or whatever its called. I try to let it know- from memory, since it keeps all my directories Access Denied from me- where the AUTOCHK.EXE file is. Not that hard, it's just in the I386 folder right? I cross my fingers.<br />
<br />
BAM.<br />
<br />
It runs.<br />
<br />
I let it run.<br />
<br />
I type in DIR when it is finished.<br />
<br />
The contents of my C drive display correctly.<br />
<br />
I let loose a whoop of excitement, exit form the recovery console, and try to start windows normally.<br />
<br />
It works. The Acer is functional. Everything is alive. My programs are fine. My Google Chrome is patiently awaiting my orders. And would you look at that! Flashing the Bios appears to have fixed the Acer's battery! Oh isn't today the most wonderful of days? I need a nap. And a beer. And a cat. Why didn't I bring home my Bamboo tablet to fix that too? I wonder if that hard drive is <i>really</i> dead, or if it's only <i>mostly</i> dead. I need some billows. Goodnight, and thanks be to the Omnipotent: For the Acer was dead, and by the power invested in me it has risen again!<br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-35962427986312551072012-11-15T21:23:00.000-08:002012-11-15T21:34:56.640-08:00Game Design AuteurismWhat on earth is Game Design Auteurism? Auteurism doesn't even show up as a 'real word' in my spell-check program. It's certainly not a common word- not outside of film, that is- but it could likely be applied to any creative discipline, and could certainly be applied to film's next door neighbor: video game design.<br />
<br />
Auteur theory holds that a film reflects its director's personal creative vision. The film exists as a manifestation of the director's design philosophy. For us to study game design auteurism is for us to look at video games and to try and extract from them the personal design philosophy of the 'directors' who orchestrated them.<br />
<br />
One of my first questions when entering this class was to wonder whether or not this class really ought to be, 'The History of Game Design.' Then I considered that perhaps it ought to be, 'The History of Thinking About Game Design.' It was only after I cared to look up the definition of 'auteur' that I suddenly comprehended why my college so valued this class.<br />
<br />
Auteur theory stresses that a film will reflect it's director's vision <i>despite</i> the fact that films are the end result of a highly industrialized creative process, involving hundreds if not thousands of additional minds, opinions, and design philosophies. Although games and film different in many key ways, the overall form of their production process is very similar. This 'industrialization,' this collection of massive numbers of warring ideologies, is what makes Auteur theory just as applicable to game design as it ever could be to film.<br />
<br />
Here at the Savannah College of Art and Design, there is a strong focus both on anchoring ourselves in our artistic values, but also on one day obtaining a job. Nowhere is this dichotomy more present than in the disciplines of game design. The idea that a single man/woman's vision can rise <i>above</i> all this chaos and be heard in the final product is of immense value to us as art and design students. We are not training to become cogs. We are training to become visionaries as vital to our own production pipeline as directors are to theirs.<br />
<br />
Actually, that's exactly what Game Design Auteurism implies in its very name: that game designers can be, should be, <i>are</i>, directors. That a game developer to his/her industry is as a director would be to their industry. And that we are responsible for the creative vision that steers the game as a whole.<br />
<br />
Of course this levies upon us games students a heavy responsibility. No longer can we be content to be programmers, technicians, engineers, or managers. We are not even craftsmen or artisans. We are directors. Our voice, our leadership, our vision is going to be heard. And should we avoid this role, or should we neglect to cultivate a powerful design philosophy, the result will be felt in our games.<br />
<br />
Before this quarter, I had never considered what my own personal design philosophy might be. I had started looking at how I designed games differently, to be sure. I had moved away from boring tasks like trying to 'fix' the games industry, and headed off to find blue oceans of untapped gamers, and was investigating new forms of game play that had not yet been thoroughly explored. In my studies on women in video games, I realized that one of the reasons I played games was because my father had originally shared them with me as a small child.<br />
<br />
I had never considered what it is about games that actually gives me <i>pleasure</i>. I knew what genres I liked, and I could tell a game I cared about from a game I hated. But when it came down to it, I lacked the vocabulary to talk about my choices. I could title a game good or bad and explore its strengths and weaknesses, but I had not analyzed my own sense of taste. The closest I had come to doing anything of the sort was to say that I liked strategy games because I was a highly logical person. But that didn't explain why micro managing alien armies made me<i> </i>comfortable, happy, and relaxed.<br />
<br />
This 'taste' was important not just because it reflected what I chose to consume, but also because I have long been a producer of game and game-like products, and in that too, I had a sense of taste. In fact, I was incredibly picky. There were certain areas in which I refused to consume anything at all, because only the ideas I produced were 'good enough' to me.<br />
<br />
Okay, but then what was my 'taste' like?<br />
<br />
I honestly had no clue.<br />
<br />
At first I considered the video games I liked to play. Then, as I kept going with the readings in the class, I began to realize that the true driving force behind each individual didn't necessarily have to do with the products they liked to consume, or the media they cared about. Each individual had been sculpted by childhood experiences. Will Wright had gone to a highly creative school where learning was built around playful exploration of toys and spaces. Carmack had been denied access to computers. Jobs had been something of a social outcast, totally removed from the office-type white-collar worker that <i>usually</i> consumed computer products in his day.<br />
<br />
The more designers we studied, the more it became clearer: there was a vision deep inside me, and it didn't come from games. It was a lot deeper than that. And I had to find it. Because if I couldn't identify it, I couldn't cultivate it. As an Auteur/Author I could not permit this to happen.<br />
<br />
I sat down and thought about it for awhile. I stopped thinking about video games and I went further back. What forces had driven me out into the forests as a young child to build stick forts and dig up bugs? What had my favorite movies been? What kinds of impossible Christmas presents had I asked for on my Christmas list?<br />
<br />
I was very surprised to find out that Agon and Alea, my current project, is all about bringing a digital companion to life. And judging by my childhood Christmas Lists, I was constantly asking for a real-life miniature dinosaur/dragon/unicorn/Power Ranger to play with.<br />
<br />
I kept thinking. I pulled out gardening books, and started looking for images that struck a chord in my soul. I searched the internet for some of my favorite kinds of images in the world: images of mountain-top temples, in places so far removed from modern civilization that nothing can be seen in any direction but the temple, stone, water, and trees.<br />
<br />
A movie I loved lately was "How to Train Your Dragon". I'd once asked my father as a child, "If you really love something that's not real, how do you make it more real?" and was totally devastated by his answer, "You can't."<br />
<br />
It that moment of recollection, I hit soundly upon my design philosophy: To undermine that, 'You can't.'<br />
<br />
I design games because I want to make the unreal, real. Just for awhile, just for the duration of an escapist journey, just a <i>little</i>. I want to give everyone their, 'Where the Wild Things Are,' their own fairies, their own dragon, their own unicorn, their own Power Ranger, their own hero. I wanted to send them to worlds they would never otherwise experience, and meet people they could never otherwise meet. I wanted to put more poetry in their lives, and to chip away at the mundane. At the end of these stories, the children/protagonists always return to the real world to live out their lives. But they are better for it. Happier for it. More joyful for it.<br />
<br />
Game Design Auteurism started out- to me- as The History of Game Design. But what I left with was a surprisingly deep insight into myself, into what I believe in, into what I value, into what I love. I have finally thought to wonder what the force is that powers me, and I have started to piece together what that force is. This is the design philosophy- the heart of my beliefs- that will have to anchor me through any rainstorm, that will need to persevere through the chaos of the production process, and emerge unscathed and handsomely clothed on the other side, shining for the world to see.<br />
<br />
And as a result?<br />
<br />
I am ready to put on my director's hat. Cut!<br />
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-24620470639730213292012-11-15T17:18:00.000-08:002012-11-15T17:18:08.828-08:00On Design MethodologyWe were reading in class about the architect Frank Gehry. All designers share some aspects in common with one another, and architectures are most certainly designers. Frank Ghery has an interesting design methodology. You can read about one of his latest buildings, the Opus, here: http://www.opushongkong.com/en/Design_programming.html<br />
<br />
So what does Franky Gehry do that's so interesting? Well he builds funky buildings, but that crucial point for <i>this</i> discussion is that he doesn't just dream them up in Maya or sketch them from scratch. He has a design methodology. That isn't just a funny flavoring word added in to talk about his modeling pipeline in AutoCAD. Design Methodology is the topic of this paper. The idea behind it is that there are certain things an artist has to do: rituals they must perform, angles they must look at, breaks they must take, and slightly-related problems they must solve, in the course of creating a new work.<br />
<br />
Basically, Frank Gehry's first step (after obtaining all the survey data and so forth) is to build very childish looking towers out of brightly painted wood blocks.<br />
<br />
And if he didn't, he couldn't design buildings. Pay attention, because this is crucial. He <i>couldn't</i> design buildings without his wood blocks. It is part of his process. Without it, the creativity will refuse to come. It cannot be skipped, or the resulting building will not be a Frank Gehry building.<br />
<br />
For any building, Gehry makes about twenty of these towers, glues them together, and then sets them all out for his examination. He pushes them about and deforms them. Perhaps they let him visualize and block out shapes and space. He goes through each of these and begins to articulate why it is he is attracted to each form. The process of articulating these things brings the design to the forefront. It is only after building his block towers that Frank Gehry can sit down and start to put together the amorphous wriggles of glass and oddly positioned corners that have become his trademark look.<br />
<br />
Now how does the discipline of design methodology apply to me? Obviously I'm not going to build block towers like Frank Gehry, but it's clear to see that I could and should have my own process for building games.<br />
<br />
I should identify and pay attention to this 'design process' that I must somehow possess and then study it. That's pretty simple. Essentially, if I know what it is I do that helps me be creative, I should document it, so that at points in the future when I need to be creative, I know what to do to get the creativity juices flowing. Okay, I get that. Ah, and then I can also <i>study</i> my own design methodology. I can tweak it, make changes to it. My methodology becomes something I'm designing and reiterating constantly, with every new project. It becomes a project in itself.<br />
<br />
This is kinda neat stuff. As soon as I identify the existence of a design methodology, I can start applying my own creative talents to it. I can intelligently alter how I think about and pursue projects. I can conduct experiments on my own creative process. I can design my life to yield more creativity. I can formulate a process- specific to me- that helps me come up with the best ideas. I can try new things within a framework. I can form a basis for evaluating my own actions based on whether they are helpful to my creativity, or detrimental. Cool.<br />
<br />
So is there an example of a person who has a design methodology in games? Does it involve blocks? To answer that question, we researched KeitaTakahashi, the creator of an extremely innovative and ground breaking gamed called Katamari Damany. This is they keynote 'speech' he gave at an annual game jam. The subject is, "How to Come Up With an Idea," but it shows off a very different, less structured, and more emotional design methodology. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbiVtYPtIqk<br />
<br />
Hmm. You know, I'm starting to think that Frank Gehry's methodology isn't specific to architecture. It's just how he visualizes problems. And likewise, Takahashi's design methodology isn't specific to anything at all. It's more a creative exploration of his environment while letting an idea bake away in the back of his skull. These design methodologies look to be the ways by which we creative humans solve problems, and each one is specific to each of us.<br />
<br />
I have done a great deal of exploration as to my own design methodologies this quarter, and I have come up with some observations that I need to document, so that I can understand them for later. To study my own creative process, I looked at how I solved a number of problems, from designing my video games, to planning out a demo module for this semester, to the actual research I conduct while developing a game, to the way I pick out computer parts at the store, to puzzling out how to bring my cat to the USA for a month and a half over Christmas, and then get him safely back to Hong Kong without quarantine.<br />
<br />
Based on my studies, I've managed to isolate a few elements that were present in every problem-solving scenario, and which seem to be common across my entire decision making process. At the moment, I am currently focused on identifying largely beneficial aspects of my design methodology, but in the future I expect I will have to isolate faulty aspects as well, so that I can eschew them.<br />
<br />
When confronted with a large problem (and often even a small one), the first thing I want to obtain is a bird's eye view of the situation. I want to know the full extent of the problem. I try to surround the problem with my arms, as if putting it in a big hug. At this point, I really just want to know what it's circumference is. How big is this problem? Where does it extend to? I will start off by researching the problem indirectly, trying to find things like reviews, opinions, forums, help sites, etc. instead of going straight to the source.<br />
<br />
Often times I will enumerate potential options for solving the problem, as well as potential pitfalls that I may have to solve in the future. I bookmark answers to problems I may encounter, reference materials, Wiki sites, etc. I keep a very organized set of bookmarks in Google Chrome. This is one of my brainstorming phases. I will labor through big problems and read books. I need an understanding of what it is I'm doing, a set of ideas in which I can base my upcoming activities. I need to feel informed and competent I need to feel a bit like an expert in the field.<br />
<br />
This stage of the process is not usually very long, and remaining in it for too long can leave me feeling emotionally drained and exhausted. Never the less, it is an established part of my design methodology, and is vital for me to take my first steps along the road to solving a problem.<br />
<br />
The next step is to release my bear hug on the problem and to freeze it's size. At this point I am tired of skirting around the edge of the issue, and instead dive straight into it. The next thing I want to know about is not the breadth of the problem, but rather its depth. At this point I will basically make an 'asset list,' of each and every tiny last minute detail of the problem I am trying to solve.<br />
<br />
I cannot make this list from start to finish. I have tried doing so many times, and it is never beneficial to my creative process. For awhile I was writing out ideas on index cards. Index cards let me constrain the problem to bite sized pieces. Working this way, I felt like a DNA Synthase, chewing on one tiny part of the problem at a time and eventually getting around to chewing on the whole issue. However, I was never satisfied with this method. The fact that certain cards could go missing or simply not be displayed at the moment was both a mixed boon and a distressing curse. I also disliked the fact that it was hard and time-consuming to visualize the entire problem at once.<br />
<br />
The latest addition to my design process has been mind maps. Because I am working at the speed of consciousness, I cannot afford to use programs like Illustrator to create these maps. Often I work by hand on very large pieces of paper. This is pleasurable. It keeps my hands busy. It keeps my artistic side busy while my logical side is working. In fact, I frequently use architecture stencils to make rapid circles, squares, and other shapes. I always work with multiple colors, to render groups visually distinct. The neatness and simplicity of the stencils keeps the overall image looking well-planned and organized. I feel good while creating the diagram, which prompts me to keep working on it. When I back up, I get a very clear and instantaneous visualization of my problem- as well as any elements I've failed to wrap my arms around in the previous stage.<br />
<br />
For ideas that require a lot of online research, I will usually use a mind mapping software called Mindomo. Mindomo is very useful for referencing files and images and linking websites. The map can be closed up or expanded as I need it. I can visualize the problem as a whole or drill down to view only a few branches at a time. I use it not necessarily because it is the best, but because for what I need it for, it is good looking, professional in appearance, and easy to use. Remember that I am working at the speed of thought, and that I need my ideas to be visually distinct from one another and also to pleasurable to look at.<br />
<br />
Once I have passed this stage, I am ready to start working on solving the problem. This does not mean my researching is over, only that now I will be researching answers to very specific problems that I encounter while problem solving. My previous bookmarks serve as useful anchors, and my asset list is something of a 'minimap' (gamer terminology) for keeping my goals in sight.<br />
<br />
This is important. I am capable both of very broad lateral thinking and very deep vertical thinking. In order to keep one type of thought from upsetting and muddling up the other, I have to keep documentation on hand that soothes each of them while the other is working. This is why I had to bookmark answers to possible problems while doing my preliminary bear-hug research; and it's why I now have to keep my mind map on hand to refocus my on-the-ground development efforts.<br />
<br />
The rest of my design methodology is not 100% clear to me, and seems to contain a lot of tips and tricks for how to get my brain to focus. For example, I must keep a clean living space, eat well, communicate frequently with friends and family, and both wake and sleep early on in the day in order to be productive. It will be my habit to try and eschew some of these things in order to focus, but the result will be intense frustration and lack of productivity.<br />
<br />
I must also solve multiple kinds of problem at once. These problems may come from many difference sources. While solving a technical problem, I will also need to solve an artistic one. On the side I may be working on design issues. To let my inner creativity out, I may need to write something. When two problems of the same type show up, waiting to be solved at once, I enter a creative block. For example, two time-sensitive problems that operate in the same time frame will cause a lock up. So will two programming tasks of equal importance. Or two intellectual problems from different aspects of my life that are both important for different reasons.<br />
<br />
In these cases, it is usually vital that I take care of the problem that's most personal, more urgent, smaller, or which strikes closer to home, first. If I can get past the initial block, the experience of solving a problem fills me with self-gratification and pleasure, and I am given a boost with which to complete my other problems.<br />
<br />
For example. Say that I need to obtain a Visa for foreign travel and complete a final project at the same time. The Visa is very time sensitive, but quick to do. However, the fact that I have both things on my mind suddenly generates a sense of paralysis. The only way to break this paralysis is to bolt out the door and get to the Visa office. As soon as I commit to getting the Visa now instead of trying to weather through the anxiety of working on my long term final project awhile longer, I am liberated. When I return from the Visa office, I will be filled with energy to work on my project. If I recognize the source of my paralysis quickly, I can actually become <i>more</i> productive than usual as a result of having more problems to solve. If I deny the source of my paralysis, I remain paralyzed.<br />
<br />
I frequently have to change my working environment. A current environment may suddenly stop eliciting creativity. This may be at home, which feels like a place of sleep and relaxation while I am exhausted pushing forward with a final project. Or this may be at school, where I feel overworked and stressed without the comforts of my home. Frequently, I work best in tea shops and parks, where I settle down with an iPad in order to plot out my course of actions for the day and solve difficult problems that had been plaguing me the night before.<br />
<br />
I am still working out all the details of my design process. There are smaller details which I am not certain are significant just yet. For instance, I believe that tending to my cat may prove to be an instrumental part of my design process, at least for my current thesis. Right now I am working on games that permit escapism, bonding with digital characters, and encouraging relaxation and playfulness while alleviating loneliness. It is clear to see my cat is related to this problem, and that by interacting with him, I can better understand the product I am making and the audience I am trying to reach. However, I am not sure which is the cause and which is the effect. I do know that interacting with other living things is a vital part of my design process.<br />
<br />
The crucial thing at this point is that I have acknowledged the existence of my own design methodology, and have taken steps to define it, modify it, research it, and nurture it. If I had to be completely honest, however, I would probably rather have a process like Gehry's instead of Takahashi's! Perhaps that is my logic talking.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-20058801276573258352012-11-15T15:44:00.001-08:002012-11-15T15:49:29.621-08:00On the Influence of Masters<br />
Melissa Kronenberger<br />
Game Design Auteurism<br />
Fall 2012 SCAD Hong Kong<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
On The Influence of Masters</div>
<br />
Take any great artist and you should be able to find the previous Masters she or he drew inspiration from. Whether this 'artist' is a painter like Pablo Picasso, a philosopher like Aristotle, or a game designer as myself, all of them are inspired by other Artists. Nothing comes from nothing. Ideas are like plants. They may root themselves in untilled soil, but something must drop the seed they spring from. And something must water them as they grow.<br />
<br />
For me, the Masters we admire are the rain that helps direct our growing curiosity- the growth of our branches. As we stumble out to explore the world, we come across signs of the Masters' passing; Marks and instructions they've left to tell us about the path ahead. They point out exotic sights and scenery. We follow some of these signs and visit the same scenes; in other places, we strike out on our lonesome.<br />
<br />
Those Masters are not the ones who plant the original seeds in us. Those seeds are far deeper, their roots cradled in the substance of who we are. Those seeds bring us to the Masters in the first place, and later mandate that we seek out many different Masters to follow.<br />
<br />
Let me clarify these metaphors by using myself as an example. If I look deep within me, there is no Bach or Dali who scripted my core. The seed at the heart of my design philosophy was not placed there by any master. What drives me is a sense of wonder. A curiosity, a thrill for adventure, a spirit of competition and accomplishment. I want to discover, explore, outwit, and overcome! I still imagine fairies when walking alone in a beautiful garden. I want to know whether there's another world in the back of an old wardrobe. I'm even afraid the boogeyman will jump out from beneath a bed to grab at me.<br />
<br />
None of that has anything to do with Masters. Yet all of it shapes my games. As a result of my 'seed,' I want to great games that bring you into a totally different world, that serve as a perfect escape into an alternate reality, and that encourage your sense of wonder and adventure until your safe return to earth. I want to model and simulate and bring to life worlds, characters, choices, and possibilities that could never exist in our world. My ideal game is a person's own, individualized, Where the Wild Things Are.<br />
<br />
If you take a broad sampling of my work, you'll find that I'm interested in topics like women and-games, simulation, strategy, god games, digital life game, storytelling, procedural generation, and education. Now that you know where my seed came from, you can see how these different topics relate to my core self. I'm interested in education and women-in-games because I'm an adventurer, and I'm always off on quests to make the world a better place. God and digital life games aren't just creative outlets for me; they unleash a player into a world of their own, customized making. Storytelling and procedural storytelling are a way to bring those worlds to life. Simulation is a mechanism through which I can create an emergent, fantastic world for players to explore. Strategy is likely related to my boundless curiosity.<br />
<br />
The Masters I admire do not always come from the same seeds as me. I look up to game designers like Danielle Berry, Will Wright, Sid Meier, and Roberta Williams. The first two are pioneers in simulation, Sid Meier is a strategy game designer, and Roberta Williams is known for creating story games. I'll go over how each designer has impacted one at a time. I will also discuss each designer in terms of the 4% and 16%, percentages which represent two groups of innovators. The 4%, or 'Scouts,' represent individuals who are constantly on the move to explore new territory. The 16%, or 'Generals' represent individuals who piece together new ideas from the Scouts and plot solid, long term expeditions into these new territories. The Generals are less groundbreaking in their products, but are usually more successful (they don't discover the gold deposits, but they mine them thoroughly and well). The Scouts are always breaking new ground, but often don't remain with the idea long enough to become successful. I will look Danielle Berry was interested in games for their social component. She liked the way players could compete and collaborate together, and saw games as an inherently social activity. Her belief system manifested in a series of surprisingly advanced simulations and complex strategy games, which allowed players incredible freedom of choice. Danielle underwent gender reassignment to become a woman, and suffered socially as a result of her choice. It is clear that freedom of choice- and the ability of the system to recognize and use that individualized choice- were very important to her. The result of this passion was that she founded a new genre of games, and is still cited as a source of inspiration for simulation titles launched years after her death.<br />
<br />
In many ways, Danielle should probably be considered a Scout. She never earned the notoriety of other designers like Will Wright or Sid Meier (although the latter was arguably a narrow miss, as she had wanted to work on Civilization). She had strong ideals and couldn't always compromise to push a game through to completion, such as when she refused to work on M.U.L.E. 2 because the publishers were talking about putting guns and bombs in the game.<br />
<br />
I admire Danielle because she used her emotional and social values as tools to sculpt her games. She was always working on projects she truly believed in, not toys that had happened to catch her interest. Games had a lot of meaning to Danielle. On the other hand, I can look to her story as a cautionary tale. Danielle's talent isn't up for debate, but very few outside the industry ever knew her name. Her impact was only in how she influenced other designers. I can appreciate that- but it's not a route I'm interested in pursuing right now.<br />
<br />
Will Wright is the General to Danielle’s Scout. Sort of. In fact, Will Wright would probably rather spend his days scouting, and spends long stretches of time off in the wilderness, researching new things. Danielle is credited on his latest game, Spore. Yet Will Wright can do something Danielle could not. For one reason or another, he is capable of 'flipping his hat' so to speak and taking on the mantle of General. He has established a legacy. People still know his name, and companies are still making his games. He had an enormous impact not just on the industry, but on everything outside the industry. The Sims was one of the founders of casual gaming, and brought countless women to video games for the first time in history.<br />
<br />
Will Wright is an interesting fellow. He went to a Montessori elementary school, and in light of that his design choices make a surprising amount of sense. In one respect, Will Wright chose a single area of experimentation- simulators- and using his Mantle of General-hood he expertly explored every last corner of the simulator genre, creating countless games and having a massive effect on gaming. In another sense, Will Wright was constantly breaking new ground. He made games about subjects no one had ever considered making games about before. He invented game mechanics that had never been seen before. He caused the dawn of casual gaming. In this sense, Will Wright did not make a single kind of game. He was simply a digital toymaker, and his works were each more innovative than the last.<br />
<br />
Out of all the designers I could want to be like, I think Will Wright is the choice that I admire most. His Scout instincts are apparent in that he was unable to remain with any series indefinitely. The latest Sims 3 and Sim City iterations have been left to a new generation of designers. I know that I have both Scouting and General tendencies, and that- like a Scout- I couldn't remain with any one idea forever. At the same time, Will Wright was able to remain with each of his creations long enough to turn it into a self-sustaining success. I can look to him to understand what's required of me as a General, so that I can also make games that last.<br />
<br />
Of course, my seeds are different from Will Wright's. He has a phenomenal curiosity for the system in itself. He loves systems, loves watching their interrelated parts, to the point that even social systems between his fans are of great interest to him. For Will Wright, the focus is on the system- the toy- itself, and then on the creativity expressed through the system. For me, games are about briefly hopping over to Narnia. This is the reason I say that we must follow more than one Master, and that Masters are merely rain to help us grow, not foundations on which to stake our futures.<br />
<br />
Sid Meier's has his name on the cover of his games. He's one of the few designers to have this honor. Officially it was for marketing purposes, but to me it has an aire of arrogance about it. An aire I admire. I should look at him more closely! Movie directors and producers have their names on movie<br />
covers, and I fail to see why game designers shouldn't stamp themselves on game boxes. When I want to escape reality for a little bit, my game of choice is actually a strategy game.<br />
<br />
Strategy games are neat because I get to keep using my brain, but for a totally unproductive purpose. It is sort of like exercising the body. On one hand, physical exercise involves a lot of manual labor for no manual product. On the other hand, physical exercise keeps our bodies strong and flexible after confining them to positions and tasks that forbid freedom of movement. My passion for strategy games comes from a totally different place than my passion for other games. In fact, we could probably diagnose a completely independent seed that my strategy-love springs from. But the two are often related in the real world- after all, aren't strategy games a simulation of war?<br />
<br />
Meier is another, different case study in how to make simulation games work. For instance, Civilization is fun while other simulation games are frequently boring or frustrating. Simulation games can be very limited by accuracy, intuitiveness, and pacing. In any other game, elements like pacing and balance can be directly built into the game rules. In a simulation, these elements have to emerge indirectly through the system. Problems can arise when the system doesn't correct itself to pace the game appropriately, or when the underlying logic of the system is too unintuitive or concealed for learners to develop a working understanding of how to use it. Meier's games are neat because they succeed both as fully developed games (not just toys) and as simulators. I learn a lot by observing his work.<br />
<br />
I study Sid Meier also as a lesson on how to 'switch hats' even better than Will Wright. When Meier finished his last flight simulator, he stated that he had put everything fun he could think of into a flight simulator, and when he was done there was nothing more to do. So he moved on to something else. This is a perfect example for me to study how to be both a Scout and a General. Meier found an area of interest and then explored it to its fullest potential. At a certain point he determined that any further focus in that area would be work instead of play; he had already made the game as fun as he knew how. So he moved on.<br />
<br />
This sheds some light on why Will Wright was also so successful. Each individual founded a core game system, a new collection of IP, that could stand on its own. When each IP was firmly entrenched, they moved on to tackle other problems. But they focused on each of these projects to the exclusion of all else until they had exhausted the possibilities, so to speak. And they used 'fun' as their meter of when these possibilities had been exhausted. Both men remained enamored with their projects by having fun with them, and I can use that as a technique for anchoring myself to one project or another as a General. By seeking out what is fun about my game and continuing to develop it. Meier, like Wright, was also interested in the system itself. In fact, most early game designers were. From John Carmack to David Perry, game designers were fascinated by systems and moving parts- that's what made them early adopters of computers, after all. Now this is troublesome for me, because the machine itself doesn't really interest me. I can find a lot of 'General' or 'Scout' game designers who are passionate about story and new worlds, such as Tim Shaffer or Chris Crawford, but finding hybrids is more difficult.<br />
<br />
The last designer I shall mention is special to me, not only because she is she one such 'hybrid' game designer, with no particular interest in the system and a passion for storytelling, but also because there is no clear divide between when she is being a Scout or a General. In all of the other hybrid designers I mentioned, there was a clear divide between when they were acting exploitative and when they were thoroughly mining out an idea. For Roberta Williams, this whole classification scheme might as well not apply. She just designed games.<br />
<br />
Roberta Williams is, more or less, the mother of graphical adventure games. She was once named by GameSpot as one of the top ten most influential people in computer gaming of all time. Her games changed the relationship between game play and story, and led to the modern RPG and adventure game genres. Though she retired before video games became too mainstream, her works had the impact and success of any Will Wright or Sid Meier. And she took players to another world! Coming from a background of mythology and novels, Roberta Williams didn't have the adoration of the system that my other Masters held. She treated games more as if they were a medium, and less as pieces of technology. Despite this, her games always pushed the envelop of graphics and sound. How is it that one person managed to break new ground, mine that new ground, constantly push the envelope, continue some successful titles, and constantly release new works as well? How did one person wear two different hats simultaneously, all without breaking a sweat, all without growing bored?<br />
<br />
Or did she? She did retire, after all, which is more than can be said about any of the other game designers I've mentioned. Perhaps the key to Roberta Williams success is that it wasn't forced, manufactured, or driven by complete exploration of a topic followed by border-fueled-flight to another topic. She simply focused on doing something neat, that she enjoyed and that was passionate about. She sat down to tell a story, and she told it. She didn't constantly have to be seeking out new things, because her passion for storytelling was constantly filling her with new ideas. And twenty years later, when she was no longer passionate about pursuing games, she simply quit. As if quitting games was quite easy and natural once one was no longer entertained by them.<br />
<br />
I think I have the greatest lesson to learn of all from Roberta Williams. It feels that all the other designers I mentioned were doing a lucky and precarious balancing act between passion and irritated boredom to be both 4 and 16 in one. Roberta seemed to lack that inner conflict. She did what she was passionate about. And then she went off to write a historical novel. Perhaps the key to being both Scout and General is not to constantly weight each side so as to balance the two, but rather to ignore their existence all together. Maybe what I need to do is to follow wherever my seeds take me, and to accept any and all rainfall while on the wayUnknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-29474054287437811412012-11-12T08:58:00.002-08:002012-11-12T08:58:55.571-08:00Conclusion of Fall 2012I gave my final presentation on Agon and Alea (AaA) today, just a few short days after submitting to the Indie Games Conference.<br />
<br />
<h2>
And How Does That Make You Feel?</h2>
<br />
It's difficult to describe the sensations going through me. I am at once joyful/hopeful/relieved/excited/satisfied and sad/self-critical/panicked/dissatisfied. I think the joyful is winning.<br />
<br />
I wanted to do more. It was both expected and hoped that I would be able to do more. But I did a ton, learned a lot, and grew immensely. Did I succeed?<br />
<br />
Let's hit this from a side perspective. My limiting factor is neither talent nor time, but rather faith. Emotional faith in myself. In my own power. In my own awesomeness. When I have this faith, I am able to live my life with joy and inspiration; when I lack it, everything is a panic. Faith means I can do anything. Lack of faith means I'm paralyzed. And I've been having less and less and less "Working" faith as the years have gone by. Which means I've been plummeting into a pretty big, self-facilitating hole.<br />
<br />
Right now I am playing a self-help game called SuperBetter in order to help me overcome my limiting factor. So my end goal for the semester wasn't to network, make friends, conduct a team, develop a game, launch a product, enter a competition, or further my eventual master's thesis. My end goal was to restore some of my faith in myself. To emerge from the fall semester, inspired and ready to go<br />
<br />
Basically I need to start a positive feedback loop. If I can get to the point where I start feeling better about myself, the work will just start <i>happening</i> by virtue of my inspiration.<br />
<br />
Starting that loop is hard. Especially if you look at the fact that certain things I'd wanted and expected to do, I didn't end up doing. Especially when you think that I'm already emotionally exhausted by my game, which I'd begun to feel I'd never actually make a dent in completing. I also kept feeling like I was performing a role (programming) that wasn't really my own, like I was being forced to 'waste my time' implementing something that I should have been able to hire someone else to do.<br />
<br />
In light of that, we need some objective form of measurement. What is it that I feel like I'm failing at? What is it I could have succeeded at? Independent of my own mood, what tasks was I working at that could be used to gauge my success?<br />
<br />
Well I'm a college student. And I'm trying to get the most out of my college experience so that I can one day end up working at the job that will make me happiest. Surprisingly, that definition of my actual goal doesn't say anything at all about teams, projects, modules, or what I did or did not get done. Logically, if I can demonstrate that I've grown towards this goal, I should be able to prove that I had a successful semester/quarter, and boost my own feelings on the matter.<br />
<br />
So why don't I just make a long list of everything I learned this semester?<br />
<h2>
The Learn'ed List</h2>
<br />
<ol>
<li>I learned how to work with Flex, Flash Builder, and FlashDevelop (Open Source IDE) to create Actionscript-based projects using resource bundles from Flash and a programmer-oriented framework from Flex. </li>
<ol>
<li>I worked with open source projects and found several libraries and 'engines' to download and tinker with that expanded what I knew about rapid Flash games development.</li>
<li>I formulated some ideas for a number of small quick projects that I can do in my spare time, or as part of the portfolio class.</li>
</ol>
<li>I finally sat down and thought at length Fuzzy State system, did some research started preliminary investigations, asked some important questions</li>
<ol>
<li>broke an otherwise opaque problem down into smaller parts. </li>
<li>Difference between Fuzzy Control, Fuzzy States, Fuzzy Models and Fuzzy Modeling of real-world data. </li>
<li>Read two papers</li>
<li>Speant a day modeling what our Fuzzy State system will actually look like</li>
</ol>
<li>I taught myself how to work with two different social coding frameworks</li>
<ol>
<li>GIT/Mercurial and SVN</li>
<li>I did research to find out the best places to host code online for free (Google Code, Git Hub, Bit Bucket, Personal Server[SVN]) and the tradeoffs between them, including having to make the code open source or to use it for non-commercial purposes.</li>
<li>I made a PBWorks Wiki/webspace and updated it.</li>
<li>I started using Issue Tracking</li>
<li>I learned how to work with the command prompt and type in all sorts of crazy stuff to get the results I wanted.</li>
<li>I downloaded like 30 different GUIs, hacks, work-arounds, and java apps in order to get my social coding framework running on my home computer, my development machine, and in-school machines (mac and PC)</li>
<li>I learned the differences between GIT and SVN. '</li>
<li>I learned about SSH keys, how to generate them, and how to setup the secure file transfer protocol for my social coding, vs. using HTTPS pushes (which was no longer working for big files)</li>
</ol>
<li>I worked in the Unity3D engine for the fourth time in my life. Previously I'd done a tutorial, made my own level with a character controller that never worked properly and had a buggy FBX export [Ed], and used Unity3D entirely as a platform for plugin development. Let's just say I learned a lot about Unity3D in its entirely</li>
<ol>
<li>Became a lot more advanced at Unity3D use in general.</li>
<li>Created my own character controllers out of RigidBodies</li>
<ol>
<li>This is actually a very important point because it's hard, people very frequently want to do it, and people very frequently give up because of how hard it is. </li>
<li>This is vital for doing a game with a character like Ed, who can turn upside down. </li>
<li>It was really hard and really cool</li>
<li>It probably actually resulted in something I can contribute back to the community. </li>
<li>It worked with a moving platform</li>
</ol>
<li>Learned about the existence of Co-routines and how to use them in conjunction with the 'yield' framework.</li>
<li>Learned to work with local and global coordinates, and parenting, to do some very cool things. </li>
<ol>
<li>Learned better ways of doing things than was at first obvious.</li>
<li>Could write a better UML for a finalized engine now</li>
</ol>
<li>Worked with particle effects to give cool glowing halos!</li>
<li>Imported a character successfully</li>
</ol>
<li>UV mapped, textured, rigged, skinned, and animated a model all in one night. After modeling it. </li>
<ol>
<li>Modeled a complete human</li>
<ol>
<li>Had never done this before</li>
<li>Had never successfully done a face before</li>
<li>Managed to handle the eye, lips, and nose all extremely well at pretty high polygon</li>
</ol>
<li>Evaluated end model</li>
<ol>
<li>End result was reasonably faithful to the sketches, but needs work to look like exactly the character we want</li>
<li>Learned the sheer importance of digital sculpting; it is impossible to create an even reasonably attractive looking model without the normal maps computed from digital sculpting</li>
<li>Learned digital sculpting could help in the future to model faces; allows experimentation with mouth/jaw/cheeks/jowls region, which is difficult to sketch, model, etc. </li>
<li>Remarkably high quality of facial detail and fidelity achieved.</li>
<li>Came to realize just how hard it is to get a distinctive 3D character with a complex (or simply realistic) facial structure. Ovoid can be hard, but its fixable with good normal control and polygon spread. Non ovoid is insane. </li>
</ol>
<li>Discovered the Maya plugin, RoadKill for UV unwrapping and learned how to use.</li>
<ol>
<li>IT WAS SO EASY MUAHAHAHAHAHA (I'm remembering a week of unwrapping Ed)</li>
</ol>
<li>Used an Auto-Rigger</li>
<ol>
<li>Had to learn to export to fbx</li>
<li>Wasn't able to import the rigged character back into Maya, and recalling that it's a common problem that I'll be able to research!</li>
<li>Had a 1 day free trial and used it!</li>
</ol>
<li>Managed to use all free animations offered by Auto-Rigging site to animate character</li>
<li>Character looks very nice in loincloth. </li>
</ol>
<li>Math</li>
<ol>
<li>Refresher course on 3D geometry</li>
<li>Matrices, Vectors, Quaternions. </li>
<li>World vs Local space</li>
<li>Velocity, force, and physics</li>
</ol>
<li>Had to deal with my programmatic urges</li>
<ol>
<li>Worked with the stress of self-identity and the fear of personal incompetence or misdirection that these urges brought. </li>
<ol>
<li>Had to come to accept that I am not a programmer, and that my goal is not to create a perfect end product, but rather to rough in a shape that a programmer would later fill out, by showing it's possible and doing a lot of the necessary preliminary research. </li>
<li>Dealt with the realization that my goal is to create something testable, not something perfect. The first iteration. The demo. The proof of concept. The equivalent of the Scratch Mockup, but higher level. </li>
</ol>
<li>Worked with the frustration of an extremely picky target audience</li>
<ol>
<li>Struggled with the fact that my audience requires such a high level of polish that testing was difficult without a well-polished product. </li>
<li>Tried to figure out how to distill the game into its essential parts, so that they could be tested. Tried to figure out what to make so that it is testable with the audience, not just alone.</li>
</ol>
<li>Gained experience working in a new way</li>
<ol>
<li>Intended Agile Development</li>
<ol>
<li>Failed to think Agile-ly!</li>
<li>Got experience in that respect, and will be able to set up later projects better. </li>
</ol>
<li>Can now look at project and realize what parts are unnecessary and ended up causing a tremendous quantity of overhead and bugs. </li>
<li>Ready to try it it out again. </li>
</ol>
<li>Created a game</li>
<ol>
<li>Programmed thousands of lines of code. </li>
<li>Created an engine that suited my needs.</li>
<li>Could gut it and remake it better now, (a new 'slice') for optimization (unnecessary) or simply to reduce the 'bugs' overhead (streamlining) to make it easier to move forward (might help).</li>
</ol>
</ol>
<li>Developed a design thesis</li>
<ol>
<li>Found Design Philosophy</li>
<li>Realized what I'm genuinely passionate about at my core, what motivates me</li>
<li>Storyboarded new introduction to gameplay. </li>
<li>Moved from the idea of creating a proof of concept (Which is when I was expected to include more features) to creating a module (An in-depth exploration of certain difficult-to-implement features)</li>
</ol>
</ol>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Wow, okay. I think we can stop there for now. We've already got a ton. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<h2>
So What Does That Tell You?</h2>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Did I shoot myself in the foot a few times in development? Did that slow down development and prevent the integration of the story component? </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Maybe.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Did it matter?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Nope. Turns out my game is fun to fiddle with as a toy, even having no story at all. I could literally box up several augmented reality variants based on my little 'engine' as digital toys and sell them through iOS. Not a bad start.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
How do I feel now? All wiggly. I still can't get my feelings to stabilize entirely. I can't still convince <i>all</i> of me that I did a phenomenal job. I still can't be sure I'm going to be excited and curious and filled with new ideas to implement when the morrow comes, I still can't be sure I've outsmarted the anxiety-exhaustion thing. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But you know what? Maybe its all just a little more human than that. Maybe it's all just a little more nebulous around the edges than having a clear-cut certainty about where one stands. These are emotions we're talking about, after all. Perhaps most important of all is that this semester ends with me focusing on my own emotional state instead of ignoring it and simply trying to be more productive. I now understand my limiting factor, and how to increase my creativity through addressing the limiting factor. I've got lots of ideas, and I don't feel (mostly) like I've 'wasted my time' (which is a common feeling when you're an anxious perfectionist). </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I'm okay. I'm about where I want to be. I'm afloat. The battle isn't over. But you know, when I woke up today? I was filled with excitement. I wanted to program. Immediately. I wanted to implement this and that and the other. I was filled with vim! I was ready to go! </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I felt it and I know it's there, and I know that I can get it flowing again. It's like an oil well just beneath the surface; all I have to do is tap it juuuust right. It's not going anywhere and I won't lose it. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I'm not excited right now. This very second. This instant. I'm sleepy and need to go to bed. The old me would have been <i>bummed</i> that I wasn't excited and asked "What's wrong with me!?" as if I could be excited 24/7 365 days a year. The new me knows that if I was excited 30 minutes ago, I could be excited again 30 minutes from now. The new me is adaptive instead of critical; and so the new me is figuring out how to get results. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
My limiting factor will always be my own lack of faith. And though at this precise second I'm down off a 'high' of excitement, I honestly now have faith in my ability to find it again. And I'm peeling back the other stuff on top of it, layer by layer, so now I've started to see the excitement more and more and more frequently. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
That is what I'm going to come out of this with. At the Conclusion of Fall 2012, I have emerged with an acknowledgement and understanding of my own emotional foundation: of how to evaluate it, how to love it, how to nurture it, how to tweak it, how to respect its natural fluctuations- up and down, high and low- and maximize the highs while minimizing the lows.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I left school in May 2012 completely emotionally exhausted and burnt out.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I left school in November 2012 afloat and with 30 minute spurts of excitement about all the things I'm going to tinker with over the break.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Let's set the next milestone. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So I proved I can float. Well, when you're learning to swim, that's definitely the first step. So now that I proved I can float, let's start treading water a little.By January 2012 I want a better and more intimate emotional understanding of my own 'bummed' and self-critical periods. Instead of focusing on floating or excitement or accomplishing tasks, I will instead focus on getting to know my self-critic. Bit by bit, we will restore my motive power, my self-faith, my sense of power. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Gaming Imperatrix: Out!</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-6152681284021649922012-10-29T03:43:00.001-07:002012-10-29T03:43:58.215-07:00Indie Games Festival SubmissionAgon and Alea is to be entered into the Student Competition part of the Indie Games Festival competition. This is pretty much just a practice entry run (the demo isn't show-worthy yet, and the IGF warns that 'in progress' games have trouble competing against finalized games) but yet it remains very important. This is where we/I learn how to submit games.<br />
<br />
Every submission process takes work and attention to detail; but this one is made all the more complex by the fact that I'm scrambling to debug the project AND assemble art assets, all at the very last second. Which is made more complex by worrying about the submission process. For example, how am I going to submit an iOS game? I have no idea. Truth be told, I haven't even looked in detail at the submission process. I'm too busy freaking out about where I'm going to get three high-tracking student made marker designs tomorrow.<br />
<br />
I suppose that's the next thing on my to-do list: Stop worrying about assets and worry about submissions. After all, we can keep updating the code forever if it pleases us, leading up to the show, and if we keep updating for a few days its likely those updates will be pulled when our project is judged. And, hey, It's not like we expect to win anything at this stage! We pass/fail solely based on whether we enter or not, not based on whether we win! So clearly I need to look back at my priorities and make sure we're ready to show.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-9753569159230932292012-10-25T02:53:00.002-07:002012-10-25T02:53:40.811-07:00My Cat Feels Replaced<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBqFWhR929UK1o-Db_uP3PbSnW9CJ1dr4ZUBHwra0-iSiDF-gEM-BmTiijH-V6ZeVOvc4tglFiIXde9SKGaA0I2tIoONz4WLjSVeJr0mZq6Y4xQdyC8FTGRqzZzBboiR0x4NZK2O1_Kek/s1600/224411_4925519462176_2021185060_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBqFWhR929UK1o-Db_uP3PbSnW9CJ1dr4ZUBHwra0-iSiDF-gEM-BmTiijH-V6ZeVOvc4tglFiIXde9SKGaA0I2tIoONz4WLjSVeJr0mZq6Y4xQdyC8FTGRqzZzBboiR0x4NZK2O1_Kek/s320/224411_4925519462176_2021185060_n.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Tychus J. Findlay has been making it very difficult to debug Agon and Alea lately.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I had to take this screenshot by using my chin and free hand to press the requisite buttons on the iPad.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-59459850200196357852012-10-23T02:26:00.002-07:002012-10-25T02:03:41.351-07:00Why is Your Blog Purple?Why is it that every 'games for girls' site is pink? I mean we are talking about girls playing <i>video games</i>. Nine times out of ten that means smashing down gender boundaries. So why the heck do these sites start off with a hot pink layout? Isn't that in opposition to the point of getting girls involved with games?<br />
<br />
Why not green? Black? White? Or heck, just do things the brute force way, and make them red and blue. Can't get any more 'in your face we are tough gals' than that, right?<br />
<br />
Now purple is also seen as an effeminate color. Not <i>quite</i> as effeminate as pink. It's the less popular, but nevertheless vitally important 'color to use for girls when you are tired of pink.'<br />
<br />
So why is this blog purple?<br />
<br />
Well I'm only asking the question so that I can bring us to an interesting topic, which is tagging/branding. For reasons that can probably only be explained by group psychology, certain kinds of products end up having a certain 'look' to them. This look has several properties. First of all, it tends to evolve slowly or not at all- it's tenacious, a 'default setting', and hard to budge. Second of all, it helps us visually group products, making selection, navigation, indexing, evaluation, etc. faster and easier.<br />
<br />
Instead of girl's toys, let's use shampoo bottles. How can you tell the difference between a shampoo bottle for women, and a shampoo bottle for men?<br />
<br />
I'll tell you how. They both provide visual clues. Sometimes the female bottle is more sensuous. Sometimes it has softer curves. But more often than not, these subtleties are unnecessary for anything but the most artistically designed bottles. After all, they're a little harder to notice from afar. If you want to call someone's attention over from halfway across the room, and you want them to walk to the right side of the shampoo shelf, there is one tried-and-true property that humans can spot from pretty darn far away. Color.<br />
<br />
<img alt="Thickening Shampoo" height="320" src="http://images.askmen.com/fashion/grooming/1252944154_loreal-vive-pro-men-thickening-shampoo_1.jpg" width="320" /><img height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLzcuOHBbt1Tc_oywIPyK6IPCMMIIkduxiEdXGP13mkEK2np0A-cYHr1Dv9tujOrWd9kFHwWsOAEC6TimyebA-nuvseuM_Bfw78HjehrvOXOue740H7WX0nrOuxSkli1n_B1yt_Iwedxk/s320/loreal-shampoo-50-BFAB-0407-de.jpg" width="250" /><br />
<br />
That's the sum of it. Color helps us sort. Color helps us find what we need. Color is fast, color is easy, color is convenient.<br />
<br />
More importantly, humans <i>like</i> to sort. We are pattern matchers. Our brains work best when we can group things. Humans like help digging through all of their choices. Humans like having decisions made easier for them- especially when they're only half paying attention in the first place. Imagine if every bottle in the store looked the same, and you had to look through each and every one and read the ingredients on the back to find the product that helped give you bouncier curls. And heaven forbid there should be curl-bouncing ingredients on more than one identically looking package! How are you going to decide!?<br />
<br />
Girl toys are packaged in pink because once the convention started, it made it easier and easier to find toys that were most-likely to be appealing to girls in the way everyone assumed was most-normal. After that point, any package not in pink would accidentally and swiftly get shelved into the excluded-from-products-I-need-to-look-through category. These quick mental heuristics, which helped people shop for their girls, created the wrapped-in-pink thing. No product could compete with a near-identical product in pink- Not because pink was 'better', but because without the pink it couldn't be <i>found</i>.<br />
<br />
A big chunk of my research is devoted to studying this phenomena, because my target audience is ladies. Ladies who have extensive shopping experience and well-trained mental heuristics to narrow down what products are for them. Which means that if you throw a video game at them in all the normal video game trappings, not a single dame is ever going to touch it. She's too efficient. She can't bother with packages that don't meet her mental model. She doesn't have time to waste on you, just like she doesn't have time to waste on the six thousand masculine first person shooters out there. There are too many products out there vying for her attention.<br />
<br />
So you have to find the proper clothing to dress the video game in. You have to meet her mental model. You have to let her know, by the external features of the package, that this product is <i>intended for her</i>. That this is a female product. You need a voluptuous shampoo bottle with a video game inside it. You have to signal to her quick an efficient mind that this game (or whatever it is) should be placed in the 'products I need to look through' category instead of the 'products not for me' category.<br />
<br />
Now here's the kicker. The appearance of the packaging is frequently unrelated to the object inside. More often than not, if you unwrap a covered-in-pink item from the toy story, you'll find that the interior contents are not-pink. The doll is dressed in red. Or green. Or yellow. Cause girls get bored of visual sameness much faster than guys, actually. The pink is not the product. The pink is a <i>signal</i>. A <i>tag</i> in the <i>cloud</i> of life. The pink is for <i>sorting algorithms</i>. The pink is not the staying factor, it's not even the hook! It's a tag. Nothing more.<br />
<br />
A woman will sort the objects into a 'review this' category based on the tag. Then she will evaluate it's hooks through the title, easily accessible details, and exposed visual details. If hooked, she will turn it over and glance for any issues or problems, such as age unsuitability. But what will make her come back and buy it again and again and again will be her evaluation of what's <i>inside. </i>And usually she has to sort, get hooked, evaluate, buy, and bring home long before she actually gets to the insides.<br />
<br />
So why are girl gamer sites pink? To let you know you're in the right place. And why is my blog purple?<br />
<br />
Because I am Gaming Imperatrix, and purple is traditionally the color associated with the Roman Emperor.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
What did you think I was going to say?<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
Look up Sumptuary Laws of Ancient Rome. Only the Emperor was allowed to wear purple, so one could quickly and easily distinguish individuals based on rank. Kinda like identifying shampoo bottles.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-56733727789492899232012-10-21T09:37:00.001-07:002012-10-25T02:04:26.368-07:00Spartan Dummy Hero Takes First Steps....Agon and Alea is doing good, though I left my posse alone for a week and they need me to reinvigorate them. I was too deep in programming and didn't surface for air!<br />
<br />
Here is the result of four weeks of hard labor: Our dummy spartan stand in takes his first virtual steps into the real world, bug free and lookin' fine!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1lIQlC_VOGDu33h7tW_3x38I6cekfZ6g_NB9pwCfDHKigwtAsUj5CaNkYc_XwVXCFHX3tRO6KikInNmMyEjhiY_uLcfwV4RNYQwMDlvwvcAHlHglC_GbKHqwepvLOHlIkS5wCtzcJl_8/s1600/550285_4905048270409_532206324_n.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1lIQlC_VOGDu33h7tW_3x38I6cekfZ6g_NB9pwCfDHKigwtAsUj5CaNkYc_XwVXCFHX3tRO6KikInNmMyEjhiY_uLcfwV4RNYQwMDlvwvcAHlHglC_GbKHqwepvLOHlIkS5wCtzcJl_8/s320/550285_4905048270409_532206324_n.jpeg" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
This is an important milestone, because not only have we reached our first major functional build, but also because this is just after midterms when my team needs something to invigorate and inspire them. I sort of had to neglect them for a week to get this out.<br />
<br />
Now I can show them what they have been working on. Now they can see it with their own eyes. And now they can be absolutely sure I know what I'm talking about, and that I'm not going to let them down. I hope this will give them some of that much needed Vim required to keep a person going in the middle of the semester.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-48630401257416020752012-10-18T19:21:00.005-07:002012-10-25T02:06:49.918-07:00So What is Agon and Alea?Agon and Alea is a game for ladies. It's about heroes and companionship. It's on the iPad and uses new technology ("Augmented Reality" to bring a small digital character 'into' the real world, so she can see it standing on her hand (A bit like the Holodeck from Star Trek). This character is a social and emotional toy one can play with, and a little like a digital child, boyfriend, and pet all wrapped into one. Agon and Alea is also an adventure game in which women coaxes this character through story obstacles and enemies to save the day.<br />
<br />
When I started Agon and Alea, I put off starting my blog for about a month. I had no inspiration to write anything. Then one day, in the midst of frustration and uncertainty, I logged in to www.blogger.com and began vomiting my feelings and thoughts out into text. This kind of writing is really neat, really therapeutic, really enjoyable- for me. I read my own stuff, and I remember exactly how I felt- it's like a diary of my emotions, my highs, my lows, my epiphanies. Re-reading it is a real big emotional booster for me.<br />
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But then some days I just wanna get online and write down the whole cohesive narrative of what the heck I'm doing- instead of tossing around thought vomit ;)<br />
<br />
So, what is Agon and Alea?<br />
<br />
Graduate school is a doozy; I'm expected to change the world. I came in 'just wanting to make games.' Research sounded stupid. I wanted to make what I played, and play what I made. Strategy games. Horror games. <i>Normal</i> games, I now realize, but <i>better</i> than they had been done before.<br />
<br />
Then my Teacher/Mentors stopped me in my tracks with a brick wall of graduate-level questions. I smashed into that wall over and over and over again, crying some days I was so confused about what I was doing wrong. Was something wrong with me? Was I just incapable? Why couldn't I figure out what he wanted me to do?<br />
<br />
He didn't want me to <i>do</i> anything; he was trying to make me <i>think </i>about games. This wasn't to say I was adverse to thinking; quite the contrary! Actually, the issue was that we take for granted what we <i>know</i>, and it prevents us from exploring.<br />
<br />
Somewhere through my first quarter here at SCAD, I began making breakthrough after breakthrough. Everything about my games changed. The gameplay became richer, more interesting. People started getting excited about what I was doing. <i>I </i>started getting excited about what I was doing. I started off thinking that some of the exercises I was being put through were just that, exercises.<br />
<br />
My teacher would ask me to design a game for small children using unique input devices. Blah. That's not a horror game. That's weird edutainment stuff. I got in to this major because I liked Bioshock; not for LeapFrog. But once I gave it a try, once I pulled out all the stops and really let my mind explore, I started coming up with some things I'd never seen or heard of before. The stuff I was coming up with? Actually <i>meant</i> something in the grand scheme of things.<br />
<br />
I <i>meant</i> something. I had power. I could change <i>things</i>. I could invent a product that altered how people thought about something. Me, a game designer! I'm no surgeon, no rocket scientist, no lawyer, no judge. I'd told myself on occasion- whenever I was struck by the thought that 'video game design' and 'novelism' seemed petty in comparison to 'rocket science' (which I would probably also be capable of doing) that I would never want to be responsible for a project where one small mistake could kill a person. Holy crap! Why did I have to tell myself that!? Did I feel like I was <i>wasting</i> my talent? Did I feel like I needed a reassurance, or an 'out', or some explanation for my waste, and that <i>cowardice</i> was an acceptable excuse?<br />
<br />
Who knows what I had been thinking. But what I know <i>now</i> is that my chosen career path requires greater courage- and provides for the chance to make greater cultural change- than any rocket scientist ever could. Engineers don't put their stories, their messages, their immersive interactive experiences, into the homes and hands and hearts of today's children. Not really. Not like <i>I</i> can do. I am in an immensely powerful position. My mentor taught me that.<br />
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Agon and Alea is an amalgamation of everything I learned about myself and my talents in Interactive Design 101 here at SCAD. And a composite of everything I've learned since. It represents who I am, what I'm good at, what I'm passionate about, where the core of my heart is. For me, games are a way to make the fantastical, real. They let us leave the real world and explore an imaginative space- a fairy world- and then return home safe and sound. To me, each game is a <i>Where the Wild Things Are</i> or a <i>Slumberland</i>. And I'm really big about getting anyone and everyone to get up and let their curiosity lead them off into these worlds, so they can play and escape and relax and <i>wonder</i> for a bit.<br />
<br />
Agon and Alea is a video game for ladies. My target audience starts one or two generations my senior and stretches up through the baby boomer dames. My observation is that these are a group of women who just don't get enough play time. No one but Tide Bleach and Better Homes and Garden advertises for them. No one is encouraging them to play, wonder, escape, or relax- unless it's the time share industry (And the damsels and dames I'm aiming for are <i>way</i> too clever with their finances to get sucked into unnecessary time shares.) Even cruise lines prefer to target her children and husband over her and say - "Look, your family will have such a good time, so you should buy this!"<br />
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I've been conducting research on my target audience for awhile now. I'm looking both at women in this demographic who already game, as well as women who aren't drawn into gaming- and why. I'm trying to figure out how to make a video game that does something for her akin to what TV dramas do for her- but interactive instead of passive.<br />
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Now this is where the research comes in. Because anyone (and I do mean anyone) can look at what I've said about and quickly summon together an opinion about women. I often gets stuff like... let's see... "Hold on a second, you should know that women are more motivated by their families than men." Or "Women just enjoy passive media more than men." For some reason, people can snap together a gut instinct on the issue to explain away the current state of things faster than on almost any other topic.<br />
<br />
But that's what my Mentor was telling me all that time ago when I started out my video game quest. <i>You are taking what you 'know' for granted</i>. My job is to stop taking all this 'common knowledge' at face value. I am disinterested in <i>what</i> women are, or what we know them to be like. If women are one thing, a known constant, an unchangeable pillar, than there are no new products we can pitch to her. If she can't be altered or swayed, if she has no unmet needs, or if her needs are unmeetable, than we have nothing- as designers, developers, producers- to offer her.<br />
<br />
But this is not the case. The minivan, tupperware, the microwave, the cellular phone, the right to vote, the dress suit, organized sports in elementary schools- these things changed what it means to be a 'woman,' a 'mother,' etc. forever. These products built on pre-existing utilitarian objects, but they opened up new channels, new forms of culture, new ways of being that previous products never had.<br />
<br />
Designers changed culture by designing new and previously unthought of experiences for ladies.<br />
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Which means that if I stop accepting the face-value assumption that what women need is a faster can opener, and I start looking at the underlying requirements of her life, I can come upon the startling realization that she doesn't even need cans at all- she needs plastic tupperware. Alternatively, if I stop answering 'why don't women play games?' and I start looking at the underlying requirements of her life, I can find a need that only games could ever possibly meet.<br />
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My job is not only to question common knowledge, but to actually ignore facts (effects) about women all together and reach down to find out the forces that drive her. Women love collecting fashion objects? Okay. Why? What does that satisfy in her? What is she longing for? What does she lack? Who did she inherit this practice from? her mother? Her grandmother? Her friends? What need did it satisfy then? How was she first introduced to it?<br />
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Zynga asked those questions and realized that women didn't need a game about shoes. They wanted Farmville. They just didn't know it yet.<br />
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So Agon and Alea is a game about companionship, social play, emotions, moods, and heroes. It gives a woman a character she can respect- like the protagonist of a TV serial drama- but makes that hero small and slightly vulnerable to her and her alone. He (or she) needs the player's attention and care, and in exchange he is capable of great feats of intelligence, craft, acrobatics, strength, honor, and bravery. He is a character the player can take seriously, drawing in an audience that otherwise despises cartoons and mindless play. A character like Captain Kirk; or the protagonist of I am Legend; or Gregory House. <br />
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The character is unique to her, and remembers what she tells him. He has needs, wants, desires, habits (good and bad) and personality quirks. Some can be trained out of him/her; others he will convince the player to accept. The character is intelligent enough to analyze the player, and complex enough to be analyzed by the player, as both attempt to optimize their relationship while at the same time pressing their own needs. He is devoted, loyal, and while occasionally grumbly or aloof, he will always rush to the player's defense in a time of need.<br />
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Oh, and she can take pictures with him on her shoulder and send them to her friends.<br />
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Agon and Alea is a digital doll, a TV drama hero, a miniature friend, a fun toy, an escape into another world, and a facilitator of play- not necessarily for a lonely introverted woman- but really for any woman who needs to recapture a little bit of the magic they experienced when watching a movie like Indian and the Cupboard, or from when they once believed their Dolls came alive at night, or Fairies roamed in the backyard garden. <br />
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My project with Agon and Alea has another big fundamental component: Distribution. But I'll save that for another blog post. For now, just know that while we spend a lot of time designing this game, we spend a lot more time figuring out how to A) inform ladies about our product, B) get the product to the ladies, and C) lower her guard enough that she'll be willing to give it a try.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-49739786967266145192012-10-15T12:10:00.002-07:002012-10-25T02:13:05.751-07:00Hopes and FearsSo it's Monday Night and I haven't gotten done what I wanted to do over the weekend. In fact, looking back, it feels like I worked on a single problem, and that the problem I worked on wasn't the most significant of problems to the overall program. Nor, in fact, did I come up with the perfect solution, either!<br />
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This isn't true, of course, but in ways it IS what it feels like. I decided I wanted my character to be velocity driven because collision detection and gravity would work the most intuitively if I could work entirely with composited vectors. Also, I knew that I would be working with parts of Unity like Linear Interpolation and Coroutines that I didn't know anything about, and wanted to learn.<br />
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I also did a lot of brainstorming on my Fuzzy State Machine and what the finished Machine and the Baby Machine will look like.<br />
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But let's face it, I'm a newb! I've never been on a team that's going through Agile Development. As much as I say that my game is on a rapid development cycle and I'm taking an 'Agile' approach to designing it, that's not exactly true. The final scope of my project is definitely an Agile sliced of a final work, yes. But as for what I do day-to-day, I tend to spend my time solving problems the 'best' way I know how, instead of the quickest. And then if I have to abandon the 'best' way due to time constraints, well I just end up with the worst of all worlds.<br />
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Let's take this as a learning experience, however. I still have a number of weeks before the semester ends. But it's become clearer and clearer that I and my team are just not going to hit the October 31st deadline. That's okay. I didn't expect the HKDC deadline when I started up my project. I also didn't expect losing a grand total of 20% of my overall programming time to getting food poisoning (which is what the entire weekend DID amount to). February is actually a very realistic date to shoot for, and if we can hit the November IndiePub deadline along the way, so much the better. Technically the SCAD winter break is very long, and it's more likely I can get a few freelance volunteers over the winter than during the grueling fall.<br />
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So you know what? I'm going to sit back and relax and just get what I CAN get done for the end of the class. I'm going to believe in myself a little more. And instead of worrying about deadlines, I'm going to worry about learning and developing my game. This is school, Am I right? So I'm going to study. Here I shall learn how to manage, how to think in terms of Agile development (I've got a few more weeks left to figure out what that means, and I can try again each week), how to network, how to increase my productivity, how to ignore my Email, and how to just keep my anxiety levels low.<br />
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The first thing I have planned for the upcoming week? To talk to myself! See, here I go:<br />
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Implement everything easy first. Pick the easiest implementation that exists. Okay, you wanted to use vectors for movement? Very well. You did it. Milk the functionality out of that ASAP. Your vectors give you the phenomenal bonus of being able to include gravity, so include it. You have a pose filter sitting around gathering dust. Implement it. After you have gravity, all you need is a simple marker with a bounding box to implement the hand plane. Even before you have gravity, you just need a marker with a bounding box to activate the wand. These are all 'simple things'. Leave the big projects like rewriting motion engines and creating fuzzy state machines for the weekend- leave the thinking for your emptier days. You have tons of tiny tasks that you can get done while your brain is half off and your emotions are crazy. Use them to reward yourself and abandon them for the moment if they resist you.<br />
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Utilize the time you have according to your ability. You know you have a lot of time at tutoring hours that no one takes advantage of, but you're too distracted to do much. Write blog posts in this time. Create homework for the students. Check your email. (Oh, btw, you have to check Student Universe to make sure your airline tickets updated, and call Air Canada about your cat). Put together your ACC portfolio. Research scholarships.<br />
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Or take these 'little things' that are easy to implement, and implement THEM. Use your 'half brain-dead anyway' time to get that stuff done.<br />
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The thing that I've figured out about maintaining anxiety is to be your own biggest fan and your own coach. I could be feeling stressed out about the fact that I implemented a single line on my task list, I'm a week behind, and I'm going to have to drop a deadline. But I'm not. I'm amazingly confident about the fact that this is going to work.<br />
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I look at the people around me and I know some of them are capable of pushing out code faster than me. I know a lot of it has to do with frustration- that stress, distractions, and any sense of doubt can chew hours off programming time. A surprisingly quantity of the time I set aside for programming sees me waking up in the middle of surfing Wikipedia going "How the hell did I get here? Wasn't I looking up Matrices?" And I know that I run into a lot of hurtles simply because I'm unfamiliar with the Unity 3D API and have to try a hundred things of varying complexity before I settle upon the most streamlined set of commands that gets what I want to do, done.<br />
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But then, I remember. I remember- as by now you should realize- to remind myself that I am not a programmer. I am actually extremely good at doing something that isn't even my job. I'm a game designer, a game developer, a leader, a person who solves problems by technical means in a creative fashion, but I'm really the gal who's supposed to be making the UML diagram, not implementing it. And here I am hacking away at command terminals and trying to find out the right way to multiply inverse Quaternions to write an engine for a style of game that doesn't even exist yet.<br />
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I started my game with six weeks of production time. I'm working with augmented reality. I have a reference for how long this kind of stuff should take, too. Game Company X, which I am familiar with, took two months and a fully fledged game programmer and another fully fledged artist, to create a game that can't do many of the things MY game can currently do.<br />
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If I'm lucky, it will take one more week and weekend to write all of the code necessary to implement the 'hard' parts of the game, that is, the Pos filter (so things aren't vibrating violently all over the place), the hand plane, the wand, gravity, and the ability to poke and pat my character and have him react to that poke and pat. Theoretically speaking, if I were SUPER lucky, I could comment back in my DeviceMotion support and it would work almost out of the box.<br />
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But what's really going to make my game shine is the fuzzy logic engine. I know that I'm supposed to be Agile- and I'm going to do my best. But that Engine is what makes or breaks my game. It's my prize. It's the thing that's not going to be ready for the October 31st entry date, and it's the reason I'm probably going to pull the game from that show and save it just a little longer. That's the thing I have to get done by November 14th. Not AR, not physics, not pose filters, or cute animations, or neat sounds, or interfaces, or system averages, but /the fuzzy engine/, and the scripted segment that leads up to it.<br />
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But I need everything else, too, to give it a foundation to stand on.<br />
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I take it all back. This is my goal for Fall Semester: To End Fall Semester with the same passionate drive that I started with, so that I feel compelled to work on my project all Winter Semester. I want to feel alive when November 14th hits. And I want to feel ready. Because February 28th I've got a present in store for the Indie Games community, and I'll be damned if I'm late on the delivery.<br />
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Heh. Want to know something funny? I just realized... That that long scripted sequence I'm semi-dreading to implement? Everything I learned today in my programming, and everything I programmed, amounts to the sum total of what I need to have in order to script it. Maybe I really do know exactly what I'm doing after all.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-16269151570698957692012-10-15T01:46:00.001-07:002012-10-25T02:13:08.379-07:00Management and Brainstorming<h2>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>Management</i></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>Brainstorming</i></span></h2>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-86703563157466965802012-10-15T00:37:00.001-07:002012-10-25T02:13:10.267-07:00SSH vs HTTP posting for GIT: What it means to be Artistically TechnicalAcronyms, right? Do you know what SVN is? GIT? SSH? HTTP?<br />
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<h3>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>Tagging People</i></span></h3>
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When a person in my industry self-identifies, they usually give them-self some sort of appellation There's an adjective, a tag in there. A person may be a Business Person, an Artistic Person, a Technical Person, a Communications Person, a Managerial Person, etc. These aren't related to a person's job, or place in the company- well, not by causation, anyway. An Artistic Person thinks with the right side of the Cerebrum. A Technical Person thinks with the left side of the Cerebrum. A Business Person thinks with the Cerebellum.<br />
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Okay, that was mean. But you get the point.<br />
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But as a Game Developer, I find that I get no part of the brain assigned to me. Depending on the phase of the moon and the disposition of the client, I am a Technical Person, an Artistic Person, or a Business Person. There really doesn't appear to be any 'Developer Person' role.<br />
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This presents a problem, because, as a Game Developer, I have a totally different purpose than someone who sits soundly within one of these predefined tags. If you just arbitrarily call me an Artistic Person because you know I can draw (a little), it seems then as if I become a FULL ARTISTIC PERSON, bound by the metrics and expectations that that post encapsulates.<br />
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<h3>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>Role-playing Metaphors</i></span></h3>
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Let's use a DND Metaphor. This is like there are only three classes that anyone ever talks about, "Warrior," "Cleric," and "Rogue," and then me rolling up a Ranger. After that, give that I can fight, cast a little magic, and sneak around, you call me a Warrior, Cleric, or Rogue respectively, depending on what you need at the time. But doing this is going to frustrate our relationship: I can't live up to any of those three classes. In fact, my purpose is totally different from all three of them. Like I have a pet bear following me around, for starters.<br />
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So let me tell you what I'm actually good at. First of all, I can wear a lot of different hats. But second of all, the hats I DO wear, are different from the ones your straight-discipline guys wear.<br />
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I wear the hat of leadership. Ordinarily this would mean I'd know how to motivate people and seize the day. But specifically to me, I trade off some of the specialty leadership would ordinarily afford and exchange it for a competent and fairly detailed understanding of the development process as a whole. A pure-blooded "Leadership Class" person has spent a lot more time learning how to manage time, keep on target, and set goals than I have.<br />
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But my derivation of the "Leadership Class" is synergistic with all of my other 'Development' hats. I've traded off some time I could have spent purely on leadership for a set of different skills that affect me in many ways. I know how to talk to programmers, to artists, to writers, to business people. I understand the relationships between the different parts of the whole, and where fractures can cause an entire company's development process to ground to a halt. And a totally self-contained "Leadership Class" couldn't do that.<br />
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<h3>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>My Two Hats</i></span></h3>
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Now if you asked me, I wear about two hats. The first hat has to do with Leadership/ Production/ Management /Networking/ Business. This hat is newer, and I'm still working on developing it and integrating it with the rest of myself.<br />
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The second hat, much older and more established, is the Artistic/Technical hat. Right now, if you asked me what I am, and 'Designer' or 'Developer' wasn't a good enough answer for you, I'd tell you that I am an Artistic Technician.<br />
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<h3>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>Artistic Technician</i></span></h3>
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So what does it mean to be an Artistic Technician? I am obviously not an Engineer or Computer Scientist. I'm not even a Computer Programmer. But I am also not a Writer, not an Artist, not a 3D Modeler, Texturer, or Character Concept Artist.... What exactly is it I do? Certainly I can do SOME of all the above tasks, but none as well as a specialist. To fill in their boots is to be a Ranger filling in the role of an absent Warrior.<br />
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Where's the bear that follows me around?<br />
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An Artistic Technician's strength comes from their ability to apply a wide variety of unrelated disciplines to a seemingly unrelated problem. We are cross-disciplinary creative problem solvers. At first this sounds like I'm saying I can solve Artistic Problems, but I only have half the Artistic Tools- and that I can solve Programming Problems, but I still only have half the Programming Tools.<br />
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Not so!<br />
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The real value of an Artistic Technician is that I can solve Artistic Problems with Neurology Tools, and Engineering Problems with Interior Design Tools. Here's a case in point: an Engineer has written a piece of software that can do unusual computations. Right now, he is working on trying to find the perfect technology for programming a computer to drive a car. Everything going on in his mind is related to camera vision. His narrow focus means that he is able to reach out very far in one direction, but simultaneously he is aware of few disciplines outside his own. He can neither pull nor push ideas to or from those other disciplines.<br />
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As a Artistic Technical person, I don't have the in-depth understanding of camera vision to program very sophisticated vision software. In fact, I'm not even up to date on all the technical jargon for the discipline or the latest algorithms. But I have the <i>baseline tools</i>. That is, I have the access tool that allow me to peer into any discipline and follow a quick path from no understanding of a given subject to a functional understanding of a given subject in a very quick period of time. For <i>any</i> discipline.<br />
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So although I'm currently designing a game for children that involves spelling, I can A) translate a game problem into generic terms, B) go out, research, and find a few disciplines that may be able to yield solutions to my generic-ified game problem, C) find the engineering paper on computer vision, D) read and comprehend the paper sufficiently, and E) take his work across a wide variety of disciplines and apply it to video games totally unrelated to computer vision, who merely use the technique in order to augment the 'fun' factor.<br />
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And likewise I can take anything a fashion designer knows about how the human eye registers distinct visual objects, and talk to the Engineer about it in terms he'll understand. My knowledge might change the way he thinks about the problem he's trying to solve, and inspire a solution from an entirely new angle.<br />
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<h3>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>So What are SSH, HTTP, and GIT?</i></span></h3>
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Lately I've been working with Social Coding frameworks in order to make my coding process smoother and more intuitive, and so that I can develop simultaneously on multiple machines. I had never done this before, and so ran into a lot of hiccups as I struggled with alien terminology and command lines. Of course, the process of working with the Social Coding framework has probably taken up more time than it would have saved- but that's only for <i>this</i> specific six week project. Now that I have an understanding of how social coding works, I am going to be able to understand similar paradigms <i>forever</i>- really useful given that odds are most of the teams I'll ever work on will use some form of Social Coding framework.<br />
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A network person might laugh in my face at the difficulties I had. After all, countless thousands of people out there all use Social Coding. It's not like I discovered a new planet, here. But the issue at hand here is that those people are usually working IT jobs. I'm a Technical Artist. Am I just fooling around with stuff I shouldn't have to know, ignoring my true discipline? Heavens, no!<br />
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Just imagine down the line when the IT department and Art department are arguing over an asset that has gone 'missing' in a network Commit, and no one can seem to make the other side understand exactly what the 'problem' is.<br />
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My talent is not in understanding everything. I trade off having an in-depth internal library of knowledge concerning every one subject in exchange for having the baseline tools to understand just about anything. And then I only learn tools <i>as I need them</i>. I am an interpreter, not a compiler. And I like that word 'interpret.' Because not only do I absorb skills precisely in the order they become useful, but I also interpret between different disciplines.<br />
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I cannot stress how important this is: because usually the different disciplines of the world all 'know' certain things that they've never shared with other disciplines- things that would make everyone's life a lot easier, and advance technology a lot faster. Imagine if your teacher actually <i>understood</i> how to use all the technical tools available to them through the school. Imagine if they knew how to use every feature of blackboard, and had a thriving internet metropolis of ideas flowing about online as a result. Imagine if the guys who build blackboard could actually talk to the teachers, and redesign the system for increased usability.<br />
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Cross-discipline problem solving is <i>everything</i>. For the everyday layman, every technological problem they could ever have has already been solved by someone out there- they just don't know how to find that info or what to do with it if they find it. I'm the missing link.<br />
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For games? For one of the most interdisciplinary jobs on this planet?<br />
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Cross-discipline problem solving is probably the most valuable skill a developer could have.<br />
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<h3>
<span style="color: #ead1dc;"><i>Git, Plz</i></span></h3>
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So what did I do? Simple on the face of it. My GIT repository for social coding was having difficulty accepting HTTP posts that exceeded a certain size. Although I was pushing <50MB, the system was slowing down and hanging and the remote server was hanging up unexpectedly. Part of the issue may have been when I re-imported my Spartan King prefab from the Asset store in order to get back some animations that had gone missing along the line.<br />
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I simply upgraded my system to use SSH keys, which all in all took about two hours with some setup and troubleshooting guides and an alternative .bashrc script I found on Stackoverflow while Googling. Then it worked like magic and I've been pushing fine ever since.<br />
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If you understood a word of that, you still might not understand why my skill set is so valuable because you underestimate the difficulty of what it is you already understand, and you also have no way to gauge how difficult other aspects of my job are, like designing this so that it stretches properly in the Unity 3D engine:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9gPsTk8L7PQ5qP9Rwd9zOduqxsUe-dbD030JGco8lsex5yHMtwWpcRPALl3h8_770NQ67YsZlmP-AkzBhFCJuoTkU0k9U9YBK372loBYHzT2Mlntu3nWKxaZkdXc4F7yQKvz7Vq528aQ/s1600/Button+Blueprint.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9gPsTk8L7PQ5qP9Rwd9zOduqxsUe-dbD030JGco8lsex5yHMtwWpcRPALl3h8_770NQ67YsZlmP-AkzBhFCJuoTkU0k9U9YBK372loBYHzT2Mlntu3nWKxaZkdXc4F7yQKvz7Vq528aQ/s1600/Button+Blueprint.png" /></a></div>
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For those of you who didn't really understand a word: rejoice! I exist as a point of communication between you and the tech guys, and I can report back simply this:<br />
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I put together a system so you can download the latest version of our project from any computer in the world. It's always up-to-date. We got a bug in the system when the project started getting too big. I fixed it this morning. This means it is going to be easier to back up and archive our art from now on.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-70356997667568577302012-10-14T07:47:00.002-07:002012-10-25T02:13:12.555-07:00The Terminal and II and the Terminal/Command Prompt are on a whirlwind, vicious love affair, which started out as an arrangement of convenience and has quickly exploded into a blazing inferno.<br />
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Maybe it's me. I admire a program of high competence .. but more than that... the Command Prompt really <i>communicates</i> with me. No endlessly spiraling beach balls .. no progress loading bars that never move... Hell, even when I don't know what it's saying, it's talking to me. It's a polyglot after all...<br />
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Yeah. Command prompt. I love you. For now. Now get my Mac through this strange remote end hanging up unexpectedly error, please and thank you. We'll keep talking if you somehow figure it out. I'm posed to do the craziest merge since I started this endeavor and I can't afford to be late."Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-58390309817685980862012-10-13T21:42:00.004-07:002012-10-25T02:13:14.523-07:00MonoDevelopMonoDevelop is the tool that comes with Unity that's used to write scripts. It's invaluable, has phenomenal auto-completion, and really I wouldn't want to code without it.<br />
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Somehow I deleted something essential to its operation and it crashes on every save. I'm trying to revive it now with every inch of my technical know how but it may be too far gone.<br />
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Edit: (My Solution)<br />
<br />
<br />
I ended up installing the standalone MonoDevelop, which is actually a much more current version than the one packaged with Unity. It doesn't Sync with Unity quite as well, and you have to be delicate with it, but it's capable of working with a GIT repository on Windows being active in the same folder without crashing (Especially if you disable the GIT plugin), which is more than I can say about the built in Unity version (which was crashing left and right, unable to save anything).<br />
<br />
I cannot open files from within Unity, but I can create a complete Unity MonoDevelop project by clicking "Sync MonoDevelop Project" I get all the code completion, the Assembly Browser for Unity functions, the help, the debugging... all I have to do is manually look from the Unity 3D console to the MonoDevelop line number to make everything work. And I can open files from the MonoDevelop project hierarchy. So you know all in all I'm not complaining.<br />
<br />
It works 95% of the way, the only inconvenience is I can't directly click on Unity Console errors to have them pop up, and I have to remember to open scripts in the Mono hierarchy, not the Unity one.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-10145584182346149612012-10-11T21:40:00.001-07:002012-10-25T02:13:17.419-07:00Dynamic FontsSo remember how I promised myself to get my social coding up and to not worry about programming till Friday? Well, It's Friday. I'm having trouble restraining myself from tutoring (I spent a few hours on it this morning despite promising myself not to). But I got the whole of my social coding beast up and running at about 12:00 (when I stopped tutoring). After that it's been like lightning jumping back and forward between two computers, sharing references across them, debugging on both machines, etc.<br />
<br />
I solved an irritating bug in about 15 minutes. Building to the iPad now to see if it will run for me. If it does, it'll be the first glimpse I get of the game running on my iPad with the GUI intact, and I'll take a screen and post it. <br />
<br />
Man, GIT is sexy for what I was going for. I usually don't like interacting with the command prompt, but at this point even the command prompt is totally sexy. Like a completely non-issue. Everything is up and running like a well-oiled machine. A purring sports car. It is an utter relief to use both machines available to me at max capacity- and trade code with computers at school- with no impediments or frustration in the way.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-48716309745373987532012-10-11T02:49:00.006-07:002012-10-25T02:13:19.794-07:00My Relationship With Command LineWhen you're talking about networking, social coding, or moving around files, you inevitably run into a terminal app or command prompt.<br />
<br />
Which I hate.<br />
<br />
I avoid them with a passion, using GUI interfaces even when everyone else around me is using terminal. I find all the latest interfaces with the best merging tools, the slickest designs, the most stability, the best integration.<br />
<br />
So then.<br />
<br />
How is it no matter what I do, I always end up back at the command prompt?<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh20yYbd1BOcsaPARLv70XrP-liqklxhUV1nw9843Bu0x3entU3OLHvSi2ob4w-PP218JVVidejLM-_qxnKrMMLgYKIfKk6LmY8SS4xHz7coI6ARqPOeDnMS-Y7WM6P_pWLNev_5QMGSiw/s1600/Untitled.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh20yYbd1BOcsaPARLv70XrP-liqklxhUV1nw9843Bu0x3entU3OLHvSi2ob4w-PP218JVVidejLM-_qxnKrMMLgYKIfKk6LmY8SS4xHz7coI6ARqPOeDnMS-Y7WM6P_pWLNev_5QMGSiw/s320/Untitled.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Sometimes its because people pay money for GUI interfaces, I'm poor, and my command prompt abilities provide me another alternative to shelling out 'the big bucks' or going without. Other times its because GUI interfaces can be buggy, laggy, constrained by strange Operating System Forces, or otherwise blocked by well-meaning school officials.<br />
<br />
But really, when it comes down to it, the command prompt just tends to work. Whenever I find myself downloading a bunch of programs online, only to find one doesn't work, one is a 30 day free trial only, one is for the wrong operating system, one is non-commercial only, the other works only for a very specific situation, another is for the wrong software-<br />
<br />
Those days? Dragon days?<br />
<br />
Those days, all it takes is Google Git Bash Commands and a friendly command line, and I'm back on my way from the brink with a begrudging smile on my face.<br />
<br />
Damn You Command Line. Damn you and all your wretched ilk. I suspect this will be a love hate relationship all our lives, in which you provide me with vague but functional data, and while I constantly wander off to date other programs, I always come crawling back to you. Damn you. Damn you for being so dependable.<br />
<br />
Could you at least dress up for me once in awhile?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-5962197410188064842012-10-11T02:03:00.001-07:002012-10-25T02:15:20.272-07:00An Interesting Problem to which Coffee is the SolutionSchool computers always present interesting conundrums for tech folk. On one hand, they are equipped with a lot of software that we- especially if we are the dreaded hybrid creature known as the 'tech-artist'- cannot afford on our lonesome.<br />
<br />
And, you know, they provide work stations away from home, enormous screens, additional storage space, and most importantly: the ability to do 'other stuff' when we are supposed to be working. Depending on the school, they may be equipped with powerful hardware. They're ubiquitous; instead of lugging around a high-powered laptop, we can jump on a computer with the same account no matter what building or room we're in.<br />
<br />
On the other hand, we don't have administrative rights to them. We can't install anything on them. There are a lot of constraints on the machine. Stupid things don't work. Command terminals are blocked. System Preferences are turned off. Annoying buttons are pre-programmed and can't be disabled. There's a whole lot of any school-based computer system that the average tech person doesn't have access to, restricting what we're capable of doing. And this can be very frustrating when we're trying to accomplish relatively simple tasks.<br />
<br />
Given a spot of cleverness, it is of course possible to bypass system restrictions and install programs on school machines. Bare in mind that this means the programs will usually only be installed on a single machine, and these programs wont carry over from compute to computer. Which really causes either a lot of work as you install your programs on every feasible computer workstation you might need to play with, or else a lot of limitations as you are constantly forced to go back to only one workstation. Not an option for licensed tools, assuming you have legit licenses (and usually you don't want to advertise your pirated software all over school computers where, you know, someone potentially could find it...)<br />
<br />
Now I'm sure a true nerd could, after a few days of focused meditation in a dark closet somewhere, return and hack in to the school IT department and install their favorite programs anywhere they please, all while avoiding getting caught, and still managing to keep their Apple Developer License information secret and safe and restricted to a single account. But for the rest of us, finding workarounds becomes a useful skill.<br />
<br />
It is possible to find portable executables for Windows development machines, and often these are a saving grace. But in an art school, where anyone might divide by zero and open up an inter-dimensional portal at any moment, a chained Mac can be irritatingly dense and inaccessible.<br />
<br />
The solution, often, is Java.<br />
<br />
I hate Java. I'll be the first one to tell you I hate Java. I hate that Open Office uses Java. I hate that my undergraduate university, The University of Central Florida, had a Computer Science program where the students all learned C, and then Java, and then <i>nothing</i>! They were sent out into the world believing that Java was a gift from the heavens! They were never taught C++ or any sensible programming language! And they wanted to make games! Games! In Java!!!!<br />
<br />
While Runescape may be the only Java game that ever succeeds, ever, in the full sum total history of the world, Java serves another extraordinarily valuable purpose on those school computers lucky enough to be installed with self-updating Java run-time environment: Java programs are platform independent, need not be installed, and just <i>work</i>. Java can bypass most of the limitations of a school computer, providing things like command terminals when terminals are disabled, whole suites of software when technical tickets go unanswered, and even just simple productivity widgets like digital flashcard helpers.<br />
<br />
And don't get me started on networking! SSH, FTP, SVN, GIT- you name it- if it has an acronym and involves something concerning networking, someone out there made a java app for it. It might be a little flaky, and it might not run correctly until you wiggle a few parts and flop on some duct tape, but Java WILL save your bacon, come hell and high water, no matter what goofy school restrictions stand in the way.<br />
<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7167236935024051104.post-81416625902731138442012-10-10T03:15:00.001-07:002012-10-25T02:15:19.139-07:00Agon and Alea - October 10th<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>My Cat Is More Interesting Than A Dragon</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
Today was about my cat.<br />
<br />
My cat has something like 30 different pieces of paper, 7 vaccines, 1 microchip, and 20 blood tests to go through in order to get to and from my home in America for the Christmas Season (which, by the way, at the very steep cost of flying a cat, is my only Christmas present this year!)<br />
<br />
He has extrasensory perception when it comes to telling when we're off to the vet. He will go outside for any romp or run, but the vet? <i>Oh no</i>. Today we got the rabies vaccine and the microchip, which at least means that he should safely be able to enter the USA. We still need to get three pieces of paper signed by a notary so he can stop over in Canada, all within a very complex time table closely surrounding my trip to Shanghai and departure date. "Time Sensitivity," is the word.<br />
<br />
Yes, I know I'm doing an Agon and Alea update.<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Agon and Alea - October 10th</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
In non-cat related news, Agon and Alea is still in development, and doing quite well for itself. Unfortunately, half a week's programming work was lost to food poisoning, and it's going to be difficult for me to make up the lost ground.<br />
<br />
To conserve my resources, I'm changing off from showing up during my professor's C++ class, to focusing instead on helping the students through my tutoring hours. My tutoring hours really stacks my 'Time at SCAD' onto Tuesdays and Thursdays, leaving me a relatively clean Monday and Wednesday for development and handling personal issues.<br />
<br />
I've spent this week working on a lot of things- getting a lot behind me- given that I was KOed the entire weekend. Most of them were personal, but I did manage to make some important strides with Agon and Alea. Last week I worked on the art bible and saw my game's concept art through to completion while grappling with the in-game math necessary to control my Augmented Reality.<br />
<br />
This week I implemented the GUI interface which is going to drive the demo forward.<br />
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And today? Today stunk. That's why today is about my cat.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Hacking: Here There Be Dragons</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
No plan ever survives the first engagement with the enemy. Let that be a lesson to all future programmers out there. If you book every last one of your moments with a small task, you're going to die when a problem ends up taking 100x the duration it should take, and 100 small tasks seem to mount up on your shoulders like a horrific demon of time management.<br />
<br />
One of the hurtles when developing with Agon and Alea is that I code on a wide variety of machines (PCs, Macs, and an iPad text editor) and the actual development machine is a seven year old hacked Dell Laptop running an old version of MacOS (Snow Leopard) with a 'clever' XCode and iOS SDK work around to let me develop for iOS 5.0 and 5.1 on my iPad2. Oh, and it's battery just gave up the ghost a month ago.<br />
<br />
Portable and 100% mine, the Laptop is a good solution to the difficulties and dangers of keeping my Apple Developer ID and other potentially sensitive information on an up to date school computer with power cord issues and a different version of MacOS. It also allows me to develop from home on weekends, holidays, and when I don't feel like going into school to compile my code.<br />
<br />
On the other hand.... It's a six year old cleverly worked-around Dell laptop. Whose battery just died. The poor baby is flaky.<br />
<br />
Now here's the issue. I needed/need a convenient way to get my code around. Dropbox couldn't do version control, and I started having strange errors where files were mysteriously disappearing or being replaced by unknown forces (my cat walking on the keyboard when I turned my back) and I was spending more time chasing down missing files than I was coding.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>The Complications: Subversion</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
At the recommendation of a friend, I switched to using SVN (or Subversion) for all of my coding needs. It handles source code version control, allows me to use my computer as a server to pump code to any other machine I want, and is in general pretty intuitive and useful.<br />
<br />
On a Mac. Before I really start using Unity 3D.<br />
<br />
Any development IDE, from Xcode to Unity, allows for the editing of the file hierarchy, that is the moving and deleting of files from within the project explorer. The Mac best-solution SVN-integration-with-finder is a far cry from the Windows Alternative (very flaky gets itself into errors it can't resolve super easy and needs everything to be deleted and rebuilt). Furthermore, any time you delete or move a file or directory in Unity 3D on either system? Everything breaks.<br />
<br />
I really didn't know anything about social coding before going to work for Trader Analytics, but I'm very grateful for everything they taught me, and for the ways I was able to help them put together their project. While the GIT framework stumped and confused me at first, I now have an alternative, SVN, to compare it to. I also learned about things like the View/Model/View-Model development scheme (and derivatives). But let's focus on GIT and SVN for now.<br />
<br />
Since approximately 2:30pm I have been trying to take my fully functional code from my Windows PC machine, pull it onto my Dell Machine, and run it on my iPad.<br />
<br />
The only significant changes from my last build that I have made at this point have been to swap out a white cube for an animated figure, and to implement the GUI, which is working perfectly on my Windows machine.<br />
<br />
Three hours later, and my game still hasn't gotten safely from one computer to another.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Dragons: Have Nothing To Do With Coding</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
<b>The Dragon in Computer Programming is The Unforeseen, Difficult-to-Pinpoint Hangup That Prevents You From Coding at all.</b><br />
<br />
If you aren't coding, you aren't coding. Coding is a relatively straightforward, speedy process. Sure, if you're like me, you run off researching unnecessary things every few minutes. But if you can restrain yourself to Googling only once per question coding itself is just a time consuming process in which work gets done.<br />
<br />
It's everything else that creates horror, stress, and pain.<br />
<br />
It's when there isn't a power outlet, or a broadband jack, or a broadband cable, or a mouse, or a reference, or a resource, or a plan. It's when the tools you're using start showing gaps and holes. It's when the tools you're using end up lacking functionality you expected them to have. It's when you try to do something that seems intuitive and obvious, but the framework you were experimenting in was made for another purpose, and shatters. It's when someone doesn't point out the obvious to you, and you walk headlong into a pillar.<br />
<br />
These Dragons not only keep coding from happening because they take up a lot of <i>time</i> (and let's face it, they tend to take up more time than even just coding, because they're vague and amorphous and we really don't even want to solve them we just want to get to work, and then they start getting bigger and bigger, and we end up having to wait long periods of time for file transfers or gaps in our schedule or what have you to fix them) but they send us spiraling off into a mood from which it is impossible to code with any efficiency.<br />
<br />
Your fingertips can only code as fast and as efficiently as your mind is working. When you have to sit down and find out why half your files are missing in between shutdown last night and power up this morning, it stresses you out. Your brain, which spent the evening piecing together your thoughts from the previous day and forming new algorithms, has been smacked upside the head and forced to solve a problem it doesn't care about, that isn't going to yield any immediate result on the final project, and which really shouldn't even exist in the first place. By the time you even manage to solve your Dragon (IF you solve your dragon) you are so frazzled and low on time that everything you do seems to result in failure. The next day you might as well scrap everything you did and start over from scratch.<br />
<br />
<b>The Computer Programmer Dragon Stinks.</b> Precisely because it has nothing whatsoever to do with computer programming.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>My Current Dragon is Subversion</i></b></span></h2>
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Mine is currently the SVN framework, which doesn't let you edit files from within a project explorer. My solution is to transfer over to a GIT framework, which is going to take time and make it impossible to code until I'm done. On the other hand, once I do it- <i>hopefully- </i>it will make my life a little smoother.<br />
<br />
But how do you know when to give up and do things the 'brute force' way of throwing everything on a HDD and saving iterative copies and just praying nothing gets lost? Experience, I'd wager. Only experience- and your gut- can tell you when one solution is bad and needs to be scrapped for another. Certainly you shouldn't rely on frustration. Frustration will just lead you to make a choice you think is 'easier' which will in the long run frustrate you more because your anger and stress will cause you to make all the mistakes you absolutely could not make when using the alternative solution.<br />
<br />
Two choices have to be made. One, that the current software is not going to meet your needs. Two, you must decide what of your remaining choices IS going to meet your needs.<br />
<br />
So first of all, can Subversion meet my needs? To me, the answer is no. No, it cannot. Why? Because Subversion cannot track when files are deleted or destroyed, it results in a lot of dangerous clutter I have to chase down and delete long after I've actually modified all my files. This is a problem because I want to do as little management of the repository as possible. I can't be hunting down and deleting needed files and trying my game one file at a time to see which ones went missing and which ones reappeared.<br />
<br />
Unity really creates a lot of junk when running. A lot of junk. Junk that then becomes surprisingly necessary in order to get the file to run the same way on one computer as it has ran on another. If the junk fails to cache or update or not-update, or whatever the heck it is that the junk needs to do, the whole solution fails for reasons that make sense only to Zeus and the Olympian Gods. I either need to include or not include this junk very precisely, very easily, from update to update, with almost zero management.<br />
<br />
Subversion can't do that, because Subversion files migrate out to each and every last remaining tiny directory, and the whole system explodes on me in a MAC every time something goes missing for even a moment. I've deleted my whole repository multiple times for this reason.<br />
<br />
So is there a solution? Obviously I could copy the entire thing on to Dropbox, wipe my hands, and call it a day. Except that's where I came from and I know it wasn't working for me. Which means I know the HDD solution wont work for me either. I was losing files. I couldn't keep good-enough track of what was happening from iteration to iteration. as much as Subversion makes me want to kick puppies, I haven't <i>lost</i> anything to it.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>GIT is Both a Solution, and a Another Dragon</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
So what's a solution? I can try GIT. It could be dangerous, it might come with its own hurtles (read: it WILL come with it's own hurtles) and take up even more of my time trying to run than Subversion. But since Subversion- by design- cannot serve my needs, it means I need to get off Subversion and on to something else. And since I can't work with Dropbox, it's time to move to GIT.<br />
<br />
From my experience with Trader Analytics, I've been able to use GIT before, and I will be able to use it now. No problem. Should be easy. Still, it's a dragon. It's keeping me from coding, and upsetting me in the process.<br />
<br />
How is GIT different from Subversion? Since it tracks from a top down framework instead of a bottom up framework (that's the easiest way I can think of to explain it, please do not judge my computer literacy on that one ;)) it simply doesn't have the issues Subversion has. With Subversion I found myself deleting whole repositories on both sides (server and client) and using the Terminal to navigate through all my broken folders to find 'hidden' .svn directories and delete them by command line, only to recreate the repository and drag the files in all over again, rebuilding it from scratch.<br />
<br />
And I'm not a coder, if you remember. I'm a game designer. If I'm working with the command line, I'm already grumpy ;)<br />
<br />
With GIT that just won't happen. Furthermore, I'm more familiar with how to address repository conflicts in GIT than I am in Subversion, which, while it might be a lean mean super process, simply never got explained to me in a way that made any sense at all.<br />
<br />
Of course GIT is gonna bite me in the foot and make me swear just like Subversion, but it will at least be able to handle the fact that I frequently move, rename, and delete files from within project explorers, and Unity likes to create mountains of crap to help it make games. GIT shouldn't have any problem tracking that at all. The only problems I should have are the normal repository ones, where I've deleted a file on one computer, changed it heavily on another, and can't figure out how to reconcile the two repositories.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>So How Do You Deal With Dragons?</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
If one of the primary attributes of a 'Dragon' is that it makes it hard for all future coding because you're stressed and behind, how do you handle hitting one?<br />
<br />
Easy. You just remember your Cat is a lot more interesting than Dragons.<br />
<br />
When you begin having experience in something, when you've repeated a task multiple times, it starts being worth your time to look back and find patterns, to figure out where your best productive moments were, and what sort of pitfalls to avoid to keep the Dragons at bay. But when you're new- as I am- and everything is a shot in the dark before you start, you are never going to be able to stop Dragons from happening.<br />
<br />
Let me put it this way: You HAVE no 'most productive' state, because you have no data about yourself to make that estimation by. There's nothing you could be doing better. You are <i>already</i> working hard. You are <i>already</i> trying everything you can think of to do the best project you can.<br />
<br />
So Dragons are going to happen. Period. You try an engine, it blows up in your face. You try social coding, it ends up having a pitfall you COULD have known about, but didn't because there just isn't enough <i>time</i> to know everything, and life didn't get you to the tiny subsection of the FAQ you actually would end up needing. And hey, even if it had, you might not have recognized you needed it just yet!<br />
<br />
You can't stop the Dragon from happening. You're too inexperienced to figured out when to put your nose to the grindstone (or HOW to put your nose to the grindstone), and when to back off and find another technology. You really have no means of gauging the most effective way to work, because again you have no data, no patterns, no material to make those predictions by. So your Dragons are going to be long, fat Dragons that are hard to get around and impossible to see the dimensions of, and everywhere you turn there are going to be more of them.<br />
<br />
<br />
<h2>
<span style="color: magenta; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>That Does Not Sound Like Dealing With It!!!!</i></b></span></h2>
<br />
<br />
Like I said, it's all about Cats. You can't control the pitfalls, only how you behave once you encounter them. You can't control hitting a wall, only how you feel about hitting the wall. You can't control the fact that the Dragon will stop you from coding. You can only deal with your efficiency once the Dragon is past and you're left with your own stress and looming deadlines.<br />
<br />
You take some deep breaths. As you work through the Dragon, you focus on other things. The more 'other things' you get done while working on the Dragon, the easier things are going to be because you will regain a little control over your life. While your code is compiling, you do your taxes. You take a nap. You go for a walk. Need to research? Do it in line for a bank on a mobile device. Or at the park. Or in a library. Get out of the house.<br />
<br />
Find some way to clear your head.<br />
<br />
Debug with clear objectives in mind. Think "I am looking to diagnose the cause of symptom X by examining the states of Y, Z, F, and Q, and to do that I am going to write a script for 15 minutes that allows me to print that data to screen and log it for future reference."<br />
<br />
Cook a meal that'll last you a week and refrigerate half of it. Make that phone call you've been putting off in between trying stressful tasks. Drink some tea. Drink a beer. Read three pages in a book that's sitting untouched on your shelf. Practice a single sentence in another language. Practice boxing on a punching bag. Go for a single lap swim.<br />
<br />
I'm not telling you to avoid your Dragon. I'm telling you that if you focus on it to the exclusion of all else, you'll spin your wheels and accomplish things slower than if you find a way to control your mood through the endevour. This is all about yourself, and controlling whats going on inside your head. The Dragon is just a task- not some personified spawn of satan- and it can be completed through careful application of your task-solving skills. Like everything else.<br />
<br />
Its your MOOD that makes Dragons huge. It's your mood that makes problems unsolvable. And if you can find the delicate balance that lets you do your work without avoiding it, while at the same time finding a way to control your mood. This is about ROI. Invest in your own well being the exact amount of capital that you need to in order to start getting a return from your creative/technical side again.<br />
<br />
Or, in my case, pay your rent, sort out your plane tickets, get your cat his shot and microchip, take him for a walk to alleviate his stress, figure out your bills, and, setup GIT, and while you're at it realize that the reason that your program wont compile is because iOS is just turning its nose up at something it dislikes in the interface.<br />
<br />
A day is almost gone, and no code has been written. And, probably, no code will be written. Not till Friday. Does that bother me? Sure. But nothing could have changed that. And I've a Cat to worry about. And if I can manage to focus on him instead of the Dragon, I'll wake up Friday to find my development environment set up and primed for my use, with my working code debugged, my social coding server largely functional, and all my other obligations taken care of.<br />
<br />
And then, if I keep focusing on my Cat, I'll bet you I'll get a surprisingly amount of work done on Friday.<br />
<br />
--Gaming Imperatrix.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0