So we’re in the process of setting things up so that a series of computers runs the lights, audio, televisions, heat, etc. We’re using Control4 and so far, I’m mixed on whether I like it or not. It has both an iPhone and iPad app which is a major plus. But its user interface (in those apps) is terrible and ugly (ugly to the point of being distracting). Given the popularity of Control4, I wonder if I’m missing something given how awful and primitive it seems to be so far....
So as some of you know, I recently built a big house. And by big I mean ridiculously, offensively big. Naturally, the class warfare people have come out of the woodwork in certain circles to complain. Do I need such a large house? Nope. Then why? Because I wanted it. It was one of the personal objectives I had set out for back when I started my business. But doesn’t such an extravagant display of wealth merely demonstrate how unfair our system is? Sure, I may have work...
Someone asked me recently if there were any activities that I had had to put aside that I really missed. The answer was easy: blogging about social issues. People now take politics very seriously and some people, mostly liberals to be honest, take politics extremely personally. Conservatives and liberals can be very passionate in their beliefs but in my experience, liberals are a lot more likely to hate someone for having a different ideology than themselves. One of the sit...
I’m slowly putting together the 2011 business plan for Stardock. Where to budget what. It’s a difficult challenge this year because the Windows market isn’t just fragmented but the tech market is fragmented (iOS has become a serious venue for development). Our business model for skinning has slowly broken down over the years. Years ago, we would come up with app ideas and then look out on the net to find someone who has made something similar and work with them on a royalty basis....
First impressions: Very positive. Anyone else here have one?
Historically speaking, have you ever noticed that on some games, the reviewer consensus is much higher than the player consensus? And other times, the reviewer consensus is much lower than the player consensus. What do you think causes this?
Since the beginning of my career, I’ve been a creature of the net. That is, my “real life” exists on the Internet. It may be a generational thing or a just a niche geek thing. Probably the latter. Many years ago, I created the blog, Joeuser.com explicitly so that I and anyone else could freely post our thoughts. It didn’t matter what my day job was because, there was a clear separation in people’s minds between a person’s personal opinions and what they produced...
This Fall I’m starting to get back into skinning. For the past 8 months or so, I’ve been the interim Project Manager on Elemental: War of Magic to get that game ready for release – which I failed spectacularly at. Sometimes, the answer is not to “work harder”. But I digress. The problem I’m seeing with skinning is business vs. passion. That is, Windows XP users still represent a near majority of the people using our skinning programs. The problem is, Windows XP is dead as a tech...
My beloved Thinkpad T400 is starting to get a bit long in the teeth. It’s 3 years old now, the longest I’ve ever kept a laptop as my primary non-programming machine. I’m thinking that I want to wait until USB 3 is in these laptops but I’m not sure how long that’ll be.
http://gawker.com/5641211/steve-jobs-in-email-pissing-match-with-college-journalism-student?skyline=true&s=i A woman buys an apple from a local farmer. The woman now has an apple and the farmer has money. Both parties have made, what they believe, is an even trade. Yet, time and time again we see people who feel entitled to something beyond the original trade. In this case, the woman buys an apple and now expects the farmer to help her out on something unrelated. What amazes...
August 24th…HURRY UP! First off, we’re so ready to not be dealing with the beta content. If I have to deal with “You got Gildar!” one more time I’m going to scream. If I go into a tactical battle able to cast a half dozen spells per turn with a single unit I think I’ll curl up. Dealing with the UI as it is in beta 4 makes me cringe. But it’s more than that. A lot more than that. What is Elemental? What can you expect? How can you explain it to other people? I’ve been bedev...
It’s interesting to see a case where one isn’t definitely better than the other. Regular lighting looks pretty good I think. It’s sharper. Advanced lighting looks good too. It’s softer. I wonder if this should be renamed to Soft Lighting or something because it implies that one is more “advanced” than the other.
As we move towards release many of the assets in the beta make their exit. We shall miss them (well, maybe not). The finished quests start to get put into place, the finalized notable locations begin to be inserted and the unreleased spell books and special abilities start to get implemented. The beta program has largely been about testing out systems and mechanics. Some mechanics, like the per city level building limiter, didn’t survive. Others, like influence based resource control, ...
Starting with beta 4 of Elemental, the modding tools for the game have begun to be made available. This article will serve as a very very basic primer on how modding works in Elemental. During the beta process, the team will try as much as it can to help users learn what can and can’t be done with the existing modding tools. Those who need a lot of hand holding should probably wait until after release since the team will have very limited time available to document what is what...
We got our beta 4 milestone done a bit early so the team got Tuesday off to recuperate. So tomorrow, with any luck, we should have beta 4 released. After that, the beta is closed to new users and we move towards release next month. We’ve really had a blast working on Elemental. I was talking to some friends today on how Elemental is different (in terms of development) from other games and the big difference is, on a sequel or when using an established engine, if something isn’t done, ...