Pinpointing Purchase-Power

One of the biggest problems that exists in the world right now (in the technology industry, at least) is that Google and other advertisement-driven companies sometimes can’t stop soliciting a service or product after it has already been purchased by a member of the target demographic.

The person or company that finds a reasonable solution to this problem is going to make a disgusting amount of money.

First Attempts at Level Design

One of the great things about the game Quake icon-external-link-12x12 icon-search-12x12 was that it unleashed the inner game developer in all of us. Sometimes this was a good thing, and sometimes it wasn’t, but the technologies it made available to the world led to an explosion of user-generated content for a game that was already engrossing.

I was a little late to the party, but ended up releasing two maps after getting my hands on a nifty level editor called WorldCraft. These were smaller maps—usually one or two rooms—designed for a special one-on-one game mode called Rocket Arena icon-external-link-12x12 icon-search-12x12. My initial release was called All Along the Watchtower and it turned out to be a respectable first effort. The followup was called Storage Facility and it was one of the better Rocket Arena maps of the time.

All Along the Watchtower
Rocket Arena map for Quake
Download wtower10.zip

Storage Facility
Rocket Arena map for Quake
Download facil10.zip

My third and final map for Quake came some time later: one weekend, a couple years after I finished Storage Facility, I got a fierce itch to make something and WorldCraft and Quake ended up being the best outlet for this creative energy. The result was a map called Generator Room, which is a really tidy level with a good environment for dueling. Unfortunately, Quake was old news at this point, so there weren’t very many people who got to play it.

Generator Room
Rocket Arena map for Quake
Download gen10.zip

These three Rocket Arena maps are relics of the past yet they hold up quite well for people who still enjoy a round of multiplayer Quake from time to time. I wouldn’t want to have to use them as the centerpiece of a résumé, but they are worth sharing nonetheless.

If Shaquille O’Neil Were an Orange…

…this is what he would look like:

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For an appropriate sense of scale, a deck of Bicycle playing cards was added to the scene:

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This orange is the size of a small pumpkin! In fact, after setting it on the counter and staring for a few moments, I was struck by a strange compulsion to carve it into a jack-o’-lantern.

Also, I couldn’t quite capture it in the pictures, but the smaller regular-sized orange is very slowly orbiting the larger one.

Game Developer Confessions, Part 01: Cultivated Workflow

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My primary workstation is an AMD64 3400+ processor with 4GB of RAM running Fedora 20 and XFCE. Its name is Kraid.

My secondary computer is a Mac Mini with an Intel Core 2 Duo 2GHz processor and 4GB of RAM. This system is much faster than my primary workstation. Its name is Phantoon.

My tertiary computer is a Dell Latitude laptop with an AMD64 X2 Turion 2GHz processor and 4GB RAM running a dual boot of Fedora 23 and Windows 7. Its name is Ridley.

My quaternary computer is an HTC Desire 610 running Android 4.4.2. Its name is Chad’s Dumb Phone.

My quinary computer is an AMD XP 2800+ processor with 2GB of RAM and an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro running Windows XP. This is my gaming rig and I get 90+ FPS in Return to Zork. Its name is Kraid-Old.

I have two Synology DS115j NAS devices with 4TB hard drives. One is named Draygon and it synchronizes data to the other which is named Botwoon.

I have a Brother MFC-8910DW copy/print/fax machine. I don’t believe it has a name. People just call it Brother.

Somewhere in this mess was a device named Crocomire, but I can’t for the life of me remember what.

I have the following consoles at my desk: Nintendo 64, Dreamcast, GameCube, PlayStation 2, 3DS and Wii U. The N64, GameCube and Wii U are the Japanese versions. With this setup, I can also play games that were released for the PlayStation, Gameboy, Gameboy Advance, and Wii.

I only get to play video games when I’m studying Japanese, which right now is not very often. As expected, the games end up being much less fun because of this, but eventually that will change big time.

My network was necessarily entitled Zebes.

And if the above doesn’t make much sense, here’s a layman’s summary:

  • I use many different types of computer systems on a daily basis (Linux, Mac, Windows, Android)
  • The newest personal computer I own is almost seven years old while the oldest is about 12 years old
  • Comprehensive data backup is very important
  • I have a lot of video games yet rarely play them
  • Super Metroid icon-external-link-12x12 icon-search-12x12, a well respected video game, has imaginative monikers for its characters and environments