Tag: gamingdood

  • Drawing: Android Power

    android-power

     

    Inspiration

    My inspiration came when I bought my new Samsung Note 3 and realising that Android is getting things done right!

  • Drawing: A Small World

    a-small-world

    Inspiration

    This sketch was done a while back and left it offline for a while. I feel like I should just post it anyway. Still something right? Enjoy…

  • Drawing: Mario’s 25th Anniversary

    mario-grabbing-the-mushroom

     

    Inspiration

    To celebrate Nintendo’s Mario 25th Anniversary, I have drawn this picture for the very occasion! Enjoy!

  • Drawing: Nefarious

    nefarious

     

    Inspiration

    With the new illustration friday topic “Nefarious”,  (illustrationfriday.com), here is the new drawing I thought of. Enjoy!

  • Drawing: Sword VS Guns

    sword-vs-guns

     

    Inspiration

    The inspiration here was clearly the Matrix and Final Fantasy. Just something that I really wanted to draw with action!

  • Drawing: Invention

    inventionInspiration

    This drawing is for the recent topic for Illustration Friday (illustrationfriday.com). The scientist finally made his robot!

     

  • Realization…

    There are many things that I think about on a day to day basis but the one thing that really gets to me is the career path.

    I spent a few years collecting experience and spending half of my life in an office and I felt like I was trapped. A place with high pressure just cannot make me think very well but more importantly, problem solving becomes harder! Solving problems does not feel as good as it used to and maybe the reason for that is the repetition of the same issues arises becoming nothing more but a chore.

    I recently jumped into a new job where things are constantly changing, consistency is slowly integrating and unlocking new areas I have not experienced before… It feels like I am finally leveling up and it feels great.

    One thing that I have felt confused about lately was mixing the hobby and work to improve my quality of life! So when I was thinking to become a games developer, I would have created the illusion of being excited to go to work everyday! It feels like it makes perfect sense… to me anyway.

    However, there is a slight problem when trying merge a hobby with work…

    The way I define a hobby is an activity that I like to do and it creates a nice distraction that allows me to escape the work environment. Work, on the other hand, brings an environment where things need to be done at a certain time generating a thing I like to call “unnecessary pressure”. The reason I call it this is because the pressure is pushed by someone else but does not benefit anyone else but the person who owns the company!

    Getting the pressure from individuals who may not care about the project and only cares about the payslip makes the other begin to dislike the entire operation altogether. The way I see it is that if it is supposed to be something you enjoy, how could you truly love it if you are being pressured to do it?

    Don’t get me wrong though, there are some areas that do not deal with this kind of pressure.

    So with me, I am a web developer in the day but a games developer as my side quest. Web development is a broad area and it equally gives the same frustrations as a games developer but the key difference between the two is the fact that the development patterns are different which gives that extra challenge.

    What I am trying to get at is that creating two environments for one thing you enjoy most and the other being a job is the ideal thing to do if you want to continue enjoying what you want to do…

    It is not to say that jobs are boring but people are pressuring to finish things where you want to be perfect about… Jobs are also a place to learn! If you don’t learn something new in a job, you end up being bored.

    For me, the way to really fix this is just to keep my games as personal projects and my web life as work. This keeps the game development as a stress-free environment.

    Maybe this is not an ideal way for some people but I feel it is the right move for me. One way or another, I’m glad I have some sort of direction once again…

  • Quick update…

    It has been a long while since I have written a blog post however, now that I have installed Evernote (http://www.evernote.com) on all my devices, I can finally share across all platforms so with this, I will probably write more posts…
    So I want to start with my development progress since I have been hard at work recently. I have been working on securing a virtual server which I recently purchased from Linode.com. This is the first time I have ever used this and I spent quite a bit of time doing this. My aim is to use this virtual server to keep all my future developments here so I can monitor precisely what is going on. Although it does require a bit of technical knowledge to get around to places, but it was rather fun just getting to understand it. The server seems to be stabilised and now moving forward to creating my web servers onto it. I have 3 in total so I need to secure those. This server has the capability to do much more and I plan to use it to its full capacity!
    So lets move onto movies… After a lot of waiting around, I finally sat down to watch the entire Fast & Furious collection (only the 5 movies… The 6th one is on hold until the DVD is released)… I think it was a good set of films but the fact that it was rather a messy transition between 1-3 but went back on the story at 4-5. But 2 was more of comedy and 3 was just a whole new story with new characters which rather put me off the whole collection altogether. In my opinion, I think the 5th was probably my favourite one.
    Moving back a bit more, so I went out to purchase a tablet, Acer W700, and I need to put my opinion on this bit of kit. So this device holds an Intel i5 3rd gen processor, 4GB RAM and Intel HD 4000. The 11-inch screen grabs an impressive HD resolution with pixel perfect display. Nowadays, this tablet is my complete replacement of my Mac Mini and it accomplishes more or less my day to day activities on a computer. One downside I would probably mention is the heating and the noise that comes out when a bit of activity is being processed on the tablet… Besides this, I believe it can sit side by side with a low end laptop but just with the touch screen controls…
    Finally, gaming… Resident Evil 6… The game I bought on the first day it came out and completed 2 campaigns but need to finish the last one. The game is pretty good with the storyline and all but one problem is the camera angles. It is very frustrating when the camera just moves around a lot and also, it is too close to the body that the bottom is not visible. If these issues were fixed, this may actually reach a 8/10 but unfortunately, I would give it a 7/10…
    I hope to work more on my blog so I hope you enjoyed this one.
  • Withthegamers.com

    There has been a project that I have been involved with in an upcoming website releasing a version shortly. The first version of the website will consist of the latest news in gaming and will keep you up to date with the upcoming events such as the long awaited E3!

     

     

    Sign up to our newsletters at:

    The site will be free to use and is available to anyone. We have some exciting ideas coming ahead so be sure to check the website often…

    We are open to feedback as well so if you also have ideas, please let us know and we will be sure to note it down.

    Thanks for the support…

  • Xbox One announced

    So the Xbox One has been confirmed and from all the rumours spread before hand, it seems like the announcement did not reach the expectations of the viewers! In other words, it was over-hyped! Here is precisely what I think of the 1 hour presentation…

    Image from mashable.com

    The name “Xbox One” felt as though they were going backwards… There was a big number “360” at the end of Xbox and now they want to minus 359 from it? I don’t know but to me, it feels like a downgrade to me.

    The console itself was quite a bit of a disappointment to me. The style of it didn’t look so great and to be honest, the old one looks better. The Kinect (which now comes with the console) does look a little chunky and again, I’d prefer the old design. What makes up for my negativity is probably the controller. It looks more or less the same as the old one but a few changes but I guess for me, the controller made Xbox the right choice for me. Although it is not the best thing for beat em up games, it does accomplish other genre of gaming correctly. Seeing that the console and Kinect will be sitting in front of me, the controller is the vital importance of gaming here so all in all, its not so bad…

    Image from Technobuffalo.com

    The presentation then moved onto living room activities. From what I gathered, they seem to want navigation through TV, movies, music and games easier just with a few simple voice commands. Also, they introduced Skype into the mix. It seems as though I was looking at the Windows 8 interface since the Skype call was taken on the side and had the ability to also watch Star Trek. But with Skype integration, that is what made it interesting. One thing I really loved about PC gaming was that I could video call on Skype with one monitor and play  games on the other.

    Then there was a brief overview with EA Sports, Quantum Break and Call of Duty: Ghosts. Of course I expected no game line up since they did specify before hand that the games will be announced at the E3 Expo. Quite honestly, EA Sports always deliver the same and expected games so to me, that is no surprise. Quantum Break was completely baffling! Although the story line of this game remains a mystery, it looks rather interesting. Finally, Call of Duty: Ghosts looks more or less the same as their previous games but the graphics are a touch better.

    Image from Joystiq.com

    So the presentation leaves me with the following opinion. It wasn’t a full disappointment but the big point is that the Kinect will be sold with the Xbox One at launch which is a good thing. With the game line up coming up, there really isn’t much to say just yet but with Skype and TV integration, it makes the console worth having. The controller is also kept consistent which I don’t see a problem with.

    So far, a 7/10 only because I want to see what games are coming out on launch and especially the price is one of the key factors I was waiting for… One other thing they did not announce is the specific day of release… Would be nice to know when to expect this bad boy…