An Important Decision…

(A open letter of personal conflictions.)

If you religiously scan everything about me on the Internet, you would be a little creepy. And, while there isn’t too much out there to go on, you’ll know I am a university student. I am finishing soon, expecting to graduate within months with a Bachelor’s in Computer Science. As my classes come to a close, I have some important decisions to make.

Most people are asked throughout their student lives the same question: “What will you do when you graduate?”

How do we answer? Often, we don’t know yet. Some people, even after college or university, don’t know exactly what they want to do.

At least, that’s what they say. I think, deep down, everyone knows exactly what they would like to do. The problem is that it may or may not be viable or realistic, or are just too strange for people to be willing to admit. If you have a passion for becoming a Fortune Cookie Writer or Professional Whistler, then great, but that might be a difficult job to obtain, let alone the fear of what your family or friends would think.

Continue reading

Animation Test – Running – March 19, 2014

Ok, here’s some actual evidence of me doing something towards game development. A rough test animation of a character running, as seen below.drew_test_001

It’s a little better than how “James” used to look when running, but the legs/feet still aren’t quite right, and a few extra frames could do wonders. The top part of the body bobbing up and down is a nice touch, though. Not bad, but I should try again to improve this a little more.

Oh yeah, obviously this isn’t “James.” Who is it? Stay tuned…

True Indies Have Part-Time Jobs

Over the last few weeks I’ve adopted the motto of a new definition for “indie.”

“Indie” used to simply mean that you were independent, that no one was paying you to do something, that you were completely free.

And yet, we have multi-million dollar projects appearing on Kickstarter every year. Projects run by famous figureheads. Are these really comparable to the tiny developer spending their savings and their time into their work?

And thus, I repeat my new definition of “indie:”

Continue reading

Kickstarter Funding Goals (How High Is Too High?)

Kickstarter is a fantastic site. Crowdfunding is one of the greatest inventions of the last decade.

Many people use this as a method of getting extra funding for their projects. But how much funding is too much? Who should be using Kickstarter?

Dan Crawley of “Gamesbeat” writes a fantastic article about the subject, and how larger developers using crowdfunding can both hinder and help smaller bedroom indies. Larger developers, with better experience with PR and marketing, can get in most of the viewership they require. But despite this, their funding goals are sometimes too high, and they simply fall short of their goals.

 

Contrary to popular belief, this is not what Kickstarter.com looks like (image from VentureBeat.com)

Contrary to popular belief, this is not what Kickstarter.com looks like…

Continue reading