12 posts tagged “games”
I have a thing for purposeful monochromatic constructions, devices that simultaneously tickle my parietal and occipital lobes, Venn diagrams of precious little intersection of the trickster, beauty and math. Childhood ingredients included parts Escher, Pinball Construction Set and the Basel School. This week I was ecstatic to be exposed to not one, but two examples of this meter—one physical, the other virtual, both Japanese, rendered in white, challenges to be experimented with.
This news post today regarding BioWare and LucasArts made me recall a phone conversation I had on the lawn outside AltaVista back in 2001. A producer from BioWare called me and said they were using a set of textures I’d made to prototype KOTOR. They wanted to know if I was interested in moving to Canada.
It was then that I realized that the game industry, as attractive and fun as it could be, was not going to, well, pay well enough to have the life I wanted to have. Especially in 2001. In Canada.
I ended up taking a 50% pay cut to go work on a PS2 game in Seattle later that year. Silly me, not learning.
Found this on YouTube—a video of someone (badly) playing through the opening level in Marathon Infinity. I made this level and the accompanying textures in 1996 while drinking way too much Coke and listening to Portishead. The music definitely influenced the textures.
Update: Yes! Portishead’s new album!
...I used to design stuff. Websites, logos, tradeshow booths, user interfaces, videogames, levels, flyers, CD covers, packaging. I went digging through old archives of hard-drives of archives of hard-drives today and pulled out a few gems from 1992-2001, including a 1997 design for the first celebrity gossip blog.
In althetic events, DNF means did not finish. In videogames, DNF means did not finish.
I hope Valve implements 1st-party support for the Wiimote...pardon the music:
This is truly great advertising:
