Progress!

So I deployed my first deployable build to the Xbox. I have the first 720p test map displayed, and the grid structure behind it loading correctly. I have the playable characters represented with some placeholders. Tonight I'll be attaching some basic controls to move the placeholders, and adding collisions, for locations you aren't allowed to move (and maybe some places that just slow you down, like hills?)

I got some pretty good progress yesterday, but need to make a lot of progress this week too. We have about 2 weeks until the deadline for submissions for the PAX 10. Hopefully by the end of next weekend, it's a a demo-able state. I might be hitting up a couple friends to start playtesting sometime this week, so be forewarned!

Hopefully I get the first 3d model sometime today, so I can retrofit my classes to support it. I'm a bit nervous about that. Hopefully it's as easy as I've tried to set it up to be. That is definitely my focus for this week though. Trying to free up some evenings to work on it, and I'll have to enforce a strict "Butt in Chair, Hands on Keyboard" policy. Hopefully I'll have a successful week!

Frustrated

So I write my final for my course in 2 days. I still do not know if they will be giving me my degree. I have been receiving invites to grad, and all that stuff, but no one has concretely told me if it's possible or not. So I'm studying, and hoping I'll be done school potentially forever come Friday.

And then, oh boy, do I get even more busy. I have a game project, Project Instant Ramen, that we are hoping to have in reasonable shape to submit to some competitions. The deadline for most of the competitions is the end of the month. We have quite a bit of work to do to make that deadline. The good thing is almost all our art assets, including 3d models and everything, sound like they are almost finished. Our script is past first draft, but by no means finished. A lot of the libraries I intend to use are somewhat built up. I have a lot of the pieces done / ready to go. It's just waiting on me to finish my course, so I can sink a lot of time into it, and get it going. My plan is to sink quite a few hours into it this weekend.

My other goal for the weekend is to get my sleep schedule adjusted for the summer. I get "trapped" in various requirements during the school year to allow me to attend class and work, and my body doesn't like all of them. It works still, but I know I could do better. I'll have to work it all out, and likely re-adapt somewhat. Done it before, and it'll be good to get back to a better schedule. My plan is as follows:
Up at 4am. Yoga, Breakfast, Shower, and so forth. Drive to work around 6:30-6:45. Nap at work, before starting anything, around 7am. Work, breaking for a nap around 2pm. More work, Drive home. Eat supper. Nap around 8pm. Up till 1am. I'm hoping I can lock in the 9pm to 1am range as time to work on Project Instant Ramen. My biggest concern with it, is for the next 2 or 3 weeks, I'll be logging roughly 13 hours of programming a day. I need to, as I have a lot I need to get finished, but that might be a bit stressful. That does leave my weekends code free. I may say like Tuesday Thursday, evening work on PIR, and Saturday Sunday, and take the other evenings as entertainment time to keep my sanity.

I'll keep you updated with how well it pans out.

Happy Broken Internet Day

April Fool's Day is one of my least favourite days in the world. You get exposed to pranks, that typically aren't funny, and are just annoying. Main annoying factor, the broken internet. Normally you should be thinking when you read anything on the internet, as nothing is guaranteed to be true, but on April Fool's Day that problem is magnified tenfold. You have to filter through so much crap to get to any nuggets of truth today, that it's easier to just give up and disconnect for the day. Now for a tech junkie like myself, fully disconnecting for a day is pretty hard.

But too much work to do, so this post is very short. I will update more after finals!

These are the days of my life

Oh boy. I was SICK.
So I missed 3 days of work, lost some weight, and had a very crummy start to the week. Feeling much better now, actually ate a normally sized meal last night. Things seem to be on the up and up. However, now I am behind on everything important. I have a big assignment due on Tuesday I've barely started. I have to make a Demolition Derby game. Currently it loads and displays the background... Obviously I have a little ways to go. So that will likely take most (if not all) of my time this weekend. Also, I need to get more work done on Project Instant Ramen (one of which tasks should be actually finding a name...). We are setting some targets for full demo versions. To enter for the PAX 10, we need to have a full working demo submittable by May 9th, which gives us just under 2 months to essentially finish. That means a lot more work. We have another one we're shooting for too, IndieCade, with a deadline of April 30th. Once we're closer to that date, we'll see if there is a Beta or something we can make publicly available. Don't hold your breath.

I'm still very very excited for this project. I would love nothing more than to have it play like we want it to. Getting it on XBox Live Arcade, or Greenhouse, or something would be nice, making money with it would be even nicer, but just for the experience and practice it is definitely worth the effort. I'm hoping that I can sink some time into it this weekend, but assignment has to take priority.

But I should get to work here, I'll be keeping you updated.

Summer Plans

So I have been trying to decide what to do with my holidays this year. I've put some aside for the Penny Arcade Expo, as I always go, and it's a great time. This year I may be taking resumes too. But last year I took two full weeks off, and spent 1/2 a month on that coast (and loved it). This year, I don't think I'll be spending near that much time, which gives me a few holiday days to use up elsewhere.

As that was sitting in my mind for a couple weeks, I was contacted by a friend in FFXI, the MMO I play. There is a crew of folks, all of whom I know in game, who all live (somewhat) on the East Coast. They get together every summer for a BBQ to hang out and have fun. I was invited this year. They haven't locked a date in yet, but with some rough estimates I determined that it would be a decently cheap flight ($400 round trip? nice) and I would have no hotel or anything to worry about, as I can crash at friend's places. I think it would be a lot of fun, and a good chance to meet these people for real. So I'm pretty excited for it.

That sort of event always brings up debates. Some people, like my sisters, and parents, think it's crazy that I would have friends that I consider really good friends, that I have never met face to face. They thought it was very weird last time I had some online friends share a hotel room with me for PAX (which was 3 years ago now? And Ruben still owes me money for!). I think many people in our society think along the same lines. Sure, I have never met these people face to face, or even seen pictures of some of them, and constantly forget their real names (I don't even know how many of them know I'm a Cody), but friendship isn't based off that. I DEFINITELY talk to these online friends more than my Parents, and my sisters (likely combined). I know what they do for a living, I know of some of their interests. I know about the good and the bad things that happen in their life. I trust them with things like my account numbers for my game characters, which gives them access to years of effort on my part, and virtual goods worth thousands of dollars. That's more than I trust some of my local friends with.

I just find it an interesting generational divide. Making solid connections over the internet is just a foreign concept to many people. To those of us who have done it though, it just seems natural.

Allergy Season!

Its not here yet. We've been getting quite a bit of snow lately. But I have started my pre-season treatments. They have created an interesting dilemma. They put me to sleep. Something about injecting with pollens makes me sleep. Maybe I just need to time this better. They sure knock me out. Worth it though. I can't imagine doing through a spring without my shots. It's bad enough with my shots. My allergies are definitely one of my biggest concerns about moving to the coast. In more temperate climates, I suspect I will have allergic reactions much more frequently. I'll be constantly on meds. I think it'll be worth it though, for the nicer weather.

Due to demand, I'll look into posting a version of my assignment here for people to try out. It's definitely not perfect. I should have started working on it earlier than I did. I think over the summer, or maybe after Project Instant Ramen (the code name for Monoclesoft's current project) is done, I'll come back to it, and improve it. I'd love to get it more so to a quality product I am willing to use to supplement my resume for job apps to the industry. Although with the economy the way it is, the Games industry seems to be laying people off left and right, so that may hinder my chances there. You never know until you try though.

So I'm in the process of correcting my sleep schedule still. I really need to just buckle down, and re-adapt the the changes I want to make. I'm been getting to work between 7:30 and 9 ish, which takes a lot of the pressure off in the morning, which has turned into me sleeping in more regularly. I really need to be very rigid with my schedule for a bit to correct this. Hopefully as weather warms up, I can go outsied more, which will help provide more tasks I can work on. I'll keep you updated with how that all pans out.

Holy assignment Batman

So I'm taking one class this term. It's a Computer Game Development course. I'm really enjoying it. It's a very informative. But it is a very heavy class. I just recently finished the first assignment, which was create a version of SpyHunter. It was a touch harder than I expected. As a result, I ended up not getting much sleep (even by my standards) the couple of days before the assignment was due. This was the first time I'd really cut my sleep down further. It was rough. I don't recommend it. I will definitely start the next assignment within a day or two of it being assigned. That said, I think I'll get a decent mark on it. I hit 19 of the 20 main requirements, which I think was the most anyone in the class did. I paid dearly in my sleeping though.

Due to lack of sleep, I slept a lot the day following (like 6 hours at night). It has damaged my schedule pretty good. So I am going to have to work at it this weekend to get everything back in order. I think I'll take this chance to move back up to 3 naps a day, instead of the two I've fallen into. It'll help that the weather is starting to warm up again, so I can start napping in my car if I'm trapped somewhere. I think I'm going to try moving my core. I'm thinking of changing it to 1-4am, nap around 10am, 3pm, 7:30, or 8pm. This means I'll have to find some new good tasks for early AM, as I won't be going into work at 5am, so I have an extra hour to kill. Maybe I'll actually try to get in the habit of a morning workout or Yoga session.

That's my goal for this weekend, and next week. I don't have classes next week, and it is a long weekend, so hopefully it'll work out well as a transition time.