I got some down time today to get on the computer while working, only to be shocked at what I saw when I took a look at the Vega Development Blog. Project Vega has been canceled. Wow

Carnevil, the project leader (if you weren’t aware), had finally finished up the publisher demo a few days ago and also found a legit name for the game. From what I saw on his Twitter, he was trying to find a willing publisher, although it was proving difficult to get in contact with any of the companies. That was two days ago, I believe. Today I get online only to see this. And my heart sank . The short version is this: it would be nigh impossible to find a publisher given what we have so far. So in order to get one of those publisher’s attention for funding, the game would have to be in a state where it would not need funding. Yea, it’s a viscous cycle. The problem is that none of us, myself included, can put all of our time into getting the game to that point without some sort of income coming from it. Carn probably has the time, but not the skills or talent to make textures, models, maps, or the art required to get the game to that point.

And so, it seems that Carn is pretty much dead set on dropping the project entirely. Where does this leave me right now? I’ve already said it a couple times now (read my comment there), but with this turn of events I’m seriously second guessing my plans to go into the game development industry. Aside from the occasional lucky indie game developers who make a break into the industry, no one really cares about anything else other than the big name games being made by the big name companies because they make big time profits. And that was one reason why I was stoked to get a chance to work with Carn on his project. It would be my chance to get into an environment where I wouldn’t be drowned out in a huge development team, where I and everyone else would have a say, and where ideas are genuinely heard. I dread working for a giant soulless company and would much rather take a risk and go into business with someone. I have no idea if I’ll ever get that opportunity again. Right now, I’m just not nearly as excited as I use to be about the possibility of going into a game design career.

So I’ve been pondering what I’m going to be doing form here on out. I have been thinking about trying to finish up college starting this coming spring, personal issues willing. I was working on a game design degree the last time I was in class so I’ll probably finish that up. I’d also like to possibly do something in relation to Architecture and then use the knowledge from that for level design. I’ll probably also start to focus on Doom stuff again. I was conscripted to contribute to The Shores of ZDoom, although after I started Vega (and due to the lack of activity of TSoZD at the time) I sorta fell into the background of that project. But now that I’m no longer working on Vega, I will probably try to help out with that effort. There’s also Vaporware, although I was never really planning on dropping from that project. And then there’s Supplice, and now that there’s no longer a Project Vega, I’ll be hitting it pretty hard. My man Jimmy91 has been helping me out with it. I’ve made mention of Supplice here and there, but not enough to really go into depth about it. It’s still in the planning/pre-alpha stages, but once I have my goals all set in stone, I’ll be making a post about it here. Also, I’ve had my eye on Quake I for a while now since I got a taste of 3D mapping from Vega. Now that I won’t be able to get my 3D mapping fix, I think I’m going to get my hands wet with Quake mapping some day soon.

It’s always sad to see something that you are genuinely interested and that you’ve got lots of work into go down the tubes. I felt the same way when I eventually made the decision to cancel Sabbat Martyr II. But that’s the way it goes sometimes, and the best thing for you do to is to look forward.

I am now 23 years of age. Pretty cool, I guess. Thinking back over the years, it’s a tad depressing where I’m sitting at right now. I haven’t accomplished much since I finished up High School, other than flirting here and there with some interests of mine, hoping that they will lead me somewhere. I tried college but sort of fizzled out on that. Most of my other opportunities either never came or were pushed away because of my dag-blasted social ineptitudes. But I suppose as you get older you can’t help to think of these things and sometimes regret where your at in the present. Aside from continuing my game development interests, I’m not sure what other goals I have planned for my future. I would like to try and finish up my game design degree at the very least, and maybe even try for a degree in architecture (which I would then apply to my mapping…I find that somewhat humorous ). Aside from that, I don’t have any other major ambitions or plans on where I want to go from here. Just playing it by ear I guess. Nothing wrong with that, right? RIGHT?!

Also I hope everyone had an enjoyable and safe holiday! (if you celebrate anything, that is). This time of the year we usually visit with lots of our family since it’s one of the few times everyone gets together, so it’s pretty much always busy until the new year. By the end of the festivities, I’m usually wore out; this year is certainly no exception so far . We also did the traditional Christmas thing of having a big dinner and opening presents. I’m too old to really do the presents mess these days, but I did get some new pants, some DS games, some candy, and a few other things. Neat! We also made a trip up to D.C. about a week before Christmas to just screw around and take in the sights. Unfortunately this was the same time that massive snow storm hit the eastern part of the country. We got caught in the storm while there with about 12″+ of snow and had to stay an extra day until the roads were clear enough to make it back home. I love the snow and I love it when we get LOTS of it. I do not, however, enjoy driving in it. It can wreck havoc on an overly anxious person’s brain like mine. We made it back in one piece though

By the way, cookies to anyone who gets what “Geewiz” is all about

So Doom’s 16th birthday has come and gone. I was gonna celebrate by playing some Episode 1 while eating some cake, but I was too busy most of the day (I did play a little bit…no cake though ). For you Doom-heads out there, I’m sure you caught this year’s Cacowards. It’s been a really great year for releases and quite the busy one for me. Of the wads that won awards, I really enjoyed and highly recommend Harmony by Thomas van der Velden, Mapgame by Ravage, Plutonia 2, and UDMX by UniDoom. I’ve still got to play though some of the other awarded maps, but those that I listed are definitely my favorites this year. (I’ve heard very good things about Demons of Problematique 2 and Legacy of Suffering). But the biggest surprise of all…I won the award for the year’s best mapper!! Wow…, I think it didn’t really hit me until today. It’s really a huge honor and I’m still kinda dumbstruck by all of it. Of course the irony in all of this now is that my popular nickname of “Lazyadon” is now more ironic than true, which I find hilarious! Anyways, as I said in a comment of Carn’s Vega post about my award, I realize that in the larger scheme of things, this is just an award from a community of a 16 year old game that most of the regular video game population pays no attention to these days. So maybe my shock and appreciation seems a bit out of place given that. But for me, I find it too awesome for words. Doom mapping…well, mapping in general, has become a significant activity in my life and I enjoy it very much. This award only shows that people truly do enjoy my efforts and work and it makes me want to stick around for the long haul and keep contributing to the community at large. And that’s most likely what I’ll do . So thanks to everyone who thought I deserved this award! I cannot put into words how much I appreciate it and I intended to stick around and keep mapping for a long time to come. Also congratulations to everyone who won an award and to everyone else who was nominated! I’ll be looking forward to what’s in store this coming year with much anticipation. I can’t wait to get my trophy in the mail Scuba Steve!

….

Oh, did you think that was it? Well, it’s not. pcorf happened to mention that he would love to see a “WOS” style wad by me in the Cacoward thread at Doomworld. Incidentally, I’ve been planning just such a project for a really long time now (since IGPack release…maybe a little earlier). I wasn’t sure when I wanted to announce it to the public, but his comment made me want to just post a little snippet about it. The name of this project is “Supplice” and production officially started 6/14/2009 (around the same time I was having those computer issues and was unable to work on Vega). I’m planning on another post later on to discuss the overall goals of the project, but I’ll go ahead and say just a bit about it. It’s going to be a Boom compatible, singleplayer map set (possibly COOP compatible). Lots of my inspiration will likely come from wads like Scythe II, Suspended in Dusk, etc and from mapper’s such as Vader, Espi, esselfortium, Dutch Devil, Agent Spork, afterglow, and a few others. One big thing I want is for the majority of the content to be made by me and me alone. So things like new textures, monsters, graphics, music, sprites and maps (duh) will all be made by my own hands. Certain things I’ll probably have to outsource (like monsters sprites and, possibly, music). I want the general theme to follow closely to Doom’s theme but at the same time I want it to have it’s own feel and atmosphere. It may even have some sort of crudely written skeleton story that will stem from the Doom saga in some way. At the moment I’m doing ALL of the resources first; mapping will only start once that’s out of the way (I can only focus on one thing at a time). So far I’ve made some graphics, a bunch of textures, and some new monster behaviors but that’s it. I haven’t been able to work on it (or much else) since I’ve been working though. I’ll make another wordy, drawn-out post about it later on where I can go into more depth about the project’s goals. So let’s leave it at that for now.

However, if your reading this and your getting excited, then just get yourself unexcited . The biggest reason why I didn’t want to announce this was because I have no timeline set for this project. As in, I’m putting the largest majority of my free time into Project Vega first and foremost. I will only work on Supplice when I can, and I have no idea how often that will be. And given the project’s scope and size, it’s likely it will take a very long time before anything of interest is presentable. But I can atleast say this; I plan on working on it and finishing it as long as I’m able. So if you are truly interested, keep your eye’s peeled for my official announcement post sometime in the future.

I hope everyone had a fun and safe Thanksgiving! To add to all the delicious mountains of turkey I gobbled down today, Greenwar II was finally released! It took about 7 years total of work and lots and lots of mapping on my end (more than I was planning on doing :p ) but it finally got finished. It was a lot of hard work and everyone did an excellent job, so we’re all glad to see if released. This was definitely a pretty cool Thanksgiving

For the time being, I’m hosting Greenwar II on my webspace until the /idgames link is put up. Once the /idgames is up, I’ll replace the link with it. Grab it below!

Download Greenwar II from /idgames!
(mirror)
Readme

I’ll get some screenshots up tomorrow. And, eventually, I’ll update the Design Page with it :p

[EDIT]

Sorry, I was too lazy to take my own screenshots. So, until I get the Design page updated, I’m going to steal essel’s shots :p

Click here for a pile of face-melting screenshooters.

Bizarro!