A Year Out

I am currently in my work placement year of my degree and as you make have noticed by now this means that development outside of work is currently nothing more than playing around. It is because of this that I have paused my blogging on the subject of games development for a year. I will be back summer of 2011!

In the mean time I have just started a new blogging project that is more general about my day to day life and other geeky pass-times over at www.standinginthefire.co.uk . Watch that site for further details.

Thank You!

Easter "Holiday"

Over the last term I have made a large amount of progress in all areas. My C++ skills have greatly improved and I now feel confident that I am good enough for a games studio.

My racing game is coming along nicely. My team handed in a alpha build last which included a menu systems, car and track selection, AI, pick-ups and a HUD. Gamebryo is treating us well now we have got to grips with it.

This week I am concentrating heavily on my Mobile Devices module coursework. I am programming a Java version of Llamasoft's classic arcade title "Llamatron" for mobile phones. As well as this task I must write a essay about the limitations of mobile phones as a platform. For some reason after all the programming a essay seems like a nice break.

Ill keep you updated with my progress and show you some screenshots once everything is presentable.

2010 is going fast

So the second semester of the second year is here and the work is piling on.

In "Interactive 3D Graphics Programming" I have been using Direct X to render different lighting techniques and meshs. The project is to create a basic, reusable, graphics engine for a 3D game. While Direct X is not the easiest thing in the world it seems fairly simple after I made my own render from scratch last year.

Console Development is speeding up as this week we must start our "Demo Scene" like PSP development application. At the moment this is the hardest module and with a tight deadline to produce such a open ended project I will have to be careful with my work balance.

If you don't know know about the demo scene it is effectively a group of elite programmers who get together in large groups and challenge themselves to create amazing real time graphic and audio effects often with constraints. Such a constraint might been a low file size or that it must run on old hardware. Here is a video example of a demo scene project.

In Applied Game Development am am the lead programmer of a 9 man development team with the goal of creating a "bladerunner style" futuristic racing game using the Gamebryo Engine. We have 4 programmers and 5 artist to produce possibly the most fantastic game any of us have ever made. On the other hand the use of this industrial engine may prove too much for us. We will see. Here is a video from the makers of the Gamebryo Engine showing off some of the many games that are made using it.

Last but not least is the Mobile Devices module. Going into this semester I really didn't thing too much about it as it but now I am working on it I am beginning to realise what a fantastic language Java is. I am looking forward to having my assignment application running on my phone. The only question now is, what shall I program?

So far this semester has been tough and its only going to get harder.