Plan for Nauris Krauze

Yeh, long time no type.

Yeh, long time no type.
I'm not much of a .plan-posting type, its been a while since the last one. The thing with .plans is- if you dont post them regularly, there are lots of things which you dont feel like writing about after a while.
Anyway, things have been whizzing past with the speed of light.
Pre-IGF days were the busiest, since it was a significant milestone for so many projects. I dont know why, but non-negotiable deadlines are so invigorating. Perhaps I'm just an adrenaline junkie.
There's just something sweet in that sudden Paul's "hey, it's not in the high priority tasks, but what if we did make a new art for all the GUI for Flash Bios?" And you both know its crazy because there's other stuff to be done, and deadline is looming and the countdown is not days anymore, its hours... And then you MAKE time. Ok, I'm rambling, but its just seriously cool until the deadline passes, of course, and then you hit pillows with that dull thud.


- Hey, why dont we give GUI an overhaul now, instead of after-IGF, huh?
- You're completely out of your bonkers. Sure, let's do it!

Well, helluva run it was. There was work on couple of other games during that time, but they're kinda not of public knowledge as of yet.
Then i lost my hard drive, as well as motherboard, ram and cpu. Well, crap happens, I can only be thankful that it happened right after the IGF and not before. Plus I have an external hard drive for backups which means I salvaged most of the stuff. Lucky me.
Anyway, apart from that adrenaline pump, things have been running in a rather zen-like fashion, if I may.
There was a short contract work for 21-6. Nothing big, couple of skins, it was more of filling-the-gaps job, but anyway, it was cool having the opportunity to work with Justin Mette. He's a cool guy, clear-headed and smart. If I'll say anything more, I'll sound like some matchmaker, I guess.


Skinned by me, models by Craig Fortune and L Foster.

Other contract thingie has been for Bryan Edds, I guess I just liked the weird world idea where all characters are marbles, the game world "isnt real" and..well its weird :)

Its a mockup thingie, but using actual in-game assets


Some location images. I since its "all about marbles", I wanted everything have slightly "roundish" shapes. It's actually quite hard to draw world inhabited by marbles. In such a world there wouldnt be steps, for example and architecture would be Really Weird, but after some discussions, we decided to keep basic concepts recognizable. The first images just looked unrecognizable and alien, it certainly wasnt a world bipeds like us could make much sense of.

Snachurz have been progressing slowly but steadily. Which is other way of saying that it's been coming slower than we expected back in the summer. On the other hand, stuff is being done, James Urquhart is doing his code voodoo, Ben "Djaggernaut" Chavigner is secretly lowering my self-esteem by churning out really niiiiiice (and I mean niiiiice) models and skins and Craig Fortune is betraying the fancy-pants artists species by actually understanding what James is talking about, while bombarding me with 3D models. I guess its some kind of indie family thing. I've heard that families are like fudge- mostly sweet with a few nuts. That nuts thing? Thats me.


Rocket Launcer Rocky With Its Trusty Companion The Projectile

Speaking of nuts... Tom Bampton and me have been kicking around an idea about turn based strategy for like...ages. So recently Tom just said something sophisticated along the lines "f*k it" and actually started coding. We decided that initial plans are way too grand and the whole stuff is prone to burn-out and fizzle. So currently we're aiming for much more contained design upon which to build later.
Its basically a turn-based strategy, a "mini-Civ" if you will, set in a harsh post-apocalyptic world which allows rich pickings for ruthless warlords and enlightened restorers alike. Welcome to the Sunburn.





Misc Stuff

I thought it would be cool to share some of the recent findings of mine. None of them alone is important enough for a .plan or even forum post, yet I believe they could help some. In fact, I'm convinced many of you have stumbled upon cool thingummies like these, so perhaps its not such a bad idea to include them in the end of your .plans. Perhaps with time not only pictures would indicate a "healthy" .plan but also such random findings.

Aenigma Fonts
Free fonts are chore. Lots of font libraries on the net boast having free fonts, but once you start downloading them and reading licenses of individual fonts included in .zips, the picture becomes bleaker and bleaker- many of them dont allow use in commercial products, many are free only for indie comics, some are emailware and author wants written request sent before use. It's a mess.
That's why I was pleasantly surprised, stumbling upon Aenigma Fonts. They're all made by one person, they all have once license and they're all free for commercial use. Those are quality fonts, all kinds, lots of them. Nice website, nice font previews. Enjoy.

Van Buren Design Docs
Van Buren was the code name of Fallout3 back from when it was the Black Isle that worked on the franchise. Fallout fan-site No Mutants Allowed has somehow gotten their dirty radiated hands on the design docs for locations and quests that were used for Van Buren.
Lookie for docs HERE.
I believe they'd be of interest to anyone who's on a crusade to create a complex game, with many dependencies, bunch of locations where player might and will return numerous times, character progression etc. In other words- RPG.
Docs are messy, they obviously were meant for strictly internal use, and writers knew well that they'd change numerous times. I think that adds to the value of documents, and sets apart them from other design docs floating "in the internets". Warning- if you have High Sensitivity perk, avoid the docs- chance of Strong Language random encounter is pretty high. There, thats all the encouragement you need ;)
Ah, I'd recommend starting reading with 01_Tibbets_Prison.doc since its the first location and the document is also kind of a template for all the other location docs.

John Sawyer on project management
Another goodie on No Mutants Allowed. John Sawyer, formerly of Black Isle Studios, gives good tips on project management. The target audience is mod teams, but it doesnt really matter in this case. Some good stuff HERE.

Moonpod Developer Diary
Good stuff. Indie developers from Moonpod, creators of Starscape, are keeping "kinda monthly" dev diary. Good read, shows the progress and evolution of their upcoming project, various decisions they have made and why they were made. HERE.

Well, that's about it :)