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Hoping All is Well
The truth is that I have (often) intended to write for this blog again over the past couple years but every time I tried it it seemed that there was a huge event in the world happening and that my little announcements or questions just didn’t seem that important. I am realizing that there will never be a perfect window to talk about myself or my projects. So I might as well just go ahead. Here’s a short update in regards to what I have been up to: I have been working with a technical college (NAIT) as part of a research team on virtual reality and augmented reality projects…
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Odyssey of the Dragonlords
Super excited to receive my copy of Odyssey of the Dragonlords. This 5e campaign was created by my former design lead… James Ohlen with help from other BioWare folk like Jesse Sky and Drew Karpyshyn. I had access to a digital copy of the material a while back and started a campaign that I am running, with my kids and their friends. We are only a couple sessions into it but everyone enjoyed the greek-themed character creation and the epic backgrounds that were introduced. And the main campaign is fun and engaging. It was great to finally have the physical copy in hand though! Here’s a couple pics. I will…
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NAIT’s Motion Capture Studio
A little over a year ago I joined the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology’s (NAIT) Industry Solutions as a Senior Technical Theme Lead for the Centre for Innovative Media. While we primarily focus on project work — virtual and augmented reality solutions primarily — we are also building infrastructure. Our main offering will be a medium-sized motion capture studio. It will open later in 2020. Construction is set to begin early 2020 but we are still evaluating hardware, services, and props. If any Edmonton area company is interested in renting space in the studio once it opens and influencing the features that will be available, please do get in touch.…
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A Chat with Matt
This morning I had a fun discussion with Matt Barton from Matt Chat. We spent a couple hours talking about my time at BioWare (from 1999 to 2009). We discussed what BioWare was like back then, the games I used to enjoy (versus now), and my design philosophy. The interview will air sometime this weekend, so keep on an eye on his twitter: https://twitter.com/mattbarton I tend to avoid interviews, especially since departing BioWare. But I enjoyed the conversation… thanks, Matt, for the opportunity. (Also thanks to my girlfriend for talking me into accepting the interview since my default response to these requests is almost always, “nope, busy being a hermit!”)
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Iceland!
Last month I had the opportunity to take my kids on a week-long vacation to Iceland. I have long wanted to visit the country but was waiting till my kids were old enough to enjoy the experience. And what an experience it was! We only explored a very small portion of the country but enjoyed (almost) every moment of it. We were home-based in the Reykjavik area and visited most of the nearby popular tourist sites. I spent a lot of time driving us around the south-western portion, exploring ice caves, volcanoes, and visiting Heimaey (I don’t advise taking the ferry over during rough weather — my kids and I…
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End of Year Check-In
Hello all. Life still finds me pretty busy with chasing after my kids and work, not doing much in the way of writing. I am working on my own game in my free time, but it is too early to share details there. In terms of other updates, I left Beamdog a couple months ago to join NAIT, a polytechnic in Edmonton. It is quite a change of pace from what I’ve done in the past but it is exciting. I’m not actually teaching. Instead I’m the senior technical lead for the Centre for Innovative Media. Which basically means a lot of my experience in the games industry is going…
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Summer 2018… what’s going on?
Hello. I know I’m still not updating this very often. Thought maybe I’d poke things to see if anyone is out there anymore. If I were to start posting anything more often — and I apologize, I know I’ve asked the question before — what would you like to see? Bits from the Lazy Designer game design books? Commentary on other games? Board game notes — the kids and I play a fair bit & I’m always looking for new suggestions. I could also post pics of my recent woodworking projects, though that has slowed down with a busy summer. I think since my last post I’ve stained the bookshelf…
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Neverwinter Nights
Almost twenty years ago I began my game development career at BioWare. My first title to do design work on was Baldur’s Gate 2. My second… Neverwinter Nights. I eventually become co-lead designer on the game, which was both a RPG as well as an online Dungeons & Dragons campaign “facilitator”. In the hands of players it was used as a small-scale MMO, a teaching tool, and many other things. I have always been really proud of the game. Last month Beamdog released the Enhanced Edition for Neverwinter Nights. I have been busy on other projects and have only been tangentially involved with NWN:EE but at home, I’ve been playing…
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My second project…
Hope the New Year is treating everyone well. I’ve been very busy at work with Beamdog… but can’t really dive into what I’m doing so I’ll keep it quiet on that front and just discuss my second wood working project instead. After building the large entryway organizer I decided I would tackle something simpler. The previous owner of my home had a tall and narrow bookcase near the living room window and I wanted to duplicate that (at this point most of my books were still in storage!) I found some stock plans and modified them — my bookcase was going to need to be narrower and taller. The construction…
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Enjoy the holidays!
Hello… just a quick update before I abandon the interwebs for the holiday season. Hope everyone has something fun lined up for the holidays. I’m going to take my couple weeks off and just relax mostly… I’m digging through old writing and programming projects today for example. And I might build a table, we’ll see. Neverwinter Nights As I’m sure you already know, Beamdog is working on a Neverwinter Nights Enhanced Edition. Neverwinter certainly has a fond place in my heart… it was the second game I worked on and the first in which I had lead design responsibilities. It is really exciting that work is resuming on it. If…
