Not in reference to the game, or the acclaimed developer, but the scene from outside my Window today, which can only be described as an angry white Christmas! It was stormy last night, but today (and now) it's horizontal snow and it's shot blasting everything not nailed down. It's actually quite nice to look at, all white and clean. Only occurred to take photo evidence once it got dark so here is the shot:
What you are looking at is a window, and that lovely curve of white on the other side is snow!! Both roads into where I live are now blocked off my the police due to dangerous levels of snow drift on the roads and Saturday it looks to continue, so I might make a snowman if I get up early enough.
You can also see other lovely things in the photo, from left to right, my stack of games played and yet to play, a metal yellow pyramid from the DarkBASIC classic days, a larger crystal pyramid with an Egyptian head inside it, cello-tape, binoculars to look out of the window with, the red apple pealer which is a 100 year old design and absolutely has to be seen to be believed, my clock and bag of bits, a money can which has since filled up with foreign coins and I can't fit any more in and a landline phone which I positively don't answer under any circumstances due to the fact 100% of incoming calls are cold calls selling me something. The certificate is a framed printout of the latest company created to bring joy to the world, but more on that in months and years to come (I like to think three years ahead).
FPS Game; Dead Space
Yep indeed. Not a first person game, a third person one. I thusly looked past this control system (which was torturous and slow) and focused on the excellent use of light and shadow (and fading smoke and sparks) to create some very nice scenery. This one again used a single point of light casting singular shadows out from the characters and scene elements within a specific cone range. Done correctly, you only need one incident light at any one time to create the atmosphere you want for a particular area in your level, and the game benefits from that increased performance which smooths out game play and makes the world a better place. It will be a very strong argument now for adding more than one shadow in the scene after playing so many games that used only one per location!
I was also send some videos of Crysis 3 (not yet for sale) which looks very tasty visually, and time will tell whether the gameplay is equally engaging or a glorified sequence of cut scenes and shooting from a fixed rail through the level. I have high hopes for this one however.
Friday Night Beer
It is Friday night, and I will be killed by a Snow Yeti Saturday, so I have cracked open a Beer and decided to write my blog. I have ticked a lot of boxes today across the whole spectrum of tasks I have to do. So much so, I think I have deserved an extra episode of Top Gear and permission to load the final level of Dishonoured and defeat the evil bad guy with all my super powers and all my saved ammo.
Signing Off
It's only 11:20PM now, so plenty of hours to muck about on the computer. I've ticked all the tasks in my diary so effectively off the hook now until Monday when I shall resume my professional ministrations. Until then, I have the ingredients of an authentic Irish Coffee winging it's way to me from Asda home delivery for Saturday and providing the snow lets the van through, my weekend is shaping up nicely. For fellow UKers, good luck riding this storm and remember, if you don't need to travel, I recommend you bolt the doors and launch yourself into your favourite FPS game!
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