In any given day, I’ll perform from one to three functions:
The first is animation design and integration. I work with the code and design to determine what features we can add and how to deliver the assets so they function properly. This involves a lot of cross-team communication and a lot of spreadsheet work. It might seem like a fire-and-forget kind of job, but we’re always trying to get more out of our technology, and there’s always new assets being delivered, so it really is a day-to-day thing.
The second is managing the animation team. I to talk to the design team to find out what class abilities are coming online for that milestone. I meet with the character team and content team on upcoming monsters and their abilities. I then determine which animator is the right one to perform any given task, and follow up with everyone to make sure it all gets done on time.
The third, and perhaps most difficult function, is managing myself. This may sound like a joke, but between the above two responsibilities, bug fixes, and other fire drills, the actual amount of time I have to produce motion often ends up being very limited. As such, I try not to jealously guard any key tasks *cough* Skaven *cough*, so I don’t hold up the process. Instead, most of my work often ends up being R&D on new features and such… things that I don’t mind re-doing over and over again if necessary. I do this to minimize the amount of re-work my team must do, as having to go back to an asset over and over again tends to damage morale.
What is your background? Where did you go to college? What other jobs have you held in
the industry?
I received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Advertising/Graphic Design from Sam Houston State University,
in Huntsville, TX. (You really can’t beat a good art program at a state school for a well-rounded
problem-solving foundation. It’s also WAY cheaper than other alternatives.) I was literally on a
plane from Texas to California 8hrs after getting my diploma from SHSU. I worked for a few months
on contract at the Neverhood, did a couple odd jobs and worked on a shareware project before
moving up to Multigen in San Jose (3D software for Vis Sim, and a ton of N64 titles back in the
day). From there I went to Atari Games (which later became Midway) to work on RUSH 2049 for the
arcade. I then prototyped a couple projects and got laid off.
My next gig was at Accolade (which became Infogrames, which then became Atari) working on Looney Tunes Racing. When Atari moved from San Jose to Santa Monica I got laid off.
Our team started Circus Freak Studios to make Superman: The Man of Steel. We finished this project, but we didn’t get another contract fast enough so I got laid off.
I then moved to Virginia to join Lodestone, worked there for a few months, found out the publisher was going to shaft us, and we all got laid off. Most of us came up here to EA Mythic in 2003, and have, happily, not been laid off since.
What other titles have you worked on in the past? In what capacity?
1. The Neverhood Chronicles (pc): Tech Artist. Gathered and archived shots for
the game, then created custom 8-bit palettes for each, and processed them into game-ready format.
2. Excalibur: Morgana’s Revenge (Mac): Artist/Animator. Total Conversion of Bungie’s
Marathon. Some level design, some modeling and animation, and some FX work.
3. San Francisco RUSH 2049 (Arcade): World art, design work/implementation on some of
the short cuts.
4. Looney Tunes Racing (PSX): World art, some early track and arena design, some
character art.
5. Superman: The Man of Steel (Xbox): 3D Artist/Animator. Monster/Robot/NPC Models
and animation
6. DAoC: Frontiers / Catacombs / Darkness Rising: 3D Artist/Animator. New versions of
classic monsters, new monsters and a ton of player cloak work, new emotes
7. Imperator: the vast majority of player and monster animations, with a couple
model/texture tasks.
What was your “welcome to the game industry” moment when it hit you that you were really
making games for a living?
I’d say handing out Neverhood T-shirts in the lobby of the LA Convention Center during E3 in
1996, but it was actually a couple days before that. It must have been around 2am, with half
the team clomping around upstairs singing along with “dum dum doi doi doi” blaring, waiting
for the demo build to finish so we could test it.
A close second was having an actual full-size arcade cabinet in my cubicle when working on RUSH 2049.
What excites you about the Warhammer property? What makes it perfect for an MMO?
Warhammer is savagery and comedy. It’s drama and despair. And Skaven! Games Workshop is the
best in the industry at creating a compelling universe that’s just saturated with mood. If we
can deliver even a third of the richness of the property into our game, we’ll be thrilled.
Do you collect Warhammer figures? What army do you play?
Miniatures games are a lot like MMOs in that they’re something I tried to stay away from,
knowing that once I got sucked in, I’d be doomed. My will broke (along with my wallet)
with some Eldar Harlequin figures about ten years ago.
I’ve got a fairly large collection of miniatures, but as far as playable armies, I have
probably enough to field 3 separate Eldar tournament lists simultaneously, a Kroot
Mercenary force, Clan Moulder Skaven, and the Empire army I’m working on now.
What your key influences when making the game? Anything besides Warhammer?
To be honest, everything’s an influence (ok, well, maybe not EVERYTHING). It’s then down to filtering out the things that aren’t appropriate. I play a lot of different kinds of games. Watch a lot of different kinds of movies. I watch a lot of animation. Some things are directly translatable, like some Animal Planet special that’s got a great shot of buzzards fighting over a carcass. Some are more oblique, like the rhythm of some fight sequence or song. We don’t have much opportunity to “Act” in an MMO, so trying to figure out how to cram some of our influences into an RVR game where it’s really all about “hitting” isn’t easy.
What are your hopes/goals for the game?
I really don’t have any goals more lofty than the game being well-received and fun to play. I want to WANT to play it. We have a lot of people here that are really passionate about making a great game, and every milestone the game gets better, so we’re well on track.
What is the biggest problem with current MMO’s you hope to fix with WAR?
At its core, an MMO is a turn-based game (in the sense that it runs on a clock, even though turns happen simultaneously).
It has to be, especially when it’s massive RVR. Trying to get that many people all over the world to compete
on a fairly level field when they all have varying hardware and connection rates is a real challenge.
As such you often get a lot of Attack… pause… Attack… pause… pause… etc. in an MMO. One of the things we’re
trying to achieve with the animation in WAR is to deliver a much more fluid-feeling experience, even if under
the hood it’s still the same math. We’re not 100% there yet, but things are progressing nicely.
What are your favorite video/computer games of all time? What games are you playing right now?
All-timers: Robotron, Earthworm Jim, Myst, the Jak/Sly/Ratchet games. CounterStrike and Battlefield2
are really good objective-based shooters, but a lot of us are really looking forward to the new Enemy Territory.
Strategy games are always fun (Dawn of War being the current victor), but I find I enjoy tactical games more.
Games like Myth, Sacrifice (highly underrated), and the upcoming Warhammer: Mark of Chaos are more enjoyable,
as you spend less time making stuff and more time fighting. On a more micro level, games where you either play
one guy with a supporting squad, or direct that small unit entirely like Full Spectrum Warrior, Republic Commando,
and (it might be a stretch) Chaos Legion really intrigue me. Right now my MMO budget flips back and forth between
WoW and CoH/V.
What music are you listening to right now?
http://music.yahoo.com/lc/?rt=0&rp1=0&rp2=1277931343
Do you have any advice for someone wanting to get into the industry?
Work on a Mod. There really is no better way to learn how to make a game than to actually
make one. It’s really more quantifiable than a demo reel as well. It shows that you’re
serious about what you’re doing and that you’ve got the skills to at least read some instructions
to get something working right.
Any parting thoughts?
The Dude abides.
