Jean-Eric Khalife

Can't answer the first question, but as for the second one... developers have no say in DRM, that's purely a publisher's decision. So you'd have to go ask Square (or look at Square's other titles to get an idea of their stance on DRM.)

It can be tough, but the original DS games were able to come up with solutions for it, so it wasn't too tough for us to build off of what they did. It all depends on the game and the situation. It would be silly for us not to re-use and expand on our code, but if doing so hinders the quality of the game then we'll have to look at other solutions.

You also have to alternate between left trigger and right trigger to move your character. We're going for the sim arpg feel for this game.

It's a very technical document, but if you're into that kind of thing, here you go: http://scottbilas.com/files/2003/gdc_san_j...world_paper.pdf

Early on in the project I remember someone sending out a technical document they found online describing how the loading system working in DS1... I can't seem to find it now... maybe funcroc can use his skillz to locate it.

This quote got me really excited. The game is looking amazing... I love Onyx

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW6YDv_EhnY#t=0m32s

Wow, that was quick. Thanks for posting it funcroc, saves me the trouble

Well, I never played Mass Effect so I'm not very astute in the action RPG genre. Growing up, I always loved 007 movies and once Goldeneye came out I would spend hours playing with my friends and unlocking every cheat in the game. After Golden Eye the rest of the 007 series went down the drain. To me, Alpha Protocol is what those games should have been. I chose to make my character mimic Bond so it felt like I was playing a 007 movie. I got to fight sweet looking bad guys, I got to negotiate with shady dealers and I got to romance the ladies all in one play through. This is what a spy game should be and I can't wait to try modeling Bauer and Bourne. So that's what the game felt like during my play through, but because of its nature it will be different depending on how you play it and that's the beauty of the game.

Nah, I'm just a lowly techincal artist that really enjoyed playing the game, also I apologize for being vague in my desciption, I don't know what I'm allowed to share and what I'm not allowed to share, that's Matt's job . I primarily play RPG's for their story and I think that's one of AP's greatest strengths, the gameplay was a blast too, but stories are what I love and it really drew me in and made me want to keep playing. p.s. It's Jean-Eric not Jean, sorry it's a little pet peeve of mine.

and... I had a blast playing it. The game was super fun and I didn't want to put it down. Everyone has done a great job on the project and I can't wait to get my hands on the final product. My favorite part of the game was the story and all the cutscenes, I got really into it and I kept playing just one more mission so I could see what happens next. This game is gonna be a great RPG. okay I'm all done rubbing it in

While the course will help you learn about the industry and begin to train you, you can make yourself stand out even more by working on some mods. It's quite easy to find a team of people that just want to mod games and it will build your experience. Doing this will also help you stand out from the crowd. You can also be the head of a mod team to let your creative ideas out right away. You don't have to get paid to make a great game. As for switching to other positions, it depends on the company. I've heard stories about people from Blizzard that spend 3 years making glass break correctly and that's all they do. Obsidian has been great at letting us switch positions if we show interest and talent, but not all companies are like that. A combo of schooling and side projects are your best bet if you want to get into the industry, but you should do what you want to do. If you want to design a game, be a designer, annie's post gives some great tips for that, don't settle for being a character artist if that's not what you really want to do.

My story is a bit similar to Joseph's story. I've always wanted a job in the industry, but I never knew what I wanted to do. I took some C++ classes in high school and I really enjoyed them, so I decided to become a CS major in college. I had the professor from hell in my first class. He was bulgarian, so he talked like the terminator and he had a hearing problem, so communication was very difficult. I already knew most of the basic programming techniques so the class was a breeze, but other students were having a lot of trouble. He would make us write out our programs on paper during the test. No compiling, no checking for errors, none of that. So I lost half the points on missing semi-colons and accidentally putting commas in the wrong places. Simple syntax errors that a compiler would have picked out in a second. After that class I never wanted to take another class with that professor, so I started to explore other majors. After a year and a half of taking G.E. classes, I was clueless, so I started doing web design and I enjoyed it. I worked with an artist friend of mine, I did the html/css and he did the art. I ended up learning Flash in the process and Illustrator. I started to really get into graphic design and with no experience I landed an internship at my school. They taught me everything I knew about art and I realized that I had a creative side. I figured I would rather have a bachelors in science, so I continued to learn computer science while building my art portfolio in hopes of landing a job. I ended up taking a class in game development at my school and our goal was to make a game that would be judged by different companies on the final day of the class. Obsidian was on the panel as well as Blizzard, Google, Red 5 and others. Kevin Saunders had emailed my professor about people who might be interested in an internship at Obsidian. I jumped all over that, but it was an unpaid internship. I applied and showed them my programming resume and my art portfolio and they decided they wanted me as a UI artist, so that's what I did on NX1. I was working unpaid at obsidian while holding two other jobs and going to school full time, but it was worth it and I ended up getting hired as a paid intern and then a junior artist. I was hired on as the 2D guy, but since working here I've been taught two different 3D packages and two different editors. I've really been able to take advantage of how much knowledge and talent the people on the teams have. My advice to people interested would be to do whatever it takes if you really want to get into the industry. Look for smaller companies and apply, even if there's no position listed. Use the machine gun approach and send your stuff out to everyone you can and don't be afraid to take on an unpaid internship. For you art kids out there, modding is a great way to build your portfolio and your art will look right if you actually place it in a mod and see what it looks like. Try to get your portfolio to have fantasy, sci-fi and real world art in it, this is one of the best recommendations I've heard is to show of your skills effectively. Of course, feel free to ask us if you do have any questions, we're more than happy to help