News
Portal
Every few aeons I write about games that really did it for me. The last one was Quake 4 exactly two years ago.
I probably should have told you previously, that Bioshock is a great game, but it took Portal to get my lazy ass to actually write something. So what's so special about Portal? Well, it's refreshing! I never experienced this nerdy kind of humor in any game! You'll love it, if you like Futurama or "serious" Science Fiction in general.
The gameplay is very smooth; I expected to encounter some artifacts (read: bugs) with this kind freedom the player has, but I didn't. The puzzles could've been a bit more challenging, but on the other hand it was nice not get stuck anywhere. Great game, great story (I'd love to tell you more, but don't want to spoil it). Somewhere in the middle of the game I thought something like "Awesome, Cube as game" - It had such a dense atmosphere. And I miss my weighted companion cube <3
I also played some quick games of Team Fortress 2, which also comes with the Orange Box, and it looked very polished, too. Very cool style and humor. I haven't played Episode One or Two yet, but I can tell you one thing: BUY BUY BUY!
Application Portfolios
Now, that I've been studying at the Hochschule Darmstadt for two weeks, I decided to upload my portfolios. I sent these in for my application some month ago. The two pathways I applied for were Interactive Media and Animation and Game. Both of my portfolios were accepted, but I choose to study Interactive Media in the end.
Quake 4
Quake 4 is out. I played through the singleplayer in like 2 days, and its so awesome! Best singleplayer I've played since Quake(1). It has everything. From dirty waste facilities to high tech data storage centers.
While the game features some outdoor maps, they could look better. But its nice to see, that the Doom3 engine can handle them as well. The indoor maps however are a real eye candy. And I just love the gameplay. Its full of action and so much more pleasant than Doom3's (and I like Doom3!).
Great job, lunaran, pjw and everyone else working at Raven!
... I also started to work on a MP map that I might even finish some day.
Ummm... Newsflash!
Currently we've some holidays here in Germany, and I resolved to do some stuff in my free time. but, as always, I don't have the insert various excuse here to work that much on my projects.
Nevertheless my map is progressing well. Brushwork and texturing is nearly done, but the tweaking and shaders and stuff will take some more time. Expect a release in about 2 month... or 3... or 4...