Friday with(out) Means - Aug. 7th, 2009

Developer Kintaii fills in for Game Director Means during his August vacation:

http://forums.anarchy-online.com/showthread.php?t=558994

(i had these really dorky photoshopped pictures of means i was going to put here but someone disabled the damn img code on the forums so i cant post them which is ok i guess because they were sorta lame but at least i did them on work time so i got paid for it)

You know, when Means asked me if I'd write the Friday update for him while he was off in Canada, I practically leapt at the chance. I mean, this is awesome - Finally, my chance to take the spotlight for a little bit and interact directly with the community. Or, well, it would be awesome if Means didn't happen to leave on a week where pretty much everyone else on the team is off on vacation, meaning that production is rather slow and leaving me with next to nothing to write about.

Thanks, Colin. Much love, bro.

Just because I can hear an echo in the office every time I say anything doesn't mean that production has halted though. Far, far from it. One of the joys of working in a relatively small team is that no matter how small the team actually gets, everyone still has something they can accomplish. Flaptoot has been working hard on the Opifex female model this week, as well as cranking out a few basic concepts for Uber Secret Stuff That We May Be Doing At Some Point Soon™. Genele and Metaing have been having some... shall we say "lively" debates regarding the profession rebalancing, which I'm now officially a part of - Some of the stuff we've been discussing is really, really interesting and should lend some new dimensions to the various professions of AO. And, of course, our awesome render coder of uberness INSERTGMNAMEHERE (I'm calling him this for the moment because he can't decide on a GM nick) is still hard at work on the conversion process over to Cheetah for our new graphics engine. I gotta tell you, every single time I wander over there I'm absolutely amazed at how quickly things are progressing - I know it's frustrating for you guys not being able to see the work as it comes along, but what we view as 'progress' most people would tilt their heads at and say "... it's a rock." Well, yes, it's a rock, but it's a rock being displayed in a new engine. It... it's cool, I promise - Just not very exciting visually. That said, though, I'm hoping I might be able to work in a couple of sneak peeks to the new engine stuff before Means gets back - Don't tell him that, though, or else I might get whacked about with the Managerial Nerf Bat (each hit lowers my salary stat by around 25000 Norwegian kroner).

As for me? I'm... quickly discovering exactly why I don't envy Means's job. At all. Don't get me wrong, I'm only experiencing a small taste of what he goes through on a daily basis keeping this game going, but mad, mad props to the man - It takes a lot of dedication to work on AO, but to lead it? I think that nickle statue of him in an astronaut suit pointing to the stars may not be a bad idea afterall.

Oh, right. Forgot to actually introduce myself to those out there who may not have run across me before. I'm Brad, AKA Kintaii - I started playing Anarchy Online just before the launch of Alien Invasion and, after several years in ARK, moved here to the Oslo office to work as a designer. Hard to believe it's actually been two years since I got here - A lot of awesome, amazing things have happened in that time for AO, and I'm genuinely proud to have been a part of them. That's one of the things about working on Anarchy that's really important to understand - With the exception of one artist on our team, every single member of the AO team was a former player. We care about this game just like you guys do, and we can get just as passionate. And trust me - When I say 'passionate' I mean *passionate*. Hell, I've seen things get thrown in design meetings before - It ain't always pretty. But at the end of the day, any arguments and disagreements we have are all because we want to see a better game; same thing with you guys, really. It may sound kinda... odd, I guess, but to an extent it's always sorta heartening to see the various flames/trolls/complaints/moans/groans/whining here on the forums. Why? Because it shows that people out there genuinely care about what we do and the game we work on. I'll be the first person to admit that we may not always get it right on the first try, but we at least always try, and if it wasn't for the feedback we get from you guys it'd make our jobs a lot harder. So I guess this is a thanks - To all the forum trolls, to all the complainers, to all the people screaming "OMG FC U SUX!!!1!". Thank you for caring. I promise you that we up here care just as much. We... just keep our trolling limited to the office. :P

Speaking of the forums, something I would like to address a bit - Forums activity. I realize, of course, that a decent amount of our playerbase is made up of the fr00b community, who don't have access to post here on the forums (but would get access to the forums and the amazing Shadowlands expansion for just 5 USD/EUR a month if they signed up for the Shadowlands-only subscription package! /shamelessplug) - We have plenty of people who are signed up for the Shadowlands offer, though, and plenty more who are signed up for the full package. If you guys have the ability to post on the forums, please do! We always like hearing from the playerbase, and the forums are a great way of interacting with the community - You guys are the reason we do what we do, and getting feedback and the chance to interact with our players is always great for us. We're also entering a very interesting phase for Anarchy Online, with the engine update looming in the future and the profession rebalancing soon underway - It's important that everyone in the game weigh in on these changes and discuss the future of their professions in the game. The more debate and discussion we have, the better the end product will be. So I want to issue a challenge of sorts to all the lurkers out there: Post! Seriously, come in, drop a line, say hey, whatever - If you've never posted on the forums before, then get started right here. Few things would make my weekend better than logging into the forums tomorrow and seeing a bunch of new nicks posting in this thread. So come out of the woodwork, stop lurking, make your voices heard - I promise we don't bite (except maybe for Genele, but she's had all her shots). Consider posting in this thread the first step in making sure your voice is heard in the important times ahead. We want to make sure that everyone has a chance to weigh in on these important issues, and I don't want anyone left out.

In other news, we've been thinking quite a bit about the new nightclub as of late - As Friday with Means the other week proved, there's no end to the suggestions out there, and quite a few of 'em are really catchy. So here's what we're going to do - After having talked to Famine about it earlier in this week, we're going to run a little contest while Colin is out. Here's how it works:

When you reply in this thread, you may suggest a name for the new nightclub. One. Only one. No more than one. I'm seriously not kidding about this, and if you post more than one I'm just gonna take the first one in your list and consider it your submission. To make your entry stand out, please use the following format:

ENTRY FOR NIGHTCLUB NAME CONTEST: insertclubnamesuggestionhere

Again, only one from each player please - Makes it a little easier on us in the long run. Deadline for entries into the contest is noon GMT, August 12th (that'd be next Weds.). Once the deadline has passed I'll compile all the names into a list, and the team will pick the top entries. From there, in the next Friday With(out) Means, we'll host a poll of the top ten choices. After that the official winner will be chosen as the new nightclub name (and we may even toss out a prize or two along the way)!

Anyhow, that's about it from me for this week - Next week I'm actually going to try and have some content I can write about (and maybe even a picture or two I can show you guys). Also, Colin: I expect you and Cam both to return with some smokes for me. I could use 'em about now. ><

Later guys!

__________________

Brad L. McAtee/Kintaii

AO Designer/Jack of All Trades