Where the heck have you been?!

It's only been well over a year since I wrote anything meaningful on this blog. I have been re-he-he-heally busy... and it's been an insane year. I am finally off of my project, and on vacation, awaiting reassignment to another project.
Lemme fill ya'll in on what's happened since I last wrote.

The last time I posted, I was employed at a videogame developer in St Catherines Ontario, where I was working on an X-Men game published by Activision. I lived in St Kitt's in my first purchased house with my lovely wife and 3 amazing kids. We had a great life (full of Monster Cereal).

For some of us in the games industry, we develop a type of 6th sense regarding job stability. Something in the air changes when you're about to get laid off or downsized or outsourced. I (fortunately or unfortunately depending on how you look at it) developed the ability to sense that change in the air early on. I began to sense it at the place where I was working. Call it intuition, or call it plain-to-see-your-employers-were-about-to-tank, I started weighing my options. I applied for a job at Ubisoft Entertainment in Montreal, and lo and behold, got it.

The problem was, we owned a house. We had just invested almost $20,000 in renovating it, and we didn't want to rent it. We didn't have enough money to carry two mortgages so we decided my wife would stay behind with the kids and sell the place through ComFree (a real-estate agency where the home owner sells does all the footwork, thus drastically reducing the cost... and eliminating the commission... very nice, in theory). We figured it would take a month, maybe two to sell our place. We were very, very wrong.

I now look back on 2011.5 to 2012.5 as my 'lost year'. After the first month, I moved into a friends basement bedroom (one of the silver linings, was to develop a relationship with these amazing people). I spent the year working very hard on a game am now very proud of, and going back to St Catherines (via megabus.com) every 2 to 3 weeks. It really, REALLY sucked.

I should go back and say that a few things happened that affected the sale of our property. For one, after about 3 or 4 months, we decided to give up on Comfree and hire a real-estate agent to sell our house. We were very excited by the prospect of a quick sale... at first.
Second, the company I was working for in St Catherines imploded as I had predicted. I was hoping to have my house sold before that happened, as it caused an over-saturation in housing in that area, which seemed to be a real setback.

We were feeling insanely discouraged and defeated. My kids were now growing up in a province that wasn't the one I was living in and it was killing me. It baffles me how anyone can willingly live far away from their kids.

This continued until May 2012 when we FINALLY got an offer on our house! Interestingly, the person who made the offer was a contact who knew of the house from when my wife was selling the house herself (grumble grumble... why couldn't they have just bought it THEN?). We haggled a bit, but essentially, we were prepared to just dump the place so we could get on with our lives. We sold the house. Although it was amazing news, it was also very sad to say goodbye to some of the best neighbors we had ever had.

In June, my wife and the kids came to stay with me in Montreal so we could find a place. It's all a bit of a fog now looking back on it. We bought a place and moved in in July (after a crazy hairy adventure for another blog post). We've been together ever since. All is well. Very well.

As I said at the start of this post, I am on vacation, in between projects. Today, we are going down to NY state, just south of Quebec to find Monster Cereal.

Maybe I'll blog more...

...if I use this handy-dandy blogger app.

Oh hai blog... been a long time.

Merry Christmas.

Finally, something about game audio...

I admit it's been a while since I posted on this blog. Seems there's so much incoming and outgoing data in today's social media infused lifestyle that by the time I get to the ol'blog I've nothing left to say (that hasn't been said elsewhere in under 140 characters).

So, my twitter account says I'm a video-game sound designer, and I'm only guessing that when people see it, and are directed over here, they might expect to find some sort of nugget on game audio... only to be inundated with trivial tales of breakfast cereal desire. My apologies all you audio fellow audio nutjobs.

I will do 2 things though for you...

1) Recommend AudioKinetics WWISE audio middlewear wholeheartedly. (It is officially the shizznizzle)

2) Point you towards a list of game audio articles assembled by the ever studious Damian Kastbauer (thanks Damian!). Tons of good info to digest here...

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/DamianKastbauer/20110104/6734/Game_Audio_Rewind_2010.php


Lastly, not specifically audio related, I would like to acknowledge the recent Dead Island trailer that made waves this last week or so 'round the nets...

(warning: very graphic violence
http://www.youtube.com/verify_age?next_url=http%3A//www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DlZqrG1bdGtg)

This trailer stayed with me the whole day after I watched it. I was expecting to see yet another zombie game trailer and was met with something that actually provoked an emotional response. Admittedly, I've never been moved by a game trailer (that doesn't have Wookies in it).
Now, whether or not the game itself can garner the same response remains to be seen, but never-the-less, my interest is piqued. Bravo Techland.

Back to twitter...

At the time of this writing...

I'm happily employed.

But... if ever I apply for a position within the ranks of your team (whether or not it's in the video game development field), my advice is to hire me. Trust me on this one ;)

Love,

Tony

I don't FEEL tardy.

Well, it's been a month or so since I touched base with my loyal readership :P

So what's been goin' on? Well, in a nutshell, not much. Things are going quite well. Almost too well.

To be completely honest, things have never been better... and I'm feeling a bit antsy about it.

I'm feeling quite thankful for my current station in life, and I don't want to take it for granted, as things can change in a heartbeat.

That is all.

Perhaps I'll become a feared furnace fighter?

I officially hit my mid-30's (34) in less than 3 weeks, ie: Old Man. I'm having a tough time with it.

Other than that, all is going really well.

Job is good, family is good, house is good, and dog is good (when she's not stealing food). Can't wait for Christmas.

Sorry about the boring blog post, but I had to post something to avoid 'blog neglect guilt'.

Tally-ho!

Quest Line Status: Completed!

Yeah, you read that right. As I sit here with a belly full of Frankenberry (and some BooBerry).

I feel so victorious.

We went over the border to Niagara Falls NY last night. After getting slightly lost due to our very WRONG map, we finally made our way to a Target store, where some generous online fellow cereal nuts directed me to. I was looking forward to my first visit to Target, as I'm a big fan of Kristen Wiig's 'Target Lady' skit on SNL. Unfortunately, when we got to the oh so tiny cereal aisle, my Monster Cereal was nowhere to be found. Another unfortunate thing... the guy working in the aisle was very smart and personable, and not at all like Wiig's Target Lady. Double let down. Oh well. Julie (my wife) did find me a cool "no whining!' coffee mug that I'm sipping from as I type this. "Fer a DOLLER!" (said in Wiig's Target Lady voice).

There was a Tops next door (where I found the Count Chocula last time).

Upon entering the cereal aisle, what do I find but a giant pile of Count Chocula. Hmmm, good, but not good enough.
So I and my 3 kids circle the store a bit, as I've heard that Frankenberry often doesn't associate with the cereal aisle, but demands his own display during the Halloween season. What do we again find in the Halloween section, but another huge display of the Count. Then a light bulb goes on in my head to start digging. BAMM, I find it! One lone box of Frankenberry! We are victorious... mostly. My goal was to find enough to last me a solid few months, but this will do.

With my two Monster Cereal boxes in hand (I grabbed a Count Chocula box... just 'cause) I go to the checkout.

I decided not to give up on my 6 box goal and off we go to the Super Wal-Mart that the guy at Target told us about. Skunked! Nadda boxes there (although Julie excitedly grabbed a few boxes of Chex for her Christmas Nuts'N'Bolts mix).

So we decide to head home. At least I have one box of Frank to satisfy until next weekend when we try again.

Then we see a small grocery store across the parking lot for Wal-Mart call Wegmans.

Upon arriving at the cereal aisle, we see a small crowd has formed at the end of the aisle. I instinctively know what the fuss is all about (so does my daughter as she breaks into a run).
When I catch up to her I can see stacks and stacks of purple and blue boxes.... Frankenberry and BooBerry.

Eureka! I felt like diving into the display.

I grab 5 boxes of Frank, and 2 of BooBerry, and head to the checkout.

Victorious.

Now what am I supposed to obsess about?

My Quest is turning into a Quest Line.

So, I consider myself to be somewhat of a breakfast cereal aficionado.

I've tried many cereals. I've even formed a cereal club in my late teens (where hazing new members included eating a bowl full of soggy grape nuts that have been sitting in luke warm milk for a half an hour). We were even fortunate enough to have a member from Japan who wrangled some interesting cereal from his homeland. But I digress. It was essentially a geeky cereal/videogame orgy. And it was fantastic. Many different sugary cereals flowed freely into my bowl on those occasions, the best our grocery stores would offer, but one cereal... the KING of sugery cereals in my opinion, was missing... FRANKENBERRY.

I've had a small part of my brain power(maybe 2%) silently thinking about Frankenberry cereal for about 20 years now (since about my last bowl of it). Suddenly, for some reason, about a month ago my desire for Frankenberry Cereal has nearly overtaken me. Likely due to the fact that I discovered they still make the bloody stuff around Halloween in the US. I live in Canada, and we for some reason, haven't had it here in an eternity (likely due to stricter FDA regs perhaps. see: http://www.blogadilla.com/2007/07/13/urban-non-legends-frankenberry-stool/).

I found a pack of 12 boxes on amazon.com, but when I tried to buy the stuff, they refused to ship it to my country. I found it on another website (http://www.crossroads-market.com/hard-to-find-grocer/Franken-Berry-Cereal-96-oz/productinfo/HFCE103/) but the shipping cost was MORE than the product itself.

So I decided to take my kids on a quest. I read that the SuperWal-Marts in the US often carry it. Upon looking on Google Earth, we discovered we have a Super Wal-Mart just across the border from us. Early Saturday morning, we finally set out on what was to be a quick trip into cereal cornucopia.

So we got across the border, drove for awhile, got lost on a toll highway, paid twice due to going up the road, and coming back, and finally made it to a regular sized Wal-Mart (which Google Earth claimed was a Super Center). Upon entering, we discovered that of course they had no Frankenberry. So we chanced it and went across the parking lot to the local grocery store called 'Tops'. There we found our old friend, Count Chocula. I was pretty excited, as this was a sign that I was close (I thought). I bought a box, just in case we didn't find that strawberry flavoured bastard (my booby prize I guess), and set out for the second Wal-Mart (I planned a back up just in case). This one turned out to actually be a Super Center, so I was pumped. Upon arriving at the huge cereal aisle, I discovered... NO FRANKENBERRY. Not even Count Chocula. I asked the gentleman stocking shelves if they ever carried it. He said "oh yeah, all year, we ran out about a month ago and we aren't expecting any more". My heart sank.

Funny aside, at the checkout counter at the Mega-Wal-Mart, the cashier, who was an elderly lady, asked me if I found everything I was looking for. I said 'naw' (in that 'Ralphie' voice before he discovers his BB gun behind the desk). She pry's out of me what I didn't find and sympathetically recounts here own quest for ABC cereal (I think she meant Alphabits?) and how she said she bought 5 boxes. Anyways, it was nice she understood.

I went back to Tops and bought another box of Count Chocula (I have 3 kids... and I'd like to get more than 2 bowls to myself).

On our journey back,here are some things that happened:
Family got hungry,
Went to Wendy's,
Left Wendy's due to the horrible hygene on of the cashier,
Went to McDonalds,
Paid less than $10 to feed the family (less strict FDA regs FTW?)
Drove through the slums.
Drove through a 4 way intersection where ALL the lights were GREEN (as in everybody was going... it was nuts)
Got stuck at the border due to a parade RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE BORDER! What the...!

Anyhow, we made it home, and Count Chocula tastes great... but my quest goes on.

Don't want to clean the fishtank!

I think I've discussed already how I've been hired at an outfit across the country. So now we're in the throws of packing/moving etc.

I don't really have too much to say, but am compelled to write something since I haven't written anything in a few weeks.

I will say this. The big job for me today is to clean the fishtank. I hate poop. I hate fish poop the most. Everybody in the house 'BLEEUUCK!'

Where the flip have you been?!

I get like this some times. I get into a transitory phase in my life and I tend to not tell the internets what's goin' on. Hope I didn't freak anyone out.

Biggest news, I got a job at a company I am totally pumped about! These peeps make great games, and from the limited time I've spent amongst their people, have a fantastic corporate culture (a byproduct of course, of having great people around).
They want me to start on the 13th of July which to me looks feasible.

So it looks like I'll be moving the Family across the country ASAP. Fun fun. I think we're gonna drive. I've never driven across Canada before. Should be an adventure.

What's been a real benchmark lately is the fact that a few weeks ago, we had a massive gathering at my current abode to say goodbye to some good friends of our who've since relocated themselves across the country. It was pretty surreal. The core of the group was a small group of about 5 or 6 of us from about 15 years ago who were very close. Since then, we've all gone our own ways and gotten ourselves married, had children, and basically grown up (for the most part). We've all kept in touch to varying degrees, but never have we gathered together at one place with all of our families. A great time was had by all (I think there was upwards of 40 of us at one point, judging by how many burgers we had consumed). People came from Ft St John, Victoria, Nelson (where we all met 15ish years ago) and Edmonton. What a great thing to have happened before we make such a big move.

So we've concerned ourselves with packing since then.

Video games I've been playing:
Battlefield Hereos (beta :D... it's awesome trust me)
World of Warcraft (I'm subbed until 2010, so I really don't feel any urgency to play, but it's paid for, so I go in to check it out every now and then).
Star Wars Galaxies (I hate what this game has become, but they just gave me a free month of game time, so I log in to see how it's doing... can't wait for BioWare's SW TOR)
Americas Army 3 (downloaded it cause it's free... so full of bugs it's INSANE! They laid off the entire dev team the day after it was released. When I play it, I can smell the beaurocratic BS that was pooped all over the poor devs... good luck gang. I may actually blog about this subject again soon, as I do have some rather strong opinions on the subject)

Is there hope for print media?

Awhile back, my favorite magazine of all time, EGM Magazine (Electronic Gaming Monthly), went belly up. Readership was way down siting the internet as it's main cause of death.
I was actually a bit saddened by this as EGM was the first game magazine to travel to Japan and get the scoop on new games/gear long before Nintendo and Sega wanted us to know about this stuff. I of course, hadn't purchased a copy of EGM in about 7 years due to the fact that it was pretty much all fullpage ads plus one long childish article by Seanbaby which annoyed the hell out of me. So they canned it.

Well, now it's been repurchased by the original owner/founder, and it looks like it's gonna make a comeback. We'll all have to wait and see if it returns to it's roots of gaming journalistic integrity, or if Seanbaby is once again invited to the party.

The question of course still remains. Can print media (at least in a demographic so jacked-in as gamers) compete with the internet?

Well, my opinion is, it can, but only if people don't have iPhones that they use to surf the internet on the crapper.

Maternity cloths for men.

I've been saying this for years (since my wife was pregnant with our first child), that I should create a line of maternity cloths for men who's significant others are expecting.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8063004.stm

I was skinny as a rail before I met my wife and her food luvin' family (God bless 'em!). As soon as she got pregnant, it was all feast and no famine (she craved strawberries everynight... to which we added a healthy dose of whipped cream... not my idea I swear!), hence I have gained a considerable amount of weight over the years (we have gone through this 3 times now). The real kicker is that she lost all her prego weight every time the baby was born. I was not so fortunate...

Ahhhhh that new Nintendo smell!

The kids bought a Nintendo Wii last night. I'm pretty proud of them. They've been pretty good about saving their holiday cash and decided to pool their resources together and buy one. They've actually had enough money for one for quite sometime, but their Mother and I have been encouraging them (ie: not letting them buy one) to wait until they can actually afford a game too.

So I was surfing the net and found Futureshop (essentially BestBuy in Canada) had them on sale. so we decided now's the time. I picked it up on the way home last night, without the kids knowing we got it (they thought they were going to have to wait 'til today). The kids were asleep when I got home so I decided to set it up, looking forward to that new Nintendo smell that always brings me back to my early youth. I open up the box, empty the contents onto the floor (I don't actually care about the Wii), hold the box up to my face and take a big wiff... nothing! Well, not nothing, it did smell like cardboard, but what the hell?! No new Nintendo smell. I feel so ripped off. No trips back in time were had. Fail.

Why do you think I bought all 3 kids their own Nintendo DS for Christmas? It wasn't for the games... perhaps that was the last fix I'll ever get.

Perhaps the Wii smells like snot? We may never know.

May the 4th be with you!

Today is Star Wars Day! Too bad it's not on a weekend so we could have a marathon. I did manage to get the kids to sit through 2 episodes on Friday and Sunday.

All in all had a good weekend. Managed to get outside a bit too.

To boldly go where millions of people have gone before...

So my new blog is out of it's wrapper. Ready to be chewed on a bit. So I'm gonna head on out there and start following other peeps blogs.

In other news. I'll be heading to the Canada GDC in a few weeks. I'm pretty psyched about that. Turns out the local IGDA is sponsoring some sort of free pass for those of us who are (or will be) unemployed at the time of the event. And since I'm getting laid off in a week, I get to go.

So if anyone who reads this (...crickets...) is going, lemme know and we'll grab a coffee or something.

Cheerio.

I miss my laptop.

Affectionately named Lappy. I left him at home so my wife could get some work done on the iPhone app we're working on. Unfortunately, the desktop beast she was using previously is about 5 years old, and therefore, not capable of running Photoshop and Illustrator simultaniously.

My back feels better after the walk to work for some reason... usually I feel like gravity is somewhat stronger on my journey to and from work. Huh, strange.

What does snot smell like?

We may never know...

If there's one thing we are all desensitized to, it's the smell of snot.

Thanks for reading my first post. I hope we've both grown through this experience.