OPEN HOUSE

I’ve had the entire week off work but I returned to the office this evening for our company’s open house. We moved offices in late February so the bigwigs wanted to show off where we are and what we do. There was a smaller open house about a month ago for close friends and family but this one was open to industry friends, schools, and the media. I probably would have not attended tonight but I had invited my friend Garrett to come check out the place. I also have not seen Garrett in months so I looked forward to the evening.

GK and I go way back to my early days of testing at EA. We’ve since escaped those chains of labour and the experience has left an indelible bond. I got there a bit early and every other person was asking me, “What the hell are you doing here? Aren’t you on vacation?”

After Garrett arrived, I managed to lead him to a somewhat satisfactory spread of appetizer and finger foods. Just as we were about to leave the stiffling crush of people in the lobby we got caught by the start of the studio head’s presentation. After that was over, I led Garrett upstairs where I gave him a personal demo of Shadow-Born, the game I’ve been working on since last June. Garrett was brought up right so if he doesn’t have anything nice to say, he won’t say anything, which is why he sat pretty much silent as he played the game.

I also brought Garrett around to Taylor, a producer at my company. Those two had worked together before and greeted each other warmly. After the ass-slapping was done, I led Garrett around for a quick tour of the office. It was there, that I ran into Yuko Shinyashiki, whom I went to elementary school with. She was there representing The Art Institute of Vancouver. This was the second time I’ve run into Yuko in three weeks as she was at office for an earlier visit. I took her business card and returned my attention to GK.

The tour got quite boring for Garrett afterwards and I kinda felt bad about that. He did, however, point out that Maestro Fresh Wes was at the open house. It’s been years since I’ve seen the rapper in the media but Garrett, the young whippersnapper that he is, noticed him immediately. I am sure that “brush with greatness” was the highlight of the evening for the both of us. It is weird though that his most famous song was “Let Your Backbone Slide” and the company name is Backbone Entertainment.

Garrett and I then ate a significant amount of vegetables and dip while discussing plans to go hiking together in the near future. After a bit more chit-chat it was time to put an end to the fun-filled evening. I walked Garrett to the door so he could salvage the night.

If you want a slightly alternate take on the evening, feel free to read Garrett’s account at his blog. It’s like watching the Zapruder film taken from a different angle.

SUSHI PANTIES

I went to the Eatery for dinner tonight. It’s a nice place with some fabulous food and a really great atmosphere. While we were dining, Sarah pointed out the restaurant sold Eatery merchandise, specifically panties (link has music). You can see actual customers modeling said panties in photos when you go to the bathroom.

This only makes me want to order up a batch of erwintang.com panties myself and see if I can give them away. Sarah says that would be creepy. I don’t see the difference between the Eatery selling panties and me giving them away. Anyways, the debate rages on.

On the t-shirt front (get it? ha ha ha), I have sizes from everyone except Nic, Chris D, and Jonathan. Nic probably didn’t check his e-mail. Chris D probably read my e-mail but is way too busy to respond just yet. Jonathan didn’t get an e-mail and probably hasn’t read this post, which would make it a good time to make fun of him. Let’s hope those three send in their info so I can start the ordering process.

And last but not least, let me publicly congratulate Tyson for being formally accepted into the medical school at Memorial University. He’s been working his ass off for about a year studying for the MCAT and finishing his Ph.D thesis. He might even get into a few more schools as well, so the celebrating might not end here. In any case, good job Bone!

T-SHIRT UPDATE

After much research, I’ve picked a vendor and a specific style for my web site t-shirts. The next step is to get sizes from those people who’ve indicated they want one. I’m about to send an e-mail to everyone. I have everyone’s address except for Jonathan and Cameron (at least I think you wanted one Cam). You guys can either e-mail me or leave your size as a comment here.

Please refer to the size chart below.

CHEZ TANG

Ron, a former co-worker of mine, was in Paris recently for a business trip. While touring the city, he happened upon an interesting dining establishment and took the above photo. It says it’s a Chinese restaurant but it also looks like a grocery store. Maybe it’s a combination of both. A quick search of the web reveals it makes a pretty good hot and sour soup.

It seems like a place my Mom would go back to, three nights in a row while on vacation, thus preventing her children from experiencing their first ever Red Lobster visit… but that’s another story.

PARTY TIME

It wasn’t until I started working as a software engineer that I realized video game companies have wrap parties, much like movie productions. I worked on four different games as a tester and they didn’t even tell us about a party that we weren’t invited to.

Now that I’m in a role that offers a bit more respect, I’m finally invited to these damn things. On Sunday night, the producer for our game arranged for a little shindig at Mark’s Fiasco. A lot of people are going on vacation starting on Monday (myself included) so sooner was better than later for this.

Quite a few people quit the company during the course of the project and some of them were kind enough to attend the party. It was good seeing them and it reminded me how much more fun I had when they were around.

One of the former team members attending was Ron, he of the infamous “The Bet“. Oh, there were some fun times when the “The Bet” was brought up again. Ron seems to be a lightning rod for these types of discussions and I’m pretty sure my sister thinks he’s a bad influence on me. The discussion also elicited the most odd/funniest comment of the night:

“Hi, I’d like you to meet Wang, my boyfriend.”

In general, many drinks and much food was consumed. They make a kick ass fish and chips there. A single piece of fish there is about the size of your forearm. I didn’t order that but mooched off other people that did.

As can be expected for a video game related party, the males outnumbered the females by a fair number. It was, however, nice to get the whole crew out of the office and into a bar for a change.

As a final note, on my way to the place, I saw Pierce Brosnan downtown doing an on location shoot. Though I’m at least 85% straight (a web site quiz told me so), I have no shame in admitting Brosnan is pretty good looking dude.

VH1 STORYTELLERS

When I was in elementary school I knew this guy named Andrew. I used to go to his house to play Nintendo. His parents had an extensive Neil Diamond album collection. They’d also go to his concerts whenever he was in town. I’d make fun of his parents for their devotion to the Diamond.

Alas, I was only a child back then and did not realize that some music was timeless and classic. Many years later, I came upon the realization that Neil Diamond had his place in music history. Several of his tracks are now in my MP3 collection.

VH1 has a series called Storytellers in which artists describe how a particular song was written and then they perform the piece. Good stuff. Neil Diamond did one such show. I’d like to share with you the following clip from that show.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cliq6UcgSlk]

DONE

Friday marks the last day my team will be working on Shadow-Born, the game we’ve been developing for Nokia and their N-Gage “gaming” system. I’ve been working on this game since June of 2005. The months have not been easy.

I’m acutely aware of blogging too much about work so I’ll have to choose my words wisely. I will say that our company is trying to learn a lot from how our project proceeded. A lot of the decisions will be analyzed. If any mistakes were found in how things were done, they will be duly noted. I really hope that the bad parts will be identified and avoided for future projects.

Having said that, I’m actually quite surprised at how the game turned out. I’ll be quite honest and say that during the fall, I had some serious doubts about the quality of the game. I thought it might turn out to be a disaster. Through some sheer determination and hard work though, the team came through turned out a pretty decent cell phone game. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how many of you will ever even see this game. As far as cell phone games go, they aren’t as sexy as PS3 or Xbox 360 games.

Um, I’m not sure if I should say this, but our game will get some exposure sometime soon. If you look at the calendar and kinda have some knowledge of the games industry, you’ll probably figure it out.

Anyways, I’m looking forward to moving on and doing something different. I don’t want to work on any more cell phone games, that’s it for me. Before that though, I’ll be taking next week off. I look forward to getting some rest and relaxing.

One day left!

CLINTON, A PORN STAR, AND A ROCKET

The best news story of the day comes from Las Vegas where former US President Bill Clinton was visiting. Clinton was partaking in a round of golf at the LV Country Club. At the same time and near by, porn star Sophia Rossi was at her five-year old daughter’s birthday party.

Ms. Rossi had arranged for an 18-inch long firework to be launched as part of the festivities. Secret Service agents quickly interrupted the party and prevented the launch. The little girl was allowed to later send the rocket off, presumably after Clinton had left the scene.

A full account can be read here.

Now, I know all of you are thinking that this story is completely without closure unless one can see a picture of Ms. Rossi. If you click here, you’ll see a work-safe picture of the considerate Mom in question.

MORE COWBELL

I was going through my DVD collection tonight when I noticed I didn’t know where my Best of Will Ferrell Vol. 1 was. In terms of my favourite discs, this one ranks right up there, just behind those two specialty porno titles I got in Amsterdam last summer.

Back to the Will Ferrell disc though. I remember I’ve lent it out on at least two occasions. I was wondering if someone else still has it. So, if you’ve got a copy of the above DVD and don’t know how you came upon it, can ya give me a shout?