Departures. . .
So I signed an NDA in December 2008.
Since the last update, I'm happy to announce that Shadewood won Module of the Year 2008 (Vault Award), Best Dramtic Module and Veteran Author Award (AME Award), Almraiven passed the 10,000 download mark and
I'm flying out to Edmonton in eleven days to meet the good old fashioned men and women of BioWare.
I hate flying too. 737-700 (winglets) plane. I type that because at first I thought it read "wingless" but I guess that's just my fear of being in the air and not in control. Sure, they say statistics show the odds of getting in an accident in a car is higher then flying. I'm not sure about you but driving at 60 km/h, (Canadian, eh?), doesn't sound so deadly as say, falling from the sky at 500 km/h while the men and women around you scream and children look at you with a questioning look of "what's going on?" when the plane is flipping and twirling through the air as you attempt to grab the oxygen mask which keeps slapping your face just before the plane explodes on impact.
Last October I flew from Toronto to Montreal for work and it's about an hour in the sky. You're up and then you're down. It wasn't so bad, after asking for two vomit bags while on the plane. To add to all of that, I had the middle seat in the row.
The year before that I flew out to Calgary. Never unbuckled the seat belt, had nothing to drink or eat and looked straight ahead while holding on to the arm rests. I was so nervous that I left my boarding pass at the bar. Could have been the beer though. 
Summer is here, hot, sticky and humid, so building has really slowed down. I do my best, when I can, to pick and poke at the module, playing it to keep the story in my mind fresh as well as to come up with new ideas. Progress is always slow at this time of the year for me and is no different compared to the time I spent building Almraiven and Shadewood during the summer months. Canada Day is just around the corner, so Happy Birthday Canada!
I've been told my igloo in Edmonton has been reserved. HA! Good fun!
| 53° 34' N 113° 31' W | 06.26.09 |
| Clouds | 06.01.09 |
I see shapes in the clouds. . .
I've ventured to the realm of skyboxes for the first time, custom ones that is. Do players really need to see a sky when the isometric view of a camera offers more visibility around the character? My own personal playing style is not done by dropping the camera behind my character but perhaps it's popular with some.
It's been fun learning a little about a side of the game I've never customized before. In Almraiven, the skybox was always available when outside in the streets. Shadewood offered it in a few choice places outside of the wood and both used Bioware default skybox settings. Even then, the only time I really took notice of it was when it was time to take screen shots, otherwise the camera angle I prefer never showed the sky.
Is it really worth the effort and additional size to a hakpak when it's all said and done or is it just a nice backdrop for those screen shots. In comparison, the earlier shots posted offered no skybox, which created a more darker and sinister view of the Land of the Dead.
Here are some shots with custom skyboxes enabled.
