My New Best Friends

My calculations were a bit off yesterday with the price of my books. I went to the bookstore today and actually purchased my first semester's worth of books. Total cost=$968.53. I added a law dictionary and some study guides as well.

Here's the new gang of friends I'll be hanging out with for the next 4 months, and some perhaps longer:

Getting Close

After a very long drive and the toughest move of my life, Kim and I made it to our Hartford, Connecticut home. The last time I moved it was from a one bedroom apartment to a four bedroom house, and Disney paid for professionals. This time we moved ourselves, and other than driving the trailer, we did it all. Of course we had a lot of indispensable help from friends and family. We're still adjusting to our new place--I may have to dedicate a whole post to that.

Orientation starts in less than 2 weeks. I'm not nervous, but it sure is getting close. I got my first assignment today, which is to read 40 pages in Criminal Law prior to the first class. That doesn't seem too bad. I'll let you know how dry or complex it is. 40 pages of Harry Potter goes by pretty quickly. This may take me hours...

Total cost for books for the first semester=$772.95. That's if I buy all new books, and if I pick up the two optional books, which are both about $40 each. I also need to pick up a new laptop, for which a reasonably well-equipped one ranges from $750 to $1200. A new Macbook Pro is the trendy choice, and it starts around $1200. Now that I'm not working, big expenses tend to be harder to swallow. Oh well, it's an investment in the future, right?

Moving Day

Today is moving day, or more accurately, loading day. We won't begin our cross country trip until Monday, August 1, but we're loading up our trailer today. Of course, we're still scrambling to get everything prepared, but I had to take a brief respite--especially since we ran out of packing tape.

The last few days have pulled at my heartstrings. Saying goodbye to friends has been tough. Saying goodbye to my car of 13 years (still in great shape!) was pretty tough too. I know that saying goodbye to this house (for now) will be tough as well. It already looks strange with all the paintings off the walls, furniture wrapped and moved out of place, and towers of boxes in every corner.

Honestly I've never been happier than during the time I've spent here. It seems odd then to leave, doesn't it? Today's sacrifice ensures tomorrow's happiness. Nonetheless, I'll miss this place and the people that made it great.

Double Broken Heart

With my first project under my belt and that first promotion, my confidence soared. So did my work ethic. I had my dream job, and I didn't want to screw it up. I remember working my heart out, trying to incorporate my boss's ideas while still making a cool game. That is often quite challenging for a designer, but most of us adapt.

Then the industry broke my heart--the first time. The game I had worked on for many months was canceled; not my fault, but there are always thoughts like, "If I had only worked a little harder on it, maybe they would have liked it more." I use this analogy now as a defense against those thoughts: Just because we couldn't save the sinking ship doesn't mean that we caused it to hit the iceberg.

Saffire ended up having fiscal stability problems, and eventually I quit to move with my wife to the San Francisco Bay Area.

My experience at Saffire and a great contact got me a job at Namco (famous for Pac-man, Dig Dug, and Pole Position). Namco was big-time. The teams were huge, the pay was almost triple what I made at Saffire. I was awestruck with how tight a ship they ran. And they were impressed with me, quickly expanding my roles and responsibilities.

Unfortunately, even Namco had fiscal problems. After a couple years, they laid off nearly everyone (80-ish people, if I remember correctly) in development, except for me and five other guys. I don't think I was the best designer, but my salary was probably the smallest (yes, even at triple the pay)...so perhaps I was the best value at the time. The good part of the layoff for me was that as the sole designer I had a lot of opportunity to guide and direct the games. But Namco had a penchant for cancellations too, and eventually it wore at my faith in the company. They broke my heart the second time.

Game Career Beginnings

All that eagerness paid off pretty quickly. Hard work goes a long way in any industry, but this is particularly true in the games industry, where young, passionate rookies are extremely eager to prove their mettle.

My good friend Taran was already working for a local Utah game developer called Saffire. He clued me into an entry-level opening at the studio as a tester. Taran was also a tester, and Saffire let him go the day they hired me. It was an ironic way to start my career. Nevertheless, I pressed forward as best I could.

Testing is mind-numbingly repetitious. A focused tester with a logical mind and decent communication skills can be a strong help to the team, but more often than not, testers lack these traits. I had them. I would spend countless hours replaying all the levels looking for slight discrepancies from the previous version. When a new version would come out, I would redo it all over again, sometimes all through the night as deadlines approached. My observance sharpened as a tester, and no one was quicker or more efficient than I was at finding bugs and verifying fixes.

Towards the end of the project, the lead designer of the game, Gavan, trusted me enough (or was desperate enough) to let me design a couple of multiplayer (competitive) maps. Oddly, multiplayer level design has never been my forte, although in this case the levels worked out OK and the game shipped. I guess they were so happy with my work, they promptly promoted me to designer.

Rear-view Reflection

I went to lunch with my longtime friend Alan today. He got me thinking a little bit about my eleven-plus year video game career. For many months I have been quite focused on the future, yet now is also a rare opportunity for reflection while that game career still lingers prominently in my rear-view.

For a few posts, I think I'll talk about my career with games: my start, my rise, my disenchantment, and my exit.

It seems that in our youth we identify with a few things that give us a feeling of uniqueness, whether it be the music we listen to, the teams we like, or even our favorite subjects in school. Often one of those things rises above the others and becomes our passion--our identity. When I was just a game-player (i.e., pre-designer), games were my passion--my best friends loved movies (now directors), some loved music, and a few even liked sports. I loved games. I felt like I was part of an elite minority, and I was quite satisfied, proud even, with that status. Video games as a pastime really started in my generation, and thanks to my Dad buying an Intellivision and a Commodore 64, I was hooked early on.

When I started, I was a lot like the cardboard robot in this video: endless passion, but not much know-how. I couldn't be told "no". I loved grinding away, eager to show the world that I could do it better than anyone else.

"Why do you want to be a lawyer?"

People usually ask some common questions when I tell them that I'm going to law school. The most common is something like, "Why do you want to be a lawyer?" I'll try to answer that question, although, truth be told, I don't have a stand-out, singular reason for going.

The fact of the matter is that some of the best people I know are attorneys or went to law school. I realize that some of the worst people you know may also be lawyers, especially those of you who have had direct dealings. However, my lawyer-friends are happy, stable, intelligent, well-to-do people. They have the freedom and flexibility to live life on their terms. Many of them serve in volunteer capacities, giving freely of their time to help those who are less fortunate. Some of them work in the public sector, protecting the interests of the people from criminals and organizations that break the law.

I respect them for what they have been able to accomplish, for their ability to think and speak clearly, for their self-reliance, and for their contributions to society at large. I hope to be that kind of person, and I'm hopeful that law school will help me down that path.