No, I wasn't abducted by tap-dancing aliens.

There’s a reason I haven’t been able to update the blog in a month (a MONTH? that’s just no good), but it is kind of lame, so I’d rather say I’ve been too busy to even glance at my blog.

Luckily it’s partly true…

So, let me try and recollect what happened since last time…

December 20th: The beginning of the end of the year.

The 20th was the day where we presented the M.A.Z.E. concept to the teachers and representatives from the french game industry (Eric Viennot, folks from Ubisoft and other independent studios), and of course, Jordan Mechner.

The presentations went well, the questions were interesting… in a nutshell, it rocked. We were very nervous, of course, but also pretty confident, so it’s a good mix.

The funny thing is, the game has changed from what we showed a month ago, so we’ll see who manages to see the difference two months from now.

Christmas and New Year’s eve were excellent, but not very game design-y, so I’ll pass.

January 8th: the “rentrée”.

So, everyone came back from their families or whatever, having spent a good two weeks away from the game (I can even say with pride that my two weeks have been work-free). We had agreed to start working under SCRUM, so the first week was spent learning what it was and how it worked. Then, on Friday, we sat around and began defining tasks for each team member… And then the most wonderful thing happened! By starting to think in concrete terms, we discovered a major design flaw who, if unchecked, would have made the gameplay cumbersome and bloated. The game was simplified, streamlined, “funified” (I love making words up). Good Times.

Now: second “sprint”.

At the start of the second sprint, things are looking good. We’re not late and the design is strong. The prototype has big chances of being playable and fun, and that’s his major strength. I don’t think we could achieve this with a 3d game…

I’ve also been preparing my trip to GDC (in just three weeks!! I can’t wait to get there). I know I should at least try to update Poesysteme, get a proper menu and stuff, but it will be hard to find time to sort that out. I will be giving a post-mortem on it the 19th, so I have to get that powerpoint done, and I still have to print my business cards to go “Shinobi bonus level” on every person I lay my eyes on.

Take THAT! You evil game developer-slash-ninja!