Uncharted 2, The Saboteur, Splinter

I was so excited that Uncharted 2 was coming out that I bought it the day it came out, finished it in like 2 days (which i never do anymore for a lack of time) and thought it was simply an incredibly fun and beautiful game!!!

Sometimes you are so excited by a product coming out, but in the end they let you down and made a crappy game after all with the marketing making sure everybody bought it anyways ... wont mention any big franchise here ;)

This was definitly not the case with Uncharted... which was absolutely amazing graphicly: walking in the snow which glues itself to Drake's feet and legs, the extraordinary backdrops where you get views of the whole area which is jawdropping.

The story is good and don't want to skip any part of it even though we know some plots will arrive well in advanced since like all treasure hunting games/movies there is always somebody trying to screw you to get the gold ... but nonetheless it is great and one of the best presentation of any games out there including the camera shots and how it's "filmed".

The characters are interesting (except the bad guy) they are unlike most games like the first one was, but it seems that the company has trouble making believable female characters compared to the male counterpart. For example, Drake has some scars that tells a story about him, there is some kind of personality in his body/face, whereas the female seems to be bland, and all shiny with not a lot of definition there is something missing I think.

The acrobatic gameplay is really fun, there is some movement and events happening during the different moments in the game, it's not only go up this area, there is a feel of urgency, the elements move around as we can see in the first 10 min of the game and the building collapsing part. its fun and unexpected.

the shooting sections of gameplay are better done than in the first game where some parts were frustrating. here we dont get that sensation, i like how they tried to give us a lot of different scenarios and different elevation which changes how we handle things. shooting mechanics work, had some troubles to get from cover to cover sometimes something that has to do with the controls.

puzzles were a little to easy but thats better than a hard one I have to get on the net to find the solution to ;)

great experience that i would replay again if time permits. really good reference for any games on cinematic aspects and how to present a story.

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The Saboteur is coming out on December 8!!!!!! Finally it comes out I'm so glad they made it ... those people were really great to work with and I'm really happy for them. Last time, I played the game design had finally been tweaked to make it a lot better than when I was working there.

the game is getting a lot of coverage from the different medias and events and im waiting for players response when the game comes out.

So glad!

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Splinter is coming along nicely. A lot of coverage has been done at the last couple of events where we showed a second map. the different medias seem to really enjoy it.

It is a beautiful game which plays really well. With the extra time we got we are making sure the experience will be fun and new to everyone.

hope people enjoy it when it comes out in a couple of months :)

VFest Toronto

I was at the Virgin Mobile Music Festival in Toronto this week-end located at the Molson Amphitheater next to Ontario Place.

It was a great festival in a venue that I'd never visited before and I was impressed by the architecture. Its an outdoor venue but not all of it ... since part of the seats are covered with a roof and the section 300 and grass areas are not. There are walls to hold the roof structure, but it gets windy everywhere. The floor section is really small, but makes the first sections that much closer :)

So the tickets I had were for the floor (100 level) and the 200 level seating so I was really close to the stage at all times.

There were 3 stages ( 2 of them quite far from the main stage ) but because of the schedules and their distanced location I didnt really got to see other stages but I only missed one of the groups I really wanted to see (Von Bondies). The fact that there was only one stage was kinda bad since we had to wait for the stage to be set for the next act everytime unlike at Osheaga in Mtl where the two main stages are side by side and we dont have to wait between bands.

Here are the bands that played and some comments about them ( if I remember them ):

Saturday
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Mates of State : first band playing at the festival they had a good first song and I was into it, but then 10 min later I was bored and wanted something different since it was all of the same

Lights : She was young, full of energy, kinda shy, shes talented and has some good songs, but ...

Grizzly Bear : I was waiting to see them, I was told it was a good band, but maybe my expectations were way too high cuz I was bored except for one song that was a little bit like Wolf Parade on the piano and all ...

Sloan : I had heard some of their older songs and I thought I liked it back then ... and I really
enjoyed their music now it was a lot of fun and they were enjoying themselves even though the singer couldnt play his instruments so they invited other people to play with them ... funny too.

Paolo Nutini : Scottish, weird posture, weird faces, screaming a lot, zzzzz music but people seemed to enjoy it on the floor dancing with their Scottish flags


Franz Ferdinand: Last time I saw them in Montreal I loved them, but for some weird reason I never listened to them after that show ... it never happened to me before and I still dont know why. I was expected a great performance from them and ... they delivered everything I was hoping for !! They kept playing some great songs ... in fact all their songs were major hits. I loved their energy, singing, interacting with the crowd and everybody was dancing. Great Performance at the festival ... one of the best.

Pixies: I already saw them before, but i dont remember where exactly, but they produced an amazing show also with rythmic songs like the good old days of alternative and grunge ... a band I'm really happy I saw again and wish to see them another time in a full show.

Ben Harper : I left before his show ... didnt really cared

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SUNDAY
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Coeur de Pirate: A lovely girl from Quebec with her band doing good songs that nobody could
understand, but delivered a good performance. A little shy since nobody really
got what she was singing about.

Datarock: Electronic music, red jumpsuits, extreme energy, jumping all over, playing many
intruments, good!

Mew: Bad music, really bad voice ... awful live anyways

Mutemath : didnt know at all the band, thought they were really good ( but playing after Mew
might be a reason I liked them so much lol ), people seemed to like them too so...

Cold War Kids: Dont remember them that much ... but I dont remember them to be good or as
good as other bands

N.E.R.D. : HipHop with 2 drums ... a lot of energy, not my style but was good live, brought
people on stage for most songs, good opening band

Our Lady Peace: This was a band which I loved the first 3 albums (mostly the first one though), but then they made some boring albums and still do which they should stop doing and just play their old material which is soooo good and grungy. So the show reflected that: old songs made people sing, dance and enjoy them, but half of the show was new stuff which should have never been invented ... ;)

PET SHOP BOYS: I knew the name but never really listened to them ... them being from the 80s or something ;) but they were excellent live! keywords to describe the show: Electronic, singing Robots, Cubes, Sports, Adidas, costumes, crazy videos, entertaining a lot, good songs. Excellent show !!!

Nine Inch Nails: This was one of their last performances ever (4 left). Ive been listening to them since their first album(20 years ago) and Trent has delievered great albums one after the other, trying to change his formulas, live they've always been incredible with stuff that you would never have seen before with screens effect and ... This show was more than any Ive seen from them before minus some of their technical scenic material since it was a 20 min stage construction. They gave a solid 2 hours finally to this festival and their career in Canada anyways. He sang so many of their greatest hits which are energetic and transmits it to the crowd who showed up for this last performance. Changing to more calm songs at times to relax a little bit even though after a while Trent's voice was a little bit irritated he kept singing for our pleasure.

The show started great and at the end of the first song the mic and its support was thrown off stage by Trent as he does sometimes ... the show was set to be a great one!! During the second song, Trent destroyed his guitar on his synthetiser right in front of the crowd and thousands of pieces flew all over the stage and some in the crowd... technicians had to give him another guitar and had the change the now destroyed synthetiser as well LOLL great start of the show !!!
Songs after songs they gave us the energy that we needed after such a long festival. During the show other guitars or instruments were trashed all over the stage for the fans pleasure and surely Trents own.

It was a great festival overall and a great time I had in Toronto for 3 days.

A lot has happened

A lot has happened since I last posted ... I quit my job, went in Europe for 2 weeks and started at a new place...

So unfortunately I had to leave this great place that was Eidos and leave good friends for many reasons that made my stay on Deus Ex unbearable. That is not too say that the game in the end will not be an awesome beast that everyone will want to buy cuz I truly believe that the people who really create it will be able to achieve such of a complex game (like Deus Ex 1 was).

I really enjoyed the work I did as a Living World Specialist for them and I really wish I could have continued my tasks, but ...

This is all I'm going to say about it since all that happened after was great and positive :)

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Europe

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So I decided to take some time off (2 weeks) and relax (as much as travelling in multiple cities can be) to see the world and experience something new since the opportunity to take some time off in this industry dont happen often.

I quit my job, buy a plane ticket and the next day I was on a plane to Paris without any sort of planning on my end ... my only plan was to go to Germany (frankfurt, Munich, Berlin), Amsterdam and Paris. Details like the when, where to stay, how to get there, etc... were not planned at all... all I had was a backpack and a will to explore and have fun!

I flew during the night to arrive in Paris at 10am. From there I wanted to get to a train to Frankfurt ... so I looked around and searched for a train ticket ... unfortunately I had to wait all day in Paris to get a train that wasnt filled up ... so I visited a little bit the 18 and 19th arrondissement of Paris in a really hot sunny day...ended up not drinking enough and kinda got sun sick ... a great way to start a trip ;)

Got on my train to Germany at 5:30pm and got in Frankfurt at 9pm and headed to a youth hostel.

No I dont speak German at all ... knew only 2-3 words. Fortunately for me, Germans are REALLY nice and speak English (most of them anyways) AND are happy to help tourists who are looking for their way... YES people actually came to me to help when I had a map in hands or I looked lost :D

Frankfurt which I visited for 2 days didnt had a lot to show, but I enjoyed the different types of architecture and old churches. My hostel was a great place to stay also.

Left by train to go to Munich 2 days later. Arrived in Munich and walked around a little bit without a map to discover by myself for the first night before entering my new hostel which was as crappy as ever with a welcoming flow of piss in front of the main door!! LOL

I stayed 3 days in Munich visited a lot to see as much as possible all the history that Munich had to tell about hitler and his movement, etc... I went to visit Neuschwanstein Castle which was one of King Ludwig II unfinished castle and who inspired Walt Disney to create his iconic Disney castle that you see in all Disney movies. This was a great site to experience.

It is unfinished but all rooms that are finished are just amazingly well made and most things were new inventions at the time. The visit didnt really last long since it is a big castle but only two stories are completed. I met fun people on this tour and we had a long time to talk since we had a 2 hour trip to get to the castle and another 2 hour to come back, but it was worth it and talking to other people about thier experience during their own trip was cool since I was all alone in Europe at least I could speak to someone here.

Also, I went on a tour of Hitler and Third Reich in Munich which showed us all the areas where they met and told us all that happened in Munich which was the capital of that movement. I took some time to go to a lot of bars, pubs, beer gardens to experience their incredible Municheen beer hmmmmmmmm :) Best beer I tasted in Europe by the way...

Then I went to Berlin where a lot has happened also (world war, Berlin Wall,...) There was a lot of history here to hear, to look at (the wall is still present in some areas), but Berlin unlike other cities in Germany has been rebuilt but modernly so we cannot see all the great buildings that were pre world wars, but it feels fresh and modern though. During my stay I took some time to go to a concentration camp which was a strange area to visit.

Left after a couple of days to get to Amsterdam. Amsterdam is different from what I had visited before since its a city built by men on some docks. I really liked how the Dutch created their city since the different canals makes it fresh to look at and offers a lot of ways to get lost like I did a couple of times with the many circular streets that go around town hehehe. Its a different language, but feels like it is still some kind of German language ... so I couldnt understand people and unfortunately people speak English but will not help you as the Germans did before so ... I had to find my way around town hence me getting lost sometimes trying to find my far away hostel. I had the opportunity to join a free tour of the city which was really interesting.

After a couple of days, I went back to Paris for three days before going back home. Visited almost all major attractions of Paris in one day which was sometimes incredibly hot sunny day then extremely rainy with a friend I met there. I was really happy to arrive in Paris since after more than a week and a half I could understand people around me and talk to them in French...even though some faked that they did not understand me and asked me to speak in English and slowly ... damn Parisians!!! But the fact that I could listen around was a great plus in this city. The second day I visited placed I didnt have time to go to the previous day like the Sacre-Coeur church in Montmartre where I attended church for the first time in more than 18 years, but there was something so great about this place and the fact that my feet hurt so much at his point that I stayed for something like 45 min.

I had the best ice cream ever in Paris and some great meals in some small restaurant around. The best meal I had during my trip was at a french restaurant in Amsterdam though.

Then I tried to come back to Montreal through Charles de Gaulle airport... I was unfortunately stuck during more than 3 hours in line at the customs since some Marocans whose flight was cancelled had decided that they were angry about it and blocked off all entry to everyone ... and since in France workers tend to go on lockouts as soon as possible well the customs officers didnt do anything and waited from 3am to 10am to do anything ... well in fact they called the police who came in mass, but decided not to do anything either ... until 10am !! at this moment they huffed and puffed and pushed people until they all were out of the customs lines ... finally I could go home ... well when everyone in line would be through which meant waiting in the airplane for more than 2 hours ... finally got back home :)

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This is becoming a long post ... but almost done here!

So I came back on Sunday and Monday I was starting at my new great job :)

YES I am back at Ubisoft Montreal on a great and huge project that will sell an incredible amount of copies due to its future status of game of the year when it comes out next year!!!

Just took over the map of another designer this week and starting to make magic again :)

Im happy to be back at Ubi with a positive attitude!! Im meeting so many people that I worked with before and friends I had not seen in years that Im really happy about this new adventure.

I will post later to talk more about my conviction that this project will be great.

have fun during this end of summer hot sunny days!

Michael Jackson ...

So now everyone knows that MJ is no more.

I just want to say that I think it's a sad thing that such a great pop star dies at a young age of natural causes, but mostly sad because nobody seemed to care too much about him until he passed away. I guess that always happens, but doesnt it feel right though ... now I hear his music all day on most radio stations and people buy his CDs which is a great thing since he made so many great songs and mostly hits. Making songs to make a difference in the world.
Of course, he had a lot of problems and people really focused on those in the last couple of years forgetting what he had done and now we can't even show our appreciation to the king of pop.
Now we will always remember him for his music which stays with us on different formats ;)

Lets just keep in mind for next time that we should not take anyone for granted since life can be short and stop at any moment for anybody.

Back from E3

So I've been back from E3 for a couple of weeks now, but I've taken the time to do a recap yet so here goes.

As I said before it was my first time at the BIG event and I was really enthousiastic about it to say the least. I had a lot of fun there talking to a lot of interesting developpers about their games, experience and our games, Deus Ex and Thief, playing the demos on the floor, meeting with old friends from Pandemic (and playing Saboteur) and representing Eidos Montreal, but I was way too hyped about E3. I liked it, but playing demos isn't really my thing. Fortunately, there was not as many people as other years so we could walking around easily and play games almost instantly without waiting except for Zelda and God Of War 3.

I played great games though such as God Of War 3 which was just incredible. Watching it while waiting was something and kinds ruined the surprises, I thought, but playing it was a whole different thing. It was thrilling, exciting and I really felt powerful while playing. Its bloody, disgusting and wow! ;)

Also, I played Ghostbuster which was great to first play it and no lines to get to it. I bought the game when it came out and it felt like a Ghostbuster movie but with me playing in it. :)

Moreover, I played Brutal Legend ... we'll see if the story makes it good, cuz I was a little disapointed by the game in itself.

Played Saboteur, obviously, at Pandemic and watched the demo being played at the event and I'm really impressed as to where it as gone to... it looks better than ever, some cut features have been reborned (which is great news) and the missions are fun to play. By the way cinematics look really good also.

Games I loved include: Splinter Cell, Batman, Saboteur, Ghostbusters, God Of War, Modern Warfare 2(looks amazing) and Alan Wake (game of the show for me)

Had a great time on the rest of the trip with the Pandemic guys, at the beach, going out and doing most of the things I missed from Los Angeles.

I met a lot of great people there and mostly the guys from Deck13 (http://www.deck13.com/english/index.html) check out their stuff done with a small team of developpers in Germany.

take care

Going to E3 + updates

Havent done updates for a while...

Ive been too busy with our current milestone on Deus Ex which is a huge thing for us and all looks great at this point.

Kinda put on hold the idea of iphone games for now since needs more research on my side for programming tasks and our little team doesnt have that focus yet. So maybe at some point ... lol

Ive designed a level on paper (for now) to be created using the Little Big Planet assets and engine, but to create something cool and fun using the ps3 version of the engine will take a longer time than expected since the tools lack precision for platforms etc...
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Im going to E3 with a colleague.

This will be my first E3 and I'm so excited about it.
Last year I was working in L.A., but there was no real E3 ... this time is the real thing :)

Happy to finally live this experience. I will try to get a glimpse of the most games possible.
Ill try to check out the Saboteur demo to see where its at now with Tom French as presenter.

I'll be representing Eidos in some ways ...

Hope E3 will be as awesome as it used to be.
Will spend the rest of the week around L.A. and going back to all the things I'm missing here in Montreal... including E3 parties and crazy lounges ...

I'll come back after E3 to post about it.

2 days before leaving for Los Angeles ... wow so soon :)

Games and exciting stuff

I'm starting some personal projects which will be quite exciting I believe :

1. After playing most of Little Big Planet, I will be making some maps for the game which will let me be creative again. I havent worked on a map for a while now so it will be great to come back to map design and since this game lets people do almost whatever they want, I will be able to take some old concepts I had for a game and hopefully be able to use these tools to create some exciting stuff :)
2. I am starting to check out the IPhone SDK to see what can be done on the platform. I might be starting to create a game on there soon (even though we need a Mac to develop with the SDK it seems). This will also be a huge comeback to programming which I havent really done in 5 years (not counting scripting)... i've seen some games on it and great things can be accomplished. Might need an artist though ...

so this is it for whats coming on my side outside of my normal work hours ;)

I've been playing some great games lately and here's some thought on them :

Little Big Planet

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Obviously I've played LBP as stated above... I didnt want to play at first since making maps didnt really interest me ( doing it all day is enough), but I tried to play it for the game being a platformer and I finally bought it since it was so much fun.

Been playing with my girlfriend who enjoys it a lot a little bit at a time. Its a lot more fun and sometimes easier with someone to play with since if I'm bad in some sections I can be saved by the other player ;) Also, you get to collect more stickers (etc) since some challenges need to be done by 2-4 players... sucks that some challenges need more than 2 players since I only have 2 controllers ... who really have more than this on their ps3 ???

Anyways collecting shit to use later to design map is an incentive to be more careful while playing and makes it more amusing to try and get the most out of them.

The themes of each map are great and really different makes the playthrough that much more fun. The ingredients used are so diverse that the challenges are never the same between levels. The artistic direction is great and I love most of the themes. The game is quite challenging in the latter levels which may get frustrating. Playing with friends might make it frustrating when one character gets ahead of a challenge and cant see whats ahead since the other cant follow ... and I usually the one behind :(

Great game, great buy!

Flower

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Flower is a beautiful, relaxing and fun game to enjoy when stressed out. The graphics are simple, colorful, pleasant to the eyes and what I like the most is the difference between the effects/painting we get before the levels which reflect the real world and offers some kind of narrative to the game.

The sound track is calm, relaxing and resonates well with the gameplay and surely helps it ... without it the game would not feel the same at all. The music feels a lot like Flow which I loved when I played last year.

The gameplay is working fine, is quite simple since you only have to collect flower petals to open up new areas of the game and cause flowers to grow in areas where nothing could and you control your petal using the motion control of the ps3 controller which is working as it should even though sometimes I get to fight to do a 360 degree.

fun game and great for you when charged with negative energy (lol)

Locoroco 2

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Yesterday, I booted up my psp for the first time in at least a year to play Locoroco 2. I really enjoyed the first one when it came out (not the ps3 version) and this new game takes back the great control and gameplay from the first iteration. It offers the same kinda of gameplay, but adds some new elements which make the game better in every way. The levels are still small so there is no problem playing a level or 2 during a Metro ride and be able to save and power down the console when needed.
Fun, cute and refreshing (as was the first one)

see ya soon