Hell, it's about time.

Just got home from the midnight launch of Starcraft 2 featuring a stage with live matches and Samwise's own band (and a few others that feature on the SC2 jukebox). I must also mention the pre-zerg Kerrigan cosplayer who was quite hard to look away from. Luke and the rest of the SC team were ecstatic, for one night they get o be celebrities and sign boxes. Nice! It's also Luke's birthday which Chris and I both forgot this morning. Sorry buddy =)
We went there straight from sketch group inside the Blizzard compound so I couldn't bring my camera... I'm failing hard now.

In fact, we are standing around the kitchen while Luke cooks a stir fry discussing how great it would have been to bring my camera. Renee was dressed as Raynor and had found himself a hot little Kerrigan, there were live games of starcraft 2, Samwise's band played and there were a ton of hardcore gamers being interviewed in line by tv networks. Sigh.



SC2 looks amazing and I look forward to playing through it tomorrow. I played through the Frozen Throne expansion to Warcraft 3 today and realised how much of WoW is set up in that game. Warcraft may have borrowed heavily from Warhammer initially but has since become irrefutably original. The writing on Blizzard titles is often overlooked, but it is increasingly solid. After all, they just buy the best writers in games. Bioware has good writers? Blizzard hires them. Mark Gibbons is a brilliant designer? Hire him. It's a solid business plan. I saw MG again tonight which was again very cool. I may get a chance to buy him a drink before I head on up the coast.

I'm having such a wonderful time here with Luke and Chris it's hard to man up and head off. But plans are tightening up nicely. Then I'll be dedicated to filming and it should go well. My two camera setup is yielding results. But the phrase 'I should have brought my camera' is becoming a mantra.

I honestly think if I had the talent to produce a good folio, I could have gotten a job by now. Which is good for the future, but right now I feel my skills fall short of the standards set by companies like Wizards of the Coast and Blizzard Entertainment. Next time Gadget, next time.

I played through an indie game today that goes by the name 'Limbo'. It only threw a few hours of gameplay at me, but (due to a lifetime of puzzle games) I didn't get stuck on any of the puzzles. Which was fine because what really stuck me was the cold and cruel visual style of the game, well worth the price of admission on xbox live. If you like puzzle games (perhaps you recently enjoyed Machinarium?) then you may like this one.