Kevvy Metal

I, NOSTRADAMUS SHALL REVEAL ALL!!!

I think people have N64 emulators running on the SNES Mini now.

I've seen this in regards to YouTube streamers. Even on console they're all using Asus monitors with like 1ms lag.

If only management guru rafaqat was in charge of the dev team! We'd of had it out for the PS4 launch!

Maybe the devs should work 100 hour weeks to get it out the door for Feb eh?

I was playing a bunch of Duo's with randoms last night and each time the fucking other guy just straight turned around and shot me. Like seriously maddening.... I didn't expect friendly fire to be on for teams :/

Remember Boozy trolling the whole forum with his Sony DELAYSTATION schtick? Nothing made me want to punch the screen harder. People should be more patient yeah. I've also seen games go round in circles with constant reiteration or super slow pace of new features, so it can need a bit of a push and a deadline to get things going. Good management is needed basically. Some degree of technical knowledge from the people pushing the development schedule. Not just marketing bods pulling the strings.

I've often refrained from talking about my career in videogame development, often in case it steps on the toes of NDA's and the like but yeah. Crunch isn't good and it's no fun. I worked in games for almost exactly 10 years before managing to transition to IT software development as I originally came from a computing background -- but initially coming out of university -- I had aspirations to be a game designer. I've had stints in QA, design and production over the years starting -- as you do -- in QA. Studio A, actually wasn't my first game project but it was the first major AAA game that I was involved in from close to the start. The project was super tight from the beginning, with everyone involved knowing that the game had to be done in around 18 months, so things were always going to be really tight. I saw insane crunch, that I didn't quite get fully involved in as I was on a series of rolling 6 month contracts, even though I knew I was meant to be on for the duration. I still worked some 70 hour weeks, put on about 5 stone in weight and got totally estranged from my girlfriend at the time, but I kinda wanted to do it and be involved, being wide-eyed fresh meat and all. The crunch that others were doing was absolutely insane though, basically doing nothing but work for the whole 18 months. Stuff checked in at any time throughout the night. Temp QA staff were promised permanent jobs at the end of it, but we all actually all got let go as the game didn't quite hit expectations in the eyes of the publisher. I did have fun there even if it was totally mental, and made a lot of great friends -- we would work hard and play hard -- and in some ways, I would of been fine with exiting from games right there and then. Studio B, was a small start up focusing development in the iOS arena (which at the time was the new goldrush) and everything about it was 100 times worse, so this is not just a AAA development thing at all. I was permanent staff which was the biggest victory for me but the CEO and management basically communicated to us that the whole show was constantly a pay check away from going under, so we all had to put in our all to keep the ship from sinking. They might have felt they were being transparent but really they were just pushing all these company wide anxieties down onto the other employees who didn't really know how to deal with it, other than push really hard. There was basically perpetual crunch for 2 years, staying up till 2 am to oversee app launches in worldwide territories then immediately firefighting as the development process was a haphazard mess. Most people were just graduates, desperate to prove themselves basically getting chewed up. Abysmal wages, with the threat of "cutting them by 30%" in order to keep the company going and not face redundancies. It was just awful. Also, these apps that require constant maintenance, change and new content can mean that the team basically gets no respite at the end of the project as there's no real end in sight. When I got through a successful job interview for a new studio and got a new job I basically cried in the street. Studio C, was another small mobile developer, this time with a lot of money and backing. Night and day difference that a little money in the pot can make. Decent wages, nice atmosphere, friendly people who wanted to socialise all the time. Most importantly, no crunch at all. That was until a management change resulted in a new manager who wanted the team to crunch occasionally for no real reason. Like they thought this was the "done thing" in games, and we weren't pulling our weight if we weren't doing it. That's the kind of shit you get when "crunch" become a trope of videogame development. Return to Studio A. I left a nice place to work to rejoin Studio A again, this time as a permanent employee. The vibe had changed as it was a much smaller studio and I got to work on a remaster of one of my favourite games ever. So I couldn't say no. No real crunch, and a far steadier development of a cool AAA remaster project. I enjoyed it. A project change meant moving onto a far beefier AAA game that was going to mean years of development and then a good while of post release support, so all of a sudden the wheels were in motion again, which was good for the company but I just did not want to face the potential crunch period that was enviably going to happen. I was on that game for maybe a year before getting a job in I.T. software development. I now haven't done a single second of overtime, and I don't intend on going back to game development ever again (*touchwood*). So, my point in all this. Crunch is crap. It does not make a game better, at all. It just gets it out the door quicker. This kind of thing is absolutely not just a AAA thing. There's plenty of iOS/mobile F2P places that will be doing this only even worse as there's no end in sight. Crunch made me miserable, I didn't get rewarded for it. I split up with a long term girlfriend, I got fat, then I shed the weight only to get fat again as project schedule dictates. Being involved in game development did actually gave me real appreciation for how games are put together. How the designers actually intend the game in question to be played and this is partly why I often have a short temper when a lot of people on this forum have a little moan about whatever game they're playing as they don't really see what was involved in making it. Spending a fair amount of time with the game -- not just in a development way -- and having a little patience with it can reveal what the developers were trying to convey. I enjoy videogame maybe more than ever now that I'm not near the development process, but I feel my experience in that field has heightened my enjoyment of them. Dunno what I'm getting at. tl;dr but something that I wasn't ever really going to go into on the forum. But feels good to talk about a huge chunk of my life that you often don't get to talk about.

I've been charged this morning too. Didn't expect that and also not the beeeeest time, but still! Totally awesome that this is coming. As a PVM owner, I really want them to get going with the DAC adapter so I can run these over RGB. If it works good I'll prob retire my OG SFC and Genesis consoles.

...ah fuck!

You don't pay now for the pre-order, they'll take money when it ships. Assuming things play out exactly the same as the Super NT, best to get a pre-order in now to secure one of the first batch, as the second batch of Super NT's didn't appear for purchase for months after initial release.... 6+ months or thereabouts.

Also, seen as there's no assist chip or memory expansion game carts for the Megadrive, the ROM compatibility will likely be 100%.

Got ma preorder in oh yeah! JPN all the way. Now to wait 7 months!

Amazing! Crysis 2 on the 360 runs at a weird super low frame rate that's kinda actually still 30 fps but it's actually the engine that's slowing down... if I remember correctly. While be totally awesome if these issues just get sorted out completely.

Website is still boned. I'll defo be getting a pre-order in.