Re: Mindshift Design

From: Jason Paul McCartan <jasonm@mindshiftdesign.com>

Date: Fri, 31 May 2002 19:51:18 +0000

MadCentral wrote:

> Jason?

Steve?

> Jason?

Steve?

> Are you out there?

Physically yes. Mentally at the moment no. Since the beginning of the year,
my head has been hidden from daylight in a manner that I'd much rather not
go into <g>. I've only just found time to subsribe to mailing lists and
newsgroups again for the first time in 6 months. I just rejoined this group
two days ago.

> Im *still* waiting to play this fantastic game you've been promising us
> for
> years.  Several times in the past I've challenged you on this, simply
> because I
> want to *play* it.  Each time I've asked if its ever going to happen.
> Each
> time you tell me it is.  You tell me playtests are running, you tell me
> you've
> built this amazing engine out of which you are spawning many games.  Etc
> etc. You keep buying PBM licenses with the plans to release them, or
> recode them in
> the wonder-engine and release them that way.  You recruited me, and
> others, to
> help you write for an online magazine.  You keep making announcements in
> various forums.
>
> Where, oh where, are the games?  Where is *anything* you've announced?

Sitting in piles of source code on our fileservers hard drive along with
most of the documentation. There's a layer of dust about 10 feet thick on
top of it. Apart from some of the documentation, which I actually dusted
off this week, because I have time off (what a concept!) from the "day job".

There were playtests with the original engine for STSI, but it's been
modified since then. I've not had any time to work on it as I've been
swamped with family life and too much work getting in the way.

There are a nubmer of PBM programs (not licenses although that's under
dispute) that we own, technically. Long story. They'll be reengineered and
released under different names. The source will live again ...

I actually can't remember the last time I made an announcement regarding
any of our gaming stuff.

I won't be annouoncing the release of anything until it's close to being
tested. There will be notes on the website soon about what stage various
projects are at.

> I've just checked your website, for the first time this year, hoping to
> see some great news about one of these eternal playtests, hoping to
> actually get to
> play one.  But instead I just see a generic notice about "a new version of
> the
> site is coming soon to show a new direction for our company".  NEW
> direction? Im still waiting for the old direction!

<chuckle> Over the past year we've been trying to find our legs in a
difficult market. Originally we had a web-based product which crapped out
when we lost funding (and had to let all the staff go), then we got back
into consulting (and got crapped on by a client majorly) and I ended up
going into contract instruction. This was just at the time after September
11th and suddenly a lot of people were out of work here in the US, and
companies were folding left, right and center. All in all, a pretty tough
time. We survived by having me work contract instruction, which meant
writing a number of course manuals myself, which can really chew up time).

> The website also says... this site will be operational on 1st February
> 2002. Um... its June tomorrow...

I'd fire the web developer personally, but I won't let myself be fired.
Yes, that website is out of date. WAY out of date, and you're not the first
to comment. Even my wife has been making comments to me about how out of
date it is.

In fact the only thing I've been doing lately is teaching IT and most of
that's been out of town. Either that or writing courseware, and it's been
chewing up so much of my time. So much in fact that I'm planning on getting
out of teaching because it IS chewing up too much time. Even when I've been
home and not in a classroom, I've been writing course material and hardly
spent any time with my family. And when out of town, I've also been writing
course material. I've not been working on anything game-related for several
months (until this week).

This week I had an epiphany regarding a number of things in my life, and
I've been taking time over the past couple of days to work out some things
and make some decisions. Chief among these is that I have to give up the
contract instruction and spend more time at home where I can be Dad,
Husband, and then Game Developer/Writer. At the moment I'm being neither of
these very successfully. So I'm heading back to the Land of the Employee
most likely so that I no longer travel and I can actually get back to the
things I really enjoy.

> Now I dont *want* to be an ass... but the last time I put a message here I
> said "are you ever going to actually DO something you say you are going to
> do" and
> you assured us all you were neither a wannabee or a time-waster.  We said,
> "great, good to hear it" and all waited.  And waited.  And waited.

There'll be some more waiting, I'm afraid, but there is a new version of
the website 75% complete. Not much, but its a start. I'm slowly getting on
top of things again.

> COME ON!  I WANNA PLAY!  <dissolves into hysterical shrieking and beating
> the floor with his fists>

You should have taken the red pill you know :)

Seriously though, I'll be restarting work on our projects after this
weekend. I have a lot of paperwork and other crap I need to get out of the
way first.

--
Jason Paul McCartan
(Re-organizing a number of things in his life right now that are chewing up
way too much of his time and making him very unhappy.)

References

Mindshift Design
madcentral@aol.com (MadCentral)
Fri, 31 May 2002 14:53:37 +0000

Referenced By

Mindshift Design
madcentral@aol.com (MadCentral)
Fri, 31 May 2002 14:53:37 +0000