Kevin Kelly

TONIGHT AT 6:30 PM join us for an improvised version of PVP Circuit and help us rebuild our local community brick by brick. I still can't believe I get to work in the video game industry. My 6-year-old would laugh, and then cry once she realized what it means to work in the creative technology sector. That's why IMO everyone could use some levity during these unprecedented times. Join us for a fun evening to raise funds for the Trevor Project. Event link >>> https://lnkd.in/g7tBuP6d Frequently Asked Questions: What if I can't attend the event? - If you can't make it, please consider purchasing a ticket to help us raise money for charity or get one on behalf of someone impacted by layoffs. What if I want to join but can't justify the cost? - If you want to join but find the cost prohibitive, DM me and we'll make it happen (see point above). Do I have to pitch at the event? - No, you don't have to pitch if you prefer to observe. It’s a great way to see how it's done. Will there be another event like this? - We plan to host our community again, but I can't specify if this event will be the focus. #gamesindustry #event #comedy <3

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TAROF - The Amazing Ring of Fire - Dev Blog 4 Over the past week or so I have been reverting to an older build (back to one with the skylight before experimental materials removal broke it) and going through code and content clean up so not as much progress as expected. I have been learning a lot though and spending the time needed to implement certain things. A lot more experimenting. Here's what's changed this week: FIXES/IMPLEMENTATION - Reverted back to a previous build (before disabling experimental materials broke my skybox). - Want to get game in a clean stable state so this is a build I can always revert back to as a main checkpoint. - Code & content clean up. - Cleaned up blueprints to make them more readable. - Collapsed key functionality into functions. - Added comments. - Deleted unused code snippets. - Deleted unused content in content browser. - Moved everything into appropriate folders. - Deleted all card textures below 1024 pixels. Don't need higher. - Rearranged card blueprints to order them to my liking. - Added 2 Niagara effects for specific cards. - Waterfall - For the Ace card with the rule 'Waterfall'. A lot of playing around with this over the past week. Got it to a point I am happy with for now. Can return later if needs be. - Created a sprite sheet and added both the red and blue pixelate card to it so both can be used as a particle. - Question Marks - For the Queen card with the rule 'Questions'. Simple but effective. - Hooked up functionality for the niagara FX to play / stop when needed and also hooked these up to the appropriate cards. - Card Info/Rules section - Added descriptions for each rank that shows when the card is selected. - Changed size of description text. - Changed colour to yellow. Same as title. - Removed handles from text box by turning alpha all the way down. - Stopped user from interacting with the text box. - Added a secondary 'Next Turn' button at the top center. - This allows for different placements depending on games needs. For example, when the waterfall FX is played, it covers the lower half of the ring and also the next turn button so the button can be set to the top instead, making it accessible. - Added a placeholder settings menu - Includes new icons. - Settings Icons Spins on mouse hover and once selected shows an X to close menu. - Currently has debug and VFX options KNOWN ISSUES - Card Z order on used cards not working properly TO DO - Add card spawn lerp - Add spawn point to deck creator BP - Add ring of fire effect - Background music - Add SFX - Add VFX - Add Main menu IDEAS - Add multipliers / punishments - For example when a suit (Diamond / Club / Heat / Spade) or rank (A - K) is completed. - Implement 'Imposter Cards' - The small suits on the card change on the fly and if a player selects 'End Turn' without realising then they will be punished.

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Awful news today with Skydance Interactive having gone through a round of layoffs last week. My dear friend Scott Fine announced the news today, sharing the news and the profiles of those affected in a heartfelt post: https://lnkd.in/ex4BnyrX To those impacted please check out the following resources: 🥇First, reach out to us at People Can Fly Studio, we have many roles open right now in Canada, the UK, Ireland and Europe, please check them out here: https://lnkd.in/eWpV5PbA 🥈Next, Discipline Games Jobs Resources: Over the past months I have created 9 (at time of writing) Games Jobs Resources to find jobs in a wide range of disciplines, and I would urge you to check them out, if anything just to see what would be available to you: https://lnkd.in/epvmzDW6 You can find over 6,300 jobs there. 🥉 Third, the Ultimate list of Video Games Career Resources: This should be your one-stop shop for all information. My dear friend Amir Satvat maintains these documents, he is a legend for doing this - please check them out: https://amirsatvat.com/ I urge you to check out the areas in particular about CV support and mentoring, as these will help you no matter what industry you are hailing from or are looking into going next. 🎖 Finally, do not give up. Ever. No matter how dark things may look right now, I KNOW you will get through this, you have got this! 👊 Remember you are not alone. If you need help, advice, or even an ear to listen, we're here for you. Always! ➡ A request to my community, please can I ask you to repost this post to your colleagues and friends, so that we can get as many into jobs as possible! And please comment if you or your studio are currently hiring - let's help each other! Much love ❤️ #skydanceinteractive #layoffs

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Not mentioned in this post, but you could also not ask for a better manager and advocate than Emily!

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Localization is often one of the last things developers think about. There are so many elements to it, making it a rather complicated problem to design for. Here's another consideration to keep in mind when thinking about localization, especially in games: https://lnkd.in/g6AaiaJy

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Happy Tuesday! Yesterday was a long day, glad to start today at a regular time. My recent Chinese fortunes declare I'll success this year and other said it would be November. Arrgggh! But I want it now. :D Today I'm beginning a series on optimizations in Unity focused around graphics. There is a lot to cover, so it will take me some 9 articles to cover what I found with my recent research. #unity3d #unitydevelopment

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At Uncapped Games I'm helping to develop my favorite game I've ever worked on professionally by far... and surprisingly it's an RTS. This is surprising because I (unlike nearly the whole team who are RTS powerhouses), have basically no RTS experience at all. Fire up Super Smash Bros and I may have a shot to impress, but RTS has been a huge - and fun - mental shift for me! ...and somehow, I've gotten pretty good! (At our game at least 😅). Very excitingly, we're on the schedule to say more about our game at SGF ( https://lnkd.in/e5uDTwZp ) in June, but now, kicking things off so to speak, we've put out a really cool documentary that explains some of our philosophies, hopes, and goals. If you're an RTS nerd - or just curious to learn more, check it out: https://lnkd.in/eQpxP3WZ

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Looking for some #SystemDesign advice on my #LevelDesign / #GameDev Platform Game Template. I've got custom Sequence Players that can be targetted by switches as shown here. Each Player then has an option for whether the switch input switches it On/Off or Forward/Back. The problem is I'm sure some designers are going to want one switch for On/Off and another for Forward/Back. I've got a couple options, but nothing is totally comfortable. One option would be to create an advanced Sequence Player which has a slot for a switch that turns it On/Off and another for Forward/Back, or even a map of switches and the behaviour that it uses per switch, but that means a two-step process where the switch has to target the player AND the player has to target back to the switch. The other option is to rework all the switch logic to include Forward/Back or On/Off behaviour, but that seems confusing to me when you're connecting it to, say, a Door which doesn't really have a different behaviour for each. What's people's preferences?

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I was in a 1:1 today where I mentioned that I wanted to do away with our weekly defect status reports. Why? Because no one likes a wall of text that has a bunch of risks and call outs. Folks get blind to the things that really matter and they become bogged down by repeated pings in the same spots. Our solution: Use the triage sessions to delegate status. Ping only the most important action items in the big channel. Make sure ownership is felt and not just seen.

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Game testing and quality assurance are among the gaming industry's most mistreated and poorly compensated disciplines. With new in-game content and DLCs being released almost daily, game QAs and testers are constantly in demand. Yet, they are considered an entry-level role that helps people break into the gaming industry. Don’t even get me started on the thin line drawn around assuring a game’s (product) quality. Firstly, it is usually the lowest-paid game development role. Even the most experienced game testers are paid as much as 10$ per hour. Then comes the problem of recognition, when QA or testing is considered a role that adds the lowest value during the development of a video game. Another issue is that quality assurance is often thought of as a role that criticizes the work created by others. In reality, quality assurance workers are just doing their job of finding bugs to ensure the quality of a finished product. A series of these norms and biases have left game testing and QA as among the most looked-down-on jobs in the gaming industry. But it is so much more than that! We need to bring about a change that makes game testing and QA an equally respectable role. And that change has to start with us. So, in light of supporting the game testers and QA experts, this post is a shoutout to the QA professionals from different studios who were recently impacted by the layoffs. Sean Reddie — Impacted by the layoffs at Surgent Studios recently, he was working on Tales of Kenzera: ZAU. Before that, he had worked on titles: Human Fall Flat, Forza Motorsport 7, Mafia 3, and Payday 2 for Sumo. Jessica Muniz — The recent closure of Timbre Games affected her, but she has worked for companies like The Coalition Studio, Kabam, Ubisoft Toronto, SkyBox Labs, and Motive Studio.  Olov Taul — Paladin Studios’ closure impacted Olov, who has superb experience working on AAAs like Rise of the Tomb Raider and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided for Nixxes Software. Most recently, he was a senior QA tester on the Cut The Rope titles for mobile. William Ebright — Was impacted by the layoffs at Lightforge Games, where he was working on Project O.R.C.S. But what’s remarkable is that William is a veteran tester, having worked at Blizzard Entertainment (8+ yrs) as a QA test lead. Darrin House — The director of QA at Take-Two Interactive, recently impacted by the studio’s massive layoffs. Before T2, he worked on Amazon Luna as a senior QA manager for four years. Notably, Darrin has also worked for almost two decades at Microsoft as both a program and test manager. *** Know someone who was impacted by the gaming industry layoffs? For everyone who lost their jobs to the gaming industry's restructuring, we are offering a chance to learn game programming from skilled game programmers, gain a programming edge on your game design, art, production, or testing skills, and turn your vision into reality. Apply here: https://lnkd.in/eS3tUiyT *** #layoffsupport #qa

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Valve corporation has implemented updates to Steam's store page system to enhance discoverability for developers. These changes were made in response to feedback received from developers, including discussions at Gamescom. Key Changes: 👉 Related Items Customization: Developers can now choose which games appear in the "More From this Developer" section of a game's store page. 👉 DLC Pinning: Developers can highlight a specific DLC item to draw attention from players. 👉 Flexible Customization: Developers have control over the order of related games and can manually adjust their position. These new features provide developers with greater control over how their games are presented on Steam. By carefully selecting related titles and highlighting specific DLC items, developers can increase their games' visibility and attract more potential players. For more details on these changes and how to implement them, developers can refer to the official Steam documentation. https://lnkd.in/ekWfnQKP

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TOP-LIST NEWCOMERS ”ZENLESS ZONE ZERO”, “MINESWEEPER NETFLIX”, AND OTHERS. Last week was filled with new games on the top charts. 🏅 I'll talk about some of them below. ✅ “Zenless Zone Zero” by HoYoverse The developer of the big hits “Genshin Impact” and “Honkai: Star Rail” released its new action RPG for iOS, Android, PC, and PS5 last week: “Zenless Zone Zero”. As with previous HoYoverse games, ZZZ begins with incredible numbers. 🤯 In five days the game reached almost US$20MM in IAP revenue on the Apple store alone. Among the game reviews, I recommend Harshal Karvande's excellent article on the Naavik blog. 👉 🧠 ✅ “Schoolboy Runaway - stealth” by Linked Squad “Schoolboy” is a life simulator in which the player is a young man unhappy with his parents. As it says in the store description, “immerse yourself in the role of a schoolchild whom the parents punished for a bad grade at school, and try to escape from home without being noticed by father and mother.” 😕 Despite its ethical dilemmas, the game has become a trend in Russia 🇷🇺 and is spreading around the world. In the last two weeks, the game has accumulated more than 2MM downloads. ✅ “Wasteland Life: Survival Idle” by SayGames I mentioned "Wasteland” in my list of releases and transfers from the last half of May. It is an Idle Arcade with a Mad Max-style desert survival narrative. 🏜️💦 Developed by Tinkles Games, “Wasteland Life” started the growth stage on June 4th, reaching over 1MM so far. 📈 ✅ “Minesweeper NETFLIX” by Netflix Developed by Smoking Gun Interactive Inc. (a Keywords Studios company), this streaming giant's version of a classic puzzle Minesweeper📍💣 is amazing! And it wasn't just me who liked the game. 🤩 In just a couple of days since its release, the game has already surpassed 200k downloads. 📈 Swipe through the slides below and you'll find out about games from Supercent, Goodroid, Inc., Wonder Group, Fanatee, Ateam Inc.（株式会社エイチーム）, and others that are also on the rise. - X - This research was supported by Cost Center. Cost Center is a tech company that offers a powerful suite of tools for Mobile Publishers to optimize UA campaigns. 💪 Its portfolio includes amazing clients such as Amanotes and Lihuhu. 🏆 Do you like it? 🤩 Call my friend Yi Ting Ho. She'll show you a demo. 😉 #netflix #gaming #gamedevelopment #HypercasualByCarlosPereira

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Don't want to bum you out but I know I'm not the only one who has noticed the same layoff cycle on LinkedIn over and over. I can tell your future... 1. Studio is shut down, all the devs become active on LinkedIn maybe for the first time in years and do their looking for work posts. People reach out with connections and support emojis. 2. The outpouring of thanks to the wonderful gamedev community. Amir Satvat and other full time LinkedIn influencers are tagged. 3. Nothing comes of all the LinkedIn support. Devs post frustration posts about how hard it is to be laid off and the injustice of the game industry. Many people will later delete these posts when they start to realize studios still aren't hiring them. 4. The reality step. Months pass and prominent veterans are still unemployed, let alone those "juniors" with a mere 5 years experience. At this point, people either give up and disappear, get a job and disappear (rare), or become a chronic disillusioned LinkedIn user. This last one either requires wearing a mask or ranting about capitalism more and more. 5. The laid off devs watch this cycle repeat for a whole swath of suffering people every couple weeks/days. And that's the step I've been on for a few months. But hey I've been working hard on my family and my solo projects. Magehunter coming soon, and AAA Simulator devlogs will be in production even sooner! Make art for yourself and those you love. Don't make my mistake - look for happiness outside this Microsoft product called LinkedIn.

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The software testing community here on LinkedIn is appearing like the rest of social media lately. It has mostly binary opinions, and lacks empathy and respect for the context - with many saying one way is the only way. It's a shame more people are not open to being challenged across all areas of work and life. I remember a time when students were open to listen to talks that directly challenged their beliefs, now many won't accept it, so colleges and universities shy away from it. Free speech is important, as long as it doesn't violate someone else's rights (free speech doesn't allow for inciting hatred for example). Back to testing...I'm not suggesting people stop with their opinions on testing, yet it would be more effective if their binary argueing stopped, and an open conversation with various views were shared. Then we can all learn and make informed decisions. Just saying... It would be nice across all areas of life I think. Sadly social media appears to make people feel safe to do otherwise. I hope you're open to different opinions and are able to debate instead of force an argument based on a binary belief you have. #softwaretesting #softwaredevelopment #technology #whatinspiresme

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I am always amazed at how many teams don't include QA in team scrums. As Ben says (better than I will), this is a mistake. There is literally no one in the studio that knows the *game* (not the vision - the game that is actually being built) better than the QA folks that are "playing" it over and over, all day, every day. I pull the QA lead into the scrum immediately, and ask them to bring one of their senior testers, as well as a rotating group of other testers, to every scrum and planning session. The amount of dev team time and pain saved by having the QA folks *right there* to talk about what's going on is a huge savings. Extra bonus? QA Leads are a natural fit for production mentoring. In the four years I was Lead Art Producer for ESO, three of the QA leads for my teams were hired as Associate Producers. I'm not claiming credit here - those three folks were the ones that put in the hard work of building their skills. I was happy to help where I could. It was happening so fast that I jokingly told my boss that I would have to approve each time he hired one of "my" QA leads to reduce my workload in bringing the new one up to speed. In the end, with the third one, I compromised and hired them onto MY team of producers 🙂

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Check out the testers-in-action. Stars Reach is in pre-Alpha.

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