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As promised, here's a nostalgic photo thread of my first #gamedev gig working at Jester Interactive from '99 on an unreleased Dreamcast game called Hellgate. I started unwisely as the Lead Artist due to my lack of leadership skills - I just graduated from uni!
This was a young and naive me way back when. Note the old CRT monitor and pile of plush toys on top. Think I was still fresh with animation zing from my college days. I still have that Um Jammer Lammy doll.
Another view. Note the Dreamcast dev kits! The darkened office space was that - we were nocturnal and stupidly crunchy due to stupid management decisions.
You may recognise this fella as @CoLDSToRAGE - aka Tim Wright. I used to get lifts to work with him which involved near death experiences with bin lorries to the soundtrack of rare Wipeout remixes.
Who else joined in this folly? Here's @andrewjburrows being the coolest MF in the office. This was probably taken early evening due to aforementioned crap management conditions.
He played the guitar too.
He also slept on the floor.
In fact, we all kind of slept in the office at times. Here's me snoozing with Nick Stephens in the background. I'm fascinated with the magazine clutter on my desk. Edge, PC Gamer, and 3D tutorial magazines.
We were often in a delirious state while working on our hybrid racing shooter set in Hell. Here's me looking slightly worse for wear.
We had our own Space Invaders machine too. It was played too often to the point of that warning note on the top to play only at lunch or "after work" which is a crazy concept if you're always working.
We also had a whiteboard too! That's my handwriting on there so I guess I was taking notes? Spot the upside-down text with "Dolphin" getting a mention as well as other projects and a list of publishers we probably touted Hellgate to.
We had folk in to come playtest the multiplayer too. I remember this being a bit of a strange thing as the multiplayer was kind of crappy? Everyone travelled too fast and the arenas were *huge*.
We also paid a visit to ECTS 2002 in Earl's Court! This was kind of a big deal for us as it was our first expo. Lots of swag and unreleased games to play.
For instance! Here's me playing Samba De Amigo on the Dreamcast and I ended up buying this and playing it in my condemned shithole flat.
Andrew Burrows and Nick Stephens soaking in the ambience in the main hall. Game Boy Advance was a big deal in those days! I think Andy still craved blessed sleep.
Lastly - Andrew (who was a game designer), me (hack fraud artist) and Gareth Richards (programmer) hanging out together. I miss that Bruce Lee t-shirt.
So although we worked our asses off on a game that got canned, I still have great memories of early gamedev days. Multiplayer Q3A at lunch was also a highlight. Hope you enjoyed this photo dump!
