Cat & Mouse Game

Another December, another year in which I missed the deadline to finish Sentenced! While updating my website yesterday, I noticed guiltily that I still had the release date down as 2019 in one paragraph. I quickly changed it, hoping nobody would notice, but I suppose I’ve given the game away to anyone reading this.

I AM actually working hard on Sentenced now. During 2020 with my health issues and the coronavirus outbreak, I decided it would be wise to stay steadily employed in VFX longer than I’d initially intended. I ended up taking the position of Lead Modeller on Tom & Jerry, responsible for leading the team creating and maintaining characters on the show, as well as props, vehicles and environments.

This was my first leadership role in VFX, and as you can imagine, taking on one of the biggest shows at the company during a pandemic in which we could no longer work in the office was a real trial by fire. My team size fluctuated from around 5-10 people, and we had to contend with work-from-home conditions, mass layoffs caused by cost-saving measures from the company, and a low morale. We just about managed to keep it together despite not being able to blow off steam at the pub on Fridays, and I’m really proud of the team and the work we delivered on this show. I really enjoyed the experience of leading a team and learned a huge amount about managing, production and coordination on large projects. The first trailer is out now for Tom & Jerry, and I believe the movie will be out in March. Trailer below:

We wrapped on the film a few weeks ago, signaling the start of what I’m very much hoping is the ‘final push’ on Sentenced. I’m still employed at Framestore, but taking a big chunk of unpaid leave between shows to try and finish up the game. I would love to go full time making Sentenced and the numerous other game ideas I have floating around in my skull, but I also have to pay the bills, so until something drastically changes with my income I’ll be splitting the months between my own projects and client work for the foreseeable future.

As such, I’m also setting up a Patreon account for my work. I’ll be posting work-in-progress, early builds and more. I’m not expecting to get much in the way of income from it initially, but it would be great to build up enough support to supplement a full-time career making games. A man can dream. I intend on moving this blog to Patreon (viewable for free).

Find my page here: https://www.patreon.com/samuelgordon

If you want to support the work I do then this will be the best way to do it! (other than buying my game when it launches). I’m currently working with voices.com to get the scripts voice acted for my game, and working on a tutorial.

I think that’s all for now, but I’ll be posting regularly here, on Twitter & Instagram @samthesane, and so on, so watch this space.

The Plague Post

What’s up everyone?

It feels as though every company that’s ever obtained my contact details has sent me an email recently entitled ‘our response to the Covid-19 crisis’, acknowledging ‘the strange times we live in’, so I thought I’d jump on the bandwagon!

Welcome to the ‘Sentenced VR’ ☢️-- C o v i d - 1 9 --☢️ update.

I write this to you from my flat in Battersea, London, where I’m currently under lockdown along with the rest of the world. It’s just me and my flatmate, day after day. My computer is now the center of my life, though this statement was arguably true even before I was confined to quarters.

I’m still working full time from home at Framestore. As a result, I don’t have a huge amount of extra free time, aside from the hour or two I used to spend commuting. But I’m still getting paid, so I know I’m one of the lucky ones. My days consist of working, playing video games, painting miniatures, and cycling around Battersea park, which is beautiful this time of year as the Cherry blossoms bloom with the start of spring. My social life consists of movie dates, phone calls and online roleplaying games.

Since my last post I’ve been diagnosed with a heart condition called HCM (Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy). This involves my heart muscle being thickened in the left ventricle for no apparent reason, allowing less blood to enter the heart and therefore less to be pumped, causing a variety of unfortunate symptoms such as heart failure. As such I’m making extra effort to isolate myself, as I’m at a somewhat increased risk from the virus. I’ve got a big heart, what can I say ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Game-wise, I’ve spent the last nine months working hard to save up funds for developing Sentenced. I’ve enough now to hire voice actors, but I’m waiting to see how the situation evolves with the pandemic before actually taking the financial plunge. No new films being shot means no new VFX work down the line, so it seems pretty likely that there will be a dry spell with work later in the year. Therefore I need to plan carefully to make sure I have enough saved to see me through potential hard times.

So, like much of the rest of the world I find myself twiddling my thumbs and waiting to see how things turn out. It’s my hope that some good will come from all this, and people will recognise the value of the public institutions and key workers who are keeping our civilization from collapsing right now. I sincerely applaud the NHS, health workers, care workers, service staff, civic employees and others from the bottom of my heart.

Until next time,

Keep it weird (and stay indoors),

Samuel