Ramblings from a Noob +1

[Jojon]

Sorry for being one of the hijackers, Calena - please ramble on - it's /quite/ enjoyable. :)

I just hope the impossible-to-complete-in-one-try doesn't go anywhere near meta-gaming territory, where you'd relistically never get a second chance, but do anyway, because it's a game.
There should be litte risk of that, I'm sure, given the whole thing with there being no dying in Uru and the Relto books, but I have bad memories of having to memorize enemy attack patterns, which would be nigh unaviodable, if you didn't know them beforehand, in 8-bit era shoot-em-up games. Trial-and-error can get frustrating. :P

[Calena]

Hey, I'm not talking to myself . This is a good thing.

Jojon, thank you for the apology and you're forgiven . It's really no big deal, I just find it ironic that my first thread hijack happened in the forum where I would least expect it. There are so few people posting here that someone felt it necessary to recruit a poster who has already made it clear that he no longer posts here. Speaking of which, am I the only one who now has an urge to put that poster's name in my signature line? Then every time I post, people would have to email him to advise him that his name was mentioned? Oh crud, I dropped my halo again. The thing keeps falling off.

The way my son is designing the age, the need to go back in to complete it will be entirely at will and motivated by curiosity. It won't be caused by traps or anything like that. Of course, there's always failed challenges, like the bridge in R'Oshanhnin Korvahkhn. I think I actually hold the record for falling off that bridge in Deep Island. I can't control my avatar on that shard with my laser mouse. I spend most of my time there spinning in circles and falling off things. Not to be discouraged, I am practicing using the buttons on my keyboard to move around there.

I'm going to my son's tonight for Christmas Eve. I finally get to go through that age with my grandson. Then I can report back to Corvus about whether or not grandson likes it as much as Hayal. I'm not betting on winning that one. He REALLY loves Corvus' robot, balloons, flying saucer and penguins.

Maybe while I'm at it, I can again show my son how to get to the other ages. I set his game up to autolink straight into the age we're building. He mentioned that grandson was checking it out, but kept asking to go "see some bird?" Grandson wants to call Urwin and son has no idea what he's talking about. So there still is at least one complete noob in this thread.

Merry Christmas everyone - peace in URU, good will to explorers

[tachzusamm]

I think I actually hold the record for falling off that bridge in Deep Island. I can't control my avatar on that shard with my laser mouse. I spend most of my time there spinning in circles and falling off things.

Merry Christmas Show Spoiler

Switching off "go to where I click" in the game options would help.

<= Imagine this smilie having a white beard and a red hat.

[Wamduskasapa]

@tachzusamm - That is an easy design -- here are 4 for you

Show Spoiler

[Calena]

Thanks tach (again ). That fixed it.

I made it half-way through the age with my grandson. Christmas Eve is not the best time to get an 8 year old concentrating on anything that isn't Santa. Although I still don't know officially if it matches up to Hayal, he likes it. He advised me to stop worrying about falling off the bridge. It's okay to watch it go round in circles, but then just fly over it.

He also passed the trap test . I went into first person mode so he could get a good look and asked him if I should click on the yeesha page. His response was, "NO! Don't click it!". Then he looked me in the eye and said, "Grandma, that's a trap. Stay away from it". I'm not certain if he's really that wise or if he just knows his papa really well. That trap was an idea his papa came up with while I was still building Rahsoo Bahrotan.

My son is having an absolute blast coming up with ideas. Thank God he has a good head on his shoulders, because once I think about them, I realize his ideas are all very doable in spite of the fact that we're incorporating major effects into this age. He's even seeing shortcuts to make building and coding much faster and easier. I was discussing how it would take some time for the first effect because I would have to do A B C D E F G H I J K and L. Then my son thought, looked at me and said, "Why don't you just do this instead. You'll get the same visual without all that work". I APPROVE of my partner.

His constant reminder to me is that we have to make it real. Over and over, he keeps coming up with what has to be done to make it real. Remember the flies and spiderwebs in Rahsoo Bahrotan? Think that multiplied many times over. Details. This just may become the never-ending age building project, even though the building is going extremely fast since I'm not struggling trying to come up with ideas and find textures. I certainly won't be the one to call it quits. He's calling me every day, sometimes several times a day. He did accuse me of doing this whole thing on purpose just so he'd call me more often. That's at least partially true, though it wouldn't have worked if we both didn't totally enjoy the building. He wasn't complaining, just picking on me a little for fun.

@Chuckles58 - if you have an idea for an age, you're half-way there. That's usually the hardest part. Then to start, get your sequence number, make a plane, texture it and give it some collision. Export and go walk around on it. After that, if you're an age-builder, you'll be hooked . Then you'll understand us when we say we don't care about when or where it gets released. We just like building.

[Calena]

My son and I are truely buried in age building. I finally found something we both totally love doing together. That only took 34 years . I am happy, happy, happy with the results we're getting. Graphic quality is going through the roof with his talent and guidance. And even though he's no tech geek, he's sharp enough that he picks up on the tech requirements and capabilities right away.

Right now, my biggest concern is that he's going to neglect his home, family and my grandson. He's calling me all the time now and starting to complain if he doesn't see his daily updates or doesn't hear from me. Hey, anybody can learn to build ages, but who can get a middle aged man to all of a sudden want to spend all his time talking with his with mom!

We're still working on the opening scene. It's starting to happen though. It's looking real , giving it a believability I was never able to capture working on my own. I learned how poor my art skills are when he was 4 years old. I drew him a picture of a cat. He brought it back to me about 10 minutes later with another cat drawn on the paper. The new cat was 10 times better than what I had drawn. Then he started to explain to me how I could make my cat look more like a real cat. He's a REAL artist. And he's only gotten better over the last 30 years. Oh, and now I get custom drawn textures complete with shading. He does a draft, I map it to the object, then he does draws the complete texture so it looks just right. Only the objects that are vital to the age story are getting this treatment. We're still getting most of our textures the old-fashioned way, though he tells me what to look for as far as colors and shading is concerned.

He's downloaded Bryce so he can make some of the landscape models himself. He has specific 'ideas' and he decided it would be easier to model them himself than try to explain it to me. He's used Bryce before with excellent results. I hope he lets me stay on this project . Fortunately, he doesn't have his mom's tech skills, so he'll still need me .

We're up to our eyeballs in age-building and loving every minute of it .

[dendwaler]

Well and i love your Ramblings!
Please keep up the rambling!
Its great to read the enthousiasm you are both working on this.
Surprize us all with " your born talent."
The virus called " agebuilding" can spread very quickly so be aware that you do not have to be isolated from other, not infected persons.
I do read between the lines , you are close to it!.

Kidding, realy its fun to see this enjoyment.

(and i am a bit jealous to.)

[Chacal]

Heart-warming story.
AFter all these years, there are still new aspects in Age building!

[Annabelle]

Very interesting story Calena I really enjoyed reading thru it.

I'm surprised though that your grandson has less proprensity than me to click on everything. And I remember having been warned by non other than you, Calena, that there would be bear trap somewhere in your age

[Calena]

And I remember having been warned by non other than you, Calena, that there would be bear trap somewhere in your age

I remember that conversation . And yes, I had you in mind when I built that thing. The challenge was to build something you couldn't jump out of. You're also the reason I built those cliffs around the bridge. It would take a skilled sky-diver to jump around those things. I can't do it, I've tried. We'll probably be coming to you for some advice at some point on the new age. There will be one or two areas built just for skydivers and we could benefit from your expertise in that area.

Well, it's official. As far as grandson is concerned, Hayal is still the best . R'Oshanhnin Korvahkhn isn't even close. My grandson is one tough cookie and he isn't the least bit swayed by the fact that grandma built it. The good news is, even though his papa and I are still working on the opening scene of the new age, it's already been declared "Cool". Of course, the boy is right smack in the middle of building this one and his papa is assisting in keeping the boy's expectations in the realm of possibility.

The two of them are doing a great job of keeping me learning and letting me know exactly how far we have to get anywhere near the level they're used to. I spent an hour at my son's today studying his favorite game, Darksiders. He's big into action games, but we were studying what was done in that game that put it over the top. We spent some time in Jonnee's Hood too. My son's very impressed with Jonnee's grasp of using color. Of course, I have the same complaint with that age that I had with Myst. I'd like to get my hand on the blend file for that and make that boat move!

So onward we march, building our age. When we first started this, my son was feeling very awkward with the whole idea of giving orders to his mother. I practically had to drag his ideas out of him. He's gotten over that now . He's still very polite and always asks if this is possible and would it be too difficult to change this, or he'll say, "you know, i had this idea". But yea, he's dishing out orders left and right. I'm cheerfully going along with being his grunt worker since the one thing I enjoy more than seeing my own ideas brought to life is seeing his ideas brought to life.

He has been online and read a few threads though. He wants me to put a sign at the very end of the age that says "If you'd like to file a complaint or suggest ways to improve this age, please go to www dot helenwaite dot com and leave a message". That might be one idea of his that I nix, though I certainly empathize with the sentiment. I might go along with the idea of advising complainers to send a check in the amount of $$$$$ to this address and then we'll be happy to discuss your ideas. Otherwise, go to Blender.org and knock yourself out. I've got my grandson critiquing everything I build. I don't need anyone else's opinion!

I have to get back to work now. My son pointed out a couple of things that need changed, then we'll have one more spot that is just right. It's looking good, or as my grandson has proclaimed, "Hey! This is pretty cool!"