crunchtime
Latest
Industry pipes up on lack of overtime pay from crunch time
Just over a month ago, Joystiq talked to Epic Games' Mike Capps about crunch times in game development cycles and how many hours his employees are expected to work throughout the development of a game. Interestingly, Develop put the question of crunch time (among other things) to "over 350 industry professionals" via a poll and found that nearly 98 percent of respondents received no overtime pay for crunch work.When we spoke with Capps, he pointed out that, for his company, crunch isn't a matter of force but that employees understand its necessity. "Our guys vote on how they want to crunch and last time they chose having weekends off ... I had one or two that were, wow that went too long, we had a rough time, we made some mistakes in planning but that's not to say that crunching is the wrong thing to do," Capps told us. He also noted that while crunch can hurt, employees (at least at Epic) are able to take a few weeks off between projects after a crunch so as to recharge, saying, "If you scoop someone off the front lines of Afghanistan and fly them to Iraq and you put them back out and you keep doing it, performance is going to suffer." It seems to us that, like most things in life, generalizing -- for instance, about the gaming industry as a whole -- doesn't make a whole lot of sense. 98 percent of those polled may not receive overtime for crunching on a project, but they may very well receive large bonuses after the product ships, or a long vacation, or a variety of other incentives. One thing's for sure: 100 percent of Joystiq writers make no overtime pay. [Image credit]
Fanswag: Shred Nebula and CrunchTime T-Shirts
It's time for a special Friday Fanswag boys and girls. We've gotten our hands on five redemption codes for Shred Nebula from CrunchTime Games. Not only that, but we've scored five CrunchTime T-shirts to go along with each copy. In case you haven't noticed, CrunchTime has a sweet logo. Even if you don't know who the folks at CrunchTime are, you'll be proud to wear their shirt. It just so happens that Shred Nebula is a nice space shooter with deep play mechanics and online dogfights, so it's win-win, really. To enter: Leave a comment on this post telling us about your favorite space battle. Only one comment will be accepted per person. Posters of multiple comments will be disqualified. We'll accept entries until 5:00PM, Eastern Time, Friday, September 5th, 2008. You must be at least 18 years old to enter. This giveaway is open only to residents of the U.S. and Canada (excluding Quebec). Later today, we'll pick five winners via a random drawing. Five winners will each receive a redemption code for Shred Nebula on XBLA and a CrunchTime Games T-shirt, worth a total of $25. Complete giveaway rules can be found here Gallery: Shred Nebula (XBLA)
Shred Nebula warps to XBLA September 3
Crunchtime Games has informed us that their upcoming space shooter Shred Nebula will hit Xbox Live Arcade on September 3. Shred Nebula ditches the now ubiquitous twin-stick shooter design in favor of more traditional flight combat controls. Utilizing thrust-based flying and aiming akin to Asteroids and the classic PC title SubSpace, we're hoping for some epic dogfights. With two single player modes and eight person multiplayer matches that CrunchTime head James Goddard equated with character match-ups in the Street Fighter series, Shred Nebula at least represents something different. On XBLA that's definitely not a bad thing.
Sorry readers, no Shred Nebula next week
First, we need to apologize to you guys. When we received an email from Crunchtime staff that told us that Shred Nebula had grabbed an open release slot and would be releasing July 16th we jumped at the chance to tell you. Unfortunately it seems that there was some word from the higher reaches of Microsoft and plans changed. And changed fast. Whether or not that had anything to do with other current events, no one can really say. And while Shred Nebula is back to having no official release date, we'll be sure to keep you informed about the latest happenings with the title. It's really too bad, unless there's something Microsoft has up it's sleeve we're back to *shudder* Coffeetime Crosswords as next week's XBLA release.[Via Press Info, Thanks very much for the clarification guys!]
E3 XBLA release redeemed: Shred Nebula UPDATE
UPDATE: The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry ... Oh Coffeetime Crosswords you are a funny, funny game, but are certainly not the kind of release we want to see during the week of E3. Thankfully an email came that ended our apprehension. Having been flying under the radar a bit this year, Shred Nebula has no official date will actually be hitting the Live Arcade on July 16th. For the calender challenged that's an unknown day of the week next Wednesday. The top-down shooter may appear to be just another twin-stick game but it actually has roots in both Asteroids and, believe it or not, Street Fighter. With a concept like that, and the promise of large free-roaming space environments we're willing to give Shred Nebula a good portion of our time when it's released during the busy week next week. %Gallery-11478%[Via Press Info]
X3F interview: Shred Nebula's James Goddard
We recently got a chance to talk with James Goddard of CrunchTime Games, creators of the upcoming Xbox Live Arcade game Shred Nebula. A shooter of a different sort, Shred Nebula is attacking the shooter genre from a different angle than all the Geometry Wars clones (which are really RoboTron clones anyway) to give gamers a new experience. We discuss how Goddard is using his experience developing for the Street Fighter series to inject fighting game elements into Shred Nebula. Check out the interview for some exclusive details on the game as well as a look at what CrunchTime games is all about. We've also got some great screens of the game, many of which are new or exclusive to X3F. Read on for the full interview.%Gallery-11478%
SubSpace inspired Shred Nebula headed to XBLA
Many PC gamers out there likely have fond memories of a simple space shooter by the name of SubSpace. The game tasked players with flying around large 2D maps and engaging in dogfights with other players. The different weights, speeds, and weapons of each ship assured a different play experience every time, and a high degree of skill was necessary to effectively strafe your enemies and to utilize the secondary weapons. If SubSpace froths up some teary-eyed nostalgia deep inside, you should probably keep an eye on Shred Nebula, and XBLA title from CrunchTime Games. In a recent preview on GameSpot, CrunchTime head James Goddard notes that much inspiration was drawn from SubSpace in the creation of Shred Nebula, including multiple ships with different abilities and the similar flying mechanics. In other words, this isn't another omni-direction shooter like Geometry Wars. With guns mounted on the front of your ship, precision flying takes precedence over an itchy trigger finger. Right now, we don't know much more about it, except that it's confirmed to be priced at 800 MS Point when it releases in early 2008. Hit the "read" link for the full preview at GameSpot.
