How do you work?

[Acies]

I had been interested in learning 3D modeling for a few years. Previous to Amnesia I had tried the hammer editor, but never gotten far. I started modding Amnesia about 2 months prior to my registration on the forum, which would be early 2011. This was during the making of my first project; Belphegor (cannot recommend playing it).

After this I started up a teamproject together with Palistov; Teamnesia. This didn't make it far - was based around a castle and 'a werewolf' (the first thing I modeled, following the steps of a tutorial). I have the project lying around on my computer, together with some voiceacting of Cryaotic - this was before he became the youtuber he is today.

Created the library of alexandria - aiming for it to be short. Cryaotic also did voiceacting to that - he was 'the good voiceacting forumer' at the time, I think(?). During that period I developed my modeling skills and decided to drop the teamnesia project.

As I scrapped that project I went on to making Taskforce: V (http://www.frictionalgames.com/forum/thread-10618.html). The demise of that project was met as I 'progressed' in my modeling skills. Because as you grow drastically better, all of your old work needs remaking - something which didn't seem interesting.

In between all this I participated in the 24-hour Amnesia thing, whereby 'Timorem' was formed. As 'Timorem' had been formed we decided to create 'Horizon', and 'The red light' (by me and Traggey). Both of these were scrapped as well.

Today I'm working on Spacies.

Latest thing I released was this: http://www.frictionalgames.com/forum/thread-21474.html

It's 'quick and odd'. Try it out ;D

1. I listen to music and/or talk to friends while modding. Most of my modding consists of making custom assets.

2. I haven't modded since June, but there's usually a few days of intense work - then some days without.

3. Could be anything. Some days I do something 'small' and work for 2 hours. There's been a day when I work for like 14 hours straight. But usually 4-6 hours (on the days that I do mod).

4. --

5. No problems yet. Perhaps working at a decent pace, gameplay wise. Seems as if 100 hours of work = 0,1 hours of gameplay. lol.

6. I mod Amnesia because I enjoy modeling. I wouldn't enjoy making a jumpscare/cliche map using the default assets.

[Kreekakon]

Yay I always love interview sessions which stroke my massive ego, and make myself feel actually important!!

Joking aside though here's my story:

I mainly first got into making games in Flash half because of interest, and half because of homework in university. After a while though I decided that after I completed whatever I was working on in Flash at the time (Which was this by the way) I wanted to get into something a bit more 3D-ish, and hearing about how easy it was to mod HPL2 I hopped right in.

After a bit of practice I discovered that the Amnesia tools were great for bringing to life a small, underdeveloped, but interesting story I had thought up for a real-life horror game back somewhere in 2011-2012. I spent some time refining the story up to standard, adding some nice concepts to make it more engaging overall.

It is now the in development mod by me called "Hell Awakening". You can find the link down below in my signature

NOW...onto questions!

1. Do you listen to any music when making a CS, if you do, what kind of music?

I am not too much of a conventional music person as in I don't really listen to any signers, bands, or dedicated music creators like that.

Most of the time I like to listen to video game, or movie soundtracks, usually based off of whatever is occupying my mind at the time.

2. How often does your development stop or pause?

It usually stops when I'm busy as I have a very busy real life. I have classes, and am now after four years of being in it, becoming one of the members in the highest ranked "Consultant Group" in my university's community service club.

3. How often do you work on your project? 2h a day? 2h a week?

I usually work whenever I either get motivation, or I feel like working is very well at the top of my priorities list. The priorities list is very unstable, and changes depending on how I'm feeling XD

4. Do you have any unreleased, private CS done or full conversion?

Currently I've devoted my entire modding career (If you can call it that?) to developing the Hell Awakening series. Currently I've already released the prologue of said series entitled "Hell Awakening Prologue: The Dorm".

The next installment will be the first of the main series, and is called "Hell Awakening Part 1". It is currently in development, and I am hoping for a Summer 2014 release.

"Hell Awakening Part 2" which is the followup, and final part of the main series has had little to no work gone into it currently besides a few concepts, and ideas.

5. Which kind of problems appear most often to you?

Currently the biggest problem I have are mainly two:

1. Lacking inspiration. Sometimes when I'm making rooms, or any map I can often get stuck on how I think something could turn out, or how it would be engaging in visual, realism, or gameplay sense. All three are very important to me.

2. Time. For reasons I've said above I lead a fairly busy life which can sometimes hinder development. To make matters worse sometimes the limited free time means there's higher chance that free time will overlap with time when I have a lack of motivation, resulting in me just wanting to relax, and not work right then.

6. Have you ever stopped caring at some point or thought about making a non serious or a complete cliche CS?

Yes. Yes, I have. I am actually contemplating doing one right now. It will not be at all your typical Amnesia mod, and will be "fun" like your normal fun games.

I don't think that all Amnesia mods need to be completely story driven, and/or depressing. I'm actually a bit disappointed we haven't seen all that many non-serious fun mods. There's definitely room for silliness, and fun games to be made in HPL2 though admittedly it can be a bit difficult due to the constraints of HPL2 in general.

If this "fun" little mod of mine does actually get green-lit by me, and I do actually go work on it, I'll let the community know more then.

[Gilligan's Hell]

1. Do you listen to any music when making a CS, if you do, what kind of music?
Yes, I Tend to listen to tracks from amnesia and others to see if it would fit into the mod and sometimes Indie Rock music.

2. How often does your development stop or pause?
Quite frequently i'm afraid but since AAMFP, I've been more focused.

3. How often do you work on your project? 2h a day? 2h a week?

Sometimes Nearly 24hrs a day and rarely a week.

4. Do you have any unreleased, private CS done or full conversion?an unreleased Full Conversion mod Amnesia - Intervene. I Have another mod in production but it's private until i release something. I Also plan to make a game on the source engine (Half-Life 2 engine) soon.

5. Which kind of problems appear most often to you?
Scripting errors are frequent, i'm merely a beginner. Collision issues in my maps happen rarely.
I Sometimes have trouble on thinking what to add to a map and it gets me on edge.

6. Have you ever stopped caring at some point or thought about
making a non serious or a complete cliche CS?
Rarely. I Keep focus and stay on track. i don't exactly have a sense of humor.

[7heDubz]

1. Do you listen to any music when making a CS, if you do, what kind of music?
Yes, Either ambient, chillstep, or just whatever's on my playlist (spotify)

2. How often does your development stop or pause?
Quite often, i lose drive but when i doget it back (say a week later) its in big spurts and i ussually get a bunch done.

3. How often do you work on your project? 2h a day? 2h a week?
Lets talk monthly, probably 16h about


4. Do you have any unreleased, private CS done or full conversion?
Nope.

5. Which kind of problems appear most often to you?
innovative mapping.

6. Have you ever stopped caring at some point or thought about making a non serious or a complete cliche CS?
Quite often, then ill get inspired and come back to it. Never thought about it, seemed boring to me.

[Alex Ros]

Since the very first FPS game I've played 20 years ago Wolfenstein 3D I realized it's a new form of art. Painting, sculpture, literature, poetry, theater, film, animation and now at the end of the XX century the new form have born. The first dreams were in particular about the Divine Comedy by Dante, interactive excursion into the Inferno. So since my very first encounter with the games I knew that sooner or later it will become a new kind of art. Dear Esther was a first sign, at least the first one noticeable.

As for modding it all started with the release of the STALKER Clear Sky at the august of 2008. The game was horrible in comparison with the original STALKER Shadow of Chernobyl. So that's how it begun. And until late 2011 I was working "Old Good Stalker Mod CS", known as the best mod made on CS platform ever, which I am kinda proud of a bit. Sadly it wasn't ever translated into English so there's no ModDB page for example. It's well known only in Russia.

Anyway, until then I got back to my childish ideas of making an art-game. And here I am now and I do know what to do exactly. Maybe someday I will open a special thread at the Off-Topic section to announce what I am working on last... well, for quite some time already.

Oh and in parallel I really love HPL engine interactivity. So it's possible that I would release some HPL maps. Probably, I am not sure about that. And most likely that would be just empty maps without story or gameplay. Presumably, not sure about that too. Maybe I would decide to waste some time on making normal mod, not just empty maps. I do not know... yup... everything is possible...

1. Do you listen to any music when making a CS, if you do, what kind of music?

If I listen to the music, when working on something, most of times it's an ambient music without a melody. LUSTMORD for a clear example. Sometimes it's just instrumental music, but quite druggy and somehow heavy but psychedelic. For example it could be 5IVE. Anyway, most of times I do not listen music, when I am doing something. I try to give the music a separate time, I sit down and listen to music and nothing more. The musicians did invest their time into writing music, so it's honest to admire that and invest your own time in listening that music.

2. How often does your development stop or pause?

If I start something, then I would not stop, until it's finished. No other way. That's way I am very careful with starting anything at all. It's better not to do anything at all in my opinion, then start something and do not complete it.

3. How often do you work on your project? 2h a day? 2h a week?

If I work on something, if I started something, then every free minute I am investing in work. Yup, I am surely a bit crazy son of a bitch maximalist.

4. Do you have any unreleased, private CS done or full conversion?

The only things that I can leave unreleased are ideas, design documents, even fully complete .PDF documents. But no mods or work-in-progress.

5. Which kind of problems appear most often to you?

A lack of the free time. Everything else is just something I can learn, there's nothing I can't learn.

6. Have you ever stopped caring at some point or thought about making a non serious or a complete cliche CS?

I do not like to work on something not fully seriously. More of that I do not like other people works made not seriously, just for fun. I do not like with all my heart. But do not get me wrong. Do not confuse a comedy with something made for fun not seriously. I really love comedies and laughing.

---

Anyway the main question is "How do you work?" The answer on that question is quite simple: "Thinking. Thinking over again. Trying to write down and formulate my thoughts. Thinking again and mostly about possible production problems. Thinking on how to minimize any possible production problems. Writing down final design document with all photo references, pictures, sketches, etc. And then... then I am observing what I've done and thinking again. Thinking about the amount of the free time I have and the amount of time which that project might need. 99% of times I realize I can not make that, there would not be enough energy and free time. And that's OK, it does not makes me sad in any way. Simply because I love the process itself, not the final product and the reaction of the auditory."

[LankySpankey103]

I started making CS's because I have always been interested in making games. And when I realised that the HPL engine isn't THAT complicated, I thought I would give it a shot :-) So I told my friend (who is also a huge fan og Amnesia) about it, and we started looking into it. And now we are kind of a "team" so to speak.

1. Do you listen to any music when making a CS, if you do, what kind of music?
Yes! I have to listen to music while working. It is what drives me :-) I mostly listen to, believe it or not, but Halo music. It's relaxes me.

2. How often does your development stop or pause?
This happens a lot. I work on it for weeks and weeks and then I get tired of it. A month or two later I pick it up again and cotinues.

3. How often do you work on your project? 2h a day? 2h a week?
Difficult question. I would say 4-6 hrs a week.

4. Do you have any unreleased, private CS done or full conversion?
We have not yet released something, but we are currently working on something. And we are planning on finishing it! :-P

5. Which kind of problems appear most often to you?
Mostly scripting. But then I come to you guys and you help me solve my problems. Thank you community :-D

6. Have you ever stopped caring at some point or thought about making a non serious or a complete cliche CS?
Well, it has occured to me when I just wanna finish the project.

[Red]

This must be the shortest introduction ever. But i don't have nothing
more to add to it.

After i finished Atdd, i took the opportunity and looked at the editor.
After messing with some entities and other models i got hooked to it
and started my long 2 year learning curve among the hpl 2 engine.
And here i am. Still developing.

1. I usually listen music, it gives me motive. I listen all kind of music,
depending on what mood i am. Mostly Rock and classical.

2. Often, sometimes i develop day after day, sometimes once a week.

3. 15 minutes - 9 hours on a day. Depends on day and mood.

4. Yes, one full story and one demo.

5. Sometimes on scripting.

6.Yes, when rushing through project.

I would like to add another question to the line, if you could accept it:
7. What is the order you start developing the story?

I personally start with the storyscript. What is the mileu who is the
protagonist, what is this story focused on etc.
Then i start to implement the story with level editor and so on.