Bungie Weekly Update
Posted by KPaul at 10/8/2006 3:15 AM PDT
Sorry for the delay, Frank was pretty sure he could get Bnet updated from where he was but it just didn't work out and I wasn't able to get to it. It won't happen again, I swear. Please don't leave me, baby.
Much of the office, including the community team, spent a pretty huge amount of time this week crunching on some stuffs. It was the first such crunch that I've been around for and having finished it I can say that I am very tired. It's tough to imagine that this kind of thing commonly goes on for months at a time in this industry. It's also the reason that I'm doing an update at 4am. My sleep schedule may never recover. I caught Stosh napping in the field of pillows once or twice, for his sauce is of a degree that can only be described as weak. In the end though, we accomplished our goals and beyond. We can't wait to share. Soon™
There wasn't a whole lot else going on this week, then again there could have been a loud, obnoxious clown performing nearby and I wouldn't have known it. Oh wait there was, and his name is Ninjer the Clown. Ohhh burn.
Moving on... perhaps a word on Joseph Staten: The man, the myth, the legend. I have the pleasure of sitting next to him and it's been an interesting experience. He's an insanely busy guy, especially these days with all of the projects that we've got our hands in. As you know, he's the main man for the Halo 3 script, he's working closely with Peter Jackson on movie stuff and his hat even holds one or two secret hats. Hats that are, at this moment in time, invisible. Either that or there just aren't any hats there and I just like to think that there are. The best part of being near Joe is that every once in a while he'll run a scene or a piece of dialogue by us all and we get sneak-peaks at the story or what have you. He does all the voices too. Maybe we'll drag him in to do a reading for the podcast. But only if Bob plays the Master Chief.
Now, this being 4am and me not trusting myself to say things I won't regret, I thought I'd share with you something that I already regret and cannot take back. A feature that I was saving for a rainy day. Guess what? It's Seattle and it's raining. Gasp. The concept of this feature is to take a Bungie employee and let you know what a day in their life is like. I call it "Adventures Of:" and if you guys like it, I might be inspired to push my luck even further with another one.
Adventures Of: The O'Donnell
8am: I awake to the bright sunshine beaming in from the window that Chumley, our manservant, opens every morning. He fetches my robe and slippers and of course, a jaunty cravat and helps me into them. We make our way to the East Wing kitchen for a spot of breakfast. Caviar spread over toast sprinkled with tiny, melt-in-one's mouth, one karat diamonds.
10am: Chumley pulls the Rolls up to Bungie Studios' front door and Jerome lets me out. I casually slip him a shiny farthing, or perhaps a sovereign, should the weather be clement. I grease his palm and he attaches, "ATTN: Marty O'Donnell" to each piece of Bungie fan mail. As I stroll into the office the developers part before me, bowing to my superior individual talent. I enter my office with purpose, ready for yet another productive day.
11am: I finish my third cup of coffee for the morning and eat all of my blue M&Ms. I play the latest build of Halo 3 campaign for a while to keep myself entertained. After a while I get bored of it and join some system link games under the name, "bentllama." I throw various grenades at the developers who are testing things until they finally get tired of my presence and start up a new game.
12pm: Chumley brings the car around to pick me up for my luncheon outing. We go a tenth of a mile down the road to a small Italian eatery where I request my usual corner booth complete with a 2 table buffer, minimum, from the rest of the crowd. I order two veal parmigiana entrées, the second is just to stick it to the vegetarians.
2pm: I return from lunch long after the other developers so as to minimize any unwanted contact with them. Once I'm back in my studio (The Ivory Tower) I try to concoct new ways to seem busy until I actually need to compose music. I get on the phone to the makers of my sound board. The Vegas button that makes all the lights flash and buttons move is all well and good, but it's too obvious and they need to make a sequence that looks more like actual work.
3pm: I get bored and make my rounds about the office. I head to the writers' corner to speak with the four most important men in the office. On my way there, I pass by Ninja 0n Fire, humming the Halo theme. His rhythm is imperfect, at best, and his pitch leaves much to be desired. I carefully select the Xbox Dev Kit with the largest hard drive from his testing station and strike his blindside with it. I continue on to the writers' area and share some of my views on current events with them.
4pm: With Ninja sufficiently bloodied and my patience with the writers grows thin, I move on to the designers. Naturally I'm drawn to Noguchi, as his rage has reached such a level that its mass has a compelling gravitational pull. I make note of the state of his desk, comment on the pretty colors that his code has and whatever else I can think of to distract him. Eventually, Noguchi's frustration rises to such a level that he gets up, walks over to Bob and pokes him in the eye. Two blunt traumas in two hours, a successful day to say the least.
6pm: Food arrives for the guys who're going to put in a long night of work. I go through the meals and find Jay Weinland's. I replace the patty in his hamburger with an equally thick stack of paper that I spent the better part of the past two hours cutting out, fraying and coloring with brown magic marker. That'll teach him to doubt my cowbell measurements. More is not the new less, Jay.
7pm: I depart for Chateau O'Donnell, satisfied with a full day's work. Chumley has prepared a five course meal, I'm still full from stealing Jay's food but I don't want to see it wasted, so I make Chumley eat all of it for being so presumptuous. After he's done I decide to retire to my study for the night, where I sit amongst my many leather-bound tomes to ponder my next move. All in all, another splendid day.
Oh, before you click that, "Discuss this story" link, know that this is the Bungie Weekly Update. Not the Halo 3 Weekly Update. When and if it becomes that, the title will change. Until then, this update serves to inform you as to the goings on of Bungie staff. Granted, Halo 3 takes up most of our time - Youtube links taking up the remainder - but there's no guarantee that we'll ever touch on it in an update (as I didn't with this one). You've been warned, so don't post that this update sucks because it had no Halo 3 info. It sucks for far more legitimate reasons and you know it.
