[7:30:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Hi. Enough for a first impression? I can send you the uncompressed one as soon as my wifi is back.
[7:30:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: although it should be readable
[7:31:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm not sure what that was. Something sreamWorks and something DotA 2
[7:31:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: It really doesn't prove anything to me.
[7:31:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: I couldn't read anything on them either.
[7:32:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: That's the TF room
[7:32:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the notebook is irellevant.
[7:33:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i just needed something to display a newssite on
[7:33:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: I've never seen the tf2 room
[7:33:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[7:34:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm pretty sure I took that picture on the 7th. Zoom in, you can read the headlines. At least I can on my end. Not sure if Protonmail compressed them yet again
[7:35:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that glow sign is a fairly recent addition
[7:36:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, it's not new, one of the TF guys had it. We just didn't put it up until september or so
[7:37:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: in case you're wondering what I'm doing in the TF room:
[7:37:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We did a network test. Thats Matt in the background
[7:38:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't k ow Matt
[7:38:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: So like, is there any other ways you could prove your authenticity?
[7:39:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: He's our network guy. Not matt yukubousky, That's the poor soul who does steamworks support.
[7:40:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Sure I guess, what more do you want?
[7:41:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: wifi is back, let me upload an uncompressed version
[7:43:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: How long you been at Valve
[7:43:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not long, it's my second year
[7:44:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, March 2014
[7:45:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: VR the whole time?
[7:47:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Kind of, we don't have have as rigid of a hierarchy as most devs. I got hired specifically for VR but I do a bit of everything kind of.
[7:48:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: like that figure I wanna talk about but let me upload an uncompressed version of the tf room photo first
[7:49:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sorry
[7:49:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay cool
[7:50:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: zoom in, the headlines are legible, at least the lower half
[7:52:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: That's from the week we got a network overhall after months of complaining
[7:52:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: matt is aa contractor, not a full time employee
[7:52:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: W here did you find out about VNN
[7:52:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's just our general support guy for networking issues and mac related stuff.
[7:53:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: some of our artists rely heavily on osx or at least pretend they do
[7:54:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you did a commentary on that the know video
[7:54:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: more than just a couple people here watched that
[7:54:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is this a good thing?
[7:56:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well it's always nice to be defended
[7:56:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I've been watching most of your videos since then
[7:57:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We follow discussions on YT, Facepunch among others
[7:58:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: They were wrong right? The Know later attacked me pretty bad a few times following that.
[7:58:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you get the most feedback that way. also the most hurtfull
[7:58:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: They were very adamant about their source being true.
[7:58:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Depends on what your definition of wrong is
[7:59:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they weren't 100% right
[7:59:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but theres some truth in there
[7:59:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example
[8:00:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they claimed that fear of negativity is the #1 reason why there hasn't been a new Half-Life installment in a while
[8:00:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's not true
[8:01:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the #1 reason is because it's just not that relevant in the grand scheme of our current gaming "landscape".
[8:04:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm pretty sure Dota 2 has made more money last quarter than all our singleplayer games combined in their respective first years.
[8:06:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: If we were to focus on a huge singleplayer game with all the meat a game of that kind needs to have a player retention of more than a week, we would have to focus half the studio on that game.
[8:08:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: And that would mean cutting resources for VR, which is much more important for the future of steam
[8:09:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: money is not the issue here, we're doing pretty well overall, we just don't have the time and people.
[8:09:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: valve needs an extension IMO.
[8:10:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if we had a second location, we could dedicate the whole place to a singleplayer game
[8:10:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but then you have to ask yourself: what could that second studio instead of a singleplayer game
[8:10:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they could make an MMO
[8:11:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: massive player retention
[8:11:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: overall a much better decision business wise.
[8:13:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the only barrier for an MMO is it's infrastructure
[8:13:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which is no problem at all for us
[8:13:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: of course all hypothetical, there are no plans to expand sadly
[8:15:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they were working actively on an MMO before I joined
[8:15:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that didn't come to fruition either
[8:17:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I saw the last few weeks of that project. That must have been my first demoralizing experience there
[8:19:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It would have been a perfect fit for VR, too. Such a shame.
[8:19:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: Stars of Blood?
[8:20:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's out there?
[8:20:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[8:20:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's well known
[8:20:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: There is a lot of Concept Art and Gabe talked about it in an Interview with /v/ back in 2013
[8:20:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah that was before my time
[8:21:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Hey, could I Skype you real quick? You don't have to give me your name, I just need to make sure you are not one of my stalkers scamming
[8:21:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we wanted to kind of revive
[8:22:52 PM] *** Call to Cephalon Cephalon, no answer.
Send video message ***
[8:22:53 PM | Edited 8:22:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nope, no voice whatsoever. sorry but that's way too risky. We can switch back to mail if prefer
[8:23:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: No this is fine
[8:23:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you have stalkers that would go though this much trouble?
[8:23:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yep
[8:23:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well that's fucking terrifying
[8:23:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: One in particular told a friend of mine she wanted to eat my girlfriend and take her place
[8:23:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: And that is the one I am worried about here
[8:23:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: She has done things like this
[8:24:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: ...what
[8:24:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[8:24:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: VNN is great, and I love the work I do, but it comes with it's cost
[8:24:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how do you attract those people by doing harmess opinion videos? they're not even offensive in the slightest
[8:24:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Are there any other ways you could prove you work for Valve that you can think og?
[8:24:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: of?
[8:25:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, maybe tell me something that will happen very soon so I can check what you are telling me?
[8:25:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well the figures, if all goes well
[8:25:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: DOTA 2 figures then?
[8:26:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's neat
[8:26:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah way cooler
[8:26:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, what is it?
[8:27:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're codenamed the allstars line and wheÄre definitely not keeping that name.
[8:27:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's actually a bit more complex than just figures
[8:27:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Valve Amiibo?!
[8:28:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah, too easy to spoof
[8:28:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we thought about it though
[8:28:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: I like Amiibo
[8:28:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is it like some kind of AR thing then?
[8:29:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'd post a photo of my collection but It's not THAT impressive
[8:29:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[8:29:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: theyre all unboxed and I'm missing most of the ones after the fist AC wave
[8:30:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't do the AC ones, I stick to Smash and Mario
[8:30:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: I bought most of these before moving out of my parents house though, so I really haven't been keeping up
[8:30:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I kept telling myself the same initially
[8:30:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: didn't work
[8:30:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: They are additctive
[8:30:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I know
[8:30:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and they're not even usefull in game
[8:31:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i have no idea why i like them
[8:31:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: No, I can't even use them
[8:31:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Even if you are spoofing me, you still seem cool
[8:31:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: I appreciate that
[8:31:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no nintendo platform?
[8:31:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: No, you can't use them in the box
[8:31:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: I have every Nintendo console to date.
[8:32:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you seriously think I put up a TF2 glowsign up my wall to troll you?
[8:32:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: People have done worse
[8:32:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Im almost too afraid to ask: like what?
[8:32:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Not only do I have Stalkers, but I have steep competition with other channels. ValveTime in particular.
[8:33:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we like valvetime : <
[8:33:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i do at least
[8:33:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: beef or just competition?
[8:33:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: There were a few times where VT pretended to be a source of info to trick me into reporting a faulty story just to call me out on it
[8:34:01 PM] Tyler McVicker:  When I first got started out, they would allways derate me in comments and reddit and facepunch
[8:34:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then, when I got an exclusive on Portal Beta stuff, they did this
[8:34:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Omnomnick has threatened me a lot
[8:34:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then Smash start up with it after Nick calmed down
[8:35:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: I told Glen about all of this, he just told me it was nothing and that I was worrying to much.
[8:36:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what the fuck
[8:36:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[8:37:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: This has gone on for over two years now.
[8:37:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they seemed so nice and well researched
[8:37:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well there's stuff that is behid the scenes no one knows about
[8:37:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like their "archive" and Barnz
[8:37:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the mega archive?
[8:37:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: VT is sketchy
[8:37:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we weren't too happy about that video tbh
[8:38:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we would prefer if there were no full copies of our games in there
[8:38:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: The Portal video
[8:38:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: ?
[8:39:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: artwork is fine, the models and game rips are not. I mean, not that I care but valve in general does
[8:39:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no the one where you linked to a dump of all our leaks
[8:39:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: The public archive?
[8:39:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: including pirated copies, that wasn't very cool tbh. the artworks are fine
[8:39:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah
[8:40:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's my buddy Jacks, and it's nothing compared to what is floating around.
[8:40:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know a few that have the entire Source dev repo backed up on their PCs
[8:40:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the raw models?
[8:40:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: And they always threaten to leak the whole thing to get eyes on their profiles on FP
[8:40:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: The raw everything
[8:41:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: From HL2 to EP3
[8:41:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: FStop, CS2, the different TF2s, everyting
[8:42:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: So the one video where I linked recent links in an archive was a No no then?
[8:42:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: compilable builds or just the model files and script examples?
[8:42:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: specifically fstop, that would be bad
[8:42:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because we're trying to bring that back for VR
[8:43:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know, but there are some people that are going around talking about what it is
[8:43:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, specifically an aperture science themed puzzle game. no portals though that's a concious decisign
[8:43:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sorry my typing accuracy is awful today
[8:43:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what did they say it is?
[8:43:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: And with the files that are in Portal 2, and concept art put out during the Potato arg, it's possible to make a good guess
[8:44:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: I've been working on a big video for months about what my guess is
[8:44:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: wanna tell me?
[8:44:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not going to stop you if you nailed it
[8:44:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I couldn't care less
[8:45:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, I know about the Chickens, Mousetraps, Buttons and Cubes, Mannequins, the fact that you carry a camera, can take 3 pictures, and that it took place in 80s-ish aperture, or at least that is what you are lead to believe.
[8:46:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: I had a feeling that the Manaquins were more for story than gameplay
[8:46:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: And the chickens acted like Striders from HL2
[8:46:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: I also thought that the Manaquins had taken over, and it was actually in the distant future.
[8:47:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, the Manquins attempted to try and live like humans from the time, but didn't do everything completely 100%, so some of the tests were done improperly, so it caused the Chickens to mutate
[8:47:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Also, Cave was a robot, or a recording
[8:48:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they were androids to be precise
[8:49:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: built to transform aperture into a self sustaining human free organism
[8:49:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: like a hivemind if you will
[8:49:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: The different levels were mannequin representations of "Normal Human Life" that you went around taking pictures to solve puzzles, and the pictures actually were video? Like you saw a live feed of the point you took the picture at.
[8:49:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: idk, I have much more, but it's hard to type it all down from memory.
[8:49:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Did you play F-Stop?
[8:49:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the original? no
[8:49:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Even though you came in like 5 years after
[8:50:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Couldn't you though?
[8:50:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I would imagine it's in the archive
[8:50:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: ours that is :D
[8:50:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, just pull it off the server
[8:50:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[8:50:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you underestimate our security
[8:50:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: True, but people end up with a lot of stuff all the time
[8:51:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Yeah but I can't just log in and grab stuff
[8:51:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like the entire dev history of Portal
[8:51:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we keep logs
[8:51:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and have a tiered system
[8:51:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: certain employees have deeper access
[8:51:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I can grab artwork no problem
[8:51:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well that sucks
[8:52:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why is VR viewed as the future of Steam?
[8:52:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: can I elaborate on the figures first?
[8:52:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: yea sure
[8:53:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're really cool and I've spent the last 3 weeks of my life on the tech
[8:53:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you know how figures are made traditionally?
[8:53:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: I do not
[8:53:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you start with a 3D sculpt
[8:54:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which means remodelling in most cases
[8:54:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: especially for older projects
[8:54:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we don't have most of the hi-poly sculpts from HL2
[8:55:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: let's say you want to make a strider figure
[8:55:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you look at the low poly ingame model and aproximate how it would look in higher detail
[8:56:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is that where that D.O.G. model came from?
[8:56:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not the one who posted it to 4chan
[8:57:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but that model was for an older attempt at a first party figure line
[8:57:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know who posted it
[8:57:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: in the past we would sell licenses to sideshow collectibles among others
[8:57:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: And it's not Valve
[8:57:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ya
[8:58:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yo, once your sculpt is done, you 3d print
[8:58:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's how most figure prototyping is done these days
[8:58:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[8:58:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and then you refine, refine, refine until it looks proportional
[8:58:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's already a week worth of work for a single artist
[8:59:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: So that's cool, first party figures.
[8:59:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: I would probably buy a few
[8:59:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: once you're happy with the sculpt you would make a paint master
[9:00:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: paint masters are figures that are hand paintet and used as reference for the painters
[9:00:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: imagine a room with 10 people
[9:00:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[9:00:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're painting figures all day, looking at a slightly higher quality reference figure
[9:00:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: That almost sounds like a nightmare
[9:01:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: now what if you could make figures directly from game art?
[9:01:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: with only minimal touch up by an artist needed
[9:01:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're calling it rapid figure design
[9:02:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's essencially a fusion between two technologies
[9:02:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: remeshing and vr
[9:02:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you start off with a low poly game model
[9:02:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: let's say juggernaut
[9:03:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we have an algorithm that can create high poly sculpts from game art
[9:03:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's pretty wild computer vision stuff. most of the magic happens in 2D actually
[9:03:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: all the detail is generated from texture maps alone
[9:04:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: my comparing the different maps, diffuse, normal etc. we can recognize detail in the textures and translate it into 3D displacement
[9:04:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: like tesselation but using a combination of maps instead of just normals
[9:05:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: This is blowing my mind
[9:05:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: This is from 2D art?
[9:05:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: this allows us to convert a game model into a high poly sculpt, that is then posed by an animator
[9:05:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or low poly 3d models/
[9:05:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no you need a low poly model
[9:05:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[9:05:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[9:05:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but all the detail is estimated from the models's textures
[9:05:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: And it works well?
[9:05:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well you've seen the first print
[9:05:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[9:06:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: dang
[9:06:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that figure was made in a day
[9:06:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can load any game art starting with HL2 into the software
[9:06:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: This whole process? Start to finish?
[9:06:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: start to finish.
[9:07:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: What kind of 3D printers you have up in Washington?
[9:08:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I could just feed in a strider model, it would generate a sculpt, then an artist would take a look at it and fix geometry if needed, then you just print it and done, a finished unpainted figure
[9:08:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't know the name from memory, it's the orange resin one
[9:08:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh yea
[9:08:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[9:08:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: forma 2
[9:08:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well I expect Valve to have the most expensive one of things
[9:09:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why was a bit of the picture pixelated?
[9:09:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because it says my name on there
[9:09:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: across the arm
[9:09:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[9:10:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: So how long has this been worked on?
[9:10:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: all physical creations are labeled so that someone can be held accountable if something gets out.
[9:10:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea that makes sense
[9:11:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we started experimenting with first party toy production in mid 2014
[9:11:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Does Valve not like the NECA stuff?
[9:12:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah, we have a pretty good relationship with them
[9:12:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and will continue working with neca
[9:12:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: I love the Gordon and the TF2 Chess
[9:13:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't have the money for the Portal Guns or anything though
[9:13:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the allstars figures are meant as an inexpensive way for us to release nice figures, that's all
[9:13:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: ETA on those then?
[9:14:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: wait, the best part is yet to come
[9:14:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[9:14:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and please remind me to take a photo of the machine
[9:14:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: I will
[9:14:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Could you just send the pictures through Skype>
[9:14:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: ?
[9:14:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what's the worst and most time consuming part of figure production?
[9:14:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ummm
[9:15:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I can but I'm at home
[9:15:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand
[9:15:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Packaging?
[9:15:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: painting
[9:15:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh yea
[9:15:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[9:15:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are 3d printers that can print in color but they are very low rez and blurry
[9:16:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[9:16:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because they print in colored plastic which tends to melt together woth different colors
[9:16:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: I've heard of Colored sandstone printers
[9:18:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: basically, we have CNC machine that moves airbrushes around the model in all axes
[9:18:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and paints them the same every time
[9:18:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: machines*
[9:18:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 5
[9:18:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and they're not even big
[9:18:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: desktop sized
[9:19:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the current ones have 4 brushes
[9:19:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's enough to paint most figures without changing colors
[9:21:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the big problem with this tech is that it requies someone to manually animate the painting process for each of the airbrush arms
[9:22:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's what we're working on right now, a way to let the machine recognize the surface of the model
[9:22:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: our current approach is to use the 3d model generated in the first step of production
[9:23:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: This seems like it would have more applications then just figures
[9:23:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: kind of. the tech is too expensive to be scaled up to car size
[9:23:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yet
[9:24:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you would need giant robotic arms with multiple airbrushes on each
[9:24:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the beauty of it all is that it's so inexpensive for figures
[9:26:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: once the painting machines have the ability to adapt to any model, we could theoretically build figures to order
[9:27:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the goal is to release a tool that can be used to customize TF2 characters with items you already own in the main game. you can then order an exact figure of your character
[9:28:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: harmonix had something similiar fpr rock band 3
[9:28:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you could upload your band and get them printed
[9:28:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but instead of prints, ours will be professional looking figures
[9:28:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: How much would something like this cost?
[9:29:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: BOM on the 10 inch juggernaut is somewhere around $20
[9:29:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if we can get it down to 15, we could possibly sell at 25
[9:30:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we haven't done calculations on disctribution yet
[9:31:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but I think $25 at a revenue of 5-7 per figure should be possible
[9:32:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the tech is about a year away from being production ready
[9:33:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the goal is to eliminate human labor completely for figure production. We're not going to market before there are no manual steps involved on our part, from order to arrival.
[9:33:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, even shipping and packaging?
[9:35:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's our distributor's job. we work with multiple distributors globally to ship the steam controller
[9:35:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: once there are no manual steps involved in the creation, we can just ship machines to our distributors and they print for the customers of their region.
[9:37:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Well that sucks
Why is VR viewed as the future of Steam?back to VR. sorry, I'm obsessed with figures
[9:37:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand being obsessed with your work
[9:38:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you have a vr headset?
[9:38:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: No, I can't afford ti
[9:38:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: it
[9:39:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: If you had one, you wouldn't be asking why we consider VR the future of our platform.
[9:40:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It's one of few things that you seriously have to try for more than just a quick demo session to fully grasp
[9:41:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the main appeal is that there is no next better thing than VR
[9:41:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's quite literally the final frontier of entertainment
[9:41:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: everything you can imagine can theoretically be simulated in VR
[9:42:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: I haven't even had a demo
[9:43:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you know, there just is no next thing. Once you can create convincing realities, there is no next step.
[9:43:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: The problem I see is the idea of cost, the other barriers to entry, such as the pc, the fact that sometimes people don't want to move around when playing games, and that when using controllers it makes people sick. Also wires.
[9:43:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you've been missing out
[9:43:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well College does that to you
[9:44:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm also missing out on food that isnt spegettios
[9:44:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are enough chances to get a demo though
[9:44:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Not around where I live.
[9:44:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: psvr had a tour not that long ago, probably still do
[9:44:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm in middle of nowhere Ohio.
[9:44:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we demo during guided tours if you ask nicely and make an appointment in advance
[9:45:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm not gonna be in Belleville anytime soon.
[9:45:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but there's surely a gamestop near you
[9:45:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: A tiny one in a mall. They don't do VR demos there.
[9:45:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: bummer
[9:46:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand the excitement behind VR, but is Valve working to pull the price down?
[9:46:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: have you seen the oculus keynote?
[9:46:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: Which one?
[9:46:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they announced what they're calling spacewarp
[9:46:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's actually pretty cool tbh
[9:47:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the latest one from earlier this month
[9:47:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the vive and rift do variants of reprojection (although differently) to keep head rotation fluid even during frame drops
[9:48:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: their new tech is kind of like that but in 3D
[9:48:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they compare two frames and reconstruct a third one from the change in geometry
[9:49:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's only a matter of time until we adapt this for steam vr
[9:49:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[9:49:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's kind of insane, you can play at 45 fps doubled with this tech and it does not look of feel different from real 90
[9:50:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no difference in lateny even
[9:50:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: So cheaper hardware.
[9:50:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: latency
[9:50:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: On the pc side of things.
[9:50:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, they lowered the minspecs to a 960 i think
[9:50:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Dabg
[9:50:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Danh
[9:50:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Dang
[9:50:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the 1050 is confirmed to be the new entry point once that comes out
[9:50:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's at $150 card
[9:51:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: oculus is selling a VR compatible PC for 500 right now.
[9:51:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: So Valve is justifying the expense of the hardware because of the lowering cost of the PC required?
[9:51:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no, we're justifying it by how profound the experiences you have are in VR
[9:52:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the prive halving is something we didn't even see coming
[9:52:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: That what?
[9:52:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Of price
[9:52:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: price
[9:52:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sry
[9:52:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[9:53:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is Valve working to get that big game out then?
[9:53:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, what is Valve working on for VR for software?
[9:53:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're currently seeking new partners (multiple) for the next generation and we're planning to launch some kind of real game around the same timeframe
[9:54:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We're working on a big update to destinations
[9:54:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: That seems to be turning into a social hub
[9:54:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: With the Multiayer stuff that just happened.
[9:54:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which is probably going to coincide with the launch of Touch
[9:55:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: What will be in the update?
[9:55:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we'll most likely roll it out in chunks instead of one big update
[9:55:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the big one is in-vr creation
[9:56:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like Tiltbrush?
[9:56:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the end goal for destinations is kind of what second life was to early social gaming
[9:56:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just without the furries
[9:57:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: tiltbrush is strictly a painting app
[9:57:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: You cant keep away the flurries.
[9:57:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Furries
[9:57:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: destinations is supposed to become a social network over time
[9:57:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: over a loooong time
[9:57:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Wow, that is not what I expected when it lanched.
[9:58:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: where you can build your own places
[9:58:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's actually inspired by wildstar
[9:58:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Will the photogrammetric stuff still be a focus?
[9:58:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: by the housing of wildstar, of course
[9:59:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: only for real places
[9:59:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: custom ones have to be traditional models
[9:59:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because with photogrammetry, shadows are baked into the texture
[10:00:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you can't make modular wall pieces that way
[10:00:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but for real places, absolutely
[10:01:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: So like, what specifically will be in the next few updates then? Will the first signs of this be seen?
[10:02:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the first sign was when we announced multiplayer in, I think july?
[10:02:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ummm
[10:02:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10:02:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and that update wasn't that long ago
[10:03:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the next one is probably going to be a reworked avatar system
[10:04:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're also adding more complex interactions soon ish
[10:04:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[10:04:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: by that i mean minigames
[10:04:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's an app called altspace
[10:05:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10:05:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they do something similiar but their apps and minigames are all web based
[10:05:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10:05:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: I've seen videos of it
[10:05:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're aiming for a proper SDK that just integrates into Unity, which you can get for free
[10:06:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's more or less an extension of vscript
[10:06:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why not Source 2?
[10:06:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: Isn't destinations Source 2?
[10:08:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: source 2 is a huge topic. possibly a bigger can of worms than my figure essay from earlier.
[10:09:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh boy
[10:09:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It's highly unlikely that we will use Source 2 for any future projects
[10:09:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: What
[10:09:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why?
[10:09:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: We as in the VR team, or we as in Valve?
[10:10:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's a good question
[10:10:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the vr team is all unity from here on
[10:10:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there will be at least one game running on source 2
[10:11:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just because it's too late to port
[10:11:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: L4D3
[10:11:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea I figured
[10:11:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is it really that bad of an engine to work with?
[10:12:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It's rough. Our PBR implementation frankly sucks
[10:12:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's physically based rendering, the nice looking metal you see in newer games
[10:12:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10:12:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10:13:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: It sucks?!
[10:13:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, it can't deal with packed textures
[10:13:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and the entire rendering core is built upon having a seperate texture for each channel
[10:14:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: in unity and unreal 4, you would just drop in 3 textures that contain all of the maps on different channels
[10:14:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: So Valve will be working on other engines from here on out, after they get out whatever projects are too late to port?
[10:15:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example, things like metalness maps, which are monochrome can be bundled into a single texture by using a different color channel for each map
[10:15:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: source 2 can't do that
[10:15:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we have to import every single map as its own texture
[10:16:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: And it's not just standard PBR
[10:16:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: most of the legacy Source 1 crap needs to be in source 2
[10:16:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why?
[10:16:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because the whole point of the engine was easy next gen ports and easy design tools
[10:17:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: But this failed esentually?
[10:18:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: kind of. it does work but
[10:18:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the trade off is that source 2 is incredibly bloated
[10:19:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is this the big reason why the SDK or any games are out?
[10:19:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Does it just take a long time to dev for?
[10:21:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not really, it's just not as good as other engines
[10:22:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Would you say Valve is out of the engine game?
[10:22:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and it has absolutely no unique feature that would be impossible to port to Unity and Unreal
[10:22:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are 2 cool things in Source 2: Volumetric Physics and strand rendering for hair
[10:23:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: both can be ported no problem
[10:23:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, I guess. At this point it's just an issue of pride
[10:23:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: That is going to kill certain communities
[10:24:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: So L4D3, and then Valve will let go of S2?
[10:24:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: many here are emotionally attached and just cant let it go
[10:24:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, we have DOTA 2 and Destinations
[10:24:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: And I'm guessing Destinations is getting ported
[10:25:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: probably, if the L4D team doesn't cancel it in favor of an unreal rework.
[10:25:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well how far along would you say it is?
[10:25:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: destinations is staying on source 2 for the forseeable future
[10:25:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but our creation software is based on unity
[10:25:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: l4d is playable
[10:26:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's kind of unpredictable though, it's good enough for an early access release, absolutely
[10:26:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but you never know
[10:26:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is it radically different to be able to incorporate "Games as a Service" ?
[10:26:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if tomorrow they all agree that it should be moved to unity, then it'll be canceled the same day
[10:27:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: Holy shit
[10:27:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, the l4d team is in the unreal camp
[10:27:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and they're wrong
[10:27:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is L4D being made in Unreal?
[10:27:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or Source 2?
[10:27:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: source 2 atm
[10:27:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is there talks to cancel it?
[10:28:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's tension between that group. some REALLY want to keep Source 2 so all the work they put in isn't going to waste
[10:28:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Any vets on the team, or just new guys?
[10:29:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I think one of the art guys came over from turtle rock after l4d2
[10:29:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: mostly new faces
[10:30:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's good though. If they want to keep source 2 they should just release it right now on early access
[10:30:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: I would expect them to want some fanfare around it
[10:30:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, E3 or somthing
[10:31:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: e3 requires the ability to abide by deadlines, which is why we almost never visit shows.
[10:32:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if there just happens to be an event going on while a team feels comfortable with an announcement, sure.
[10:32:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Would L4D not be on Xbox or whatever/
[10:32:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but we don't plan ahead to meet meaningless dates when we have the biggest marketing machinge on millions of PCs already.
[10:32:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: machine
[10:33:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not if it's source 2
[10:33:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: Wow
[10:33:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10:33:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: except if they're really pulling of some coding magic
[10:33:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why is that
[10:33:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well
[10:34:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the dirty secret is that source 2 runs an almost feature complete version of source 1 at all times
[10:34:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: at this point in time
[10:34:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: this was never intended for release but it doesn't look like they're doing anything about that design flaw
[10:35:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and now we're at a point where years of development went into this thing
[10:35:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you have to ask yourself, is it worth the trouble of reversing years of stacking shit on top of the Source 1 frame
[10:36:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: or if you should start over with a modern approach to level design and shading
[10:36:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: So Source 2 is just Source 2016
[10:36:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and then you'll have to ask yourself, why the hell am I not using Unreal 4 which already does all those things and tbh does them a lot better
[10:37:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is the only tradition game in real dev L4D?
[10:37:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: source 2 is kind of like cutting a spoon into a fork. it works but why would you, just get a fork.
[10:38:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that depends on your definition of real development
[10:38:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: I mean a group of people, like, more than 5, working on a game on a daily basis
[10:38:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: does a game with a more troubled development history than The Last Guardian count? We got plenty of those
[10:39:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: More than just ep3, sob and hl3?
[10:39:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sob is dead, completely
[10:39:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't see it ever coming back
[10:39:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: I figured
[10:39:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: It was an MMO though?
[10:40:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's kind of like a mix between star citizen and destiny.
[10:40:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[10:40:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: What other crap is in dev hell?
[10:40:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and ultimately failed because their ideas were bigger than their time schedule
[10:40:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we tried to bring it back as a VR title
[10:41:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and it would have been amazing
[10:41:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Was it canned before 2014?
[10:41:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: open world questing, dynamic transitions between planetary fps combat and space travel.
[10:42:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh boy
[10:42:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is that what the QuestCitizens are?
[10:42:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it was never really cancelled, it's one of these things that people stopped working on, then my team picked up their work and dropped it too.
[10:43:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: from the dota 2 leak?
[10:43:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that was intentional
[10:43:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh fuck
[10:43:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Here we go
[10:43:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we haven't had a leak since D0g
[10:43:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: WHat
[10:43:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: WHAT
[10:43:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: You are making me feel like a puppet kind sir
[10:43:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: at least i think so, maybe you remember something?
[10:44:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, so everything left in destinations was intentional?
[10:44:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that I do not know
[10:44:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, one sec
[10:44:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the hl3.txt leak? come on. do you think were that stupid?
[10:44:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: This stuff
[10:45:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: The HL3 leak I figured was intentional, especially since it was in for like, 2 days
[10:45:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: gordon in front of a mac was kind of an in-joke
[10:46:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: How so?
[10:46:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we used that as the in-engine placeholder for the player spawn when playing seated VR
[10:46:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can only see it if you're watching someone play in the source 2 editor.
[10:47:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hl3.txt and rpg.txt were intentional
[10:47:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, why though
[10:47:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not sure about mac gordon, that might have been an accident
[10:48:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: More than Mac Gordon was found
[10:48:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: HLVR stuff along with more RPG stuff was also found
[10:48:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, eversything else is intentional
[10:48:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10:48:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why
[10:48:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hlvr is the codename for my team's game
[10:48:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's not Half-Life VR is it
[10:48:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what once was fstop
[10:48:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no it's a crossover game
[10:48:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is it the Portal VR game
[10:49:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Crossover from HL and Portal uni?
[10:50:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the story jumps between locations in BM East pre-cascade and Aperture after the events of  portal 1.
[10:50:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's told from two different character's views
[10:51:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I won't spoil anything, no worries.
[10:51:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's just the basic premise
[10:51:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Please not story-wise no
[10:52:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the gameplay is focused around perspective puzzles
[10:52:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Which is what F-Stop is?
[10:53:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Was
[10:53:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: ?
[10:54:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I really don't want to give away too much since this is the most likely game to survive but you can store depth information from different positions in a test chamber and then you jump between them
[10:54:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example, you can photograph a switch in one end of the room
[10:55:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and an immovable cube in the other
[10:55:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: then you layer the two photos
[10:55:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and they become one
[10:55:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: then you stick your head through the photo to teleport into that reality
[10:56:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: I was almost right
[10:56:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's the basic puzzle mechanic
[10:56:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: I was so close to being right
[10:56:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: I never thought of the photo layering bit
[10:56:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: this is one of those cases where you can pretend like it's your idea. it you sell it right, it might generate a bit of hype around the concept
[10:57:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you*
[10:57:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: I can
[10:57:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'll send you the script when it's done
[10:57:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: This isn't until next month
[10:57:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm working on a CSCZ video this month
[10:57:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: And it's killing me
[10:58:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you want to see artwork for certain project, I miiight be able to help you out
[10:58:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: as long as they stay confidential
[10:58:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: I can keep it just here
[10:58:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: projects*
[10:58:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you could help me out with a few pieces of F-Stop art, that would be a huge help with the video
[10:58:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just art
[10:58:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I hope so. don't use your inside scoop to impress VT
[10:59:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't talk to them
[10:59:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: They usually message me to threaten, or to get info on projects I'm working in
[10:59:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I have access to some fstop models too
[10:59:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: only a few
[10:59:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: really old programmer art
[11:00:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we recycled them as placeholders for the current reincarnation
[11:00:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[11:00:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Portal 2 has the hud, the texture sheet for the camera
[11:00:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: and a few textures from levels
[11:03:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: may i ask how much peope on the outside know about what happened to Half-Life between Ep2 and today?
[11:03:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[11:03:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well
[11:03:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: really curious about that because we keep hinting and no one really picks up on anything
[11:04:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: There are a lot of people that claim to know
[11:04:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just how much do they know?
[11:04:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: I have been studying this for a big video for Feb/March
[11:04:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: There is one firl
[11:04:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: girl
[11:04:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Kay
[11:05:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Who claims to know everything, and she is one of the people that also claims to have the source dev repo
[11:05:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: She is going around telling people that it only recently start up dev again like, a few months ago
[11:05:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: However, the rest of her story is all over the place
[11:05:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: wait
[11:05:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Also she is one of those stalkers I was telling you about
[11:06:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you want me to summarize?
[11:06:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Let me guess first
[11:06:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: k
[11:06:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: wait
[11:07:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[11:07:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there were multiple attempts development resets. specifically 2010. 12 and 15
[11:07:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: multiple attempted, geez, spellinh
[11:08:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I give up, you win, keyboard
[11:08:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay well, what I thought was
[11:08:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: After Orange Box, Newell, Wolpaw, Falisek, Jeep, Swift and a few others were on this press junket
[11:08:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm gonna be real impressed if you can guess the theme ans setting of each iteration
[11:08:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and*
[11:08:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh hell no
[11:09:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[11:09:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Once the junket was over, the science fair started
[11:09:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: And most of Valve's projects were put on hold and this is where F-Stop and Time and 2 Bots 1 Wrech came from
[11:10:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ep3 was being dev before this happened, but afterwards was stalled due to everyone wanting to go in and work on Portal 2
[11:10:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: F-Stop stops in like 2009-ish
[11:10:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: And the rest of POrtal 2 takes shape with a big team until 2011
[11:10:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ep3 was forgotten in the chaos, and it wasn't until 2010 that dev restarted, however with the bigger scope of HL3 instead of Ep3
[11:11:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: so far so good
[11:11:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Now, Durring the steampipe updates, there was a map that leaked, that involved bringing gas tanks to a helicopter pad in the artic
[11:12:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: This is very unknown in the community, however it points to the idea that the initial HL3 was borrowing many ideas from whatever was being deved for Ep3
[11:12:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Esentually fleshing out Ep3 into a whole game with a much longer story
[11:12:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: But
[11:12:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: DOTA 2
[11:12:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know that Valve got the license way before 12
[11:12:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: but
[11:13:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: dota has quite the interesting history too
[11:13:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: It didn't start the public beta around 12
[11:13:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: And I've allways thought that most of the HL people went over to work on the DOTA cash cow
[11:13:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then CS:GO became a much better game and that took man power over
[11:14:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: funny how you don't mention tf2
[11:14:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: However, CS is dying down, and TF is nowhere near what it was
[11:14:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: TF2 is one of my favorite games of all time
[11:14:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are like 5 people working on tf2 atm
[11:14:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: I think it's more fun then CS and DOTA
[11:14:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: And I know
[11:14:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: They are not doing the best of jobs right now
[11:15:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: The Halloween update was broken all weekend
[11:15:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: can't disagree
[11:15:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I should probably explain that one
[11:15:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Also none of them will answer an E-Mail from me
[11:16:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: in software development, there is what's called a shippable
[11:17:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's a bug not sever enough to warrant a delay
[11:18:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: some people here consider all of valve's OS X support a "shippable"
[11:18:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're not even that wrong, sadly
[11:19:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: os x is a tiny fraction of steam usage
[11:19:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and most of the time, actually always as far as i recall, we don't playtest on osx
[11:19:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: all our playtesting is done inhouse except for smaller things
[11:20:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and updates with a certain deadline won't get a dedicated playtest session at all
[11:21:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: usually we would all play tf2 for a day and write bug reports
[11:21:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that doesn't happen with osx at all
[11:21:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: everyone plays on windows
[11:21:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we have 3 macs in the entire building and they're all imacs
[11:21:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: You don't just have one guy with a Mac in the room?
[11:22:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's literally INSIDE the TF2 room. it's infuriating
[11:22:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Not even like an employees mac laptop?
[11:22:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like the major bug was that Mac would crash on server join
[11:22:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: correct
[11:22:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: That went on for hours after the update was pushed
[11:23:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: affected a tiny minority of the total playerbase
[11:23:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not defending them but it's a business decising on their part
[11:23:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and sadly the correct one
[11:24:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Alright
[11:24:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well I use Windows
[11:24:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the financial dent from loosing a couple hundred players for a day or 2 is nothing compared to missing an important deadline
[11:25:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: a whole week worth of playtesting and fixing would mean missing october
[11:25:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's all.
[11:26:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Alright
[11:26:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: back to hl
[11:27:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[11:27:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just tell me then
[11:27:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: BEcause I told you everything I have figured out so far
[11:27:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: oh k
[11:29:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: after ep2, the HL team tried to buy more time for their own final third episode by licensing episodes out to other studios
[11:29:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you probably already know that part
[11:29:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the planned order of episodes changed too
[11:29:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know about return to ravenholm
[11:30:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: and Warren Spectors
[11:30:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: And EA
[11:30:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Any others?
[11:30:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: monolith i think
[11:30:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, Xenoblade people?
[11:30:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the fear people
[11:31:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[11:31:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Btw, how do you know all this if you started in 2014?
[11:32:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what's the first thing you would do on your first day at valve?
[11:32:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Look through everything
[11:32:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Play anything
[11:33:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: this
[11:33:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Learn everything
[11:33:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: I would do that at any game company
[11:33:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: ok
[11:33:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: I get it
[11:33:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: monolith was supposed to do a horror themed episode
[11:34:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the deal never went through sadly.
[11:34:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: So no dev happened on that?
[11:34:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: none, there is concept art though
[11:35:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Have you seen it?
[11:36:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I've seen two, there are apparently more. every piece in our archival system is numbered and there are a few missing between them
[11:37:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: So the numbers were gonna be differnet?
[11:38:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah it skipps a couple numbers that are filled up by nothing
[11:38:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: What do you mean?
[11:39:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: basically, you can look at a list of all archived pieces from PCs within the local network
[11:40:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[11:40:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you want to actually look at them, you have to input the number into a pc in our archival room
[11:41:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you can view them from there
[11:41:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: So tell me the story on exactually what happened
[11:41:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: or access them via ftp, which you're not allowed to if you're not a vet.
[11:41:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: k
[11:45:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: after negotiations with monolith failed, their artists left and the other outsourced episodes weren't progressing either, the team agreed to cancel all licensed episodes and to take a break from ep3 to work on other projects
[11:47:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: as soon as portal 2 shipped everyone moved back into the hl rooms
[11:47:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: up until that point it was just supposed to be a straight sequel to ep2
[11:48:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: starting almost exactly
[11:48:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: where ep2 left off
[11:49:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It would have probably been what you and everyone else expected
[11:49:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hl2 with snow and an ending
[11:50:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they were in that weird in between period where source 1 started to really show it's age but source 2 was barely even on anyones mind
[11:51:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: in 2012, they basically threw out the entire concept of episodic content
[11:52:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that was a pretty big deal actually as some were clearly convinced that all content from now on should be episodic to avoid droughts
[11:52:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: so they started fresh
[11:53:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and tried to really set a different tone than the previous games
[11:54:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 2012 hl3 was kind of a throwback to mid-development cycle HL2
[11:54:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: by that i mean kind of dark
[11:54:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: visually and thematically
[10/23/2016 11:55:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I get sad every time I think about that particular reincarnation of HL3, it's by far my favorite
[10/23/2016 11:55:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: That period of HL2 is my favorite
[10/23/2016 11:55:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Are we talking like Air-Ex and stuff
[10/23/2016 11:55:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: ?
[10/23/2016 11:56:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're talking cremators
[10/23/2016 11:57:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: from what i've heard, the cremators came originally from an entirely different project
[10/23/2016 11:58:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but the team liked the design so much that they appeared briefly during hl2's development and again during hl3 in 2012
[10/23/2016 11:58:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I've probably seen every bit of that particular era there is
[10/23/2016 11:59:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there is actually footage of the intro sequence
[10/23/2016 11:59:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Remind me in a week an I'll try to get it
[12:00:26 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: gordon would wake up inside of an unspecified dimension
[12:00:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: apparently not xen
[12:01:30 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so you would wake up in this field of grass
[12:02:50 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and there are these beings in the sky that look kind of like living aurora borealis (the lights, not the ship)
[12:03:06 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: like worms of light or something
[12:03:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't know what was supposed to happen after that but It was definitely supposed to be the intro sequence
[12:04:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: not just for the demo but in general for the game later on
[12:04:37 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the rest of my knowledge is from a story outline and a couple of artworks
[12:05:38 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so apparently you would "wake up" from that sequence and find yourself in the midst of a battle.
[12:06:06 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: altough there were supposed to be flashbacks to that place all throughout the game
[12:06:24 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: where you would pass out and find yourself in that dimension
[12:07:45 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: i don't know if that place is supposed to be real of a construct of your mind
[12:08:01 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the lines become really blurry for that kind of stuff later on
[12:08:19 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so you're in the mids of a battle
[12:09:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's a single piece of artwork to this scene. it's a city skyline with a swarm of ships or aircraft in the sky
[12:10:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's apparently a full on invasion happening
[12:10:40 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are a couple more of there intentionally dream like scenes
[12:10:58 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they were supposed to be a recap what happened in the last few years
[12:11:04 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: 10 apparently
[12:11:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: was
[12:11:32 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: 10 years, not 10 flashbacks
[12:11:58 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and it the jumps were supposed to get intentionally more dramatic
[12:12:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you were supposed to be shocked by how much has happened and changed since ep2
[12:14:18 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so after watching how all of earth ends up getting enslaved, you finally wake up in a sterile looking room
[12:14:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: apparently for real this time
[12:16:48 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it turns out you're in a lab and I heavily suspect that you're in some kind of aperture facility
[12:18:44 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: because, and this is where it get's different, some of the artwork depicts gordon with a mechanical arm that looks very aperture-like
[12:19:29 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you somehow lost your arm, you have no idea were you've been for 10 years
[12:19:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and part of the storyline was unraveling what exactly went down during these 10 years
[12:21:51 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and in the beginning of 2014. they were making good progress
[12:22:22 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: to the point where they showed a closed doors demo to a few select media personalities
[12:22:34 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's the only playable version I ever had access to
[12:22:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and it's amazing
[12:23:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the mechanical arm replaced your weapon most of the time
[12:23:17 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you could control the elements
[12:23:20 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example
[12:23:30 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: this is the #1 reason why source exists
[12:23:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: soruce 2 that is
[12:24:11 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and that's the physics engine
[12:24:32 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they made their own custom physics engine for this to replace havok
[12:24:44 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and it's completely volumetric
[12:24:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example
[12:25:06 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can switch between ice and fire
[12:25:24 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: let's say you see an enemy down the hallway
[12:26:04 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can switch to a weapon and shoot, altough the game had steath components and you weren't supposed to shoot
[12:26:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you're in this hallway, trying to avoid bein spottet while also clearing the area of enemies
[12:27:26 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it starts off in a hallway, this particular level and you would combine your abilities to take out the enemies without being suspicious
[12:27:56 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example, you can freeze the floor a couple feet in front of you
[12:29:21 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: then you can use the ice to kick over an exploding barrel, it would slide down the hallway, enemies would mistake it as an intruder and open fire
[12:30:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can also erode support structures on a bridge by freezing, melting, freezing, melting for a while until the bridge colapses
[12:31:34 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: temperature is one of the things where volumetric physics can be pretty insane
[12:32:31 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it would simulate basic thermodynamics for things like making a baloon fly by heating up the air in front of you
[12:32:54 AM] Tyler McVicker: Why was this canned?!
[12:33:06 AM] Tyler McVicker: Everything you have said is perfect
[12:33:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and, although this didn't make it in before the cancellation, you were supposed to get an air abilityat some point later in the game
[12:34:38 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and again, thanks to volumetric physics, you would be able to blow things away from you in a physically plausible way
[12:35:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the system would also be able to simulate ropes and springs with plausible behavious
[12:36:25 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can have many ropes connected together into some kind of shape and it would behave and tear plausibly
[12:36:37 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's all still in source 2
[12:36:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but it's not reliant on source at all
[12:37:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: theoretically, we could license that technology as middleware for other engines
[12:38:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: when I joined the team, one of my first contributions was rubikon strands
[12:39:17 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's a simplified version of the rope system to plausibly simulate hair particles
[12:40:16 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can have about 5000 strands of hair on the screen with minimal framerate impact
[12:41:13 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I have backups on all the work I did on that project and more than just a few test recordings
[12:41:28 AM] Tyler McVicker: Why did it get cancelled?
[12:41:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're not done yet, I havent talked about the setting yet
[12:41:54 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[12:42:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they wanted to make it a super dark vision of the future
[12:43:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so the whole world is enslaved under this (presumably combine) network of beings
[12:43:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you're back in city 17 at some point
[12:44:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: although not much is left
[12:45:58 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: There's now a government of humans in place that have been selected by these beings as their "representatives"
[12:46:30 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: their job is to spread propaganda about these being
[12:46:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and to make it seem like a good thing
[12:48:10 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: So in city 17, theres a new resistance group of people who live off the being's radars.
[12:50:08 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you join them and I guess become their leader
[12:52:01 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you're scavenging for food with the group and you stumble upon what looks like a factory
[12:52:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, it turns out, they're making cremators in that factory
[12:53:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: every time someone commits a crime or what the representatives view as a crime, the person would be mentally tortured until they are i guess ready to become a cremator
[12:55:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they are torturing them by somehow implating hallucinations that drive them insane. then the bodies are modified to be turned into cremators who would then patrol the streets as police and light everyone on fire who doesn't abide by the rules.
[12:56:36 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: during  hl2s development, the cremators were supposed to be used against headcrabs, not humans
[12:57:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the worst part is, that's where it stopps
[12:57:17 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there is not much beyond that point
[12:57:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: games are rarely developed linearly, HL games however are. The story is usually written alongside creating the levels.
[1:00:02 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so that's where it ends in mid 2015 over creative differences. The writer apparently  had a great idea how to finish off the story and connect it back to the end of portal 2
[1:00:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the rest of the team didn't agree at all
[1:00:16 AM] Tyler McVicker: Who was the writer?
[1:00:46 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: laidlaw and at least one co writer
[1:01:18 AM] Tyler McVicker: And it got cancelled due to creative differences?
[1:02:40 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they kind of decided that it would be better to part ways so that laidlaw can focus on writing without constant whining by the designers.
[1:02:50 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it sounds more dramatic than it actually is
[1:03:01 AM] Tyler McVicker: That's why he left?
[1:03:34 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: kind of, yeah. Apparently he wasn't too happy with his work in general and thought about leaving earlier
[1:03:51 AM] Tyler McVicker: So it was cancelled because of Laidlaw
[1:03:54 AM] Tyler McVicker: Wow
[1:04:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's no bad blood though between valve and laidlaw
[1:04:54 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it was more of a mutual agreement to seperate
[1:05:15 AM] Tyler McVicker: So that leaves us with the 2015 restart
[1:05:36 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I would say it got canned because of the rest of the team constantly criticising laidlaw, not in reverse
[1:05:45 AM] Tyler McVicker: Why though?
[1:06:11 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: because he had all the good ideas
[1:06:23 AM] Tyler McVicker: This is just upsetting
[1:07:05 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the designers were just whining all the time how their opinion should be more important because it is a video game and not a book.
[1:07:24 AM] Tyler McVicker: I'm guessing these guys hadn't worked on HL2
[1:07:27 AM] Tyler McVicker: Or HL1
[1:07:46 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: nope, there isn't much left of the original employees
[1:07:57 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: on HL at least
[1:09:36 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: wanna see the key art for the 2012-2015 era?
[1:09:50 AM] Tyler McVicker: Yea sure
[1:09:51 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's not much, just keyart to visualize the tone and feel of the game
[1:17:02 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: i really like that one. there's another one called "among rats" but have access to it from at home
[1:17:03 AM] Tyler McVicker: So what was being worked on there, is completely gone now?
[1:18:18 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's a 20-ish people team right now to my knowledge. that's not tiny by valve standards but nowhere near peak 2014
[1:19:12 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's actually  kind of exciting right now
[1:19:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: don't get your hopes up though
[1:20:28 AM] Tyler McVicker: But like, is it building off of what they had, or completely restarting
[1:20:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: wolpaw has done 2 recording sessions for voice acting this week. at least he booked two
[1:20:52 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and he's not VO director on my project
[1:20:54 AM] Tyler McVicker: For Half Life?
[1:21:11 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: presumably
[1:21:29 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: definitely not l4d3
[1:21:46 AM] Tyler McVicker: So 20 people
[1:21:53 AM] Tyler McVicker: Is it the same game still?
[1:22:01 AM] Tyler McVicker: With Wolpaw working on it?
[1:24:08 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not sure if I should tell you this because it's kind of gossipy but apparently there was a falling out between newell and the design lead
[1:24:21 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: lots of shouting
[1:24:25 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're fired now
[1:24:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the design lead and his minions
[1:25:01 AM] Tyler McVicker: I heard about this actually
[1:25:10 AM] Tyler McVicker: That there were fireings
[1:25:37 AM] Tyler McVicker: Just creative differences?
[1:25:40 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they are also not telling other groups what the hell they are currently doing in that room
[1:26:18 AM] Tyler McVicker: So you don't know if it's the same game then?
[1:26:31 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they have a new designer but no experienced lead at the moment
[1:26:57 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the most recent thing i know is that wolpaw is not writing anything currently
[1:27:13 AM] Tyler McVicker: But he is doing VO stuff?
[1:27:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and I don't know what that means, did they change the story? How without writers?
[1:27:59 AM] Tyler McVicker: He had voice acting appointments
[1:28:57 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but I also don't want to get excited because, every time I mention the 2014 era, they sound so nostalgic. Not in a good way though. In a "Yeah, If only we finished that idea" way.
[1:29:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: not a quote, that's just how it sounds to me
[1:29:25 AM] Tyler McVicker: If he isn't writing, what is he doing?
[1:29:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's VO director
[1:29:54 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but here's the thing
[1:30:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so far he hasn't directed a story that he didn write himself
[1:30:30 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but supposedly, he's not writing
[1:30:54 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and last time they got so secretive, things didn't turn out well
[1:31:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so far, internal secrecy has always been a bad sign
[1:31:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: he wrote and directed robot repair
[1:31:54 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but it's been a while since then
[1:32:06 AM] Tyler McVicker: That was over a year ago
[1:32:10 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: no idea what he's doing, he comes to work every day
[1:32:33 AM] Tyler McVicker: Well, he is in the secret room
[1:32:39 AM] Tyler McVicker: Right?
[1:33:26 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the only secret room I am aware of is our VR R&D unit
[1:33:40 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the half life room is accessible
[1:33:55 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh, then how are they being secretive?
[1:34:31 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's just not hard drives upon hardd rives of working builds stacked on top of another if that's what you're hoping for.
[1:35:06 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: by half life room, I mean the meeting room for the half life group
[1:35:38 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the actual development happens in regular office rooms
[1:35:46 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, so it's being worked on, by a group larger than 10, that's all I needed to know.
[1:36:03 AM] Tyler McVicker: So like, where does the RPG.txt and HL3.txt come in?
[1:36:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, they're hints
[1:37:11 AM] Tyler McVicker: Towards what though? It leaked Oct last year and youre telling me that hl3 had stopped dev at that point.
[1:37:34 AM] Tyler McVicker: And also I have no idea on what the RPG is for
[1:37:42 AM] Tyler McVicker: There are some rumors going around.
[1:37:48 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: exactly, if you take a look at older leaks, they line up with development breaks
[1:38:03 AM] Tyler McVicker: How so?
[1:38:10 AM] Tyler McVicker: The leaks happen when dev breaks?
[1:42:41 AM] Tyler McVicker: So the things that leaked are things that were scrapped?
[1:44:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: we don't just do it with half life. If the community starts to get upset, we leak small things that hint at what was planned before we hit the roadblock. It gives them a bit more hope and us valuable feedback if they liked what we were doing. There's always the chance that we might pick it back up and continue, if they liked it
[1:45:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: kind of, yeah, but scraps that are still in consideration for the next attempt
[1:46:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: For example, when the TF2 community gets mad, we leak things to make them aware that we are actually still working on the game and caring, we're just now very efficient
[1:47:06 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, my mind needs a little bit to process all this info. I won't be spreading this, and I appreciate you coming to me to discuss all this. I just have one more question for tonight. You say that Valve has seen my stuff, and are aware of my channel, but do they look at it positively? Like, does Valve like Valve News Network?
[1:47:40 AM] Tyler McVicker: And we haven't had a tf2 leak in a long while. Have we been missing it?
[1:47:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: just not very efficient*
[1:48:02 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: no, there wasn't anything to leak this time
[1:48:22 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: this time the fuck up happened while releasing the update
[1:48:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: we can't leak parts of the update when that's the cause
[1:50:18 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I can't speak for everyone but they wouldn't watch your videos for feedback if they don't care what you have to say
[1:52:33 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: just maybe don't link to archives of pirated copies of most of our games?
[1:53:44 AM] Tyler McVicker: Yea I understand that, I'm gonna redo the archive and remove some the dlls and stuff of the leaks.
[1:54:05 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't think you have to
[1:54:32 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh is Valve gonna take it down?
[1:54:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: we don't sue, we just shake our heads on disappointment
[1:54:53 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: nooo, nothings going to happen afaik
[1:55:24 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh, well I didn't realize
[1:55:34 AM] Tyler McVicker: I won't be linking to the archive anymore then.
[1:55:57 AM] Tyler McVicker: Does this mean Valve doesn't like reporting on Leaks at all? Like those that had happened in the video?
[1:56:16 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's been up for a while and aside from some not so thrilled comments, no one here wan'ts do do anything about it
[1:56:37 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: leaks are fine
[1:56:59 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: 80% of them are controlled ones anyway
[1:58:14 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, I figured. I didnt realize it was upsetting. Anyways, I appreciate the conversation, and I'll try to message you soon so we can continue, I've just got class in the morning
[1:58:19 AM] Tyler McVicker: Thanks
[1:59:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: no problem. I will keep you updated
[2:00:12 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: message me via mail please, I won't check and maintain this account unless for conversations
[3:18:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just got out of the nintendo meeting
[3:18:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[3:18:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they offered 6 figures for an exclusive
[3:18:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're thinking about it
[3:19:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's pretty interesting
[3:19:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Probably a Unity made game
[3:19:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Something Puzzle, attached to Aperture
[3:19:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: could be unreal. most here seem to be team unreal and NX supports it
[3:19:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Nice
[3:20:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Unreal is cool too
[3:20:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: switch, sorry. that's a habit by now
[3:20:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: I still call it NX
[3:20:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: I reported on that thing since it's first announcement, it's NX to me for a while
[3:20:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we got 5 of each
[3:20:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are 2 versions
[3:20:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: What do you mean each?
[3:21:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: one with just the screen part that looks more or less identical to the one in the reveal video
[3:21:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and one with a "box" at the back with built in lan and a controller port
[3:21:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh, so a dev unit
[3:22:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, they're final internals though
[3:22:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Does the box one have like, 2 coaxel looking things
[3:22:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Sticking out
[3:22:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: uh, they do. how do you know?
[3:23:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: It leaked the day before the reveal
[3:23:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: oh
[3:23:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: So that's pretty sweet
[3:23:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Did they show anything of interest?
[3:24:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we talked for almost 2 hours, they showed pretty much everything there is to show
[3:24:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Nice
[3:24:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Was that Mario footage representative of anything?
[3:25:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how do you know they showed us mario?
[3:25:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Did you see the reveal?
[3:25:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: of course
[3:25:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: It had like 4 seconds of Mario something
[3:25:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: oh, sorry, I thought you asked about the footage they showed us
[3:25:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: It was like, Samba de Mario Galaxy
[3:25:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hah, kind of
[3:26:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they weren't very specific and refused to answer questions about it. they showed us 2 tech demos, one of which was a new mario game
[3:27:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Did it look more like Galaxy, 64 or 3D World?
[3:27:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm getting sunshine vibes, there were NPCs
[3:28:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Piantas or something new
[3:28:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hidden UI though, as in the trailer
[3:28:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Figured
[3:28:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: It would give it away
[3:28:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the stage they showed was a forrest level
[3:28:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh
[3:28:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: so I'm guessing multiple settings, not just one
[3:28:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: That could mean 64 style is back babeeee
[3:29:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: Little background on me
[3:29:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Galaxy is my favorite game of all time
[3:29:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Portal is close, but Galaxy wins it
[3:30:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's an overview mode that switches to a top down view of the stage
[3:30:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can place waypoints
[3:30:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: looked open world to me
[3:30:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i asked about that and they refused to answer
[3:31:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or maybe they are just big levels that have the man goal of the star, but side "quests" as well
[3:31:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: either that or one connected world with multiple settings
[3:31:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, did they say if vet staff was working on this?
[3:32:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or no answers on that
[3:32:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they didn't even confirm wether it's an actual game or just a techdemo
[3:32:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: But that seems to be fleshed out a big more to be a tech demo
[3:33:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: looked way too good for just a demo though. all the assets look new and original
[3:33:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: And this console is out in 5 months
[3:33:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's too late to not be having full games nearing completion
[3:33:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Tech demos are for console 2 years off
[3:33:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: or to convince devs to work on exclusives
[3:34:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: Irk?
[3:34:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: This was the leak
[3:34:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, that's legit
[3:34:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[3:34:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's a screenshot of the manual
[3:34:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh nice
[3:35:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's odd how they are still using the Nunchuk port
[3:35:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand that the NES Mini uses it, but are they planning on having support for that?
[3:35:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'd do the same. why make an entirely new design for dev hardware?
[3:35:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no, it's to connect controllers
[3:35:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: for dev purposes
[3:35:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Dev controllers?
[3:36:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yes, there's no bluetooth on the devkit
[3:36:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[3:36:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: controllers connect via wire
[3:36:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Does it just look like the Pro controller with a cable?
[3:37:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's just a wii u pro controller with a cable. they said we're getting final controllers as soon as they roll off the production line.
[3:37:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[3:38:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Was the other "Tech Demo" Splatoon?
[3:38:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no, the Adam demo by Unity
[3:38:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh, okay
[3:38:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: It ran that well?
[3:39:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it looked like 30 fps
[3:39:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: But it's the Adam demo
[3:39:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't know if they made any visual downgrades
[3:39:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: On a handheld
[3:39:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but I doubt it, looked as I remember it
[3:41:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're using a custom tegra class chip. seems to be on par with xbox one or slightly below
[3:41:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: So they gave Valve 10 units, and want an exclusive
[3:41:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which is damn impressive for a portable
[3:41:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Did they show off the dock and all that?
[3:42:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they we're very clear about not wanting to pressure us. we can just keep the kits and decide whether or not we want to do anything with them
[3:42:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Wow they really want HL3
[3:42:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if we do decide to, they would offer between 150k to 400k depending on the franchise
[3:42:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: Haha, they actually do want HL
[3:43:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they specifically asked for an exclusive  HL spinoff
[3:43:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: I could see a Portal thing no problem, like, with Co-Op for those controllers and stuff
[3:43:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Who all was in the meeting?
[3:44:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, did Gabe seem at all interested?
[3:44:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: around 20 people. gabe and a few other core members were there
[3:45:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he was as impressed as anyone else in that room
[3:45:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh well that's cool
[3:46:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I tried real hard not to go all fangirl on them
[3:46:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is it really that impressive hardware wise?
[3:46:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there focus being on "tried"
[3:46:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[3:46:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: I would have died
[3:46:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: They didn't have any NOJ people there did they?
[3:46:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It's no scorpio but for what is essentially half handheld? yeah, very impressed
[3:47:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nope, just nintendo devs and management
[3:47:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: bill trinen wasn't there either, sadly
[3:47:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Reggie?
[3:47:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah
[3:47:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I didn't recognize anyone
[3:48:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Those Treehouse people?
[3:48:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: actually one guy, I know from last years treehouse
[3:48:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the rest I didn't recognize
[3:48:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, the treehouse people are pretty memorable
[3:49:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: current console games can be ported with minimal sacrifices and they run both docked and on the go
[3:49:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Does docking do anything to performance?
[3:49:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: though the console runs at a lower clock speed when on the go
[3:49:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[3:49:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: most likely due to thermals
[3:49:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: I figured
[3:49:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's about a 20% difference
[3:49:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: What's the res on the go vs docked?
[3:50:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which can mostly be matched visually by just dropping to 720p for mobile use
[3:50:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: docked up to 1080p and mobile up to 720p
[3:50:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: I predicted correctly
[3:50:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that may not be the screen resolution though, they were vague
[3:51:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the vita renders at 720 and has a 544 screen, i suspect they're doing something similiar
[3:51:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why is that a good thing?
[3:51:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: To have a lesser res screen?
[3:51:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: less than native?
[3:52:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[3:52:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because downsampling looks nicer than rendering straight 544
[3:52:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: And a 544 screen is cheaper?
[3:53:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not saying the nx has a 544 screen, just that they didn't want to discuss specs at all aside from what they provided
[3:53:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[3:53:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they said mobile supports up to 720p, they didn't say that it's a 720p screen, that' all
[3:54:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: What's the general feeling of the office after the meeting? You think it might happen?
[3:54:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's now an NX group on our intranet, only 2 members so far though
[3:54:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that doesn't mean that it's gonna happen as you should know by now
[3:55:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, it's definitely interesting to think about
[3:55:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they gave us a quick overview of the concept and their goals
[3:56:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Anything more than the reveal went into?
[3:57:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: basically, NX is their only home console but it may not be the only handheld
[3:57:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that depends entirely on the success of the switch brand
[3:58:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're considering a smaller, weaker version for just handheld games
[3:58:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but these games would still run on the regular switch
[3:58:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: although not the other way around
[3:59:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Could one of the games be programmed to run better depending on the configuration it's played on?
[4:00:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yes, they don't enforce parity between docked and mobile. you don't have to make your docked game work on mobile if you don't want to
[4:00:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but there has to be some kind of equal functionality on the go
[4:01:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we don't have docks btw
[4:01:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why?
[4:01:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the devkits don't have bottom IO
[4:01:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's a white plastic bar at the bottom
[4:02:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because the EDEV has HDMI
[4:02:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and an extra fan
[4:02:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[4:02:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: EDEV is for capturing and prototyping and SDEV is for playtesting
[4:02:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can upload builds to EDEV via lan
[4:03:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: SDEV can only read flash cards
[4:03:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: of which we got 50
[4:03:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: How loarge are they
[4:03:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: a literal box full of cards
[4:03:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 25 gigs
[4:03:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are bigger ones on the way
[4:03:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay good
[4:03:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 25 should be the target though
[4:04:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: or 24 i think
[4:04:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: SDEVs have UI at all?
[4:05:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not much beyond what's shown in the photo
[4:05:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[4:05:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's a setup wizard in the beginning to sign up for a nintendo acc and for language and location settings
[4:05:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: So they are pushing MyNintendo
[4:05:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can pick your location freely, though I'm not sure if that's staying for the retail release
[4:06:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I have a strong impression that it's region free
[4:06:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's already confirmed to be
[4:06:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or at least semi-confirmed
[4:06:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: There was an NOE rep that said it would be, but then the interview was taken down
[4:06:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we had to fill our a survey
[4:06:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: About what
[4:06:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they asked for things like "would you be interested in an achievement system?"
[4:07:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: "Yes"
[4:07:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's 5 months Nitnendo
[4:07:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Do you think that March date will stick?
[4:07:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and if achievements should reward a currency that you can spend in games
[4:07:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: like play coins
[4:08:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 5 months is more than enough to add achievements
[4:08:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: march is going to stick
[4:09:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: There was a patent app out talking about that.
[4:09:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: one interesting thing is:
[4:10:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they didn't talk about this and I forgot to bring it up but the documentation suggests that you can emulate touch input via IR
[4:10:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can use touch on the go or pointing at home
[4:10:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not sure how that's going to work without wii motes
[4:11:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are at least code snippets to get the location info of an IR cursor
[4:11:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and they use the same function as touch interaction
[4:12:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's weird.
[4:12:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe the joy cons would do it?
[4:12:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: That's the weirdest part
[4:13:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we didn't get any
[4:13:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: What
[4:13:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're not ready to be released
[4:13:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay then
[4:13:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: So the final design is not done?
[4:13:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they want to reveal some secret about them publicly before they risk leaks
[4:13:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no, they're done
[4:13:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: What do you mean?
[4:14:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just not ready to be in the hands of devs
[4:14:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i think the secret is that they double as wiimotes
[4:14:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: I thought it want backwards compatible
[4:14:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Wasn't
[4:14:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it isn't
[4:15:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but I suspect you can flip the joycons around
[4:15:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and there's an IR emitter on the other side
[4:15:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you just switch hands
[4:15:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: noticed how they never show the botton in the video?
[4:15:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: bottom
[4:15:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: I did yea
[4:16:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're bringing back the web framework
[4:16:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: old wii u projects can be ported with literally a single click
[4:16:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay cool
[4:17:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: The button layout is what doesn't make sense though
[4:17:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: For it to be used as a WiiMote
[4:18:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: why not though? the stick is at the bottom of the left joycon. if you switch hands, you still have buttons under your right thumb and a stick under your left
[4:18:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm almost certain that's their reason for an asymetrical stick layout
[4:19:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the stick is at the top*
[4:19:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you flip the whole thing around, you're still getting the same layout
[4:20:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh yea.
[4:20:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[4:21:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's essentially the same as wiimote + nunchuck
[4:21:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you're just missing the B button
[4:21:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: You have the triggers on the back
[4:21:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Those could maybe work.
[4:22:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you would have to press them with your pinky
[4:22:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Gmm
[4:22:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Hmm
[4:22:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, there are dual sholder buttons at the inside
[4:22:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: shoulder
[4:22:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the part that slides into the screen
[4:22:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: at least that's what it looked like in their photos
[4:23:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: I thought so
[4:23:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: I figured it would have too
[4:23:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Hey, I'll brb, I have to run out and do something, I'll me back in under an hour.
[4:23:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is that okay?
[4:24:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't think I'm available for more than 20 minutes
[4:24:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I haven't been at the vr office all day
[4:24:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and there's a lot of work to do
[4:25:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay. Well, I have a few questions, answer them when you get time.
[4:25:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sure, just write them all down as a list and I will work my way through
[4:29:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: 1. Whats the progress on the VR game right now? 
2. Was Alyx or Kliener in the 2015 era? 
3. Why did you come to me to tell me this stuff? 
4. Will there be a entire hardware revision for the Vive soon? 
5. Is Valves relationship with HTC still good? 
6. Is it not known exactly what the Hl team is even working on anymore? 
7. Could I see the intro footage from the 15 build? 
8. If you have any art or stuff from FStop, that would really help with the writing of a video.
9. Are there any other smaller teams working on random stuff around the office? 
10. What exactly is the l4d team even working on? Is it a full sequel or a completely different type of game?
[4:29:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, ttyl
[4:43:00 PM | Edited 4:43:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 1. Whats the progress on the VR game right now? 40% done if I had to put a number on it. We're targeting a surprise release during Dev Days 2017 if and only if we're happy with the game's state by then. You may hear first bits of info at GDC. We're probably going to have a VR talk and could use the chance to hint at what we're working on. Possibly footage too. I can't tell you what's going to happen until a few days prior. We're really bad at predictions and change our minds too often to promise anything.
[4:46:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 2. Was Alyx or Kliener in the 2015 era? Neither were mentioned in any of the footage and artwork I saw.
[5:08:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 3. Why did you come to me to tell me this stuff? Seeing all these amazing projects end up absolutely nowhere is just crushing every single time. It's relieving in a way to talk about them. My original idea was just to contact you about the "the know" video because you had doubts about their source. I know who their source is (no, it's not me) and I know what said source sent them. They misquoted the person by saying that Valve is scared of the feedback to a game that can't live up to it's hype. In reality their source said that it doesn't make sense to get a game out the door just for the sake of having a 3 in the name when that kind of attitude can only lead to a bad game and a tarnished reputation. We would rather not release anything and hold fans over until they stop caring than to alienate them by releasing something that's less than perfect. There are also more important things to focus on than single player games. Steam and community made content, sadly, have a much bigger positive impact on the company. If we're ever going to release a classic single player non-VR game, it's because we want to and because we like how it turned out, not because fans demand it. The number 1 rule at valve is to work on what YOU want to work on. They hired me as a VR Engineer but I'm free to do whatever I want, like fancy hair rendering.
[5:12:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 4. Will there be a entire hardware revision for the Vive soon? I don't know, Vive is HTC's product, we simply provide the technology and a standard for all headsets. We worked with them on a new set of controllers that brings feature parity with Oculus Touch for the most part. It would make sense to bundle them with a hardware revision.
[6:29:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 5. Is Valves relationship with HTC still good? Not really. They screwed up the launch and insist on unnecessary margins of about 10% on top of BOM and staff. We agreed to a partnership under the impression that they would sell at cost. They're close to cost but still making profit on the hardware, which we didn't agree to and are not okay with. We're actively looking for additional partners for Steam VR branded headsets.

They also love to make announcements on our behave that aren't based on reality whatsoever. At the time they said that we're working on an Half-Life game for VR, we weren't even thinking about a first party VR game, let alone Half-Life.

Asus, LG and Oculus were among possible candidates for the first round and LG will likely be our pick moving forward. 

Yes, Oculus. We had and to some degree still have a good relationship and wanted the Rift to be sold under SteamVR co-branding but Alan Yates despises them. He's still pissed about Michael Abrash's departure and slings mud at Oculus for every chance he gets. The VR team had an open exchange of research with Oculus before I joined the company. He quickly killed every chance we ever had at a proper partnership when he started accusing them of stealing, even though both sided profited greatly from the exchange.

Our goal was to establish a unified VR consortium with Oculus and anyone else who would like to join. We wanted to create standards that would allow every PC headset to be used across every PC VR platform, be it SteamVR, Oculus Home or other platforms by members of the consortium.

Oculus has done some questionable shit but I have to defend them on this one. They were open to the idea of allowing Vive on the Oculus platform but they wanted native support of the Oculus SDK and all it's features. Yates still refuses to allow Oculus access to the Vive source even though HTC and almost everyone on the VR group are on board. We have the full source code of fairly recent Oculus Runtime builds, yet he refuses to do the same. Basically everything is a democratic process at Valve and the groups as a collective get to decide but he's a relic from the early 2012 days of Steam VR and some of the required pieces are under his sole ownership. There's a person here specifically to overthrow people like him in situations like these but we have no leverage against him. We can't sign off on his property. 

We're now in a situation where Oculus Rift + Touch can run the entire SteamVR library at roughly the same price while Vive can only be used with Steam. It's in our best interest to lure people over to Steam but we don't want to restrict what people can do with our licensed hardware. Yates seems to enjoy the fact that Oculus got all the heat for this.

The Razer folks don't want to be a manufacturer, sadly, they want to establish an open source headset without any form of corporate oversight.
[6:41:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 6. Is it not known exactly what the Hl team is even working on anymore? We don't have a rigid hierarchy. We're all on the same level of authority except for Gabe but most of the time, a lead emerges naturally during the process of creating a group. If said lead prefers to keep information within the group then they'll most likely respect that. We've done the same multiple times where we weren't happy with the state of Robot Repair and later The Lab and we'd simply refuse to show it to anyone who isn't legitimately interested in joining the group.
[6:41:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I do have some news though
[6:42:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: What is the news
[6:43:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I attended their meeting today and it's definitely not dead but it's not about to be unveiled either. The project is currently looking for additional people to ramp up development.
[6:44:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: They're feeling confident but it's too early to tell wether this is the one
[6:44:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the story has changed, some of the gameplay elements carry over
[6:44:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the arm won't be back but there will be more to do than just shoot
[6:44:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Source 2 still or Unreal?
[6:45:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can explore a fairly open city environment with underground passages and ziplines
[6:45:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the latter is a direct result of positive reception to a controlled leak
[6:46:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Crowbar Ziplines
[6:46:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: Alright
[6:48:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're hiring and hoping that a new influx of people could ramp up development on HL3 and Source 2.
[6:48:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: The new office?
[6:48:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah, we're not expanding any time soon
[6:49:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just hiring new people
[6:49:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: I thought Valve was getting a new office
[6:50:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're moving, we're not adding a second office solely dedicated to a single player game which is what I want.
[6:51:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and that's still more than half a year away
[6:53:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: So I just had something click today.
[6:53:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: You said that "We would only make a retro game If we wanted too" thing that Gabe said a couple of years ago.
[6:54:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: I now know that doesn't mean that Valve isn't NOT working on things, but instead they are, and the only reason they are is because employees want too.
[6:55:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: our main reasons are that we can't do VR in the current building as the room requirements would get out of hand fast. For our VR game, we're going to need a whole floor for simultaneous playtesting. Our approach for The Lab was WFH, which is a problem if you can't find a decent amount of people internally with big enough rooms to test at max play area size.
[6:55:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: correct
[6:57:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it also means that we're not going to finish a classic single player game just because we started and because fands demand it. We're releasing when it's ready, if it's ever ready.
[6:57:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: HL looks like it's on the right track
[6:58:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but Source 2 is still causing headache
[6:59:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: They told a few devs at the Dev Days about the state of Source 2 and their reaction made them reconsider a rework of the engine
[7:00:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: partially because there is still room for innovation and partially because it would be embarassing to launch HL3 on Unreal or Unity after all the hype around Source 2
[7:01:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 7. Could I see the intro footage from the 15 build? I'm trying my best to obtain screenshots at the very least. There is supposed to be a recording of the media briefing but I'll have to do more digging
[7:03:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 8. If you have any art or stuff from FStop, that would really help with the writing of a video.I will do my best. We're still using some models from FStop for our VR project, I can send you pictures of them but you can't show them in the video or acknowledge their existence
[7:07:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand, I already have most of that video written in my head anyways
[7:08:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 9. Are there any other smaller teams working on random stuff around the office? We have groups for Left 4 Dead, Half-Life, VR games, VR software (mainly SteamVR itself), Steamworks, Anti-Cheat, hardware, merchandise and a couple more that I can't recall without looking them up.
[7:08:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the hardware group made our steam controllers
[7:09:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and they're working on a revision
[7:09:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: I love the steam controller
[7:09:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: What do you think about it?
[7:09:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I know, right? I pressured them to keep the gyro controls after playing splatoon
[7:10:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: So they want to remove the gyro!?
[7:10:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's perfect for Dolphin
[7:11:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, there was like a 10% usage rate among family & friends testers
[7:11:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: How many F&F testers use Emulators though?
[7:11:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: omg I never thought about using the gyro for IR.
[7:11:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: good point, I just play all shooters with gyro controls
[7:11:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's a big ol' pain to set up, but amazing once it is
[7:12:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're working on open source steam controller support
[7:12:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: so no more closed API needed
[7:12:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that should enable support for many different applications
[7:12:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Good, the Dolphin guys would have that up in like 3 days
[7:13:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is the revision much of a change?
[7:13:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Because I know it was talked about a little bit at GDC
[7:13:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they can also just try to go through greenlight or our dev contacts. I don't think we have a policy against emulators on the store, I may be wrong though
[7:14:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: especially since MS approved an N64 emulator on Xbox One. I think we're on board with that
[7:15:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're considering 2 versions, an improved streamlined steam controller with quieter motors
[7:15:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and one with a touch screen like in our earliest model
[7:16:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: A full on screen?
[7:16:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: battery life's an issue though. I doubt that one will make it past playtesting
[7:17:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: a full, somewhat low resolution oled with only black and white used to save on battery life as much as possible
[7:17:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: What would be the purpose of the screen then?
[7:18:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hotkey buttons in configurable size and shape, note taking or as a second screen for basic stats and maps
[7:19:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: So we Wii U now. That would probably be more expensive right?
[7:19:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, that's gonna be 150+
[7:19:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: At least I can sellsome CS:GO skins for it
[7:19:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're targeting 40 for the slim
[7:19:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: How much smaller is it going to be?
[7:20:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: about the same, just better ergonomics and shoulder buttons that won't make you want to kill yourself
[7:20:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: The Bumbers are pretty bad, the triggers are fine
[7:21:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Very stiff
[7:21:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hollow and plasticy
[7:21:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[7:21:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Very loud
[7:22:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's probably going to be bent away from your hand instead of inwards
[7:22:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: customers don't seem to like the convex curve : (
[7:22:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: concave, damn it
[7:22:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: I like concave lol
[7:22:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: same
[7:23:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Im gonna force them to make a custom gen 1 steam controller with good shoulder buttons just for me
[7:23:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol, but it's the same shape though right?
[7:23:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the same dimensions, at least the current prototype is
[7:23:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: How far off would that be?
[7:25:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I would expect an announcement fairly early into the year for the slim
[7:25:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're probably going to announce it right after playtesting
[7:26:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: The screen one will probably never come out
[7:26:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: probably not...
[7:26:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: always liked the idea
[7:26:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well I mean, it's 150 so that will probably be a very small install base
[7:26:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's better then the Elite One controller, but still
[7:27:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: I would buy one, but that's because I have a reason too.
[7:27:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: (And also because I could just take a sponsorship from one of these trading sites once to get it)
[7:27:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: skin trading sites?
[7:28:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Backpack.tf
[7:28:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: mostly
[7:28:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't do gambling stuff
[7:28:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: better be quick until our hands are forced to shut external trading as a whole down
[7:28:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: I did once, it was a nightmare
[7:28:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: External trading is what exactly?
[7:28:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like the API for other sites?
[7:29:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: trading using anything else than services owned by valve
[7:29:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay well
[7:29:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: OpSkins is dead
[7:29:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[7:29:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: That site is great
[7:29:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're in serious legal trouble about CSGO Lotto and may be forced to kill the API
[7:29:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: over *
[7:29:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[7:29:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: I didn't think it would end up like that
[7:30:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not a fan of were we're going in terms of microtransactions and random loot
[7:30:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well it's been around for 7-ish years now
[7:30:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Paid Sprays
[7:31:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah...
[7:31:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Explain this to me, why was this seen as a good idea
[7:32:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: It wasn't by anyone except than the CSGO team, which is the worst group to work with
[7:32:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: except the*
[7:32:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is it really?
[7:32:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they do not care at all
[7:32:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: some do, I assume
[7:32:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cliffe doesn't care?
[7:33:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but again, we have a democratic process, if they make decisions like these, it means that more than 50% are in agreement
[7:35:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Jess is a truly good guy but he's reduced himself to an advisor role, more or less.
[7:36:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's mainly working on levels for the L4D group where he is one of 2 level design leads
[7:36:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh that's interesting
[7:37:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: I liked the Inferno remake, ad the Beta branch is great. Just, ya know, Paid sprays
[7:37:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's also not at the office every single day, he's WFH most of the time
[7:37:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: WFH?
[7:37:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh
[7:37:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: working from home
[7:37:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Work from home
[7:37:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[7:37:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: You can do that at Valve often?
[7:37:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: every day if it helps your creative output
[7:38:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are artists at the company who I've never seen in person
[7:38:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh, then why don't people work from other parts of the country?
[7:38:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they do
[7:38:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh crap
[7:38:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're hiring globally
[7:38:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[7:39:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: mostly for translations but there are opportunities for artists and other positions as long as they are permitted to work for an US based company.
[7:41:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: send your resume to http://www.valvesoftware.com/jobs/ and maybe you'll hear back
[7:41:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: The problem I experienced with the Paid Sprays is that so many people defended it, and had huge problems that I shit talked them in a video. If it was any other company it would have been down voted to oblivion, but because it was Valve, they defend everything. I don't think the CS team doesn't completely care, we have been getting more Reddit comments, and the whole "ep2" beta branch joke was funny.
[7:41:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: I always liked the whole set your own goals set-up at Valve, mostly due to the fact I do that everyday already.
[7:44:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know it would never happen, but I've had an idea, and started writing a huge documentary on Valve, the games, and all the cancelled projects that are known. I'm gonna do it but it would be amazing to get it made on some official level.
[7:44:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like get some interviews and some art and stuff
[7:44:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like my Portal video level of writing, but about the whole dang history of the company.
[7:44:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Yeah, I am surprised at how much good will there is left for us
[7:45:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: http://www.valvesoftware.com/jobs/ click on "have a better idea"
[7:45:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[7:46:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: send us a detailed overview of what you want to do
[7:46:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: Very nervous about that, wanted to wait until I get a big bigger.
[7:46:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: I wanted to get better at making stuff
[7:46:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, I'm pushing myself to make one doc video a month.
[7:47:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's pretty impressive. You're doing this all alone?
[7:51:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 10. What exactly is the l4d team even working on? Is it a full sequel or a completely different type of game?It's a different approach to the same concept. One that works for screens and VR.
[7:52:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's titled L4D3 at the moment but they haven't decided on a final name yet
[7:53:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: calling it L4D3 might lead to some anger at the changes, calling it L4D - Cool Subtitle Here would sell less copies
[7:56:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: You're going to see a few first leaks soon to gauge how the community feels about some of these changes
[7:57:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't understand why they're not just releasing it on Early Access. That's what that platform is for.
[7:58:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: The game is playable and has an already higher level of polish than most third party releases on steam.
[7:59:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Maybe, some day I'll wake up and they stealth released the game over night on Early Access.
[8:05:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We're making progress on an adaption of Oculus' "Spacewarp" tech. I'd say about a month until it's out
[8:05:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We've just finished our work on asynchonous reprojection, which is now live on the beta branch.
[8:06:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's an adaptation of "timewarp"
[8:07:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i think we need wacky names for our tech too
[8:09:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: There shouldn't be any frame pacing issues on steam vr from now on. I haven't had a chance to thoroughly test it though, we just set it live on the beta branch after I came out of the nintendo meeting.
[8:11:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I voted "next week" but oh well
[8:18:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: woah
[8:19:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the nx group has 6 members
[8:19:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: I do all my work by myself, except for a close friend that I discuss and workshop ideas with.
[8:20:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I almost want to switch to that group for a month or so
[8:20:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[8:21:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: alright, I'm joining them for the day to see what they're up to
[8:21:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: THe Switch group? Or the HL Group?
[8:21:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: switch
[8:21:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[8:21:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: So if enough people want to, then it would happen?
[8:21:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like that's the only factor at play here?
[8:21:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yep
[8:22:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Awesome
[8:22:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Gabe is out entire management
[8:22:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: our
[8:22:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, it would probably cause some initial backlash, but it would sell incredibly well
[8:22:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know, is he a nice guy in real life?
[8:23:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's my main concern right now. I'm thinking a HL NX announcement would cause riots in the streets
[8:24:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: It wouldn't have to be HL though
[8:24:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, gabe is nice. He's kind of a weirdo but in a good way
[8:24:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, quirky?
[8:24:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah
[8:24:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Knife collecting, exersize ball kinda guy?
[8:24:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: like, thousands of knives in his office - quirky
[8:24:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: exactly
[8:25:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: So Dwight Schruit?
[8:25:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: schrute
[8:25:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I haven't seen a single episode of the office
[8:25:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: YOU WHAT
[8:25:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not much of a TV person and I'm binging on always sunny at the moment
[8:26:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: I recommend the office, a lot
[8:26:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's the best
[8:26:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which one is considered the better version?
[8:26:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: US
[8:26:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: UK is okay, it's to hyped up
[8:26:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: The characters in US are so much better
[8:27:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: Specifically Jim, Dwight and Pam
[8:28:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: I might be biased due to growing up with the show, but it's great.
[8:29:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm gonna give it a shot once I'm done with always sunny
[8:29:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Season 1 sucks
[8:29:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: It gets good half though season 2
[8:30:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then it stays great for the rest of the show
[8:30:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm sitting in the back of our improvised NX room, pretending to check twitter
[8:31:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Dang, how long are people at work?
[8:31:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 10-17 usually
[8:31:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: hours a day!?
[8:31:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but we can stay until 22 if we want to
[8:32:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh you're talking about Military Time
[8:33:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah 10-17 as in 10 am to 5 pm. I'm used to the 24h system because that's what we use for scheduling
[8:33:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: People stick around until 10 PM?
[8:34:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're on some weird open source scheduling system because it's the only one that works with our databases without the need for custom software
[8:34:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if they want to, sure
[8:35:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we have an arcade, a massage room and 2 LAN rooms, why wouldn't you stay a bit logner and chill?
[8:36:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I can't complain about my schedule or treatment here at all. I don't think there's a better place in the industry.
[8:37:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no one is ever forced to work in crunch mode, we can stay how ever long we want as long as it helps with our creative output
[8:37:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Its salaried work right?
[8:38:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yes, an hourly system would work against our core concepts
[8:39:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea that makes sense
[8:39:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's also why projects tend to die off. There is no one who forces you to work on something you don't enjoy.
[8:40:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea I know, but it's also why when things come out it's great
[8:40:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: exactly
[8:40:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: No one told me what to do or where to go on my first day
[8:41:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: They gave me a fancy handbook and told me to join whatever project looks fun an is vaguely VR related
[8:41:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: I love the handbook
[8:42:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We're constantly making changes, too.
[8:42:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: pretty much anyone at valve can contribute to the handbook
[8:43:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm away for 20 minutes or so
[8:43:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I gotta participate in the discussion, this is way too interesting
[8:47:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: Np
[10/25/2016 9:07:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: What are your thoughts on a Half-Life realtime strategy game during the seven hour war? We're thinking there's a lot of potential for touch and IR controls and we can explore a mostly untold part of the timeline.
[10/25/2016 9:08:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We're not sure how we would make that work, considering the humans loose but I'm sure we can figure something out
[10/25/2016 9:08:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: I think that is a great seed of an idea.
[10/25/2016 9:08:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Possibly start the right after the Cascade
[10/25/2016 9:08:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe have the tutirals be in BM against easy mobs like headcrabs and stuff
[10/25/2016 9:09:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe not have the whole game be about the 7 hours way entirely
[10/25/2016 9:09:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: But different eras
[10/25/2016 9:09:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like the Cascade, the initial invasion (7 hours) and the following rebellion
[10/25/2016 9:10:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe have a few funny Freeman appearances
[10/25/2016 9:10:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's brilliant
[10/25/2016 9:11:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: a perfect way to close any gaps before and during the events of HL2
[10/25/2016 9:11:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Thanks man
[10/25/2016 9:12:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: especially what the resistance is up to before gordon shows up
[10/25/2016 9:12:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we can re tell the battle of city 17 from their pov
[10/25/2016 9:12:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then use the events of HL2, and maybe use it as a precursor to the future story
[10/25/2016 9:13:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I need an honest opinion: do you think people would get mad if we unveil this before HL3?
[10/25/2016 9:13:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes, initially, however, the internet always gets made about everything
[10/25/2016 9:13:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: They will calm down
[10/25/2016 9:13:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: idk man
[10/25/2016 9:13:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: If it's a good game it will speak for itself
[10/25/2016 9:14:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Think Paper Mario Color Splash
[10/25/2016 9:14:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i know but
[10/25/2016 9:14:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Everybody hated the trailer, but then it got good reviews and now is reguarded as a good game
[10/25/2016 9:14:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Honestly, anything Half-Life will make people excited
[10/25/2016 9:14:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes, it being on a Nintendo console will cause from friction, but the switch is everything people are talking about
[10/25/2016 9:15:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 76 isn't exactly what we would consider a good game but I get what you're saying
[10/25/2016 9:15:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: And the fact that Valve is on board will sell some units
[10/25/2016 9:15:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 9:15:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 9:15:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, oaky
[10/25/2016 9:15:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 9:15:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: How hard would it be to announce it along with "Oh yea, we are working on it"
[10/25/2016 9:15:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: The only thing people want is a "we are working on it"
[10/25/2016 9:15:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's all
[10/25/2016 9:16:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: idk, I think there will be riots
[10/25/2016 9:16:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't know how actuve you are on /r/Half-Life
[10/25/2016 9:16:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: But I'm there everyday
[10/25/2016 9:16:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: People are crushed because they are getting nothing
[10/25/2016 9:16:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: This is something
[10/25/2016 9:16:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: active enough to be depressed by proxy
[10/25/2016 9:17:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Valve would have to make it clear that this is not Half-Life 3, and that Half-Life 3 is still going to happen eventually
[10/25/2016 9:17:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Express what you expressed to me, about how it needs to be made in the perfect situation to be able to meet or exceed expectations.
[10/25/2016 9:17:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Even if we're starting the reveal off by stating loud and clear that this is not Half-Life 3, we'd still get disliked into oblivion
[10/25/2016 9:17:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: It may be in dev hell, but eventually it will be finished once you guys hit that stride, which is probably about to happen anyways
[10/25/2016 9:17:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[10/25/2016 9:17:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: Initally
[10/25/2016 9:18:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: But the internet is a very volatile place
[10/25/2016 9:18:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm not sure
[10/25/2016 9:18:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Most Likely HL3 that doesn't immediately answer the Eli question will be disliked just as much
[10/25/2016 9:18:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we've had protest in front of the office twice, this year alone. It's not even funny anymore
[10/25/2016 9:19:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, yea, I know
[10/25/2016 9:19:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Those are all over the internet everytime
[10/25/2016 9:19:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Look, I know this community better than most, and yes, the general public will probably be iffy, and the hardcore fans will be devided, but if you make a great game, it won't matter after the release.
[10/25/2016 9:20:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: All you have to do if announce it along with "THis is not replaceing HL3, we are still working to make the perfect HL follow up"
[10/25/2016 9:20:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: "Also sub to VNN"
[10/25/2016 9:20:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but do we want to nuke our reputation and good will from the community for 300k and 80% of sales?
[10/25/2016 9:20:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because that's their offer for something canon  in the HL universe
[10/25/2016 9:21:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: But you wouldn't be doing that if you communicate what the hell is going on
[10/25/2016 9:21:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Even in somewhat broad terms, don't get into the specifcs about each version of the project, but instead explain how Valve works, make parallels to TF2 and HL2, and people will understand
[10/25/2016 9:22:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: "look, this game wouldn't exist because of funding by [company x]" has never in the history of gaming been a successfull attempt at damage control
[10/25/2016 9:22:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: The problem Valve is in, is that people think that Valve is money-grubbing, and that you won't release the game because you don't care anymore.
[10/25/2016 9:22:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Most people think Valve doesn't care anymore.
[10/25/2016 9:22:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: just look at how mad people get every time there's an oculus funded exclusive. We're trying to stay out of these things for good reasons
[10/25/2016 9:22:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: And that all you want to do is VR and Paid Sprays.
[10/25/2016 9:23:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, Valve really hasn't been in game releaseing for a few years, and the market has changed.
[10/25/2016 9:23:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you try to relase anything, there will be drama, and VAlve has already had it's drama over the last few years.
[10/25/2016 9:23:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: And then we're finally announcing the next installment in the Half-Life franchise - all eyes are on our reveal stream and then - the trailer 

A FUCKING NX GAME

with no chance of a PC port
[10/25/2016 9:23:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: MyM, Paid Sprays, getting CS:GO'd, the Manella Major, etc etc
[10/25/2016 9:24:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Would a PC port like, a few years down the road be completely off the table?
[10/25/2016 9:24:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Isn't it a running gag by now that HL3 is gonna be a Wii U exclusive? I've seen that more than once on the subreddit.
[10/25/2016 9:24:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: Don't hype it up as "THe NExt HL GAME!11!!"
[10/25/2016 9:24:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: It is
[10/25/2016 9:24:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[10/25/2016 9:24:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We can't make it come true
[10/25/2016 9:24:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Old Meme, but yes
[10/25/2016 9:25:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: But it's not HL3, and you know that this could be a great game.
[10/25/2016 9:25:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, revisting BM?
[10/25/2016 9:25:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I think there's only one way to do this right
[10/25/2016 9:25:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea, it's annouceing it along with something from HL3, but that's completely up to you guys
[10/25/2016 9:25:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Even a teaser
[10/25/2016 9:25:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: WIth no gameplay
[10/25/2016 9:25:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Half Life 3 teaser and then "tune in tomorrow to nintendo direct to learn more about an upcoming project
[10/25/2016 9:25:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just a number 3
[10/25/2016 9:26:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just show a number 3
[10/25/2016 9:26:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but then there's gonna be confusion about whether the strategy game is 3
[10/25/2016 9:26:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: Not if you communitcate this right
[10/25/2016 9:26:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: dude, we don't even maintain our twitter
[10/25/2016 9:26:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea, hire me as community manager.
[10/25/2016 9:27:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 9:27:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: But seriously, it can be done right
[10/25/2016 9:27:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you should seriously apply as community manager
[10/25/2016 9:28:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 9:28:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm padding out a resume
[10/25/2016 9:28:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Let me finish my ideas for the rest of the year
[10/25/2016 9:28:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm still trying to finish college as well.
[10/25/2016 9:28:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you should do that first
[10/25/2016 9:29:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Anyways, maybe you could loop it into the Portal cannon as well, maybe allow players to recruit apperature Co-Op robot types as units as well, once the players reach that point. It wouldn't have to be specifically Half-Life, but both Protal and Half-Life.
[10/25/2016 9:30:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Don't focus on famous characters from HL either, distance it from the main line games, make it it's own thing
[10/25/2016 9:30:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: That wouldn't fit our existing canon too well, except if you know something I don't
[10/25/2016 9:30:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well, Portal and HL are one in the same, unless Co-Op doesn't fit?
[10/25/2016 9:30:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: But it does
[10/25/2016 9:30:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't understand how it doesn't fit....
[10/25/2016 9:30:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Enlighten me good sir
[10/25/2016 9:30:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not the robots, they're from portal 2, that's after HL3 on the timeline
[10/25/2016 9:31:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: But Apperature is completely abandoned forever after Portal 1
[10/25/2016 9:31:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, Portal 1 takes place after the combine invasion anyways?
[10/25/2016 9:31:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe turrent types?
[10/25/2016 9:31:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like dig up the walking turrent from Portal 1
[10/25/2016 9:31:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: We can always make up new shit
[10/25/2016 9:31:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or some other cut concepts from Portal 1
[10/25/2016 9:32:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know, but it would be better to keep the astetic closer to Portal 1 when relating it back to HL, it fits better.
[10/25/2016 9:32:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know that Portal 1 looks a lot more amature than 2, but it sets the tone so much better.
[10/25/2016 9:32:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: I like, you can cut the tension of Portal 1 with a knife.
[10/25/2016 9:32:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: POrtal 2 is more like "Oh lololol, look at this computer Potatoe
[10/25/2016 9:33:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how would you incorporate the portal canon into a seven hour war scenario and the battle of city 17
[10/25/2016 9:33:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well the Borialis is set to have had a similar catastrophy at around the same time as the cascade.
[10/25/2016 9:33:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: And the Borialis is Aperature owned
[10/25/2016 9:33:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Many fans have speculated that both BM and Aperature is being watched over by G-Man anyways.
[10/25/2016 9:33:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Gabe's gonna get stabbed if we show the borealis in a spinoff on nx
[10/25/2016 9:34:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 9:34:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10/25/2016 9:34:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: But you know what I mean
[10/25/2016 9:34:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you can incorporate Portal cannon as well, then it would deffen the blow to the community, because we are all used to seeing portal product come out, with RR and the lab
[10/25/2016 9:35:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Obviously this is in the earliest of stages, but still, it's a good idea.
[10/25/2016 9:35:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: And it could REALLY help NIntendo
[10/25/2016 9:35:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Which is a win win for the gaming community in the long run
[10/25/2016 9:35:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, as a whole
[10/25/2016 9:36:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it has to be half life focused and canon if we want 300k and 80% of sales
[10/25/2016 9:36:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes I know
[10/25/2016 9:36:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: What are people saying?
[10/25/2016 9:37:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: In the room
[10/25/2016 9:37:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 300k is a buttload for a game of this kind. we can go all out with voice acting and performance capture
[10/25/2016 9:37:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Exactly
[10/25/2016 9:37:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: It would sell uits like crazy and really build the relationship with Nitnendo, which is great
[10/25/2016 9:38:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's a higher budget than star craft 2 had
[10/25/2016 9:39:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sc2 is rumored to be around 200k for the main game
[10/25/2016 9:39:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: I remember it being that kind of numbers
[10/25/2016 9:40:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okayt
[10/25/2016 9:40:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: So let's go over the concerns again, from the beginning
[10/25/2016 9:40:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: plus we do all our performance capture in-house, we'd just have to pay for actors
[10/25/2016 9:40:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: alright
[10/25/2016 9:40:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10/25/2016 9:41:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: my main concern is the reaction to any kind of console exclusive valve game
[10/25/2016 9:41:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it being half life only makes it so much worse
[10/25/2016 9:41:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10/25/2016 9:41:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: You need to put the teaser along with it
[10/25/2016 9:41:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: But then we'd have to wait for HL3 to be presentable and confident in their product
[10/25/2016 9:42:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which is not gonna happen in 2017
[10/25/2016 9:42:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you want to be the good guy who never lies, yes.
[10/25/2016 9:42:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we can't announce hl3 on their behalf
[10/25/2016 9:42:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: But I've done my research and I know that Valve has lied in the past to the pubic
[10/25/2016 9:42:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: No
[10/25/2016 9:42:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: But
[10/25/2016 9:42:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: You just have to tell the halrdcore fans that you still care, and it's still coming
[10/25/2016 9:42:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: That
[10/25/2016 9:42:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: is
[10/25/2016 9:42:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: All
[10/25/2016 9:43:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: People just want to know it's being made, most have lost hope that it even is on your minds anymore
[10/25/2016 9:43:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: You have to make a video with Chet, Gabe, Erik and possibly Doug, just talking
[10/25/2016 9:43:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like call it
[10/25/2016 9:44:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: "The Half-Life F.A.Q."
[10/25/2016 9:44:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: And just have them answer some questions for real
[10/25/2016 9:44:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: chet doesn't have anything to do with half life though
[10/25/2016 9:44:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: That doesn't matter, it's a face people recognize
[10/25/2016 9:44:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's lead and advisor on all things vr
[10/25/2016 9:44:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's a guy people know works at Valve
[10/25/2016 9:44:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: I talk about Chet in videos all the tim
[10/25/2016 9:44:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hmm i guess youre right
[10/25/2016 9:44:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: You don't need these specific people, you just need faces
[10/25/2016 9:45:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: Jeep, Gabe, Chet, Erik, Doug, etc etc
[10/25/2016 9:45:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you juist make a video of them answering the question in a direct way, the community would respect the hell out of it.
[10/25/2016 9:45:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what if we get Kelly Bailey back to do the soundtrack?
[10/25/2016 9:45:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: OH hell yes
[10/25/2016 9:45:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, yes
[10/25/2016 9:45:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Have him make a song for the video
[10/25/2016 9:46:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Look, I know just how much people love Half-Life probably more than Valve.
[10/25/2016 9:46:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know the legths some peole have gone to find "new" content
[10/25/2016 9:46:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: funfact: we wanted to employ kojima but sony outbid us by - like a lot
[10/25/2016 9:46:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: I have seen some shit, and I have stories
[10/25/2016 9:47:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not when he visited, way back when all the shit at konami went down
[10/25/2016 9:47:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: I figured
[10/25/2016 9:48:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Anyways, just make that video, answer some questions in a direct non meme way, and just explain it how you explained it to me.
[10/25/2016 9:48:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: 95% of people will understand from that point forward.
[10/25/2016 9:48:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: You would get the same amount of hate for announcing a third L4D game before HL btw
[10/25/2016 9:48:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you know about the guy who walked into our office, impersonated an employee at the reception and made it to the lower office hallway before secuirty got him?
[10/25/2016 9:49:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: No I didn't
[10/25/2016 9:49:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 9:49:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: That's when we got photo IDs
[10/25/2016 9:49:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: How long ago was it
[10/25/2016 9:49:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: must have been late 2014
[10/25/2016 9:50:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: That guy was brave
[10/25/2016 9:50:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: So what's going on now?
[10/25/2016 9:50:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: What's the mood of the room
[10/25/2016 9:51:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're brainstorming. I'm throwing your ideas into the mix
[10/25/2016 9:51:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol, that's awesome
[10/25/2016 9:51:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: although everone is on board with unity, which makes me happy
[10/25/2016 9:51:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's fine
[10/25/2016 9:52:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: DId you talk about how you will have to talk about it?
[10/25/2016 9:52:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Because you WILL have too
[10/25/2016 9:52:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't want to kill this project
[10/25/2016 9:52:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: so no, haven't brought it up yet
[10/25/2016 9:52:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol okay
[10/25/2016 9:52:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: I guess that is something to think about closer to announce
[10/25/2016 9:53:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah
[10/25/2016 9:53:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: one of the HL3 artists wants to help us out
[10/25/2016 9:53:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: In what way?
[10/25/2016 9:53:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's 8 people now, including me
[10/25/2016 9:54:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: by doing most of the art
[10/25/2016 9:54:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Awesome
[10/25/2016 9:55:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Do it man
[10/25/2016 9:55:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're going home in about an hour
[10/25/2016 9:55:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's some intense chalk drawing happening right now
[10/25/2016 9:56:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're collecting gameplay ideas
[10/25/2016 9:57:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: IR & touch for unit movement is a given
[10/25/2016 9:57:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but we need more than that
[10/25/2016 9:57:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how many units at once? should there be hero units?
[10/25/2016 9:57:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: should gordon be a hero unity?
[10/25/2016 9:58:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: No, Gorden should not be a playable characheter.
[10/25/2016 9:58:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: It would be poking the bear to much on that one
[10/25/2016 9:58:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: should he appear in cutscenes?
[10/25/2016 9:58:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: The idea of "Hero" characters is probably a no no
[10/25/2016 9:58:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe as a camio
[10/25/2016 9:58:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, make the community excited when he shows up
[10/25/2016 9:58:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Let's not think about the backlash for a moment. We're not going to change anything based on perception. We just have to sell it right once it's done
[10/25/2016 9:59:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Also remember, you can't make him talk
[10/25/2016 9:59:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: So him in a cutscene will be limited
[10/25/2016 9:59:22 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we can't make him talk?
[10/25/2016 9:59:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Iiiiii don't think the HL3 team got the memo on that one...
[10/25/2016 9:59:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: No! You can't give Goden a voice
[10/25/2016 10:00:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: The idea of the character is a blank slate the player fits his/her personality into, giving him a voice, even in a spinoff, would completely kill the character for most
[10/25/2016 10:00:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: are cinematic cutscenes okay? there were going to be some in the 2014 game
[10/25/2016 10:01:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but the player had no impact on the story in hl 1 and 2, why would it matter?
[10/25/2016 10:02:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: They may not have had inpact, but allowing the playable character be a blank slate, allows the palyers to be more immpersed into the story
[10/25/2016 10:02:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: There should never be cinimatci cutscens in a half life game
[10/25/2016 10:02:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Its fine for this spinoff, but nto for a main line game
[10/25/2016 10:03:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: The idea of never taking control away from the palyer was huge in both games, and should stay thoughout, no matter how far you deviate from the HL2 blueprint
[10/25/2016 10:03:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how do we show gordon from the outside then? most of the interesting bits of 2014 were about the character deteriorating and sacrificing his own humanity, that wouldn't have worked as well without ever actually showing him
[10/25/2016 10:04:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, well you showed the same thing in Portal 1, just through Portals
[10/25/2016 10:04:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: You can do that without taking control away
[10/25/2016 10:04:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: Mirrors, refections in water, have gorden take a shower, and he can look into a bathroom mirror
[10/25/2016 10:05:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: There are many ways this could happen
[10/25/2016 10:05:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Hell, even make a portal appear in game, letting the player see what you have become over the years.
[10/25/2016 10:05:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the flashbacks were all supposed to be cinematics, while all real world interaction happens around you like in previous games
[10/25/2016 10:05:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oooooooo
[10/25/2016 10:05:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 10:05:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well
[10/25/2016 10:05:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: That would not be received well by the hardcore crowd
[10/25/2016 10:05:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but they're dream sequences
[10/25/2016 10:05:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Half-Life has never taken control away from the player over the last 20 years.
[10/25/2016 10:06:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's fine, but Fallout 4 had playable dreams
[10/25/2016 10:06:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: dreams aren't always first person in reality either
[10/25/2016 10:06:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's also fine
[10/25/2016 10:06:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Make the dreams as weird as you want
[10/25/2016 10:06:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: Their dreams
[10/25/2016 10:06:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: But it would be so much more entertaining to explore those dreams first hand, instead of being shown them in a video
[10/25/2016 10:06:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes, it's more work, but it is more pay off
[10/25/2016 10:07:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: Have a dream with grown Alyx is walking about BM
[10/25/2016 10:07:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Dreams are dreams.
[10/25/2016 10:07:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: But you should like, let the player dream it out themselves
[10/25/2016 10:07:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's more work to direct, actually, they did them using positionally tracked, virtual cameras. basically vive controllers bound to a virtual camera
[10/25/2016 10:07:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: As if it was their own dream
[10/25/2016 10:08:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 10:08:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well
[10/25/2016 10:08:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Why
[10/25/2016 10:08:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, did Laidlaw like this idea?
[10/25/2016 10:08:32 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can't get natural looking camera movement from keyframe animation
[10/25/2016 10:08:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 10:08:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: but why do cutscenes at all
[10/25/2016 10:09:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: because these visions were pretty damn weird
[10/25/2016 10:09:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 10:09:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: But why couldn't the player play through them?
[10/25/2016 10:09:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: You could, they just started out as a cinematic that then leads into gameplay. they were all puzzle focused
[10/25/2016 10:10:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm just saying that Half-Life could honestly be anything as long as it sticks to a few conventions
[10/25/2016 10:10:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Crowbar, First Person, and Never taking control away, ever.
[10/25/2016 10:10:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the most important thing is: can we do cutscenes for half life tactics?
[10/25/2016 10:10:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, HL2 did it, they still let you look around when you couldn't move
[10/25/2016 10:11:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: And yes'
[10/25/2016 10:11:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Cutscenes would work fine in a spinoff
[10/25/2016 10:11:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: There is no prior tradition there
[10/25/2016 10:11:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just don't Gordon talk
[10/25/2016 10:11:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: You could bring in any character
[10/25/2016 10:11:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's what hl3 was like though, the action happens around you during the real world scenes while the visions are part cinematic, part puzzle gameplay
[10/25/2016 10:11:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Hell, even show Alyx grow up, or Eli losing the leg, just don't give Gorden a voice
[10/25/2016 10:12:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's fine
[10/25/2016 10:12:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just no prerender stuff
[10/25/2016 10:12:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: All inengine
[10/25/2016 10:12:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: never take control away
[10/25/2016 10:12:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: our reasoning is: gordon isn't the protagonist of hl tactics. why wouldn't he talk?
[10/25/2016 10:12:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: everyone lese talks on in valve games except the protagonist
[10/25/2016 10:12:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: Because it will kill the character for futre games
[10/25/2016 10:12:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's true
[10/25/2016 10:13:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Let him appear
[10/25/2016 10:13:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Let it be brief
[10/25/2016 10:13:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: WHAT IF
[10/25/2016 10:13:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: The audience will freak the fuck out
[10/25/2016 10:13:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we don't show him in the hl3 trailer
[10/25/2016 10:13:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but we do at the end of tactics
[10/25/2016 10:13:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: You don't need to do a trailer for HL3, just talking
[10/25/2016 10:13:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you are not comfortable with showing any gameplay
[10/25/2016 10:14:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: You could show him, but like, it would be best to only show him a little in the game to begin with
[10/25/2016 10:14:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I am, the HL3 group won't
[10/25/2016 10:14:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: So showing him in the trailer will deflate the excitement of him showing up
[10/25/2016 10:14:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, I'm thinking the final scene is him picking up a crowbar
[10/25/2016 10:14:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: slow camera pan reveal
[10/25/2016 10:15:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: Man I wish I could really be in this discussion
[10/25/2016 10:15:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 10:15:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like
[10/25/2016 10:15:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, I have to ask a question before we continue talking
[10/25/2016 10:15:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is that oaky?
[10/25/2016 10:15:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sure
[10/25/2016 10:16:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: This in my mind is way to good to be true.
[10/25/2016 10:16:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Are you not trolling me?
[10/25/2016 10:16:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Could you like, just sneak a pic of the room you are in, and just send it over?
[10/25/2016 10:16:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just really prove that you are really at Valve, and all this is actually happening.
[10/25/2016 10:16:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: where would I get an nx devkit?
[10/25/2016 10:17:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know, just, this is probably gonna to lead into a huge step in my carrer, so I am just skeptical bhecause not a lot has ever gone well for me.
[10/25/2016 10:17:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you think I'm a dev at a different company with access to an NX devkit that says "property of valve" on the side?
[10/25/2016 10:18:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and I just happen to have too much time on my hands?
[10/25/2016 10:18:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, I'm totally going to apply as community manager, and from what you are telling me, there may be some mistakes being made that may turn the community off.
[10/25/2016 10:18:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't know, like I said, stalkers
[10/25/2016 10:18:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: I've been goofed a few times before.
[10/25/2016 10:18:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10/25/2016 10:19:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I can't take pictures without looking suspicious. It's also just an empty room with a couple chairs, a table ant a chalkboard
[10/25/2016 10:19:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: as i said:
[10/25/2016 10:19:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: tell me what to photograph and I'll make it happen as soon as i get the chance
[10/25/2016 10:20:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and
[10/25/2016 10:20:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: also, where would I get the artwork from?
[10/25/2016 10:20:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: How about the copy Gunman Chronics you have in the office?
[10/25/2016 10:20:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: That is obcure enough
[10/25/2016 10:20:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 10:20:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm sorry if this is annoying
[10/25/2016 10:20:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 10:21:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I guess, if that's proof
[10/25/2016 10:21:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea it would be lol
[10/25/2016 10:21:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you took just that, which has never been photographed as the subject on the shelve
[10/25/2016 10:21:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 10:22:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how would that be proof though considering anyone can just buy a copy?
[10/25/2016 10:22:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: No like, a picture on the Valve shelve
[10/25/2016 10:22:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: But it's the subject of the picture
[10/25/2016 10:23:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: in gabe's office? I can't go in there with a phone ,looking all suspicious
[10/25/2016 10:23:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh that's in Gabe office?
[10/25/2016 10:23:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: can we delay this topic by 30 minutes? We can talk on my way home
[10/25/2016 10:23:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, just snap a picture of something lol
[10/25/2016 10:24:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'll figure something out but I'll need more than a day if you want something big like the lobby or the golden crowbar
[10/25/2016 10:24:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 10:25:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: back to hl tactics for now please. if you want to participate: I can summarize what everyone's saying
[10/25/2016 10:25:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you tell me what to say
[10/25/2016 10:25:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay cool
[10/25/2016 10:26:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're debating wether we want WC style heroes
[10/25/2016 10:26:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Who all would be the heros
[10/25/2016 10:26:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Don't use Gorden btw
[10/25/2016 10:26:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just dont
[10/25/2016 10:26:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: You would have to use new characters as well though
[10/25/2016 10:27:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: It would be easier if you used a few Portal related people, but it would be difficult to work into the story
[10/25/2016 10:27:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, the consensus is: characters from HL2 and original ones
[10/25/2016 10:27:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, the expantions
[10/25/2016 10:27:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: ?
[10/25/2016 10:27:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: BEcause that would be a great idea
[10/25/2016 10:27:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, finally bring Adrien back from the dead
[10/25/2016 10:27:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Barney
[10/25/2016 10:28:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Gina & Collete
[10/25/2016 10:28:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: grigori
[10/25/2016 10:28:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Grigori
[10/25/2016 10:28:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ehh
[10/25/2016 10:28:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if we haven't already killed him off in 3
[10/25/2016 10:28:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: He is a crazy dude from HL2
[10/25/2016 10:28:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: He doesn't need to return
[10/25/2016 10:28:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, that is a total one note character
[10/25/2016 10:28:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's a fan favorite though?
[10/25/2016 10:28:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, you can use all the playable characters from other games
[10/25/2016 10:29:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: And he is more of a "we want him to be alive", but they don't want to see him again
[10/25/2016 10:29:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: Idk
[10/25/2016 10:29:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: He is kinda the joke of the cannon
[10/25/2016 10:29:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Kliner could be like, a Marge type character
[10/25/2016 10:29:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: But science instead of Magic
[10/25/2016 10:30:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are some great ideas coming up about grigori
[10/25/2016 10:30:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you are talking Pre-Seven hours war though, Eli would be great, but same as Kliener, science
[10/25/2016 10:30:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Grigori is alright, but there are much better characters
[10/25/2016 10:30:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he would be entirely shotgun focused
[10/25/2016 10:30:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: So could any other character
[10/25/2016 10:30:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but the weapon
[10/25/2016 10:30:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: who has history with shotguns as much as that guy?
[10/25/2016 10:31:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: If the only charactieraztion you can come up with is "He uses a shotgun" then it may be a problem
[10/25/2016 10:31:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: one of his lines would be "aim for the head"
[10/25/2016 10:31:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, you could make barney disguse himself
[10/25/2016 10:31:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Or you could have Kliner build stuff that could benefit the overall match
[10/25/2016 10:32:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Keep in mind that Grigori only had to start fighting AFTER the way
[10/25/2016 10:32:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: war
[10/25/2016 10:32:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: match? we're making a single player game
[10/25/2016 10:32:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: before that, he was just a preist in a town
[10/25/2016 10:32:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 10:32:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: You know what I mean
[10/25/2016 10:32:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: THese could be the abilities of the heros
[10/25/2016 10:32:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: oh sure
[10/25/2016 10:33:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're not just covering the war
[10/25/2016 10:33:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're probably going to do a ravelholm chapter
[10/25/2016 10:33:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe Mossman could be not a fighter, but a leader.
[10/25/2016 10:34:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, she could highten the attack of a group of troops by being around them because she is just charasimatic
[10/25/2016 10:34:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, she double crossed the combine and the rebels
[10/25/2016 10:34:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: She was slick
[10/25/2016 10:34:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's one way to put it
[10/25/2016 10:35:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're gonna need a builder class
[10/25/2016 10:35:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: black mesa scientists
[10/25/2016 10:35:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: Eli or Kliner
[10/25/2016 10:35:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: They are scienctset
[10/25/2016 10:35:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Eli could build
[10/25/2016 10:35:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: can we do that, even after the war?
[10/25/2016 10:35:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Kliner could research
[10/25/2016 10:35:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: most of them shouldn't have survive the raid on BM
[10/25/2016 10:35:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Eli built Black Mesa East
[10/25/2016 10:35:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Along with Alyx and the rebels
[10/25/2016 10:36:06 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: alyx is definitely one of the hero chars
[10/25/2016 10:36:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea that's fine
[10/25/2016 10:36:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: She would use the AlyxGun right?
[10/25/2016 10:36:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: The duel Pistol/SMG
[10/25/2016 10:36:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you can't think of a better gimmick, yeah
[10/25/2016 10:36:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: She can snipe
[10/25/2016 10:36:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: She can fix stuff
[10/25/2016 10:37:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: She can hack things
[10/25/2016 10:37:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: She is a good companion and can work with others well
[10/25/2016 10:37:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: She could buff other classes when around them
[10/25/2016 10:37:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Due to her ability to work well with others.
[10/25/2016 10:37:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: mhm
[10/25/2016 10:38:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Vorts would have to unlock over time as a playable class
[10/25/2016 10:38:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you start the game at BM
[10/25/2016 10:38:14 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what about barney? i like the disguise idea
[10/25/2016 10:38:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: They would start as a hostile class
[10/25/2016 10:38:25 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he could be equivalent to the spy in tf2
[10/25/2016 10:38:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Barney could disguise as a combine officer, and get behind enemy lines and gather intel, but not kill enimies because it would give away his position
[10/25/2016 10:39:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: So like, if you have builders, you would have to research tech to build, and Barney could still whatever the enimeise had
[10/25/2016 10:39:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: research
[10/25/2016 10:39:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: like civ?
[10/25/2016 10:39:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Kinda yea
[10/25/2016 10:39:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Also, you would want to use rebels as their own unit
[10/25/2016 10:39:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how would that work over the course of a story driven campaign
[10/25/2016 10:39:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well it's an RTS
[10/25/2016 10:40:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: So it would have to be somewhat open ended
[10/25/2016 10:40:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: At least a little
[10/25/2016 10:40:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: doesn't xcom do this?
[10/25/2016 10:40:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, you can't let the player build everyhtnig from the start
[10/25/2016 10:40:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I should play that for reference
[10/25/2016 10:40:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, are we thinking XCom type RTS or StarCraft/Warcraft RTS
[10/25/2016 10:41:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: warcraft
[10/25/2016 10:41:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i just meant that xcom has progression
[10/25/2016 10:41:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, there are a lot of ideas I have here
[10/25/2016 10:41:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: Alright
[10/25/2016 10:42:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: haven't played the new ones but I think there are skill trees
[10/25/2016 10:42:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: There are
[10/25/2016 10:42:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 10:43:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: let me hear your ideas
[10/25/2016 10:43:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Start the game before the Cascade
[10/25/2016 10:43:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: You are in the perspective of employees, not Gorden
[10/25/2016 10:43:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: wait
[10/25/2016 10:43:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: what if
[10/25/2016 10:44:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you get to customize a scientist who then is the main hero
[10/25/2016 10:44:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's a good idea
[10/25/2016 10:44:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[10/25/2016 10:44:40 PM] Tyler McVicker: You start he game before cascade
[10/25/2016 10:44:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: You introduce all the characers we would expect, with the exection of freeman
[10/25/2016 10:45:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Freeman will be seen in the backround, shopwoingup late, getting the suit on, and the testchaber
[10/25/2016 10:45:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe don't even show the chamber, just have your character be taught the basic controls while doing normal work tasks for your character
[10/25/2016 10:45:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I gotta be honest, I prefer the dramatic reveal at the very end
[10/25/2016 10:46:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't think he should appear at all except in that final cutscene after the credits
[10/25/2016 10:46:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that would shock people
[10/25/2016 10:46:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe in the end of the game
[10/25/2016 10:46:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Sure
[10/25/2016 10:46:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: But not the trailer
[10/25/2016 10:46:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, not show him at all until the end of the game would be a great idea
[10/25/2016 10:46:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: of course not, we're not going to spoil the final scene
[10/25/2016 10:46:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay cool
[10/25/2016 10:46:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, exactly
[10/25/2016 10:47:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, infer that he is around, have the cascade occur
[10/25/2016 10:47:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like have a scientist say that freeman finallywent down to the test chamber
[10/25/2016 10:47:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: But other than that, just like, have him be sporatically referenced in points where it would line up with the games
[10/25/2016 10:48:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, that's good
[10/25/2016 10:48:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: And yea, If you don't want him to be seen until the very end of the game, then yea that's a great idea
[10/25/2016 10:48:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just don't have him pick up crowbar, he has one, he carries one like, all the time
[10/25/2016 10:48:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're pretty much in agreement that we shouldn't show gordon at all until the final scene, not even in an official HL3 traier if that happens before tactics
[10/25/2016 10:48:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: There are only like, 4 points in the games where he doesn't have one
[10/25/2016 10:48:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: yea that's fine
[10/25/2016 10:49:52 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you don't know if he has a crowbar, the final scene would be a teaser for HL3 and would likely be somewhere around that place of the timeline
[10/25/2016 10:50:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Has that point been written?
[10/25/2016 10:50:22 PM] Tyler McVicker: Are you gonna use Liadlaws stuff? Or new stuff?
[10/25/2016 10:50:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, are Chet and Erik gonna write stuff?
[10/25/2016 10:50:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we'll see if one of the remaining writers wants to jump on this
[10/25/2016 10:51:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Get Chet or Erik
[10/25/2016 10:51:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: There are other talented people here too
[10/25/2016 10:51:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't know your whole staff
[10/25/2016 10:51:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 10:51:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: not in my group, in general
[10/25/2016 10:51:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: I knwo
[10/25/2016 10:53:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: any final things you want to add before we close today's meeting?
[10/25/2016 10:54:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we can talk about more on my way home, this is the last chance to get anything out the the rest of the crew today
[10/25/2016 10:54:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Open the game in BM, right after the cascade, remember that there is a time before the invasion, so there has to be a middle period
[10/25/2016 10:54:28 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: out to*
[10/25/2016 10:54:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: No rebels, just people and the military trying to get rid of the headcrabs and stuff
[10/25/2016 10:54:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then the invasion happens, and therebels start to form
[10/25/2016 10:54:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: how do we open a strategy game without enemies?
[10/25/2016 10:54:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: You can use the military from Op4
[10/25/2016 10:55:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: The enimies are the Xen and RaceX cretures
[10/25/2016 10:55:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: or should the first part in BM be just cutscenes?
[10/25/2016 10:55:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Until the invasion
[10/25/2016 10:55:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: No
[10/25/2016 10:55:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: It should be against the BM eniumies
[10/25/2016 10:55:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Which is mostly Xen
[10/25/2016 10:55:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: oh yeah, that would be great as a tutorial
[10/25/2016 10:55:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: And it should be used as a tutorial
[10/25/2016 10:55:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then the military bombs BM
[10/25/2016 10:55:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: and you have the middle period before the war, which would be the military against XEN and RaceX
[10/25/2016 10:56:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: You could also come up with new aline types, or possibly resued cut ones
[10/25/2016 10:56:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like Mr. Happy or soething
[10/25/2016 10:56:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: ...maybe not that one
[10/25/2016 10:56:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol, you know what I mean
[10/25/2016 10:56:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Skukabats and stuff
[10/25/2016 10:57:16 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then the war would only be a short period in the game, because it was so short, and maybe it's impossible to win
[10/25/2016 10:57:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then the rest of the game involves building up the rebels and eventually ending the game around the end of ep1 or 2
[10/25/2016 10:57:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then the teaser
[10/25/2016 10:57:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it has to be, we can't break canon
[10/25/2016 10:58:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm thinking we go a bit deeper than ep2
[10/25/2016 10:58:19 PM] Tyler McVicker: Building up the Rebels would be great, and possibly using some of the military that you traied before the way can become rebels
[10/25/2016 10:58:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: war
[10/25/2016 10:59:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Yeah, we're definitely leading up to a huge finale in city 17 with striders and shit
[10/25/2016 10:59:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Good
[10/25/2016 10:59:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Have Breen appear, reuse the vo from HL2
[10/25/2016 10:59:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe some alt takes
[10/25/2016 10:59:33 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah that's lazy
[10/25/2016 10:59:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: But the guy died I thought
[10/25/2016 10:59:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we gotta recast
[10/25/2016 10:59:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: No way
[10/25/2016 10:59:53 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we can't use 10 year old voice clips
[10/25/2016 11:00:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Uuuuuhhhhhh
[10/25/2016 11:00:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's gotta be spot on
[10/25/2016 11:00:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: That is a very specific voice
[10/25/2016 11:00:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: also, we need to kill him off, he's definitely not in 3 in it's current form
[10/25/2016 11:00:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he should be the boss
[10/25/2016 11:00:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well Breen became a grub
[10/25/2016 11:00:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: After HL2
[10/25/2016 11:01:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: The final boss?
[10/25/2016 11:01:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Breens a Pawn
[10/25/2016 11:01:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Breen has no power, he is just the figure head for the vombine
[10/25/2016 11:01:57 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sure but there's potential for tragedy here
[10/25/2016 11:02:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: But it's cannon that he lives as a grub after HL2
[10/25/2016 11:02:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: he's just serving out of weakness, right?
[10/25/2016 11:02:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you'll have to explain what a grub is. I thought I got my lore straight but apparently not
[10/25/2016 11:02:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: No, he is serving because he was already in power, and he ran the neogotiations of the surrender
[10/25/2016 11:02:48 PM] Tyler McVicker: He ran BM
[10/25/2016 11:03:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: I wouldn't say weakness, just the situation called for it
[10/25/2016 11:03:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: It was the postion he was in anyways
[10/25/2016 11:04:03 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we have all the original scripts. they're not any more detailed than the games but getting the lore right will be the least of our concerns
[10/25/2016 11:04:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: The lore is the least?
[10/25/2016 11:04:49 PM] Tyler McVicker: Isn't this a narrative driven RTS?
[10/25/2016 11:04:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: The Lore of Half-Life is better then most
[10/25/2016 11:05:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're just throwing ideas around, we can think about how it's going to fit in with existing canon later
[10/25/2016 11:05:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: And being able to expand upon it wherever possiblte should be done
[10/25/2016 11:05:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: I mean
[10/25/2016 11:05:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10/25/2016 11:05:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: HL is build Gamepaly first
[10/25/2016 11:05:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: But you don't want to go and do something completely out of left field in terms of established story
[10/25/2016 11:05:37 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, we're thinking story heavy with cutscenes and dialogue in-game. basically like SC2
[10/25/2016 11:05:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's fine for an RTS yea
[10/25/2016 11:05:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: You do need to get the lore exactly right though
[10/25/2016 11:06:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Have you played Lambda Wars?
[10/25/2016 11:06:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: of course. we got plenty of people at the company to yell at us if we get something wron
[10/25/2016 11:06:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no
[10/25/2016 11:06:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: I would look at this then
[10/25/2016 11:07:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: well
[10/25/2016 11:07:21 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's unfortunate
[10/25/2016 11:07:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: No it's not, it's a good game
[10/25/2016 11:07:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Look into it
[10/25/2016 11:07:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Make something better
[10/25/2016 11:07:54 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's unfortunate that our idea isn't original anymore
[10/25/2016 11:08:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: It's on Steam Greenlight
[10/25/2016 11:08:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: It got through
[10/25/2016 11:08:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, maybe use some of the devs on that?
[10/25/2016 11:08:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Talk to them? They would really appreciate that.
[10/25/2016 11:09:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Plus, with a budget like that, you could really make something great
[10/25/2016 11:09:11 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, spanning the whole cannon
[10/25/2016 11:09:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: From Pre-HL1 to Post-Ep2
[10/25/2016 11:09:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: This only covers Post-Hl2
[10/25/2016 11:09:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's also not canon
[10/25/2016 11:09:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: No it's not
[10/25/2016 11:10:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: alright, I really gotta leave. I'll message you in a few minutes
[10/25/2016 11:10:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:17:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: k, so how can I prove my authenticity without acting suspicious around the office if NX devkits, concept art and unreleased figure prototypes aren't enough.I hope I don't sound agressive as it's definitely not meant this way.
[10/25/2016 11:17:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can do a reverse image search on all of the pictures, they've never appeared on the internet
[10/25/2016 11:19:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 11:19:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm sure you understand where I'm coming from
[10/25/2016 11:20:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, 6 months ago this would have been a dream that I woke up from
[10/25/2016 11:20:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: I was just involded in a Valve brainstorm, and kept up with everyting
[10/25/2016 11:20:26 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, that's a big deal to me
[10/25/2016 11:20:48 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sure but I'm having a hard time believing that you have stalkers that are dedicated enough to somehow obtain an NX devkit or i gues print their own figures at home?
[10/25/2016 11:20:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: They would photoshop shit
[10/25/2016 11:21:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: then check the photos, they're all unedited except for brightness & contrast.
[10/25/2016 11:21:54 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 11:21:59 PM] Tyler McVicker: Don't worry man
[10/25/2016 11:22:58 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: is there anything else I can do without looking like a weirdo around the office?
[10/25/2016 11:23:18 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I can't walk around take pictures of stuff while others are around. no one does that.
[10/25/2016 11:23:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just take a picture of something popular, like the mag wall, or the trophies, or the PCs, and I can reverse image search them to see if it's a new picture.
[10/25/2016 11:24:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can reverse searche the figures, artwork or nx devkit
[10/25/2016 11:24:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 11:24:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: You are legit
[10/25/2016 11:24:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 11:24:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Sorry
[10/25/2016 11:25:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: sorry, I'm not angry or anything, it's hard to sound calm via text
[10/25/2016 11:25:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's just that,
[10/25/2016 11:25:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: I completely understand
[10/25/2016 11:25:34 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: for your scenario to be true, I'd have to own an NX devkit, have a glowsign of the TF2 logo
[10/25/2016 11:25:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe I have become trustworthy enough for a voice chat? :$
[10/25/2016 11:25:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand
[10/25/2016 11:25:46 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm being crazy
[10/25/2016 11:25:51 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: be an amazing artist to fake artwork
[10/25/2016 11:25:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Fuck yea
[10/25/2016 11:26:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: That art was awesome
[10/25/2016 11:26:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and somehow have the ability to print flawless figures without buildlines out of glossy, polished plastic?
[10/25/2016 11:27:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, you legit
[10/25/2016 11:27:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there are a number of reasons why I won't do voice chats, sorry. I can't give you anything that would be serious evidence against me, if valve finds out
[10/25/2016 11:27:37 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:27:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Are you Gabe?
[10/25/2016 11:27:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Do you have a voice I would be able to pick out very quickly?
[10/25/2016 11:27:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 11:28:10 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: for example, what if I'm a woman? not saying I am, just, If I am, that's 3/4 of the company already gone as possible suspects
[10/25/2016 11:28:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: I understand, I'm just messing
[10/25/2016 11:28:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: I was thinking the same thing
[10/25/2016 11:28:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't know!
[10/25/2016 11:28:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 11:28:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: If you are a woman, hello!
[10/25/2016 11:28:47 PM] Tyler McVicker: But I keep writing pronouns about you as if you are male
[10/25/2016 11:28:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: So I am sorry if that is wrong
[10/25/2016 11:29:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: ah, I wouldn't care either way
[10/25/2016 11:29:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:29:31 PM] Tyler McVicker: Nice to know you are legit
[10/25/2016 11:29:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: Thakns
[10/25/2016 11:29:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Little bit about me
[10/25/2016 11:30:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: I am 19, and I live in Ohio
[10/25/2016 11:30:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Nice to meet you
[10/25/2016 11:30:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: also, my voice would indicate wether I am over or under the age of 40, that's, again, half the company gone as suspects
[10/25/2016 11:30:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'm gonna guess you under 40
[10/25/2016 11:30:38 PM] Tyler McVicker: Just a guess
[10/25/2016 11:30:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: Well I won't answer that one, sorry
[10/25/2016 11:30:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: You like Amiibo, so that puts you under 40
[10/25/2016 11:31:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you've clearly never talked to anyone at valve lol
[10/25/2016 11:31:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: most of us are nintendo fans - grew up with nintendo
[10/25/2016 11:31:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: I have talked to Jeep a few times, and Chet once
[10/25/2016 11:31:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: On steam
[10/25/2016 11:31:33 PM] Tyler McVicker: Over chat
[10/25/2016 11:31:36 PM] Tyler McVicker: So yea
[10/25/2016 11:31:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: Not a lo t
[10/25/2016 11:31:55 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: chet's not a nintendo fan?
[10/25/2016 11:32:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't know
[10/25/2016 11:32:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Is he not
[10/25/2016 11:32:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: I don't know Chet very well at all
[10/25/2016 11:32:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: brb, switching to oculus
[10/25/2016 11:32:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: ;D
[10/25/2016 11:32:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't know, never talked to him about nintendo
[10/25/2016 11:32:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but I guess I have a reason now
[10/25/2016 11:33:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lo. yea
[10/25/2016 11:34:11 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: so, tell me everything you would like to see in an HL strategy game
[10/25/2016 11:34:16 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: from a fan's perspective
[10/25/2016 11:34:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: also in an half life themed vr mini adventure...
[10/25/2016 11:34:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:34:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's apparently happening
[10/25/2016 11:35:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the HL3 team is working a small VR experience. not the whole group
[10/25/2016 11:35:21 PM] Tyler McVicker: The VR adventure would have complexly differnet wants
[10/25/2016 11:35:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: SO lets start with the RTS
[10/25/2016 11:35:31 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: of course, let's go over them seperately
[10/25/2016 11:35:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Ummm
[10/25/2016 11:35:36 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: hl adventure first please
[10/25/2016 11:35:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's shorter
[10/25/2016 11:35:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:36:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: Have it take place in between games, instead of trying to continue the story, like Lost Coast
[10/25/2016 11:36:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: Possibly reuse old concepts, such as those found in the HL2 leak
[10/25/2016 11:36:29 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're targeting a 30 minute experience somewhere in the half life canon. possibly a memorable moment
[10/25/2016 11:36:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe use it to flesh out 1 or 2 side characters more
[10/25/2016 11:36:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like Mossman, or Cubage
[10/25/2016 11:37:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Obviously bake the locomotion into the story
[10/25/2016 11:37:25 PM] Tyler McVicker: Allow gravity gun to be used in VR
[10/25/2016 11:37:42 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we don't have to explain the locomotion to be honest.
[10/25/2016 11:37:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, wouldit be teleporting
[10/25/2016 11:37:58 PM] Tyler McVicker: would
[10/25/2016 11:38:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: it
[10/25/2016 11:38:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: teleportation is pretty much standard vr movement at this point
[10/25/2016 11:38:09 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:38:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't see a reason to explain it much like I don't see a reason to explain analogue sticks in the game's context
[10/25/2016 11:39:00 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, maybe allow the game to explain certain brushed over parts in the story
[10/25/2016 11:39:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it would be teleportation + limited walking with roomscale
[10/25/2016 11:39:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea
[10/25/2016 11:39:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: or just teleportation for standing-only
[10/25/2016 11:39:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: Who do I have to take out to dinner to get a Vive btw.
[10/25/2016 11:39:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Because I'm super excited about this, but my student loans beg to differ.
[10/25/2016 11:39:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[10/25/2016 11:40:24 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: odd question coming from somewone so involved in the Vive but: why would you get a vive over a rift?
[10/25/2016 11:40:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Team Valve?
[10/25/2016 11:40:44 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they cost basically the same and you can play vive games on the rift
[10/25/2016 11:40:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: Room Scale?
[10/25/2016 11:41:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Maybe....
[10/25/2016 11:41:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can do that too
[10/25/2016 11:41:06 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh
[10/25/2016 11:41:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: I guess just beause team Valve
[10/25/2016 11:41:24 PM] Tyler McVicker: And I'm VNN, so peoplewould expect to see a Vive
[10/25/2016 11:41:41 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, it's packavked like any other piece of Steam hardware
[10/25/2016 11:42:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, I mean, I'm kind of responsible for the partnered headsets but if I'm being honest, the Rift is the way to go until next generation
[10/25/2016 11:42:30 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: at least it's my favorite out of the 3
[10/25/2016 11:42:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're going to fix that next time around
[10/25/2016 11:42:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Oh
[10/25/2016 11:42:51 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:43:04 PM] Tyler McVicker: That is weird to hear
[10/25/2016 11:43:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: There are more than just me who feel that way
[10/25/2016 11:43:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Wow
[10/25/2016 11:43:32 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:43:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'll look into the rift then
[10/25/2016 11:43:47 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: tbh we would much rather work with oculus and especially abrash instead of htc and yates
[10/25/2016 11:44:02 PM] Tyler McVicker: Dang
[10/25/2016 11:44:03 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:44:05 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well
[10/25/2016 11:44:13 PM] Tyler McVicker: How do you do room scale with the rift
[10/25/2016 11:44:39 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's not to say the vive is bad. I'm doing my best on the software side and yates and chet are doing their best on the hardware side, but there's no point in pretending like we got the upper hand right now
[10/25/2016 11:44:50 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: depends on how big your room is
[10/25/2016 11:45:19 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: 1.5m 1.5m (in the superior metric system) shouldn't require a third cam
[10/25/2016 11:45:39 PM] Tyler McVicker: This just makes me want to wait for SteamVR gen 2
[10/25/2016 11:45:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's one bundled with the touch controllers
[10/25/2016 11:45:53 PM] Tyler McVicker: Then trying to spend/somehow get a HMD
[10/25/2016 11:46:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: steamvr is just our platform. you can get a rift or some other compatible headset and play the entire library
[10/25/2016 11:46:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: there's no difference in the way we support the rift than in the way we support vive
[10/25/2016 11:47:15 PM] Tyler McVicker: So like, the next "Vive" won't be out anytime soon then?
[10/25/2016 11:47:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'm just thinking, if you can barely even afford one, you might as well pick the one that supports both platforms
[10/25/2016 11:47:29 PM] Tyler McVicker: Yea I understand
[10/25/2016 11:48:00 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't have control or knowledge at what HTC are doing in their labs but I don't see a major revision coming any time soon
[10/25/2016 11:48:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: I was under the impression that Valve deved the HMDs
[10/25/2016 11:48:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: Most of the gaming community was under that impression
[10/25/2016 11:48:43 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: except when we're ready to release our new controllers, we may partner with HTC again to relaunch the vive with these instead of the vive wands
[10/25/2016 11:48:59 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's a common misconception
[10/25/2016 11:49:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we came up with lighthouse
[10/25/2016 11:49:13 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: and we license that technology to other companies
[10/25/2016 11:49:20 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: HTC happened to be the one we picked
[10/25/2016 11:49:23 PM] Tyler McVicker: Wow, that's mindblowing
[10/25/2016 11:49:43 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, Chet always talks about the Cellphones they bought from Ebay
[10/25/2016 11:49:44 PM] Tyler McVicker: Idk
[10/25/2016 11:49:52 PM] Tyler McVicker: Always thought you guys did the HMD As well
[10/25/2016 11:49:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: That's good to know now
[10/25/2016 11:50:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we didn't design the vive, we created lighthouse and made suggestions about the kind of panel and fpgas needed to make it work
[10/25/2016 11:50:09 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: no no that's true
[10/25/2016 11:50:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're constantly iterating on prototype headsets internally
[10/25/2016 11:50:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but we don't sell them or do we plan to
[10/25/2016 11:51:01 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[10/25/2016 11:51:10 PM] Tyler McVicker: This is something that I am glad I know
[10/25/2016 11:51:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: vive is very much HTC's project, sorry to burst any bubbles but we never pretended like it's ours
[10/25/2016 11:52:07 PM] Tyler McVicker: No problem, always thought it was yours lol
[10/25/2016 11:52:12 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, so a rifht
[10/25/2016 11:52:14 PM] Tyler McVicker: rift
[10/25/2016 11:52:30 PM] Tyler McVicker: 830
[10/25/2016 11:52:35 PM] Tyler McVicker: I'll work towards that
[10/25/2016 11:52:41 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: i don't know, you have to make the decision for yourself
[10/25/2016 11:52:50 PM] Tyler McVicker: Well I mean you are right
[10/25/2016 11:52:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: It plays both sides of the games
[10/25/2016 11:53:04 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: I personally think the rift is slightly better hardware wise and has a lot better content on their platform
[10/25/2016 11:53:17 PM] Tyler McVicker: And it also does room scale
[10/25/2016 11:53:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we seriously dropped the ball on content : /
[10/25/2016 11:53:45 PM] Tyler McVicker: So like, if I set this thing up in my parents basement, which has a lot of space, it should work great?
[10/25/2016 11:53:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: facebook is pumping money like crazy into indies and AAA studios. funding exclusives left and right
[10/25/2016 11:53:56 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: our anti exclusive stance is really hurting us right now
[10/25/2016 11:54:23 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yes. if you get the rift + touch, you have 2 cameras
[10/25/2016 11:54:38 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: the second camera will come with an extension cord but you can use your own, up to 3m
[10/25/2016 11:54:56 PM] Tyler McVicker: Okay awesome
[10/25/2016 11:55:08 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: you just them in opposing corners
[10/25/2016 11:55:27 PM] Tyler McVicker: I could probably get this with the Dec check after I pay off next submitter
[10/25/2016 11:55:42 PM] Tyler McVicker: Like, from what you are telling me, I need this in order to do my job properly right?
[10/25/2016 11:56:15 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you do encounter tracking issues, you can buy a third one ant arrange them in a triangle. that's my setup at home and I'm having a better experience than on the vive
[10/25/2016 11:56:18 PM] Tyler McVicker: A short HL experience, Half-Stop or whatever you are going to call your project, and any other first party stuff that happens
[10/25/2016 11:56:35 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: less things to worry about. now drilling or covering of mirrors required
[10/25/2016 11:57:02 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah, we're commited to VR, even if our first attempt failed
[10/25/2016 11:57:07 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: were in it for the long run
[10/25/2016 11:57:27 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: it way HTCs idea to launch so early
[10/25/2016 11:57:40 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: they shipped rebranded devkits
[10/25/2016 11:57:45 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we had an actual final design
[10/25/2016 11:57:49 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: which they never used
[10/25/2016 11:57:57 PM] Tyler McVicker: Lol, get rid of them
[10/25/2016 11:58:05 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: contracts
[10/25/2016 11:58:08 PM] Tyler McVicker: I know
[10/25/2016 11:58:17 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: we're dumping them as soon as we can
[10/25/2016 11:58:20 PM] Tyler McVicker: Good
[10/25/2016 11:58:26 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: but we're bound for at least a year
[10/25/2016 11:58:28 PM] Tyler McVicker: How long is the contract run for?
[10/25/2016 11:58:34 PM] Tyler McVicker: So April?
[10/25/2016 11:58:46 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: at least one more year
[10/25/2016 11:58:55 PM] Tyler McVicker: So 2018?
[10/25/2016 11:59:01 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah
[10/25/2016 11:59:12 PM] Cephalon Cephalon: if we can't find a loophole
[12:00:04 AM] Tyler McVicker: True
[12:00:11 AM] Tyler McVicker: Alright
[12:00:11 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: we thought about suing but the backlash would be devastating
[12:00:23 AM] Tyler McVicker: That would be crazy
[12:00:44 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: especially for VR, with all these oldschool media sites that can't wait to see VR fail
[12:00:50 AM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[12:00:52 AM] Tyler McVicker: True
[12:01:08 AM] Tyler McVicker: I guess I'm just a skeptic who hasn't had the chance to experience it yet
[12:01:14 AM] Tyler McVicker: So I'll see once I get too
[12:01:28 AM] Tyler McVicker: Hey, with a Valve game coming up, yea, I'll probably like it
[12:01:31 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: You will understand it once you get to play on one
[12:01:38 AM] Tyler McVicker: Yea I know
[12:01:46 AM] Tyler McVicker: There are a few games I really wanted to play anyways
[12:01:57 AM] Tyler McVicker: Have you tried Accounting?
[12:02:11 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you should probably watch the oculus keynote
[12:02:23 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they had their developer conference a few weeks ago
[12:02:28 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[12:02:32 AM] Tyler McVicker: I will this weekend
[12:02:43 AM] Tyler McVicker: I have like 5 videos to try and get done by the end of the month
[12:02:52 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's pretty long, 2h but you can skip the second half. all the content and tech is in the first half
[12:03:03 AM] Tyler McVicker: Cool
[12:03:37 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: so, how big would your play area be?
[12:03:48 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: haven't played accounting yet
[12:04:02 AM] Tyler McVicker: Probably 8ft x 8ft
[12:04:26 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's 2.5m in a better system
[12:04:32 AM] Tyler McVicker: ol
[12:04:34 AM] Tyler McVicker:  Okay
[12:04:35 AM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[12:04:38 AM] Tyler McVicker: 2.5 m
[12:05:04 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: i think the maximum supported right now is 1.5 x 2 on steam and no restrictions on oculus
[12:05:16 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: although you can force bigger rooms in steam too
[12:05:31 AM] Tyler McVicker: So Oculus does it better anyways]
[12:05:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you'll have to do that if you want to use any kind of headset for steam at that size
[12:05:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: nom that's a software limitation
[12:05:58 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you want to play steamvr games on rift, you'll have to circumvent the size limit
[12:06:05 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[12:06:06 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's just a checkbox though
[12:06:22 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: or you just configure a smaller play area
[12:06:31 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it doesn't have to be the size of your room,
[12:06:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: most games aren't build for that big of a play area anyway
[12:06:59 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, well, I'm gonna start saving now, I'll send some E-Mails though, see what I can do.
[12:07:06 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: wait
[12:07:13 AM] Tyler McVicker: Yes
[12:08:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: callum.underwood@oculus.com
[12:08:03 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: do not mention me
[12:08:12 AM] Tyler McVicker: Who this be
[12:08:18 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: pretend like you found his mail on twitter or don't say anything
[12:08:25 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: dev relations guy
[12:08:30 AM] Tyler McVicker: What do I say? Lol
[12:08:46 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: ask him about a Rift + Touch for VNN, explain what you're doing
[12:09:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: just don't mention that you got his address from someone
[12:09:33 AM] Tyler McVicker: I'll send you the email when I'm done typing it
[12:09:39 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: k
[12:09:51 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they will send you an order form
[12:10:01 AM] Tyler McVicker: What is that
[12:10:04 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you fill it out with the quantity you need
[12:10:16 AM] Tyler McVicker: I need 1
[12:10:26 AM] Tyler McVicker: Do I need more than 1?
[12:10:47 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: nope, just enter "1x Rift, 1x Touch"
[12:11:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they will make you sign an NDA
[12:11:48 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you need an oculus account first
[12:11:50 AM] Tyler McVicker: Why?
[12:12:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: because touch is not out yet
[12:12:03 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[12:12:11 AM] Tyler McVicker: It's out in like a little over a month
[12:12:16 AM] Tyler McVicker: Would I really get sent it early?
[12:12:51 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: They're still sending out engineering samples to devs
[12:12:58 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: as recently as last week
[12:13:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: tell them that you want to pursue vr reviews
[12:14:48 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: alternatively, if you would rather have a vive: message matt yukubousky and do the same thing
[12:15:09 AM] Tyler McVicker: Or I could do both (smirk)
[12:15:30 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I'd do oculus first and then valve if they refuse
[12:15:52 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: well, technically...
[12:16:03 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I could volunteer for vr dev support
[12:16:11 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and then greenlight your request
[12:16:21 AM] Tyler McVicker: That's too sketchy
[12:16:23 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's pretty shady though and doesn't look good
[12:16:29 AM] Tyler McVicker: Ima try this
[12:16:37 AM] Tyler McVicker: If it doesn't work I'll just save the money overtime
[12:17:02 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: don't get the third camera until you've tried 2
[12:17:07 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you'll most likely be fine
[12:17:15 AM] Tyler McVicker: Dear Mr. Underwood, 

    My name is Tyler McVicker, and I am the sole member of the YouTube channel Valve News Network, among others. The aim of the channel is to keep the public up to date on all of the goings on at Valve weather that be announced or speculated by their many "leaks". Obviously, one of the many focuses that gaming in general is moving towards is VR, Valve especially. Unfortunately my problem is my inability to report on the current and future VR software projects they release due to my current financial situation, being a college student with loans and such. After doing my research, I have concluded that the Rift is currently superior to the Vive, especially with the upcoming touch. I am contacting you to see if I could get a Rift to be used in the reporting I do, along with pursuing VR reviews of upcoming games and software. I appreciate any assistance in this matter, and I also appreciate the time. 

Valve News Network : Valve News Network

    
Valve News Network
Welcome to Valve News Network! This channel aims to give you all the information you need to keep up to date wit...


Thank You
-Tyler McVicker
[12:18:10 AM] Tyler McVicker: That whole thing is a link
[12:18:15 AM] Tyler McVicker: It copied weird
[12:19:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: weatherI'd replace that with "wether"
[12:19:57 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: seems good though
[12:20:01 AM] Tyler McVicker: you mean whether?
[12:20:21 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: dammit :D
[12:20:31 AM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[12:20:36 AM] Tyler McVicker: It's good?
[12:20:45 AM] Tyler McVicker: What should the subject line be?
[12:20:52 AM] Tyler McVicker: "Rift Request"
[12:20:58 AM] Tyler McVicker: "Rift Inquiry"
[12:21:03 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it's good, just a bit too formal imo
[12:21:03 AM] Tyler McVicker: "Rift Questions"
[12:21:12 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh I always start formal though
[12:21:21 AM] Tyler McVicker: Like, I send E-Mails to dev and stuff almost daily
[12:21:25 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: i've never been called my last name by anyone at oculus ever, lol
[12:21:41 AM] Tyler McVicker: Lol
[12:21:43 AM] Tyler McVicker: Well
[12:22:08 AM] Tyler McVicker: What should the subject line be?
[12:22:15 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I mean, it won't lower your chances, it's just a bit ammusing considering how casual the tone is with oculus
[12:22:27 AM] Tyler McVicker: I wouldn't know that though ;-)
[12:22:34 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: true
[12:22:44 AM] Tyler McVicker: Subject Line!
[12:22:51 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: rift request sounds alright to me
[12:23:01 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay sending
[12:23:13 AM] Tyler McVicker: Sent
[12:23:14 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: good luck
[12:23:17 AM] Tyler McVicker: Thanks
[12:23:24 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: don't forget to create an oculus account
[12:23:28 AM] Tyler McVicker: Right now?
[12:23:34 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: before he gets the mail :D
[12:24:55 AM] Tyler McVicker: DOne
[12:25:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and once you're done: create an organization
[12:25:18 AM] Tyler McVicker: Just called Valve News Network?
[12:25:38 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: name it the exact legal name ov VNN or, if you're an individual: Your own full name
[12:25:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: of
[12:25:53 AM] Tyler McVicker: So Tyler McVicker?
[12:25:55 AM] Tyler McVicker: McVicker
[12:26:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeahm full name as on your ID
[12:26:25 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay, that is set now
[12:27:48 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: Company Name
Project Title
Contact Name
Contact Email
Address
Phone Number
Amount
[12:27:55 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's what the form looks like
[12:28:02 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you leave company name empty
[12:28:10 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: prject title Valve News Network
[12:28:23 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: contact name your full name, the rest is self explanatory
[12:28:25 AM] Tyler McVicker: So I create a new app?
[12:28:44 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: "Amount" should say  1x Rift , 1x Touch
[12:29:00 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: yeah,I'd create an app and call if Valve News Network
[12:29:12 AM] Tyler McVicker: I haven't received an E-Mail back
[12:29:17 AM] Tyler McVicker: I still do that?
[12:29:44 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it hasn't even been 30 minutes lol
[12:29:58 AM] Tyler McVicker: I know, but I set an app even though I'm not making an app?
[12:30:23 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: no that's fine, everyone can do that. you're in their version of steamworks right now. this is supposed
[12:30:44 AM] Tyler McVicker: So the name of the app is Valve News Network?
[12:31:20 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: this is supposed to be used for games but our app is just called VR Research @ Valve or something
[12:31:44 AM] Tyler McVicker: Dude, I think they may have changed it
[12:31:59 AM] Tyler McVicker: Because I ain't seeing anything you said I would see
[12:32:12 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: wait, can you screenshot the page?
[12:32:37 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: dashboard.oculus.com
[12:32:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there should be a way for you to add an organization and an app
[12:33:01 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the organization must be named after your legal entity
[12:33:07 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: Your name in this case
[12:33:15 AM] Tyler McVicker: It is
[12:33:19 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but you did everything right
[12:33:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that's all the steps there are
[12:33:42 AM] Tyler McVicker: There is nothing that tells me to fill out ammoune
[12:33:42 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: now you'll have to wait for a response by callum
[12:33:46 AM] Tyler McVicker: Amount
[12:34:04 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: no that's a form that callum's gonna send you if you're accepted
[12:34:08 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh okay
[12:34:31 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you will need a printer and scanner to sign the nda
[12:34:39 AM] Tyler McVicker: I have those things
[12:34:49 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: great, then you'll just have to wait
[12:34:53 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[12:35:08 AM] Tyler McVicker: Well, hopefully that goes well
[12:35:38 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: if you want to play around with their software, you can download it at oculus.com/en-us/setup/
[12:36:27 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay cool
[12:36:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it will ask you to pair a rift but you can skip all the steps if you just want to take a look at the store for example
[12:36:40 AM] Tyler McVicker: I'll look into that
[12:36:54 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: that box in the background is real btw, that's how it's packaged
[12:37:03 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: though htc did an amazing job too
[12:37:31 AM] Tyler McVicker: The 2nd Camera comes with the Touch?
[12:37:36 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: correct
[12:37:39 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[12:37:51 AM] Tyler McVicker: Are the new earphones worth getting?
[12:38:13 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: you can take of the head and there's a standard tripod mount inside
[12:38:35 AM] Tyler McVicker: Oh cool
[12:39:14 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: just get some kind of mini tripod for the second camera if there's nothing to put it on behind you
[12:39:29 AM] Tyler McVicker: I have a fe tripods
[12:39:32 AM] Tyler McVicker: few
[12:40:10 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: the camera is 16:9 as far as i know, so don't rotate it 90 degrees or you end up with a narrower cone
[12:40:26 AM] Tyler McVicker: Okay
[12:40:58 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and to connect it to steam, you just launch steam after you're done with the initial setup inside of the oculus app
[12:41:17 AM] Tyler McVicker: Well, let's just hope they accept my request
[12:41:19 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: steam should auto detect it and there shouldn't be any steps required
[12:43:10 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they're usually pretty quick to answer
[12:43:16 AM] Tyler McVicker: Even this late?
[12:43:32 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: nah, check back during daytime lol
[12:43:39 AM] Tyler McVicker: I figured
[12:44:08 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it usually takes him an hour to reply to my mails
[12:44:18 AM] Tyler McVicker: Is this the guys personal E-Mail
[12:45:17 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: I don't think it is. It's not impossible to find, he tweeted it out a while ago
[12:46:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: there is also a general developer support mail. I thing it's riftES@oculus.com
[12:46:27 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: think
[12:47:17 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but those mails end up on callums pc anyway
[12:47:35 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: and you got more of a shot by contacting him directly imo
[12:48:42 AM] Tyler McVicker: Awesome
[12:48:54 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: sorry, I didn't answer the headphone question
[12:49:24 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: they sound great, every attendee of Oculus Connect got a free pair
[12:49:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but the standard ones are great too
[12:49:52 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: it really just depends on your preference
[12:49:59 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: do you want in-ears or on-ears
[12:50:53 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: in-ears are more immersive and they allow for slightly better accuracy with positional audio because the driver is closer to your eardrum
[12:51:09 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: but on-ears are better for social as you can actually hear yourself speak
[12:53:19 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: just stick with the built in ones and see how you like them first, that's 60 bucks i'd rather spend on Edge of Nowhere or a couple of indies
[12:53:29 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: or, preferably, on steam
[12:54:30 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: what are your pc specs?
[1:00:08 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: because you need all the USB 3.0 ports in the world to run this thing
[1:00:37 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: pcie cards work too if you don't have any slots left
[1:02:25 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: oh and pet the robot dog in The Lab.
[1:05:41 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: alright, logging off for today. let me know if you get one via email.
[1:06:28 AM] Cephalon Cephalon: also, I can't promise that I'll check my mails every single day but I'll read them regularly.