Balthazar Auger

Picture this: after having graduated from a fairly prestigious public game school with a heavily academic and independent-development-oriented curriculum, you immediately land a job at a big-name publisheloper (publisher + developer) as a designer on a top seller, yearly released license.

As usual with that kind of gig, the pay is nice, you have lots of good workplace relationships, you have vast resources at your disposal and the overall quality of life is better than average. On the other hand, you also need to learn how to cope with the -sometimes Escheresque- logics of HR, Business and Editorial services. You also need to deal with yourself-from-two-years-ago constantly whispering you’re sometimes just reinventing the wheel and treading familiar paths.

Is there a way to reconcile what you were taught to do and what you are doing now? Let’s find out together.

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Over at Gamasutra:

Take-Two subsidiary 2K Games announced today that developer Firaxis is currently working on Sid Meier’s Civilization IV: Colonization for PC, set to be released this fall. A “complete reimagining” of the original Colonization, it again puts the player in the role of one of four European powers seeking to establish colonial dominance over the New World. (more…)

The long hiatus is over, I have Internet access at home once again. Granted, I havent been completely disconnected, since I’m now interning at Ubisoft, but I like keeping my Ubi work and my personal work separated.

I could also have posted from an internet cafe, but, hey, come on!

Newness is around the corner.

I’ve just heard that Gary Gygax, co-creator of the Dungeons and Dragons roleplaying game, has passed away.

That man was virtually responsible for the gaming (video and other) industry’s place in the world as of now.

I feel… strange.

Okay, sorry I haven’t been able to pay more attention to this blog, it’s just that I’m putting in a bit of overtime on M.A.Z.E. to compensate the week I’ll be spending at GDC, which is also taking me time to get ready for.

I’m sure GDC will provide me with good stories to tell, and I’m also sure I’ll be unable to update this until I come back.

If you are attending GDC, I’d be glad to meet you! I should be stuck at the IGF Booth during the expo (Wed. to Fri.) to demo Poesysteme, and I think I won’t miss the IGDA party either (Tuesday, I think).

So, until then, then!

In the mailbox today, excellent news! (for me)

Cher Balthazar,

J’ai le plaisir de vous confirmer que vous avez été retenu par le jury du concours SACD – GDC pour partir à la GDC qui a lieu du 18 au 22 février, à San Francisco, Californie, USA.

Tout d’abord, bravo pour votre jeu “Poesysteme” qui a fortement impressionné le jury SACD qui s’est tenu lundi 5 novembre à Paris.

Want to know what it means exactly? More after the jump.

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I understand that i should introduce myself a little, as I’m starting this from scratch in english ; All previous content was in french before, this blog is a sort of writing exercise… So, “excuse my french”!

I am actually a second-year Game Design student at ENJMIN, located in Angoulême, France. This public institution is rather new, even by the game industry standards, but is already proving to be one of the leading creative forces in Europe, as far as videogames are concerned.

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