Tactical Gamer - Blogs - BigGaayAl http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/ Tactical Gamer is the PREMIERE mature online gaming community. We feature games such as PlanetSide 2, Battlefield 3, Armed Assault (ARMA2), Natural Selection 2, and more. Our community is geared around teamwork, strategy and tactics in a mature environment. en Sun, 19 May 2013 04:29:56 GMT vBulletin 60 http://www.tacticalgamer.com/images/styles/UndergroundStyle/misc/rss.jpg Tactical Gamer - Blogs - BigGaayAl http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/ Back... 1st: India, gaming and outsourcing: an uncomfortable truth. http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/918-back-1st-india-gaming-outsourcing-uncomfortable-truth.html Fri, 24 Feb 2012 05:09:26 GMT Hi all. I had written one blog post in India, but then it was on an apple computer and apparently safari does not remember posts if sending fails...Stupid apple, I hope Steve Jobs reincarnated as one! My plan to write certainly did fail hard, as 4 of my 6 weeks in India were spent without... Hi all.

I had written one blog post in India, but then it was on an apple computer and apparently safari does not remember posts if sending fails...Stupid apple, I hope Steve Jobs reincarnated as one!

My plan to write certainly did fail hard, as 4 of my 6 weeks in India were spent without electricity or running water on a beach with a bunch of hippies. Therefore I plan to make a series of smaller posts describing various things of interest. Today is the first post. Surprisingly, it is about the games industry.

First the setting: me, my gf, her son, a full power 50yr old Italian, a Canarian, 3 Indian friends from... Bangalore ;) all sitting in a small bar smoking charas over drinks and delicious but risky food. We were on a beach right next to this one, just to give you an idea:



After some time an other indian man joins us at the table. Now this is quite a nice beach; huts made from palm leaves, lots of yoga peoples and musicians on the beach etc. Then someone asks what his job is. Turns out he is a lead programmer/developer in a game-designing company. Now I found it quite funny to be talking to a programmer on a quite idyllic beach. Bu t I proceeded to ask him exactly what he does, how, for who...everything.

What I learned was quite the surprise. This man had worked on many of the most important games of the last years. His company has made MOST of COD Modern Combat....While we are led to believe that these blockbuster games are made in Dice Canada, or Tetryarch etc....we are totally being deceived!

Major production studios are outsourcing most of the developement of their games to indian software companies. And when I say most I really do mean most. I discussed this in detail with him. It varies how much they do, but it goes from doing only the most labour intensive work like building all the levels, artwork, objects etc. But it usually also includes gameplay design.

This was a shocker to me. All these big companies really don't let this show. The truth is I suspect, that most of all the big games are produced in India period. The Indian programmer told me at least 5 times in the talk that really all they still do abroad (=not in India) is build the engine.

For those interested: the indian developer I speak of said that they are starting to do games fully in India more and more. He said they had just finished a game about Doctor Who. I think it might be this one: http://ps3.ign.com/articles/121/1217016p1.html Doctor who: the eternety clock, 'by' the bbc.

For his role as lead programmer/dev, he made about 1000 euro, 1 337.3 U.S. dollars a month. I don't think we can compete with that...

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I thought this might be a nice start to explain some things about this insane country. It certainly tought me something unexpected. See you next post ;) x ]]> BigGaayAl http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/918-back-1st-india-gaming-outsourcing-uncomfortable-truth.html India Bound. http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/868-india-bound.html Wed, 14 Dec 2011 04:44:10 GMT Hi, I leave for six weeks of India in about an hour. I usually write a blog somwhere, but sparked by the interest of some TG-ers I figured I would write it here this time around. And who knows, maybe it might inspire some of the fans of american exceptionalism of which there seem to be suite a... Hi,
I leave for six weeks of India in about an hour. I usually write a blog somwhere, but sparked by the interest of some TG-ers I figured I would write it here this time around. And who knows, maybe it might inspire some of the fans of american exceptionalism of which there seem to be suite a bit in TG, to travel themselves one day and learn about different culture. Failing that, I'll aim to spark at least an interest in other cultures, and the exceptional wisdom and creativity that exists in every single culture if you bother to look at it in the right light.

Departure: I leave in a few hours by -tram(trolley?) then -train -plane -plane -taxi -plane -taxi. All together I aim to arrive after a journey of approximately 30 hours and this right after a full night shift.

Fortunately, experience tought me that suffering a lot before you arrive at a destination makes it exponentially easier to acclimatise to whatever circumstances you will find yourself in.

So tommorow I should be in a place that I have no clue about, other then that it has a temperature around 35°c at this time (vs 1°c in Belgium), lies on the southwest coast of India, and has stuff. Now I know travelling without an itinerary is intimidating for many people. But once you have done it, it is so liberating, so enthralling that it is nearly impossible to go back to planned travelling. This is another aspect which I hope will be interesting to some.

Any remarks or questions are welcome. Furthermore I don't know too well how the blogging system works on TG, so I hope I won't bother anyone if it does or does not appear on the main page.

Cheers,
Biggaayal, (since very recently proud) citizen of possibly the first country in the world with an openly gay and openly socialist prime minister which has not collapsed into chaos sodomy and concentration camps against all odds for now ;). ]]> BigGaayAl http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/868-india-bound.html Lake Pokhare, Nepal. http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/67-lake-pokhare-nepal.html Thu, 04 Mar 2010 15:37:07 GMT Image: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/840639/Kopie%20van%20Nepal%20970.jpg I raise your fence one flower.
I raise your fence one flower. ]]> BigGaayAl http://www.tacticalgamer.com/blogs/biggaayal/67-lake-pokhare-nepal.html