brandonleedy

As an industrial designer with only 3 years of experience, I have two comments:

1) I've worked with/for quite a few different types of companies and I can say that hiring one industrial designer is certainly a signal that they're at least interested in hardware. But if they're going to actually produce something, I suspect they'd need a larger team. Now it's possible they want one in-house I.D. guy to help them better communicate with an outside I.D. firm (such as Microsoft did with the 360). But they probably want this first I.D. guy to generate initial concepts (sketches, models, etc) they can use to get a feel for manufacturing, look and feel, etc. before bringing on more people to help develop a real product.

Then again, after reading the Valve Employee Handbook, I was enamored at how different they felt as a company, so they may want only one experienced guy to "Lone Ranger" this product vision into development. Only time will tell.

2) I've never wished I had 3 more years of experience under my belt more than I do right now. Working on a project as potentially awesome as this for a company like Valve would be an immensely cool experience. Like I said, that Employee Handbook made me yearn for more companies like Valve to take Industrial Designers. Believe it or not, the thing that matters most to most designers is work culture, not type of product. I'm not alone in saying that I can be passionate and excited about designing almost anything, but it's the people and culture that make the job great. When I saw that position appear on their job boards a few weeks ago, I was psyched! It at least means that someday I could work for a place with as cool of a culture and product as Valve.

@tamriilin: No worries, 1920 x 1080 is 16:9 so this one here is for you! :)

I'm glad everyone's liking the wallpapers, and thank you for all the compliments!

@Video_Game_King Ha I was thinking the same thing! For now, I'm making screenshots for the back of the "box" and I'm looking at how actual Atari games drew people so I can draw an accurate 2600 Bombcast crew. I was originally thinking they'd all look like variations on Pitfall Harry (which still wouldn't be too bad) but I've been looking at Kaboom! and Cakewalk in particular, and it appears that there's a fair amount of detail I can work with if I make the guys a little taller and wider.

More to come later, duders and dudettes!

Recently I've been playing my way through the entire Atari 2600 catalog (thanks Jeff!) and I've been having a lot of fun. With the graphics boiled to their purest form, I'm finding just pure awesome mechanics and quite a few times I've had an "Oh that's where that idea/concept came from" moment. If you got the time to play them too, I'd highly recommend it. I'm also a designer, so the visual style and the box art for each of these Atari games is pretty evocative and fun to look at.

Anyways, in my retro / Atari fervor I decided to make some Atari 2600 inspired artwork for Giant Bomb!

I'm working towards a full box art with more text, but this cleaner version seemed ripe for digital wallpapers... and why not share them with the duders?

Asteroids Red:

(hosted on my dropbox, so let me know if any errors occur):

iPhone Sized: 640 x 960, 988kb

iPad Sized: 2048 x 2048, 5.5MB

Desktop (16:9 ratio) : 4.4MB (16:9 Ratio Scales for 11" Macbook Air and All iMacs)

Desktop (16:10 ratio) : 8.3MB (16:10 Ratio Scales for 13" Macbook Air and All Macbook Pros)

Some notes:

- Because trying to hit every pixel size for people's screens is a bit crazy, I made high res wallpapers for different screen ratios. If your screen is a ratio other than 16:9 or 16:10 let me know! The desktop versions are probably bigger than most laptop screens, but the 16:9 & 16:10 ratio should scale to cover all of the display sizes (made by Apple at least).

- Expert retro design duders might notice that I used the Atari title font with the Activision style graphics, and to that I say, YUP. I love that crazy rainbow tail from the Activision covers.

- Also, I'm not sure of the exact copyright vs. fair use when it comes to ape-ing retro style like this (my past experience says this should be fine). But if the GB community would want this on a poster or a shirt and can get in contact with Ryan / whoever gets product on the GB store, I have no problem giving this design to them for use!

9/9/2012 Update! - MORE STUFF

Because I love you all so much (and I was really having fun with it) I finished up the box art, added it to a quick 3d render, and even made some alternate colors for the wallpaper!

Here's the finished box art and the art quickly rendered on a box... albeit a 3D one. (Click to embiggen and see the details!)

And finally, here's the new color options for the wallpaper! I based the hue of red off of the Asteroids' red so I copped some colors from some other classic Atari boxes!

Space Invaders Blue:

iPhone Sized - 960 x 640

iPad Sized - 2048 x 2048

Desktop (16:9 ratio) - (16:9 Ratio Scales for 11" Macbook Air and All iMacs)

Desktop (16:10 ratio) - (16:10 Ratio Scales for 13" Macbook Air and All Macbook Pros)

Pitfall Green:

iPhone Sized - 960 x 640

iPad Sized - 2048 x 2048

Desktop (16:9 ratio) - (16:9 Ratio Scales for 11" Macbook Air and All iMacs)

Desktop (16:10 ratio) - (16:10 Ratio Scales for 13" Macbook Air and All Macbook Pros)

Cool? Thanks again for all the good vibes duders and dudettes, hope you enjoy the retro wallpapers!

Like many, the concept of Greenlight seems exciting, but the execution doesn't feel quite there yet. As some have mentioned previously, Steam needs to use reliable feedback to better motivate users to participate and hold a higher standard. Ironically, the quest system here on GB seems like a cool fit. Try and review games, participate in discussions, etc for Greenlight achievements? I also like the idea of a small monetary "gatekeeper" fee to prevent spamming, but not higher than $5.

Woo, a dominating amount of encouragement to go for Ocarina of Time.  
 
@blacklabeldomm Ha yes, a Wii that actually sees some use, though not by me normally. I haven't touched it since the Galaxies and a half-hearted attempt to play Goldeneye (probably a good reason to go with the classic controller, the wii-mote with that game is rough). Now, my sister and Mom use it frequently to do Wii Fit, Zumba, and the Just Dances. 
 
@Th3_James I've considered it, and it runs well on my Mac, but using the keyboard is cramp central... and if I'm gonna buy a controller I figure I'll buy the Classic Controller for Wii where I can use it on other games too (namely an unfinished copy of Goldeneye). 
 
Thanks to everybody for the input! I'll be playing Ocarina of Time soon!

Really well done! Huge props.  
Also, I'm not sure I will ever tire or cease to laugh at Ryan being shooped into games. So amazing.

Distinctive Software