Hooray! iPhone 3G S is on the left, 2nd generation iPod Touch is on the right in the following pictures:

Can't comment on the phone functionality since I rarely make calls, but performance-wise the new 3G S is significantly faster when loading content-heavy web pages (most of the internet), and the overall OS is much snappier than the already fast 2nd Gen iPod Touch. I Love Katamari was rather difficult to play on the iPod due to an inconsistent frame rate, but on the 3G S it is much smoother and easier to play. Loading times are also cut by at least 25% in most cases, and sometimes more! Even the awesome Solitaire app runs smoother! I can tell because according to the stats page on my iPod I've played at least 65 hours of it.

On the health front: the colonoscopy procedure went alright. The absolute worst part was drinking the gallon of solution the night before the procedure. You basically get a gallon jug filled with some powdered stuff in the bottom 10%. You mix it with water and it becomes this slimy goo that has the consistency of watered-down maple syrup, though significantly less tasty than actual maple syrup. The actual procedure was no problem, as I was out like a light within a minute of being sedated.

E3:

Not too much in the show that I'm particularly excited for with the exception of Mass Effect 2 and Modern Warfare 2. I'm very intrigued about the possibilities of both Sony's motion controller and Microsoft's Project Natal, though both have different strengths to me.

I'm a firm believer that physical buttons are required even with motion control, so I feel like Sony's implementation will be easier to control and generally more intuitive. It appears that Sony's controller only uses the Eyetoy, and from my experiences with it the camera does not work well in low-light situations (i.e. 90% of my gaming).

Microsoft's Natal is the more developed product at the moment, and I particularly like its seamless integration into the 360 dashboard. It also looks like it can be patched as a controller for games that have already been released (Burnout Paradise was used to demo the system at E3.) I have difficulty imagining a serious business game being controlled solely by the Natal camera besides a racing or strategy game.

iPhone 3GS:

Most of today's coverage of the new iPhone unit has been about the new 3.0 OS, the camera, and AT&T totally shafting their customers as usual, with only vague notions as to what has changed as far as its gaming capabilities. It was mentioned only briefly in the presentation, but the new iPhone has an upgraded graphics processor that now supports OpenGL ES 2.0 rather than 1.1 like previous units.

The main change in this upgrade is that the graphics are no longer fixed-function, but are now fully programmable. This means that shaders (pixel and vertex) can now be used and accelerated by the hardware! To put this in more understandable terms: previous generations of the iPhone platform had graphics on-par with the PSP, now it can do effects more in-line with consoles like the Xbox 360! It won't do it in high definition, and flashy effects are still worthless if the CPU gets bogged down with physics and AI, but it's nice to finally have the option of using shaders.

Here's an example video of a different hardware processor showing some of the effects OpenGL ES 2.0 is capable of. You might want to mute your sound for the video, as it was recorded at a tradeshow floor. The effects are similar to the beginning of the Half Life 2 benchmark level.

This is why I can't have nice things:

My health situation has taken a turn for the painful, as I've had constant abdominal pain for the last two weeks. I've seen three different doctors in the last few weeks, and as a result I have to have a colonoscopy done this Wednesday. I can't eat any solid food starting tonight until Wednesday after the procedure, and tomorrow I have to drink a gallon of some vile liquid. :(

I'm getting to the point in the creation of my iPhone games where I can start to blog about them -- though I'm keeping the details about my first project intentionally vague. My first game is something that I (and others I've shared the idea with) believe is perfect for the platform, however there aren't any games like it currently on the app store. I'd like to keep this one close to my chest in case someone with a team and resources beats me to it! :P I can tell you the project's title: Elective Immortality.

For now I'll be posting about the tools I'm using in general, and today's is specifically about a pair of programs: Blender and L3DT. Blender is the (100% free) 3D program I used to create my 3D short movie about a year ago, and it also just happens to have nearly all the capabilities required to make a game. L3DT is, as the name implies, a Large 3-Dimensional Terrain generator. It's dead simple to create planet-sized terrains complete with different climates for each region and nice-looking textures to boot.

The only real problem with L3DT is that each tile of terrain is made up of just over 2 MILLION polygons when it's exported to a mesh. To put that in perspective: my game engine's recommended polygon count is 6000 to 7000 for 30fps on low-end iPhones and iPods! Fortunately, Blender has an awesome Retopo tool which allows users to easily create low-polygon meshes over high-polygon meshes. Here's a video of it in action done by someone else. Below are comparison shots of the high poly, then the low poly version. Disregard the shadows, as L3DT baked in the shadows directly onto the full texture map.

Not too much difference between the two, and if I wanted to make the low-poly match the higher-poly one more it'd still only add about 25% to the face count. As is, the low-poly version is 98 polygons! Quite a bit less than 2.09 million.

These blocks of terrain are actually intended for my second project, which I can tell you about. My second project is going to be an RPG, similar in gameplay and graphical style to the PlayStation Final Fantasy games. The majority of modern RPGs don't let you roam around an overworld, opting instead for the method of selecting a location from a list and then going there automatically. I'd rather be able to freely run around a fully 3D overworld, so that was one of the first things I tested. It works, and works well. :)

I also picked up another piece of gear in the last few days: a Wacom Intuos4 tablet. My old Gateway tablet PC's digitizer on the screen stopped working, so I needed a new drawing tablet. The Intuos4 just came out a few weeks ago, so that's what I went with. It's the medium-sized version, because I wanted the cool OLED screens for button labels since I switch it between my PC and my Mac, and I couldn't justify getting one of the larger sizes.

It's a much different drawing experience compared to my old tablet PC, however it's better in all the areas that count. It's incredibly sensitive now, so even the lightest brush of the stylus on the tablet will register. It'll also track the angle of the stylus relative to the tablet surface, which is awesome for the included sketching programs (akin to drawing with a pencil tip for fine detail and tilting the pencil to shade much larger areas at a time,) You can also flip the stylus over and use the eraser functionality.

I think that's about it for this update -- I'll write another once I have a bit more time and material to show you!

It's one of the brand-new Canon T1i kits! My first digital SLR, and it's rather awesome. 15 megapixels (I know, I know - megapixels are less important than quality lenses), awesome 720p video and significantly less awesome 1080p video.

I needed a decent camera for texture work for my iPhone games, but I also needed something that can shoot decent video as well. Renting a quality video camera is a few hundred dollars for a 36-hour rental cycle, which is why I went with the video-capable T1i over a cheaper still-only XS.

Video capability means video blogs soonish! Making progress on the game but it's not quite ready to unveil to the public yet.

Click on the pictures below to open the full resolution versions.

Copied & pasted from my GS blog, because I am lazy.

After a very quick cycle of applications and interviews in the last 10 days, I finally got the call this morning that I've been accepted for a job! Even more exciting to me is that this job is at Sony Online Entertainment!

I start training sometime in the next week or so, and then start my shifts soon after. Exciting times, and finally an end to my very long search for employment.

On a sad note, I had to sell my trusty video camera last month for some much-needed cash, so no more video blogs for the next while unless I hook up one of my awful webcams.

Got Left 4 Dead on PC, played it, loved it, my GAME OF THE YEAR for 2008.

And now for your consideration: Dune Cat!

...on my other blog, I announced that I am no longer producing video reviews because I now have a job in the gaming industry. I now work for Sony as a Game Test Analyst! Hooray!

Videos will still be made, just not formal reviews.

...and I can't say anything more about the job than is already said due to contract stipulations, so please don't ask. :P

My '03 Mustang has served me well these past five years, but now it's time to part ways. Should sell for a decent amount since its got hella low miles on it (37k).

I'm not too bummed about it because I've decided to replace it with a motorcycle! I went in to the DMV today and, after a three hour wait, passed my written test for an M1 learner's permit. Hooray! They made me take the C-class test as well since I already have a regular license, and oddly enough that test had trickier questions than the motorcycle one -- mostly due to the recent laws that went into effect in CA. I had no idea it's now illegal to smoke in a car with a minor! There was also a question about the new cellphone law too. Serious business.

I plan to take the MSF course sometime in the near future, so I can have my full license and get my own bike. The courses are in really high demand at the moment due to gas prices, so I might not be able to get into one until later this fall. We'll see. I plan on starting off with a (used) Suzuki GS500F as my first bike, and then working up to something a bit more sporty. :P

Also sent in some more job applications recently, because it's becoming more and more apparent that my game requires more staff than one person in order to get it done within a reasonable timeframe. :( I'll probably miss the competition deadline, but I'll still post the final product on MS's service later on in the year once it's ready.