It’s been three weeks and I’m back to work today. It was just a day of catching up on all the stuff that went on while I was gone. In fact, the rest of the week is probably going to be catching up and getting the new project I’m working on heading in the right direction.
Today’s picture is of my parents with the girls while we were visiting my grandparents in Lindale, Texas.
Happy Father’s Day to all the fathers out there. I received French Toast for breakfast from my family today. My present was a framed picture from the Rose Bowl which included one of our tickets. It’s great and when I finally have an office up at work, I’m going to take it up to work and hang it up there. We didn’t do much today. We just hung around the house and rested.
Tonight an NFL Head Coach commercial ad played during the NBA Finals. If you missed it, you can see it at this link on YouTube.
Today’s picture is back from Isabelle’s party. She finished her cupcake with some icing on her nose.
It’s been a busy last couple of weeks as we’ve been finishing up NFL Head Coach, but it’s out the door and I’m off of work for the next three weeks.
This past week was also that last week of school, which means that Abby has graduated from pre-school and is on her way to Kindergarten in a couple of months. Today’s picture is from Abby getting her pre-school diploma. They start the year pretty early: July 31st. Can’t believe she’s about to go to “big school” as we’ve been calling it.
This past week Isabelle has really started walking a lot more. She will randomly walk around the living room, but when she wants to really get around she still relies on the speed crawling.
One last thing I wanted to call out was my Xbox 360’s blog. While I was at work a lot, it got very lonely and started writing bad things about me in it’s blog. Now that I’m back, it’s pretty stoked that I’ve been playing a lot of NFS Most Wanted.
It’s been a while since I’ve had the time to write on Frenchville. We are still in our crunch time on NFL Head Coach and I haven’t even turned on my computer in 2 weeks. In an attempt to get something posted to Frenchville, I’m writing this at work, right before I leave.
Today Jennifer took all the girls down to the Outlet Mall in order to get out of the house and go do something. They also went to the giant McDonalds down on International Drive for lunch. Lately Abby has been noticing that some people smoke cigarettes. She asks us why and we tell her that it’s bad and we don’t know why people do it. Today Jennifer and the girls were getting ice cream and Jennifer told Abby to go outside while she paid. After a few seconds, Abby came back in holding her nose saying that people were outside smoking and that it stinks. Jennifer said it was pretty funny.
Isabelle is on the verge of walking. She can easily stand up in the middle of the room and take one step. Then, she switches to her preferred mode of transport: crawling. It probably doesn’t help that Abby picks her up and carries her around the house all the time. Why learn to walk when you have a big sister who can carry you around.
My break over, I headed back to work last Thursday and right back into our Finaling period on NFL Head Coach. So far, we’ve been able to keep it 10 – 11 hour days with weekends off. So far, so good. One of the nice things about working for EA is you get to go to special NFL events. As part of research for NFL Head Coach, this past weekend, I was able to go up to the Annual Owners and Coaches’ Meeting taking place here in Orlando. We were able to interview most of the coaches in order to get ideas for the game. One of my co-workers did most of the talking but I got to meet the following coaches: Bill Cowher (Steelers), Marty Schottenheimer (Chargers), Dick Jauron (Bills), Andy Reid (Eagles), Jim Mora (Falcons), Mike Holmgren (Seahawks), Jack Del Rio (Jaguars), and Mike McCarthy (Packers). Bill Cowher is going to be on the cover of NFL Head Coach and I got to show him a build of the game, which we filmed for marketing purposes. If any of the footage makes the light of day, I’ll be sure and post a link. Meeting all of them was great and a excellent resource for ideas for our game.
On Wednesday, we had several magazines come to visit Tiburon in order to get a first look at NFL Head Coach. Gamespot and IGN have both written pretty good previews of the game. This week we also announced that the game is officially entitled “NFL Head Coach” and that Bill Cowher is going to be on the cover. We also announced the ship date of: June 20th. The feedback was pretty favorable and we are all looking forward to getting this game done so we can see the reaction of the fans to the game.
Sorry it’s been a while again. I just can’t seem to get back into writing on Frenchville. This week we started our finaling period on NFL Head Coach. That’s where we stop working on new features that will be in the game and just work on fixing bugs. That’s also the time where I put in the most hours. So, sounds like a good time to take a week off. I was approaching my limit on PTO, so my boss told me to take a week off so that I don’t hit the limit. I can’t complain with that. So, I’ve been home since Thursday and I don’t go back to work until next Thursday. You would think that we would get out and do stuff, but we’ve really just been hanging around the house. We did go play putt-putt golf on Thursday, but that’s the extent of our excursions.
The terrible three’s have arrived from Emily. She just doesn’t listen to what we are saying. She is just off doing what ever Emily wants to do. Jennifer and I are reaching our wits end. Today she pushed Isabelle over and she bumped her head. Emily ran for her life once Isabelle started screaming.
Speaking of Isabelle, she has really been getting around the house. She crawls pretty much every where now and can walk down the edge of the couch. Yesterday she’s started wheeling herself around in this walker we have. We’ve been using it for weeks now, but it hasn’t been until recently that she’s noticed that she can roll herself around. Today’s picture is actually a movie. It’s suggested for high bandwidth Internet connection because it’s almost 8 MB. Isabelle has a special interest in this plastic duck.
I finished The Da Vinci Code yesterday. It was pretty good. I guess I was expecting much more since the book was so popular. To tell you the truth, Angels and Demons was better. I can’t wait to see the movie. Unfortunately a preview for the movie spoiled the ending of the book for me. I kept waiting for this one particular scene to happen and guess what? I happened at the end of the book. Overall, though, I thought it was a good book. I’ve now read all of Dan Brown’s books. I really like him as an author and I plan on reading anything he writes in the future. Now I’m back to the Dark Tower series again: Wizard and Glass.
Everyone has been telling me how much they enjoyed my Rose Bowl coverage. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to get back into the habit of writing on Frenchville. Things are starting to settle down, so hopefully I can get back into the routine.
One of the first things that happened once we got back was Emily’s 3rd birthday party. We rented out The Little Gym and we were really worried if anyone was going to show up. We ended up inviting some of Abby’s friends in order to round out the group. We only had one out of Emily’s six classmates show up. For the cake, Jennifer made a new creation: a group of cup cakes which had candy lions, zebras, tigers, and elephants. They ran around the Gym for two hours and had great fun. It has been though planning Emily’s parties since they are so close to Christmas. This year was no different.
At work I moved on to a new product tentatively entitled NFL Head Coach. It’s a new NFL franchise we are creating at Tiburon that is a strategy game where you attempt to build and manage a football team. I’ve come in to manage the Gameplay and Online aspects of the game. The game will be available in stores spring 2006 for the Playstation 2, Xbox and PC.
A couple of weeks ago Tiburon paid for everyone’s family to go to Disney World’s Epcot. The girls had fun going to a park that we don’t normally go to. (We usually go to Magic Kingdom.) We went from “country” to “country” decorating a mask at each one. I finally got to ride Mission: Space, which is only at Epcot. It’s a simulator ride which really makes it feel like you are taking off in a space shuttle. It was pretty cool. However, I was feeling a little dizzy when I got off. It spins you around like you are in a centrifuge, but you can’t tell it since you are locked into a simulator room.
A week ago last Wednesday Electronic Arts laid off 5% of their work force. It was a cost cutting move that typically happens during what we call a “transition year” (the time between generations of hardware). 35 people were laid off from Tiburon. It was sad because this was the first time that we had to go through this. Last transition (1999-2000) the lay offs happened at other studios because Tiburon was so small. Now that we are approaching 600 employees, it was time to downsize our work force. Although I wasn’t personal friends with some of the people that got laid off, I knew some of them and, like I said, it was sad to see them go.
This weekend I took the plunge and had laser eye surgery. I went in Friday morning. It was really easy there wasn’t much pain at all. I could tell a difference right after the surgery. I went home and slept for several hours and I could see much better. It’s quite amazing. My vision isn’t 100%, but it’s getting better every day. There were two strange events that went on. First, a very tall lanky guy comes up to you and says in a real calm voice, “Dr. Filutowski is going to be your surgeon today. He requests that everyone have a massage to relax you for your surgery. Would you care for a massage?” That was weird, but a guy who works on NFL Head Coach who got the surgery two weeks ago pre-warned me of the event. The other strange thing is that immediately after the surgery, Dr. Filutowski has you give a “thumbs up” and they take your picture with him. It’s framed and given to you when you leave. Besides the two strange events, I’ve been really happy with my surgery so far. I was amazed how easy it was.
Finally, Isabelle has made a lot of progress over the month. During Christmas vacation she was sitting up on her own. Now she crawls all over the house and will stand up against any kind of furniture that will let her. At first she would stand up and then she couldn’t get down, but now she’s fully mastered getting up and down. This is the first time we’ve had a baby so young that is mobile in a big area. When Abby and Emily were mobile we were living in apartments and we could section off the areas of the apartment. Isabelle is going from room to room getting in trouble. Abby has been a great help watching over her and moving her from room to room when necessary.
Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve written. We’ve been busy getting ready for our big trip to Texas as well as buying presents for Christmas. At work, I was moved onto a new project: NFL Head Coach. They are about to start finaling and I’m going to be working on getting them through the process. It’s tough since I just finaled Madden Next Gen, but I think I can be a lot of help. NFL Head Coach is another football game, but instead of being the player you are the coach. It’s more of a strategy game than an arcade game like Madden.
Abby was counting the days until we leave for Texas. Each morning she would ask, “How long until we leave for Grandma and Poppa’s house?” Well, the past two days were spent traveling from Orlando to Houston. We are staying with Jennifer’s parents for the next week through Christmas day. We spent the night in a hotel in Mobile, Alabama and traveled through the Katrina hurricane damaged areas of South Mississippi and Louisiana. It was amazing how much damage was still visible from the Interstate. We saw some crumpled “Golden Arches” and a lot of miscellaneous garbage on the side of the road; and, of course, a ton of downed trees. Mississippi was worse than Louisiana, but then we didn’t go down to New Orleans. We took I-12, which bypasses New Orleans and goes directly to Baton Rouge. Once we passed all that, we hit all the damage from Rita in South Louisiana and Texas. There were a ton of blue tarps which reminded us of Orlando two years ago.
Anyway, we safely made it to Houston and we are glad to finally not be in the Sequoia anymore. Within fifteen minutes of being here Emily had already broken one of Grandma’s nativity scenes. For dinner, Christiana and Mike came over and we all had dinner together. I brought out the Xbox 360 and showed them Madden and Mike and I played some Need for Speed: Most Wanted.
We left Austin’s bed at home so we had to go out to Target and get him another one. We also stopped by Best Buy so I could get a 512 MB card for our camera. I swiped the one we had previously so that I could use it in my new Palm pilot. I’ve been using it as an MP3 player, my PSP has gotten too bulky. My Palm pilot worked great and I listened to all the Podcasts I was behind on all the way from Orlando to Houston. I caught up on This Week in Tech, Security Now!, and Inside the Net. There are still several hours that I still need to listen to in order to officially “catch up”. I got behind while I was finaling Madden Next Gen.
Last Saturday was Abby’s 5th birthday. We had a simple party at our house, inviting Abby’s friends from school and the neighborhood. The new play gym got a lot of use during the party. It was so nice outside, that we opened up the back doors and just freely roamed from inside and outside. Abby got several Barbies. We were amazed that no one gave her the same one, though. Right now we just can’t believe that we have a five year old running around the house.
Yesterday was the Madden Next Gen and Xbox 360 Launch Event at work. The Jacksonville Jaguar’s Cheerleaders and mascot were there and they had Madden Next Gen up on the big screen. The family came up and we ate some food and Jennifer got to finally see the game I worked on for so long. She also got to meet some of the new guys I’m working with on my new project.
I also purchased an Xbox 360 from work yesterday. They raffled off the right to buy the new console and I was one of the lucky ones to win. I spent last night playing Need for Speed and Halo 2. Today I moved our wireless router upstairs so that I could plug the Xbox into it and play games online. I just finished playing two games of Madden online, which I’ve never done on the console version of the game before. It was pretty cool and very addictive.
This past week it was back to work for me. I’ve moved onto another project and we are starting our Pre-Production phase, so I’ve been busy doing planning for that project. The game I just finished, Madden NFL 06 for the Xbox 360, was just released to stores today, even though the Xbox 360 console won’t be in stores until November 22nd. I’m still hoping to get my hands on an Xbox 360 before leaving for Christmas.
We’ve mainly been busy getting ready for Abby’s birthday party on Saturday. We aren’t doing anything fancy for Abby’s party this year. We are just having a normal party with her friends from the neighborhood and school coming over to celebrate. It’s still hard work getting everything together, order balloons and food for the party, etc. Jennifer has been handling all the logistics for that, as usual.
Emily had to stay home from school today. She crawled into our bed last night and was burning up hot. Jennifer gave her some Tylenol, but she’s had a fever all day. Now we are just waiting for each one of the girls to get sick. We seem to have this pattern lately where Emily brings it home and then starts giving it to each of us.
Frenchville 