Team Epimetheus

"Life is what you make of it.", a common adage used to express the way in which we can choose to receive the challenges of this world. Ronald Reagan once said that "Life is one grand, sweet song, so start the music." An awesome outlook. There are countless phrases and anecdotes that impress upon us a sunnyside to a darkened day. But sometimes even the strongest raincoats cannot prevent the rain from dampening your clothes. Spring of last year I separated from my family. Immediately after that my estranged family publicly shamed me. My Immediate brother lost the love of his life to a drug overdose that following summer. The little girl whom I love with all my heart and delivered singlehandedly, okay I used both hands, is no longer talking to me. Upon separation from my girlfriend, I discovered that she had let the utilities fall behind by nearly $2,000 and my hours at work had been cut in half. Life was pretty bleak. Through that storm I stayed the course, I slu...

Last month we described the monotony and lackluster of cartography. Specifically, the life-draining attempts at creating maps for Aborlon. Praise God for the discernment to switch gears rather than toss in the towel. Not that this team wasn't going to go the whole ten rounds with any challenge that confronted us. Nonetheless, switching to art asset creation has proven to be far more rewarding and productive than swinging at the formidable opponent of landscape development. Last month we shared the Axe and Sword collections. This week we would like to share some collages that cover a majority of what has been done in the last thirty or so days. Interestingly enough, as we are nearing the completion of the weapons list from the ' smithie ' trade tree it has provided many specialized skills to add to our ever-growing skills list . For example, perhaps your avatar in Aborlon is going to wield a sword. A common weapon choice really. After training the skill 1-handed swor...

One of my favorite artists said: "After every dark night, there is a brighter day." (Tupac Shakur) To me, this has become a philosophy that keeps me focused on the hope that someday things will get better. Recently, I have suffered many weeks of depression and loneliness. I have worked on this blog intermittently only and for any potential followers that probably seems pretty obvious. But I wanted to take a moment to discuss some of my troubles, to get a little personal so that our followers might know the challenges that this blog has endured recently. Back in April of this year, 2019, I made the decision to separate from my girlfriend, who just so happened to be the Product Manager of the blog. It was a hard decision to make but I am now more confident than ever that it was the right one to make. Right decision or not it was still a difficult one. I love her and her daughter very much. Leaving them was like ripping a part of me off. It tore an immense hole into my he...

Have you been following along like an addicted blog follower; impatiently tapping your foot between the monthly posts? Did you keep up with the happenings that have been taking place as we forge our way forward? Are you up to date on the current tasks we are tackling or have leveled our gazes at? Well, if you said yes to any of those questions then you might arch an eyebrow at this months post. Goodness, cartography is a tedious, slow-going process. Quite frankly my dear I have little to no desire to push forward on those tasks at the moment. In fact, it is going to require a heavenly decree from nothing short of an archangel to bring me back to those grueling life-sucking efforts. I would rather scratch my nails down a chalkboard or revert back to dial-up then spend one more minute creating a map. I jest not, it truly is that monotonous. Axes So to keep the progress moving forward I decided to try my hand at weaponsmithing. With several pumps of the bellows, the coals have be...

What does it take to build a unique game world? Imagination? Dedication? Research? Perhaps just artistic talent. Well, if you ever wondered I might be an expert on the matter soon enough. Let me tell you what I have discovered so far. Patience is one of the first things I have noticed is needed. The amount of time I have spent working on the capital city of Busciples has now exceeded the time spent on a racial remastering, and it's not even half done!!! I am going to be adding some maps to the blog allowing followers to see what has been accomplished. Keeping things to scale is an ongoing process. Things are currently at a point where we might want to produce more floorplans before moving forward with the city map as we attempt to keep things consistent. Research is still a fundamental part of this game's development. What were the common elements in a medieval castle? What was the difference between a castle, keep, fortress and a stronghold? How will this play out in...

I bet many of you are wondering: why the gap in posts? Well this page, Team Epimetheus, serves as the front page of our collaborative efforts. However, there are a total of eight pages (blogs) all tied together. These other blogs, or lairs as we like to call them, were created to make navigation of our accomplishments as well as overall direction both more manageable and easier to browse through. Eventually, we will purchase a domain and transfer all of this to a private website. For now, Blogger has provided an amazing platform that costs absolutely nothing to utilize. I really am a fan of what is possible with Blogger, and applaud their services. So what are these other pages that I speak of? I am glad you asked that question. Let me give you a quick tour of our creative realm. Grab your torches, lock-picking tools and let's gear up for an adventure the likes of which will never be matched again in this digitized world! You are of course aware of our cover page: Team Epime...

The more artistic content that is created utilizing the paint.net software, the better the work gets. When this project began an art asset took no more than ten to twelve hours to remaster. It seems like a world of time when considering it alone. However, if a world of time describes the time spent on the first examples then the more than thirty-six hours spent on the Nephilim must easily transcend to the life cycle of a solar system. Perhaps it is the finer details found within the talons of the feet or the odd body posture, or perhaps it is the detailed shading found within each horn and tusk. No matter which aspect of the remastering bogged down the progress of this particular asset, the image never truly felt complete. But sometimes a project has to be called complete, and this demonic-looking race needed to reach its omega. ...