Ze streak! She is the broken!

I’m gonna try using this blog to release stress, because for one I’ve got it in spades – yay for starting corporations – and for two maybe if it works, I’ll start being a little bit more regular with my posts. Besides, that’ll give me some content to discuss on a regular basis other than my roguelike Southgate. This is important, because now that I have about sixty five full time jobs, I rarely get out of the house anymore. Hopefully that’ll change once the company’s off of the ground.

So, what to talk about? I still can’t talk much about that; the patents are only partially underway, and I’m being a total secrecy freak. All I’ll say is that it’s for the Nintendo DS, that it’s a huge risk, that the reward is gigantic, and that if I somehow manage to pull this off, things are going to change in a relatively surprising fashion. I’m not one prone to hyperbole, so people who know me, maybe pay attention. I really believe that if this works, it’s going to be a capital b capital d Big Deal. Of course, in order to get that initial capital I have to give half the horse away, which tehsux. Also, I have to give a big chunk to my new business partner, because she’s making this, um, what’s the word, possible. That all said, I talked to my friend Brooke about this (luckily he doesn’t give a damn about my blog so he’ll never read this,) and he says the deal I’m getting is actually pretty sweet, and that I’m offended by the numbers is me just being a business noob. Sure, from my perspective the equity I have to hand out – approximately two point three bujillion dollars for every peso invested – seems a mite on the high side. Apparently though, this is the norm, as much to recoup investments into other companies which failed for a given investor as because they have barrels with which to bend people over.

I still want to keep 110%.

I’m kind of excited in that several of my friends are among the initial investors. That I didn’t expect, but when I’ve mumbled about what I was doing, several people whose opinions I value have done the instant messenger equivalent of the pants crappery dance, and have requested to jump onboard. This means that some of the people who I’m making Bruce Wayne rich in exchange for handing me the price of an extra value meal will actually be people I give a damn about. This, it turns out, is double-awesome.

Y’see, if someone had asked me before this all started whether I’d ever take money from a friend, my answer would have been a flat no. Totally not about the spreading of the risk to people I care about. Not into the whole notion of if I go down, I drag my friends down with me. That’s something you expect from scumbags who care more about getting ahead in the world than their interpersonal relationships or their honor.

Or, at least, so I would have said. Then, I started telling one of my dear friends what I was up to, and I swear to god I could hear him hyperventilating over the internet. He all but stuffed a wad of money in my face, and then told me he was going to get his brother in on it too. And, combined with a different one of my investors, who was once a professional gambler and gave me a very clear view of things as his not investing money he couldn’t afford to lose, it turns out that my beliefs about appropriacy in investment are starting to 180. I used to think friends and family stock was generally morally bankrupt. I’m starting to understand it now, and why it’s there, and I’m starting to think about maybe offering it. Being able to support one’s family’s fiscal development by directing capital into things you have faith will grow turns out to be a warm fuzzy feeling, not a cold clammy feeling. And, to be quite clear, that’s a big surprise to me.

So, I’ve now opened investment to half a dozen friends. Three months ago I would have been appalled by the notion, and would have insisted I’d only accept investment from professionals. Now, I’m starting to get out of this kneejerk reaction I have of preventing people from getting into danger. To be plain, my friends are adults, and they don’t need my watchful eye. If they believe in what I’m doing, I’m starting to believe that they should just be allowed to take the risk with me. Hell, one of my friends is going on a private crusade for me; he grew up in one of those Money areas of the United States, and he’s gone back to talk to the people with whom he grew up, who can throw around six digits without much concern.

Only takes one, right?

Anyhoo, that’s why I’ve been gone for a month – I’ve been stupid, I forgot, the reminder I made for myself disappeared until just now, and I’ve been so far past nose to the grindstone that the inside of my skull is getting grindwheel marks. I’ve been whoring up initial funding, setting up services, registering a corporation, filing for patents, getting patent lawyers, getting IP lawyers, getting marketers, and even occasionally working on the actual product. It’s kind of nice that the actual product is already done; that way I don’t have to feel like this is all bass ackwards. I can just watch a real businessperson do her thing, and learn from it, instead of indulging in second guesses the whole way.

More on how lucky I am to have found my business partner another day. She’s awesome in the way that my artist is awesome, except with spreadsheets instead of pixels. She sees the potential and she’s just working on making it happen, because she knows I’ll do the right thing and make the bootstrap people rich with me. She’s been working hard, too, and with nothing more than the promise of the company output itself. Sure, this is what you always hear about in the stories of people having made it work, but actually landing someone like that turns out to be a whole different matter.

Anyway, here’s some Charles Bronson Murderology for the palette.

And, I’m back.

So, today I wrote two two-page documents, another two pages on my gigantic bullet list, I spent another zillion hours on the phone trying to extract simple short answers out of people who don’t seem to know how not to frame “yes” or “no” in sixteen sentences about why, and so on. huhu. Thank god for my one friend Josh, who puts up with enough of my crap to let me put my foot down and not accept Maddenized answers.

On the bright side, I discovered this. Apparently it’s a cut from a longer song by Hard and Phirm, whose album I’m beginning to think about tracking down. I found a wholly obnoxious exerpt from a children’s show that actually plays a big chunk of the rest of the song at Keith Schofield’s page, but there’s this awful bit with children asking extremely (and annoyingly) unlikely questions as a lead-in.

Look, I know it’s annoying. Suffer through it, and while you’re at it, ditch the visual part. You’re in that Schofield page for the song, not the video. The video’s double-crap. But, the song it frames – inexplicably awesome. I totally tranced out repeating it for like 40 minutes. Don’t mind the idiot children playing with a mop or throwing a hat around; it’s disinteresting. The song, though. Unf.

• Jobs
  • I have two jobs right now, both of which are full time, and only one of which pays. This is a surprisingly brutal position, moreso than it’s been in the past when I’ve done this before, largely due to the nature of the second, non-paying job.
• Starting a Business
  • I’m starting a business again. Unsurprisingly, this is the second non-paying job. Problem is, unlike the last few times, when I was just spinning up some project to be sold off (which, hey, I’m also doing – look for RoffleBlox sooner or later – so I guess it’s actually three jobs,) this time I’ve got a real business partner who’s raised eight digits for more than one business in the past. I’m not looking for anywhere near that kind of money, but I am looking for major money, so this time I’m having to write all sorts of business documents and patent applications and whatnot.
• Sidenote
  • Lawyers suck.
• Where Am I? Who Am I?
  • I don’t really have a direction yet. I really should be commenting on game design, which is my strongest field and one of my deepest loves. The problem is, every time I want to talk about something, I get all retentive and act like it’s some kind of state secret, so this takes time. I’m starting to let loose on one of my designs, especially since Oasis came out, and did one of my games better than I did. Luckily, I never showed my game around, nor did I release it, so I can’t entertain any notions that they stole my work; they’ve never seen it, so it’s an honest to god reinvention. Besides, they did a better job of it. I’m retooling my game, which has several fundamental differences from Oasis which I believe will bear out my design in the long run, but I’ve learned several things from Mind Control, especially as regards drastically simplified interfaces. I can tell that in the long run, I’m going to consider having seen their game as an important step in learning to pander to the casual gamer.
• Civic Obligations and You
  • Jury duty. I mean, come on. ”’Jury”’ duty. Who does this shit anymore? Can’t we just execute them and move on?
• Arranging compiler extensions
  • One of my side projects for the Nintendo DS, seperate from my work on the platform, requires several things that neither the CodeWarrior toolchain nor the SDK provide. Unfortunately, I’m bound not to say anything by the NDA, so all I can really do is say “it’s missing something;” this is a problem because in the past sometimes my just saying “wow I wish this was around” has led to people pointing out existing resources to me. Yay for NDAs. So, I’m funding an extension to the compiler on personal money from another licensed developer.
• Teh Netwark
  • Hackery on the NDS WiFi Stack which was generated by my DS WiFi Bounty. It’s good enough for amateur use, but it doesn’t work in the SDK, again for reasons I’m not allowed to explain. I’m attempting to arrange changes to it as well, but it’s not entirely clear if I would be allowed to use the stack once modified.
• Sidenote
  • No really, lawyers suck.
• What’s a RAFB City
  • Work on RAFB City. No, it’s not over. Yes, I am making new cartoons. Yes, I know it’s been two years. Yes, I know most of you don’t care anymore. I’m still making more, because I think they’re funny.
• You Ain’t Foolin’ No One, Chump
  • Work on the book that got this site started in the first place. You know, it’s funny: as soon as I put this site up, I made a local replication, and all my book work has gone on on the laptop, instead of on the web. For some reason this site ended up accumulating all of the crap I’ve put up since I put up the system, and some of that crap has gotten popular, especially the image collection and some of the rants. That said, the book has progressed significantly; I have quite a bit of material now, and the book has a ”theme”. You heard me, a ”theme”. Wait’ll you see it; it’s one of the dumbest things I’ve ever done, and that’s saying a lot. I think it’s awesome.

Balls. I mean, there’s a lot of crap going on in my life right now. Trying to raise capital, even with a business partner, is a tremendously time consuming and exhausting process, one which leaves you feeling more than slightly like a whore. That said, it seems to be leading to the completion of one of my dream projects, the kind of thing you just can’t do without Big Money Backing™. As such, I’m only gonna complain a wee bit.

Am I going to start blogging regularly? Yeah, eventually. I’m getting less bad about it, or at least so I’m telling myself. But, nobody tell DrgdHmstr, or I’ll never hear the end of it. (Not like I would anyway. <3 Hammy.) Until then, a hearty humbug to all, and learn to spell, please, for the love of any God in which you choose to believe.