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Here’s why we think Gavin is swell:

Lead artist Shawn Robertson: Here are some things you should know about Gavin. He looks like he should be driving a 1932 Ford Roadster. He postponed his start date here at IG so he could finish his tattoo sleeve (a ballsy move). And he can probably model a fully detailed character, rigged, complete with multiple materials, in the amount of time that it took me to write this paragraph.

Gavin came to us as a simple character modeler but quickly grew beyond his job description.  If you look at our recent demo, you can see Gavin’s touch everywhere.  From character rigging, to facial animation, down to the hats that our NPCs wear, Gavin was involved.  Not bad for a quiet artist with a raging battle between a waitress and a horde of zombies depicted on his arm.

Your title is character artist. What does that mean?

Gavin Goulden: I model and texture characters and creatures, or objects that are related to characters (like statues, or hats and props the characters can hold). Most of my work the public has seen so far has gone into making citizens and enemy characters.  I also try to help out on the tech art side where I can–assisting with pipeline development, weighting character meshes, and toying with our facial animation system.

What games have you worked on?

GG: Before joining Irrational, I was a character artist on Dead Rising 2 and The Bigs 2.  I also contributed to Dragon Age, F.E.A.R. 2, Damnation and a few other titles including everyone’s favorite target shooting game, NRA Gun Club.

Describe Life at Irrational in three words or less.

GG: Stepping into darkness.

What is your favorite game of all time?

GG: Doom.  I spent countless hours as a kid both playing and creating fan art for that game and consider it my biggest influence for actually wanting to make games.

Name a game everyone should play once in their life.

GG: I think everyone should play the original Fallout at least once, even if the graphics are considered dated.  I mean, drug addiction and point blank shotgun blasts to the eye in a post apocalyptic setting–what more do you need?

What is your favorite movie?

GG: Reservoir Dogs.

What are your hobbies outside of work?

GG: I’m Canadian. I do what an average Canadian likes to do in his spare time: saving baby seals from the toothy maw of an orca whale, hunting bears with a spear, taming the wild moose of Cape Breton for our world famous Glooscap Parade, taking in a game of our national sport lacrosse, listening to the extensive catalogue of Celine Dion, playing high stakes poker, racing polar bears, snowshoeing from coast to coast.  Other than that, I’m just a regular guy who likes tattoos, whiskey, and a nice cigar every now and then.

Can you tell us more about the tattoo hobby? Do you have favorite artists?  What’s your decision and planning process for each new piece?

GG: For current guys, I have a strong bias toward the artist who has done the majority of my work, Breadman–a.k.a. Steve Cole from Sacred Heart in Vancouver. Lately,  I’ve been following Shawn Barber, Vinny Romanelli (the artist who did my knuckles), and Marcus Kuhn, an artist Shawn recommended to me.  In general, I’m a fan of old-school, traditional Americana style.

Very little planning goes into my own pieces.  I like to give the artist a rough idea and let him run with it. I have full confidence that the artist knows what to do and, given the freedom, will make a piece he really wants to make.  I research the artist’s work heavily before committing, so my trust is already built up.  My Alice sleeve started with a simple idea of a few different elements–Alice, the Hatter, and the Cheshire Cat.  It’s a fairly iconic story, so it was easy to tie in different ideas.  While we were getting that done, Steve and I started talking about a zombie sleeve and more or less had it all planned out before my first sleeve was done.

What’s your favorite story about life at Irrational?

GG: My entire interview and new hire process was an epic journey.  After meeting the team and seeing the project, there was absolutely no doubt in my mind that I wanted to be part of Irrational, but the actual process of picking up and moving from my home of 10 years was a crazy experience.  Within the course of a month I had finished an art test, travelled from coast to coast (Vancouver to Boston) three times, switched jobs, finished my zombie sleeve, gotten married, gone through the visa application and immigration process, and leased a new apartment.  It was a ton of life-altering events in one month. It was stressful, but totally worth it.

JUST TRY IT!

In the latest PC Gamer, you’re going to feel the intense rush of a Sky-Hook to your FACE! Either that, or an awesome six-page feature packed with BioShock Infinite details and interview material from a quartet of Irrational folks: creative director Ken Levine, director of product development Tim Gerritsen, art director Nate Wells, and lead artist Shawn Robertson.

There’s a lot of roundtable discussion about the influences behind Infinite, and the development choices and design evolution that led to the E3 gameplay demonstration. And vigors. There’s a whole sidebar about ‘em. You’ve already seen Murder of Crows–that’s the bird-based crowd control vigor you saw for the first time in last year’s gameplay demo. You send forth a flock of particularly aggressive crows to temporarily incapacitate a group of your foes.

You may not be as familiar with Bucking Bronco. That’s the vigor you saw Booker use in the latest gameplay demo to forcibly eject his enemies out from behind cover with a rolling wave of turbulent force. And after you’ve tossed enemies up with Bucking Bronco, you can extend their forced airborne relaxation session by juggling them. With bullets.

And finally, while it’s common knowledge that dead men tell no tales, it’s a slightly less-well-worn (but equally true) maxim that dead men fire no weapons. With the Weapon Slave vigor, you can put those abandoned arms to good use by turning them into your own personal automated turrets that hunt down those enemies who have not yet discarded their own lives (and guns).

As always in game development, these details are subject to change. And rest assured–there are more vigors to come, but you’ll have to wait for more details. In the meantime, why not pick up the new PC Gamer and check out the BioShock Infinite cover story. If you don’t, you’ll disappoint Shawn and Nate, and do you really want that on your conscience? Just look at those faces.

Ken Levine and Irrational’s senior art team packed the house at PAX East 2011 with an hour-long discussion about the studio’s approach to creating video game worlds. Art director Nate Wells, lead artist Shawn Robertson, and senior effects artist Stephen Alexander joined Ken with moderator Julian Murdoch to show the evolution of BioShock Infinite’s flying city of Columbia–starting from, essentially, Rapture in the sky. Newly-revealed concept art and Sky-Line prototype videos accompanied the presentation.

Video of the panel is available from GameSpot and G4. The GameSpot version includes the Q&A section at the end.

One image that appeared several times throughout the panel was this simple guide, created by BioShock art director Scott Sinclair and given to Nate as he took over art director duties for Infinite:

The image pokes fun at the notion that creating the game would be as easy as moving the city up to the clouds, but it also serves as a reminder that at one point Columbia really was a lot like Rapture. This concept image shows a scene that’s so dark and constrained by clouds that it might as well be underwater. Even the Art Nouveau architecture is reminiscent of Rapture’s Art Deco:

“This is a lie we tell ourselves every time we start a game,” Nate said, referring to early assumptions about the straightforward BioShock-in-the-sky approach. “I think it’s evolutionary. If you go to the dawn of man, there’s a cave with elders sitting around going, ‘Today we’re going to hunt a buffalo. It’s pretty much a big raccoon. We’re just going to do what we do in raccoon hunting, like, more.’”

Of course, he added, “if it really was like this, we’d be so fucking bored that we wouldn’t know what to do.”

The bright Fourth of July Americana look that Infinite had adopted by the time it was announced came later–but once it did, it became obvious to the team that it was the right approach.

Throughout the panel, the crew showed pieces of period reference photography, much of which was drawn from the excellent Shorpy Historical Photo Archive. It’s an invaluable source for those interested in past eras (including Ken, who describes himself as a big documentary nerd). Nate also called out Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City, which simultaneously chronicles the creation of Chicago’s 1893 World’s Fair and recounts the story of Dr. H.H. Holmes, America’s first serial killer. Many Irrational team members read the book while developing Infinite’s setting and concept, and it helped to crystallize the optimism, ambition–and darkness–that characterized the era.

Later, the panel audience was shown a proof-of-concept video showing a player leap from Sky-Line to Sky-Line armed with a rocket launcher. While visually primitive, the footage was an important step in development, as it gave the team a glimpse at the kinds of gameplay Sky-Lines could support. That video was followed up with a test from the art team showing how audiovisual presentation could help sell the experience to players. Both videos can be seen in the GameSpot and G4 footage.

Ken summed up the ultimate goal for Sky-Lines in BioShock Infinite: “It’s like being on a rollercoaster, but you’re hanging in the air and you have a fucking gun.”

Finally, during our PAX fan event, we were presented with an unexpected mashup of the Art Director image and Robb Waters’ take on Dog in a Wheelchair. Apparently, community member Japester sketched this remarkable Dog in a Balloon Harness during the panel:

Key Irrational developers will answer that question during an in-depth panel at PAX East in Boston this March, with BioShock Infinite materials ranging from concept sketches to fully formed scenes. Creative director Ken Levine, art director Nate Wells, lead artist Shawn Robertson, and senior effects artist Stephen Alexander will show not just how Columbia was created from a technical standpoint, but how it was originally conceived and how it became a key character at the heart of BioShock Infinite.

“From Background To Center Stage: Building Game Worlds As Main Characters” will be held at 5:00pm in the Manticore Theater on Friday, March 11.

Plan the rest of your PAX East schedule with the official show schedule, and check out how you can pick up some free swag courtesy of Irrational Games!

Does Irrational Games have a mission? Can there possibly be any methods to its well-documented madness? We’re ringing in the new year with an attempt to answer those questions, viewed through the lens of an employee who joined Irrational just four months ago. Discussions with studio members of all stripes–ranging from other relative newcomers all the way to co-founder Ken Levine–reveal that nothing is certain in the world of game development. And that’s just fine.

• Part 1: The Co-Founder – Ken Levine
• Part 2: Immigrants – Don Norbury, Jeff Seamster, Josh Davis, Murray Kraft
• Part 3: Gatekeepers – Bill Gardner, Shawn Robertson, Robert Tzong, Chris Kline
• Part 4: Natives – Alexx Kay, Nate Wells, Scott Sinclair, Shawn Robertson

Going forward, Irrational podcasts will continue to release once a month, but our plan is to alternate Irrational Behavior with Irrational Interviews. If you already subscribe to the individual podcast RSS feeds, please replace them with this new combined feed that incorporates both Behavior and Interviews.

Direct Download Episode 8

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Irrational Podcasts iTunes Page

Podcast music provided by:

• George Glass (Theme music)
• Spirit Kid (Part 1 intro)
• Permafav (Part 2 intro)
• Patrick Balthrop (Part 3 intro)
• Walking Sleep (Part 4 intro)
• The Monolators (Ending music)

It’s not a “top ten” or a ranking. These are just a few of the games that have special significance to Irrational team members, from mega-hits to some more obscure titles. Share your own favorites in the comments.

We’ve also updated our Now Playing list over on the Studio page–and two of the games featured were also singled out here.

Ian Davis, Rigger/Technical Animator
Diablo II (Blizzard North, 2000)

It’s gotta be Diablo II. The first Diablo got me thinking about being a game artist in the first place, then Diablo II refined all the goodness in Diablo and made it better.

Justin Pappas, Level Designer
STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl (GSC Game World, 2007)

After System Shock 2, which is probably unfair to call out on our own site, my favorite PC game is STALKER with the Complete mod or Redux mod. Mods make this game, and mods are exclusive to PC gaming. STALKER creates a world that feels very real and very scary, while providing the player with interesting choices and simulating most accurately a desperate survival situation.

Alexx Kay, Senior Designer
Minecraft (Markus “Notch” Persson, 2009/2010)

Minecraft stitches together a huge, powerfully expressive sandbox world with just enough gameplay to encourage the emergence of player goals.

John Fuhrer, Quality Assurance Tester
Baldur’s Gate II (BioWare, 2000)

This game excels in pretty much every area, but what keeps me coming back are the customization options. With tons of class options, a huge gear selection, and the ability to customize your biography, portraits, and choose companions and romantic interests, every character in BG2 feels unique. The ability to make my persona my own got me invested and in the role-playing mood, and made each playthrough special.

Forrest Dowling, Principal Level Designer
Deus Ex (Ion Storm Austin, 2001)

The depth and breadth of player choice was groundbreaking, and allowed for an unprecedented level of expressive play, invention, and player discovery. Also, it had inventory Tetris.

James Bonney, Audio Director
The Dark Eye (Inscape, 1995)

I’ve never forgotten this game based on Edgar Allen Poe stories.  All the characters’ faces were modeled out of clay, with creepy stop-motion animation, so the entire game had a very unique look. Naked Lunch author William S. Burroughs was one of the voice actors, and the music was by Thomas Dolby (“She Blinded Me with Science”)…how could it lose?  Well, I guess it did, because I’ve met very few people who have even heard of The Dark Eye.  And for better or worse, I’ve never seen a game like it since.

Adrian Murphy, Associate Producer
World of Warcraft (Blizzard Entertainment, 2004)

This is still a game I find has no end between the constant content updates and personal attachment I have to my characters. WoW has moved past “game” into “hobby.” It’s constantly giving me returns on my time investment, no matter how little or how much I play.

Kayla Belmore, Personal Assistant
Team Fortress 2 (Valve Software, 2007)

Each class plays very differently, accommodating just about any play style or mood–though, I confess my mood most of the time is “kill it with fire.” The character videos and frequent content updates keep me playing despite having a short attention span. Also: HATS!!!!

Chris Remo, Community Manager
Far Cry 2 (Ubisoft Montreal, 2008)

An impressive simulation of being totally screwed in the middle of a gorgeous, sprawling savanna. If you can invest yourself into an experience where your weapons will fall apart, careful plans will blow up in your face, and you will contract malaria, Far Cry 2 can give you some of the most surprising, memorable, and triumphant FPS experiences you’ll ever have.

Shawn Robertson, Lead Artist
Silent Storm (Nival Interactive, 2003)

A turn-based RPG set in an alternate WWII universe featuring Nazis, robots, and robot Nazis.  All environments were destructible–if you don’t want to spend action points running down the stairs, just blow a hole in the floor.  The best part is that the AI would understand these new routes and use them against you, and bullets had ballistics and would bounce or go through walls. If anyone knows how to get this game running on Windows 7, I will love you forever.

• It was Ken’s birthday yesterday, and 1UP happened to be here in the office to get the party on video, as well as chat about the early development of BioShock Infinite.
• Ken was interviewed by sports radio personality Chad Dukes, but sports talk wasn’t on the agenda. The pair discussed the BioShock Infinite reveal, multiplayer considerations, morality in games, the in-development BioShock film, and more.
• GameSpy spoke with lead artist Shawn Robertson about BioShock Infinite’s visual and historical influences, and Irrational’s attitude to developing the game.
• A musically-attuned fellow set the BioShock  Infinite trailer to song. “Tell a baby to talk to the hand,” he recommends.

Enjoy!

We are pleased to announce that on Saturday, during our joint panel with Game Informer at Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle, we will be screening that gameplay demonstration to the public for the first time. The session, “From Concept to Cover: The Game Informer Selection Process,” will feature team members from Game Informer and Irrational discussing how video game magazine covers are chosen, with examples drawn from the upcoming October issue of the magazine.

We’re looking forward to releasing the footage later this month for everyone to enjoy–and we’ll keep you updated on when and where that will happen once those details are locked down–but PAX attendees who show up for the Game Informer panel will have the first opportunity to see the world of Columbia explored in real-time.

When: Saturday, 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM

Where: Unicorn Theatre

Who: Andy McNamara [Editor In Chief, Game Informer], Andy Reiner [Executive Editor, Game Informer], Leonie Manshanden [Director of Marketing, Irrational], Shawn Robertson [Lead Artist, Irrational]

Ever wonder how games get on the cover of Game Informer magazine? From the exploration stage to full out execution, editors Andy McNamara and Andy Reiner explain how games go from a phone call to 4.5 million readers in this candid talk about how game journalists work with game companies to reveal gaming’s biggest hits. To share the developer perspective, director of marketing Leonie Manshanden, and lead artist Shawn Robertson join us to discuss landing the October cover, which will be revealed on stage for the first time.

When: Saturday, 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM

Where: Unicorn Theatre

Who: Andy McNamara [Editor In Chief, Game Informer], Andy Reiner [Executive Editor, Game Informer], Leonie Manshanden [Director of Marketing, Irrational], Shawn Robertson [Lead Artist, Irrational]

In this episode of Irrational Behavior we let you look behind the scenes of the creation at the BioShock Infinite trailer.  Some of the people responsible for directing and creating the trailer discuss the constant evolution of the material as well as the hurdles that had to be overcome along the way in order to get to what you see released.

WARNING: This episode of Irrational Behavior is filled with spoilers.  Watch the trailer at http://www.BioshockInfinite.com before listening to the podcast.

• Part 1: The Creative Vita-Chamber
• Part 2: Infinite’s Horizon
• Part 3: Listen Up!
• Part 4: Days in the Dark

This completes the first season of Irrational Behavior.  The show will be going on a break but stay tuned to IrrationalGames.com for the latest news and content on BioShock Infinite as well as the return of Irrational Interviews starting September 1st.  Continue to discuss this episode of Irrational Behavior and BioShock Infinite in our forums.

iTunes Link

Direct Download Episode 7: Part 2

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Podcast music provided by:

• Signal Hill
• Taxpayer
• Cathode Rays

Do game makers game differently?  In this episode of Irrational Behavior we ask the team if they are able to turn off their critical filters and play the part of consumer.  From the untold developer chatter during lobby sessions in the latest multiplayer games to conquering  great single player experiences, how do we play and what do we think.  We also ask the team on games that influenced them in their roles and impacted the games they helped create.

• Part 1: Team Deathmatch
• Part 2: Appetite for Deconstruction

Stay tuned to IrrationalGames.com for more content related to this month’s podcast.

Discuss this episode of Irrational Behavior over in the forum.

iTunes Link

Direct Download Episode 6

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Podcast music provided by:

• Signal Hill
• Patrick Balthrop
• Rich Vreeland
• Razors in the Night

Additional Production provided by:

• Tim Franklin

Sharks, spiders, the dark, and chemistry exams.  These are just a couple of the things that we are scared of.  In this episode of Irrational Behavior we look at the things we are scared of and how it affects the way we make games.  Guest Andrew Weaver of Indiana University explains why we enjoy fun and the staff shed light on the challenges of making a game scary.

• Part 1: What Are We Afraid Of
• Part 2: Why Fear is Fun
• Part 3: The Art of Fear
• Part 4: The Feel of Fear
• Part 5: The Sound of Fear

Stay tuned to IrrationalGames.com for more content related to this month’s podcast.

Discuss this episode of Irrational Behavior over in the forum.

iTunes Link

Direct Download Episode 5

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Podcast music provided by:

• Signal Hill
• Walking Sleep
• Geoff Graves
• The Happy Hollows

Telemarketer Ken Levine. Playboy illustrator Scott Sinclair.  This month’s episode of Irrational Behavior explores what we did before we began developing videogames.  This months episode highlights include the commiserations of former game store clerks, an artist who accidentally concealed a Satanic message in a Christian comic for children, and a confession from the man who claims to have created the deer in Golden Tee Golf.

Stay tuned to IrrationalGames.com for more content related to this month’s podcast.

Discuss this episode of Irrational Behavior over in the forum.

iTunes Link

Direct Download Episode 3

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Podcast music provided by:

• Signal Hill
• Josh Rathbun
• Patrick Balthrop
• Justin Schwenk
• Fillipo Beck Peccoz
• Giancarlo Feltrin

Blogs, Facebook, forums and search engines didn’t exist fifteen years ago, and the primary tool to communicate with your fan base was the local bulletin board system (BBS) or Usenet and newsgroups services.  “You could go through Usenet groups such as comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg or rec.games.computer.ultima-dragons to find fans of your game,” remembers Kay.  “The web now is fragmented with dozens of places to find discussion about a specific product or subject.  Usenet provided a very specific location for fans congregate to talk about a product.”  Reading a long list of discussions and replies provided an experience similar to the on-line communities of today, but on a much smaller scale.

The tools to create games have changed dramatically in the last decade, as have the responsibilities and sizes of departments.  “Photoshop didn’t have layers when I started,” says Lead Artist Shawn Robertson.  “3D Studio was a program in DOS and no game required 3D acceleration.”  Most games at the time were still being done in 2D, but everything started to change with the releases of Wolfenstein 3D and Duke Nukem 3D.  This change accelerated rapidly with the release of 3Dfx’s Voodoo 3D graphics cards at the end of 1996, and glQuake in early 1997.  “As an artist I did everything when I started,” Robertson adds.  “I modeled, textured, animated, rigged, and did FX for those first games.  Now everyone is much more specialized and focused on a specific role. We shipped SWAT 4 with five people in the art department.  We now have over twenty-five artists working on Project Icarus and we are still growing.”

As games evolve, their budgets grow. They require more staff, more assets, and more time to complete.  “My first game was made for the astronomical sum of one million dollars,” Director of Product Development Tim Gerritsen remembers.  “It was considered a AAA title at the time and we had a staff of 12 people to work on it.  Many of us were kvetching over how unbelievable the development budgets and the team size were.”  It isn’t uncommon today for games to have staffs of well over 100 people working for two or three years on a single game.  “We had to change the way we worked and some of us had to become managers,” says Gerritsen on how growth has changed roles for people on the team.  “We had to learn how to be a business.”

It wasn’t long ago that games were shipping on 3.5” floppy discs.  “I worked on a game that fit on three floppies,” says Gerritsen.  “That is a whopping 4.32 megabytes of compressed data.  We’d have programmers working on fancy animation systems for weeks to cull every extraneous bit of data to fit our game into those 4.32 MB.”  For perspective, a typical mp3 file is around 5 MB.  Games today can ship on a dual-layer DVD holding 8.5 gigabyte (8,704 MB) and sometimes even using a 50 gigabyte (51,200 MB) Blu-ray disc.  The amount of data is staggering, and all that data needs to be processed to fit onto that disc.  “The build process on The Lost took about 20 hours to complete,” says Lead Programmer John Abercrombie.  “It was a ridiculous setup that included a script that automated mouse movement and button presses since the application didn’t have a command line interface.”  A build process involves taking all the raw assets such as models, textures and sounds, and converting them to a format the game understands.  Depending on the game, this could be tens or even hundreds of thousands of assets.  “There is nothing worse than going through a 20-hour build process to find a blocking bug once you load the game up,” says Abercrombie.

As the amount of data in the final game grows, so does the revision database.  “I had a meeting with the IT department to discuss how large our Perforce server should be for our first next generation game,” remembers Senior Technology Programmer Steve Anichini.  Perforce is a program that builds a database that stores every revision on every asset in the game.  “We estimated it would take one terabyte (1,048,576 MB), which at the time was unheard of.  The IT department was rather skeptical the project would need that much space, especially compared to games from the previous generation which were only a couple hundred gigabytes.  By the end of the project the Perforce database was well over two terabytes,” says Anichini.

As for my own experience … when I started as a game tester back in 1998, I had to write all my bugs on sticky notes, as the company didn’t have any extra computers for the testing department.  The sticky notes were handed to the test lead, who would then add them to the bug database — which at that time was an Excel spreadsheet.  Compare that to the 35,000 bugs written up on BioShock, which would span 1.5 miles if they were to be written out on sticky notes!

Irrational was once a tiny team that made games on miniscule budgets. Today we’re much, much bigger and the budget’s grown along with the ambition of the group’s games. This month’s episode of Irrational Behavior explores what these changes have meant for the studio’s culture and the individuals who’ve been on board as the industry itself has had to adopt the professional practices of big business. Episode highlights include an insider take on the making of Thief, designers Dorian Hart and Alexx Kay waxing nostalgic on the days when they were allowed to do voice over work for Freedom Force, as well as the story of a mysterious onanist who secretly used artist Shawn Robertson’s office for forbidden self-pleasures.

Stay tuned to IrrationalGames.com for more content related to this months podcast.

Discuss this episode of Irrational Behavior over in the forum.

iTunes Link

Direct Download Episode 2

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Podcast music provided by:

• Josh Rathbun
• Matt Grimm
• Geoff Graves
• Rich Vreeland/DisasterPeace
• Signal Hill

Dog in a Wheelchair

Before BioShock’s “gatherers” became Little Sisters in an artistic process characterized by false starts and filled garbage bins, they were sea slugs. Nobody empathized with the creatures enough to care whether they lived or died. When the call went out to come up with a character that players would pity, Lead Artist Shawn Robertson submitted this insipid image of a Doberman in a wheelchair. The illustration is now infamous at the studio, although Shawn insists that fellow artist Scott Sinclair’s “frog with the funnel in its anus” is more embarrassing by far.

Frog with a Funnel in its Anus

Before BioShock’s “gatherers” became Little Sisters in an artistic process characterized by false starts and filled garbage bins, they were sea slugs. Nobody empathized with the creatures enough to care whether they lived or died. When the call went out to come up with a character that players would pity, Art Principal Scott Sinclair submitted this insipid image of a toad with a funnel and sun tea jug attached to its anus. Scott insists that fellow artist Shawn Robertson’s “dog in a wheelchair” is more embarrassing by far.

Gatherer

The original BioShock “gatherer” — based on a sea slug — was later replaced by the Little Sister.

SloProFum

SloProFum, the studio’s internal name for this prototype Big Daddy variant that mauled players with an enormous hook and fired iron bearings from a barrel, stands for “slow projectile/fucked-up melee.” Hear how the design didn’t work on this month’s Irrational Behavior podcast.

Stay Puft Bouncer

Initially reluctant to add a drill arm to the Bouncer Big Daddy variant at Creative Director Ken Levine’s insistence, artists Nate Wells and Robb Waters started exchanging a series of images in which they attached marshmallows, human butts, and other items to the character’s hand.

]]> http://irrationalgames.com/insider/january-from-the-vault/feed/ 75 http://irrationalgames.com/insider/irrational-behavior/introducing-irrational-behavior/ http://irrationalgames.com/insider/irrational-behavior/introducing-irrational-behavior/#comments Tue, 12 Jan 2010 05:10:00 +0000 IG.ShawnElliott http://irrationalgames.com/?p=5

In any game development studio, you’ll find a bunch of inspired and imaginative people who have a lot to get off their chests. To save on counseling fees, we decided to sublimate these repressed feelings about their gaming lives by sticking a microphone in their faces and creating a series of podcasts that offer an insight into what makes us – and our games – tick.

Each podcast will explore a particular theme in what we hope is an entertaining and insightful way, and this theme will also evolve throughout the month on the Irrational Games website itself. Visit regularly and you’ll find content on the site that helps illustrate what we’re trying to describe in the podcast, or expands and explores the theme further.

Please contribute to the discussions about the podcasts in the forums and if you have a great idea for a future theme then let us know! We might even send you something to say thanks. But don’t hold us to it.

So to kick off, we chose a brutal theme – “ideas that died”. We explore what happens when creativity runs into technical restrictions, a lack of clear consensus, and – at times – its own convolution. You’ll glimpse abandoned BioShock tidbits, as well as an as yet unrevealed game from four years ago when Irrational Games backed away from a zombie invasion. And much, much more.

Oh, and you’ll understand why ‘dog in a wheelchair’ is the answer to just about any question…

Irrational Behavior podcasts act as tables of contents for stories that appear here on IrrationalGames.com each month. January’s content continues to explore dead ideas with the following features:

Discuss this episode of Irrational Behavior over in the forum.

iTunes Link

Direct Download Episode 1

Irrational Podcasts RSS Feed

Podcast theme song, “Luna Park”, provided by Signal Hill from the album, “More After We’re Gone”.