"If you're going through hell, keep going." - Winston Churchill

An Interactive Suspense Thriller

The Opimo, a $1 Trillion dollar mega-resort and casino in Las Vegas, is all set for its grand opening.  The result of a multinational investment fund, the grand opening will be celebrated by presidents, prime ministers, kings, queens, and other dignitaries.

This high profile debut of the most expensive real estate in the history of the world has not gone unnoticed by a sleeper terrorist cell embedded in southern Nevada.

You, one of the best agents in Her Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service, are assigned to the Prime Minister's security detail to keep him and all of the inhabitants of Las Vegas secure.

You know all about the plot to destroy The Opimo and everyone inside.

The Americans are authorizing you to use deadly force if need be.

Your own director has given you carte blanche to do whatever it takes.

The terrorists, not stupid, are expecting a pre-emptive strike.

Billy Bob Dean, the chief of police in Las Vegas, expects you to follow every order he gives you.

The day your party checks in to its own set of suites in The Opimo, dead bodies start showing up in parking garages, golf courses and swimming pools all over the 500 acres of Opimo land.

Bloody hell.  Now what do you do?

November 18, 2009

"I've played this damn thing so many times my eyeballs are spinning in their sockets."

So said Al today.  If you're new to the Malinche program he's my #1 play tester and chief cartographer and story map maker and has been since damned near the beginning.

Al's also quite possibly one of  my biggest fans and definitely my most unforgiving critic and he tells me tonight that Saints in Sin City is finally ready.  So it must be true.

The wrestling match all of the testers and I have faced is finally over. 

Not since Greystone have I encountered so many different story endings and mid-plot possibilities.  There are so many different characters each one capable of so many different actions that following each thread of the tapestry of this novel has been exhausting.

But so damned worth it.

As far as I can tell you can you enjoy Saints in Sin City for a year with no end of surprises so far as plot twists and alternative story endings go. If you keep on trying different things you're going to be treated to a slightly different story every time.

Release Candidate 7 is off to testers for one final walkabout.  With any luck, Monday November 23rd will be the launch day.

Meanwhile, review copies of Release Candidate 7 are already on their way to respected reviewers and media outlets all over the world.

Now I can devote 100% of my time and attention to Hermitage.  Will I make my December deadline? That's another story.

November 12, 2009

Ready, Set, Go?

As you can see the cover art is finalized. Now we just need a finished fiction novel to make it official.

Saints in Sin City is now up to Release Candidate 6b as we close in on the finale.  I think we're there.  I'm going to give it the weekend and set Monday as the "on sale" date pending any new bug discoveries or logistical issues.

October 13, 2009 - 6:40PM Eastern Standard Time

No More Nagging Feeling

I just sent off Release Candidate 4 to my band of merry man known as my playtesters and I know - beyond all doubt -- that I'm done.

That's because I tested and I tweaked for hours over Friday and today and hit new milestones that made my famous "nagging feeling" go away.

For newcomers to Malinche my nagging feeling is that "Spidey sense" that tells me I'm not done with a title.

Running through a dozen different conditions and successfully achieving one of the (many) possible outcomes I am glowing.

Confession time: That glow did not come until after I added three other possible outcomes to the story based on different conditions of other characters, plot development, etc. within the past sixty minutes.

I expect to receive a small trickle of bug reports of minor importance which will be quickly addressed.

And then Saints in Sin City will go on sale! Las Vegas is calling! Can you hear it?

And will you answer that siren song?

September 30, 2009

Release Candidate 2 - The Beat Goes On

Some serious flaws in two major sequences - the magic show and in the spa - were corrected and tested extensively.

I added another few characters and even one more room (for a grand total of 137 - almost a record in terms of how small a game area we have) to add intrigue and atmosphere.

Then I did some tweaking and adding to refine the overall experience of exploring every inch of a posh Las Vegas casino implemented in a five star setting.

All told Saints in Sin City is one of my smaller titles yet surprisingly fulfilling.  I really feel as though I lived the life of a first-generation Implementor by packing in so much ambience and quality into a comparatively small field of play where the story is concerned.

Back in the day The Great Ones of Infocom had no choice but to make the most of what they had - and they took a computer's capacity to its limits.  I have a lot more computing power at my disposal and feel particularly proud that I left a lot of resources on the table, as it were, and took a minimalist approach this time around. 

I'm curious to hear the feedback from my fans.

Next on my to-do list is to finalize the cover art, go over what few bug reports I expect to receive and Saints in Sin City on sale next week - hopefully.

September 25, 2009

Release Candidate 2

The bug reports from RC2 are trickling in which is the surest sign Saints in Sin City is nearly ready for release.

With just a few more minor adjustments and additions we're ready to launch.

September 18, 2009

Across the Finish Line.

I just sent off Release Candidate 1 to testers.  With the exception of adding another few characters - we're done.  Release Candidate 2 should be the last test version before I slam the lid on this Las Vegas spy thriller and release Saints in Sin City.

With that out of the way, I will turn all of my attention on Hermitage which is so far standing at 13 rooms and 3 objects as I conduct a lot of background reading and research.

To all my Jewish friends  - Have a happy and a healthy new year!

July 20, 2009

A Small Change in Plans

Saints in Sin City is going to end up being a dyed-in-the-wool spy thriller. Full stop.

I'm dropping the murder mystery moniker...mostly.

Oh sure there'll be dead bodies and lots of suspense but as I finalize Beta 1 for release to quality control testers tomorrow, I realize there is so much going on in the story already there's no room to pack a murder mystery into all of the action already happening.

To do this would distract you, the reader, from the bigger picture.  Spies kill people.  And so do the bad guys whom spies pursue. That premise is present in my plot.  Oh boy is it ever!

So, yes, there'll be murders and they will invoke mystery but Saints in Sin City is not to be billed as a murder mystery as such.

That's why you, as the player in this party, should not ponder on whodunit but why do it? A spy thriller is a murder mystery of a different kind and for an entirely different reason though the underlying motivations are mostly the same.

Why leads to who and who leads to what.  Then you will know what needs to be done. Here's the only question that remains: Will you be able to take care of business?

July 13, 2009

Juggling Like Jilette.

Launching this Las Vegas mystery thriller in very early September seems likely.  I'm implementing the story at a good clip every day as bug reports come in and I wind up the very complicated endgame sequences. Because of all the different operators (good guys AND bad guys) and all the different plot elements that can enter or exit different points that can change the story dramatically, I'm taking my time to get this right the first time.  Flashbacks of Greystone wash over me as I spent hours computing all the different permutations of the case depending upon the evidence you picked up, the people you questioned and how strong your overall case was.  While the plot and the premise is different here the underlying concept of interactive fiction never changes -- laying out a seemingly endless number of "what if?" scenarios and implementing plausible, expected responses to most every one of them.

Without giving away too much let me give you some idea of what I'm contending with:

What if the player stumbles on an unwitting accomplice who's helping fund terrorism with millions of dollars every year without even knowing it? (Yes, the rich and powerful can be that stupid, blind and/or naive.)

Should the reader naturally assume the Triads are involved merely because one of Hong Kong's wealthiest, most influential and well-connected captains of industry is running amok in Las Vegas like a hillbilly lottery winner's first visit to the big city?

The antagonists of all this are quietly operating all the while -- will you be aware of that? And how do you handle them all by yourself being outnumbered (minor spoiler here) roughly six to one?

This is all very entertaining to me -- and soon will be for you! 

May 18, 2009

With Al Leading the Way

My chief tester and cartographer Al has been with Malinche almost since the beginning. He's tested and played a lot of games for me but this time I think I threw him for a loop. 

That's understandable.  Al hasn't been in Las Vegas since 1985 and a lot has  changed in nearly 25 years. The pivotal change in Las Vegas occurred in 1989 when Steve Wynn opened The Mirage on Las Vegas Boulevard thus shifting the entire paradigm of what a Las Vegas hotel and casino should be; a posh resort destination with "must see" status.

Al's the first Malinche play tester to get his hands on the first Alpha release of Saints in Sin City. And those hands of his are full.  Loaded, even.

He thought I made a mistake placing the "Shmears and Schmaltz" bagel stand near a bank of guest elevators and that the bagel joint belonged on restaurant row, perhaps next to Bistecca or near O.

Not so.

I explained how coffee and bagel (and muffin and croissant) concessions are strategically placed near the elevators in a casino hotel to catch guests first thing in the morning with a $3 cup of coffee or a $5 bagel. 

This went on for the first day or two as Al settled into his posh surroundings in the newest addition to the Las Vegas Strip as he hit the nightclub, checked out the noodle joint and rubbed shoulders with Asian mamasans pumping dollars into slot machines once every 3-4 seconds.

So far me and Al have banged out most of the kinks with bad room connections and some obvious bugs.  This will pave the way to a smoother time with testers who aren't so familiar with some of the logical problems that crop up to confuse people.

Our two teams of testers will receive the Alpha 2 copy of Saints in Sin City this week.

April 14, 2009

Not Too Taxing.

As with every fiction title I create, arduous primary research is conducted to deliver the immersive experience that is my calling card as an Implementor of Interactive Fiction. Since interactive fiction is known as the book you play or the game your read, I make sure this research is almost always fun but never, ever boring.

Today's research is on the phenomenon known as the superstar icon.  I had a lot of fun researching this and even more fun Implementing two such paparazzi targets at the private pool deck, north of the Opimo casino, west of the botanical gardens and east of the golf course.

Our first, rough Alpha test copy is shipping out today/tonight. I can send it right now but there's a couple of things I want to tie up before my two quality control teams get cracking.

The big one; the ability to complete your mission perfectly is not fully implemented.  The same holds true for a few characters.  Still, it's more than 90% complete and ready for early alpha testing.

April 6, 2009

The Path to Victory

We don't live in a black and white world and I take pains to insure that appears in my writing.  This morning I finished drafting out the final alternative ending to the story the reader can discover when everything goes wrong yet they do everything right and save the day.

I am floating on air as I write this blog because I am excited at the bursts of creativity that I channeled into the story using the conduit of my keyboard during this morning's round of writing.

Some readers may be appalled at how things could turn out.  Others amused.  Others still - orgasmic.

That's the essence of Las Vegas itself, isn't it?

At this rate I'm feeling very good about going into a wide alpha test seven days from today.

March 29, 2009

Character Development 401

Great news! That "nagging feeling" I get each time I approach the end of the Implementation phase is finally satisfied this time around.

About a month back I wrote about the importance the people have in a story and over the weekend I achieved full clarity.

For a long time my subconscious mind stopped me from wrapping up "Saints in Sin City". Every step of the way something in the back of my mind kept trying to tell me... something.

Sin City is a title unlike any other I'd ever written.  I knew this would be the case so I approached it differently and thought about it differently. In ever sense I was on a new frontier where my tried and true methods and expertise as an interactive fiction Implementor would be tested to their limits.

Over the weekend I finally discovered the secret sauce of the most important element.  A month or so back I talked about the people.  And, yes, the people are the most important part of this story and in ways that stand out far apart from the norms. But there was something about all these different people that was missing.

As I wracked my brains for the missing link the idea came into full bloom over the weekend.  It's easy enough to implement Avi, the Mossad agent or Commander Davis, the American patriot and  it's child's play to draft out a billionaire Asian magnate and his spoiled playboy of a son dropping $500,000 per day at Opimo as they partake of every possible indulgence.

The ghosts of Sin City that haunted me every day were the bad guys.  The terrorists.  What makes Al Qaeda tick? By their light, yes we are infidels and they want to destroy the great Satan.  Got it.  But why, exactly?

Why kill innocent people by the thousands with bombs and high jacked airplanes? Why kidnap people and behead them on TV? What drives a father to perpetrate an "honor killing" and slaughter his teenage daughter for wearing immodest clothes or, Allah forbid, dating a non-Muslim?

I could paint with a broad brush and just chalk them up to crazed fundamentalists who are bent on a one-world-under-Allah ideology (or just simply bent!) but such a simplistic approach never sat well with me; too two dimensional.  Too predictable, even stereotypical.

I never wanted Saints in Sin City to be simply a good guy versus bad guys story.  Now I know it won't be.

I need just a little more time to add the secret sauce to this recipe.  And then we have soup.  I promise.

BY THE WAY - I've been reminded (nagged?) about updating this designer's blog more often when it occurred to me that many of you probably haven't heard I'm on Twitter now.  I Twitter something almost every day -- including my thoughts and feelings while Implementing.  Twitter is perfect for this; a quick microblog of my thought or feeling of the moment.

Here's my Twitter: Join up and check in once per day to see what I'm up to:  Howard Sherman on Twitter

February 26, 2009

Eureka!

Flashback: I'm in the 11th grade and I just can't wrap my head around math.  My math teacher and I (God bless him but his name escapes me at the moment. Something Irish I think...) were engaged in a battle of wits and a contest of wills all semester long.  I did whatever I could to legitimately skip class.  Not cutting.  That would be too easy.  So I had the computer teacher write me excuse notes (Howard was helping me load Pascal on the Apple //es in one of the computer labs, etc.) and a social studies teacher (forgot his name too, darn it.  I must dig out my year book!) who was also a computer nut covered me with his own excuse notes.  His notes didn't involve the Crusades or Columbus but... Commodore 64 questions.

I knew what I was doing and he knew what I was doing too.  It was a fun contest and an entertaining diversion but I digress....

During one of those gruesome math classes as I fought the impulse to read a magazine, doodle on the cover of my notebook or write a short story I forced myself to follow along on the blackboard. As I struggled to follow the absurd algebraic formulas that, to this day, I have never had any practical fucking use for I suddenly understood quadratic equations.

"OH SHIT!" I exclaimed loudly and with great gusto.  The teacher, my nemesis true but a good sport as well said "You had an epiphany, Mr. Sherman? Perhaps the term 'eureka' will suffice?" he said dryly through his grin.

Yes indeed.  Eureka. 

Putting aside the writer's block (I'm well past that now, thank you very much), the mood-altering Milana Sherman and myriads of minutia there was something bothering me about Saints in Sin City.

It's that nagging feeling I get somewhere along the way of developing an interactive fiction title.  It was much harder to identify this time and I attribute that to the fact that at 117 rooms the nagging feeling of this fiction title being just too small was drowning out the real problem.

The lack of people!

I have the place -- Opimo.  Implemented to be just big enough and posh enough to be interesting but not so large as to be pedantic.

I have the plot -- and a mighty fine one at that.

I have tons of puzzles in various stages of completion.

What was missing? The people!

Well sure I had some characters -- the chief of police, the bad guys, some good guys, the requisite prostitutes, cocktail waitresses, etc. but they're all expected to be there.

I'm talking about the people.

The road warriors in town for a convention as their nervous wives stay home worrying about hubby's week flying solo and doing God-only-knows-what in Sin City.

The regulars (like me) who hit the Las Vegas strip no less than once per year -- and quite often more -- who've seen it all, done it all (well, almost all) and still can't get bored of the place.

The tourists who stare out the window as the plane touches down just a few feet away from some of the most astonishing architectural spectacles imaginable.

The very serious gamblers who don't even give a second glance at the goddess-like cocktail waitress who struts right in front of him with her perfect ass jutting and her big boobs bobbling as her perfume tickles his nose. The action on the table is far more important and much more interesting.

With the nagging feeling now identified I can now sprint to the finish line.

That's how I roll.

February 25, 2009

The Synchronicity of Spycraft

As I tie up loose ends and play out the all logical possibilities of a terror cell working feverishly to wipe out Las Vegas I discover a hidden cache of fun...

What happens if you take out an innocent bystander near a bagel joint?

If you take tango #3 into custody and separate him from his peers what will he do? More importantly - What will YOU do?

If other players work from the old playbook as you covertly work against them... what will happen next?

We'll find out, won't we?

February 22, 2009

Of Bonds and Babies

The "total immersion" credo that's driven me to implement interactive fiction that's as much virtual reality as eye-gluing fiction since Malinche's inception to present day is backfiring this time around.

Why?

It's hard to think like a bad-ass with a baby giggling at you.

(Case in point -- Milana just strolled into my office asking (in the inescapably adorable voice of a not-quite-three year old) "Hi Daddy! How are you today?!" before hopping onto my lap to watch me as I type this. James Bond himself would be rendered utterly helpless by an impossibly affectionate and incorrigibly cute girl such as Milana Sherman...)

The most maddening part is that I am five yards from the touchdown and I sense I will be fighting for every inch.

Drawing upon our excellent results with The Matawan Project I hereby launch -- The Manhattan Project Mark II.

What is it?

A substantial number of New Jersey residents commute... mostly to Manhattan... to do their work.

I am going to start commuting (in a sense) also.  It's impossible to write an edgy spy thriller live on location from Romper Room.

Field reports to follow!

February 1, 2009

Crossfire

I've never cross-blogged before but my latest entry on my formal blog really does earn a place on this here Las Vegas blog:

http://web.me.com/lordrandom/Site/Blog/Entries/2009/2/1_The_Multitasking_Myth.html

PS - Yes I really did intend to say "this here" above.

January 19th, 2009

Soup's On!

Click to Enlarge

OK.  We've got a good compile and ultimate endgame (losing).

Now the fun begins.  I play the part of five star casino/hotel/resort owner just before the grand opening as I explore the sprawling Opimo property inspecting everything as I make hundreds of adjustments big and small.

I also need to wear my architect's hat and finish up another half dozen rooms or so.  This will bring the total room count to 120. Not that I'm trying to pretend to be Lord Dimwit Flathead the Excessive or anything but let's face it; 120 rooms seems just too small for a Howard Sherman masterpiece which usually never sees the south side of 200 rooms.

After that I'll put on my two foot tall chef's hat and satisfy the foodies in the audience with virtual victuals to enthrall and enchant.

Then I must step into the shoes God made for me -- those of an Implementor.  I spotted a couple of bugs just running through the opening sequence!

Then I need to implement at least seven (or eight?) more characters who figure very prominently in the story.

After that I'll fill in the plot elements and implement a few more optional story endings....

... and then the main course will be served.

January 18, 2009

Homestretch

After a four hour marathon debugging session I am happy to say I'm almost done.... with the first compile.

There are a dozen or so tiny bugs still to fix, a nagging feeling that the story's overall playing area is too small and a number of characters still need to be completed.

But we're almost there.

January 14, 2009

The First Cut

Here's the first thing that won't make the final cut of Saints in Sin City:

! Car chase through the garage - Drive the Aston Martin through the casino, down restaurant row  and into the garage??? Real James Bond stuff.

The above is a comment made in the source code  of Saints -- it's preceded by a ! so the Inform compiler knows to skip that line and move on to the next one.  I drop dozens of such comments into any story I'm working on.  This insurance policy protects me from forgetting ideas that come to me as I write.

In this case I decided not to go with Implementing a car chase.  Why? If a bad guy is running through the casino and hanging a sharp right to run past the restaurants, through the convention center and into the garage -- why would the player need to be in hot pursuit in a car? Legging it just makes more sense. The entire series of events could be a lot of fun for my dear readers but it just wouldn't make any sense.

Out it goes.

January 13, 2009

Weekend Kickoff

The rest of this week will be spent filling in the last few remaining rooms and rounding out the other characters in the story as I finalize the puzzles and the plot elements (at least conceptually) leading up to the first complete compile which will happen this Sunday. 

So will it be soup?

Not quite, but it will be a succulent broth.

While there is no endgame yet implemented making it impossible to actually finish the story, alpha testers can run rampant on the grounds and help me check for room connectivity and glaring bugs as they take in the ambience of opulence.

This will also allow me to tie up the loose ends (like actually finishing the middle and the end of the story so it is, in fact, a complete work of fiction) and toy with one or two expansion ideas that have come to mind.

January 6, 2009

Mind the Mousetraps

Confession time: I didn't get much writing done in the Poconos. Moreover, I barely used my laptop the entire time. 

This is a masterstroke for achieving productivity gains.

Why?

Because I am totally recharged and rejuvenated after four solid days of snow tubing, hiking, swimming, game playing and -- oh yes -- eating!

In other news -- I'd like to remind ardent adventurers to mind the mental traps we Implementors lay out for the unsuspecting adventurer from time to time.

Someone took the bait on my December 29th entry in this designer's journal and showed himself to be quite the fool in the process.

January 2nd, 2009

Righting the Write Way

Yesterday I wrote one single room (the main pool deck) and just one witty one-liner explaining why the player won't be allowed to enter the topless area of the outdoor pool.

Why so little writing on a day off? Don't panic! My writer's block is long gone.

The car was all packed, running and raring to go and my wife summoned me.

And off we went - for a long weekend getaway to Woodloch in the Poconos.

After a long, challenging albeit rewarding year it was high time for a vacation. A vacation for all the obvious reasons but also a necessary jaunt to help me kick things in to high gear so I can wrap up Sin City.  Nothing gets the creative juices flowing better than truly free time.

During the dreamy drive in the Jaguar (wide open roads with a surprising absence of speed traps and traffic) I listened to a good portion of Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist which made the three hours or so of driving pass even more pleasantly while mother and daughter napped on the backseat.

We explored the expansive grounds and checked out just a dozen of the hundred or so activities and had fun at every turn.  Quality time with my wife and my daughter whilst my head cleared and my batteries recharged.

Marvelous!

Today I woke up at my usual 5ish to start my routine -- read, write, think and imagine but not necessarily in that order.

I've already made some excellent inroads -- and it's just now 7am.  Excellent!

Another day of fun with the family with a bit more writing snuck in while Milana naps.

December 29th, 2008

A Three Ring Circus

December 8, 2008

Room Count and Body Count

We're at 89 rooms as I wrap up the first alpha version for testing. 

89 rooms?

That seems so.... small.

For a Malinche game at least.

I have yet to implement the vault beneath the casino cage, an important set of rooms near the golf course and the "back office" of the Opimo.

I might add a section of outdoor parking garage.... if it makes sense at the end of the day. There's that shiny new Aston Martin parked near the front of the casino....

Writer's block aside, I've been grappling with how to implement what is normally an enormous piece of property and discovered... size doesn't always matter.

Think about it.

According to USA Today, the combined room count of The Venetian and The Palazzo comes to 7,100 suites.  That makes for the world's largest hotel by room count.

Does that mean I need to implement the world's largest text adventure game to make Saints in Sin City a viable fiction thriller?

Shucks, no.

I think my own perception of reality has been getting in the way here.  I've spent many more weeks than I care to count fretting over the realistic implementation of The Opimo...

Is it real enough? Am I tickling all of the reader's senses?

(Yes I am.. check!)

Is it big enough? Is it necessary to implement thousands of rooms spanning 50 floors?

Related question: As an author, where do I stash all of the murder victims in this murder mystery?

(Yes, it is big enough and no I do not need to implement thousands of redundant hotel rooms so as to exhaust the reader who feels they must explore each one - check again!)

Is it challenging enough?

Aha! Now that is sticking point. 

My heart tells me I am constrained in creativity due to the cramped quarters of just 100 (or so) rooms to work with.

My mind tells me that Infocom had achieved much more with much less.

So what's stopping me?

November 25, 2008

Feng Shui? Fuckin' Ay!

I had a silly idea to help me push me well past any possibility of writer's block ever encroaching upon my creativity again.

My iMac G5 and my Windows Vista Ultimate desktop switched places on my desk.

Such a tiny change in my personal studio led to immediate improvements in output.

Who would've thought?

Shifting my reality yet again leads me to conclude a January 20th, 2009 launch of Saints in Sin City is going to happen.

Yes, yes.  I know.  Mumblings of me being dubbed "Douglas Adams Jr." and so forth.  Yes.  I get it. I've blown yet another deadline.

Well... I've been busy.

November 19, 2008

Total Immersion

I'm living a life of glamour, wealth, power and spycraft these days.

How else can one accurately Implement a fictional world of billionaires, bombs, blondes, booze and baccarat?

Talk about a mood maker! I'm writing constantly. And when I'm not writing I'm thinking about writing.

I'm having a great time.  Why?

Not only am I celebrating the complete conquest of writer's block, I feel like James Bond with the added bonus of having no boss.

This rocks.

October 27, 2008

Pareto's Principle as it Applies to Implementing

Some months back I went through Tim Ferris' Four Hour Work Week (four or five times!) which led me to expand my research into the alternate reality of "less is more" living.  I immediately started transforming my life by implementing my own take on his DEAL acronym.  My version of DEAL is:

Delegate. Eliminate. Automate. Liberate.

Executing the first three led me to realize the fourth one; liberation.

An Implementor who wishes to practice at the peak of his or her powers must be liberated from the drab so that we may bring on the dazzle.

Running Malinche Entertainment Corporation had become something of a gargantuan task in recent months and I questioned the current state of affairs.  Why was I spending more and more of my day in minutia? Why was I the one being drawn into simplistic processes with regard to customer care, technical support and distribution?

Did Marc Blank work in the shipping department? Nope.

Did Steve Meretzky ever help out on the phones? Doubt it.

Did Dave Lebling help put together the packaging? Nahhh.

But I was doing all of this... and more!

In short -- why was 80% of my time being consumed with just 20% of what Malinche is supposed to do?

After my fifth re-read of The Four Hour Workweek I continued to implement Tim's ideas as I scrutinized what Malinche was doing on a day to day basis.

(Why did I read this book five times in six months? I needed to persist in deprogramming myself from the way I used to do things and replace that with fresh prerogatives. Old habits die hard don't ya know?)

Time for questions and actions.

How could I reduce that 80% in and of itself and how I could invest more of my time in the 20% of activities that drives the whole company?  Let's face it; 80% of what drives Malinche is what I put in front of customers leading to the 20% which is everything else.

This fascinated me so I decided to delve deeper.

Tim Ferris spent a chapter on the 80/20 principle and recommended Richard Koch's "80/20 Principle" as required reading.

I knocked off the 80/20 Principle last week and boy am I glad.

By implementing more of 80/20 in my professional and personal life using the experiences Tim shared with the world coupled with Mr. Koch's case studies I quickly realized incredible gains in free time and productivity.

Adjustments and outright overhauls to Malinche procedures, protocols and processes has instantly freed my mind and body.

It was so hard to get creative as a dozen customer issues a week hit my desk on everything ranging from download problems to a lost shipment to South America to telephone handling. Confession time: I've been experiencing the longest dry spell of creative juices since I launched Malinche five years ago. I've been struggling through writer's block for the past several months as the mundane took up residency in my mind leaving very little room for creativity to breathe let alone grow.

Results so far?

No more international shipping (10% of our shipping socked us with 90% of our overall folio edition delivery problems)

No more folio editions at all (5% of our sales represented 95% of organizational overhead in producing, packaging and delivering tangible products)

With my brain recharging from the ravages of rapid-fire resolutions of regular stuff, the power hour (see below) is yielding more and more results in what Malinche is all about; giving the customers what they are paying for.

Saints in Sin City is back on track.

October 7th, 2008

"Delays, delays.  There are always delays."

I know exactly how the mad scientist from that classic Bugs Bunny cartoon felt.  I'm wrapping up my first foray into the world of spy novels right now.  Gaming area is being rounded off and final puzzles being concluded.

The biggest challenge right now is -- use all of my puzzle ideas or cut a few? Oh man.  What a dilemma.

So, yes, my Las Vegas murder mystery is not going on sale on October 31st.

But if you want to sign up to be a tester you will receive a copy of Saints in Sin City on October 31st after all...

September 11, 2008

The Power Hour

The demands of day-to-day business running a string of successful companies has made it increasingly difficult to sit down and do any proper writing the last few weeks.  Then there are the incredible demands of being a loving and attentive husband, the awesome responsibility of being a father and the absolutely essential need for this human to indulge in some fun from time to time and it's easy to see how quickly the day comes and goes without a single word forward in Sin City...

... until now!

While skimming through an article from Gary Bencivenga, one of the world's greatest copy writers (if not THE greatest), I learned all of his greatest secrets to success.

"Jackpot!" one might say.

What does Gary do first thing in the morning before he showers, eats breakfast or even brushes his teeth?

He writes.  Before the phones start ringing, before the UPS guy shows up with a package, before his wife wakes up and starts her day with him.

He calls this first, most productive hour or two of the day The Power Hour.  Not a new term and not a new idea. But Gary just has this way of presenting information, even seemingly stale stuff, and breathing new life into it.

Gary Bencievenga is quite a writer, let me tell you.

I've tried this two days in a row by waking up at 5:30am and heading straight to my home studio taking just the tiniest of detours to brew fresh coffee and answer the call of nature - -not necessarily in that order.

Results?

Spectacular. 

I initially dismissed the idea of getting up super early to write.  I thought it would be impossible for me to get "in state" and start writing right out of bed. Wrong! My imagination is bristling with ideas, the plot twists flow and the humor is dancing out of my fingertips and onto the keyboard.

Saints in Sin City is Coming Soon to a Computer Near You.

September 3, 2008

Prophetic... again?

Tonight I carried forward an idea I had formed some months ago.  What is it? A sensational element of the plot I thought of several weeks before current events seem destined to prove me right.... again.

David Copperfield frequently shows off his powers of predicting the future with regard to audience participation involving magic markers and scratch paper as well as picking winning lottery numbers well in advance of the drawing.

Should I change my title from Implementor to Illusionist?

The well-schooled on the subject of interactive fiction should already know that a professional Implementor is also an accomplished illusionist at all times...

Except in this case a proposed plot element in a work of fiction may, unfortunately, materialize in a shockingly real reality.   A round of Endgame, anyone?

A hint? Sure.  The future may be found at Villas Imponente.

August 5th, 2008

Reducing My Carbon Footprint and Going Green.

I've always been a big fan of recycling.  It really is a senseless shame to waste.

So when I cut a puzzle idea from Pentari: Second Dawn I decided to recycle it for use in Saints in Sin City. The idea was just too good to throw away.

Here are my original comments taken directly from the Sin City source code (which was transplanted directly from the Pentari: Second Dawn source code):

! Water puzzle - Dolphin tank at the hotel -- player must secure the dolphins in a small
! holding tank as they explore the large area. This large area will lead to a series
! of tanks that will lead to a tiny artifact of evil that must be destroyed
! Or something like that.

Here's the recycling bit -- dolphins are now sharks and the hotel is The Opimo. There's  not much to explore for the player but there is still an artifact of evil to be destroyed.

Quite a bit more has changed but the core concept of the puzzle will remain the same.

July 1, 2008

Delays, Dalliances and Dancing with the Devil

I'm finishing the alpha version on August 31st.  That'll give all of the play testers 60 days to help me find all the problems so I can smash them before we launch "Saints in Sin City" on October 31st.

I know, I know.  We announced a summer release.

You can't rush greatness.

The complexity of the characters and the intricate plot gives me no choice.

The permutations and possibilities of this spy thriller/murder mystery would give a geek a headache.

Yet you will be able to explore them all and decide for yourself.

A mundane exchange by the convention center may be pivotal or pointless to the plot.

A bagel and a coffee by the elevators could turn the tide against terrorism or be a terrific time waster.

A blackjack table could beguile you or bankrupt you in terms far outside the boundaries of 21

Subtleties and nuances such as these cannot be rushed.

June 4th, 2008

Devil May Care

An article appearing in today's edition of the UK's Telegraph about the latest James Bond epic "Devil May Care" really caught my eye.

Why?

Not just because I've been a James Bond fan since before puberty...

...but also because Mister Sebastian Faulks wrote the entire novel in six weeks!

The article went on to describe Mr. Ian Fleming's daily schedule of writing 1,000 words, then going snorkeling, have a cocktail followed by lunch on the terrace, then another go at diving followed up with another 1,000 words of writing with the end of the day bringing on a fresh round of martinis then dinner at his estate in Jamaica.

I said it before and I'll say it again... my cousins in the conventional fiction book world have it easy. 

Proper interactive fiction that tells a full story could never be written in six weeks.

Hell, I don't even know if I could pull off a stunt like that in even twice that time under the very best circumstances.

There's just too much going on -- character interplay, constant monitoring of the non-linear elements to make sure they mesh no matter what the reader does or when they do it, infinite checking of actual program code to make sure that nothing was missed and no obvious software bugs come and so on and so on and...

... let's not forget that the writing is the central hub of all of this activity.

If the writing is crap then every other element of a work of interactive fiction becomes irrelevant even if executed perfectly.

Like I said, we Implementors of Interactive Fiction write our fiction the hard way.

May 28th, 2008

Lights... Camera.... Action!

The game's shaping up nicely with the finishing touches to the story line in place with all the astonishing twists and turns I could come up with.

The boys over at 24 will want to take some notes on how to stun an audience with sophisticated, intricate and yet realistic plot twists that are completely unpredictable yet totally plausible.

Room count right now is at 40 totally done rooms and about 20 more in various stages of completion.  The characters are coming in to focus -- a hot Romanian babe at the high-stakes slots (you'll have a hard guessing her game!), a shifty Mossad agent, Commander Davis from Endgame (cover story: "On leave from USS Las Vegas to party IN Las Vegas..." Mind you -- I said that's the cover story...) among many other fascinating people from all walks of life.

I'm not completely cruel and heartless therefore readers can expect sensible hints scattered all over the place.  Any good intelligence operative will tell you  that it's very important to pay attention to everything around you.

As Freud said -- sometimes a cigar really is just a cigar... and sometimes it isn't.

I'll be heading out to Vegas in June, July and probably August to really get in the mood.  My powerfully (some say scarily) vivid imagination is having some difficulty implementing uber-posh surroundings from my perch at Starbucks or locked away in my studio.

I'll probably stay at The Palazzo in June, The Mirage in July and Mandalay Bay in August.

I need to get my mojo going.  And there's no better place for that than Sin City...

Besides, my Las Vegas Travel Guide is due for an update...

I've recruited the photographer for the cover art and the promo pics -- that would be Mr. Henri Sagalow.  His work is impressive.  Don't take my word for it -- go see for yourself: http://www.sagalow.com/index.html

I've lost 25 lbs in the past few weeks and I am aiming to lose 25 lbs more for the gratuitous glamour shots of the author.  I don't want the caption underneath my photo to read "Here's the fat bastard that wrote this fiction thriller..."

Apart from vanity, being at an ideal weight of 195-200lbs is good for me.  And my wife won't have much to complain about either. My muscles are totally not enjoying all the aches and pains, though.  I worked my arms so hard at the gym on Monday I found it challenging to steer my car properly the day after...

At least I'll look good and be able to lift any tree trunks that need tending to!

April 14th, 2008

A Minimalist Work of Fiction with Maximum Thrill

The long drive down to Atlantic City was smooth and uneventful. I spent the time listening to a sensational audio book and switched to music as I drew closer to the Borgata. I wanted to get "in mode".

Within seconds of entering the lobby my Implementor's eye got busy. Thirty foot ceilings in main casino/lobby area. Check. Twenty foot ceilings in all other areas including the retail space and restaurants. Interesting. Why the ten foot difference? Appealing to the psyche of the gambler?

That lovely fragrance.... I first smelled it at the Venetian and longed for it
ever since. I'd nearly forgotten the Borgata added that. Some company or other must manufacture the air treatment system. That's got to find its way into Saints in Sin City...

I raced up to my suite and booted up. Implementing all of this as well as an additional room based upon my own experiences at check in. I added a front desk/registration room. Initially, I wasn't going to do this.

I've been making an effort to build my interactive fiction worlds with a new sense of economy where overall gaming area (as dictated by room count) but the registration desk had to go in -- if only to give the reader a realistic sense of how the social classes sort themselves out in a posh casino setting.

You see? I really do listen to my readers and fans. Many of you have wondered why I made the gaming areas in my titles so large. Greystone is the best example of this.

With The First Mile and down to the latest Pentari titles, I've made it a point to make the gaming area just big enough.... big enough to give Infocom fans more of everything they crave thanks to what modern technology allows us today which was simply impossible back in the 1980s and 1990s. But not so big as to exhaust an adventurer who felt they must explore every inch of 200+ rooms to give them a fair chance of successfully completing the story.

On that front I am happy to announce that Saints in Sin City shouldn't be much larger than 100 rooms. This would make Sin City the smallest interactive fiction title I've ever put on sale in terms of gaming area.

There's a very good reason for this. There's just so much you can do in a casino environment. It would be ludicrous of me to Implement a 100,000 square foot casino with all the trimmings -- thousands of slot machines, hundreds of gaming tables, dozens of ATM machines, a small army of security guards and pit bosses, etc. etc. To do this would serve no purpose; this fiction thriller wouldn't benefit at all. Quite the opposite would happen if anything.

It would be unfair of me to Implement 200 rooms of almost pure scenery just so I could get the casino area properly Implemented to scale.

And let's say I implemented a fully-functional gaming area complete with games of blackjack, three card poker, Pai Gow, roulette, craps and slots... how far is too far out from the point of this murder mystery thriller?

If you want to play some games of chance you could go pick up Hoyle Casino for Windows or Hard Rock Cafe for the Mac and get a much better gambling experience.

Heck, Yahoo! Games hosts a dozen decent games of chance which you can play for free right in your web browser...

Walking all throughout the Borgata yesterday really helped me to get the gaming area in perspective. That leaves a lot more energy for the most interesting aspect of a casino; the people. Because the people always make the plots, don't they?

Oh yes, the people. Playing blackjack last night before dinner, I had the good fortune to play with a couple of Chassidic Jews for a few shoes. Before their seats could even get cold, a metrosexual Asian dude and his girlfriend landed in those still-warm seats.

Before I even got to sit down at the best blackjack table in the Borgata (criteria -- $15 minimum, letting me increase and decrease my bets comfortably coupled with a 50" flat screen with the last round of The Masters Tournament playing) my tour of the Borgata reminded me of just how diverse the crowds are at a casino. You have the old and the young, the infirm and the energetic, the obese and the skinny, the beautiful and the bland.

The young, hip crowd were at The B Bar and the Gypsy Bar knocking down $11 drinks ($9 for the alcohol, $2 for the ice cubes - no kidding!) while the older crowd lined up at the buffet line right before it opened.

How do I capture all of this in a single title? Have I raised the bar too high this time?

All of these people have a place. They all make their contributions to the experience.

In other news -- I devised a couple of new fiendish puzzles and I feel the "draft" phase of Implementation is approaching completion. A Labor Day launch seems very realistic at this point.

Quick side note -- I toured The Water Club (the forthcoming luxury resort connected to The Borgata) this morning as I planned the final convention space for Adventure Gaming Expo and came away with a single word...

Wow.

I've got a whole new set of sensory keys to work from now.  The Water Club is over the top.

Las Vegas look out.  Atlantic City is rising again.

10 April 2008

Field Research Begins.

This weekend I am heading to The Borgata on a multi-profile mission:

1) "Get in the mood" to write spy thriller fiction about a world-class casino by being in one.  I plan to park myself at a cafe or two on the Casino floor and make a sport of people-watching as I innocuously peck at my keyboard from time to time.

2) To scope out the convention space for Adventure Gaming Expo.

3) To play some serious blackjack.  I've been away from the tables for well over a year and, quite frankly, I've got the itch.

4) To partake of some seriously good food courtesy of Bobby Flay and Wolfgang Puck.

5) Crash in my suite and do some very serious Implementing with zero distractions.

6) Hit The Pump Room and the pools to just wind down from an insane first quarter of business as I recalibrate Malinche's operations with new efficiencies as I sip mineral water and soak in a steaming Jacuzzi.

Come to think of it, the entire trip could be summarized as a field research expedition where Saints in Sin City is concerned....

Next stop? Vegas, baby!

2 April 2008

Skin Care and Fire Safety Converge

What does a jar of skin cream have to do with a small fire?

This might be the most devilishly hard puzzle I ever created.

Yet, once solved, it makes perfect sense.

25 March 2008

Being James Bond.

I'm getting knee-deep in it and find myself hitting creative brick walls.  As I finish the layout for Opimo I'm torn between being a tourist, an architect, a security expert and a field operative.

Must I be all and neither all at once?  This is tricky.  Should I wear one hat at a time? All at once? The best two out of three?

But the operative is the one at work to make the impossible happen.  Doesn't that person deserve the most focus?

Yes, mostly. 

But not entirely....

One-at-a-time may be the way.

I need to design The Opimo practically and professionally as an architect would.

The architect would be designing a world-class casino with security in mind -- with the foremost experts on the subject of security close at hand through every step of the process.

Then I need to decorate the place in a way so as to stun 99% of the population without appearing gaudy or gauche as a master artisan might while subtlety disguising all the safety designs already in place.

(Have you ever seen the security and surveillance team of a casino at work?)

And after all that I need to scour the place and the people from the perspective of a world-class black ops operator looking at every instance of every angle for the hidden dangers that must be there....as a member of MI-6 must.

Here's one thing I know: I'm taking a compact approach to the gaming area.

This is both practical and realistic. 

21 March 2008

It's Showtime!

Teatro Opimo is just footsteps away from the Western Walk, the convention center and the up market shopping.

 Is it perhaps too convenient a location?

18 March 2008

Things are Heating Up

And not a moment too soon.  Creative as I am, it's hard to write about a warm, exotic place like Las Vegas from the frigid, drab environs of a wintery New Jersey.

Spring is around the corner and I'm feeling a little frisky.

Be afraid.  Yes, be very very afraid...

Remember -- an Implementor has infinite power in any interactive fiction world he creates.  Flights of fancy is the fuel of our fire.

I feel lit up enough to say that I'm shooting for a Labor Day Weekend release of Sin City.

10 February 2008

Shuffling the Deck

I've decided to approach Sin City with a development technique I've never tried before.

Usually, I write my interactive fiction titles from start to finish without stopping for air.  Whenever inspiration strikes me I'll just bang out a neat idea I have.  When it's time to add some new areas I'll map them out in my mind's eye as my fingers work the keys.  And still other times I'm not writing prose hardly at all; I'm writing program code.

That's what makes the job of an Implementor so much more difficult (and more satisfying) than that of an author.  I hold my cousins of conventional fiction books in high esteem but.... they're slackers as far as I'm concerned.

You see, I'm never just writing fiction or just writing text adventure game computer code; I'm doing both at the same time to one degree or another.

At the end of it all comes "The End".  The story's over or darned near over which means it's time to get the title ready for alpha testing.

That's when I'd normally run the first compile to see how many errors/bugs/etc. I'm hit with.  Then begins the maddening task of slogging through hundreds upon hundreds of bugs/errors/warnings/etc. before I can get to a story file that somebody can actually take a shot at.

After months and years of writing it usually takes one whole solid day to get a new interactive fiction title to successfully compile.  That's ten or twelve hours of brutal, non-stop coding which just a short break for a sandwich or a can of Red Bull.

At the end of the day I feel great! The story compiles! Have I reached the top of the mounain?

Not even close. I'm only approaching the finish line at that point.

But not this time.

This time, for the very first time,  I'm compiling as I go.  At the end of each round at the keyboard I am ending up with a finished, ready-to-play story file.

Why?

Because A Saint in Sin City (SISC for short) promises to be my most "active" interactive fiction title to date. This is partly because I want to take yet another fresh approach to interactive fiction but mostly because I write what's real. 

As places go, Las Vegas is real busy.  24x7x365.

If you were to park yourself in the middle of any casino or shopping area in any hotel on the Las Vegas Strip you can bet the ranch there'd be no less than a dozen different things going on within 100 feet of where you were standing.

The second most interesting about Las Vegas is the permeating atmosphere.  From outside the big resort casinos to inside, the magical use of light, color, fabric, glass, water, sculpture, music, aroma and a hundred other things all go into delivering a scintillating experience for the senses.

From the shark reef of one hotel to the dolphin habitat of another to the canals of a third, the mixture of the dangerous with the delightful, the mind-boggling with the magical altogether make for an experience like no other you will find anywhere else in the world.

Only in Las Vegas do millionaires mingle with the middle-class at the same blackjack table as dusty cowboys who are served by gorgeous cocktail waitresses just two seats over

My job is to wrap all of this up and package it within the confines of a single work of fiction. Sure, interactive fiction gives me an edge but let's not dither; this stuff is hard.

For the many fans of The Food Network's Dinner: Impossible out there, let me put it this way -- now I know exactly how Robert Irvine feels!

Like Mister Robert Irvine, I always manage to deliver.  Not always on schedule but never disappointing.

7 February 2008

"If you're going through hell, keep going."

This quote by Winston Churchill describes A Saint in Sin City perfectly.  This spy thriller/murder mystery will be hard.  Damned hard.  I've implemented the plot and the sub-plots and the diversions.  The characters in the story are coming to life and the 500 acres of prime Las Vegas real estate are showing signs of life in response to this Implementor's commands.

I  am implementing a brutally honest, realistic work of crime fiction that will test every reader to his or her limits.

But Sin City is reasonable. I know that "reasonable" is a subjective term so let me qualify that statement a bit.

This Sin City interactive fiction title is reasonable in the sense that if you are observant, resourceful and creative you should make it through your mission successfully.

So don't quit.  Failure only comes when you quit.  Until you quit, no matter what your obstacles might be, you're still in the game.

Success, though, is also a subjective term also...

27 January 2008

Groove Salad

Thanks to Internet radio (as heard through iTunes on my iMac), I am Implementing with the perfect background music.  All due thanks go to Grove Salad on SomaFM.  for running a 100% commercial free radio station with a superior mix of music. Check 'em out under the Ambient category in iTunes.

Now with the gratuitous plug out of the way let's turn to the very serious business of writing.

I'm putting the finishing touches on the Casino floor of the Opimo. "Still?" you may be asking yourself, Sure some months have passed since production started but let me tell you; not a precious moment was wasted. Saints is a sophisticated spy thriller with a complex plot made up of several moving parts.

The most challenging aspect is to write the story with a fresh perspective for the player.

I've been to Las Vegas over a dozen times.  The average reader probably hasn't.

What's old hat to me is probably a brand new experience for most of you.

I can't let my seasoned Las Vegas traveler mindset get in the way of rewarding, you the reader.

I can't do that to you. I won't.  I'm not.

What's my secret? I'm implementing Opimo with continual references to my first impressions of my first night ever in Las Vegas -- at The Venetian.

Mighty fine things, those reference points.

23 January 2008

Puttin' On the Ritz

What's a $1 trillion piece of property supposed to be like, anyway?

My ever-evolving writing style is a balancing act of atmosphere infused with elements of plot and interaction with characters. You'll pass by solid gold fountains of Roman gods that even billionaires stop to admire as you try and uncover the terrorist plot underway at The Opimo even before you arrive.

Just to keep things interesting, the sudden discovery of several murder victims the day you arrive will throw a very serious wrench in your plans.

Are you solving a murder mystery? Saving the day in a spy thriller? Taking a rich man's vacation in Vegas?

All of the above.  And more.

Welcome to Sin City.

7 November 2007

A Month of Boot Camp

That's not exactly true but it sometimes feels like it.  I signed myself up for an elective creative writing course to shake things up in my mind a bit.

I'm currently in week two and I am stunned by the work load.

It's an intense month of heavy reading, writing and thinking.  I'm loving it.  Sin City production has slowed down some because there is no fucking way I am getting less than an A in this class.

That's a good thing.

You see, intentionally exposing myself to an enforced syllabus of different authors and poets and their writing styles, methods and mindsets broadens me.  Working like a young pup in the writing world is an excellent workout for an old dog like me.  My skills are getting even sharper, my imagination is being teased by a hundred or more fresh ideas a week and my mind is taking all this in with all the excitement of the kid in the proverbial candy story.

Does an author of my stature need a writing class? Of course not. I can broaden myself with a new author or two, a new fiction book that jumps off the shelf at the book store and so on but... that would only grab me along the lines of my own personal likes and tastes. I could widen my bubble but I would still be in a bubble.

Having your bubble burst, in some cases, doesn't suck at all.

Can I get better at writing beguiling fiction from this class? Of course I can.  Even Tiger Woods goes back to school. From his point of view he's never good enough.  Neither am I.

Be a tiger.

October 17, 2007

Living in Las Vegas

I'm steadily implementing the fictional Opimo megaresort and casino in Las Vegas every day. Even though I haven't flown out to Las Vegas to conduct primary research yet, I feel like I'm already living there from right here in New Jersey.

Imagination on its own is so powerful.  Take imagination and couple it with experience and you get a super writing tool.

I've been to Las Vegas more times than I can count.  On average I go twice a year.

I knew all those junkets would pay off handsomely -- and not just at the blackjack tables.  Thanks to my dozens of trips to all of the best Las Vegas casinos, restaurants, nightclubs and shows I can let my thoughts and feelings about my rich set of experiences flow into A Saint in Sin City.

Nice!

I am right now implementing "Gourmet Alley" and I am tapping into every one of the impressions I received from the glorious times I spent at The Venetian, Wynn, The Bellagio, The Mirage and all the rest.

Am I still heading to Vegas a time or two as I continue to write Sin City?

You bet!