While the last year has been quite stressful with people having to get new jobs to support development and/or writing their final thesis to graduate from Uni, some enemies have been created.

While I am unable to show off all of these new enemies I still wanted to at least show off  a variation on an already shown enemy that have not only been re-textured but also remodeled for later levels in the game!

WIP Magma Rat

It is a work in progress and rendered in realtime in the viewport of 3Ds Max, Diffuse, Normal, Specular and finally a Glow map, has been used to create this effect of glowing lava, when in its natural dark environment (it’s a cave! But don’t tell anyone I leaked that.) in-game, the lava looks pretty frickin ‘ sweet!

It’s been around +30 degrees Celsius today and no wind. I went out to fish around 7 pm and I stoped around 9pm when it was still to hot (about 23-25+). It’s great that the summer has arrived : ) It looks like it will be the same tomorrow, so I’ll be a the beach (work morning, get a tan, work at night). To bad that not every job can’t have this work schedule.

It’s Valborg’s eve today here in Sweden. The other guys of Databox Interactive seem a bit drunk, but not me. Not yet. It’s only 4 PM and I have blogs to write, before I disappear into the mist of cheap beer and Jäger.

To understand what Valborg really is you need to go back to the medieval age. In 1300 AD an underwater castle was built somewhere off the Lapland coast of Sweden. Mermaids and Surströmming (fermented herrings) were the servants, crabs were the soldiers and of course a whale was the king. Due to the variation of creatures living there, the reign of the mighty whale did not last long. A civil war inside the very walls of the castle shattered the empire, leaving the creatures to find shelter somewhere else. The whale was displeased by this act and swore an oath, never to trust any mammal, fish or mutation again. He disappeared at sea and was never seen again.

Decades passed by and no one seemed to really give a sh*t, until one day when a drunken sailor from Malmö saw something he had never seen before. Lying there all huge, but helpless was the stranded whale. The drunken sailor felt sorry for the late king and decided to help him. He fed the whale, cleaned him up and got him a place to live.

Unaware of the fact that the whale needed water for its survival, the sailor was convicted for attempt of murder. The next day the sailor was hung. Unfortunately the people could not move the whale as forklifts had not been invented yet. Moments before the poor whale died of hydration, he shouted out: “Valborg” (probably with the same impact of epicness as in Brave Heart). Because of the randomness of that situation and because no one understood the meaning of that word, people just looked at each other, cheered and of course started drinking.

So now you know why everyone is completely hammered a** drunk on Valborg. No one knows why, people just look for an excuse to drink.