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Updated February 11, 2002

Part online diary, part game development journal, this site is my own little corner of the web. I don't get a lot of hits which is probably good since I can't afford to be paying mega bucks for the bandwidth.

This site originated back in 1997. I am a member of Sony's Net Yaroze which lets you make games for the original Playstation. I used this site to post updates on the game development. In 1999 we released our first game called Decaying Orbit. It's a 2D space action game where you guide your ship around the screen shooting targets and collecting money to upgrade your craft. I tried to make it as much of a complete game as I could. It has a decent menu system, cheats, and even lets you use your own audio CDs for music. The game was one-fifth of what I had original envisioned, but due to RAM constraints on the Playstation I started to run into difficulties.

I joined VM Labs in 1998 and took advantage of my time there to play around with NUON development. I eventually want to write my own original game for NUON, but finding time to code is difficult. I had hoped to somehow work it into my job at VML, but things started disintegrating in the first part of 2001.

At the end of 2001 I left VM Labs and went to NVIDIA where I am now. It's even harder to find time to code now, but I squeeze in a few hours on weekends. I'm not sure if the game I have in mind will ever see the light of day, but it sure is fun working on it. I wish I could just work on game development full time, but since I'm a hardware guy it's hard to make game companies see the value of hiring me. Maybe game development will always just be a hobby, but that's fine with me!

Scott Cartier


Previous update: August 28, 2000

This site originally started out as a progress log for the game Decaying Orbit written for the Playstation (using Sony's Net Yaroze). Once that was "done" (it took 2 years and I still didn't put in everything I wanted) things died down for a while. The site became more of a diary of my life - gaming and otherwise.

Recently, I have started work on a new game. This time I'm writing it for the NUON architecture (working for VM Labs makes this possible). The game has a very unique rendering technique which is perfectly suited for NUON's flexibility. I doubt it will ever become available to the masses (unless I can convince management to put it on a demo disc at some point). I'm mostly writing it for myself. At one point I had aspirations of getting in the game programming business, but things are going so well at VM Labs that I'm not sure if that will ever happen.

Anyway, enjoy the site!

Scott Cartier


Previous update: April 4, 2000

Things have changed a bit since I wrote the previous blurb (see below). I have all but ceased programming on the Yaroze. This is partially due to work becoming busy, but mostly I just want to take a break.

This site has become more of a diary of my life and less of the project progress indicator it was before. If/when we get cracking on another game I'll be sure to mention it here. I do have a game swimming around in my head and am waiting for the right opportunity to work on it.

Scott Cartier


Previous update: August 19, 1999

This site is a diary of sorts. We're just a couple of guys that make games. We started out making games for ourselves using construction sets (Adventure Construction Set, Racing Destruction Set, Shoot-Em Up Construction Kit, Gary Kitchen's Game Maker, etc).

In 1997 I (Scott) joined Sony's Net Yaroze group. Over the following two years I learned the ropes of 2D sprites on the Playstation. What originated as a simple test program, Decaying Orbit blossomed into a full game. To say it consumed me would be not at all inaccurate.

While not 100% complete, a demo was released in May 1999 which also made it's way onto an Official Playstation Magazine cover disc. Yes, it took 2 years to release a demo. I am doing this in my spare time after all. Plus, the game is very complete - meaning it has a lot of features you'd find in a commercial game: configuration (control, sound, buttons), an opening title screen, story sequences to progress the game, a pretty good menu system, cheat codes, a somewhat sophisticated engine running in hi-res 640x480, all original graphics and sound effects, and the ability to use audio CDs as background music.

Learning 3D is my next goal. With all the positive responses I've gotten from the Decaying Orbit demo I'm inclined to continue work on it. We'll see where that takes me.

So as I said at the beginning, this site is a diary of sorts. I'll post updates as they happen. Browse around and if you feel so inclined, drop me a line.

Oh yes. You will need a Yaroze password to access some files/links. Sorry, that's just the nature of the Yaroze license agreement.

Enjoy!