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I’ve been asked over to lend a hand with the SDK team in Frankfurt. For the week, I’ve been leading three excellent programmers in updating the SDK codebase with some of the Crysis 2 AI systems, trimming down some older systems that were no longer needed and training on some of the systems that were new to them.

It’s an exciting time to touch base with Frankfurt and a good opportunity to catch up with everyone, see how they’re faring and how development is going.

[This work saw the light of day with the 3.3 release of the CryEngine SDK]

I’m back on-site with Crytek in Nottingham and continuing my work there. There’s a lot of excitement about upcoming Crysis 2, especially the multiplayer. As always, they’re working magic – this time its an innovative approach to memory fragmentation. Having been away for a while with Microsoft, its great to catch up with developments and with the team.

I was recently asked by Intel’s Arti Gupta if I would write a couple of posts for the Intel Software Network site on my “Code Coverage for QA” system. Forming part of a series with authors of Games Programming Gems 8, I’ve written a condensed summary “Getting more out of QA with Code Coverage” which will bootstrap you in 2 minutes and answer the question: “What can CC4QA do for me?”

For an in-depth treatment and technical details you can read the original article “Code Coverage: Informing the QA Process” in Games Programming Gems 8 or watch a discussion with Alex Champandard in a masterclass video available at AiGameDev.com. You can also check out the C++ source for an example implementation mcover.

After completing my contract with Microsoft I headed straight over to Luzern to put some serious work into a new joint project. Doug Binks and I have been looking into a new way to structure your games development that we think will be of interest to anyone who has worked on a major product in C++. We spent a week proving the core concept and laying the foundation of an open source codebase for demos to come – hopefully around the middle of next year. Doug was R&D Manager on Crysis and now works for Intel, but this pet project is on our own time.

If I’ve been quiet recently it’s because I’ve been busy! For the last few months I was based in London for a short full-time contract with Microsoft, in their Xbox Live studios in Soho.

This little studio in the heart of London is best known for its live-streaming and video-on-demand applications running on your Xbox console, produced with content partners such as BSkyB and Canal+

I began by bootstrapping a new video application for the French market – recently announced by Steve Ballmer.

As that team ramped up I moved onto the Sky Player team, working on some really key features. The app has received quite a bit of coverage such as here and here and I’m looking forward to posting more on this soon.

It’s been a really great experience working with this highly professional team. Some of the highlights included:

• experience with Kinect
• rigorous use of unit testing
• networking and web services
• using Lua in anger, in a sophisticated application framework

…as well as coordinating with the development teams in Redmond and getting some valuable insight into how the big boys ship products. Plus they were a real pleasure to work with!

As it happens, I’m not the only person from the AI community the studio has attracted – Gwaredd Mountain recently joined, presenter of the fascinating talk “Psychology Profiling in Silent Hill: Shattered Memories” at the Paris AI conference.

In the last couple of months I’ve been doing some evening consulting work for Xaviant, on the AI for their upcoming title “Lichdom”. Built on CryEngine 3, the game is an RPG focused on magical abilities. Without giving too much away, I can say that they are paying particular attention to the AI and looking to push it forward in a couple of areas that are new for CryEngine. I’m helping them with the details of the AI system’s implementation and how best to extend it for their needs – as well as discussing AI more generally. In fact I’ve done some prototyping in related areas in the past, but never had a game design carry them through – so it’s going to be very interesting helping them get there. They’re an experienced team who are a pleasure to work with, and having had a sneak peek, I’m really looking forward to seeing “Lichdom” develop.

Here’s a little info on their game.

LICHDOM HIGH LEVEL OUTLINE
You play as “Roth”, the most powerful mage ever to exist, armed with untold magic abilities the world has never witnessed before. Returning to kingship once again after 1300 years, Roth must choose between ruling with perfect order in the light or plunging the world into darkness through destructive chaos.

CORE GAMEPLAY
Redefining what it means to be a single-character story driven RPG, Lichdom will feature fresh new ideas in a genre steeped in tradition. The use of magic is the one and only weapon while empowering the player to feel as if they are controlling the greatest mage who has ever existed. Make a choice to utilize that power by following a path of corrupted destruction where no one is safe and the world will tremble before Roth’s feet – or – skillfully plan your attack to root out the unjust while preserving the innocent, as the world bows to Roth’s righteous kingship.