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Darkest of Days (game/engine pimp!)

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gauss
polycounter lvl 18
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gauss polycounter lvl 18
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You may have heard some rumblings a few months back, and the rumors are true: I joined a team of monkeys (8Monkey Labs), and that the game we're working on (Darkest of Days) was officially announced and featured in PC Gamer.
Despite having a small team, we have two polycounters on-site (EQ and myself), as well as several polycounters contracted off-site: Per128 as the character lead, and dfacto contributing models and textures.
EQ knowing me through polycount was how I ended up here, and we'd like to get even more polycounters on board--we are very proud of the way the game is turning out, but we need help.

We've got several positions available for environment/generalist 3D and animators, as well as a level designer position. Polycounters have really made this title look (and play!) as well as it does now, but we're looking to really ramp up production now by expanding our on-site team.


"But gauss," you say, "you posted this in the P&P section. Where's your pimping?" Here's a taste of what you'll get to play with working with us:
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First off, the beauty JaneGoodall, for the 3D Artists. I don't really use this all that much since I'm a level designer, but I still love it. For a true testimonial about this model viewer/configuration app, talk to EQ, or better yet talk to Vahl, who doesn't work for us but got to use our engine/model viewer tech for his Dominance War 2 entry. Remember that?

For the hard data--our engine was built in-house, from scratch, and features HDR image-based lighting, uses Phys-X for the in-game physics, and full-screen motion blur. In case you don't know, image-based lighting means that in the shot above, the gun model is being lit by the photographic environment we've put it in. We've got dynamic lights and all that other stuff, but since most of our environments are outdoors, image-based lighting takes care of most of it. Oh, and though the tab isn't selected in that shot, you can load different environments and even different post effects to view the model in very quickly. Actually, the first image in this thread, the hand with the C96 Mauser, that image was taken directly from the model viewer, it's not a render (nor are the colors Photoshopped!)
The model viewer was coded tailor-made to many
of EQ's specifications. So it's designed for artists, largely by artists. How about that? With a team like ours that has some very gifted programmers, you can request specific features and, if they're reasonable enough, expect to actually get them. Crazy, I know. They still refuse to code that "make art" button, though.


Now for the real men:
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If you make it into our much-coveted third level designer slot, working alongside myself and another, you'll be using Habitat, pictured above. Much like Jane, Habitat gives a pretty accurate representation of what the final level will look like--and best of all, you're only a hotkey away from an in-editor game preview. You better believe I will never mess with creepy old BSP-based engines and their editors again, I'm just not going back.
The only thing that needs precompiling of any kind is tree lighting, and that takes at most about an hour, and that's only if you make a huge level stuffed full of trees. And besides, you only do that for polish--day to day operation of Habitat is really quite nice. Again, just like for the 3D artists, level designers here are in a very privileged position--after working here a few weeks, I noticed certain trigger types that would be useful for the level I was working on, so I made a feature request. About a week or so later, it's in the editor and in the game.


Alright, before you all tl;dr me here, I think I'm done with trying to hype the game. EQ can answer more specific question about the tools, if you'd like, and can certainly tell you more about what a job with us would entail.

I want to see a lot of you talented bastards applying, by the way--we've always known what kind of quality work comes out of here, so that's why I'm posting. I'd love to get more polycounters to work on this game--we've got a good, small team where you matter, not lost in the shuffle.

check out our job postings here:

8monkey Labs -- 3D Generalist

8monkey Labs -- Character Animator

8monkey Labs -- Weapons Animator

8monkey Labs -- Level Designer/Lead Level Designer
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