Apr. 8, 2012 @ 13:59
Goodbye for now.

Once again it’s been over half a year since I last posted anything here so I figured I should bring people up-to-date.

A lots happened over the past six months both professional and privately and as a result I’ve been pulled further and further away from game modding and programming.

In short I finally freed myself from a job I’ve been doing for almost ten years and have started working for a large multinational internet company. It’s big boy stuff and it’s a lot of responsibility and taking a lot of my time and energy. Sadly it’s not the game industry job that I’ve wanted since I was twelve but hey, thems the breaks life gives you.

Coupled with that I’ve found myself becoming more and more disillusioned with modding, specifically the Source Engine which had so much promise but just seem to of fallen flat on it’s face. Valve fan-boy that I am I’ve stuck with it but there comes a point when you look at things like CryEngine and UDK and you wonder why the hell you keep banging your head against the wall with the Source SDK. I could rant for hours about it but that’s just a waste of energy at this point.

I’ve also been forced to “kill my darling” by making the tough decision to step down as team lead on Ham and Jam and cease all involvement in the project. Ham and Jam is still going – I think – as I handed it over to the few of the team left. This was probably the hardest thing to do as it represents four years of work and ยฃ6000 out of my own pocket invested and was so close to completion. That said, it taught me a lot about how NOT to develop a game and also sadly a lot about being careful who to trust and who to let be part of your project…

So in conclusion a lot of changes and a lot of tough decisions I’ve had to face including the one to stop doing anything with my tools and plug-ins for the foreseeable future. I’m not saying I’ll never pick them up again at a later point, I just don’t know if or when that might be. What little free time I have right now is just too valuable to spend working on something I’ve lost the motivation and passion for. I’ll leave my site up, just don’t expect any updates for a while.

In the meantime I’m sure Canonfodder will keep you provided with Max plug-ins and I heartily recommend you check out and support the work Shawn Olson is doing with Wallworm which has replaced and in some cases exceeded the ability of much of my work.

Until anon, Jed

Responses to “Goodbye for now.”


Have you considered releasing the source code to some of your plugins and tools? Sad to see you leave, I recall stumbling upon your site ages ago when I did the first steps into Goldsrc modding ๐Ÿ™‚

Oh the time that’s gone by.

Posted by ScarT
Mon, April 9th, 2012 @ 19:54

@ScarT – At the risk of sounding like a dick – no, I’m not going to release the source code to my tools. While I am 100% behind the principles and idea of Open Source Software, it’s just my personal choice to keep my work close-source.

At the end of the day, I give all my stuff away for free and never expected anything for it (donations were few and entirely voluntary) and tried to help others with code snippets and advice when developing their own stuff. Keeping my source closes allowed me to maintiain some sort of control and quality of the stuff I put out there plus I’ve been backstabbed and ripped-off too much of late that I simply don’t trust people any more.

I’m also afraid of people trying to put trojans into the code – I’m already suffering with sites like BrotherSoft hosting my plug-ins without my permission (they actually opened a user account with my credentials masquerading as me) and refuse to take them down. When it’s out of my hands I can’t protect my end users from viruses and malware being added into the downloads or DLL’s themselves.

@Mikael – Tack sjรคlv. ๐Ÿ™‚

Posted by Jed
Tue, April 10th, 2012 @ 15:50

Hey,

I stumbled upon your site a week ago and was very impressed. Wish you all the good luck in the future, and thanks for all the tools and work you have kindly shared with us.

Cheers from Sweden
Mikael

Posted by Mikael
Tue, April 10th, 2012 @ 13:03

Neil… I have always greatly appreciated your help and patience. I really hope this is just a hiatus… and you’ll return in the foreseeable future. Whenever you feel refreshed and envigorated again… I still have some random Jedness to inject into WW stuff! ๐Ÿ™‚

Posted by Shawn Olson
Thu, April 12th, 2012 @ 15:44

Hey Jed

Sorry to see you leaving, and I understand your point of view in all this. The Source engine is just a pain in the ass to work with, at least with the current SDK. I left Source modding ages ago to pursue game development on my own engines where I have complete control, and I have been having way more fun doing that as a hobby.
Funny thing, my current paying job is working on the source engine… You leave for awhile and it pulls you right back! Maybe this will happen to you as well haha!

Well, I wish you all the best and thank you for all the work you have done for us!

Posted by Ryan Sheffer ( skidz )
Thu, April 12th, 2012 @ 20:32

Ah, that seems fair enough. I didn’t even consider the whole trojan thing. Either way, good luck with your future endeavours!

ps. I just made a ยฃ5 donation (sorry, I’m a student) as a thank you for your great tools! I really enjoyed the quality of them, and the fact they weren’t filled with crappy installers, ads etc.)

Posted by ScarT
Mon, April 16th, 2012 @ 22:25

@Ryan Thanks for your support. I enjoy “hacking” with C++ so I think if I don’t have some sort of side project I’ll get restless. But as I said, my affinity to the Source engine has been on the wain for a while and I just can’t justify putting all that effort into an engine I no longer use and don’t “believe” in. That and I haven’t done any PC gaming for ages now – I’m pretty much an XBox gamer now.

@ScarT Thanks for the donation but you didn’t have to. I was a student once and anyway, you’ve helped me enough in return with questions on hlcoders ๐Ÿ™‚

Posted by Jed
Fri, April 27th, 2012 @ 16:05

Hey Jed, I just wanted to say thanks for everything you’ve done. You’re awesome / the best / awesome.

And to everyone — I know it’s easy to feel “betrayed” by Valve somehow, but look at their handbook: they decide what they want to work on. Given the choice, would you rather spearhead a lonely revamp of an SDK for a breathtakingly outdated engine branch, or work on HL4 / Portal 3 / AR goggles / something new with all your friends?

Posted by Robert Yang
Sun, April 29th, 2012 @ 21:24

I was with you since that page started. It’s sad that you are leaving.
Good by and have a good luck in you life.

Posted by Maciej
Thu, May 3rd, 2012 @ 12:28

@Robert – interesting point you make there. I think if I was at Valve and was given the choice I think I *would* actually like to dedicate some time to improving the toolset of the SDK. I’m very passionate about creating things that allow others to be creative and get involved in game development so I don’t think I could leave it alone entirely. Plus, having worked in game development a bit it’s very frustrating actually being on a game dev team – I think tool development would help me avoid a lot of that.

@Maciej Well I haven’t said I’m quitting for good – just for now. I need some time off and to try and re-find my passion for game development and decide how much more effort I want to give the Source SDK. In one for or another I’m bound to be hacking some sort of tool and I might switch my focus to making more generic modding plug-ins.

Posted by Jed
Fri, May 4th, 2012 @ 11:54

Great, Autodesk just released 3ds Max 2013 about a month ago and there’s no compatible exporter or importer for SMD files. ๐Ÿ™

Posted by ScarT
Fri, May 18th, 2012 @ 19:07

So sorry to see you go, your tools have been the go-to for so long! The pain you talk about with Source, so much of that is alleviated by your tools and as you say the work Shawn is doing with Wall Worm’s.

I hope you decide to come back, or maybe you will decided to persue modding on another engine. As you say CryEngine and UDK are very attractive. It is simply sad to see someone lose their passion.

Maybe Valve should hire you to work on the SDK!

Posted by mrhappy
Sat, May 26th, 2012 @ 20:12

Cheers from Norway!

Always been following your plugins, you converted a lot of my ideas from probable to possible! Thanks from the cold north!

Posted by Haug
Wed, June 13th, 2012 @ 17:42