Guild Chat - Episode 101

The following is an unofficial, player-written transcript of the episode. The accuracy of this transcription has not been verified by ArenaNet.

The 101st episode of Guild Chat aired on July 17, 2020.

"What’s it like when a whole game studio works from home? We’re learning every day! Join host Rubi Bayer and her developer guests—remotely—for an inside look at how ArenaNet is adapting to safety precautions during the COVID-19 pandemic."

Transcription[edit]

Rubi Bayer: Hi Tyria and Happy Friday. Welcome to Guild Chat and thank you for spending some time with us today. I'm your host Rubi, and today we're going to be talking about something that we as a studio and a lot of game studios have been dealing with for months now, which is making and shipping a video game from our homes during quarantine. So we're gonna be talking with six of our devs today just about various aspects of how that works, how we're dealing with it, what's different, what's good, bad, and indifferent. So let's get started right away with our first three guests, and I will have you guys introduce yourselves and talk about what you work on or what you do at ArenaNet. Alex, let's start with you, and then Kent, and then Connor.

Alex Kain: Hi, I'm Alex Kane. I'm a senior writer and narrative designer at ArenaNet. I am—I was—the lead writer on Episode 4, which is launching next next week, week after, on the 28th. So that's coming up very soon yes and yeah I'm working on fun Guild Wars-y stuff.

Kent Benson: Yeah, hi, I'm Kent. I'm a QA analyst on Episode 4 team, and yeah it's coming out a week from now.

Rubi: Okay Connor?

Connor Fallon: Hello my name is Connor. I'm a senior designer and I am working on the new mysterious expansion. That's all you're gonna get out of me.

Rubi: Which, sorry guys, is not what we're talking about today. Let's just get ahead of that now.

Kent: He one-upped us.

Rubi: Right? He just came at the end with a—

Connor: You've got stuff that you can talk about, which is I think inherently more interesting. I don't know.

Rubi: It's certainly easier. Okay well, why don't we start with one of the most practical aspects, which is the equipment we don't have, like our homes don't come equipped with the sweet internet connection that the office has, and all of the the equipment we have to do our jobs. So how have you guys worked with that and what's different? Connor?

Connor: I mean I stole—I borrowed— sorry, I borrowed a monitor from work, and I basically plugged it into my laptop so I have have two screens still. That's really the only minimal disruption for workflow. Other than that though, I'm doing most of my work over remote desktop which means that like it's you know, very dependent on having a stable internet connection for me. But I mainly, you know, it's lucky I have a nice laptop that I can bring from location to location in order to do my work. If the internet connection is bad in one spot, I can go somewhere else. So yeah.

Rubi: Nice. How about you Kent?

Kent: I already had a computer set up at home, and it's actually fairly convenient that I built a new computer within the last two or three years. So, I have that, and as far as I guess the transitionary difficulties. They've all been relatively minor. So working over a remote desktop, there are things where I'll be using the clients on my actual computer and then I'll like take or make a gif for something like a bug. But then, I have to send it to myself to put onto my remote desktop, because I can only access JIRA via remote desktop. So yeah.

Rubi: That makes sense. Alex?

Alex: I didn't have to steal anything from the office.

Rubi: You guys they'll just give it to you if you ask.

Alex: Yeah, no, I mean it's more fun to seek forgiveness than ask permission. So what I've been fortunate with is that, you know, for the writing that we do, we do most of our initial drafts in things like Microsoft Word and Final Draft, which I already have personal copies of. So I didn't have to worry about remoting into my machine. So I've got a Surface laptop here that's plugged into an external monitor, which is the same monitor I use for gaming. It's a pretty wide monitor, so I can have all sorts of things on the screen at the same time like a command center or something. It's pretty cool. Because this is my sort of gaming area that I do my work in, however, I had to leave my work keyboard at home which is my favorite sort of typing keyboard. It's this Unicomp, it's modeled after the old IBM Model M, which is like those beige keyboards that you have when you're in school or something. And for like keyboard nerds, it doesn't have a standard switch, it uses a little spring inside the key. And it's actually called the catastrophically buckling compression column switch actuator mechanism, that's not like an MX Cherry or anything. But what it does is when I started typing on it, people start looking, and they're like "Are you a time traveler from 1983? Did you come from a high school somewhere?" Yeah so I missed that. I used the surface laptop keyboard, which is a fine keyboard, don't get me wrong, but it's not quite the same.

Rubi: So just to give a little look behind the scenes on, you know we joke about stealing equipment, there is not much left at my desk at the office. I will say that one of the things that ArenaNet did that I really appreciated was if you need stuff from your desk, we will work with you on that because I think all of us are starting to really realize "hey we're going to be doing this for a while". It happened when Washington was at its height of quarantine, like the highway signs said "stay home, stay safe" -cut-

Connor: Yeah so your call background is on point in regards to having like a nice display of things behind you. I'm curious how much of that was was what you had up beforehand and how much was you were like "I'm going to be doing this all the time. I'm going to make sure I have the best damn Guild Wars related background possible."

Rubi: Oh yeah. So let's see. I like ravaged my house. So like, all of my game boxes and my framed Tyria map, those were gifts from my husband over the years for like birthdays and Christmases. He had my game boxes put in a shadow box one year. So like, a lot of the stuff I already had. Like, we've all got the signed CD. I keep turning around to look. But I also had at my desk at work, I had a ton of fan art that I've collected over the years, and that's like all back there. I got all my extra life stuff. My whole family, we were tearing through the house going "What else do we have? What else? What's in bookshelves? What's in cabinets? What's on my desk at work?" And honestly, the extra life medals, the ones that I got, I was always putting up in our team's pod because it was a team effort, and I wanted to share. I took them back. They're mine now. So yeah, and like my nameplate, I took it off my desk at work. So yeah, between my desk and all over my house there's like 12 years of stuff back there. That was very a very long answer to your question, but that's where it came from.

Connor: I have a plain white wall because I haven't even been living in this apartment for the most part. So, I apologize.

Rubi: Yeah, you kind of. No, it's okay. It's nice and clean. It's minimalistic, as opposed to the massive clutter behind me. But yeah, my filing cabinet at work was literally wallpapered in fanart. There wasn't any space, so I just pulled it all down, and brought it home. So there's your answer. Yeah, so that's equipment. On a slightly different level, what about interaction with your team. Because, we're not really having to impromptu kitchen meetings, and we're not all fighting over 5-2 now. How has that changed for you? I'm not wrong. That's the good meeting room.

Alex: Yeah, 5-2, for those who don't know, the number of sizable meeting room at Anet HQ, we don't have too many of them. It's a very small number yeah. Yeah, I think that, for the stuff that I do, I really miss working with the physical team. The way that writers are set up is that we're sort of embedded in the episode team, so I sit with the Episode 4 writers. And it was easy for me to just you know ambiently hear what's happening at any given point. I can spin around at my desk and the whole team is right there around me, and I can ask questions, I can see what they're working on, I can see if they have a question for me, they can ask it. If I head a conversation going on and somebody wants to add something that I know is going to be a problem, I can just sort of enter into that conversation. But that doesn't quite happen as much now. So there's a lot more, you know, we have an open Teams channel that we use, that's for the whole Episode 4 team. And we have check-ins a lot more often to make sure that everyone's on the same track. It's been a change. It's been a workflow change, but the one-on-ones don't quiet capture the same ambiance the studio had.

Note: The text below hasn't yet been converted from raw subtitle text into pretty print like above. https://youtu.be/4g7QOY84ED0?t=1106

like there definitely was an adjustment
or figuring out because what what Alex
is saying about like people just won't
over here things naturally right so and
yeah like there's no hallway
conversation or anything like that where
like someone will catch wind of
something if they weren't they you know
just naturally and so it becomes extra
important for you to find like you know
to actively put a lot of effort into
keeping everyone in the loop
and you know like having regular calls
and like posting sending emails and
posting you know confluence which is all
we're always good practices to have but
I think it really especially with with
you know teams teams being like
adjusting and people and people trying
different things there's been a lot more
of that right and a lot like like just
having impromptu chats right or it's
like hey let's let's talk about this in
person because one of the other big
things is text may seem like an okay
substitute but it really isn't a lot of
the time so even though it's not as good
as being there in person like it's it's
almost always better to talk over a
team's chat even if no one has video
right just because you can hear tone of
voice you can you get a better sense of
how people especially when you're like
collaborating on ideas how people feel
about things versus like trying to
interpret their feelings from text so
yeah that's that's my big thing is it's
just you have to do as much as you can
to keep people in the loop and keep it
personal both of those things require
more active effort I will say the
opposite side of that coin is that now
that we all are digital it's so much
easier to set up a one-on-one with
somebody whereas in the studio it's like
okay well we'll set up a one-on-one will
food you know we'll try to get a meeting
room and there are like eight meeting
rooms and a hundred meetings that
everyone across the studio is trying to
have at the same time but now it's just
like you know oh I need to talk with
Connor about something I'll talk to
Connor hey do you have five minutes cool
video chat done you know it's it's that
aspect of it's a lot easier now that is
something you've made me realize is how
often I would be having a conversation
via X with somebody in a different part
of the office and we'd just be like hey
do you want to grab a room because yeah
you're right it's hard to get a meeting
room but there were a lot of small side
rooms where a couple of us would just
like duck in there and hammer something
out really quickly so it is it is super
important communication just keeping
that up at this point how about you
can't yeah actually I
I actually am one of the people that
sits directly behind Alex so oh I miss
you man
yeah it's it's been that especially as
someone who's um I'm definitely the kind
of person that prefers to kind of like
talk to people in person and kind of
like gauge their emotional responses and
all that stuff that comes with
interpersonal conversation and it's just
kind of like the just being able to like
overhear things and pick up on things
that like there's I definitely feel like
in addition to like the overarching kind
of like I would say theme of quarantine
which is like alone together or
something you know something like that
it's if there's like there's like yeah
there's there's kind of like this almost
like invisible barrier between like
humor like personal interaction when
you're like separated everyone is in
like their own I guess office as you
will and it can be like difficult
especially for people with like kind of
like apprehension about like just poking
people for like conversations there's
like a there's like a degree of
hesitancy I think there too like invade
people's personal almost like their
personal virtual space yeah that makes
as far as not as first not overhearing
and not being physically in there and
Alex he reminded me we had a we were
having a large teams meeting for
something earlier this week and I was
talking about a point and when I
finished da he was like okay thank you
for that and by the way I really miss
hearing your voice and I just had this
moment of madness hearing everybody's
voice so does that human connection also
is has become a bigger thing yeah so
yeah yeah I like feeling kind of down
and then they'd have
you chat with someone and I feel better
it's nice to see people it is it it
makes a huge difference I don't I don't
always turn my camera on in meetings we
were kind of joking about that before
the show just because half the time I
look kind of ready and I don't
necessarily want people to I don't want
to inflict that on people but it's it's
nice seeing and hearing people it's nice
seeing and hearing the people that you
miss seeing in the office every day even
more so their animals their pets yes oh
my gosh
pets invading livestream meetings pets
invading teams meetings and cameras is
fantastic I love it
I very much appreciate it alex is like
water so I'm working around before so
gotta be careful there's a lot of little
things that people do to like spice up
their chat as well
our producer Kai keeps changing his like
digital background she sings like
there's a cave or like Jurassic Park and
then one time he changed his digital
background to be inside the office so
everybody was in that meeting he's been
in old lion's arch before like he's
really been traveling during quarantine
- a lot of fantastical locations
oh yeah there she is yay oh thank you
he's just lurking he's like whatever he
yeah so team's meetings teams meetings
backgrounds are fantastic my favorite
one that I've seen so far was one of our
guys had a background that was like a
face hugger and it said free masks and
that remains that remains the best one
I've seen so far
even better than Kai's office background
if you're watching
come on Kai get the face hugger mask
background notes at the actually but you
know what you've made me think of
something drew our audio director was in
the office for something a little while
back and he went to my desk and took a
picture of it and texted it to me and
was like I can I can I can feel you here
in spirit which initially made me sad
but maybe I can make that my background
somehow no no I still have that text
so speaking of backgrounds what about
fitting your workspace into your home
life because this is we're all home
offices now how did you guys how did you
work that Kent well yeah I was gonna say
um I just you know like so when I guess
it's different for everyone and for
especially I think there's a difference
between like if you're renting a place
or even just a room in as you can see my
office is also my bedroom so that's it
can be a bit it just weird sort of to
like I mean it's the shortest commute
I've ever made to work but yeah it's
it's definitely a weird kind of like
psychological I think space to be in
where you what what is normally like
where I work on like artwork or writing
or just like recreational sort of stuff
is now also my work space so it's like
it's there's like a weird dissonance and
for me it's like it's very much I
wouldn't say it's my favorite thing but
it's definitely because I think there
are people who appreciate that sort of
like work home disconnect and yeah the
the setup that I have doesn't
necessarily accommodate for that but
yeah managing how about you Alex working
from home the shift has been a lot more
challenging than I thought like I have
I said I'm set up where where my game
station is it's this nook that sort of
you know set into the wall so I'm kind
of like staring at a wall all day but
it's a nice wall so it all works out at
the end of the day I suppose I I'm used
to doing my writing in a space that's
separate from from from where I live if
I was you know in the office that was
great it was away from my apartment I
didn't have to worry about it I if I
would if it was like after work if I was
writing personal stuff if I was you know
working on side projects or whatever on
the weekend I would go to a coffee shop
and I would write there there are no
more coffee shops and everything is done
from home now
so there's this sort of conflicts of all
this of all this stuff so I have to be a
lot more diligent about stepping away
from the computer I you know during the
week this area is the work area and
during the weekend it is the game area
and every other part of the apartment is
very much the you know you're not
thinking about work when you're here
don't even try it and that's that's
generally how I've managed to keep
saying also I'm getting a lot more use
out of my patio which is over there
which is a very small space which is
about big enough for a single chair but
I'm outside which is the important thing
yes it's very true Connor how about you
follow up on something Alex touched on
so I've actually so I very early on in
pandemic decided to move my family lives
in Seattle so I decided to go back to
them so I wouldn't be quarantine alone
for a while they did internet yes for a
while their internet was not good enough
so it's actually commuting to my
apartment and my apartment became my
like 200 people in there yeah then they
got there next and so I haven't had to
do that until today or random reasons
that we want to go into the
I touched on something that is
interesting which is I he and I both
have like side projects ArenaNet is very
good about like you've got indie games
you want to work on on the side like you
just talk to someone they like to do it
but I find I find that the one of the
side effects of quarantine and I feel
like Alex lightly touched on this is
that mental divide between like day job
and side projects is it's it's like you
don't get as much of a refresh from
switching over because you're working on
the same computer and like it's not as
like I'm moving to a different space and
doing a different thing it feels more
like you're doing a different flavor of
the same thing which was always kind of
true but you deal more of it and that's
been that's been kind of a bummer but I
you know it's I still can do a thing
where like I'll take my laptop and move
it somewhere else
right and sit somewhere else that helps
but that's probably been the biggest
side effect of quarantine for me is that
that lack of a lack of separation that
occurs between all those different
things yeah yeah absolutely and touching
touching on that lack of separation so
it's confession time
Connor you come into like my background
looks really sweet out of camera he is
so very carefully curated I got a little
bit lucky in that we happen to have a
spare bedroom because my oldest daughter
had moved in with her fancy last year so
we had this bedroom that we had turned
into a gym because we're nothing if not
a cliche and we had a computer room
downstairs so I pulled my entire rig up
here and now it's my office and while
this background looks fantastic on the
other side of these monitors like just
behind the camera is a whole home gym
and over here is like the hamper and
luggage storage so kind of like making
it fit in this corner is very much okay
now don't let people see your dirty
laundry because that's weird and nobody
needs to see your elliptical
but after once we got all of that set up
at the end of the workday I leave this
room and I do not come back in which
means I'm PC gaming very little these
days just because like Alex my my work
rig is my game rig I'm playing with my
switch a lot more and my son just bought
an oculus quest and he's happy to share
so I'm like playing the hell out of beat
Sabre and other things that don't
require me to be in this office but it
is it's important to have that
separation I'm gonna lose my mind
because I'm so bad about taking breaks
so yeah now you know now you know the
awful secret of what's outside the
camera view my TV yeah that's my TV like
that like when I'm watching TV I'm
always just kind of like looking over
and there's the workstation and the part
of me part of me gets a little sad but I
love my job but I don't want to see it
at the end of the day because otherwise
I will work 80 hours a week and be
miserable yeah that was a problem very
early on right is that from home all of
the usual cues that you have to
determine when the day is over don't
exist anymore you know like like for me
it was always you know okay well get
into the office and do this that the
other thing and oh when these people
start packing up to leave that's usually
when I start to pack up to leave now
it's just I wake up eat breakfast sit
down oh it's six o'clock in the evening
now I probably should eat something you
know for for dinner that's it it's it's
tough like the the first first couple of
weeks in particular I would just you
know be here for a lot longer than the
company would prefer that I was working
on things yeah and it was you know that
so you have to start setting you know
boundaries right you have to you have to
say okay I am on for these hours and
then I'm done and I'm leaving not you
know I'm not still periodically checking
email I'm not still available on teams
like no I'm done and now I need to leave
and then I come back tomorrow
it's it's tough it's tough to set those
boundaries when you're always on you
know yeah I got I got super protective
of that work-life integration a couple
of years ago anyway so I've been and and
like you were saying Alex it you don't
have those cues I don't have like oh I
have a bus to catch
so I literally have to go or I will miss
my bus and then I live here but I got it
I got really careful because I was
starting to burn out because I was
working away too much and I got very
protective of that a couple years ago so
I'm kind of in that habit anyway but it
fell away really fast at the beginning
of quarantine because hey it's right
here and at the time my desk was in the
main part of the house downstairs we
have an open floor plan no matter where
I went there so it was that's that's
been a lot of effort to make sure hey
your workday starts at this time
yes it's very easy because your commute
is 40 seconds it's very easy to just go
ahead and wander in there because you
know it's an hour early but whatever
yeah it that's so rad in the long run or
alternatively at the end at the end of
the day if I see like a new-build pop
I'm like I wonder if there's any bug
regressions I could not like sneak in I
do fight guilt when I get up in the
morning and I check my email when I
start my workday and I'm like oh gosh
here's emails that came in at like 8
o'clock at night and then I'm like oh
should I be doing that no that person
shouldn't be doing that either yeah what
were you gonna say Connor I was just
gonna say it is one of the things that
switched notes a little bit to things
that are kind of nice yeah I'm lazy
being able to roll out of bed like 15
minutes before like I actually start
it's very true it's like I don't have to
wake up as long before work I can wake
up like just a little bit before I tend
to start working
I have access to my full kitchen for
every meal which is fantastic I had as
we talked about show up randomly is a
nice we did we did have a long
conversation yesterday in our in our
episode for team about how much we miss
the food trucks though at work yeah it
was a long wait that would be a mark
question and I don't know the answer to
that he should if he does your chop
salad is fantastic yeah yeah they're
yuzu aioli and the fries are really good
too but I would say instead of picking
something that I like would normally get
I would say something that I'd been like
try it like anticipating but I didn't
get like the one time that I got there
was a fork and fin I wanted to try there
they're so good
yeah yeah they're dangerously good yeah
they are yes shortly before quarantine I
guess shortly before PAX East my husband
happened to have a day off work and I
was like hey let's like come down to
Bellevue and let's have a lunch date and
I want you to try fork and fin because I
thought he would really like it they
weren't at our complex that day they
were over like near bungee so we headed
over there and it was cool cuz we got to
see some friends just run into him in
the parking lot but the fork and fin guy
like recognized me as an ArenaNet person
because that's and every time I went out
every time I went out there when he was
at a read on it he was like out there
talking to co-workers and like he knew
everybody by name the guy is
ridiculously nice and I miss him
and I had forgotten about that and now
I'm sad there's a lot of food-truck
people that were super nice and like
would remember people and were always
super friendly yeah ultimate melt yeah
yeah oh gosh the ultimate melt guy was
so sweet
thank you morning two I think yeah well
according to a schedule that was posted
in our chat it's in Redmond today near
tipsy cow Oh seriously yeah I want them
to do well I like what all the food
trucks to make it through I want all the
food trucks to make it through the
pandemic okay like the thing the thing
that the food trucks gave us that helped
a lot was that it would it was an
element of randomness that would come in
to the studio right you never really
knew it we'd never seen before
yeah it would just be like mm-hmm this
is the new truck that no one's I've
gotten there's always this mystery of
like it's the farc gonna be good yeah
yeah no yeah yeah all right we should
all start asking each other what we had
for lunch today and was it good and was
it weird and should I not have it so
but yeah I'm and a note on something
that Connor said about good things
because I don't want us to just sit
around be like this is awful because
there are a lot of upsides when we were
in the office my commute was fifty mile
round-trip most of it on 405 and that
was terrible I hate totally worth it but
it was not like on bad days I was on the
road three plus hours a day to get to
and from work yeah Big Five is a
nightmare I don't I don't have that
anymore I can sleep in I can like wander
downstairs in my pajamas and make coffee
and take my time drinking it instead of
like grabbing it from my husband on the
way out the door as I run for the car
and that is like I've literally gotten
up to three hours a day back in my life
and that means I get to go out and I get
to play in my garden or I get to hang
out with kids and it does make a good
difference I am a lot less tired
stays yeah there's also some there's
also some good collaboration tools on
teams actually one that I've gotten a
lot of use out of which allows people to
coordinate in a way that's new that we
weren't really able to do in person even
is when you screen share on teams other
people can request control which doesn't
mean they take control away
it means they get an additional mouse on
your celina so you can be like if
someone's working unlike in the map you
could actually be like okay well hold on
a second instead of me just trying to
point describe the thing like I can if
you let me you do it I can just like
click and like highlight the specific
thing I'm talking about right and in
some ways that makes close collaboration
with like map art and with with you know
other designers easier and that's that's
really nice yeah that's that's been
handy screen sharing can be a little bit
scary not and not in a bad and horrible
and embarrassing way but I hadn't
thought about this the other day I was
go ahead I was gonna say one of the
questions that we got actually was about
how we how the writers actually use
those tools to work on the story content
yeah
which you know we we we use teams and
and the way it normally works is that
you know someone you know Tom usually or
Bobby Stein the associate narrative
director will we'll have the script that
we're reading up on up on screen and
we'll use that screen sharing tool to
read through it and you know we do what
we do in the studio right it's all of us
and we're just voicing out roll or we're
voicing the roles and we're reading
through it and it's it's still as much
fun now as what's up that's what I said
you're a fantastic voice actor by the
way I would think you're taking those
readings oh man I don't know how we get
to that meeting no reason
yeah I was thinking that you know you
know because we're still dealing with
the fallout from you know the the kovat
situation in in Hollywood you know uh
you know we're thinking okay well you
know maybe maybe we should just do a
stream when Episode four launches and
it's the narrative team you know I think
there's still a bit of you in one of the
bits when I think when I watched
something recently I think that's still
Alex's voice and I'll confirm with you
later
Alex talked to me about this live stream
after the show okay yes and maybe asura
that usually yeah I get I get I get
pegged with the asura voices usually
Georgian timing they like to cast
working timing for reasons that defy
understanding I can't possibly
understand why do you know I don't okay
yeah everybody heard it it's a it's like
it's a lot of fun it is a lot of fun
these these recording recording be these
voice-over sort of reads that we do
we've been doing them for years ever
since Tom became our narrative director
we've been all getting in the room and
doing these reasons we've talked about
it a lot on guilt chat and honestly the
thing that has changed is that more
people are able to come to these things
because usually we're limited by the
size of the meeting room you know like
we've got now we can have as many people
listening in as we want that's been a
huge help for things like table reads
which is when we go through everything
one last time before we lock it in and
normally it's like okay well we've got
all the writers in there we've got
editing we've got localization we've got
the designers of the content and the
room is like bursting to capacity yeah
but now we don't have to worry about
that quite so much which is kind of nice
that's handy
you know what on that topic why don't we
talk about general productivity what's
what has affected
for you guys well what's been
challenging how's it changed overall or
have you had to adapt kit this one's
about a bit of a mixed bag from because
in some ways a like there's like a
familiarity or comfortableness with
being at my like my usual desk station
and so there's there's that but as and
and you know and I'm pretty vocal about
this on I think Twitter but I have like
I have ADHD inattentive type so there
are aspects of that of that condition
that I think are kind of intensified or
amplified by working from home because
there is that familiarity and like
comfortableness but it's like there's I
think it's a little and and I think to
touch on an earlier point I made er
before the whole like work home
separation that that's part of the
reason why it's so important I think to
me but one of the great things about you
know being vocal about this is that I've
actually kind of like discovered and run
into a bunch of my own co-workers who
also are going through the same thing I
am and have them also have ADHD and we
created a I guess like a neuro diversity
channel on teams and so we kind of like
you touch with each other and check in
it's really nice I was I was literally
sitting here going I wonder if he knows
about that channel I wonderful yeah yeah
yeah it it helps it helps a lot because
that's my concentration has really
suffered I am unbelievably forgetful and
I am I am so lucky to have a team of
people that we are always proactive
about kind of reminding each other and
picking up the slack for each other when
we struggle yeah that helps me much
like I'm more forgetful and I I lose
track of stuff more easily now that I'm
home yeah and like that's just like up
for me it's like a big shout-out to my
producer our current producer Matt
Lambton and also Sara who did a
production for episode 4 there they've
just been like on the ball and
especially also my design lead Kirk
who's been just keeping on top of things
and I'm checking in with me so that's
also a fantastic James Richter in a big
way as well like shout out to the whole
production team without them yes I would
I would be surfing YouTube all day
probably seriously huge everywhere yes
good producers are worth their weight in
gold and we love you guys yeah so yeah
that is but yeah it's it is a thing that
I think a lot of us are struggling with
right now and that's been the biggest
impact to my productivity and again
having your peers around you that both
understand and aren't shy about giving
you that push when it's needed and
helping you keep track and remember
things has been invaluable
it sounds like to all of us yeah
so for your working experience overall
and we've we've kind of been touching on
this under the umbrella of productivity
but for your work experience overall
what are some of the big differences for
you guys and that can be hey I stopped
wearing real pants or sweat shorts
appalled like what does that mean I
don't know Mesmer pants I don't know I'm
I am a 100% wearing yoga pants right now
because I want to be comfortable and I
have no shame about it don't care cancer
pain of a kind of a binary thing you
don't have pants oh you do yeah overall
how is your working experience changed
it's inevitable water skiing because a
lot of what
the writing staff tries to do is you
know we spend half of our time in
meetings and we spend half of our time
writing actually it's more like three
quarters over times and meetings and a
quarter for time right it's like that
seems conservative
yeah yeah it's more like yeah it's it's
yeah we get all we get the download of
what's going on and we talked to the
design team and we hook up with our
producers and then we try to sit down
and focus and write and sometimes that
can be difficult you know a lot of the
time when we really have to crank out a
script we will you know like this is
alone time we need to get up and I need
to go somewhere and they need to work
sometimes we'll go to an office
sometimes we'll go into the common room
sometimes I would just say hey I don't
have any more meetings this afternoon
I'm going to take my work and I'm going
to go somewhere like a coffee shop and
I'm going to just bang out this script
okay you know for the rest of the day
now you know we have these digital
meetings and we spend a lot of time in
them but it's more it's easier to find
that focus time for writing which is a
good and a bad thing because you know
without the ambience that you're used to
it can be difficult to find that sort of
creative you know mojo yeah but you know
sometimes I'll I'll have no problem I'll
click into place and I will just bang
out a script no problem and sometimes
you know I'll just be staring at a white
sheet of paper for a day and you know
it's it's it's a different it's a
difference you know it's a change but
you know we're still hitting we're still
hitting our milestones and you know
we're all pretty happy with how things
are going and you know at least for a
narrative things are still trucking
along the the team support really makes
it makes all the difference you know
having people there to to collaborate
with to talk with constantly is a is a
huge boon so that that's that's really
made the difference I think yeah how
about you Connor how's your working
experience changed overall what are some
of the big impacts yeah the big thing
for me is like I you know a lot of my
style and
a lot of how I did things was if I
needed to talk someone I would just walk
over and talk to them right and there's
still some of that with IMing them but
it's harder to tell like if what
someone's up to right how much are you
disrupting them yeah if you're doing
that like often you could just find out
what we're up by be like okay they're
clearly working on something I'll poke
them later
right like but the place same time like
it's also they can just ignore the
messages until they have time to look at
it yeah but so that's and so but when
basically the side effects is that is I
talked about earlier like not not only
is do i I talked about doing work to
keep other people in the loop I also do
a lot more work to poke people about
stuff that I'm curious about that it's
not like directly my things but it's
good to know about what's going on
throughout the studio right like I'm not
on living world but I want to know like
how things are going over there so I'll
like check in with Kirk and I'll check
in with Cameron and things like that and
see like what the what the latest
developments are right because that's
it's important for me to know even if
it's not a daily thing for me yeah it's
just harder to get that get that ambient
information that with things you would
have learned from like sitting down with
lunch it was someone or like walking
down the hall and running into someone
in the kitchen what are you doing today
oh I'm working on this oh that's neat
right like that doesn't happen you don't
have them prompt you like what are you
up to conversations you have to be like
hey I'm curious what you're up to and
it's a little it's very different yes
yeah how about you Kent yeah working
experience overall it's it's been a lot
of that and I know we touched on this
earlier about like and the the whole
like making sure you don't work past
like how long you're supposed to and
that's been a real challenge for me
especially as we get closer to release
there is definitely they're sort of this
like pull to you know keep working
and like until you're I guess satisfied
with like how much work you've gotten
done during a day it it's it's not it's
not the best sort of kind of like habit
but it's I also know like in a week
it'll be over and yeah and I I'm looking
forward to kind of like taking it easy
for about a week or so after after
episode 4 drops 11 days yeah yeah but I
have on that note though Connor brought
it up I have on occasion messaged him
about because I'm gonna be moving to
what he's working on afterward so we're
gonna be connecting yeah you're getting
no more no further comments on that
though no further comment
honestly I feel like maybe this is like
a a symptom of how my workflow has
changed I don't like reflexively go just
like I trust you guys don't make me
sorry please I don't trust myself so
have some of my faith in its yes for you
so peeking how has your guys's workflow
changed with this like for example for
me I don't I don't have a lot of I don't
have those in house accountability
factors where I'm sitting in the room
with the rest of my team and I have to
sit down and like make a very clear list
every day of this is what's happening
this it's Monday here's what's happening
here the meetings you have I have to
have that in front of me and I have to I
have to be like okay hello
Fifty's did this thing or it's not gonna
happen what about you guys I always I
always start today by checking my email
and terrible I usually look and and end
of end end of day just uh but just keep
the track of because there are
like things we get in like if QA
requests are finished and you have to
just to make sure that there's no
feedback and I'm looping in the
designers if there is and checking to
make sure that just to verify them and
kick them down the the request flow line
essentially yeah what about you Connor
what about you Alex uh no I I talk a lot
Connor Connor she go now Connor uh
honestly don't know if it's changed that
much because I face the first thing i do
is i log into raw desktop and then i
basically go through the flow of stuff
that i did before just over remote
desktop instead of on my desktop so you
know I open up my email I check my
emails I open up whatever editing
programs I'm using a day arrange my
windows in a way that like I can look at
them both same time and switch mean
things there's always a little bit of
you know make sure I have everything
stinked like it's that honestly it's
it's kind of surprising to me that my
workflow has not changed it's
dramatically the one thing that can
destroy couse it if the internet is
unstable I might be like alright this
this period of time is a wash so I'll
like I'll make my work hours like a
little bit strange
I'll just them like a little bit
dynamically just to like - to adjust to
whatever is whatever the constraints are
that are rationally introduced into my
life yeah that makes sense
so I do want to where we're going on an
hour but I do want to hit on some
questions from our players just to get
your guys's take on this a couple of
these we've touched on a little bit but
you can go into more depth if you want
to what if anything do you do in your
home office to make it feel like you're
going
home when the work is over do you have
special rules you impose on yourself
during business hours or if you complete
or have you completely given up on
wearing real pants like the rest of us
[Laughter]
yeah it does depends I I have to I have
to get dressed in normal person clothes
or I can't function as a professional
light I I tried it like like initially
we're like you know I was like oh
working from home
that's so cool now we could do like
school's out kid you know no one could
stop yeah like sweats for days yeah so
like you know my go sweatpants and you
know like like crunchy crunchy hoodies
and stuff and ultimately I just realized
I wasn't nearly as productive because
Xena I'm you know be great if I just
like watch television and you know like
I can't do that
you know I have to like have to be you
know like dressed in you know at the
computer working and then when the day
is done turn off the turn off the
computer like that's been a big thing is
turning the computer off not just like
closing the lid like like definitely
turning the thing off and just stepping
stepping physically away from it as as
far physically as I can which in my case
is about three feet that way because
that's my couch and that's where I watch
television but when you have that when
you have a Bellevue apartment you you
make do with what you can I do but now
with the benefits of that don't really
you know make a whole lot of sense like
oh all the cool stuff that's right
within walking distance that's close do
it anymore
yeah Mill Creek is not so bad right now
yeah I would say for me the separation
is like non-existent so like inside your
home office to make it feel like like
what I'm going home work is over but I'm
like also in the place where I hang out
the most I think because it's like
there's not there's not much to the rest
of the house really other than like the
kitchen and the there's like a living
room area but there's not much around
there so it's really just like I like my
separation is like me going up to go
like make dinner like that's the end of
my workday and then I come back I'm like
work is over now now this room is you
know like it's relaxation time but yeah
yeah how about you Connor
yeah I mean I I think I'm gonna sink
with basically everyone else where there
isn't as much separation as I should
probably should establish right like I I
know I know but getting you to look I am
one of the things is I do I am also in
the same camp if I have to get I
determined fairly early on that I have
to I get actually dressed every day
because if I don't I'm just like well
especially I think it's combined with
the choice to having go back to my
parents during quarantine I didn't
mention my office set up in the basement
so I'm like how much of a stereotype I
really want to be oh my parents basement
in like a bathrobe like my computer like
now I got I got at least up close on so
I didn't think about that yeah so it's
part of my it's a matter of personal
dignity more than more than anything
else and there's also the lingering
thought it was like what if my camera
what if I accidentally turn my camera on
and my bathrobe into people like oh you
guys just like my nightmare so I I mean
you don't we joke about not wearing real
pants my my criteria has become would
you answer the door in this if your son
brings his girlfriend over would you die
of shame and like that's that's my
threshold like am i cool with other
people seeing what I have on right now
and if the answer is yes then you're
good for the day so yeah it's but I
think I think what Alex was saying for a
while there was we were all kind of
enjoying that stereotype and that joke
about oh my gosh we're at home we're by
ourselves we can just
completely fall to pieces and I think we
all kind of had that gradual learning
curve this is not great for productivity
and also my personal dignity like I said
on gross yeah sure
you know if I just going on for like a
week or two then great no problem but
then it's and had to race for myself
yeah yeah I like that you do and become
who you are
[Laughter]
so aside from not wearing not wearing
dignified at grown-up clothes what are
some of the things that are easier when
done from home and what things are
harder and I think I think that's
intended like in the context of shipping
a gain or shipping live content it's not
in the context of like making up corn or
brownies or something remember that time
that Alex cut your own kitchen was like
rice krispie treats and that's I don't
get any it may not look like it but I've
gained 18,000 pounds since we started
working from home because I will I will
bake things and I'll bring them in for
the whole studio and that doesn't happen
anymore so I bake things and then I have
to eat all of them and it's very sad
because that means I'm going to die soon
but on the plus side you know in the
context of making games not brownies yes
some things have been made easier I
think we've talked about a lot of them
being able to collaborate with a lot
more people than physical space usually
allows has been very helpful
being able to instantly collaborate with
people who you know it's like oh you
know normally in a studio environment
these two people are
always talking because you know they're
always working very closely together and
so they're sitting next to each other
and they're always you don't want to
interrupt their conversations because
they're always very important now that
doesn't quite happen as much you can you
can just sort of say like hey you know
I'm putting out a putting out a feeler
if you're ready to have a chat you know
let's do it and then Boop they're up on
your screen no problem and now you're
collaborating with those people it's
it's that that particular element has
been great being able to collaborate
with people in departments that you
usually don't collaborate with everyone
is the same distance apart now you know
so so it's it's it's been pretty great
at facilitating that stuff I do flip
side for things that are harder which I
personally struggle with I don't know
and I always feel like I struggle with
it disproportionately but I know other
people do is - which is the hues of when
someone is done talking because of
there's often delay or hard I don't know
what you're talking about Connor this is
why this is why I'm calling you
that's actually the thing that we do a
lot of the time now is we there's a
feature where you can like raise your
hand and it's the kind of like
kindergarten right where's like I have a
thing to say
and then like people get called on like
when they had but it does make thing a
lot easier I that a lot easier I also
have developed a habit of ending
statements with and that's the end of my
thought and that's the end of my thought
yeah I yield my time
over and out I yield my time goodbye we
were in a meeting last week where that
was happening and I jokingly suggested
that we start using like like no Vera
out and and it took and I was so happy
for the rest of the meeting I had
nothing else to say in that meeting
after that I had already finished my
thing but it was fantastic listening to
every bit like Matt out was was like the
best thing so I would like to propose
that you all do that mic drop
mic drop you're not done
yes it Rubio
now okay and then I'll turn off my
camera and I will leave this room so the
Alex it's now the Alex Kane show Alex I
do want to point out as far as the
baking that you have to eat yourself
I've been mailing I love baking also
I've been mailing boxes of cookies to
friends so you can get rid of it and
make people happy so I'm just saying I
would give you my address later you can
support the post office now I did get I
ordered like a big stack of shipping
boxes and started sharing with friends
that way by the post office and I'm
realizing that none of you have received
cookies and I'm sorry now I feel bad
Just My Luck
I'll skimp and I'll get like a flat-rate
envelope and I'll shove a bunch of
cookies in there and you'll get it Oh
cookie crumbs yay all right well let's
see we there was a question about did
you guys take equipment software and
computers from the offices in order to
continue working
I think we've confirmed that we have all
ransacked our workstations what is what
is oh go ahead oh I didn't I I mean I
already had like everything that I
technically needed well I don't even
feel a little bit bad I have three
monitors here I have like an Origin
laptop at my office chair and like all
of my decorations I made two trips and I
did not feel a little bit bad because we
live here now I will have to go back and
get my coffee making supplies I had my
grinder and stuff in the office because
I'm sorry nurse and I am yeah so I have
to go I can get that that's it oh wait
no okay
Kent and then Conner Kent go oh please
my hand I the one major purchase I did
make was an air portable air conditioner
which was yes like for most people is
like most people assume that Seattle
like is and generally most of the time
it has pretty mild temperatures but
there is like a period of time where it
does get really hot and warm yeah and
yeah I'm not I'm not a fan
so I got a fan Oh
meanwhile I hate these weather I just
put that on the record I am I am sad and
resentful of today's weather so Connor
what were you gonna say no it's not
unfortunate will forever remain a
mystery
fine by me okay why haven't you got that
fancy keyboard that you love so much
Alex from your office
yeah it's really it it's really wide the
keyboard is really wide and I don't
really have enough desk space for it so
what I do have aside from my surface
laptop the keyboard I normally use for
like gaming is this it's a key Crom that
is a wireless keyboard that I can just
sort of pick up and move around and the
the the Unicom model M is like the size
of a Volkswagen and I can't really just
easily move it around then it's wired to
so it takes your car so yeah I'm now
that we're talking about it I'm thinking
you know what okay if I like get rid of
my speakers I move some things around
okay all right maybe I could get a
bigger desk this desk by the way like oh
I'll show you like so like that's the
wall right and that's like it's like
right up against it so I really don't
have a lot of space to expand to the
desk I got lucky this you have an office
next time I do I do have an office nook
now I wonder if anyone has actually
taken their like 6-foot desk table from
the office I'm kind of curious if like
they did anybody go that far serious
yeah maybe holy crap
okay that's intense and I'm impressed
because I do kind of Miss my six-foot
desk I finally got one last year I was
using like a five-foot went up until
then and I loved it so much as someone
with a roommate it's someone with a
roommate who has who recently just
bought a standing desk I can probably
see people possibly you know taking a
standing desk if they can fit it in a
vehicle but yeah if I had gotten one of
those standing desks that some people
have it would absolutely be here at home
because I would not leave that in the
office for this long people who were
taking their whole stations at a certain
point it becomes a question of what's
easier it's probably easier to just roll
your whole desk out and then take a I
mean I don't it is to bring all the
individual components I don't know it's
true okay so I I love this question from
one of our players what is management
and leadership doing to organize
everything right now and keep your
morale up I want to talk about morale
things ooh we did the go p-- thing yeah
studio leadership did a cool thing where
there there is I guess a an organization
that takes people on video conference
live tours of of this farm and they had
all these rescue animals there they had
it's called I can't remember these
things it was like a million years ago
and it wasn't good for a long time yes
go to any day yes it was uh it was a lot
of fun and I we were all kind of
skeptical at first we were like hmm okay
this like has all the hallmarks have a
thing that sounds really cool but is
probably gonna be super lame but no it
was the coolest thing ever
and I know that I'm still sort of riding
on the high of that you know so so
so yeah like long story short I'm Way
more excited about this than I should be
it was no right with you and yeah cuz we
used to do regular morale events right
there there used to be and it was very
simple you know it's like Oh cake
cookies nachos you know like like
there's just stuff that gets people in
the same space having fun and talking
with each other
um so yeah studio leadership has had to
get a little bit more clever about that
stuff so go to meeting go to meeting was
was one of those things and that was
great and I'm I'm hopeful that there's
more of that stuff in the future that
they decide to do they also gave us like
in the adjustment to working from home a
lot of people became overwhelmed you
know they were doing that thing where
they were just working on stuff because
they didn't know how to stop because
they never had to do that before studio
leadership's been very good about you
know like hey if you need a day take a
day like everyone should just take a day
don't worry about your any time off or
anything like that just decompress get
away from get away from the computer and
that has also been extraordinarily
helpful yeah those are the two instances
I can think of in particular yeah here
two days in the hole
so I well I have two days like
backlogged essentially that I can take
off that I will it'll be part of the
week probably that I take off after
release but yeah how wide this goes in
the org but there's a Friday night um
virtual happy hour where it's like a
teams meeting have a cocktail with you
turn your camera on and let's just hang
out for a while on Friday nights so
that's like I think it's like at five
o'clock after work is done for the day
and everybody can just kind of have a
little bit of social time as best you
can right now and unwind so that's been
ongoing things we've been at home there
has been a few times now that are like
are our teams has like bug triage
meetings at the end of each day and
there there's been a number of times now
where those meetings have kind of like
run longer past kind of like a OD just
because we're we just end up talking for
a period of time afterwards that's
fantastic that's great so there's some
things that you guys simply can't do
away from the office are there are there
things in your workflow that cannot
happen remotely and that have to be in
the office as much as we've tried I
don't think we have a good substitute
for standing in front of a white board
and all writing things on the whiteboard
like there's there's yes but there's
nothing that quite hits that same
feeling we've gotten creative but it's
just there's that is that is an
experience that is not easily replicated
oh yeah yeah yeah prints just like
whiteboard yeah yeah that is the thing
that we've we've made heavy use of I
think on all teams brainstorming for
brainstorming upcoming stuff and just
general ideas so yeah that's that's a
thing that we've I think we've all kind
of had to work around
we need like digital whiteboard embedded
in teams or something okay that's with
your mouse okay yeah it's not great
comes with a built in chalk noises ropes
I hate it I would never use my
fingernails hurt right now that's awful
thanks man
all right so let's see
other than the camaraderie yeah we are
going to talk to our next group here in
a minute but there's one more question
from a viewer that I want to touch on
other than the camaraderie of in-person
contact what do you miss most from the
office work experience and I have to
note that one of our devs Robert was
looking at the questions and he would
like
that he misses the goldfish crackers
more than anything they will give him
goldfish crackers he wants goldfish
crackers in the little woke up from the
hamster feeder that's maybe that's it's
the goldfish cracker experience from our
kitchen so what about you guys
yeah the hamster feeders were dangerous
though like Oh forty thousand Reese's
Pieces have some yeah I mean every every
game studio has that problem right yeah
it's the worst so so yeah that's or like
become the camaraderie element is a big
part of it you know the we were talking
about like the lunch trucks so we were
talking about like bringing in food for
everyone
honestly it really is just the the
ambiance of being around physical people
there's just an element to it that you
can't quite capture in the digital space
just that that that sort of low hum of
activity going around you know when you
when you're in a studio that's very
difficult to capture in a digital
environment and no one's really figured
out a good way to do that and I think
that that's had an effect on my
productivity to some degree and I don't
know
Connor can't what if you agree but that
to me has probably been the biggest hit
to me like to the mental shift is that
sort of that sort of constant hum of you
know keyboards typing and you know
computers whirring and the air
conditioner and like all did all the
sounds and the ambience of being in the
studio were just gone now yeah I agree
in Cup in college there was a place that
I would hang out most of the time in
between classes it was like a
student-run coffee shop called the
eighth note and we
but you know there would be like a lot
of students just hanging out there
having conversations and had like that
kind of like almost like bar setup so
they were bar stools too so you could be
sitting up at like the counter the bar
counter and working on homework and that
sort of stuff and we're projects and
that yeah like I've got really used to
working when there's like a lot of
background and white kind like white
noise and that was definitely one of I
think the benefits of working in an open
office environment which no longer
exists so yeah I'm definitely with you
there that looks on that right you toner
element where the lot of the things that
I feel like I miss most like working at
home a lot of distractions in quotes I
removed which are like a lot of those
ambient people having conversations
about random things stuff like that but
I really becomes clear how much some of
those things help you recharge and then
actually help you get more stuff done in
the long run like I will remember
there's there were definitely times and
we talked about this during I think the
last when we were giving a post-mortem
for when we gave the guild chat for a
shadow in the ice about like how we'd
have the entire living world team
getting an argument about Twizzlers
versus like red vines and like that's
just random conversations like that
can't happen and it it it they those
things really served as a nice like
right variety in the day that helped
helps it not just become a grind
I don't know if that makes sense yeah so
yeah I miss I miss I miss those I miss
those random exchanges cuz even now like
you can't have random conversation with
someone but there's always like there's
because you have to take initiative
there's almost always a clear purpose
right it's not like I came across
something and and I had that
experience of having a conversation
about something random with someone
which then may have been inspiring or
like you know helped me recharge or
something like that so yeah absolutely
for real though Twizzlers great why wait
there okay so are you a red join Finn no
I'm at whistlers fan how about you
Connor your red vines I I was I thought
I was a Twizzlers fan but when this
debate broke out I tried both of them
and red vines are definitely better all
right Alex I don't care that much so
Alex you have to be the tiebreaker yeah
this is absolutely a conversation I'm
going to get involved in right now there
Connor there's here there's your
argument I have provided
I provided a fight for Erica tape to the
white board that had an arrow pointing
it tastes like shoe polish and please
please let that still be there when we
go back to the white green green apple
oh no I did I talked to somebody last
night at work and I I can't remember who
it is now so whoever you are I'm very
sorry this is this is part of what I was
talking about earlier I'm super
forgetful but the other morning I was
doing something I was I was like making
coffee or something and I had like this
sudden spasm of panic remembering all of
the dairy products that are at work and
I was just like oh damn buddy clean out
the fridge like or is there just like
still oh no so I was asking somebody and
they were like no it's fine the milk the
milk got cleaned out so defer Everage
did not get cleaned out and whoever was
telling me that said it turns out that
diet soda does go bad
I had no idea it's like diet sodas
barely food anymore
it's just chemicals it turns out that we
did at least take that precaution so
yeah this is that hot Gil were stupid
content that people people love this is
our life now and yeah and my and my
little quaggan stress toy more Guild
Wars 2 stuff that I brought home so
alright you guys want to add go ahead
kid let's just say I have to tuck in my
uh Charlie over there behind me yeah he
looks very comfortable what about you
guys
Alex and Connor anything else before we
go to break I know oh yeah
mark do we did we get a picture okay
yes mark says he has it hold on I'm here
for ya right my my office door is too
close there's because Sasha will come in
here and just yell and bunny will get up
on the desk and actually like alright
it's time for me to sit on your entire
mouse pad so I I try to like get a
little modicum of peace and not allow
them in so no cats here sorry they're
just they're worried about you they are
not they are hungry they don't care
about me
they're cats I'm all right there they
are wonderful and I love them they're
perfect babies so alright well thank you
guys very much for sharing part of your
day and for talking about what it's like
should the game at home you guys
watching we have three more of our dev
team to join us after the break so stick
around and we'll be back in a few
minutes
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
all right welcome back we are we are
already like ruining Nick here so thank
you guys
or thank you guys for spending some of
your time with us today why don't you
get us started by introducing yourselves
and talking about what you do here to
redeem it we're gonna go Nick Megan
Jason so Nick okay should I look into
the camera okay hi yes and I am a game
designer here at ArenaNet my most recent
work is the assault on the frosted Adele
for Episode four that's coming out on
the 28th as multiple people have
mentioned already in the last round
that's me spoilers that was the party
trailers a spoiler that's fair okay
I'm Megan I introduce both of you very
okay
I'm Megan and this is moe moe
we love moe um my other dog doesn't like
to be held so she will not be here so my
name is Megan I am a map artist uh you
know me from such hits as Episode four
which is not out yet so I also everyone
and also Glenn's legacy and also other
things hit list I love it and I love mo
and his blip he's a very good boy all
right how about you Jason hey I'm Jason
I'm the cinematics marketing lead which
basically just means I put together the
trailers most recently the episode 4
trailer that launched on Tuesday thank
you and I just saw the joke goes here
behind what oh shoot I forgot to reset
like Jason says that as if it's like
such a minor thing but like the amount
of work that he wasn't insane so I just
want like everybody in the audience oh
it's a lot of work that he does
it is Jason isn't what he does and
should just acknowledge that sure I'll
absorb it and say everybody does awesome
work yes okay we're also bad at
compliments you got one of our producers
come at me be like no I don't deserve it
i'm tresh razor for shut down one of our
producers complimented me and she said I
could see the panic on your face good
stop alright so let's talk about what
this has been like since early March you
guys we've been home for a while like
with the first group let's do the
practical stuff first
and talk about the equipment needed for
work that you had to either adjust to or
bring back to your place Jason why don't
you go first
so I got really lucky in the fact that
work had built me out this really
awesome capture machine right before we
had to you know start working from home
so I got to take that beast home which
allows me to do all that capturing at 4k
60fps and for me it was really easy to
move over to working from home it was
maybe a day that I had some downtime
ease and then I was back up yeah yeah it
you know being a little take that
machine home and not having to remote in
made it really easy and I was already
pretty much for my job you know I mostly
work you know it's most most of the most
humble work that I do is on this one
machine and I don't I don't need to
access to all this extra hardware or
servers and I think that it's all done
locally so so you just bundled up that
entire rig and brought it on home yeah I
took the Beast home look all the beast
and then a 4k monitor cuz I'm not up on
the current technology at home and I
didn't have a 4k display so took that
home along with the capture device
that that's capable of doing 4k 60fps
and I was up and running like I said
within a day that's awesome I I do like
that and I said this in the last segment
I really loved how easy the company made
it for us to just get whatever we needed
and get it home yeah super props to our
tech ops team they they were on the ball
I mean it was such a whole entire studio
over to working remotely that as quick
as they did negate I don't know how many
people they have they were just turning
on that for hours so yeah they worked
incredibly hard so thank you tech ops we
love you Megan how about you surprised
this is gonna keep happening
FYI oh cool yeah I had to take my whole
tower so that was fun
I knew Lee when I got there to go pick
up my stuff they were like oh we're just
gonna give you like a little work from
home tower and I'm like that's gonna
take forever why don't they just take
home my regular tower and they're like
you're right and then so brought home
the pattern got it all hooked up in my
in my little office area some my own
monitors and then good so far but
definitely carrying around a big PC
tower up and down stairs time to so it
was like oh please oh gosh please don't
tell me you're like on the tenth floor
and only have stairs oh no I'm actually
Anna okay good house so that part was
fine but going from the office down to
the parking lot and yeah plus I like all
of our computers stairs and like we
couldn't get to the neck and like
because they were like wishy-washy about
like oh should we take home where
regular pcs or should we take home beats
working home pcs and so like I carried
the work home PC down to the fourth
floor and then
nevermind so I had to bring it back up
to the fifth floor and then I had to go
get my PC and bring it down gosh the
parking garage yes there's just a lot of
running around carrying towers yeah but
it was a great exercise so there's that
how about you need it um I'm trying to
think of like which part of it I should
start out with so I actually was doing I
was like remoting in on a laptop for the
first portion of its like that was easy
right you just opened up a laptop it's a
remote into your desktop and it's great
except our our like editor and our
engine doesn't play very well over at
desktop so it got to a point where I was
like I need to bring my desktop home and
then it was literally just like taking
this giant Tower and bringing it into my
like tiny tiny apartment and then being
like okay how do i how do I get all this
working so I like ripped out all of my
old stuff like my like my old desktop
and I just like stole like put
everything else in storage and then just
like shoved all of my work stuff onto my
like very very small desk it's fun but
it's working yes
is it is working thankfully yeah and
that's that's something that I have I
had mentioned in the last segment we
needed to we knew that we needed to
start streaming doing like Gil chat and
Let's Plays from home and my computer at
home is fine for gaming but not really
it's okay it's terrible for streaming
it's garbage for streaming for the
quality that we like had in the studio
in office so I have like down on the
bottom my desk is this tower with
everything unplugged and I've just
plugged everything into the origin
gaming laptop that tech ops gave me I
was like okay this is just this is my
life now I know nope do you forgot to
mention that I also took my chair home
like a week later so the first week I'm
same I was like okay this is a garbage
chair and so I need to go to work and
get my nice
comfy I am worked in this for eight
hours chair ladies there's a reason
these are expensive I I didn't like you
wouldn't really think about it until you
have to sit in it for eight hours a day
cuz like I have I don't know like a
Office Max or IKEA chair like that I've
had for years and I was like I should be
fine and then like after three weeks my
body was like it was all because I tried
to I tried to martyr myself in the same
way I was like now I have like this
crappy old chair that I think is
probably office max discount at some
point that's fine for like an hour yeah
but it's terrible for your job so good
for you guys well we didn't know how we
didn't know how long we were gonna be we
didn't office so it's like for me it's
like oh I can do this for two three
weeks and then it's like oh this is
gonna be longer than that I should
probably get my nice chair yeah I can
safely say I did not see this coming
anyways did I feel bad yeah I feel bad
because like I brought my office one
home and it I like move like it's very
easy to be a swivel and I like swiveling
so just tell me that's distracting and
I'll stop yeah I will find myself doing
this a lot mm-hmm what were you gonna
say Reagan Oh I said no one no one can
blame you for not seeing this happening
so yeah that's I I just have like a
fancy soft velvet one that I got a while
ago and it's fine socrata chair well I
decided to be a princess when I bought
my chair so I built my desk with my
hands like a lumberjack or something and
so the night had to get a nice chair for
it I like the lumberjack princess
dichotomy this is making me happier and
I wanted on your business cards now
lumberjack princess that's extremely
cool that you built your desk oh yeah
there's like a bunch of like like
salvaged ii use places in seattle and so
i got this big slab of cedar wood like a
live edge and everything I just took it
home and like
sanded it down and stained it and seal
them like and now it's my desk so that's
extremely cool I love that I have a lot
of thoughts on swanston I want everybody
to know that yeah okay now you're even
cooler
yeah I'm now I'm like looking at my desk
I was like I think I got it like Target
and it was like in one of those flat
packs it's it is not either with a live
edge and it is not at all that cool so
that's kind of Awesome
later I would love to see a picture and
if your princess chair all right so yeah
let's see the princess chair that looks
so comfy I like it yeah it's like a good
office chair that I stole and then my
plants you know what that's something
else that I've noticed everybody has
like everybody's investing in plants so
much you guys can't see mine because I
put them in my line of sight so they're
behind the camera but I have like two
pretty good sized ones that are thriving
behind the camera yeah a lot of I mostly
bought them during the winter when like
I couldn't go outside and garden and
like I eat green yes like I was gifted a
few plants and there's this one
particular succulent that I have that
like it's just like this little thing
but a singular like stems that are
growing out of it and it's just grown
bigger and bigger and bigger and now it
like envelops an entire area and like I
would bring it over and show it but it
actually like the vines have entangled
into like my blinds and I'm leaving it
like that because I think it's awesome
it's just this little thing with like
this huge like vine that comes out of it
I'm like you're so small how you make so
big I love it yeah I'm I'm starting to
collect inside and outside plants so
but I think that's that and sourdough
starter is like everybody's thing so
let's talk a little bit about
interaction with your teams and how
that's changed Nick do you want to talk
about that first sure I mean Alex Connor
and Kent touched on a lot of the stuff
when it comes to like us needing more
like check-ins I think for our team for
Episode four teams specifically I don't
they mentioned it but like we every
Tuesday and Thursday we do a like 15
minutes check in everybody kind of just
older like stand-up even though we're
all sitting and we basically just sit
and like go through what we need to talk
about our team lead Kirk like gives us
any like high-level updates and then a
biweekly we have like an hour-long team
meeting which is like hard updates and
then like checks and things like that
and besides that it's like a bunch more
teams communication a lot of like
one-on-one calls or like you're having a
one-on-one call and then it's like oh
wow we like need to pull this person
into it so then like you message them
and then you just had like they're just
some people that you have to keep up
with

Guild Chat - Episode 101

Transcription[edit]

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