From the development bigwigs in charge of making this game to the actual features we're expecting when it launches, we've been covering a lot of high-profile angles on Sigil's Vanguard: Saga of Heroes. But for now, let's take a moment, and shift our attention to the unsung heroes that keep games like these running smoothly - the humble programmer.

The Vanguard main site is featuring an employee spotlight, and the dude of the moment is programmer Brian Mazza. In the interview, Brian chews the yarn on how he first started out in Sigil, and about the daily grind of working as a programmer for this growing company. As Brian mentioned on his interview:

I’d always wanted to be a game developer, so I went to the Fanguard in Las Vegas to see the game and test my luck at getting hired. I was the only person there wearing a suit, and after standing in the 103 million degree heat for about 30 seconds, I knew why. But my interview went a lot smoother – I very quickly proved to Ryan Elam I had no idea what I was talking about, but he hired me anyways. I think the suit paid off!

As the interview went on, Brian talks about the work atmosphere, one on the lighthearted side of the dev business, with co-workers prone to gags like posting pictures of a sinking Titanic, along with a note that says "Try not to screw up so much," to remind the dudes in dev to be careful.

Co-worker "Pep Talk" aside, Brian's enjoying the work atmosphere, and aside from the frustrating problem of fixing game bugs (they're a headache anywhere you go), his work does have some cool highlights:

It’s hard to pick a favorite… pretty much anything that has a noticeable impact on the game makes me proud of my work. First-person character rendering, for example, turned out to be fun and rewarding. But things as simple as bug fixes, or optimizations that make the game run a little faster, are just as much of a pay-off, in my book.

Brian also says he wants to play one of the shorter classes in-game when Vanguard launches - Halfling, Gnome or Goblin - and on that note, we conclude this glimpse into the life a typical game programmer - the grunts that keep MMO's running the way they should. Thanks, guys.

Take a xenophobic alien race lusting for universal domination. Add a coalition of rebel soldiers who signed up for a do-or-disintegrate mission to stop them.  Mix in futuristic weapons, potent demolitions and mystical powers.  That’s what the makers of Tabula Rasa did. Combining first person shooter action and role-playing immersion, Tabula Rasa was voted most likely to redefine the MMORPG genre.  What happened?

Tabula Rasa is a collaboration between Richard Garriott, the father of the first commercially-viable MMORPG , and the creative force behind Lineage, the  Korean online juggernaut.  In theory, the fusion of two powerful forces in the gaming industry should result in a Dream Team come true.  “Nearly everyone working on Tabula Rasa was at the top of their field… supremely confident, the team looked to innovate on every front, making an already ambitious design even more challenging.” But a clash of titanic egos, coupled with communication/cultural barrier, left the game floating like discarded space junk.

In the Fall of 2004, Destination Games went back to square one with 75% of the code, 100% of the art, and 20% of the staff cut. Its original backdrop, first-person shooter point-of-view, and the 30 minute story-driven cycles were retained. The work continues.  Tabula Rasa is on its way. You just got to hold on a little longer.

What does Titanic, Dick Tracy, and MMOs have in common? Jon Landau and James Cameron. No, they're not going to be doing a Titanic MMO (almost everyone dies in the end anyway), they signed up to be the advisory board for Multiverse, a MMO game network. There are even rumors circulating about a film/MMO tie up, but no official word so far.

From Jon himself: "It turns out films and MMOs are not that different,. That shouldn't be too surprising, though. After all, what we do as filmmakers is create virtual worlds...Both our industries build experiences that have the same goals."

According to the article, doing games and creating movies is an inevitable intersection. A virtual movie set would let the director film an actor and see what special effects he'd like to see in the scene--just like a game. That way, the director would be able to add or delete parts of the expensive effects even before the camera starts rolling.

Combining existing technologies would allow them this degree of freedom and creativity. The article also says that it'll help both industries regarding resources, especially financial. Movies to game adaptations can be much easier. The movie people can share some of their movie clips and other animations in the movie.

Jon said that audiences these days have much more higher expectations when it comes to their movies or games. The film industry is challenged by how an MMO keep its audiences and make them want more. He added that the virtual world should influence the movie, let it feed back into the process and provide riches and depth. However, MMOs won't replace great directing or flimaking, but rather the ones who create those games may become the next generation of directors or writers.