Source Archives - Taro Omiya

As obviously noted on the front page, I’ve been restructuring this website to appear more like one would expect a creative portfolio to look like. Originally, the redesign was in preparation for Game Developers Conference (GDC), but while the event has been postponed, I still believed a redesign was well worth the effort.

Like most sites, this site is powered by WordPress, and originally used Twenty Seventeen as the theme. Alas, Twenty Seventeen isn’t made for creative portfolios, so working with it in the past was a bit frustrating. This year, I’ve committed to developing my own theme, Game Dev Portfolio (based off of Underscore), to create a reactive website more closely aligned with what’s expected from a creative portfolio. In addition, I’ve also developed my own plugin, the Rèsumè Block, to create the timeline seen in the Rèsumè page. Both are open-sourced on Github under GPL, version 2. Feel free to use it for your own purposes!

While I could probably make a couple more enhancements to the theme, I believe the current theme and plugin has enough features to be considered stable. That said, if there are any recommendations on content to add to this website, I’m definitely interested in hearing about it. Let me know on the respective Github repo! Happy blogging!

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New week, new music, and what better way to start than a weird music that mixes futuristic sounds in a spaghetti-western composition? I’m talking about Annul, by Ed Harrison. It’s used in a Japanese-themed Half-Life 2 mod, Neotokyo. It’s an action-filled, yet melancholy music of the ever-growing conflict between the government military and the terrorists.

Since Neotokyo is a Half-Life 2 mod, it is currently only playable on the Mac and on the PC. The mod can be downloaded here.

The story for Neotokyo, like Team Fortress 2 is merely used to explain the settings and missions. An extremely nationalistic group attempts to take the Japanese government for themselves when an amendment to the constitution doesn’t come through. Fortunately for the country, the government successfully foils the group’s actions, but at a price of scattered terrorists roaming in the streets. Neotokyo sets the stage for these terrorists fighting against the government law enforcers.

Like Team Fortress 2, Neotokyo is an online multiplayer first-person shooter. The main draw are the “capture the flag” missions, where the object to capture is the Ghost. When the player carries the Ghost, he or she becomes capable of seeing opponents coming from behind the walls. In exchange, the player is unable to fight back, and must flee back to his or her base as fast as possible. Neotokyo also takes cues from theMetroid Prime series, where different classes have different visors to visually detect invisible opponents. Every class, of course, have their own camouflage suits. Lastly, the mod is reveled for its art direction and graphics. Asian cities aren’t a common sight in video games, after all.

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Website Update and New WordPress Theme

Weekly Game Music: Annul (Neotokyo)