 Prima
Games in Roseville, CA As
such we seemed to be in business part of Roseville, numerous office buildings
and eateries for as far as the eye can see. There really was no shortage of
places to eat, if you could think it up, it probably existed in a 5 mile
radius. High-end burger joints, all the major fast food places, all you can eat
pizza buffets, pizza by the slice places, high-end pizzerias, steak dinners,
Japanese, high-end Chinese, cheap-greasy Chinese, Thai, pitas; the place was
ridiculous.  Even
with all those choices, the hotel food was actually pretty good. Time
was somewhat scarce so we’d often forgo lunch and when we would take a lunch,
they were usually productive and we would brainstorm over the meal.  One
of our pow-wows, was there anything that we didn’t
order? I
stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn while the later arriving team stayed across the
street at the Courtyard. We were to stay in a single hotel but our trip to
Roseville unfortunately coincided with nearby fires and there were a ton of
firefighters staying at the Roseville hotels.  This
section is just so I can show-off this bad ass picture We
could work at the hotel or work at the Prima offices, but luckily they were
fairly close to each other so it was never a burden. The hotel had the expected
amenities: cable TV, free internet/wi-fi, small gym, an outdoor pool, laundry
room, and unfortunately a house keeper that was always seemed to mess with me,
but that’s a story for another day.  Roseville
“SunSplash” Golfland Right
across the street was a Golfland with a water park and a go-karting ring. The
arcade was decent sized (it even had a Subway inside, never seen that before)
and had a SoulCalibur II machine, although there was no Tekken to be found.
Down the street were two movie theatres and we got a chance to watch Batman on
the opening night. What’s funny is even despite Roseville’s openness, the
parking lot was filled to the brim, 500+ spaces, all of them taken. It felt
almost like every single person in Roseville was there that night, “where did
all these people come from?"  Prima
Games located at 3000 Lava Ridge Ct. Prima
Games was up the hill from the hotels and was in the heart of the business area
of Roseville. We were given 24/7 access to the building and Prima’s office, so
if we were inspired to do a 3 a.m. TTT2 session, we’d just have to drive over,
no questions asked. The rules were pretty clear, no copies outside of the
office and no unauthorized pictures/videos of the games, otherwise we were
given free rein. This
was true for the entire team and we would often work at different times,
whatever would be most conducive of getting work done. Hoa would often work
late into the early morning and would otherwise sleep in, Aris would work early
and often take a siesta and go back in later, while I would prefer to work
early but not stay too late. While not “typical”, it worked and luckily we were
given the freedom from Prima to work on our terms. It was literally a case of
“just get the work done,” whatever is needed, they’ll do their best to provide. Even
though schedules may sometimes differ, we would tend to work in teams that way
testing was as accurate as possible. Even with the numerous additions and
changes to the practice mode settings, almost nothing is better than testing
with someone who’s familiar with the game. We’d frequently bounce ideas off
each other. What works, what doesn’t, what might work, and what might work for
other characters. It was a collaborative effort and despite the chaos of the
last few days, we still functioned as a unit.  The
Prima Games offices Prima
overall was divided into logical sections, design and layout, publicity and
advertising, legal, and authoring. On the
left side of the photo one can see bookshelves with a large selection of Prima
guides. I’m not positive if that’s their entire collection on display, but it’s
quite a sight to see up close. They also had the standard break room faire with
a fridge, microwave, sink, a couple of tables, and a good selection of coffees,
teas, and other hot drinks. It was funny because I lived on hot chocolate the
first week and by the next week they were gone which makes me think I was
inadvertently stealing someone’s personal hot chocolate collection, so if
you’re reading this, sorry about that. It’s not pictured here, but the TTT2
guide team worked in a back room of Prima’s with PS3 test kits and received new
builds of the game periodically while working on the project. I’d love to have
pictures to show but I didn’t take any for fear of being sued into oblivion. Post
Roseville life included cleaning up our text and submitting final revisions of
our writing. We then got a sneak peak at the pre-print copies of the text where
could then critique and find any errors that may have slipped past the Prima
editors. Once that was done, it was off to print and now we wait for the
official release of TTT2 and the official Prima guide.  The
finished product, the TTT2 guide |
Tekken Tag 2 >