ANDREW WATERHOUSE’S BLOG

Perspective of Change

Over the years, I’ve come to realise one of my greatest weaknesses. Routine.

I guess it’s because of procrastination that I don’t like routine. All too often, we take the time on this earth for granted. It leads us to remain static and boring. Heck, I’m guilty of it too. Without some vague routine to your days, you’d become exhausted. So I am here to provide some vague clarity on what change can do for you… Damn I’m sounding like a salesman.

Change is one of the most liberating feelings. It’s what brings a spark to an otherwise bland life. The more change you make, the more you experience before you kick the bucket. The more you change stuff up, the more you learn. And as I’ve got older, the risks I take have become greater while I seek more from the world. What I’ve come to understand though, is how change isn’t always a conscious result of action and forethought.

It Can Be the Small Things

Living independent has highlighted some of the minor food habits I’ve pruned into my diet in my twenties. I’ve grown fond of a variety of foods that I would otherwise turn my nose up at. Tomatoes, in their full form and not in some form of sauce… Mushrooms, intermingled with steaks, pasta dishes and curries… Gravy is its own story. Since the move to Manchester, you’ll see me pour it on most things. Meat? Yup. KFC? Yup. Mopping it up with a slice of bread? Not quite yet.

The change I’ve made stretches beyond the dinner table too. There have been a number of groups I’ve joined and countless new people met. There have been the workplaces I’ve worked at. The sports areas I’ve played at. The touristy things I’ve done and the holidays I’ve taken. A move to a new city does that to you.

I’ve mentioned this before and I’m sure I’ll mention it again. Travel has fast become a passion of mine and I know that spark was ignited with Camp America. The lust for meeting new people, exploring new areas and creating lasting memories. Travel is a cure for both procrastination and routine.

A Return Back to Potters Bar

A recent visit to the parents back in Hertfordshire opened my eyes up to how much I have changed as a person. Returning to the hometown of Potters Bar and seeing family still in the same state as I left, it didn’t feel right. I’ve tried to advise on the uncertain situations they find themselves within, but nothing changes.

It puzzled me at first, but I soon realised who am I to judge? Who am I to advise? Am I an all-knowing being? Of course not.

It was me who had come back to normality, my hometown. I was the one who had gone through all these micro-changes that have made me a complete, changed individual. Returning back to the parent’s place was an eye opener.

Since being away, the family had changed too, I just hadn’t realised it. No longer were they stuck with me or my brother. The puppy dog that replaced me had turned in to a great big soppy Labrador. The younger sister and mum now had full-time jobs. And the youngest sister had changed the most, going through the motions of years 6 to 8.

Travelling Is So Healthy for My Head

I came to realise this when preparing for my travels of Europe. The solo travelling, again proving what its worth, but that’s for another blog post and/or book… In the brief time I spent back home, I had the time to chill out with my favourite cat, Muffin. The usual wolf whistles and songs I would serenade her with weren’t working.

It took time, but she grew to love me once again, recognising who I was and snuggling up in my arms. While stroking her like an evil supervillain, I felt contrasting emotions. First was the rush of coming home, there’s no place like it. Then, the realisation of how ‘this was what I used to be like’.

So in all, I don’t really know what this post is. I guess it’s good sometimes to sit back, put your worries + stresses to one side and appreciate the small things. Be mindful.

I’ll see you in the next one,

P.S. I quite like the play on words in the title

Where Do You See Yourself in Five Years?

Where Do You See Yourself in 5 Years Time?

It’s a question I’ve pondering to myself recently. I have searched high and low online for insightful advice, but its surprising to see that the results were all related to job interviews. It’s about time someone makes an article on this.

There’s a reason why employers ask for your long term plans in life. They want the security that you are applying for a job that you will be passionate about. They also hope you will be a long term, happy employee too. Yet, this is a question that should transcend beyond an interview room.

Having goals in your life is crucial to living a fulfilled one. In this modern day and age, its all too easy to take the easy street. Society brings everybody up to be a consumer in this capitalist world. ‘The customer always comes first’ is a rhetoric that everybody is familiar with. Putting the illusive customer first, makes ‘the customer’ role in life an easy, quick fix one. Think to yourself when was the last time you made something. By that, I don’t mean the sandwich you just made for lunch… I bet you’re scratching your head.

Living life as a customer is all too easy. Everyone panders to your every need. Living for the 9-5 as an employee and then the weekends as a consumer means you aren’t challenging yourself. You can go through life without seeing the bigger picture of what you are missing out on.

I started That’s Your Best Bet back in 2012. I don’t know what got in to me the day I took a step out of my comfort zone, I wanted more from the world. Starting my own casino website was a great way to test myself, grow and manage something on the side.

And that’s my driving force. I want to leave a small mark on this world while I try new things. I don’t want to simply be a consumer of things till I hit the bucket. You shouldn’t be satisfied with that either.

Everybody has an entrepreneurial spirit that seeks independence and growth.

Not Doing Anything is Doing Something

On to more topical matters. Over the past year or so, I have knuckled down on my book. There’s No Place Like Summer Camp is coming on well and has taken strides as I seek to improve myself as a writer. Do I have the qualifications to be a writer? No. Have I done any courses on becoming one? No. It’s the self discipline and passion which has taken the book from strength to strength. I cannot wait to have it out on the market.

While my book has been coming along well, I’ve been refining its contents so much so that I have been building up my wanderlust once again. And I now find myself seeking my next big thing. In doing so, I have been pondering this simple question: Where do I want myself in 5 years time?

‘I’d love to be an established member of the team where I’d have more responsibilities as I seek to grow up the company hierarchy…’ is a typical response in an interview. I am not critiquing the answer. But I do think that this question is something we should ask ourselves outside the workplace. Living in the short-term, so you can ‘get-by’ is a simple philosophy which can become a pit with lack of progression. Many people these days take the same monotonous path to make sure ends meet. They do not consider the bigger picture.

I know too many people who hate the situation they find themselves in. But procrastinating about making a change keeps them there. It’s only until they hear the words ‘You do realise by not doing something about X, you are still doing something about it? All you are doing is settling for X’ that their eyes open to what they are doing to themselves.

Procrastination is my worst enemy

I’m now mid-twenties which is probably the reason why for all the gusto and seeking more from normal life. But I cannot understand why people put off doing things so much.

Lack of accomplishment is devastating to me. All too often friends, family and strangers have excuses for not doing what they want to do with their lives. “I haven’t got the time”, “I can’t quit my job” and “I can’t afford it” are all pathetic excuses for the deep rooted reason: I’m too scared to take a risk.

I watched a TED Talks the other week which sums this predicament up well. Instead of saying “I’m too busy”, replace it with “It’s not a priority”. It’ll open your eyes.

Such folk find themselves dissatisfied with where they are in life. Not prioritising their ambitions first has meant they are stuck in a rut. Will they do anything about it? Will they heck.

Currently I find myself seeking more from life again. The book has sparked a lightbulb moment to grow as a person once more. Browsing through Skyscanner and YouTube travel vlogs, I can’t help but want to travel. But yet, I find myself looking in the mirror and asking “Where do I want to be in 5 years time?”

So Where Do I See Myself?

In mid-twenties now, I’ve come to realise I need to ask myself this important question… So where do I want to see myself in 5 years time? Well, I want to have a big fancy car, paying off a mortgage in a job I love. I want to grow in a company, perhapsmaking video games where hard work pays off with a complete product to show for it.

There’s perhaps more I could add, like relationship status, health and more. But for now, I think that will do.

At the moment, my life could be swung in a big way. I can settle down and buy that fancy car and start a mortgage or… seek more while I can. It’s been tearing me up for a while now as I peek through the keyhole in to the adult world.

I’m procrastinating.

I took to the forums asking for any advice and a flood of messages greeted me. Allow me to sum them up…

Things are always just that, simply things. If you spend everything on settling down with a fancy car and mortgage, will you be happier? Probably not. Because that’s it: they are just things. You will be sat in your house with a fancy car in the drive surrounded by cool things. You’d be tied down, because you can’t exactly pause a mortgage nor can you sell that car for half the price it cost you. You’ll be unhappy, surrounded by things.

Experiences though? Well. That’s what makes a person grow. You’ll find the best of friends in new people as you experience different cultures and ways of living. All that hard work of saving money will be put toward incredible memories while you live the life of dreams, if only briefly. If all you are doing is working for things, then what is the point in working at all? The world is full of adventure, you only need to take that risky step first to experience it.

Sure, it’s easier said than done but too many people these days are afraid of taking a leap of faith. A happy life doesn’t get handed to you on a plate, so go out there and grab it. Adventure is out there.

I’m going to save the big news for another blog post. I’ve got some planning to do.

See you next one,

P.S Bonus points if you got the very subtle Walking Dead reference

A Brief History of Game

Welcome to My Personal History with Video Games

One of my few passions in life is video games and I’d love to tell you my story of how I got in to them. There’s ‘a moral to the story’ at the end, as well as a roasting of one company…

My gaming journey all began at my grandad’s place (of all people!). I must have been about 6 years old at the time and on one cold wintery night, we were moving furniture in to his garage. I finished moving the heavy boxes and happened to bump in to a dusty old box.

It was like any other electronics box I had seen before. Nothing particularly special about it and yet my uncle had thrust it in to my hands. But why? It was from an ex of his who had returned back to her country and had forgot about this one. Surely it couldn’t be that important. For years, this box was lying in the garage and I was about to understand what this so-called GAME-BOY was.

Always Think of the Bigger Picture

My eyes opened up to a new type of fun that could be had in the world. In the palm of my hands was a grey box with entertainment like I never had seen before. And so, the first video-game I played was Tetris. The mathematical logic to the puzzler had me hooked from the start. I vividly recall thinking to myself: ‘How, at 6 years old am I only now being made aware of this revolutionary toy!?’ I made sure to take the clunky console back home along with as many AA batteries my pockets could fit. My passion for video games ignited that night.

Skip forward to the summer. I was in year 1 and school was coming to an end. Whenever I was out and about, the Game Boy was in my pocket. My mum had seen how glued I was to this Game Boy and told me about the release of the new console coming out, the Game Boy color. Nintendo was tying this in with the release of Pokemon games on the handheld too… My six year old mind-blown. With school coming to an end, the summer holidays approached. I dipped in to my life savings for the first time and my mum bought a Gameboy color and Pokemon Blue bundle with it. Now, that’s some way to celebrate!

Saving for the Bigger Picture

From the ages of about 6 to 12, you’d find me on some variant of Game Boy console. I always saved up my pocket money for the next Game Boy Color or Advance cartridge that caught my eye at car-boots. Each week, till the age of 17(!) I earned £3 pocket money. Which meant I would learn an important life lesson: to always be saving for the bigger picture. I also learned to have an open mind on what exactly that next big thing may be (this life lesson was learned on what video-games to buy mind you!). I ended up with a lot of random old games!

The Grey Box Affection

As I was leaving primary school, I also had adopted a PlayStation One. This, above anything else got me hooked in to everything gaming. It was at this age I was buying magazines and using our dial up connection for cheat codes on gaming websites. The sheer amount of games I would buy from the ages of 12 to 16 years old was quite astronomical.

That console too has a big place in my nostalgia filled heart. Once again, a grey box had come in to my life and a whole new world opened up. For years, the PlayStation 1 captured my imagination while the PlayStation 2 + 3 was nowhere to be seen. The games I bought would always be from second hand shops and I’d hop between different ones. Looking back, that is the strange reason I never completed Crash Bandicoot…

A Whole New World

I made the move to the Xbox 360 when I was the ripe old age of 17. It was a big change and a fantastic shared Christmas present with my brother. A couple of years would go by until we could convince our parents to use their credit card so we could go online. Those were the times.

Online gaming was a completely different world. Playing with friends after an exhaustive day of school and chatting about the antics of our play was insane. By this point, I was maturing as a player. No longer was I looking in second hand shops for games. Instead, it was the Argos buy two for £30 type deals. That limited the number of games I could buy so sought advice from mates for which were the best. Call of Duty topped that list.

Maturing as a Gamer

I’d seen friends play it before and I remember how confusing it was to an outsider like me. “Wait a sec, you have team-mates!? What happens if you kill them?” or “How did he kill me; I was behind this box!”. The fact bullets could go through materials was mind-blowing. I’d always thought it gets absorbed in to the box and nothing out the other side. At least, that’s what games like Quake, Doom and Timesplitters had taught me. For me, a new age of gaming had dawned. It would be days upon days invested in to Call of Duty until I had gone into employment and now the ‘next-gen’ was coming.

Gaming had shaped my life in a tremendous way. I would never have thought as a six year old, that one night at grandads would have such a profound affect on my life. My mathematical mind craved more and more games and I had always looked up to those that created them.

YouTube (which is in itself it’s own story) played a big part too. When I found Machinima, I would download all the gameplay videos I could from my aged laptop. That would soon then grow in to a love for certain players and games. I would endlesslywatch (and still do!) YouTubers playing games.

The Big Picture

Now matured as a player, I was quick to figure out how much I had missed because I was so invested in my PlayStation One. Skipping the majority of PS2 and the PS3 generations, a grey box had again swooned me. I made sure to schedule in the dates of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One announcement conferences. Thankfully, I wasn’t working those two evenings.

Straight after the announcements, the PlayStation 4 was pre-ordered. After all these years, my mantra of saving money for the things you want most had paid off.

Bear in mind, when the PlayStation 4 released, I was 21! I was mid-way through university but nothing could hold me back. I had been tracking the order for months and when I finally got that knock at the door, I was scrambling all over the stairs and cats that lay upon them. My family could only sit back and laugh.

And so, the next generation was in my hands. My own console.

It Finally Paid Off

There is a magic that I find in gaming and my journey through life is being influenced by it. I went through university to study computer science because that’s my passion. Projects like Aliencraft and That’s Your Best Bet started to further my skills. I enjoy taking risks.

My fascination for computers and gaming were a match made in heaven. It allowed me to stumble into Disney Interactive to work upon games there too. I still would love to work in the games industry and make a small mark upon it. I have personal projects, but I’d love to get to know what it’s like working as a team. Seeing how your baby performs, much like you see in The Indie Game Movie.

Take Risks. Some Will Work, Some Won’t. But You Will Always Learn Something.

Now, on to more recent matters. Skip forward to the other month, a friend recommended me to play a game. On special offer in the PlayStation store for one week only, 7 Days to Die. I had time to make my mind up if it would make the list of games to try out. Reading through reviews and gameplay videos on YouTube, it was a marmite type game. The open world survival genre is always a captivating one. I bought it.

Before I begin this next segment, I’d like to put a disclaimer in. Being someone who has the finger on the pulse of the industry, I know how damaging it can be to see bad reviews of ‘your baby’. Having made a game myself, I know how invested people get. Hours upon hours spent to make the slightest of tweak to the end-user experience.

7 Days to Die Game

I felt an overwhelming sense of disappointment when I opened the game. For the first time in a long while, I felt gutted I had made a leap of faith on a title I knew little about. The PlayStation 2 graphics that glared back at me on the PlayStation 4 were a blow to the stomach. Still, I sucked it up and carried on with the game itself. Games aren’t all about graphics.

Later that night with countless deaths to my name, I was as bewildered as I was when I had booted the game up. The interface was horrid, the AI was glitching out and the strength of the enemies was ludicrous. How could they expect a noob (new player) like me to take down a zombie that takes over 100 hits with a baseball bat? Dropped in the middle of it all, I hated it. Unintuitive, old fashioned and difficult; even on the easiest settings.

The last straw was when I changed my strategy. Instead of running around exploring what the game had to offer, I set up a base. I took over a desolate house, secured the doors and started to make it a home. While looking for guidance on YouTube, low and behold a bear breaks in to my house and ravages me! 7 Days to Die is the worst game I ever laid my hands upon.

Go and Make a Name for Yourself

7 Days to Die feels like a single person’s personal project. But yet, it had TellTale Games name attached to it.

Put it this way: It would not surprise me if this was a graduates project and using the company was his only way of getting out to the public. Seriously, I thought the game was that bad. Granted, the game is in Alpha stage, but I had to think to myself while playing it, how on earth has this got on to the PlayStation 4 Store? And yet, I wanted to experience the game for what it was. The years of gaming prior had taught me not to judge a book by its cover. The crappy graphics, ridiculous crafting mechanics and stupid balancing was something I had to swallow with a pinch of salt.

I’ve since grown to understand the game, but I still stand by my opinion that it shouldn’t be available for sale in its current state. The sheer number of bugs in 7 Days to Die made me feel that way. TellTale need to scrap the project and start from scratch.

Having made a game myself, to an extent I know what it takes. The amount of hard work and personal attachment to such a project goes without saying. What I don’t understand though is how a rather big name in gaming can put theirs to this.

Such is my anger of this product, that I called out in frustration “I can make a better game like this!”. And I believe it to be true. This my friends, is how I start the projects I do.

Don’t let others tarnish your passions. Instead, go out there and make a name for yourself.

So watch this space.

See you around,

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