Ricown

This week I completed my first 10 years working at Cloud Imperium Games. I often joke that your job title is just where you begin at this place, as the path I've taken over the years has been more than I could ever have imagined. The public only gets to see the host, but I've filled my days and nights at various times (and often simultaneously) as community manager, creative lead, live events coordinator/technical director, platform specialist, web designer, video editor / producer / writer / shooter / director, public relations, subscriber program manager, facilities manager, actor/performer, developer and presently as Content Director, which sort of just sucks most of that up into one big whirlwind of never-ending (but enjoyable) chaos. I've struggled with how to explain my job over the years, but most simply: When you can see a developer's face, I'm usually the guy putting it together and making it happen, often in front, but far more times behind the scenes. 1,216 times so far. It's been a hell of a ride, and I'm excited to begin the next 10 years on Monday.

If you follow Star Citizen, please RT. You can help me shout out a few people on this. So @willpricedop leads our ISC Gameplay Capture Team and dropped the first version of this scene in chat as a gag this week. It was a, "Haha, this is funny, too bad we can't do it" moment... But anyone who's ever worked alongside me will tell you that's usually the first and best reason I'll ever need to make something happen, and things started to move. Meanwhile our brilliant @Kattercakes was already working on a brand update for the show. I have a tendency to be very "xtra" and she was working to finally realize what I'd tried to do when I invented this branding way back in 2016, and everyone on the team was thrilled with the results. So, I finally had the logo I'd always wanted, and a kickass sequence that referenced the earliest days of the persistent universe (look up "Big Benny's Challenge" and @badnewsbaron if you don't know or remember) and my current life in the UK, what I needed now was a track to lay under it that could not only hold it all up, but elevate it beyond its combined parts. I spent hours searching the libraries we had. Nothing fit. Nothing vibed. In desperation, I pinged @pedrocamacho at 12:39am in the morning. Of course, he was working, too. I was only looking for guidance, but he knew exactly what was needed, and he didn't hesitate to offer to create something special for our milestone. We only had an evening to work. We'd need to extend the sequence to fit the idea. We had to create moments for the new title to reveal. This was the 1,171 video I've made for CIG, and 500th in a legacy begun by others and entrusted to me by @banditloaf that I take as seriously today as I did when he asked if I could do it in 2015 and I summoned up a lifetime of bullshit to tell him I could. 😜 But not one of those 1,171 was made by me alone. It's people like Will and Kat and Pedro and so, so many more that enable me to still love what I do, it's people like Ben and Sandi and Chris that take chances on weirdos like me, and folks who's names and faces you don't see nearly as often as mine who keep taking those chances with me week after week. It's 2:04am on another evening I can't sleep, and I just gave Twitter $4 so I could make this post. But my life doesn't get to be what it is without these people and others like David and Tom and David and Alex and Julian and Joe and Rena and Toby and Gemma and Vicki and Tyler and Elliott and more and more and I hope you'll forgive me taking this space on your timeline to say how much I love working with them. Ups and down and ups and downs, but always with love and appreciation for those who came before, those who are here now, and those that'll help make the next 500. 💖