Another One Bites the Dust

26th March 2008

The lift ascended as I was still suffering from the fatigue of the staying up to reformatting and resusitate the PC from the fabled and much-feared "Blue Screen of Death" the night before. Still visibly distraught with the loss of the entire collection of photos that I had not backed up, I routinely tapped the card at the office entrance, and stepped into the office.

Instead of the usual cold, silence that filled the office, my colleagues were all huddled together and discussing something in mummers and whispers as I entered the office.

"Hey Jeremy, you're finally here. Go read your email." Viknash told me as he saw me at the doorway, with everyone else in the group focusing their attention on me as if to scrutinize my already-too-weary countenance. Sensing something ominous in the mailbox, I turned on my PC and waited in suspense as it started up.

"What could it be I?" I wondered to myself. "Another one of the Boss' crazy ideas that I might have to go into a long rebuttal over email again?" I thought to myself, as I opened my mailbox and waited for the mails to roll in.

I scrolled through the usual headings of worksheets before coming to a mail that was titled "Company Announcement." "Should be this one," I thought to myself as I rather sleepily clicked on the heading, and read the contents of the mail.

I was almost literally slapped out of my sleepy stupor when I came to the end of the mail, utterly jolted out of my disposition. Unable to believe what I jhad ust read, I decided to read the mail again, this time digesting EVERY single word as I read it.

But with each processed word, my breath only grew shorter and my heart only grew heavier; the shocking reality of the situation creeping in slowly and surely with each word. Coming to the end of the mail a second time, I reclined into my chair without a single word and without a single thought in my head.

When I finally managed to start formulating words again, I turned around and asked Henry, "Is all this for real?"

"Yeah, it feels like a very very bad dream," he said, with an awkward and forced smile on his face, visibly unable to properly channel his emotions as well. "The whole thing just feels so.... unreal."

Indeed it did, as questions started to fill my mind; the biggest of it being "Why...."

"Why now? "

"Why after all this effort?"

"Why after coming so close?"

Desperately, I went into the mailbox and double-checked the date of the mail, hoping to find a punchline or a hint that this was an April Fool's joke played in advance; yet Denial did not have the kindness to even humour me.

Janelle came into the office, more frantic and jumpy than her normal self; scurrying around the office and asking everyone, "How? How?" It was obvious that she too was blind-sided in the process of reaching this decision, alongside the rest of us. Afterall, who wouldn't be?

Considering the day before we were all just talking about the future of the company in an extended 2 hour meeting -- ways to extend the IP, possible plans if we were unable to get the manpower up to steam, the potential of being signed, business development ideas -- and the next day, an announcement of the company closing down was rained down upon us like a blue bolt of lighting.

As we continued to deliberate about the unfounded explanations for the reasons of closing down, the Boss came in looking surprising upbeat. "Is everyone here? Let's have a meeting to discuss the announcement," he said.

We gathered in the pantry, possibly for one of the last few times, as the discussion opened with a statement from the Boss. "I know everyone is shocked with the announcement, but let's face the facts: the current business model is DEAD. There is no possible way, with our current business model, that we are going to be able to ship the game by 2009. And its better to realize that now that later in the production. I mean, it was VERY difficult for me, after all the game is my baby..."

Indeed, it was his baby; but at the same time, it was everyone else's as well, especially mine, as I was the main creative force that drove the direction of the design and the gameplay. Spending countless hours on the daily commute analysing the potential pitfalls, standing under the running water in the shower generating new ideas, having numerous talks with my brother on the feasibility of the ideas; all in the name of the desire to produce a great, if not an "at least 7.0 game."

He continued to speak at length about the other reasons as to why he made the decision that he made... "I know that the move is a radical one. But many times, you look back at the situation later and you'll be glad that you made actually made such a radical move."

"Yes. Some times, when a computer has a lot of problems, the best way to fix it is to reformat the entire computer," Henry added, as I looked at him as if he were a fucking retard.

"Yes. Good analogy," the Boss said in acknowledgement.

"Why now?" I asked the Boss, finally being able to consolidate all the running thoughts in my mind into two words. "I mean, do you really feel that this is the worse period of time for the company? Considering that we have gotten so far, developed a demo that publishers like and are this close to actually signing with them?" I asked.

And this quickly turned into a 2-way discussion as with each answer he gave, I questioned further, until a point in time when a fellow colleague told me, "Forget it, Jeremy. It won't make a difference," that I felt that I had just hit a brick wall and utterly stopped short in my inquisitive tracks.

"So, in the next 30 days, let's try to discuss some ways in which we can actually relaunch the company. If we can find a solution that is able to generate revenue, one that is able to restore the confidence in the shareholders, then the money will roll in and there will be a possible company relaunch. I would like to to add that everyone here has the possibility of being hired under the new company, as long as it makes sense to the new business model of the company," the Boss said.

"Let's all try not to be too depressed about the entire situation," he said, with a grin on his face, masking the deep sorrow that pierced through his dark brown eyes. He was probably as distraught about the entire situation as the rest of us, but forced himself to play the visionary leader that he tried to be for one last time.

Many people took off after the meeting, seeing no point staying if they were unable to work for the rest of the day. I arrived at my exceptionally late noon timing, but was told that I could leave around 5 if I wanted to.

I spent the rest of the hours mulling deeply over the shock, thinking of all the potential lost in the flash of an executive decision. I started organizing the material that we had worked on in the past 7 months for accountability and for portfolio purposes, but felt something pulling at my heartstrings as I dragged each file into the folder.

I always knew that the entire industry was a high-risk one, especially in the local scene. But I was always under the assumption that the Boss had too much pride to worry about the cost as to which he would have to go to in order to be able to ship the game. But obviously, this was merely an optimistic assumption on my part. But still, even if the company were to close her doors, I expected to have had to at least go down fighting, and would have had been able to anticipate it at least, rather than getting emotionally assassinated with a clean slice to the jugular.

As I switched off the lights before leaving the office, I instinctively turned to look at my desk, and I saw something... I saw myself, or at least, an image of myself. An image of the night before, as I bent over the desk, sketching out a design idea under my own shadows all alone in the warmly lit office, particulary proud of the award-winning design I was able to formulate and hoping to put a close to the design of that particular room before I called it a day.

The image slowly fizzled out into blinding specks of dust as the lights dimmed and greyed while the entire imagery grew too blurry to distinguish. And there I was, standing all alone in an empty office, with the shadows overhanging on the walls of the office as a result of the setting sunlight that streamed in, staring straight at an empty chair and a surprisingly organized desk.

I took a disappointing sigh of resignation as I turned my back towards my table, pulling the heavy glass door and stepped out of the office.

...The Dream was Over.