The Robbery Retold, and how the Recovery did Unfold

Ok, so it’s been a month, at least for those of you that didn’t tune into the livestreams last week. As you may have seen on our socials, we were robbed and our regularly scheduled blog and working week were thrown into disarray. However we are back! Alive, kicking, and as you might imagine, with a fair bit to talk about.

First up, the burglary. It was a dark and stormy night… Well, it was dark at least. We came in from the cold and Suzie nearly tripped over something on the floor. It took a few seconds for the brain to catch up with the world before I made the connection, holding the speaker that had mysteriously ended up in the middle of the room. Panic flooded in and my fears were confirmed when Suzie switched the light on. Our tech was gone. Laptops, consoles, controllers. Even the Stadia controllers, which will be as much of a disappointment to Google as it was to me, given I’m one of the 5 people still using the platform… Anyway, I did something really stupid, and while on the phone to the police, I bolted around the house, thoroughly unarmed, checking inventory and making sure the house was secure. Luckily it was. The degenerate(s) had left via the back door, having located the key during their tour.

But how did they get in? Well, I have to admire the resolve of scum. They forced open our upstairs bathroom window. A tiny top-of-the-window panel I might add. The weasel slid in, muddying up our bathroom with glove marks and boot marks, and had at our house. As a result, we’re toughening security in a lot of ways, with some help from a very lovely landlord. As well as the physical items, the whole ordeal was rounded off by the realisation that I hadn’t been able to back up Horde in a long while, and a lot of work was lost.

So what did I do? Well the putrid pubis that pilfered our possessions had purposefully purloined primarily portable property, so I was able to throw together a couple of low-performance towers from bits I had lying around. That got myself and Suzie back in business to a degree, so I hatched a plan to get Horde back on track. I decided to livestream the whole thing. The videos are available on our YouTube, if you’re interested in scrubbing through. At the end of each day I rounded things off by playing a videogame for an hour, which was a nice way to end things, and hopefully entertaining!

Did it work though? Yes! Not only did I restore everything we had lost, I finished some stuff I had never gotten around to; I fixed up the AI again, got the projectile system working, I also modified the scale of the game to allow for more design space in each level, and added a score system to boot! Take a look at the result below!

Turns out having you guys watching me is an excellent motivator! It was an incredibly draining week, and I know I have a lot to learn about streaming, but I also had a great time doing it. I’m hoping that in the future it’s something I can do more of.

To round things off I need to say a huge thank you to everyone who has been sympathetic and wonderful, and especially to those that have supported us by being part of, sharing, and watching the streams. It has been amazing to see so many people that care, and have wanted to help. Also to SockMonkey and the guys I’ve worked with through them, for being helpful, and understanding, and not getting on my case over the work I haven’t been able to do while we get back on track! I promise we’ll be operating at full capacity again soon!

Matt out.