It’s probably not eluded some of you that it was just over a year ago that we said we would be releasing and here we are still..

So why is that?

HaJ was always intended as a fun little side project, just to see if we could actually do it. It was never intended to be a full on mod with strict releases and the like, just fun to make and play. The core team of the mod numbered around 6-8 people at any one time and through various “life” devices we simply do not have anywhere near the amount of free time we once did.

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Just a short (and hopefully sweet) update to let you all know progress is still occuring on the mod. We know its not as fast as you’d all like but we are getting there.

We have narrowed down exactly what we will be releasing the first version with and sorting out the outstanding issues (about 8 as I write this). Once that’s all done, we’ll give it a blast with our testers and then carefully unleash it onto you guys so we can get your opinions on it.

If you’re a forum regular you will have noticed some shuffling going on, thats to try and streamline everything ready for release. Hopefully nothing has been lost in the shuffle.

It’s with a sad heart that I have to report that the Ham and Jam team has suffered the loss of one of our earliest and long serving team members.

Mitchell Curtis Keesee known to the team by his nickname, “Engineer”, passed away at home on Monday 26th September at the age of 23.

Mitchell was our sound engineer and joined the team in early 2006 not long after the game got started proper. He has created almost all of the games sound effects and was passionate and dedicated in his work.

Mitchell’s obsession with tweaking and getting things perfect was often a blessing and a curse as he could never stop fiddling no matter how much we told him he didn’t need too. He would often disappear for a month at a time only to come back with a massive update.

He was a tireless perfectionist when it came to his craft. To quote the log entry of his last submission to our SVN server:

“New sten sound, superior to previous incarnations.”

He was creative in his work not just aiming to clone a sound but to engineer it to give a specific effect or impact within the scope of the game. He saw the soundscape as something that is experienced rather than just heard. Something we’re sure came from his love of classical music.

Mitchell worked on other games, most notably Firearms:Source, but was always considered a core member of our team and was a staunch supporter of the game who would promote and praise it whenever asked about it. He was a true team player.

Apart from his work as a sound artist we’ll also remember him for his bizarre, absurd and often irreverent sense of humour which has lightened the mood on various bad times during Ham and Jams development.

On a personal note, I first met Mitchell on-line as far back as 2003 when he was a 15 year old kid interested in making 3D models. I shared many tips and tricks with him and watched him tackle new weapon models, textures and even dabble with the odd character model.

Around 2005 he started to become more focused in sound production and was already making sound effects for game such as Day of Defeat, Duke Nukem 3D and was working on The Trenches when I approached him to help with our then new venture Ham and Jam.

He had worked on a number of games that failed to see the light of day but his dedication to Ham and Jam I take as a sign in his belief that something great will eventually come out of all this.

He’ll be missed by all of us but he’ll live on with every grunt, groan, boom and bang you hear in Ham and Jam.

Our thoughts are with him and his family.