DNC Albany, New York – Halloween 2008
Despite the initial adrenaline rush and excitement of moving to a new city to start a new job and new life, it certainly was an unsettling feeling to know that I would be thrown into a completely new world devoid of anything familiar. However, it certainly didn’t take long for me to get settled in because of the amazing people I work with. They naturally live by the DNC code of an all-star professional and fun-loving social life. Despite the stereotypes of video game companies being nerd farms, Activision’s Vicarious Visions development studio is filled with amazing people. Here are a few pics from last week’s Halloween festivities.
Leave it to Katie to ruin a great picture!
The amazing thing about artists is that they extend their own respective genius to all aspects of their lives. Our Art Director made this costume all by himself. The mask is made of duct tape, paper mache, wire hangers, and sunglass lenses. I was so impressed by this costume that I took a billion pictures of it! Also, it had me creeped out and jumping at shadows the whole weekend!
Donnie Darko Rabbit
And look at this:
Giggy – a Senior Artist – made this entire costume himself as well. It’s absolutetly wonderful! He got into character and ran around scaring people in the office! It was great!
Giggy the Witch Doctor!
Here is Katie – a very talented Junior Animator – as Tom Cruise in Risky Business! All night, she kept on drunk sliding and only busted her ass twice. Amazing.
These guys are all awesome musicians! Jason (Jimi Hendrix) is one of our composers. He’s actually white, but he painted himself black! Dan DiLallo(Slash) is one of our audio designers. Dan Wallace (Caesar) is the Producer for Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2. And he used to be in a rock band that was more popular than Nirvana before they got discovered. At one point, his band – Shampain (pronounced the same way as Champagne) – played in better venues in the Pacific Northwest than Nirvana did!
Who said girls in games aren’t good looking (I consider Bryan as an honorary girl)?!
My boss is a shredding machine. He is the REAL guitar hero! He was playing the guitar all drunk too!
Shampain lead guitarist!
Small Snippet of the dance floor! This is all at my producer’s house too! Oh man, we were all getting crazy on the dance floor and dancing like complete idiots!
Speaking of silliness… Our HEAD ENGINEER (as in, highest ranking engineer at the Vicarious Visions studio) Aaron cut loose on the dance floor with his girlfriend Angel:
Here they are being normal and not insane dancing machines. All happy couples make me sick to my stomach, but they really are cute together!
Apparently Wolverine knows how to use nunchucks now!
Last ones standing:
All in all, I think Ive got more than enough to start an Albany Chapter of the Drunken Ninja Clan, but I need some of my senior DNC officers to come up and grant me my charter! *hint* *hint*
I miss everyone in Texas and I think about you guys all the time.
Lots of love, hugs, and kisses,
C. Marissa “Ling Ling the Red Dragon” Wu
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DNC Worldwide 
November 5, 2008 at 1:03 pm
Lol, I like how red you are in the last pic. Looks like a great time up there and I’m glad you’re settling in. How’s Renzo’s school?
November 5, 2008 at 7:35 pm
Uh oh… potential Ninja Slipper in picture 6, says the boys.
November 5, 2008 at 8:11 pm
Well, it’s a Renzo affiliate. It’s really REALLY small and it’s inside a mall that looks like it’s stuck in 1987. Bruno Tostes runs it. He’s a legit brown belt and a good teacher and a very nice guy, but I’m working 11 hour days and I don’t get out in time to make it to class. This is the first time I’ve been home before 9:00PM.
The girls at my company are actually really pretty. I guess the recruiters are looking to break the stereotype. In the 6th pic, both of those girls have boyfriends though. Karelle is the giant bunny’s girlfriend and Cristina is the afro guy’s girlfriend. They both have badass accents though. Karelle is French and Cristina is Spanish from Switzerland I think. I’m the only boring one!