Current Project:

Duality ZF, my upcoming Xbox 360 video game:

See more on our Xona Games YouTube channel.

Website:

xona.com/matthewdoucette

Visit my website (above) for my contact, email, msn, windows live, facebook, youtube, myspace, digg, projects, etc.


Personal:

I wish to surround myself with positive, open-minded, productive, and inspirational people. That's all!

Negativity, drama, and worrying are all a waste of your mental resources. There are better things to do! I have collected many quotes (inspirational, action, etc.) over the years. They were individually "hand picked", not just copied blindly from other source. I love them. They make you think and broaden your mind. This is the closest we can get to the insides of some of the greatest minds ever. Maybe browsing through them will help clarify and enact an important decision in your life. Who knows?


Background:

I have an extreme passion for technology, especially video games. I respect them as a player and as a programmer and designer. I have aspirations to develop my own video games from scratch and have had such aspirations since early elementary school.

So far, life, school, flawed expectations, society, a general lack of respect for technology, and other meaningless things have got in the way. However, I respect that everyone's current situation is of their own doing. I believe you should not blame anyone for your life but yourself. So, I have made efforts to correct all the mistakes and remove all the barriers that have prevented me from doing what I love to do, which is computer programming (mostly 3D graphics and game programming).

It's amazing what can be accomplished though sacrifices. I believe success is almost entirely dependant on how much you are willing to sacrifice. All the major failures I have met in my life are unwilling to make the simplest of sacrifices. As you grow and gain a better understanding of what is truly important, sacrificing becomes easy, as it is easy to give up those things that do not matter.

Anyway, now when something makes it hard for me to do what I love, a red flag goes up. Now I try to remove everything in my way. I am not looking for help, just freedom of choice. In this regard, I have been changing my life around for the better over the past 3 or 4 years.

I am now working on a very unique software project, which I must call "Project X" until we decide to release more details, with my brother Jason Doucette. We have been at it indirectly since March 12th, 2002! It is not a video game, but it is the next best thing. In a lot of ways, Project X is much better than any video game project, and is much better than any opportunity I could have hoped for. I feel fortunate and hope to make the best of it. I will release more details on Project X when it is released! It will be exciting to finally release a professional software product to the market.


"Be Yourself" Explained:

("Be Yourself" is my MySpace tagline.) "Being yourself" is a very simple idea, but something I find nearly impossible to achieve due to the expectations of others. It is my ultimate goal, to truly be myself.

"Do not wish to be anything but what you are, and try to be that perfectly." - St. Francis De Sales

I try my best to not let society guide me. When I was a child, I did not care what anyone thought. I did things that were unpopular at the time. I programmed computers, designed video games, learned new math, designed characters, etc. (Math is just a tool to be used to accomplish a goal. Math to a video game programmer is like shoes to a basketball player. Once you understand the point, once you remove the ignorance, learning math actually seems cool.) Anyway, somehow it got engraved into me that the ignorant opinions of others mattered. As I grew older, I knew enough to hide my work from others to avoid "breaking social codes" and becoming a target.

In elementary school, playing video games was cool, but designing a computer program was not. It is a matter of perspective. Another example, in "my world", my work and my designs were important. However, in the "real world", homework and test marks were deemed important. The older I grew, the more ridiculous the rules and restrictions of society became.

Once I hit junior high, I had to dress a certain way, act a certain way, and do certain things. I was never successful at conforming to society. Now, looking back, I realize there was little substance in the opinions of others. In retrospect, my peers were mostly clueless and lost themselves in relation to their dreams. I am now glad I did not "sell out" and conform. (I cannot take credit for my actions, as I wanted to conform on some level, but I fortunately lacked the skills to do so.)

School was nothing more than a huge, meaningless, judgmental barrier. Judgments can be devastating. A person cannot do what they believe they cannot do. If you destroy a person's belief in themselves, you destroy the person. This is what school does. I still have the occasional dream where I never studied for an exam I am about to write. Anything else that would cause me to have dreams years after the fact would be viewed as a traumatic experience.

School is about control and obligations, nothing more. You gain nothing by controlling someone other than destroying their freedom and diminishing their potential. I think putting such a big emphasis on school is a flawed idea. (I realize that this view does not fit everyone and every trade.) The reality is that failing an exam is not a big deal. I wish I failed more often, and spent that (wasted) energy towards my own projects.

I wish I could go back to the way I was before my mind was distorted, at such a young age, via the intellectual torture of regulated education. It now seems foolish that I worried more about school marks than my own (true) education and passions, the very thing "schooling" is supposed to develop in me. Have not all parents, teachers, and school adminstrators completely missed the point? Now, I try to "be myself" and do the things that are meaningful to me. I greatly admire those who are who they are, and do what they love.


Favorite Quotation:

"It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out where the strong man stumbled, or where a doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs, and who comes up short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause. The man who at best knows the triumph of high achievement and who at worst, if he fails, fails while daring greatly, so that his place will never be with those cold timid souls who never knew victory or defeat." - Theodore Roosevelt

As previously mentioned, I have collected many inspirational quotes over the years. Again, they were "hand picked", not just blindly copied off another quote website. On some level, I relate (or wish to relate) to all of them. Check them out.

Insult to Intelligence (Frank Smith)