(Sorry I've been quiet the last few weeks; ISP got flaky and knocked me off the air for a week or two, and now I'm deluged with email as I try to catch up.. ugh )

One of the projects I've been working on and off on for ages (some of you may recall the Zot project) is an engine for remaking old school top-down smooth scrolling games, primarily Time Bandit. (..and Gauntlet and others of course, but Time Bandit has always been my frame of reference.)

Well, I managed to get ahold of the two original authors and had a fine chat with one on the phone just now -- I know I'm a nerd, but that has me totally stoaked. Talking to someone you idolized 15 or 20 years earlier

Anyway, I got to thinking .. it could be a cool opportunity for a mini-email-interview of sorts; but what sorts of questions would be cool to ask a developer who was in the 'creating games before there was an industry' era, and still active in software development today? The one fella was the main coder (Atari ST, Amiga, IBM PC, and others) while the other was the artist, level designer and pollish-man. Any questions about the good old days, what was it like, developing games back then, etc etc all welcome.

So let me know your interview question ideas, and I'll boil them down into a few questions to ask these two fine fellas, and maybe we can get some cool information.

As to the project itself .. still alive; I've got the engine running on the GP2X now, and I'm reworking it all to be more to where I want it to go.. I've ditched the scripting language for now, and a lot of built-in logic and whatnot, and recrafting into a more targeted engine rather than a generic mini-game system. I shoudl be able to get the maps and artwork going much faster now than before, so hopefully we'll get some good progress in a little bit.. once I recover from email up to my nostrils

jeff

Given I don't have license to the actual game (does anyone?) I've been debating what to call it; ie: "Time Bandits" would likely be owned by someone (in reference to the game), but theres always "Tim Bandits" and "Grime Bandits" or any number of things

Well, How do they feel about today's 'point & click programming languages' ... I'm sure coding is a lot easier now with packages like Visual C++, and integrated game development suites like GMax (From the 3DS Max folks) ... I used to dabble in BASIC on a couple of machines back in the '80s, and never picked it up again until fooling around with Visual Basic MANY years later.

Is creating games easier today than it was back in the early days? (By easy I mean more accessable to newbs)

Is writing games easier now than it was when they originally wrote their game? What sort of differences are there?

How do they feel about todays computers? I know in "the day" I was much more into the computer scene like the Amiga. There was a certain "exitement" to the new ground that was broken by computers like the ST and Amiga. Now to me they have become powerful, but are just a mundane tool. How do they feel?


How was coding on these "relics" without all of the high level tools. Was it more fun because you could "bang the metal" more?

Do they know about the GP2X? If so how do they feel about it?

How do they see actual games gameplay (3D-fps, mass network gaming, storyboarded games...)?
Do they have fun with those actual games ?

1. If there was one thing they could change about the current game industry what would it be?

2. Is the current "industry" bad for creativity - due to large companies and "The Man", and so on?

3. How do they see game programming changing in the next ten years (or any ammount of time for that matter)?

Good questions; I've picked up some others from various interviews, so I'll send 'em over and see what comes of it

jeff

Cheeky name suggestion:

Time Banditos.

You could add a distinctly Canadian flair to yours and call it Timebits.