Part 26: Beneath The Rock
Back to it, sucka.
John Romero posted:
This is what I'm planning on doing after Daikatana to push the genre a little bit forward into some other new area and see if it takes or not. The player starts the game and chooses what character they want to be. The character is kind of tied to a different location in the game- their hometown or whatever. SO you move along, go through some levels, meet people who give you information, and you'll reach points where you'll choose where you want to go.
So I'm assuming that you brought that amazing idea to Red Faction for the N-Gage, huh?
Fuck you.No, seriously. Either Red Faction or Hyperspace Delivery Boy, right?
Those games were just a way to make some money while I proceeded with my ultimate dream game.Wasn't that Daikatana?
No, Daikatana was only the tip of the iceberg of my imagination.That's an honestly scary thought. So who are you going to get to publish this dream game?
Acclaim.Naturally.
John Romero posted:
The first thing I do when I come in is answer all my emails because I'm responsible for every aspect of the design from the programming to the map design to the art-- it's decision-making all day long. I don't get too immersed in the scheduling-- what I'm concerned with is matters like: Is this weapon doing what it should? Is it animated well enough? Do the maps flow correctly? Someone else does scheduling.
So much good stuff in one simple quote. But I guess the obvious first question is, it's pretty clear that you didn't give a fuck about scheduling. But who did? And why weren't they fired?
I'm not actually sure who was in charge of scheduling, actually. Some dude from Eidos maybe? I have no idea.Is it possible that you didn't have anyone in charge of scheduling?
Yeah, that's possible too. Like I said, not my concern.So onto the other obvious question. If you were responsible for every aspect of this game, why did it turn out so shitty?
This game didn't turn out shitty! The problem was that my brilliant design decisions were ahead of their ti-Never mind, I already figured out the answer.
I did spend a lot of time making sure the weapons did what they were supposed to do. That was probably 70% of my time spent on the game.And what were the weapons supposed to do?
Kill you.Gotta say you did a wonderful job on that one.
Thanks.John Romero posted:
Changing over to the Quake II engine is pretty much what delayed Daikatana. We thought it would be an easy change, but it wasn't, because Carmack had been rewriting everything, and nothing that we created other than the monsters-- the actual models-- could even be used. So we had to start pretty much from scratch.
So what you're saying here is that you thought Carmack basically just shit out a second version of the Quake engine with colored lighting and that conversation would be a matter of find/replace.
Of course. But no, Carmack decided to personally try to fuck me over by making the engine completely incompatable with Quake 1. It was all part of his plan to make me the laughingstock of the industry.Wait, you're claiming that the Quake II engine's only purpose was to embarrass you personally?
Absolutely. It's common knowledge in the industry.Really now? Common knowledge with who?
Me. And Chris Klie. And Stevie. And my current hot Romanian wife.Anyone else?
I haven't bothered to ask.Beneath The Rock Beneath The Rock Outro
Friendly Factory(I'm not adding these links to the OP until Google gets its shit together and processes my video.)