IN THE BEGINNING: History- March 18th

On 17th Jan 1998 my brother decided to buy a Playstation. At the time I was very sceptical, considering that games were 40 quid a go. However, having spent the last couple of years playing quality PC games like Doom, Duke and Quake, to name a few, I thought, let's see what this thing can do. When we loaded up that dino program, the proverbial jaw hit the floor. The other demos on the disc were also very impressive and I couldn't believe that this machine was capable of so much (I mean 33 Mhz, 2 Megs Ram, 3 yr old tech).

So how come I now own a Yaroze? (Long)

I subscribed to the Official Playstation Magazine and heard about this Net Yaroze thing. At this time I was in my fourth year at Strathclyde Uni, studying Computer Science (good course too), but at 550 smash I just couldn't afford it. Incidentally, I wouldn't have had any time to use it and we had just purchased a new playstation, but that was my first thought about owning a yaroze.

My initial interest in games programming only surfaced in the second year at Uni where I was spending copious amounts of time web-surfing, and it just seemed the more I read about games and the industry, the more it started to appeal to me as a possible career. I mean, from my perspective, a career in the games industry vs a career programming databases - what would you choose?

So I decided to write a game for the PC, using Borland C++ for DOS. Using good old Borland C++ I learnt the basics of 2d game programming, but I must admit that for six months effort the game I produced (called Vyrmain - don't ask) was utter mince - a half finished shoot em up effort, a truly awful thing, still lurking on my PC somewhere, with source code I think.

After that effort I basically gave up on the idea of game programming, that was until I obtained Visual C++ in 3rd year. I spent all of 2 days skimming over Direct X 3D and thought hmmmm... not for me, not at the moment anyway. I wanted to program a game for a standard platform (ala C64, Amiga). So third year was a non-event is terms of writing games - although playing networked quake was good - trying not to get caught was even harder.

Then in fourth year, the individual project came along. We had to give a list of six preferences from about 100 possible projects. I had the following list :-

1. Educational Java program
2. On-line Java tutorial
3. Software Engineering project
4. Connect-N (AI game)
5. Some html rubbish
6. Can't even remember this one

The reason Connect-N was only fourth in my preference list was because I was thinking about an interview situation where " What did you do for your final year project?" - " Ah, I wrote a wee game" would put a dampener on things, and also the man who was supposed to be supervising the project taught Scheme(Lisp) - imagine writing a game in that. But guess what, I was lumped with the Connect-N monstrosity after all. Oh dear - I was depressed just thinking about it. However, after discussions with the project supervisor it began to sound better and I didn't have to use Scheme; I ended up using JAVA having thought about C, but I wanted an excuse to learn JAVA.

Six months later, and after considering deferring UNI a couple of times in the process, I finished my coding, wrote up the final report, handed the damn thing in and - drum roll - the project acheived a mark of 83%, the HIGHEST in the year. But guess what, the program wasn't even that good - yes, it was a variation of Connect-4 using some nifty techniques, but still, there was a helluva room for improvement. It achieved that mark down to the whole project - the report, the methods used, the testing approach, etc etc. But let me give you some advice - do not jump into coding without proper research and planning - At the beginning of Connect-N I done this (going against good practice), and my hash bash approach (call it eagerness) meant that my progress ground to a halt. I even considered repeating the year because of the brick wall I had hit. However, I scrapped version 1 and started the proper development cycle the way I usually do so, with proper planning. That's not to say this approach is the way all projects (especially something as creative as yaroze games) should be done. There are situations (and deadlines) where the old hash-bash approach is the only approach - the key is trying to avoid those situations.

After exams etc, and after I got a degree, I thought, time to look for a job. Did I consider the games industry at July 98? nope. I decided I needed to take things fairly easy, feeling burnt out after four years at uni, before looking actively for that graduate job. So in August 98 I took a six month contract with Scottish Power as a Business Acceptance Tester (pay was poor, but the job was only 10 minutes walking-distance from my house). Six months later, I was actually in a position (as of Jan 99) to start a proper career in the Testing field (hell, I got offered a 3-month contract with a reputable company to do testing - with damn good money - but the job just wasn't right and so I took some temporary work helping in a lawyers firm.

At the end of that job I had to take stock of where the hell I was going. I had a damn good degree, I now had some valuable work experience, so what do I now do. I'll finally tell you what I do - I write out a 300+ cheque for Yaroze early February and then think what the F*** am I doing. Can I really consider a career in the games industry, after all I ain't a coding genius, but am I good enough to make it (even as a Tester to begin with?) Late Feb 99, after some nervousness I walk by my door and notice a sheet of paper on the ground - AMTRAK - dated yesterday - whit, nobody had noticed this vital bit of paper - hmm, so I have to get the guys to deliver it next day. At 1pm I get the NET YAROZE, open it all up, fiddle about a bit, wondering if I should dive straight in, but I read the manuals a fair bit then look round the back of the PC (A 4 year old DAN P75 - damn excellent machine - highly recommended (DAN that is)) only to find that I need a damn 9-25 pin converter - DOH!. After finally getting a converter I manage to plug everything in, and turn it all on, seems working. Ok, now I try to download the demo program hello world and siocons refuses to work. After 20 minutes of manual madness and swearing profusely at Siocons, CodeWarrior, PC, yaroze and TV, I discover that the cable wasn't fully in - DOH!. (Having swore blind I checked it twice before). The machine then works, and the demos are pretty impressive - the dino demo code is hugely convoluted and I totally panic at the amount of obscure funtions involved and trying to understand them in the manuals.

I wish SONY had included a fully documented dummy's tutorial, cos I even found a lot of functions and terminology pretty damn confusing to begin with. Anyway I obtained a few games from members sites over the next few days to guage a feel for their quality. I had already played all the net yaroze games from the playstation mag cover discs. Below is my list of current top 10 yaroze titles. To give you an idea of scoring - I rate Gran Turismo 10 and would give both Rascal/Psybadek/ about 3/10, in my opinion, taking into account these games are done in spare time and usually by one person.

1. Total Soccer - 9

   An absolute corker of a game - does this guy not have a job in the industry yet? - if not why not - somebody should sign him up.

2. Blitter Boy - 8

   Another stunning example of a simple concept tweaked and twisted into a playable game - sheer quality is written all over this, with some cool visual delights. I'm not suprised Chris Chadwick won all the awards, and got a job (with Eight Wonder - I think) in the process.

   The above games are the kind of quality that you need if you seriously want a decent chance of getting a good job in the games industry - and that is my honest opinion - unless you want to start in testing or some other area - but for programming, your game has gotta stand out from the crowd

3. Hover 120 - 8

   Not on a cover disc, but this again shows that those Japanase fellas sure know how to program.

4. SNOWBALLS - 8

   Not on cover disc, Snowballs by Mr Frosty harks back to the days of 'playability rules'. You can quote me when I say that I haven't enjoyed a Five minute two-player game this much since first playing Tekken 2. Damn hilarious gameplay.

5. Rocks and Gems - 7

   Boulder dash rules on the Playstation. Another highly playable yaroze game.

6. Bob Swan's Adventure Game - 6

   As I write this (17th March) I have this game on the PSM cover disc - not that great a game, but dialogue is hilarious and for four weeks effort this guy deserves some kind of award. Also, loved Bob's racing example. A true coding master.

7. RYE - 6

   Not on cover disc. Strange racing game, but a good example of physics and polygon drawing.

8. Comebaa - 5

   Excellent Sheep AI, and pretty funny to boot.

9. Bubble Bobble Game - 5

   A puzzle/fighter hybrid, this game has pigs ???. Anyway fun game, and smooth as silk.

10. Fighting Game - 5/10

    I forget the name of this but it was in Sony's top 10 yaroze games, anyway it's by some spanish (?) guys and is actually pretty well done.

    Everybody else who has ever written something for the yaroze - be it just for fun, or serious, or as a demo for that elusive games programming job - keep up the high standards and enjoy what you are doing.

So What Are My Plans

• My goal by the end of 1999 - To be employed by a games company in some capacity, be it as a tester, or ideally as a programmer. I can forget graphic artist - my art capabilities are hopeless. My family are sceptical about what I am planning, after all, most of my ex University buddies have all got proper graduate jobs, and I'm currently on the dole queue. But if I don't give it a go (9 months effort), I doubt I'll ever have the will to give it a go. After all, I do need a career, and games programming is my ideal first choice at the moment. - I'm going to keep a regular diary of my progress with yaroze, starting April 1999. That gives me 9 months to get a job - will I do it, let's hope so. If I fail, well that doesn't bear thinking ;).

• But as I said, no game company is gonna employ you on the basis of a simple demo (ala space invaders - unless it's in 3d of course ;). So I'm gonna spend the next couple of months getting to grips with yaroze (mainly 3-d), and then spend the next few months after that working on a game. My game will be a hybrid of some well trodden genres, maybe including some neat twists. It's an ambitious game for my first real attempt on yaroze, but I need a good example of my game programming skills; firstly to generate some interviews, then secondly to have something impressive to show people that I could be a games programmer.

• Ah, but in the meantime, I need some sort of job to keep me alive, so I better start hunting. Keep track on my progress over the year, and I'm sure it'll make for an interesting read, regardless of whether I break into the industry or not.

• Here's a final thought for the type of web page I'm going to have - A picture can say a thousand words, but if it takes a thousand times longer to load then who gives a damn?