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alex wrote:I don’t remember if we ever used those words, but it was definitely something we were aware of. We played a lot of quake (and later unreal tournament) in the office and one of the things that really struck us about it was the vibrant community. Maps, mods and genuine improvements were everywhere. When working on warzone as engineers we made decisions to leave openings so that people could make changes where they saw fit. Examples including using a scripting language (the slo,vlo’s) that wasn’t compiled into the game so users could edit them, or choosing zip as our packing format instead of something proprietary. I still think it’s a positive thing to do on pc titles, am I’m busy still doing it today!
Thanks for the detailed response Alex. All of those decisions by Pumpkin (AND that very disposition itself made obvious and genuine, like you said, via all the patches and even after when Pumpkin was no more) made WZ a game many core fans were actively passionate about in the extreme from day one it seemed. Not just playing and enjoying WZ but much inspired to making all manner of ingenious stuff for it, keeping it alive for all those many years while doing everything possible to help get the source liberated.... Quite a few of those fans I know even got into the software business (including working on new titles) as a result of being influenced by you guys and working with your creation over their formative years.
alex wrote:This ended up benefiting us too. While we always intended to do multiplayer, skirmish started as a bit of a hobby for me. It grew into something fun because the flexibility of the scripting language really opened up the possibilities (thanks to John Elliot)
I recall discussions about v.1.0 skirmish. Fans were merciless till you created v.1.04, then they backed-off and started crying it was too hard (the handicapping UI was to finally settle even them down).
I still remember our first exchange on "map omniscience". Rightfully proud you were that the WZ skirmish a.i did NOT use that method like "Star Craft" which was really annoying.
BTW - have you had an opportunity to work with the
"xaitFramework" (by xaitment) ? Looks pretty awesome and could make a huge dif in the Indie Game dev world (I'd love to work with it, still too pricey for our budget).
alex wrote:By demonstrating our commitment to the users through the various rapid patches after release we were trying to build a community of people who would be able to keep making changes to the product. There was an intention to make warzone2120, so it was the feedback from you guys that would have really driven that title.
WZ 2120 may yet see the light of day with some of the potent developments on this Project's road map.
Sounds like you're still going strong yourself in the game business and that's good to hear especially these days when the industry is going through some fundamental tectonic shifts (thinking of the last GTA title, widely regarded as an unsustainable game biz model) putting many out of work.
Regards,Whip aka Rman.

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