Mark's CV (by Mark) D.O.B. : 27/12/1967 Education : 11 years at high school. 2 months at Tech & 3 weeks at University. Programming history : Started tootling around in BASIC on a TRS-80 at about 13. Got into Z80 and 6502 assembler about a year later. Mainly self taught, but learnt heaps looking through the Apple ]['s ROM (Steve Wozniak rules!). This is probably how I picked up most of the theory behind writing compilers. Went to a school which was pretty up with the computer scene, which helped a lot. Left school at 16 and, after some pretty unsuccessful attempts at tertiary education, decided to leave the computer scene behind and explore the wilder side of life... 5 years later, and with one mother of a hangover, got back into the swing of things. At the time, software companies were dropping like flies, so my first 3 comeback efforts were short-lived success stories. However, the unemployment benefit back then was generous enough to actually live off (not so in NZ these days!), so I kept at it... These days, things are working out pretty good, and for the last couple of years, I've actually generated some income for myself. Still seem to have a knack for letting myself get ripped off though... FIRST GAME 'Shoot the pixel' on a TRS-80 computer at my old man's office. You fired by hitting the 'break' key then typing 'goto 100' really quickly. OTHER GAMES Cosmic Kamikaze (Basic, Apple ][, Galaxians style game) Magpie (first ASM game, Apple ][, a little like Defender) Dinky Kong (first commercial game, VIC-20) Zeron (VIC-20) Mercenary (VIC-20, Scrambler with 16 zones) A really hot version of Zaxxon on the Vic-20 which I enjoyed anyway... Leapin' Louie (C16, a cheesy platform game (first and last!)) Tomb of Tarabash (C16, an annoying, boring hit-the-switch-to-open-the door type game) Sproing (C64, a weird cross between Q-BERK and crystal castles) StarWarp (C64, vaguely similar to StarGate) Zeron (Amiga, sold to Software Horizons - who promptly died) Sorcerors Apprentice (Amiga, sold to CRL who...shit, not again!) Oblivion (Amiga, share-where's-the-money? just about ready to give up here...) Defender (Amiga, PD) Overkill (Amiga, ripped off badly here courtesy of DIGISOFT Australia...) Guardian (Amiga, refer to Amiga Power for a disturbingly frank appraisal) OTHER SHIT BASIC compilers on Apple ][, Vic-20 and Amiga, including Blitz Basics 1 & 2. A multitasking GUI for the C64 which was way better than GEOS, but, well, wasn't. Assemblers on just about everything, including the classic 'Hendrix' assembler and infamous 'Tokasm'. THOUGHTS ON THE AMIGA On an absolute scale, the Amiga's a bit gutless. However, for the price I think it's still way ahead of the competition (Sega, SNES etc.). The CD32 should have had some fast RAM on it (software switchable 1M/2M CHIP RAM would have been nice). For games, the A1200 and CD32 are not actually that great an improvement on the older Amigas - the extra colours are nice, but it takes the blitter longer to move stuff around. The display fetch mode helps speed things up, but I reckon they should have done the same thing with the blitter. THOUGHTS ON BLITZ BASIC When I started out on Blitz 2, the main aim was to create a powerful programming tool which could be extended and, eventually, maintained by users. This seems to be what's happening, so, groovy. I'd like to see Blitz majorly revamped with a new editor, new manuals and so on, but at the moment there isn't really enough time or money to do this. Acid has released the source code to TED to several developers so, with a bit of luck, a new editor could be on it's way. THOUGHTS ON GUARDIAN I don't know, I reckon the Amiga's at a bit of a loss when it comes to 3D stuff. Guardian doesn't move as fast, have as much detail, or does as much as I'd like it to. Fortunately, the Amiga does let you get away with a number of cute tricks - like the colour cycling copper split horizon, and 64 pixel wide sprite-mountains. The freedom of movement thing is also a bit of a problem as it's hard to give the player a real incentive for flying all over the place - this is mainly why I went for the defender-ish scenario. On the plus side, Guardian's the first 3D game I actually enjoy playing. Like most of the stuff I've written, it's basically a fast, blasty full on shoot-em-up with cool explosions. It has certainly been enlightening doing a 3D game - you've got to treat just about every aspect of a game differently than if you're doing a 2D game, especially the player control and alien intelligence. THOUGHTS ON THE GAMING SCENE IN GENERAL I'm getting sick of all the CD hype. I think CD is great, but just because it can do certain things, doesn't mean it should. At the moment, there seems to be a lot of big-money marketing type dickheads around trying to push their idea of a good game onto the public. I might be a bit of a purist when it comes to games, but I don't see how playing back pre-rendered images could be described as 'interactive' - which, surely, is what games are all about. There's also a scary kind of feeling around at the moment that the days of the solo game maker are numbered. As more and more rich-kids are realising how much money games can make them, the whole scene is turning into a 'corporate rock' type situation, where people are buying games not because they're all that good, but because there's not really much else to choose from. I'm also tired of the Saturn/PSX crap. The machines aren't even around yet, but the media have probably already sold more units than a good game would. Some magazines have even had the gall to compare existing hardware with these wonder machines. I'm sure they're gonna be great and everything, but THEY'RE NOT HERE YET! I'd like to see various magazines easing off on the CD32 'shovelware' trip. It's weird how no one bats an eyelid when an Amiga to megadrive conversion is identical, but an Amiga to CD32 conversion is always expected to be a zillion times better. Finally, I'd like to see some kind of developers association (better not say 'union') set up, as I've seen way too many developers ripped off. THOUGHTS ON THE FUTURE I'd love to see gameplay diversify into many different areas, in a similar way to the progress of the music industry. I'd also like to see some of the older type games making a comeback - I'm getting sick of hearing that a particular style of game has been deemed 'outdated', and I want my text adventures back! THOUGHTS ON ACID Where's the return key gone? Why are all the number keys blank? God I'm thirsty... LIKES Music, computer games, mind altering substances, arguing for the hell of it, beating Simon at Skidmarks, reconstructing source code from crashed disk drives, playing the gat, jumping up and down on the off-beat, waking up without a hangover. DISLIKES PCs, C programmers, highscore routines (guess what I'm doing next week!), this font, violence, oppression, prejudice. REFERENCE Mark is a sporadic worker who's personal habits and distracted manner make for a difficult person to work with. He is unreliable, dishonest and extremely discourteous. I thouroughly recomend Mark to any pub without a dress code. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ RAGS TO RICHES Acid software's mercurial rise to fame is indeed the stuff of fairy tales. From it's humble beginnings at the 'house of noise' (just up from the caravan park) to it's current premises in exotic Parnell, the story of Acid software is one of faith, hope and love, but not without it's fair share of heartache and despair. So just what IS Acid software? To answer this multi-faceted question, we must turn our attention to what can only be described as a quite remarkable slice of history... IN THE BEGINNING Once upon a time, two friends shared a flat in Auckland, NZ. Their names were Simon and Mark, and although they lived fairly contended and eventful lives, they both felt something was missing. "I know", said Simon one day, "Let's start a computer company". "Wow!" said Mark enthusiastically, "Great idea! We can import PC clones dirt cheap and flog them off for a killing!" "Well, that's not really what I had in mind", Simon explained. "I was thinking more of selling stuff we do ourselves". "Do?" murmered Mark. "Stuff? Wont that involve work?". "More than likely" declared Simon determinedly. "In fact, probably a lot of work. Still, at least we get to sit down all day...". "Count me in then!" agreed Mark, and promptly threw up and passed out. LATER... Acid's seminal project, Zeron, was nearing completion. A Defender clone (oops, variant), Zeron was destined to make the lads a small fortune. A deal had been signed with heavy weight publishers Software Horizons, and nothing