Interview John Husges profile at NMA

[Saint_Proverbius]

Tags: Black Isle Studios; Fallout 3 (Van Buren)

<b>Odin</b> of <A href="http://www.nma-fallout.com/">No Mutants Allowed</a> has informed me that they have a <A href="http://www.nma-fallout.com/article.php?id=7242">profile interview</A> posted on their site about <b>John Husges</b> of <A href="Http://www.blackisle.com">Black Isle Studios</a>. Here's a clip:
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<blockquote>I’ve been a Californian all my life, raised in the town of Newbury Park up in Ventura County. After graduating from UCLA back in ’98, I cancelled my plans for law school and took a very low-paying QA job at Interplay instead. It seemed to make a lot of sense at the time…
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But, the job was a heck of a lot of fun, despite the long hours, lack of prestige, and crappy pay. Eventually, I worked up the courage to submit a design test to Black Isle. I utterly crushed the competition (or so I like to imagine) and got brought onboard as a junior designer for Jefferson and then Van Buren.
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In my post-Interplay days, I have successfully brought greenery and life to the once-barren patch of land out in front of my townhouse.</blockquote>
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So, yeah, another one that never actually developed a released game. Props for wanting to make a space travelling type CPRG <i>with heavy CRPG elements</i> though. Someone needs to make one since it's been over a decade since we've seen a good one.
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[plin]

Good read like all the others. Some was funny too.

 

[EEVIAC]

What was the last space RRG? The last I can recall are the Buck Rogers games.

 

[Spazmo]

Escape Velocity Nova almost qualifies. I'd call it an excellent action RPG but just an average proper RPG.

 

[Voss]

What was the last space RRG? The last I can recall are the Buck Rogers games.

Hee. Those...ha.
Woo.
Talk about a dungeon crawl in space.

 

[The Situationist]

At the other end of the spectrum, there’s fun little activities like blowing up Hoover Dam and unleashing a tidal wave of toxic, radioactive water, wiping out whole towns and permanently altering the game world’s landscape.

Was this planned for FO3? I remember John Deiley saying that Hoover Dam was a location in the game.

Radical.

 

[Odin]

Was this planned for FO3? I remember John Deiley saying that Hoover Dam was a location in the game.

Yup, you could actually do this in the game..

 

[Sol Invictus]

* oops hope nobody read that. not supposed to say *

 

[plin]

At the other end of the spectrum, there’s fun little activities like blowing up Hoover Dam and unleashing a tidal wave of toxic, radioactive water, wiping out whole towns and permanently altering the game world’s landscape.

Was this planned for FO3? I remember John Deiley saying that Hoover Dam was a location in the game.

Radical.

Where'd you get that quote from?

 

[The Situationist]

At the other end of the spectrum, there’s fun little activities like blowing up Hoover Dam and unleashing a tidal wave of toxic, radioactive water, wiping out whole towns and permanently altering the game world’s landscape.

Was this planned for FO3? I remember John Deiley saying that Hoover Dam was a location in the game.

Radical.

Where'd you get that quote from?

Er, in the article?

 

[plin]

heh, I didn't see it. I'll re-read it again.

edit: Yeah, I see it, I skipped over that parapraph in my first read.

 

[EEVIAC]

Talk about a dungeon crawl in space.

I actually don't remeber that much about Countdown To Doomsday. I vaguely remember it being the first party-based RPG I really got into, the ship to ship fighting and boarding, but that just might be me slipping into reverie. Oh, and the microwave guns. More games need microwave guns.

You'd think with all the appropriation of old ideas in modern game development, someone would run through their old C64 game collection (or a Gamespy "Great Games We Don't Really Give A Fuck About" list,) see Starflight, get a hard-on, put two and two together, and go pitch an idea for a remake. There was a stack of content in that game and that might scare developers/publishers though.

On second thought, I hope they don't re-make Starflight. I can picture it now, FP dogfighting-style ship combat, FP planetary missions against alien crawlies, set NPC romances... No thanks.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

There was one that I had for the Amiga that was a PC port. I never could remember it's name, but it was turn based. It had ship to ship combat and allowed boarding. I remember it had rifles as the main weapons, and the weapons had ammo types similar to Wasteland, though there was a 12.5MM rifle. I remember that there were also very small planetary locations as well as space bases, but these were mostly combat zones. This was back in the late 1980s.

 

[Ultron]

I had a great time playing Buck Rogers "Matrix Cubed".....I miss the space CPRG genre.

Isn't Geneforge considered a space CRPG? I've never looked into it....

 

[Psilon]

No, it's definitely fantasy. It's got some genetic engineering as performed by the Shapers, but it's most emphatically not a "space CRPG."

 

[Ultron]

Bummer...so Vogel hasn't made any Space CRPGs? I would think that's a huge untapped market for him....

 

[Voss]

Talk about a dungeon crawl in space.

I actually don't remeber that much about Countdown To Doomsday. I vaguely remember it being the first party-based RPG I really got into, the ship to ship fighting and boarding, but that just might be me slipping into reverie. Oh, and the microwave guns. More games need microwave guns.

Well, they ran off the same 'engine' as the AD&D gold box games. And worked in a lot of the same ways, but with different species coming from genetically engineered variations for different planets in the solar system. And classes (warior, engineer, medic, rogue). And the weapons were better depending on what planet they came from (martian weapons were +1, venusian +2, mercurian +3). That sort of thing. And rocket launchers stood in pretty well for fireballs. (and in fact used the same animation as some of the later gold box games)

Of course, it was based on a buck rodger's pnp RPG that TSR put back in the days of the 'flood every market' strategy. It was essentially 2nd edition D&D twitched a little bit to make it spaceworthy.

 

[mr. lamat]

Oh, and the microwave guns. More games need microwave guns.

yes! and plasma ejectors! and railguns! and nano-tech grenades! and more shotguns... i don't care how advanced the tech is, there's always a place for a good sawed-off.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Found the game I was thinking about, it's called Star Command. SSI made it.

 

[Sol Invictus]

Nothing beats the Cryo gun from Crusader: No Regret.

 

[Psilon]

It didn't open doors or leave loot though. Give me the grenade or rocket launchers any day.

 

[Sol Invictus]

Yes, but there's a certain novelty to freezing your enemy and shattering him into a million pieces. I liked putting teleport disruptors on the teleports, too. Those were great. AHahahaha!!!!!

 

[EEVIAC]

lamat - you should try out Star Command (you can download from the link Saint posted.) It has shotguns, Gauss rifles, Lasers, and even some Flechettes.

 

[Sammael]

Yes, but there's a certain novelty to freezing your enemy and shattering him into a million pieces.

Duke Nukem 3D. Mortal Kombat 2.

 

[Sol Invictus]

Well, it was certainly a novelty in isometric games.