February/march 1995 GAME DEVELOPER MAGAZINE GAME PLAN GGAMEAEM The No Editor Larry O’Brien [email protected] Go Logo Senior Editor Nicole Freeman [email protected] Production Editors Barbara Hanscome [email protected] here may never be a game with a over your home’s Ethernet backbone (that Nicole Claro “Windows ’95 Compatible” logo, is, is it mail-enabled)? Second, can you [email protected] not even from Microsoft. embed an Excel spreadsheet of your Editorial Assistant Diane Anderson Microsoft, by arrogant fiat, has inventory in the middle of your character [email protected] decided that the seemingly literal sheet (that is, does it support OLE 2.0)? Contributing Editors Alex Dunne phrase, with it’s seemingly Do you have a tabbed dialog that walks [email protected] straightforward purpose, should you through the game (that is, do you Chris Hecker [email protected] be held hostage to the whims of have Wizards)? Finally, does it work on a David Sieks Tsome Redmondian marketing genius. different operating system, with a different [email protected] Windows ’95, the new operating system base architecture including a different Wayne Sikes from Microsoft, will roll out later this year tasking model (that is, Windows NT)? [email protected] and, largely due to the bundling agree- In other words, to be “compatible” Editor-at-Large Alexander Antoniades ments Microsoft has with clone makers, with Windows ’95, your game has to be a [email protected] will quickly gain its greatest marketshare mail-enabled, en-Wizarded OLE Server Cover Photography Charles Ingram Photography in the home computer market. application that runs under NT. All criti- To run under Windows ’95, your cism to date about this policy has come Publisher Veronica Costanza program will have to do one of two things: from shrinkwrap application vendors, who Group Director Regina Starr Ridley run as a Windows program, with the have pointed out that this is burdensome input, output, and multitasking methods even for office products. Honestly, Advertising Sales Staff dictated by the Win32 API, or run in a though, I can understand the argument West/Southwest virtualized DOS box. that “compatible” when applied to an Yvonne Labat (415) 905-2353 [email protected] It’s likely that much of the hard-won office application may mean a certain set New England/Midwest knowledge of how to get the most perfor- of services above and beyond display ser- Kristin Morgan (212) 626-2498 mance from machines running DOS may vices. With entertainment products, the [email protected] no longer work on machines running very products most needy of some kind of Windows ’95. We all know how few validation, this argument is without merit. Marketing Manager Susan McDonald games run in the DOS boxes of Windows I suggest two courses of action. First, Art Director/Marketing Christopher H. Clarke 3.1, the Windows ’95 DOS box will be complain to Bill Gates himself, asking for Advertising Production Coordinator Denise Temple like that (except different in unknown a reconsideration of the policy or suggest- Director of Production Andrew A. Mickus ways). The only answer seems to be the ing an alternative “Ready to Run Under Vice President/Circulation Jerry M. Okabe off-putting boot disk. Microsoft Windows ’95” validation appro- Group Circulation Director Gina Oh Your alternative is to create a true priate for digital entertainment products. Circulation Manager Kathy Henry Windows application. There are some Mail directed to [email protected] will Circulation Assistant Phil Payton advantages, the greatest of which is device not get through without being screened, Newsstand Manager Pam Santoro independence. Lifting the burden of pro- but it will be read by someone and, per- Reprints Stella Valdez (415) 655-4269 gramming for every video and sound haps, even by Gates himself. Second, cre- MillerFreeman chipset in the known world should free up ate a utility—a character editor or some A MEMBER OF THE UNITED NEWSPAPERS GROUP time for...well...learning the confines of such—that has all the necessary compo- Chairman of the Board Graham J.S. Wilson the Windows API. nents. The functionality or appropriate- President/CEO Marshall W. Freeman But let’s say that you’ve PeekMessaged ness isn’t important, this is just a silly way Executive Vice President/COO Thomas L. Kemp and PostMessaged your way around the to get around the silly restrictions. With Senior Vice Presidents H. Vern Packer, Donald A. event queue; your program is WinGed and such a utility, your game isn’t overly bur- Pazour, Wini D. Ragus WinTooned, and you’re the happiest little dened, your box gets the logo, and your Vice President/CFO Warren (Andy) Ambrose WinCamper in the whole wide Win- users, if you have a dynamite game, are Vice President/Administration Charles H. Benz World. Can you put that logo on your oblivious to this tempest in a teakettle. ■ Vice President/Production Andrew A. Mickus game? Not even close. Vice President/Circulation Jerry Okabe First, can you send your saved game Larry O’Brien, Editor Vice President/Software Development Division Regina Starr Ridley 2 GAME DEVELOPER • FEBRUARY 1995 CROSSFIRE The Golden Era of Siliwood Alex Dunne inety years after it first burst Hollywood is the undisputed entertain- onto the scene, the cinema is ment mecca of the world. Take the fact undergoing a renaissance. that the French refused to drop eco- As the artistic lines More than just a rebirth, nomic barriers to the American film actually, it’s really a fusion industry during the Uruguay round of with computer and video the General Agreement on Tariffs and games that’s resulting in Trade (GATT) talks a couple of years separating Hollywood some cool entertainment: a ago. Why? Because they feared that a Nnew breed of interactive, “live-action” flood of American movies into France games featuring Hollywood movie would strangle the relatively small stars. Such games, like Hell, Under a French film industry. Killing Moon, and Wing Commander America is good at delivering and Silicon Valley III, are coming out with more frequen- entertainment to the world, hence its cy, and they’re boosting the acting value to our country as a viable com- careers of some people in Tinseltown. modity. As we enter the 21st century Before we look at live-action and face increasing technological com- increasingly blur, two games, let’s first take a quick look into petition from abroad, American enter- the past. The evolution of the Ameri- tainment is going to be a lucrative can film industry might be a good export for the country. I predict that a model to explore in attempting to significant component of that enter- major entertainment extrapolate the future of these games tainment export will consist of live- and their impact. action games that star American actors First invented by Thomas Edison and actresses. Like the early cinema, in the late 19th century, motion pic- however, live-action games have some industries—film and tures were a new form of entertainment technical hurdles to clear before they that appealed to the masses, relied on attain widespread popularity: better state-of-the-art technology, and made player navigation and better player stars out of performers like Charlie interaction. computer and video Chaplin, Rudolph Valentino, and Mary Pickford. As film technology evolved, Enter the Dragon so grew the impact of the industry on Live-action games have roots that can the nation. The first movies shown in be traced back to that (in)famous nickelodeons were 10 minutes long, arcade game Dragon’s Lair. I remem- games—find they black-and-white, and silent. However, ber it well—as a vidiot in the early as the medium evolved, sound and 1980s, I dropped way too many quar- color were added, and movies got ters into that game at the local pizza beefed out to two hours in length. (I parlor (it was one of the first games might not make such won’t even talk about today’s cutting- that demanded 50 cents, which really edge advancements like THX sur- chapped my hide). Looking back, the round-sound and IMAX screens.) game wasn’t as exciting as other arcade In terms of their economic impact, games of its day, yet one element made strange bedfellows. look where American movies are today. it unique: rather than being composed GAME DEVELOPER • FEBRUARY 1995 5 CROSSFIRE of sprites and tiles, it was an animated development is being threatened by action adventure and role-playing cartoon you played off a laser disc. increasingly educated and efficient games suffer from a stifling story line The game was based on a series of third-world countries, the marriage of that forces players to pursue a limited short cartoon scenes spliced together in entertainment and technology will defi- course of action through the game real time and controlled by the player’s nitely give the resulting products the world. If you screw up at a particular actions at key junctures in the game. 21st-century spin they’ll need. juncture (zigged when you should have Using liberal amounts of fast-twitch I recently had a brush with Sili- zagged, and subsequently got shot by a muscle tissue and a good memory, the wood. This past summer I was fortunate bullet, for instance), you’re forced to plot of Dragon’s Lair came together, to be invited to the making of a new live- back up to the beginning of the scene and the player eventually rescued the action game, The Daedalus Encounter, where you died, listen to the same dia- princess from the dragon.