I think people keep asking to interview me because they want to see if I say something stupid. It’s pretty much a guarantee that I will say something inflammatory, but I think they want me to say something really and truly horrifyingly stupid. To that I will only say, “it’s only a matter of time so keep the questions coming, I dare you!”
~ Das Vega
So, I was minding my own business and perusing the Kotaku boards this morning when I got slapped in the face by this article:
Bulletstorm? Really? Epic is so jealous of our success and mad shooting skills that they are jumping on the BulleTrain coat tails already? C’mon Cliffy, we know that you’re hurting right now what with your Unreal engine being slapped around by Unity3D, but this is a cheap shot. Seriously dude (huge) are we that much of a threat to you that you gotta horn in on our parade? We don’t have ANY chainsaws in our game in respect to you, but you gotta go and steal our Bullets? If there’s a giant flying space train in your game I would be expecting a call from our lawyer.
~ Manny V. (sounds much cooler than Cliffy B am I right?)
For the two people who visit our site regularly, and were not already linked here via the Gamasutra article, here’s the link:
Gamasutra Interview!!
To say that we are honored to have the chance to have an interview on Gamasutra would be an understatement. Until now, Gamasutra has just been the place we visited to look for work and to troll the comments to make ourselves feel superior. Now we are on the fabled website and people are contacting us offering their services to help Downsized in our endeavors. It’s truly a nerve wracking, but thrilling, experience and I have never talked so much on the phone or typed so much email in my life! Thanks to all of you who have sent kind words, I can’t reply to everyone but know that it is appreciated. Here’s a few more screen shots to whet the appetite, and quell the rumors that we just fabricated the web site to drum up press. Hopefully we’ll be better prepared to be outed.
Welcome to those of you who are visiting us for the first time because of the awesome Kotaku article posted today. It’s strange to get a text from a friend that reads “you are Kotaku famous now!” and having no idea what they are talking about. I rushed to my cell phone, that was already in my hand from reading the text, and painfully waited for the Kotaku website to load. I admit, I was a bit nervous, I thought that there might be some unfortunate pictures of me circulating from GDC. To my utter relief though, it was for BulletTrain, and we still have no idea who we talked to that gave us up. Whoever it was… THANKS!
We are hard at work ironing out the kinks, and making the game even more fun. It’s a simple concept really, but I’m surprised how much goes into making even the simplest of games. Granted, this is a new platform for all of us, but it’s been great to get our hands dirty and make art and code for our own ideas for once. For me personally it’s been a life altering experience just to draw again and see how it all comes together.
Of course, there are some comments from people who apparently take everything at face value and have no appreciation for tongue-in-cheek. It’s really sad that in this world of social networking and sexting that people still believe everything they read, unless it ends in a “winky-face” 😉 So just in case there are some FBI agents reading this blog who do not have functioning Sarcasmeters, I never had any intention of becoming a hired assassin (I can’t vouch for Andrew). Yes we were all laid off by EA. Yes it sucked. Yes it got us together and got the creative juices flowing. Yes we are having a lot of fun poking fun and making a FREAKIN’ VIDEO GAME! Lighten up already, things are too serious in the world to not enjoy dissing your boss… 😉 (/sarcasm) lol, wtf, hah-hah… sigh.
~ Manny
So I’m having lunch with Andrew, basically the same thing we did almost every weekday, except this time it had been two or three days since EA shut down Pandemic Studios leaving most of us without anything to do. I don’t think it had sunk in yet, but it was strange that we finished eating… and then just sat there wondering what to do next. You can only send out so many resume’s before you need to let the job postings refresh. We started talking about how messed up the entire situation was. Over 200 people laid off, and all looking for jobs. The same jobs that we were looking for at that. It was at this point we decided that we would become hired assassins who got paid to eliminate the competition in the job market. Sure we’d have to kill some friends, but for the most part we’d get to finally put a bullet into some of those damn smug programmers and designers… not to mention those art guys who are so damn proud of their tree texture they just won’t shut up about it. Anyways, we drew up our plans (both secretly plotting to kill off the other once the cherry jobs became open) and made plans to buy some guns, and maybe make T-shirts with cool logos of a gas mask with X’s over the eyes. Luckily before the bloodshed began Ariel called me and said, “Hey, wanna make an iPhone game?” The rest, as you see, is history.
On a totally unrelated topic, did you know that you can not return a rifle or ammunition after you purchase it?
~Manny