{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0\deflang1033\deflangfe2052{\fonttbl{\f0\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f1\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times New Roman;}}
\viewkind4\uc1\pard\nowidctlpar\f0\fs24 AN INTERVIEW WITH RATRACER\par
\par
Conducted by: Jerome \lang2057 jvdpr@yahoo.com\lang1033\par
14 April 2003\par
\par
Eduardo Campos aka Ratracer is an independent developer of adventure games using the AGS engine. His first game, called The Uncertainty Machine, is free for download at http://www.freewebs.com/ratracer/. Curious about the backgrounds of the game, it is time to ask him some questions.\par
\par
\b Hi Eduardo thanks for having this interview at JA+\par
\par
\b0 Hi, First of all, thank you very much for your interest (and JA+'s) in my game (and me...). Let\rquote s jump straight to the questions, then!\par
\par
\b I found the Easter-egg telling me your name is Eduardo Campos also known as Ratracer. Who or what is Ratracer. Is it just a name or did you choose your alias for some reason?\par
\par
\b0 Ratracer was my first (and only) nickname at an internet forum. It's just a nick, more than anything else, but if I want to find the reasons, here they are: The "racer" part of the name is related to a past dream of mine, of being a motorcycle racer. But "ratracer" because we all are in this ratrace, and also because I liked very much the comics book Ratrace of a french author which I don't recall the name at the moment. (\i Red. Bodine Amerikah\i0 )\par
\par
I'm 42 years and live in Porto, Portugal. I discovered the pleasure of adventure gaming with Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. I can't say I "always" wanted to create an adventure game myself; since I had no idea there were free adventure game engines, until I found AGS a year ago. My profession has nothing to do with games or something. I work in the IT dept. of a bank. Before AGS, my previous hobbies (because they were hobbies) were being a motorcycle racing team manager and journalist for motor racing magazines.\par
\par
\b To make a game like The Uncertainty Machine you must have a creative mind, it has quite a lot adventure game elements. What were your motives to create the game and did you have a big example while creating this game?\par
\par
\b0 I must start by thanking Chris Jones, the maker of the AGS (Adventure Game Studio) engine (which is freeware\f1  \f0 http://www.agsforums.com/), for providing us, amateur developers, a powerful and easy tool for creating adventure games and, as such, the possibility to full fill our dreams. \par
\par
I don't think I have a creative mind, really. As most adventure gamers, I think the plot is the strongest attribute of the genre, so I tried to write a story. I also wanted my game would have some mystery into it, which is the element I enjoy most when playing an adventure. \par
\par
But back to the creative point: there isn't really creation in my game, I just took out the influences of my favourite games and my favourite literature genre, mixing them as well as I could. My art skills are limited, so I situated the game in a modern city. It's a lot easier to draw a straight line than the wiggly curves of a cathedral. \par
\par
\b From the text on your website you might improve the music on The Uncertainty Machine; you mean the game is not finished yet? How long did you work on the game and will it ever be finished? \par
\par
\b0 The game is finished and I don\rquote t think there will be changes in the future. A friend of mine was writing a new score, but time has passed in the meantime, and it isn't ready yet.\par
\par
Because I feared that I would never finish it I had the intention not to take more than a year to develop the game. Surprisingly for me, I managed to stick to that schedule: exactly 12 months! Now the beta test is finished and corrected all bugs (I take a moment to thank all the people at gameboomers and agsforums, that did a great work testing and suggesting stuff), I'm in decompressing mode and really don't want to look back onto The Uncertainty Machine to make more improvements. So probably there will be no new music. \par
\par
\b Physics appears to be a major part in The Uncertainty Machine. Why your interest in this subject, Do you have such background?\par
\par
\b0 No special academic background apart from traditional high school stuff. However, I am a "believer" in science (even if the "moral" of the game may say otherwise), and I try to read books from Sagan, Feynman, Michio Kako, etc. as much as possible. I love SF-literature as well, preferably the books that aren't too fantastic and are based more on physical principles. Once again, it was mainly a source for inspiration but if the physics look somewhat reasonable it's because I took some ideas from Arthur C. Clarke's The Gods Themselves. I hope I changed those enough not to be a rip-off, but I can't deny that I based the physics behind the "other dimensions" on that book. My next game, if there is one, may have a totally different background, based on something I like some idea I take from a book, a movie, or something else. \par
\par
\b With The Uncertainty Machine, do you want to send a word to the players of the game? I mean what is the moral of the game?\par
\par
\b0 One of the reasons I enjoyed so much developing my game is that I wrote the story as I was developing (drawing, scripting, writing puzzles) it. By the way, this is not the best way of creating a game; you should write the whole plot, before doing anything else, to avoid inconsistencies later on. But my unorganized way was more enjoyable since I didn't know how the plot would be. It was almost as I was actually playing it myself.\par
\par
Anyway, I am telling you this, to make clear that any moral in my game was coincidental. The Divide bit of the plot was thrown in the game very late in the development stages by changing backgrounds to include graffiti\rquote s, changing dialogs to add lines about the Off Limiters, etc. At that moment, I tried to introduce some kind of message in the game. But I never wanted to be too explicit about it because I changed my mind about the plot too many times. So, if I say that the Citizens are supposed to represent the western world and the Off Limiters are the equivalents of the third world countries it may be a totally different interpretation of the players. \par
\par
To conclude this reasoning, the Divide part of the plot was forced: as you play the game that subplot gets buried only to resurface at the end. There are also references to freedom and truth, but those are mostly a strike of luck. I was having a difficult time thinking of endings that somehow would wrap up most of loose bits lying around. Then I read an interview of a contemporary Portuguese poet (I just reread that interview in the newspaper and found out I got his name wrong in the game I might have to change that) that said the lines that got referenced in the game (Hmmm, this part of the answer is getting to be a bit of a spoiler) and gave me the idea for the museum bit and Mathus choice. If the game has a moral, if you want, hopefully it will be subjective, and it will be interpreted in different ways by different players.\par
\par
More than anything else, I am getting carried away here, and the game should not be taken seriously. It's just a game.\par
\par
\b Can we expect more work from you in future, and are you exploring more techniques, if so what are you having in mind?\par
\par
\b0 I hope so. I have been trying to improve my 3D skills, not because it's trendy, but because I don't like hand drawing. I think I can draw so-so, but I'm much too slow. The worst part of creating the game was the awful amount of time everything took to draw, especially animations. So, I hope I can learn to draw a lot faster with 3D tools. After that, I'll start thinking of new stuff. One thing I will try to do is to limit the developing time to one year if I manage to draw faster. Hopefully, the game length of my next game will be longer. I don't know how my next game will be; just it will be third person perspective and will receive influences from my favourite games. But, in the meantime I am also taking part in a team to work on a better developed game (than the Uncertainty Machine). I don't know if the other members want it to keep it secret from the time being, so......\par
\par
\b Thanks Eduardo for your time answering these questions. \par
\par
\b0 Thanks. I hope I wasn't too wordy. I'm pretty quiet most of the time, but once I'm on it, I tend not to stop. :-)\par
\par
\pard\nowidctlpar\fi-288\li288\lang2057 Copyright \'a9 2003 Jerome for http://www.justadventure.com/, all rights preserved.\lang1033\par
}