Good Deal Games - Classic Videogame Games INTERVIEW

INTERVIEW
Bastian Schick

Bastian Schick is a German programmer which has programmed many games
for the Atari Lynx, and has his hands in a few other projects, as well.

MT> What inspired you to create new Lynx games?
BS> The joy of fun. It was/is fun hacking on the Lynx. And if so, why not programming a game ? :-)

MT> How did you approach creating a new title? How did you go about obtaining the knowledge and tools to create new Lynx games?
BS> A friend of mine (Lars Baumstark) and I started to re-engineer the Lynx with the minimal knowledge out of Lynx FAQ. Later I did a official project for a German company which was an official Atari developer => I got my hands on the full documentation.

MT> Technically, what was required for the task of programming for the Lynx?
BS> Some assembler experience and (as with most things ) the will to learn new stuff.

MT> SIMIS was released in early '98, was this the first homebrew Lynx release?
BS> No ! You came in late, isn't it ? :-) I first wrote T-Tris which I started in early 1993 and was released in 1994
(if I remember correctly).
MT> Actually, I have a personal copy of T-Tris - silly me!

MT> How many cartridges of SIMIS were created?
BS> About 300.

MT> You programmed the games Invaders, Mines, Isolation, and the demos of Poly and Wolfenstein 3D. In which order were these fashioned?
BS> Hard to say. Most of it was developed in parallel and just as demos. Only Invaders was developed for a release. The others have been polished for release when I saw that Invaders is not enough for a release on its own.

MT> It is great to be able to play the classic Space Invaders on the Lynx. The other games were based on previous released games as well. Did you consider creating original games?
BS> I am craftsman not an artsman. Will say, I am good in preparing tools (assembler, debugger) and in re-doing stuff but I am not very innovative. Esp. new game ideas :(.

MT> While programming, did you discover anything about the Lynx hardware? Nice surprises, technical disappointments, et cetera?
BS> Nice suprises, yes, the fact the Suzy (the Sprite Engine) can draw an arbitrary triangle with only one command. And that Suzy can draw lines. Of course a programmer esp. when (s)he reaches the limits wants to have more speed, more colors etc. But I learned that it is mostly me who reached a limit in thinking.

MT> Why was Wolfenstein just a demo, and not a completed game? Technical limitations such as the low frame rate of 6 seconds, lack of interest, or some other factor?
BS> The low frame rate and the lack of a good idea how to make it faster. The W3D engine is based on a C program once published in a German computer magazine intended for x86 PC. So it is not optimal for the Lynx.

MT> Matthias Domin created the game Snake Bite, Dungeon demo and the Marble Madness demo for the SIMIS cartridge. Were these coded after you programmed your games, prior to, or at the same time? Were you each valuable resources for each other?
BS> Matthias started hacking the Lynx later. His demos/games were coded more or less like mine : In parallel. When I saw that I could not get enough on the cart I asked him (and Carl but we did not come to an agreement) to participate. Then he started to polish his demos/games a bit for the release.

MT> Do you have any memorable video game experience you would like to share?
BS> To be honest, I am a coder not a gamer. E.g. my Jaguar, it is only used as CD-player :-)
MT> Ouch, that'll hurt a lot of people!

MT> I understand that you have broadened your programming interests. What have you been doing during the last few years since completing SIMIS?
BS> I did stick to an embedded system. Currently I am programming a real-time operating system for different processores (ARM,Mcore,V850,SH2). Because of this, I do not do much for the Lynx.

MT> Lynx players throughout the world would like to thank you for creating new games for us to play on our aging Lynx portables. Is there anyone that you'd like to thank? Someone who may have helped you technically or supported you through your hard work?
BS> At first all of those who bought T-Tris and gave me the will to publish SIMIS. Of course all the SIMIS buyers. Thank you.

A big thankyou goes also the Harry Dodgson, with whom I share the Lynx hobby now for over 7 years. Also all the others like Carl Forhan, Mattias Domin, Duranik, Rob Nicholson ....

MT> And we thank you!

Good Deal Games would like to give a BIG THANK YOU to Bastian
for sharing his wisdom and time with us.

Visit Bastian Schick's Website
E-Mail: Bastian Schick