Twelve Interviews #1: Kinoko

[[Cameron]]

It would be nice if I got interviewed, but then I guess you ahve to ahve done something..... *sulks*

[Chicky]

It was a nice read, great way to get to know fellow community members.


Hell, i can talk for hours about GuardDuty!

[LGM]

Do me next! Do me!

lol, but really. Great interview and great idea.

[Gregjazz]

Ten thousand years of pain!!!

Enjoy your trip to Japan.

[Helm]

Great interview. Nice idea. Didn't dwell on ags-community self-referencing too much, which is good because outsiders can read and enjoy too.

[Evil]

Very nice. I agree with Helm. I think asking questions, other then ags related, would be great. What they do in there free time, other hobbies they enjoy, interesting things about them, etc. That's would be the number one reason I dislike zine interviews, is that they are stuck on one single topic, which is usually boring.

[Andail]

Good stuff, as I'm a cirque-fan myself.
But:
Dunno about a sticky-thread, though, or a regular series of interviews, it'll just clutter up the forums and then everybody will wanna do it and everybody will wanna be interviewed.

I just don't find the public forum a place where one person should be specially exposed like this, as there's no fair way of selecting who's gonna be honoured, so I'd prefer that you keep it to one of the many ezines we have here. Vel's for instance. The format simply suits a private-edited medium better.

Just my two cents.

[m0ds]

A nice interview, thanks for sharing - Vince, and thanks for answering, Kinoko!

I don't think it warrants a sticky, to be frank there are quite a lot of interviews out there, in Azines, ezines and bzines. Why don't you consider teaming up with someone like Vel and put your interviews in his or a zine?

Also its a shame that people start asking if they can be interviewed. Await your turn, and if you're not ask - you're obviously not worthy, so make some games and make yourself worthy

[Vince Twelve]

I'm glad you guys enjoyed the interview.  But I see the concern and would like to address it.

First of all, I'd just like to state what I had imagined as the aim of this interview (or possibly series of interviews).

The goal of the interview (and any subsequent interviews) is not to promote an upcoming or newly released game, and it's not to talk about how great the interviewee is.  The goal is to get a few game-making tips out there from people who have finished successful games or people who are particularly accomplished or knowledgeable in a particular area related to the game-making process.  If just one person on this forum reads an interview and takes away something that he/she will apply during the production of his/her own game... success! 

Now, for the others, the seasoned vets out there, who don't need any advice on the game making process, they can read the interviews and possibly at least gain some entertainment from the more off-base questions or humorous replies that might be found in the interview.

I thought that this would be a perfect place to share a few of these insights via interviews (rather than the interviewee just starting their own thread just to share a few tips that they've picked up along the long and bumpy path that is adventure game making).  Here some of the less experienced (like myself) could pick up the tips as well.  Not just the ones who are ingrained into the community enough to DL and read an ezine (or an Azine or bzine... though I'm not really sure what those are mOds...  ).  Personally, (and seriously no offence, I'm going to go check it out as soon as I finish this reply) I've never read Vel's eZine nor do I even know, through casual reading of these forums, where to find it.  As such, I'm not sure that the 'zine reaches the audience to which this interview was meant to be tailored (reference Helm's and Evil's posts above).  Though I completely recognize that I could be 100% wrong and these eZines could be read by tons of people looking for inspiration for their own game.

As far as a sticky thread goes, that was just a passing suggestion by one poster, I don't really think it would fit a once a month or so feature like this, nor would this feature deserve such a distinction.

And regarding publicly "exposing" someone in a public forum:  it didn't seem to anger anyone, least of all Kinoko.  People post their opinions all the time in this forum.  An interview is just a way get out a few opinions without having to blurt them out in a post unprompted.  If feelings are hurt by one person being put on a pedestal for one thread, I would stop this immediately.  Please let me know if that's the case because that would totally go against the aforementioned goals.

As Andail mentioned, there's no fair way of selecting who's going to be featured (I feel that "honoured," apart from having an extra 'u,' [/american-centric thinking]  is a bit of a loaded term.  The interview, while it may make the interviewee feel special, isn't intended to bestow honor on the person, just allow that person to help others in the community).  The people chosen would be chosen by my own biased whim (though I'm always open to suggestions) as people who, I felt, had achieved something great along the lines of that month's topic.  And regarding people asking if they can be interviewed, those are at least partially in jest.  It should be clear that releasing something excellent and having some experience to share is the best way to find yourself getting any kind of attention in this community.

If these faults that have been pointed out make the feature more fit for something like a 'zine then I would certainly put it there if there were a 'zine that wanted it.  I'm not planning on producing one myself, but since three people, all of whom would be considered "seasoned" on these forums, have suggested restricting this to a 'zine it is certainly something that should be considered.

Sorry for the long post.  Thoughts?

ETA: Turns out I had never noticed Vel's eZine because when I would see a thread with the word eZine in the title I would generally ignore it, revealing my own personal unfamiliarity of eZines.  Found and read through a few copies of the AGS eZine.  They were well produced and a pretty good read.  I enjoyed the interview with Dave Gilbert, it was informative, but it had different aims from my interviews as it didn't ever touch on tips for developers.  One thing I couldn't surmise from the 'zine: How often are they produced?  Only the latest issue is dated and the games reviewed inside give me only a vague idea of the timeline.

[Andail]

I've always thought most ezines have had good intentions, but sometimes not enough content. The 'zines have the advantage - over the forums - of being able to unconditionally present personal opinions, and often well expressed and well founded such. 'Zines can be one-sided, biased, unfair and even rude, as long as it's entertaining.

I for one would like to see more extensive and comprehensive ags-zines.

[Kweepa]

The 'zines have the advantage - over the forums - of being able to unconditionally present personal opinions

You can say pretty much anything on these forums too, as long as you don't mind some discussion afterward.
There's nothing in the interview that requires relegating it to a zine, if you ask me.

I don't see the point of publishing a zine that only the people on these forums are going to read anyway. Might as well cut out the awkward step of downloading and messing around with a pdf. If you must "print", consider a web page. There's much less resistance to opening up a new browser window, so your audience will be larger.

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

Ok, so no sticky. Just a passing suggestion, like Vince said. But look at it this way - I read no EZines, because these forums are all the EZines I need. I have world news sometimes, I have the gossip's column sometimes, the community article, adventure-game news, even reviews and/or link to them... and now interviews, in a sorta-regular basis. That's all I meant. Saves me the trouble of getting an Ezine (not Vel's specifically, ANY Ezine) that doesn't, CAN'T, cover everything that I can already read in the forums.

[Ponch]

Can't we have our cake and eat it too? If Vince wants to do a monthly interview thread with whichever AGS superstar that strikes his fancy, then where's the harm in that?

It's not as though it's going to make Vel's eZine obsolete. Those interviews seem to be of a completely different flavor than this one was and, if anything, two spotlight formats would expose more of us to the larger AGS community than one.

And for all of you lining up ready to answer questions, this means that your chance at fifteen minutes of fame will have doubled! 

Personally, I would like to see what makes some of the more mysterious AGSers tick. Not all the interviews have to be with the obvious people. The thought of Twelve Interviews #2: Flukeblake makes me giggle like a schoolgirl. It might be a trainwreck or it might be really insightful look into one of the forums most misunderstood members. Either way, it would sure as hell be good entertainment! 

I agree that it doesn't have to be "sticky-ed" (is that a word?) but I'm willing to bet that if the people being interviewed are interesting enough then the thread will generate enough responses to keep in on the front page for a while.

Just my two cents, but I'd really like to see this thing continued.

- Ponch

[Andail]

The thought of Twelve Interviews #2: Flukeblake makes me giggle like a schoolgirl. It might be a trainwreck or it might be really insightful look into one of the forums most misunderstood members.

I was gonna write how much I disagreed with this notion, but I couldn't find expletives strong enough

[Vince Twelve]

The thought of Twelve Interviews #2: Flukeblake makes me giggle like a schoolgirl. It might be a trainwreck or it might be really insightful look into one of the forums most misunderstood members.

I was gonna write how much I disagreed with this notion, but I couldn't find expletives strong enough

Make yure you find them by Friday, because that's when I'm posting it...

[Ponch]

I was gonna write how much I disagreed with this notion, but I couldn't find expletives strong enough

Which is exactly why it would be such a riveting interview!

- Ponch


UPDATE!

Make yure you find them by Friday, because that's when I'm posting it...

Awesome! If this turns out to be a hoax, then I'll have lost all faith in humanity!

[Vince Twelve]

Yeah, it's not really happening...  at least not for #2.  But, Ponch, I was totally planning on squeezing him in as a surprising and controversial interview somewhere down the line if these were being warmly recieved.  And I agree, it would be either a complete trainwreck, or one of the most insightful things ever.

But now, since you ruined the surprise... scratch that idea... 

Seriously though, I've made email contact with the person who I hope to be my next victim, and if all goes well, it should be a pretty good one.