Interview with Grey Alien

OK folks,
Here is another interview. This time I talked with Jake Birkett. All those interviews have one common goal - help me (and you) create successful indie business (either by improving your website or games). Expect more interviews (unless community gets sick of them )

Interview with Jake Birkett (Grey Alien), Big Fish Games Lead Programmer




Have a good reading!
Roman

I liked Grey's Iron Fist game I hope that gets going again.

And I wasn't aware that Fairway Solitaire was designed by someone else.

Thanks for posting!

Nor was I! Quite surprised to hear that, I thought it was his own little jewel.

Nice article though :)

he made no secret it was someone elses vision (perhaps the gfx artists?), he just freelanced the code aspect

Enjoyed the interview thanks. Nice to see those positive words about Blitzmax in there.

Hmm...yeah I guess that's the real depiction of his job. He's not designing but just coding the games. Big, no...HUGE difference. But worth notoriety nonetheless. Great job! ;)

@Sauer: Yeah I was thinking about doing Iron Fist in BMax the other day.

Yeah when I originally posted about Fairway I said it was originally designed by John Cutter, a Senior Designer at BFG Seattle. I converted it from an online version and then we discussed what extra features to add in and then I programmed those and added lots of little details to the game that weren't in the online version. So I was more the micro-designer and John was the macro-designer if that makes sense.

My current game was also originally designed by John Cutter, but we've overhauled the design a lot and so I've got a design credit too. They respect my design skills (I also designed 3x Match-3 games too of course) and that's why my title here is Lead Programmer/Designer because for my next game I'll be mainly designing it whilst checking in with a producer/designer BFG Seattle and I'll be helping other teams with their designs in the Vancouver Office. I can see myself moving into a Producer/Designer role in the future which will be fun.

Aww you should keep it in Blitz Plus :)

OOP is great but...

@Sauer: It was beginning to get unmanageable in BPlus without OOP that was part of the problem. Anyway, we've derailed Roman's thread.

Are you missing your two front teeth Jake, or is that just a bad picture?

funny you should ask but I've always had pretty weird teeth and I got a brace fitted a few months back to sort it out. The teeth you can see are two incisors that poked out at quite an angle whilst my middle teeth went back a bit. Now they are all straight. Time for a new photo I guess. Apart from the teeth it's one of my better photos.

you can't have my teeth, the dentist kept them in a jar to help pay his wages ;) (i only have just over a dozzen left)

Oh cool about the braces, I thought it was maybe a trick of the light. I have buck teeth myself.

I know a guy with lots of teeth missing, when he smiles you can see he has no front teeth top or bottom.

What do you eat with so few teeth, Ginger Tea?

same as when i had alot of broken teeth
oodles and oodles of chocolate :)

That probably explains the lack of teeth. ;)