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"You've ain't even impressed no more -
you're used to it!"
- Eminem
On paper, 2004 was my strongest year thus far and
produced a steady flow of the most ambitious projects yet. However, underneath the surface something wasn't quite clicking.
By the year's end, my "best" games yet were being played by a
dwindling audience. Rather oddly, the players
and journalists that drooled over my feeble 2D games grew silent once their
mighty 3D counterparts stomped onto the scene...
Wrestling MPire ~
January 2004
The year promised to get off to a
formidable start with the arrival of my first 3D wrestling simulator,
Wrestling MPire - and it didn't disappoint! Its gruelling 3-month
production schedule was the longest of any project thus far, but heralded a whole new era of
content and quality. Boasting some 200 wrestlers spread across 9 talent
pools, it was THE biggest wrestling game on the market - let alone the biggest
from my stable! Considering that it was a fully 3D affair, that scale was not
to be taken lightly either. It didn't hide a bad game so much as make a good
one even better. The role-playing possibilities in the "Career" mode went
through the roof with such a large playing field, and produced arguably the
most involving wrestling experience available to fans. Not least because of
realistic backstage details, such as contract negotiations and booking
decisions, that only a true fan could appreciate. Thankfully, the detail also
extended to the ring as well. The game faithfully recreated the anarchic,
open-ended gameplay that its predecessors were famous for. The "biggest"
again, too, as up to 30 wrestlers and 100 items littered the arena! Its
dubious graphics were inevitably criticized by some, but the fact is they made
all of the above possible. And when it went on to become the best-selling game
in my arsenal, the players had voted with their wallets - saying "NO" to eye
candy and an almighty "YES" to substance. It went on to be downloaded over
100'000 times from Download.com alone and remains my most successful
release - despite a string of infinitely superior remakes...
Wrestling
MPire can be
downloaded here! (15mb)
Booking MPire ~
April 2004
In amongst the madness surrounding Michael
Jackson, I was busy trying to deliver the inevitable follow-up to Wrestling
MPire. As successful as the first game was, it was actually meant to be
nothing more than a warm-up act! What I, and many others, were really looking
forward to was a bone fide sequel to Federation Booker - which focused
on running a promotion rather than wrestling in it. Booking MPire was
that game, and it did a fine job of bringing the management concept
u to date in a 3D world. The enjoyable gameplay of Wrestling MPire was
now just the tip of the iceberg, as countless other responsibilities flooded
the player's desk. However, for one reason or another, this cerebral sequel
was noticeably less popular than its simple-minded predecessor. Instead of
complimenting the original and perching on its throne, this release sold
barely HALF as many copies. Whether it was because people felt it wasn't
sufficiently different to warrant a second purchase or simply because the
concept was the least enjoyable of the two, I couldn't be quite sure. In any
case, I personally crowned it the champion of the two. It removed many of the
bugs that plagued the first outing and felt just that little bit more
polished. After all, a new era was dawning where such qualities would become
increasingly important...
Booking
MPire can be downloaded here! (15mb)
Develop Magazine ~
April 2004
Spring offered a double-barrel of media
exposure, as yet another page was dedicated to my work. This time it was in
the games industry journal, Develop - and this time I was writing the
news instead of being in it! The most overlooked part of my work is that I
spend as much time writing about it as I do actually making it (the words
you're reading now being a case in point!). Normally, these self-indulgent
rants are reserved for the website - but this article was the latest to spill
out into the published media. Fortunately, it was the greatest too - as I
confidently and articulately stated the case for independent game development.
Independent developers have always treated their work as some sort of stepping
stone to better things, but here I was insisting that it WAS the "better
thing"! Naturally, those sentiments were met with a distinctly mixed reaction
from the magazine's audience. Although players and journalists are thrilled by
my brazen optimism, it's not exactly what the established professionals want
to hear. I stand by it, though, as a passionate call to arms for those who
want to innovate...
Evolution Of The MPire ~
June 2004
Although they ended up dividing people, the
two games in the Wrestling MPire series were actually designed to
compliment each other. A value twin-pack was always on the cards then, and it
would appear a few months later as the Evolution Of The MPire
compilation. As the title suggests though, it was much more than a "twin-pack"
and rather generously included every other major game leading up to their
creation! The dominance of Wrestling MPire may have rendered some of
those predecessors redundant, but it still stood as a nice commemorative
package to look back on. Above all else, it was yet another MDickie
innovation. As a collection of games sharing a similar theme, made by one man
in a short space of time, it was arguably the games industry's first "album".
You could now get every major game I had ever made for the price of ONE
mainstream release! It was a tantalizingly prospect that highlighted the
benefits of my brand, and was duly snapped up by the many late-comers that
followed Wrestling MPire's arrival. In fact, the project was so
successful that it became a traditional way of re-releasing the produce of
each new era...
Popscene ~
August 2004
Evolution Of The MPire was
especially poignant because it marked the end of the wrestling era that it
encapsulated. After 4 long years of dedication to the genre, I was quite
literally burnt out and found myself going through the motions as the
Wrestling MPire series drew to a close (which is never a good sign). For
my own sanity, then, a break was essential - and Popscene had the
dubious honour of marking that departure. As risky as it felt, it was probably
the safest escape route I could have asked for. It was a remake of a charming
little 2D game that I had made way back in the early days. So far back, in
fact, that it was never even released! Not so far back, however, that its
potential didn't shine through - and so the music management concept made a
triumphant 3D comeback. It was relatively well received (considering the
flagship franchise that it had to follow), and to this day remains the most
successful release outside of a wrestling ring. More importantly, it also did
a fine job of kick-starting a new era - even managing to thaw the hateful
sceptics of the Blitz community, who finally honoured my work in their
newsletter on the month of its release. In every other respect, however, it
failed to make the huge impact of its wrestling predecessors. I had hoped that
it too would be hailed by the music community and related media - but no such luck,
as it was routinely ignored by most. It seemed my ability to play the media (which
had always been my strongest asset) was finally starting to fail me...
Popscene can be
downloaded here! (15mb)
Sure Shot 3D ~
November
2004
When you're responsible for something, there's a kind of fatherly pride that
affects your judgement. Although you can list thousands of things that you're
proud of, not a single one of them promises to be shared by the rest of the
world. Sure Shot 3D was such a game. It proved to be the single most
monumental flop in the history of my professional career - barely clocking up
any sales at all! I'm no stranger to failure, and talk about it openly
on these very pages, but there was something especially galling about Sure
Shot 3D's reception. I genuinely felt - and still do - that it was my best
release yet. Small, yes, but perfectly formed. The fact that I could be so
wrong was deeply disturbing. My favourite game proved to be my audience's
least favourite - a chasm of opinion so wide that it threatened to swallow my
career for good. As a professional game developer, everything I made now had
to be worthy of buying and there's was no longer any place for self-indulgent
projects like this. Now that the game is free to download, however, it may
enjoy a better roll of the dice. For fans of the Sure Shot concept,
there can be no doubting that this was a nice interpretation of it - as the
3rd dimension made the process of catching enemies in your line of sight even
more challenging and satisfying...
Sure
Shot 3D can be
downloaded here! (7mb)
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