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RVG Interviews John Mathieson.


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Really nice interview HERE:

 

http://www.retrovideogamer.co.uk/index.php?topic=4971.msg72834;topicseen#new

 

RVG carving itself a very worthy name for itself for 1st class interviews like this.

 

 

I particularly liked:

 

TrekMD

 

To this day I believe the Jaguar is a console that has never been pushed to its limits, even by the homebrew community. Many blame the difficulties with programming for the console as the reason. What do you believe is the reason for this issue?

 

John

 

I thought that games like Iron Soldier pushed it to its limits, we worked closely with the developers and I think they got all Jaguar had to give. And of course Jeff Minter got all sorts of results that Jaguar was never intended to give!

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Really nice interview HERE:

 

http://www.retrovideogamer.co.uk/index.php?topic=4971.msg72834;topicseen#new

 

RVG carving itself a very worthy name for itself for 1st class interviews like this.

 

 

I particularly liked:

 

TrekMD

 

To this day I believe the Jaguar is a console that has never been pushed to its limits, even by the homebrew community. Many blame the difficulties with programming for the console as the reason. What do you believe is the reason for this issue?

 

John

 

I thought that games like Iron Soldier pushed it to its limits, we worked closely with the developers and I think they got all Jaguar had to give. And of course Jeff Minter got all sorts of results that Jaguar was never intended to give!

 

 

What was about it you particularly liked?

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What i particularly liked was the fact that after reading this:

 

'The Jag hardware was cool to work with – you had the 68K, of course, but much of the interesting coding was done on the two RISC coprocessors, Tom and Jerry,” he recalls. “Most of my work was on Tom, Jerry being the domain of the audio programmers. You also had a versatile blitter that you could coax into doing interesting stuff. One of the hardware designers later told me off for running the chip ‘backwards’.

 

http://www.edge-online.com/features/making-tempest-2000/

 

Jeff got some praise for using the Jaguar hardware the way he did.

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What i particularly liked was the fact that after reading this:

 

Jeff got some praise for using the Jaguar hardware the way he did.

 

In a google video he said that John M. came up to him and told Minter he was very disappointed in T2k or some such. JM is a strange dude. He seems to talk out of two sides of his mouth sometimes.

Edited by JagChris
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Which JM?

 

Jeff Minter or John Mathieson?.

 

 

Jeff Minter i've followed over the years and he's had 'outbursts' at UK magazines (Zzap 64 prime example) as they slagged off one of his games, but later turned up doing a monthly feature on progress of a W.I.P game and the like.....

 

 

As for John...only got his interview comments to go on, never 'approached him' myself (as all the questions i'd of liked asked, have been), but maybe he's had time to reflect on his original comments or they might have been quoted out of context?

 

Jeff's often miss-quoted or claims made about...(Ultra Star Raiders, he hated PS1 Tempest X etc all rubbished by Jeff himself).

 

 

The Gaming Industry has it'ws own share of ego's etc.Maybe John would have prefered the Jaguar hardware used differently back then, had a change of heart now? just as Minter would have probably used PS1 hardware differently than it was used in Tempest X and made changes to the gameplay?

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I am talking about John Mathieson being a strange dude and talking out of both sides of his mouth. He has mentioned the Iron Soldier thing before. He also said at the same time that Doom pushed the Jaguar real hard. Which we understand now it doesn't.

 

Jeff Minter wasn't misquoted. This was a google video he himself made where he was talking about space giraffe for the Xbox 360 and what John Mathieson came up to him and said.

Edited by JagChris
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Maybe i'll look at contacting John sometime in the future and put the points raised to him, might be the 'best' way to get clarity on what he meant.He'll have to wait though, bit snowed under at work, let alone all the interviews flying about. 3 more 'in' during the last 10 days, let alone questions gone out.

 

The only time i've seen Jeff quoted regarding Space Giraffe, was him ranting about likes of OXM giving it low scores and it not selling, but then i've not really actively sought out him talking about said game as it personally left me very cold after downloading the demo, so i've missed said reference.Do you have a link to the video?

 

I much prefered the 'purity' of Tempest 2000.I love a lot of Jeffs work (Tempest, Lllamatron, AMC etc etc) but sometimes he seems to throw too much into the melting pot as it were for my, personal tastes.

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To fully quote John regarding Doom pushing Jaguar hard:' The Doom port took a lot of personal involvement from John Carmack'-So maybe he's simply suggesting that without John Carmack's direct involvement Jaguar might have ended with a sub-par version of Doom to sit alongside the Pal Saturn version and 32X and 3DO versions?.

Iron Solider II-I've no idea just how much more (and where that extra could of been used) by the developers as never seen them interviewed regarding how much untapped potential Jaguar had.
Having spoken to I.D's Dave Taylor, i did get a more...'balanced' view on how I.D viewed the Jaguar hardware: '
The hardware was vile. It was a grossly heterogeneous architecture....'
Where as thanks to articles like the I.D interview with Edge who's scan High Voltage kindly put up on here on my behalf, i'd previousily thought I.D were big fans of it.Just goes to show how different views can be, from people from the same team, working on it on same game.
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Having spoken to I.D's Dave Taylor, i did get a more...'balanced' view on how I.D viewed the Jaguar hardware: '

The hardware was vile. It was a grossly heterogeneous architecture....'

 

What? Absolutely not. You got a balanced view of what Dave Taylor thought of the Jaguar. The Jaguar kicked his ass but was easy for Carmack. He's a little bitter.

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What? Absolutely not. You got a balanced view of what Dave Taylor thought of the Jaguar. The Jaguar kicked his ass but was easy for Carmack. He's a little bitter.

 

That's not bitter.

 

 

 

[...]To this day I believe the Jaguar is a console that has never been pushed to its limits, even by the homebrew community. Many blame the difficulties with programming for the console as the reason. What do you believe is the reason for this issue?

 

That's bitter.

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Sorry JagChris, but i disagree here.As i said, up until i interviewed Dave, the 'word' as it were doing the rounds was that I.D ( full stop) loved the Jaguar hardware and that was based purely on what Carmac had been quoted as saying via various interviews like the one from EDGE i had put up here.I'm not knocking John's work, but no man is an island and Dave's work, whilst not as high profile as John's was still very much a part of bringing Doom to the Jaguar etc and thus as part of the team responsible, he gave an oppossing view of what it was like working on it, thus gave the balance as it were to Carmac's positive thoughts on the hardware.

 

I (personally) feel to get 'balanced' outlooks on what any platform was like to work for, you need to speak to more than just the more prolific coders who used it, espically where teams are concerned and get views from those who found it a nightmare and why, that way, i find you get an idea why more coders simply never bothered putting the time in on the system.

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I basically asked Dave Taylor the same question i've put to other Jaguar/Lynx/7800/ST/A8 coders and PS1 coders, Saturn coders, MSX coders etc etc.What were your personal thoughts on working with the hardware.I never attempt to suggest an answer within the question, as that way, i don't personally feel i'll get the 100% honest answer/s i'm after/the community deserves.

 

 

If Dave wanted to appear 'Bitter'...he simply could of replied to me with something like 'Sorry, i've no desire to talk about my days at I.D working with the Jaguar' (etc etc) and list reasons why.

 

Instead he gave of his valuable time to give a frank, honest interview and i very much appreciate his time in doing so, just as i do ALL those who do the same.

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A certain 'chap' i've been busy adding questions to...(the interview i'm doing with him) worked on the PS2 as well as the PS1 (and many, many other platforms) and i'm very keen to get his (personal) feelings on just how complex he found the PS2 hardware, compared to the Playstation 1, as that's often compared to the Jaguar hardware.

No idea if it 'kicked his ass' :-), but i'm looking forward to getting more views on how coders found the more 'akward' formats to write for.
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Sorry JagChris, but i disagree here.As i said, up until i interviewed Dave, the 'word' as it were doing the rounds was that I.D ( full stop) loved the Jaguar hardware and that was based purely on what Carmac had been quoted as saying via various interviews like the one from EDGE i had put up here.I'm not knocking John's work, but no man is an island and Dave's work, whilst not as high profile as John's was still very much a part of bringing Doom to the Jaguar etc and thus as part of the team responsible, he gave an oppossing view of what it was like working on it, thus gave the balance as it were to Carmac's positive thoughts on the hardware.

 

I (personally) feel to get 'balanced' outlooks on what any platform was like to work for, you need to speak to more than just the more prolific coders who used it, espically where teams are concerned and get views from those who found it a nightmare and why, that way, i find you get an idea why more coders simply never bothered putting the time in on the system.

 

OK I misread you. The way you posted that and then quoted him saying the hardware was vile, even though you did use the term 'balance' it came out to me like 'summed up' how they felt. No harm. No foul.

 

I disagree though about him being bitter. I think he is.

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No worries Jag Chris, my speed posting after work probably made the waters a tad muddy :-).

But, really the point of the recent Amiga coder who never really touched the ST i did was done to find out exactly what it was that 'put him off', as i thought that'd be a far more original approach than just asking him the familar ground type questions.
Dave Taylor i had no idea just what to expect and i have to respect him, greatly for giving frank and honest answers, even if they were a tad more blunt at times than i expected.
It's another worthy chapter in the bigger 'book' of Jaguar development and adds another side to how developers fared with the hardware.
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  • 3 weeks later...

Another Jaguar coder of the viewpoint Jaguar hardware was pushed as far as it could of gone:

 

Andrew Whittaker:

 

Pocket : And you think the Jaguar potential has been fully exploited today ? Or better games can be done ?

AW : On any system games can be improved, even if its just gameplay. Technicaly speaking, the Jaguar was maxed out.

 

 

http://www.yaronet.com/posts.php?s=34541

 

His personal viewpoint of course, but i'm starting to wonder which areas of the hardware developers could of gotten more from and just how much of a difference it would of really made.

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Another Jaguar coder of the viewpoint Jaguar hardware was pushed as far as it could of gone:

 

Andrew Whittaker:

 

Pocket : And you think the Jaguar potential has been fully exploited today ? Or better games can be done ?

AW : On any system games can be improved, even if its just gameplay. Technicaly speaking, the Jaguar was maxed out.

 

 

http://www.yaronet.com/posts.php?s=34541

 

His personal viewpoint of course, but i'm starting to wonder which areas of the hardware developers could of gotten more from and just how much of a difference it would of really made.

 

 

Are you kidding? Andrew Whittaker is from Rebellion. Yeah they totally maxed out the Jaguar with Checkered Flag. <<<<INSERT BIG-ASS EYE ROLL EMOTICON HERE>>>>

 

They have proven they are not really the authority on anything except how to do sloppy careless work. Unless you consider having to be forced to watch the movies you've never seen before to do a game you agreed to do that's based on them good work ethic then...

Edited by JagChris
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I wouldn't be that surprised if one of the commercial Jaguar games came close to maxing out the system. I think one of the biggest problems with some of the games was the choise of game type or how poorly the graphic engines were used (probably due to low budgets limiting the variety of 3D models or resulting in less talented 3D modelers).

 

Fight for life, for example, has some terrible character models, slow character animations, terrible camerawork and some ridiculous choreography. And the scenery in hoverstrike is incredibly boring and featureless with little more than varying landscape textures to distinguish the levels. But both of these games have been said to have some pretty impressive engines.

 

Iron Soldier is a great game, and it really benefits from extending the draw distance so far, but with such an impressive draw distance also comes some limitations on the amount of detail present on the objects. Zero 5 was a pretty nice looking game but as its' a space shooter you naturally see alot of black space and unfortunately in the 3rd person mode the enemies look a little basic.

 

I think a lot of people really wanted to see an action game, platformer, or even a quality 3D fighter or 3D racing game on the jaguar but unfortunately nothing along those lines with next-gen mass market appeal really came out.

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These posts always crack me up. It's like looking at some guy and guessing how much weight he can lift. Well, he lifted that 85 pound box, but I estimate he only used 72.4% of his potential :)

 

Nah, you'd at least have some personal experience of lifting things and a rough guestimate of weights. This is more like 'I've never built a nuclear fission reactor before but I estimate that coal-fired power plant could operate 40% better if they added 3 donkeys pulling a cart'

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