Adam Dawes homepage can be found here and you can find Highway Pursuit here.
A short description of the game:
"Highway Pursuit puts you in control of a powerful sports car in a world filled with enemy agents seeking to take control of the road. Your mission is to destroy as many of these enemy agents as possible, without putting any civilian life at risk.
Along the way you will encounter varied terrain and weather conditions, a number of different enemy vehicles intent on your destruction, and also a few helping pointers from your colleague Ashley back at HQ."
And so the questioning begins:
Q: Tell us more about yourself - how old are you, where do you live, what do you do for a living? (one of these basic interview questions)
A: I'm 33 years old and I live in the southeast of England. I'm married and have a two-year-old son, who keeps me both entertained and exhausted! I work for a company that produces web-based software, which I find an enjoyable environment to work in.
Q: When did you start playing games? Do you have any fond memories of those times and did you decide to make a game of your own because of some of them?
A: I've played computer games for virtually as long as I can remember. The first game I remember really enjoying was Nightmare Park on a Commodore PET towards the end of the 1970s. In 1983 I got my own first computer, a Sinclair ZX Spectrum, which was really my gateway into the world of computer games and programming, that little black box definitely changed my life!
I have many fantastic memories of playing games both on computers and in the arcades. There was something truly magical about computers back then, it seemed like every day I discovered something new and incredible that these machines could do. I look back now at the games I used to play and sometimes I'm baffled as to what possible enjoyment I could have got from them; but simply using the computer was an amazing experience, even the bad games were good.
It's a different world now where high definition 3d graphics are taken for granted, and anything older than 6 months looks out of date. I'm very curious to see what my son's attitude will be as he grows older with the virtual worlds we are surrounded by, as he will be immersed in this technology from his birth, whereas it has very much developed around me as the technology has progressed over time.
Q: Were you a big fan of a particular game that might have put you on to making this game or did you just like games in general?
A: I love a number of different game styles; my favourites at present include first person shooters, driving games, puzzle games, RPGs and more.
It was definitely Spy Hunter than inspired the creation of Highway Pursuit, though. I used to really enjoy this game in the arcades when I was younger, it combined the speed of the driving, the action from shooting and avoiding the other cars, and a great sense of excitement and progress as the gameplay continued.
Q: Did you ever have crisis where you almost decided to make commercial games instead of freeware?
A: It's something I've considered in the past. I have released several titles as shareware, the latest of which is my kids' game I Can Press Keys, but I do enjoy working on freeware titles too.
Q: What made you decide that you wanted to make freeware instead of commercial games?
A: Freeware games are great because they have a potentially huge audience. I always enjoy seeing freeware games that other people have released and it's nice to be able to make my own contribution to the scene. The success of a freeware game for me is measured purely in terms of the feedback obtained from users rather than in cold hard cash; feedback and nice comments form a currency that is much easier for people to give than their credit card details.
Q: Have you considered making commercial games?
A: Not to any serious degree. Before graduating from university it was something I considered doing, and I did consider joining a friend of mine who worked for a year at a well known UK games company as an industrial placement when we were doing our degrees. In the end I decided that a "serious" career (i.e., not in the games industry) was probably a more sensible path for me to consider, so now I work with web sites and databases. Sometimes I wonder if working in the games industry would be more fun, but then I hear the tales about long working hours and horrendous deadlines, and I decide I'm happy where I am.
I'd certainly consider working in my spare time to create a commercial "indie" game, should the appropriate idea come along. Spare time is a rare commodity these days though, so I'm not sure how likely that is to ever come to fruition.
Q: If you were to make a commercial game (however cheap or expensive) what kind of game would you make? And inspired by what?
A: It would probably be some kind of puzzle game, or maybe a platform game of some description. There are lots of great examples of this type of game, recently I've enjoyed Puzzle Quest on the PC and Loco Roco on the PSP. Something along those lines would appeal to me.
THE GAMEMAKING PROCESS:
Q: This game of course resembles SPY HUNTER quite a bit. Was there parts of the old classic game that you wished you could implement in this game but didn't? And why did you choose this particular game to remake?
A: I think the obvious element of Spy Hunter that's missing from Highway Pursuit is the river section. I was asked several times about this, but ultimately the amount of effort that would have been required to add this was out of proportion to the amount of gameplay it would have added, so in the end I decided not to include it. I tried to offset this with some new features though: the communications with HQ and the different driving environments for example.
Q: Did you work alone or with more people?
A: The first 50% of the development was done entirely on my own. I wanted to get the game to a point where it was essentially playable and could demonstrate its potential once finished. After that I approached the well-known retro game remakes group Retrospec to see if they would be interested in helping me get the game finished. I've been a member of the Retrospec team ever since, they're a fun bunch of people to work with.
I got lots of help with the graphics and 3d models from the other Retrospec guys, as well as plenty of bug reports and suggestions as to how to improve the game. I'm very grateful for all of the input I received, which helped make Highway Pursuit a much better game than it would have been without them.
(If with other people)
Q: Being the leader of a group of volunteers can be frustrating as you can´t really demand anything from them, since they are there of their own free will. How do you motivate the people making the game?
A: It can indeed be frustrating, particularly as people's interests and intentions can vary from one day to the next. Everyone that was involved does this just for fun, and often people just don't have the time to complete offers of help that they have made.
I think my main motivational tactic was to threaten to release the game with my own graphics and 3d models -- the horror was too much for the rest of the Retrospec to contemplate! The graphics and models started to appear much more rapidly after that.
Q: Was the game ever in danger of not being published? Why? And at what state?
A: Yes, many times. Completing a project like this can be a major undertaking. I worked on the game most evenings for over a year, and completely banned myself from playing any other computer games for the entire duration. If I'd got caught up playing anything else then I'm sure Highway Pursuit would have been gradually abandoned. I stood in a computer game shop one day longingly staring at a copy of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, but I did manage to resiste and get my game finished first.
I eventually reached a point where I had invested so much time in it that I simply wasn't prepared to let it go to waste. After that the game was fairly safe, but it took a long time to get there and I nearly gave up several times. Projects are always so exciting when you're planning them and first getting started, but after the drudgery of moving towards a finished product sets in, the excitement can fade away and the project can become more of a chore than an exciting piece of work. Winning that battle can be tough.
Q: What specific tech side of making a game is the hardest (to find people for)? (Music, Graphics, storyline, translation, etc.)
A: I'm lucky in many regards, as the Retrospec team are able to provide a lot of input in these areas. The things I did struggle with were music and voice acting. In the end I found some music modules from various public domain web sites and used those in the game. I attempted to track down and contact the music authors but didn't get any response -- I've still no idea if they are aware that their music is included in my game, and I really hope they are happy rather than annoyed!
I did have some offers for voice acting from my friends, but rejected them in the end. I wanted the voices to be provided by a total stranger. I must have listened to the introductory speech a thousand times during the development of the game, and by the end I just didn't want to hear that voice any more! In the end I used an online text-to-speech application to provide the voices; I was very unsure about this at first, but although the voice does still sound slightly artificial, it's very impressive nonetheless. It's sparked within me a genuine interest to watch the continuing improvements in text-to-speech technology -- it's certainly a world away from when I used to play with Amiga Speech back in the late 1980s.
Q: Did any sacrifices have to be made with the content?
A: Apart from the river sections already mentioned, I think I pretty much managed to get everything that I wanted into the game, there's nothing I can recall that was sacrificed.
Q: Where did you find the will to power through this consuming job? Did the fans help or was it just sheer willpower?
A: It was primarily will power, assisted by my determination not to let the work already completed go to waste and some encouragement from Retrospec, that got this all finished. As is my normal way, I didn't announce the project in public until it was virtually ready to be released. I prefer to do things this way as it saves disappoinment from fans of the game if it never reaches completion.
Q: Will you keep working on the game or have we seen the last version of it?
A: As far as the game itself is concerned, I think this is the final version. I have a couple of minor changes I want to make (the first to allow proper detection of monitor resolutions so that the game will work without distorting on wide screen monitors, the second to allow a few extra keys to be selected to control the game so that it'll work in my arcade cabinet) but I don't plan to change the game itself any further.
A small and mad part of my brain thinks that a sequel may be fun to write one day. I've some ideas as to what it may look like, and it'll be a very different game to Highway Pursuit, but whether I'll ever actually do this I can't say for sure at the moment.
Q: What will be your next game/remake?
A: I don't have anything concrete planned at present. There are several games I'd really like to see remade, one of which is the classic game Stunt Car Racer. I think with modern graphics, physics and networking this could be a phenomenal game. But finding the time to work on things is difficult these days.
I've also been working recently on my shareware venture called "I Can Games", writing software for small children. I Can Press Keys is the first title, which I tested extensively with my little boy. I'm hoping that soon I can find the time to get the next game in the series underway.
Q: Where do you see yourself 5 years from now regarding gamemaking?
A: Probably exactly where I am now.
Game making is just a fun hobby so it's not something I expect to make any real progression with. It'd be nice to have come up with another fun finished game five years from now, but it all depends on whether the inspiration strikes and I can find the time to get anything written.Q: Any words for other freeware game developers?
A: Don't give up. It's so easy to abandon a project and move on to something else, but nothing ever gets finished that way. Perseverance is the only way you'll get a project finished.
Q: Any favourite freeware games we should know about?
A: I'm obviously a big fan of all the other Retrospec remakes, so I'll mention those. Otherwise I tend to spend most of my game-playing time with commercial games. The one freeware game I have spent more of my time playing than any other however is the classic NetHack, which kept me occupied for several years. I've not played it for ages now, but I do have many fond memories of that game!
Q: If you were to mention a GOD of freeware, who would that be?
A: There's no one I can think of that I would feel comfortable applying that title to -- I'd like to send my thanks and respect to everyone that creates freeware software though, freeware is a great thing for the PC. It's nice to sometimes spend a few spare hours playing with free software from the internet, there are some real gems to be discovered.
Q: What are you currently working on?
A: My only active project right now is a UK TV listing and reminder application called TellyPrompter. I have several ideas in mind for future projects but no time to work on them at present.
Q: Have you ever heard of CWF's developer help project?
A: I haven't, but it sounds very interesting!
Q: CWF's dev help project aims to be a 'bridge' between freeware developers and people interested in participating creating freeware games. If you needed more helpers, would you consider opening a thread in CWF, telling which kind of help you need?
A: Certainly -- I wish I'd had the opportunity to do so when I was developing Highway Pursuit, it could have been extremely useful...
Q: If you could choose to do a freeware game with any gamedeveloper (freeware or commercial) who would it be?
A: I think working with the guys from Valve would be a dream come true. Seeing the way in which they nurtured and supported Portal from its original form (as Narbacular Drop) up to its final commercial release warms the heart.
Q: What kind of game would you make? (Related to the question before this one).
A: I'm not sure I can think of any specific type of game, but it would have to be something original, fun and unexpected.