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Steve Jackson Interview
heartless_ writes "Gamergod.com has an interview with Steve Jackson, the man behind the table-top company of the same name. SJ Games publishes, among other things, GURPS, Munchkin, Frag, Chez Geek, and Pyramid Magazine. The interview goes into Steve's opinions on the MMOG market, as well as possible involvement in the MMORPG market with his company." From the article: "GG: Does the idea of a 3D MMORPG strike you as a project you want to be a part of, and if so, in what capacity do you see yourself? SJ: (a) Heck, yes. (b)Top-end design and community work / play-test, until I learn the tools to get involved with level design. GG: Given that your claim to fame has been open ended systems, what genre of MMORPG would you most likely use to break into the industry? SJ: To nobody's surprise, I'd like it to be as open-ended as the theme allows. I think that will help get, and REALLY help keep, players."
Steve Jackson has been designing brilliant games since before most of you were born.
The first wargame I bought, back in 1979, was Metagaming's 'Ogre', designed by Jackson. it's an amazing game, moreso for the price of $2.95 back then.
He designed Ogre and it's add-ons and sequels, 'Melee' and it's successor, 'GURPs', 'Car Wars', and a number of other great table-top games.
When he started Steve Jackson Games in the early '80s and started publishing "The Space Gamer" magazine, he introduced many to the concepts of game design. The Space Gamer published an early article by Lord British, describing how 3-D graphics could be created on Apple II hardware.
Steve Jackson probably understands playability and balance like few others, and any MMORPG that he would be involved with would be of serious interest.
www.lucernesys.comHorizon: Calendar-based personal finance
Interstate 76 was practically a 3D version of Autoduel, just without arenas and the AADA.
Different Steve Jackson. There are two in the hobbyist game industry: one in Texas, and one in England. The English SJ did the Fighting Fantasy books (plus was involved in Games Workshop there at the very beginning, IIRC).