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Ken,
You may have answered this question already but have you ever played Half-Life? Actually have you ever played the official mod Team Fortress Classic that comes with it? I never quite got into half life itself but I spent about five years playing TFC. It was the first multi-player game I got serious about, and the first one I became good at. I know FPS tend to have a bad rap with old sierra fans sometimes but I thought that game was awesome and I’m glad that you had something to do with it, that way I have a good excuse to play it. There is still a pretty heavy following to TFC also, that is pretty good for the length of time its been out. Despite the fact that it is just a FPS there is a lot of strategy behind it when you get into it.
Have a good day Ken!James
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(re: re: Half Life) You know…
I’ve never been a gamer (other than poker, chess, backgammon and craps). A long time ago, I used to play backgammon for serious money. As to Sierra’s games, other than Larry, Space Quest and Phantas 1 – I never really played them (for more than a few hours each).
That said…
I’m a great judge of what will, and won’t, sell. I had solid instincts as to what might be fun, and what wouldn’t. I also had “been around” long enough to know what had been done before, and what hadn’t. Lastly, I came from an engineering background, and knew what was possible and what wasn’t. I couldn’t be bulled by the developers. I knew what was possible, and I knew how long it would take to develop.
Sierra won because I was a good engineer with strong competitive, direct marketing and sales skills, and with an ability to “relate” to the ultimate buyers of our products – not because I was a gamer. I think it also worked because I had respect for our customers (who were the smartest people on earth). I had a concept that at the time was novel – I computed how much it cost to obtain a customer, and how much it cost to RE-obtain a customer if you ever burned them. It was clear that the cost to re-acquire a customer was prohibitive. If you burn a customer, it is game over.
Roberta was (and is) the creative member of the family, and I the business-person. She played games (and, created games). I ran a software company. These are different skill sets.
To be honest, she’s the fun person in the family. I’m the boring engineer/bookeeper/geek/marketing type person. (she’s also cuter…)
-Ken W -
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(re: re: re: re: Half Life) Has she played half-life?
Posted by: skcll on 10/17/2003
Roberta played Half-Life for a couple of hours, and saw it a few times during development. She could see the quality, and could tell that it would sell, but it wasn’t something that she personally would play.
-Ken W
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