Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!scea!peter_alau@playstation.sony.com From: "David Alan Romig, Jr." Newsgroups: scea.yaroze.freetalk Subject: Re: How did you get started??? Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1999 02:26:43 -0500 Organization: SCEA News Server Lines: 63 Message-ID: <382FB58F.186C0D47@drexel.edu> References: <354a636a.1323252@news.scea.sony.com> Reply-To: drjr@drexel.edu NNTP-Posting-Host: a136.COMCAT.COM Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.7 (Macintosh; I; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en Michael Klucher wrote: > > Well I thought I might try to drum up alittle ativity in the group > asnd ask a cool question. How did you get started in the yaroze > program? I know this post is a little late, but I decided to reply anyway. Growing up, I was a video game fanatic. I had a Coleco Vision w/ Atari 2600 adapter (last adapter available in our area before Atari's law suit against Coleco). My cousins had Coleco Vision and Intelevision. I rarely got to the arcade, so my game collection grew quickly. However, when I first saw BASIC programming and what it could do, I had to have a computer. My first, now about 15 years old and sadly shorted out, was the Commodore 64. Most of my friends who had a computer had a C64, and it served me well for 10 years until I graduated high school. I taught myself BASIC and later 6502 assembly. I made several games in CBM BASIC which I shared only with friends-- (I didn't have much of a choice there being only in my teens). Programming didn't sap away from games either. My brother and I received NES, GameBoy, and Super NES as various Christmas gifts through the years and amassed a large collection of games there. Initially games and programming ate away at homework time, but it ballenced toward the end of high school and my senior year produced my best grades. I knew I wanted to persue programming or electronics at that time. Game design was not a college option so I went to Drexel University which is famous for its engineering program and is also only about an hour from home. (I heard DigiPen opened the same year I started Drexel.) Drexel was (at the time) a Macintosh campus so I got a Power Macintosh 7100/66 with 8 Meg memory and a 260 Meg drive, my second computer. I went for the cross road between my interests and focused on computer hardware. My interst fully swung into game programming but I've rarely had time outside of my classes to do much. (And when I did, I usually played games.) Using a reference book, I taught myself C, and with a coupon giving to me by Drexel bought myself Metrowerk's Codewarrior 4 Gold Academic (back when Metrowerks where Mac only). Being a large ENIX and Squaresoft fan, I was dismayed to find Dragon Warrior V and VI were not being released in the US and Final Fantasy VII was on a system I originally had no intention of purcharsing, Playstation. (Nothing against Sony-- but with all the console systems out at the time, I had decided to stick with Nintendo who had provided 3 of the systems my brother and I shared.) I caved into the lure of a game I wanted and purchased FF7 anyway with the intention of playing it on my cousin's Playstation. With it came Sony Underground CD 2. That's where I first saw Net Yaroze. The concept, no contest, I just had to have it. I had enough money but my parents helped me with the costs anyway. (By the way, my brother and I got a N64 around the same time.) Now, I am a graduate of Drexel with a dual BS in both Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering with a minor in Computer Science. (I still feel I know very little about computer hardware, though.) I'm in graduate classes (same place). I've got a new computer (my 3rd), PowerBook G3 400 Mhz with 128 Meg mem and 10 Gig drive. (I'm in debt.) My Yaroze is 2 years old, and I'm getting back to programming. I can't seem to get the download utility to work (again), but as soon as I do, I plan to finally start posting. Actually, I could use help. I've already posted the problem to scea.yaroze.problems.mac. Good luck, everyone, and happy programming. --Dave Romig, Jr. (drjr@drexel.edu)