Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news
From: Craig Graham <c_graham@hinge.mistral.co.uk>
Newsgroups: scea.yaroze.freetalk
Subject: Re: How did you get started???
Date: Thu, 07 May 1998 12:38:40 +0100
Organization: Intelligent Research
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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?

> What's your story??? :)

Hmm....got half an hour? Ok, read on....

Age 10,
    The kid (John) who's family had the Chinese takeaway in our little
village
    got a ZX81 (first computer in the village). We sat and played with it

    for hours on end on the TV in the front of their shop.
    Got Mum & Dad to buy me a ZX81 as well.
    Wrote a version of Defender in Basic.
Age 11
    Got a Dragon 32.
    Wrote loads of stuff in Basic.
    John got an Acorn/BBC Micro.
Age 12
    It wasn't fast enough, and I couldn't afford an assembler on
    2.50 a week pocket money, so I wrote my own 6809 assembler.
Age 13
    Got one of the first Atari ST's in the UK (no internal disc drive,
    TV modulator hacked in).Got a PD command line assembler
    and started doing some dodgy games and demos.
Age 16
    Sent some demo's to Gremlin, but don't take it any further
    as exams are coming....
Age 17
    Wrote a multiplayer networked MUD on the Acorn network
    at school for my A-Level CS project.
Age 18
    Started work at BAe Space Systems (Comms Sats Division) as
    student apprentice (microelectronics & computing)
Age 19
    University of Newcastle (4 years MEng) Coded a 3D graphics
    engine on Unix/OSF Motif.
    John decided computers sucked and went into graphic art...
Age 22
    Got an Atari Falcon (cool machine, shame it never took off).
    Coded some DSP56K.
Age 23
    Graduated (Masters), and got a job coding 68K & H8 Assembler
    for an Interactive TV systems company in London.
    Met a guy called Mark Lawrence in that company - cool guy, he
    coded the Memotech versions of Manic Miner & Jet Set Willy.
    Met a hacker called Jose - the guy who wrote the 3D engine
    for Robocop3 on the Amiga.
    Re-wrote the entire Atari OS from scratch to be fully multitasked
    (it could still run all programs GEM could, but at the same time).
Age 24
    Designed the graphics co-processor for the companys next generation
    box. Spent 6 monthes coding graphics demos for the new co-pro.
    Mark & myself talked one of our bosses into branching out into
    Playstation games.
    Our paths meet again, and my old friend John joins the team as our
    lead graphics and modelling man.
    Got a PC at home.
Age 25
    Finally got developer status from Sony and took delivery of dev kits
    etc....
    I'm obsesive, so I buy a Yaroze to code on at home.....
Age 26
    Start coding Direct3D as well as Yaroze and Developer Playstation.

And here we are now....

Craig.