Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news From: gil@snsys.com (Gil Jaysmith) Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.freetalk.english Subject: Re: Now I'm getting REALLY mad! Date: Fri, 12 Dec 1997 19:49:32 GMT Organization: SN Systems Lines: 43 Message-ID: <349190e4.16177852@news.playstation.co.uk> References: <34902D4B.D275BC60@tin.it> <34912FDB.DD29F57F@micronetics.com> Reply-To: gil@snsys.com NNTP-Posting-Host: trish.snsys.com X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 Jim wrote: >I do hope however, when the Playstation dies and is replace with PSX2 that >Sony would then release the full libs and docs to Yaroze owners. Any plans >for this is a few years? Given that the last ever Megadrive game was released a couple months ago, the 'death' of the PSX is likely to be in something like 2004AD :) As for the original point, my wholly personal (and probably unhelpful!) opinion is: tough. This is the cheapest and most powerful development system anyone at home has ever had a chance to use. Home developers always have a paucity of documentation, little or no support from the manufacturers, and a strong need for other people to share their discoveries. Developing on the Spectrum and BBC fifteen years ago wasn't particularly easier, it's just that the user base got off its ass and shared all the information it could and wrote its own tools and books. The user base was bigger because the prices were lower, and the shared information made its way into books and magazines which everyone could access. The reason there isn't a respected Yaroze newsletter, central webpage, book of tips, whatever, which *everyone* reads - is simply that no-one has done one. Magazines and books cost money and time to produce, and why should you contribute, let alone organise and maintain, such information if you're not getting paid for it? Because you're a hobbyist community, is why, and that's what hobbyist communities do. Whinging from an old fogey, I know... but even acknowledging the flimsiness of the Yaroze documentation, I boggle at the slackness some people exhibit in wanting everything given to them by Sony. All credit to people like Linda J. Hodge, probably the most prolific poster to the newsgroups with questions about how to do things. She wants to understand, and she wants to find out. No whinges about what is or isn't provided and what could or couldn't have been done better - just curiosity about how to get it right. Good for her! Meanwhile, if anyone was thinking of buying a Yaroze so they could be a cool PlayStation game programmer, now would be a damn good time to recall that there's a reason why "PlayStation programmer" is a full-time job and why PSX games take so long to write. Grouchy on a Friday evening - Gil