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Linda and Ian Currie Interview
Two principals from the team that worked on Wizardry 8 and Jagged Alliance tell us about their current situation.
January 10, 2003 - At the end of Crusaders of the Dark Savant, the seventh title in one of computer gaming's landmark series, the malevolent title character had taken flight toward Dominus, a world on the cusp of the Cosmic Circle. In his possession was an unbelievably powerful artifact that had originated there; called the Astral Dominae, it held the very secret of life. And hot on his trail were two powerful races, the T'Rang and the Umpani, as well as the player's own party. Sometimes referred to as Wizardry 7, the game was released in 1992. An updated CD version, Wizardry Gold, followed some four years later, but as fate would decree, the pursuit was not rejoined until the late part of 2001 when Wizardry 8 finally permitted long-time fans and new players alike to return to the epic adventure.
This title proved to be a significant critical success, accumulating a number of awards and accolades including some from this site. However, it was not enough to prevent the demise of developer Sir-tech Canada, the Ottawa, Ontario-based studio that had also been responsible for creating the acclaimed Jagged Alliance series of strategy games enhanced with RPG elements. Since that time, the development team, an experienced group with six published titles since 1994, had only been seen or heard from occasionally. This situation changed a week before Christmas when we received a rather unusual press release announcing its availability. Of course, we wanted to know more and followed up to see what we could find out. The result is the following question and answer session with two of the team's principals, accomplished game makers Linda and Ian Currie.
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Jonric: To get things started, please introduce yourselves and summarize your backgrounds in game development.
Linda Currie: I'm Linda Currie and have been Co-Designer and the Level Designer on each Jagged Alliance product (Jagged Alliance, Jagged Alliance Deadly Games, Jagged Alliance 2, Jagged Alliance 2 Unfinished Business), Designer and Project Leader of Nemesis: The Wizardry Adventure, and finally Project Leader and a Co-Designer of Wizardry 8, recipient of Computer Gaming World's 2001 RPG of the Year award.
Ian Currie: Also here is Ian Currie and I have the same last name as Linda.
I'm the creator of the Jagged Alliance series and have produced and co-designed all four products. Linda even allowed me to lend some of my design and production skills to Wizardry 8 for a while. I started programming games in 1989, but since 1997, I've concentrated more on production and design work. I love game development and the team dynamics that it involves - especially now that the related tasks have become so specialized.
Jonric: Last month, you let it be known that "the team that worked on Wizardry 8 and Jagged Alliance is still together and is available for new game projects." What do you regard as the particular strengths of this group?
Linda and Ian Currie: The team consists of many of the core people who worked on the various Jagged Alliance products and Wizardry 8 developed by Sirtech Canada. These are people that Ian and I have had the honor of working with over the course of numerous products and whose skills we hold in high regard. Even more importantly, they work efficiently together, get along well and trust each other. If you've ever had a team that didn't mesh, you really know the difference this makes. Additionally, the individual strengths of each person have really allowed us to have the "right" person for the job for the myriad of tasks that are important to creating a solid game effort.
Jonric: Who does "the team" refer to in terms of specific individuals and their roles on these titles? Aside from you, who works in the design and programming areas?
Derek Beland was our Lead Technical Programmer on Wizardry 8. His job is to create the low-level systems that the rest of the game is built around. The "first man in," he takes the raw specs and transforms them into general-purpose systems and tools that the content creators can use to flesh out the game. We've been working with Derek since 1994.
Chris Camfield was our Lead Game Designer and Programmer on Jagged Alliance 3. He first joined us to do localization work on Deadly Games and was integral to Jagged Alliance 2. He also added his coding and design contributions to Wizardry 8.
Alex Meduna was our Lead Gameplay programmer on Wizardry 8. He is a gameplay programmer, focusing on high-level systems such as combat mechanics, character creation and development, difficulty scaling, and balancing. His credits include substantial contributions to Jagged Alliance, Jagged Alliance: Deadly Games, Jagged Alliance 2, and Wizardry 8. He has been a key member of the core design team on all his projects, and has amassed an extensive knowledge of game design. We've been working with Alex since 1994.
Alex Parlour was a programmer on Wizardry 8. Like everyone on the team, Alex is a huge game fan. Alex has a background in Mechanical Engineering and studied many topics directly relevant to game design - robotics, dynamics, forward and inverse kinematics, artificial intelligence, advanced calculus and linear algebra, not to mention various programming languages and 3D graphics.
Charles Miles has been working as a game writer and designer since 1998, and previously worked on the publishing side of the business from 1995 to 1998. His efforts were integral the story, dialogue, creatures, game mechanics, and level designs for the award-winning RPG Wizardry 8. He also placed every item and creature in the game, which earned him a unique credit as "monster wrangler."
Jonric: And how about in the areas of art and animation? Who are the individuals there and what kinds of backgrounds do they have?
Linda and Ian Currie: James Ferris is a 3D Artist and has over five years of experience in the game industry. During that time he has filled roles as a Character Modeler, Animator, Level Artist, Lead Level Artist and Texture Artist on a variety of projects for three different game companies.
Lee Haneman is our Lead Artist and Animator. A traditionally trained artist and animator, Lee has been working in the game business for over seven years. During that time, Lee has held such titles as 2D Artist, 3D Modeler, Animator, Lead Animator, Department Head of Animation, and Lead Artist. Wizardry 8 features over 70 Haneman-animated creatures and his flair has contributed much to the various characters.
Joey Whelan is an Artist who entered the game business in 1996 on Sirtech's Jagged Alliance 2. He quickly created a niche for himself as a portrait artist, creating faces for the dozens of characters found in the game. He played a similar role for Wizardry 8, except this time the faces he created were for exotic races such as dwarves, elves, lizardmen, rawulfs and felpurrs.
Norman Olsen is a 3D Artist who is adept at creating and texturing 3D environments. At Sirtech Canada, he worked on 2D environmental tile sets for the award-winning Jagged Alliance 2 and also worked as a level builder and texture artist for Wizardry 8.
Nick Brdar is a 3D Artist. Though we only began working with Nick after Sirtech Canada discontinued their development efforts, we consider him to be a solid part of our team. He fits in so well with all of us that we almost forget that he wasn't around in Sirtech's days! He's taught sculpture at the university level, worked on sets, props and special effects used in film, television and commercials, and created 3D environments for architects and ride designers.
Nicholas Minns is a 3D Artist and Animator. Like our other Nick, we only began working with him after Sirtech Canada discontinued their development efforts, and in the same vein, we now consider him to be a solid part of our team. His skills in modeling, texturing and animating make him a valuable, and versatile member of the team.
Andrew King is our Concept Artist. We've been working with Andy since April 2002 and when we look back, we wonder how we did without him. His creativity and skill at putting images to paper made it possible for us to streamline many of our methods.
Terry Brose is our Lead Tester. A long-time game fanatic, Terry has transformed his hobby into his profession. Considering that we did not have the benefit of a large QA department, Wizardry 8's stability is due in no small part to Terry's tenaciousness.
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