Intel Depot

How, when and why did you get into OFP? What background did you have which predisposed you to getting into it?

So, way back in 2001, I first found out about OFP after the demo had been released for a month or two, at the same time as I was doing my Honours degree in Computer Science at the Australian Defence Force (ADF) Academy. I was 21, an Officer in the Australian Army, and I was looking for some much-needed distraction: and the OFP demo provided it. The open terrain area and wide range of operable vehicles (even in the demo) blew me away, and once I started downloading and playing some ‘hacked’ user-made scenarios in the demo I was hooked. I didn’t do any modification of the demo however, and waited until the game came out before really getting into it.

Everyone likes doing something, showing it to others and getting some kudos, but it's quite seldom you get someone prepared to write a tutorial afterwards about how to do it, and yet in the early days that's exactly what you became renowned for. What inspired you to be so generous with the expertise you were accumulating back then?

Once I had OFP, I realized that creating missions was for the first time - compared to Doom for example – not so difficult. The concept of a mission editor amazed me, and I knew early on that this would be a game unlike any other. After being hopelessly addicted to the campaign I moved onto creating scenarios, but it wasn’t the creation of scenarios that thrilled me, it was describing to others how to create scenarios that I enjoyed the most. I discovered in 2001 that I really, really enjoyed writing tutorials. I guess I’m destined to be a teacher, who knows!

The potential of a resource like OFPEC was immediately obvious to me and that is what I initially proposed to Tigershark – to write some tutorials to beef up his site. I guess I knew even then that content is king, and that the user community was hungry for knowledge, so for OFPEC to grow we needed some quality tutorials that weren’t available anywhere else.

This was a very exciting time, as you may remember. We were discovering new things every day, and we felt like true pioneers as we published trail-blazing tutorials like the config.cpp guide.

You were heavily involved in the inner workings of OFPEC, almost from the start, and along with Backoff rebuilt the forum and depots in 2002. Can you tell us a bit about that?

Honestly, I don’t remember much about the early days of OFPEC. I remember teaching myself PHP and then rebuilding the site in PHP, and I didn’t mind because I was interested in databases and for some reason I learnt PHP easier then ASP, which the very first OFPEC site was coded in. Unfortunately I have lost all my ICQ history from the time, and this is where most of the communication happened. And my memory sucks. It is funny that Wolfsbane calls me ‘old man’ – I was only 22 or 23 at the time.

The Editors Depot was my idea – it was my baby. I loved the idea of a repository of knowledge, and for a long time it was the place for the best editing tutorials. The online COMREF and function library were also my idea – I vaguely remember programming the backend for these.

You became Site Admin in the spring of 2003, but I get the impression you were almost forced into the role?

I never really sought to run OFPEC, at any stage. I was always very busy in real life, but I loved the site (and still do) and wanted to add to and protect the repository of knowledge that it represents. So I did what was required to keep things ticking along, and provided a bit of guidance and foundation here and there as needed, but it did take up many hours of my life especially in 2002.

You were also involved in the Enhanced Configuration Project (ECP) mod which was created by OFPEC regulars, and hosted by OFPEC. What was that all about?

I was beginning to see the potential of OFP for military use. In 2001, I wrote a paper (which I will email you when I find it, it's very retro) for one of my university assignments. I also first met David Lagettie of Seventh that year, who had created some ADF models that I wanted to use for a demonstration to the Chief of the Army, who was visiting my university for some reason. I learnt then about David’s plans for VBS1. Adam Easton (now the Managing Director of SimCentric Technologies) and I demonstrated Operation Axe-Point - my first and only publically released scenario - to the Chief of the Army, and it was on this day that I realised OFP could become a great military training tool, with the right modifications.

From there, my Army career came second to various OFP developments, mainly the Support Pack and ECP. ECP was a funny mod, built around my original idea for a beefed-up ‘in-game observer’ system. It included a bunch of features that didn’t really go together – such as new blood particles – but it was still fun to build. I demonstrated ECP to both Seventh and Marek Spanel sometime in 2004 I think, and this helped convince them that VBS1 needed similar functionality if it were to be accepted by the military. It is safe to say that if it weren’t for ECP, there would be no VBS1 (at least, it wouldn’t have been successful) and definitely there would be no VBS2.

And so you were hired by BIS?

In 2005 I left the Army, but not directly to work for Bohemia. I started my own company (Simlogic) that did some contracting work, but I led the development of VBS2 starting in 2006. VBS2 was a great success, and to build it Bohemia employed several ECP guys including Zayfod and General Barron. In fact, both of these guys still work for Bohemia – Zayfod is the Lead Designer for BISim in Prague, and General Barron is based at our Orlando office now. Many other OFP originals still work for Bohemia today thanks to VBS, such as SelectThis of Ballistic Addon Studios (BAS) and the original OFP Vietnam add-on, and DeadMeat (also from BAS).

Since 2006, VBS has taken a different path to Armed Assault, but it is an important part of Bohemia’s business. In many ways, revenue from VBS2 sales allows Bohemia to keep building games relatively free from budgetary pressures, and I think – especially in the case of Operation Arrowhead – this has helped a lot. So although the community sometimes dislikes the VBS concept because it's seen as ‘elitist’, it has helped Bohemia deliver better games.

Any final words?

Helping with OFPEC was a simpler time, and I have only fond memories of it. OFPEC and ECP were the stepping stones toward a fantastic career in building computer games professionally and I have no regrets. I guess I do miss those early days – finding out new and exciting things about an awesome gaming technology – especially as I can’t seem to get as excited about any of the new games that come out. I guess I really have become an ‘old man’ :)