Intel Depot

When and how did you first get into OFP?

In a nutshell, I ran into OFP in my quest to find the next Hidden and Dangerous. I've always gravitated more towards simulation-style games. Before I played my first first-person shooter, the only games I'd ever played were flight simulators, driving simulators and sports games.

I played Half-Life and then Counterstrike (up until Counterstrike left the BETA stage) but never liked that fact that that characters could be shot several times with an AK-47 and still be alive. Hidden and Dangerous filled that void, but its shelf-life was very short due to terrible multiplayer support and little to no support for modding. All three of the missions for OFP that I released publicly were similar in style to the stealthy Hidden and Dangerous missions that I enjoyed so much.

How did you find yourself on the staff at OFPEC?

I don't remember the details, but before joining the staff I do remember being very active in the forums and helping out a lot with people's scripting and editing questions. Naturally, I developed "relationships" with the various OFPEC staff members which led to my formal involvement with the site.

You were on the Editors Depot staff for a while, and then became Editors Depot Admin; you wrote mission reviews; you contributed to the coding of the website; what were the main highlights of your time at OFPEC?

As a staff member I remember focusing a lot of time on cleaning up and organizing the Editors Depot content; it wasn't a fun job but it was necessary.

As the Ed Depot admin I remember doing a tonne of work fixing PHP code of the site at the beginning. Some asshat kept hacking the site, so we had to go through the entire site and fix the variables on almost every page. Prior to that, the only scripting languages I had ever used were "Batch" language and OFP's scripting language, so it was a trial-by-fire.

By the end of my term as Ed Depot admin, I had become the de facto 'PHP dude' as SnYpir had left. I ended up fixing any bugs in the site and adding a few small enhancements here and there.

What was the LoJack fiasco all about, and what was the outcome?

The LoJack fiasco was much ado about nothing. OFPEC and I were both sent 'cease and desist' letters which claimed that my mission, "Operation Lojack", was infringing upon their trademark. After doing a bit of research into U.S. trademark law I quickly became convinced that they were wrong. I responded to them via registered mail (the response is still posted on my site) and never heard back from them again. I took the mission down from my website for a few days while researching their claim, but put it back up for download as soon as I posted my response. In retrospect, I think LoJack Corporation's lawyers were just looking for a reason to bill their clients.

Are you still involved in the Community - despite the multiple kids - and if so what do you think of the Community now compared to the OFP days?

No. The kids pretty much killed my gaming career. I did play Hidden and Dangerous 2 for a while at the end of 2004 and I loved it just as much as the first version. Since then I haven't even bought a game, and today I don't even have a desktop PC in my house!

There is one thing I noticed a while back over at the BIS forums that really brought a smile to my face. Community member W0lle took Operation Lojack II, recreated it in Arma2 with a bunch of enhancements, and rechristened it "Operation Lojack III". The very first version of Lojack was released over eight years ago, and it's amazing to me that, in a roundabout way, it's still being played today.

Any final words to inspire new editors?

Don't reinvent the wheel - I did way too much of that! ;)

Toadlife's other missions can be found in the Missions Depot:

• Suicidal Samurai
• Dead By Dawn