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I was CEO of Cinematronics (to be clear, we were a tiny startup so a CEO title didn't mean much - everyone pitched in wherever they could help.) I negotiated t
by davidst 5mo ago
I was CEO of Cinematronics (to be clear, we were a tiny startup so a CEO title didn't mean much - everyone pitched in wherever they could help.)
I negotiated the contract with Microsoft. My engineering contribution was not in the gameplay itself but in the game's memory manager and low-level rendering code. That was all performance-critical X86 assembly. I doubt any of that code lives on today.
Yes, there were a lot of anecdotes and the story on Wikipedia is both incomplete and incorrect in some ways. One day, I'll get around to editing it.
My memory is of promising it would be ready in time for Windows 95's launch, working excessively long hours, and focussing hard to make it fast enough so it would be fun to play on the minimum hardware requirement for Microsoft Plus.
- Randomno 5mo agoHave you read the Wikipedia page recently? It was less complete a couple of years ago
- davidst 5mo agoI looked at it today and it is more fleshed out but still incorrect. For example: > In 1994, the company began development of a port of Doom. No, we were never porting Doom and we used none of Doom's code or resources. And I didn't propose to tone down the violence. The game was intended to be a fun first-person shooter in the same spirit as Doom but that was the only connection. Microsoft was involved in a high-profile antitrust suit with the Department of Justice at the time. They were understandably sensitive about the potential PR impact of this type of game shipping with Windows and proposed gameplay design changes to reduce the violence.
- amiga386 5mo agoAre you reading the right page? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematronics,_LLC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematronics,_LLC Hasn't been edited since December 2024. Has never mentioned DOOM.
- Randomno 5mo agoThis page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_Tilt!_Pinball https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_Tilt!_Pinball Indeed the sources say Doom clone, not port.
- davidst 5mo agoSomeone with the user name "Hemiauchenia" edited the Wikipedia page shortly after I left my comment here. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Full_Tilt!_Pinball&action=history https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Full_Tilt!_Pinbal...
- mghackerlady 5mo agoWikipedia editor here! It would be much better to write a blog post or something, as anything you add will be removed as unsourced original research
- cyberdick 5mo ago[dead]
- mike_san 5mo agoWe had to make sure that Space Cadet ran on the minimum spec Windows machine, which had very little RAM - 4MB I think. On these machines, I made sure the game would run, but it would occasionally pause to swap sound effects when something new happened :)