AI One: An interview with Paul Pliska
Conducted on October 24-25, 2002
Welcome to the first edition of DinkersView. This week’s guest is well known in the community as a wizard of sorts. Many authors look to him for answers, techniques, and scripting help. A few of his latest techniques, or tricks, can be found on display in his latest offering, and Alternative Hero D-Mod contest winner Lyna’s Story. He may seem to be a quiet guy, but you’ll always see his name pop up where questions of scripting are concerned. The following is my interview with manauser, Paul Pliska.
Q. Paul, to many of us, you need no introduction. Your releases are all top notch, and your latest, Lyna’s Story, has an overall player rating of 9.43, tied with the classic behemoth POTA, and second only to Quest for Dorinthia II. Can you tell us what got you interested in creating add-ons and utilities for Dink Smallwood?
A. Seth. Not personally mind you, but I had played and enjoyed most of his previous games (which are BBS based) and knew he was working on a Windows 95 game. One day I just though, "hey, I wonder how that game is coming." I checked out www.rtsoft.net and it just so happened that game had been out for six months to a year already. Once I played the demo and found out about the editor, I knew it was a game I'd like.
Q. Dink is a simple 2D game, with a somewhat limited engine when it comes to complex scripting and graphics. With your ability, surely you could be producing mods for more popular, less restrictive games. What has kept you in the community, and what inspires you to continue developing mods and utilities for Dink? Is it the challenge of bending and pushing the limits of the Dink engine?
A. "The challenge of bending and pushing the limits of the Dink engine" as you put it is part of it, I suppose. But also the fact that by now I have a fairly complete understanding of DinkC so there really is a lot you can do. And in some ways the simplicity makes it more flexible. Take Morrowind, the magic effects are all hard coded. In Dink, you have to code them yourself, but have a lot of freedom when doing so. And of course, Dink Smallwood is just a cool game.
Q. Lyna’s Story is widely thought to be an exceptional D-Mod. Taking into account that it was created in about a month’s time, that’s quite an achievement. Could you share with us your thoughts on its creative process – What were your original ideas?
A. Well, to start with, I had the idea of a woman as the main character, which hasn't been done before. My very first thought was actually Dink getting turned into a woman, (before Redink1 clarified that a morphed Dink wasn't allowed) but I'm glad I picked the story I did. I remembered mentioning that Lyna became a hero in Crosslink so I picked her. I don't even recall how I came up with that originally, just an interesting twist to throw in. (It could have something to do with my mother being a feminist.)
Other than the female main character, and kind of a scavenger hunt plot, there wasn't a lot that I planed ahead of time. Two themes that show up in all my d-mods are the less linear story and trying to tie it in to the original game and/or other d-mods.
Q. The non-linear approach has been tried by others, most notably Wesley, with some success, but the tie-in as you called it is much more difficult. Some authors are never satisfied with their end product. Are you satisfied with how Lyna’s Story was received by the community, and more importantly, are you satisfied with the completed game?
A. I'm pleased by the response I got. As for the d-mod itself, maybe the only thing I think could have used a little more work is the ending. (I won't spoil it in case someone hasn't played it). It was meaningful for Lyna of course, but maybe not that rewarding for the player. When you have a somewhat loose story like that, even if it fits together, it makes a solid feeling ending kind of hard to do.
Q. What’s the deal with Crosslink? Labeled by many as ambitious with unlimited potential, this demo released in 1999 has yet to be finished. One reviewer, giving Crosslink a 9.9 player rating said, “…my favorite D-Mod is this Crosslink demo. Once Crosslink is released, I bet it will tower over current D-Mods just like POTA did back in '98”. That score and accompanying comment are from Dan Walma, Dink Network founder. Another accomplished programmer, SimonK, had this to say about it, “Given the author's breakthru programming, thinking it could easily be the best DMOD of all”. That’s high praise for a demo, though quite true in my opinion. What are your plans for Crosslink? Do you think you may complete it and what might we expect to see included?
A. Well I sure hope to finish it, but as I've said before it has kind of bogged down. It was way to big a project for my first d-mod, and to attempt without much planning. So it's often hard to know what to work on. I've been wondering if I should just keep muddling though or go back and do some of the work organizing it that I should have to start with. I really don't know which in the end would be better.
What will be included? Almost immediately after the part where the demo ends, the story takes a turn towards the non-linear. Dink still has his main goal of saving the world of course, but the path becomes a little less clear and he'll probably want to detour and build up strength some. Then of course there's the part about visiting other worlds (games), just touched on in the demo, that was at least originally the main point of the d-mod. Oh, another thing that will probably be in included is a little more adult stuff, not as much as in SimonK's work, but more than most d-mods. That's actually at least a minor part of the bogged-down-ness, I'm trying to decide if that was a wrong turn for the d-mod.
Q. With the obvious success you’ve had in the community with your releases, what advice would give to those, like myself, just starting to learn DinkC?
A. Read all the documentation. Mainly DinkC.txt or better yet DinkC Reference v3.0 which Ted Shutes put together. Maybe not all at once, but eventually, you should read the whole thing. A resource of equal importance is the source code for the original plot and any other d-mod you have available. Another piece of advice, don't start an epic d-mod right away, or without good planing, like I did.
Q. Okay, so you would suggest that a new author try to comb through all resources while learning. But the whole editing process can still be a bit daunting. What is your editor of choice, or do you use a combination to take advantage of each editors strong points?
A. I still use DinkEdit and Notepad mostly. I don't know if they're the best for a new author, but there're what I learned first. WinDinkedit, has advantages for sure, but also some compatibility problems with DinkEdit, so switching mid-project is out anyway. Notepad I use because I've yet to see a DinkC editor that really helped much, though I suspect they'd be a lot more helpful to a new author.
Q. Now I’m going to put you on the spot a bit. For the benefit of some of the community’s newer members, including your own work, what D-MOD do you feel is the all-around best and why?
A. That's a hard one alright, I guess I'd have to say Prophecy of the Ancients, but I know very well that I say that mostly because it was the first really big one. But it was a very nice d-mod aside from that, and I can't think of much that could be said badly about it.
Q. Yeah, POTA would be the one most people site, and for those same reasons. Which utility or development file do you find to be the most indispensable and why?
A. Boring answer, but the most indispensable development utility is DinkEdit. Obviously before WinDinkedit, it was absolutely required. I still prefer it.
Q. While there are tons of resources available to beginners, which tutorials, demonstrations, or development files are absolute musts to beginners? Are there any resources, commonly available on the Dink Network that you still use?
A. DinkC Reference v3.0, Skeleton B, and Dink Smallwood BMP Graphics. As far as resources, I still refer the DinkC Reference often enough. And of course I tend to use a lot of the stuff I made such as DinkC Auto-Indenter v2.0, PlayThis, v3.0 and DinkEdit Skin 1.
Q. Moving away from your D-MODS for a minute, you have also created many useful development utilities. Two of these, INIclean and Sprite Replacer share spots among the best in the category according to member reviews. Sprite Replacer even won the July, ’02 dotm. The most often thing mentioned about these two files is the amount of time and aggravation they save the author. How much time was spent making these development tools?
A. Not that long, INIClean is less than 100 lines of code. Sprite Replacer was more complicated, but you can do a lot with Visual Basic in a short time (that being it's main selling point). I'd say it took a couple weeks of off-and-on work.
Q. Returning to Lyna – The story is entertaining, yet not terribly complex in nature. What seems to be complex, however, is how it unfolds, and how the quests are completed. In other words, what was meant to be a simple one-month in production romp, turned out to be a complex group of quests worth a few hours of playing time…and it still only took a month to develop. Whereas Crosslink has a much more developed plot, and many informative conversations with NPC’s, there does appear to be a carry over in plot development. Your ability to tell a story, and develop a coherent, hint-based plot is terrific. Some people found the game to be quite difficult, not in gameplay balance, but in finding the next logical step to take. Did you have any difficulty piecing it together – the hints, the quests, etc?
A. Yes, I did have certain problems on the hints and quests. It's hard to guess how hard something is going to be before anyone else. The snakes, for example, were apparently harder then I meant them to be. The plot itself fit together very well without that much work. I was just kind of working from a mental image of the character.
I suppose this is as good a time as any to admit that it's not quite true it was all done in one month. The d-mod itself was certainly created for the contest, but obviously the main character was from the original game, plus some details from Crosslink. And, as allowed by rules, I re-used some non-plot scripts I'd made for other projects.
Q. With all the other RPG games out there, what do you find yourself playing the most? Have you done or entertained doing mods or utilities for other games? What were they, and where do we get ‘em?
A. The Sims actually.
But that's probably just for right now, as an expansion just came out. I played Morrowind for a while, but have lost interest for the moment, I'm sure I'll pick it up again. I've really not released any mods besides those for Dink, (and some ancient DooM stuff). I've made a few Sims objects, if that's of interest to anyone; they'll be available on www.livin-it-up some time soon.
Q. I'm sure folks are going to check them out. Can you give us a few other links that many of us may not be aware of, but that you visit often? And they don't have to be related to gaming, just some cool sites you've bookmarked and check up on often.
A. http://www.geocaching.com/ A real world game using Global Positioning Systems.
http://www.snopes.com/ A great web site about urban legends and internet rumors.
http://www.engrish.com/ The NOODLES of a phantom with the resistance to the teeth
of boast of our shop.
http://www.nethack.com/ An archaic but fun computer game.
Q. Hmm, engrish.com looks like an interesting site, but back to you. Your first completed D-MOD,
The Catacombs, is also a first for something else, it gave you the option of transferring all your stats and weapons from your original Dink Smallwood saved game into the game. Reading the reviews for Catacombs on TDN, the first thing nearly everyone mentions is the uniqueness of this feature, yet it has not been implemented in any release since. With the perfect demonstration on its use, and the communities obvious attraction to it, why haven’t we seen it used by others? Do you intend to use this feature with any of your future projects?
A. I suppose I might use it again, but the reason why I may not and probably why other people haven't is that it's hard not knowing how tough Dink is going to be at the start of the d-mod. And even though it doesn't make sense that Dink loses all his abilities and equipment every d-mod, it does seem to work better for the story. I've also had a number of people tell me they couldn't get the importer to work no matter what they did. I do have one idea for a d-mod that it might work in though.
Q. Can you tell us anything about this idea, or would you have to kill me?
A. It's just a tiny sliver of an idea. Basically it would be a very high level d-mod centered around
powerful magic. It would be my take on some of the things hinted at near the end of the original game,
such as Dink's ancestry.
Q. Sounds like a good idea, as it seems Dink’s ancestry is a jumbled mess. Many authors have given their take on it, and there is definitely some conflicting stories regarding it. Finally, moving away from all this, and on a more personal note, what do you do for fun besides gaming? Oh, and do you understand redink’s obsession with bananas? A quick look at the previous Poll would lead some to believe he has taken a turn for the worst
A. I also enjoy playing with cats and blowing things up… not at once of course. I haven't a clue about the bananas; it's kind of scary.
On that note, Paul left. There was, however, a reported explosion in his neighborhood. Police have no leads, but the evidence included,among other things, lots of fur.
The good thing about posting the interview in this type of forum is the ability for others to easily post follow-up questions. So, if you have any questions for Paul, post it in the comments and he may answer…I really don’t know though, it wasn’t part of our agreement
The next DinkersView is with the author of one of the communities many trilogies. Expect it to possibly include a few more personal questions, and a fair amount of charm.
