This is the full interview I conducted with Paul "Andy" Stoddart for the CRL article in Retro Gamer issue 97.
Paul started off his career at CRL programming Spectrum games before moving across to the Commodore 64 and was also involved in some of their infamous horror adventures. He left in 1988 when the distribution dispute between CRL and EA left Clem Chambers with no choice but to close his development department.
For the full story on CRL, issue 97 of Retro Gamer is still available at the Imagine shop, click here for link.
Jdanddiet: Firstly, I did come across the Crash cartoon. Why did you end up having a bag over your head?
Paul Stoddart: At the time I was quite shy and did not seek the public gaze. My first game just said "by Paul". Other games had no name at all (except via a backdoor LOL). So when the article was raised by Ian (Ellery) I asked not to have my face shown.
JS: Were you part of the "Zen Room"? If so what was it like working there, including your impressions of the office, colleagues, vibe etc?
PS: I was very much part of the Zen room. Worked for CRL when they used the old fire station as the base of development and management. Got crowded so Clem spun development out to the Zen across from the fire station, where management still operated from. The Zen was a fun place. No doors on some of the rooms so we would drop in and out for chats and suggestions. Clem would hold discussion sessions in the central office/reception area on game ideas and technical ideas. Some of the programmers etc would stay overnight and have movies for ideas and a laugh.
JD: When did you start work for CRL? Was this as a freelance or employee?
PS: April 1984. Studying at college. Top of the class for microprocessor programming. Maths was a bit shaky so my head tutor heard about CRL and suggested I have a look. Two off/on at CRL offices for expenses only. Clem liked my programming and approach so said have a full time job here.
JD: What were your first impressions of Clem Chambers?
PS: Clem in those days was very active and some would say hyper. Really hands on and excited about computer games. Very smart he predicted in my opinion things like jpeg compression where image or data could be reduce by a high margin using powerful maths. So he was alway pushing for the programmers to find new techniques for getting more graphics data into the machines. So you can imagine his response on seeing Tau Ceti. Brilliant use of maths to create graphics from very little data. I remember quizzing the programmer (Pete Cooke) on it. Once he explained it was blindly simple.
JD: What was it like working on a "big" license like Blade Runner?
PS: In reality just like another game. You were of course excited that is was a known title. But in terms of engineering etc, no real change. I believe the graphics artists found it less interesting because of being constrained by images already there ie it has to look like Blade Runner. They had more fun when they needed to come up with things from just a title idea or game concept.
JD: What were your thoughts working on the horror adventure titles? They were quite controversial at the time and your animations helped the C64 version achieve Clem's coveted 18 certificate.
PS: The graphics were a real departure for us. They used digitization of real people acting out the horror. The blood etc was then added by the graphic artist (bit like CGI film today). then had to develop animation software to move sprites & bitmaps to bring it to life without using up loads of memory. This why the stuff looks real. Now of cause it is all done this way for POV games etc. Again this idea was Clem's, he was ahead of the curve. It was fun but I think it might have been too successful when we got 18!
JD: When did you stop working for CRL? What did you do afterwards?
PS: There until the end. So the day it (development) was shutdown was my last day. After I got involved with a project setup by Ian Foster & Richard Taylor called Wildfire a contract project with a company called Destiny. It was a big game like Cyborg on three platforms. Speccy 48, C64 and Amstrad CPC. Sadly it all collapsed. There was a big press article with a picture of me, (yes my shyness had gone) Ian, Richard and someone else who was helping with graphics. Richard was doing Speccy 48 and CPC. I was helping on C64 mainly. I did a tiny bit on Speccy as well but mainly Richard's coding. The idea of cause was to lift the code onto the CPC from the Speccy and convert the graphics from the C64. After that I left the game industry found a job in the business world needing Z80 programmer (small ad in the Evening Standard LOL). Blew them away in interview, hired about a week later. Stayed doing that.
JD: Which of the games you worked on were/are you most proud of? Which would you rather forget (if any)?
PS: Tough one. To be honest I'm not proud of Blade Runner. Rocky Horror was great once it had good C64 graphics ie the USA version. I am proud of Magic Roundabout for it being my first game and I think it was a experiment by Clem to have games for a younger market. Again ahead of the time. Death or Glory from a game POV is not great but from a coding POV very good in fact the system was re-used by another coder for Traxxion (I think that is the name). Clem loved the system and technique. The game was developled from the technical experiment by me. I showed Clem the new "scrolling" updating system, so he suggested a straight forward blow everything up game. Mandroid was a nice idea (sequel to Cyborg) but I pushed the C64 too much I believe. The graphics were great though, good use of module system which I simplied from the complex coding of Cyborg (I had to debug some of it for Ian). I was one of the senior programmers at the time so would help out here and there also did mastering of games for loading effects for games.
JD: What are you upto these days?
PS: Sadly not a lot. I worked in the business programming area from 1988-2001. Learned C & Pascal programming. 68000 machine code as well. Ethernet networking etc. But the business went down in 2001 (had been shrinking for awhile). So I stayed at home looking after my kids etc. My wife (who I met at CRL in 1986) started bringing in the bucks. Now I am looking to get back into work. Would love to get back into computers again but unlikely. I do quite abit of photography. Build my own PC etc.
Thanks very much for your time Paul.
Jdanddiet: Firstly, I did come across the Crash cartoon. Why did you end up having a bag over your head?
Paul Stoddart: At the time I was quite shy and did not seek the public gaze. My first game just said "by Paul". Other games had no name at all (except via a backdoor LOL). So when the article was raised by Ian (Ellery) I asked not to have my face shown.
JS: Were you part of the "Zen Room"? If so what was it like working there, including your impressions of the office, colleagues, vibe etc?
PS: I was very much part of the Zen room. Worked for CRL when they used the old fire station as the base of development and management. Got crowded so Clem spun development out to the Zen across from the fire station, where management still operated from. The Zen was a fun place. No doors on some of the rooms so we would drop in and out for chats and suggestions. Clem would hold discussion sessions in the central office/reception area on game ideas and technical ideas. Some of the programmers etc would stay overnight and have movies for ideas and a laugh.
JD: When did you start work for CRL? Was this as a freelance or employee?
PS: April 1984. Studying at college. Top of the class for microprocessor programming. Maths was a bit shaky so my head tutor heard about CRL and suggested I have a look. Two off/on at CRL offices for expenses only. Clem liked my programming and approach so said have a full time job here.
JD: What were your first impressions of Clem Chambers?
PS: Clem in those days was very active and some would say hyper. Really hands on and excited about computer games. Very smart he predicted in my opinion things like jpeg compression where image or data could be reduce by a high margin using powerful maths. So he was alway pushing for the programmers to find new techniques for getting more graphics data into the machines. So you can imagine his response on seeing Tau Ceti. Brilliant use of maths to create graphics from very little data. I remember quizzing the programmer (Pete Cooke) on it. Once he explained it was blindly simple.
JD: What was it like working on a "big" license like Blade Runner?
PS: In reality just like another game. You were of course excited that is was a known title. But in terms of engineering etc, no real change. I believe the graphics artists found it less interesting because of being constrained by images already there ie it has to look like Blade Runner. They had more fun when they needed to come up with things from just a title idea or game concept.
JD: What were your thoughts working on the horror adventure titles? They were quite controversial at the time and your animations helped the C64 version achieve Clem's coveted 18 certificate.
PS: The graphics were a real departure for us. They used digitization of real people acting out the horror. The blood etc was then added by the graphic artist (bit like CGI film today). then had to develop animation software to move sprites & bitmaps to bring it to life without using up loads of memory. This why the stuff looks real. Now of cause it is all done this way for POV games etc. Again this idea was Clem's, he was ahead of the curve. It was fun but I think it might have been too successful when we got 18!
JD: When did you stop working for CRL? What did you do afterwards?
PS: There until the end. So the day it (development) was shutdown was my last day. After I got involved with a project setup by Ian Foster & Richard Taylor called Wildfire a contract project with a company called Destiny. It was a big game like Cyborg on three platforms. Speccy 48, C64 and Amstrad CPC. Sadly it all collapsed. There was a big press article with a picture of me, (yes my shyness had gone) Ian, Richard and someone else who was helping with graphics. Richard was doing Speccy 48 and CPC. I was helping on C64 mainly. I did a tiny bit on Speccy as well but mainly Richard's coding. The idea of cause was to lift the code onto the CPC from the Speccy and convert the graphics from the C64. After that I left the game industry found a job in the business world needing Z80 programmer (small ad in the Evening Standard LOL). Blew them away in interview, hired about a week later. Stayed doing that.
JD: Which of the games you worked on were/are you most proud of? Which would you rather forget (if any)?
PS: Tough one. To be honest I'm not proud of Blade Runner. Rocky Horror was great once it had good C64 graphics ie the USA version. I am proud of Magic Roundabout for it being my first game and I think it was a experiment by Clem to have games for a younger market. Again ahead of the time. Death or Glory from a game POV is not great but from a coding POV very good in fact the system was re-used by another coder for Traxxion (I think that is the name). Clem loved the system and technique. The game was developled from the technical experiment by me. I showed Clem the new "scrolling" updating system, so he suggested a straight forward blow everything up game. Mandroid was a nice idea (sequel to Cyborg) but I pushed the C64 too much I believe. The graphics were great though, good use of module system which I simplied from the complex coding of Cyborg (I had to debug some of it for Ian). I was one of the senior programmers at the time so would help out here and there also did mastering of games for loading effects for games.
JD: What are you upto these days?
PS: Sadly not a lot. I worked in the business programming area from 1988-2001. Learned C & Pascal programming. 68000 machine code as well. Ethernet networking etc. But the business went down in 2001 (had been shrinking for awhile). So I stayed at home looking after my kids etc. My wife (who I met at CRL in 1986) started bringing in the bucks. Now I am looking to get back into work. Would love to get back into computers again but unlikely. I do quite abit of photography. Build my own PC etc.
Thanks very much for your time Paul.
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