I read 'Total Rubbish', a two-word comment by a passing person, about Taskforce; hurtfully, harshly, and most importantly wrongly; though everyone may have an opinion. I remain happy with the game, and think of it as one of my best, if not the best, of my 25-years of making games, perhaps because I've worked on it this year. Flatspace, good at the time, clever, large, and expansive, is still not as good as I'd make it today.
Of course, these words sadden me. How does one cope with critics? I can, at best, try to understand why a critic might criticise, only so that improvements can be made, however, now as an artist, the only critic that matters is myself. I love playing Taskforce, and it works how I like and intended. If I were designing a tool or thing for others to use, I might examine feedback to please a client, but art is slightly different... and in a way, it's often not pleasing to others at first; this is often a good sign. Beethoven's symphonies, or anything new he made generally, were mystifying and not received well at first, but grew to be accepted. Works that pleased the critics (Wellington's Victory) haven't stood the test of time.
I'm happy for Taskforce, and all of my games from The Challenge of the Matrix in 1991 to Gunstorm II in 2006, to be part of my legacy, but at the same time, I'm unlikely to ever make a game again. There is neither money nor credit for it, and the workload is gruelling; massively, overwhelmingly, difficult. Those things are not part of me any more, they are relics that perhaps trained part of my mind.
In Taskforce I've made a game, and designed the 3D engine, with my own 3D format, including self-learning the vector and matrix transformation mathematics, and learning to code vertex shader assembler for the lighting system. I created my 3D texturing software in Visual Basic and developed an animation system for 3D objects. I programmed the music software, Prometheus, including all of the audio algorithms, from the anti-aliased sample players and saw-wave generators, to the reverb algorithms and filters, as well as composing and producing the soundtrack. I developed the sound effect software, SFXEngine, and recorded all of the sounds for the game, from the footsteps on concrete to the paper crashes and broken lightbulbs that made-up the weapons fire. I developed all of the artwork for the game, including developing a photo-fit system of real people for the faces, and used seamless texture generation for all of the objects and scenery. I programmed the level/map designer, Cornutopia Mapper, which can create game maps of many styles and types including using bitmasks for advanced level data; and of course I designed and programming every aspect of the gameplay and how it all works.
I also designed the box artwork, the print-quality promotional graphics, wrote the press releases and promoted the game to game to players, and designed and programmed the website in php. I wrote and illustrated the 80-page manual, and formatted it for publication as a paperback book, and published it. I've also written, and often translated into German, all of the text for the missions in the game. And of course, prepared the game for sale on Steam including all of the relevant navigation and utilisation of their API.
Few people can do such a job single handed.
A game like this is like a multi-dimensional sculpture, and every hard, hard, difficult step of the long days of crafting it, has been worth it.
