E-Views with Boomer

E-View with Wabigbear

At the RCT Space Network it seems as though we have been invaded lately with Bears! Although these bears seem friendly enough you NEVER want to corner a hungry bear! So in the staff room at this site we HAVE to maintain a healthy refrigerator well stocked and maintained and upgraded daily because we have to work with these fuzzy bears. Mama Bear is a Dutch bear that most of you know has been around this site forever, the other bear called Wabigbear has also been around for quite some time also, but came on as a fresh cub and in no time Mama Bear had whomped him a couple times across his snout to teach him some manners and to let him know who the MOMMA Bear was. Wabigbear must have learned his bear necessity lessons well though and Mama Bear must have trained him well because Wabigbear has gone on to become a well known and respected bear throughout the RCT online community He also recently was promoted here at The Network to CO-Chief Moderator to help out assisting Todd Lee in his duties. He also is on staff over at the friendly RCT *Mart. Not bad for a bear!

Wabigbear is active in many projects and things we have going on here at this site and don't think that perhaps his big bear head might be getting to big for his fur from all these accolades and accomplishments because I have got to tell you 'Wedge" is one of the most humble and un-assuming individuals I have ever known. He truly is a Teddy Bear and sweet tempered until he gets hungry or someone has pushed him to far, when that happens, even Mama Bear seems to disappear from the scene... with me running wild with fear, screaming like a little girl, right behind her.

He's known by many names, but most know him as Wabigbear, Wagi, Wedge (my little nickname for him) and for those that know him well... Bob. I haven't done any of these Staff Series E-Views in a long time and with his recent promotion lately here to assistant CM, I decided it was time to invite the Wedge into the "Room With a View" to set down and chat with me... and you, so that we all could get to know this bear a little better.

It is snowing outside and Wabigbear has just arrived a while ago, shaking himself and his wet fur, sending water and snowflakes cascading around the room in such fury that it would have made a McDonalds McFlurry stand up and applaud! My wife had orders to feed him and feed him well before sending him into The Room With a View... which she did thanks to all the leftover Thanksgiving dinner we HAD laying around.

Finally the Wedge was fed and happy and settled down in the BIG chair in the Room With a View With a fire burning in the fireplace fogging up the window with its cozy warmth we lazily started the E-View. Why don't you settle in too? Pull up a chair by the fire and join me as I talk to a Wabigbear.

Boomer:	Thanks Bob for joining me for a visit; I think it's time we all get to know the Wedge, a little bit better. So let's start out with me asking you, where do you live at?
Wagibear:	At the moment I live in São Paulo, Brazil...did you know it's second largest city on earth, there are over 21 MILLION people here in the Metropolitan area! We have an apartment on the 19th floor of a secure high-rise right downtown. This is a far cry from Deming, Washington- population 200 (40 of which are dogs...) where I grew up!
Boomer:	How do you like living in São Paulo, Brazil?
Wagibear:	I love Brazil. I really do. You know the story...boy meets country....country ignores boy....boy flies down to visit... country closes its airspace...
Boomer:	Oh a voluntary victim of circumstance I see, but I'm told that all's well that ends well, do you ever go back home to Deming, Washington to visit or perhaps collect honey?
Wagibear:	Oh yeah...I've still got a lot of Bear 'Kins and Cousins" in that neck of the woods. Every couple years I head back for the holidays and usually spend a couple months freezing my tail off. They even let me go back to work for my old company...I learned years ago it never pays to burn any bridges when it comes to the things in life...you may want to do them again someday! I've worked as a store manager for a retail chain for many years, and anytime I feel the urge to head back north there's an open spot waiting for me in some store. This year I'll stay in Brazil for Christmas, out enjoying singing 'Jingle Bells" by the pool.
Boomer:	Some members might want to know how old you are, do you mind sharing that with us?
Wagibear:	Mentally, physically or by counting the number of rings?
Boomer:	Well anyway you want to tell us as long as it's not in bear years.
Wagibear:	My mother says I was born in 1956 - AFTER 19 HOURS OF PAINFUL LABOR!!! See Ma? I haven't forgotten (not that she doesn't remind me often anyways...)
Boomer:	(laughing) Well that may be more info then we wanted to know but that does answer that question. When did you first hear about RollerCoaster Tycoon?
Wagibear:	I found the game while purchasing my first computer not long after RCT was released. This was when I gave in and bought "one of them worthless new-fangled contraptions that I'll never use". Of course now I can spend the majority of the day on-line.
Boomer:	That had to be around 1999. I like you, was hesitant to get involved with computers, feeling intimidated by the technology that I knew nothing about. It was while playing RCT that I realized that computers could be used for fun sometimes instead of business reasons. Looks like we both have come a long ways, perhaps you more then me as I still think that PC stands for Personal Confuser. When and where did you first start looking at RCT sites and using RCT forums online?
Wagibear:	I actually stumbled onto the on-line community only after I bought Zoo Tycoon and Microsoft's site mentioned that fan sites were hosting user-made content. From there I searched for similar things for RCT, and I found both The Station and RCT2.com. I didn't post much at the Station but I did a bit here at RCT2.com. After a short time I ended up at "The RCT Site That Shall Not Be Named", and then met a great number of community members there and here at RCT2com. I overcame my acute shyness (did you just roll your eyes Boomer?), and here I am!
Boomer:	You don't seem to display that acute shyness when browsing through the staff room refrigerator my friend, but anyway, getting back to RCT, what copies of RCT1 and 2 do you own and have you played?
Wagibear:	I have them all! Well, close enough anyways...I have RCT1 and its expansion packs in both English AND Portuguese, the same with RCT2. I also even bought the RCT2 Triple Thrill Pack. Yes, I'm a shameless RCT addict!
Boomer:	Aren't we all? What RCT1 and 2 parks or projects have you done?
Wagibear:	Besides the great many ones that have never left my computer hard disk?
Boomer:	Yeah, I know what you mean there, I have quite a few parks also that will be on my computer for a long time, unfinished projects that I just never seem to find the time to finish.
Wagibear:	Well, I think I've only actually released three full parks, all for RCT2. "Christmas Comes To Bradford Falls" was my first for RCT2++, it was released through a small Bradford Falls site I made right after New Year's 2004. Then I released "Disney's Imaginaria" which was chosen as the RCT2.com Vacation Park for August 2004, followed up by "Imaginaria 2 - Discovery Bay" which was picked as Vacation Park this past August. I've done a couple small benches for contests at RCT*Mart, as well as the scenario bench for the new "Jurassic Park" release they just finished there. I have a "New Orleans Square" park almost ready to be released as well. And there's a couple other's in various stages of being built.
Boomer:	I have seen some of your stuff Wedge and I have to say you do really good work with RCT, "Imaginaria 2 - Discovery Bay" came in while I was gone for awhile and it totally blew me away when I came back and opened up that Park. Do you have RCT3 and if so what expansions do you have to go with it?
Wagibear:	I do...I have both RCT3 Vanilla and Soaked! While I beta-tested Wild! they haven't yet released it here in Brazil.
Boomer:	Have you made any parks in RCT3 yet or are you currently working on one?
Wagibear:	I've started my very first park for RCT3. It will be part of the Imaginaria series, which are parks based on Disney, but which don't attempt to BE Disney...I ain't that good! LOL!
Boomer:	Well Bob you have RCT3 and the soaked expansion, you were selected to Beta test Wild, so you've had a pretty good chance to get familiar with RCT3, at this point, what do you think of it?
Wagibear:	I admit at first I didn't like it. I bought it, messed around with it, and that's about all. I had a computer that exceeded the specs by a wide margin, but the game was almost unplayable after a short while in even a small park. Because I didn't feel that the product Atari and Frontier sold me was fulfilling the things they said it would, I was pretty soured on the whole thing. I especially was highly insulted when I sensed that Atari and Frontier took the line that the problems with lag and other 'issues' where the fault of the players That was a disservice to the entire community who had been so loyal to this franchise I also wouldn't buy into the whole "you need to upgrade" claim. My computer FAR exceeded what Atari claimed was needed to play the game, so how did it become MY fault if it didn't? I didn't buy into that one. My video card then went out. I made the decision then to upgrade my card. I found that RCT3 played better, but there were still some problems like the infamous "Admiring The View" and "Suntan Lotion Junkie" bugs that made it almost unplayable after a short while. I was chosen to beta test Wild! which got me playing the game more. The fixes built into Wild! solved some of the worse problems. That, and because of jonwil, custom scenery became a reality. That caught my interest even more.
Boomer:	Yes, jonwil has defiantly added to this game. He was sitting in that very chair your setting in when I interviewed him back in March of this year. There is some interesting stuff in that E-View about RCT3, reverse engineering and hard codes he was working around to make it even better and that's all a plus for us the players, but I think that the thing that matters most with playability of RCT3 is how powerful of a computing system you have. What kind of a computer system do you use to play RCT3 on Wedge?
Wagibear:	We just bought a new Dell 5150 with Pentium 4, 4 Ghz, 1 Gb of RAM, with a Radeon X300/X550 which I'll be upgrading soon. Computers are fairly expensive here in Brazil...the import duty is horrendous! So sometimes you have to upgrade step-by-step. The new computer has made playing RCT3 even better, so that's a plus.
Boomer:	You were speaking earlier about Beta testing, how did you like being a Beta Tester for RCT3 Wild?
Wagibear:	Well, I was in the second batch called, so many of the bugs had previously been reported. I did find a few minor things, and it was really enjoyable and informative to see that side of the gaming process. Having a beta copy of Wild! to play with while waiting for it to be released here is like icing on the cake!
Boomer:	Okay, speaking of cake, I want to switch gears here and ask you what is your favorite food?
Wagibear:	What, I can only pick just one???
Boomer:	I can imagine picking just one would be hard in an exotic cuisine tropical city such as São Paulo.
Wagibear:	There's certainly a huge offering of different foods from different cultures in a city this size, and I'm not a bad cook myself (or at least not fussy...I mean look at me! Obviously I eat my own cooking!) But out of all that, my favorite thing in the world is a fresh cold fruit salad...and living in the tropics I can make a mean one I assure you!
Boomer:	I hope to take you up on that someday. Has living in the tropics resulted in you learning to speak more then one language?
Wagibear:	Oops, I thought the exorcism took care of that "speaking in tongues" thing? I'm proud to say that I can count to ten in German, French, Japanese, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese! Living in Brazil I have learned Portuguese (no...they don't speak Spanish here for all my fellow Americans...ahem) Make that "I learned to speak Portuguese...badly, and very slowly". I can read Portuguese much easier, it's just vocalizing that hard for me (unbelievable, I know...)
Boomer:	Well Wedge, you seem to be liked and understood well in the RCT community, whatever langrage you're speaking. How many RCT sites are you on staff at anyway?
Wagibear:	Well, I'm officially on staff here at The RCT Space Network. Then after they got tired of me hanging around all the time at RCT*Mart so they gave me a staff title anyways, it keeps people from thinking I'm just the strange uncle hanging around there all the time. I've also been helping Potter get his RCT Extended site up and running, something I've done for other sites as well over the years.
Boomer:	It seems you have been doing more then just hanging around here at this site. You were recently promoted to a co-Chief Moderator position to give Todd Lee a hand. How hard is your job here at the RCTSpace Network in your new position?
Wagibear:	How hard? Depends on which stick they use to poke me awake with. That Mama Bear's got a mean left jab... Seriously, the members at RCTSpace make the job an easy one. With few exceptions they are a mature bunch who share their interests in the game.
Boomer:	Okay, I ask everybody this next question and you will be no exception. If you could speak directly to Chris Sawyer right now, what would you say to him or ask him?
Wagibear:	Well, while I admire the man for being the originator of the game, I admit I'm not a "Chris Sawyer Groupie". I think much of how he envisioned the game should be played is very different than how I want to play it. I do miss some of the simplicity from the first games, but I also prefer the freedom to construct what I want - when I want...something that I understand he wasn't a big fan of. Maybe I'd ask him if that's true and to discuss his reasons why. Maybe we'd learn something from each other. And I'd also ask him what's up with the Atari lawsuit? What took so long? Anytime I go missing 4-5 million dollars you KNOW I'm gonna be looking where it went! Wouldn't take years to do it either.
Boomer:	(laughing) I hear you about that, anytime I miss 5 dollars for more then 5 minutes I go looking for it. I imagine though it took awhile for the dust to settle when this game first came out and exploded in popularity, to sort out who got what from this mega-hit PC game called RollerCoaster Tycoon and that my friend leads us into my final question for you, do you think RCT is here to stay?
Wagibear:	The franchise has a large, loyal community. It's a best-selling game. One would assume that's a no-brainer. BUT....it is also possible it can be ruined. Much more thought needs to go into the next step. RCT3 needs further expansions and fixes, if nothing else to solidify the customer base for this version of the game. Atari, whether because of their money troubles or just plain screwups, has not done a very good job with the community lately. They need to turn things around before even looking at RCT4. If they don't I still think there will be a RCT-type game..it just may not be connected with the current developers OR Chris Sawyer.
Boomer:	RCT4, now there's a pleasant thought. Well Wedge, I want to thank you for taking the time to have this chat with me here in The Room. It's been a pleasure and I'll see you in the staff room.
Wagibear:	Thanks so much for having me Boomer, and thank the Mrs. For the nice snack. Ah...maybe you could remind her to put extra mayo on your ham sandwich that I'll be sneaking from the frig? The last one was a little on the dry side, and I ended up washing it down with a couple drinks from the 'special' water cooler you and Scoop have in back. I woke up six hours later face down in Sambo's Tupperware bowl full of clam dip... Anyways, thanks again Boomer...I got a plane to catch and I need to get there before all the peanuts are gone... gotta go!