Dignitary from the very beginning of the ET has given me an honour to interview him. Here's my newest interview with the smiley-specialist and maker of infamous ET-comic
Feuersturm
First, please introduce yourself to those who may not know you.
I'm a 26 year old guitarist, strict realist, atheist and devoted antitheist. I am strangely likable for a seemingly unlikable person.
The people who might be reading this may know me for my time in ET or as the author of Just Pub comics.
I fully acknowledge the link between tragedy and comedy and live my life always prepared for the worst. This is not by a personal choice, but by natural development.
How did you start playing and had you played any other games before RTCW?
I started with the very first demo of Return To Castle Wolfenstein back in September of 2001. I pretty much took a shot in the dark there while browsing a finnish site looking for a multiplayer fps. Noticed the demo, downloaded and instantly
liked the game, which also ran well on my state of the art rig.
I did not have prior online gaming experience, just games in general. Back then I was actually still semi-interested in what the industry had to offer.
Could you tell me a little bit about your RTCW career?
After playing the first two demos (there was an updated one as well as a post-retail demo) for a few months I bought the game and by then I had already caught the attention of a few people interested in forming a clan.
The scene in Finland was naturally quite small, but incredibly vivid and active. It was a different time. People would all know each other and no one was a stranger on the servers. A v54 would get a response from everyone.
I told myself and others that I am not interested in clans and that I would simply keep playing on publics, but a player called James G managed to be the one who convinced me to start up a clan with him and another older guy called pupukello. I wanted to keep gaming and obligations apart, but I guess that was bound to chance...
James thought of the name Apical, so we went with that. We took in some people straight from the publics. Those who seemed worthy, you know. There was not much else to it, everyone was a beginner basically, but certain people would stand out.
We gathered about 12-14 people in a relatively short period of time, which was too many.. and immediately scrapped off a few. I never even got to know some of them. Those who remained, stayed for a long time.
To make a long story short, towards our more successful days Apical fielded players like Shagi from Broken and Primal from Gunslingers. We eventually participated in, among other things, Eurocup VII and made it to the playoffs, but inactivity got the best of us and we unfortunately had to call it quits at that point.
Was the transition from RTCW to ET obvious and did you like the game from the very beginning?
RTCW would have been a safe choice, but it had already withered severely when ET was about to be released. Servers slowly grew empty leaving me with no choice.
The maptest of ET was quite the abomination and felt like a retarded alpha version of RTCW and really made me think twice about changing the game. Who could forget the character models moving in 1 meter intervals or the nades that went left or right depending on which way you strafe.
I did realize that if I want a more active and eventful Wolfenstein experience, I would have to go with the flow, which I did. A free game has its benefits. There was also a wicked charm in the conveyer belt fragging frenzy of ET and the SMGs which had almost no spread at all. It wasn't an obvious transition, but a necessary one, let's put it that way.
Tell us about your time with ET a bit more elaborately.
It started the same way I started with RTCW a few years earlier - just playing publics. I was just fine keeping it that way. After a week or two however, skidi from Broken asked me to join. Basically Xes, Atlas, Bre and myself from Apical joined forces with Broken and played under their name.
Back then we tried to keep the finnish colours flying high, but we never quite matched the success of GS and DSky, albeit staying right in their wake.
In early 2004 Saevus came to be when Broken, the short-lived Amnesia and an unknown LD all folded pretty much at the same time. I can't believe I still remember how some of this stuff took place.
Top moments and best achievements?
I remember a few great matches. Back in RTCW for instance, I remember playing a damn tough tie with mORe (mouseman, sanctity, sere, one etc.) in either RTCW.no premiere or EC VII (both were being played at the time) and after the match Primal making the comment something along the lines of "next time we meet them, we will win and they will fold!". Little did he know this is exactly what happened... quite the prophet.
Some personal funny stuff from RTCW days would have to include taking out five gs.net players alone in the mp_ice flag room or neatly recapping the same flag in a great EC match against EYE (Summ3l, Sod etc). We tied one round on both maps, but lost 0-2. It was totally worth it though. A solid match, exactly what RTCW was all about.
Not a top moment by any means on our behalf, but needless to say, I will probably never forget the final against Insanity, which earned us the EC X gold. An extraordinary game, albeit a flawed performance.
I also had the "frag of the year 2002". I doubt that counts as anything though, heh, just a curiosity. It was a pretty cool moment nonetheless.
There was also some RTCW match we played with KiH where Lampan broke his keyboard in furious anger. Talk about putting emotion in the game.
Describe your playing style.
In ET, after switching away from smaller mousepads and adopting a different style, I've heard some comments about my movement being "robotic" or "like hand in a jar of fat". I think Capten said it best when he said I play very calm.
Of course in matches my approach must have been somewhat defensive because I was always briefing a lot. I never really made an aware decision to play one way or another, just tried to do what has to be done.
I emphasized slow movements because I play on a low resolution and therefore need stability to detect motion in the distance, so I don't play under sedatives or anything. I probably couldn't play any other way anyway. My sensitivity isn't as low as it may seem. Sometimes people wonder on publics why I move funny, but I can only wonder why they move like electroshocked ADHD patients with parkinson's disease themselves.
Pros and cons as a player?
The ability to harness my equipment to work fully for my favor is my strong point since it allows me to play my best. I am still deadly when this is achieved. It comes with a negative too. This means I am completely dependant on my equipment and need to have everything exactly the way I want it in order to perform well.
It only matters to me on a personal level these days since I don't have to worry about winning or losing a clanwar. So I guess I am not very flexible on that department.
Worst opponents and nicest opponents to play against?
In RTCW, we played a lot with SnapS and RaGE, so we got to know them quite well. I guess u96d was a nice bunch to play with too in the ET days because they gave a good fight usually.
The thing is, most of the time we knew who we were up against and never had to deal with problems or hackers or whatever. The "worst" opponents were in fact the best to play with since we couldn't just run them over.
Saevus was surely one of ET's most legendary clans. Could you tell us how it got started?
Xes was (secretly!) putting together a new team with zeni, so I went with his idea, along with Atlas and sic. Darky and potter were there, as was Raziel, Christa and ferus. Deadmeat was rescued a while later from the captivity of his old team, idle. Saevus was initially supposed to be Epitaph's second coming, but an entirely new name seemed more fitting for an entirely new team.
After Broken's demise, the remaining Apical players were actually trying to resurrect Apical to play ET. We already had sparked the interest of our old teammate Mehukatti and Gestapo's Maverick, two rather known early RTCW names.
My intention was to keep an all-finnish lineup, but Xes thought if we're going to go places, we have to go international. It seemed like an unnecessary decision at the time, but after one or two games it became obvious that we had a great roster together and we should take everything out of the newfound enthusiasm. Everything worked well from the start, no one had to be told what to do and there was not a trace of bitterness or despair left from the broken days of Broken.
Could you tell us about Saevus' players in greater detail?
As mentioned, Xes, Atlas and myself were teammates long before Saevus. Sic was an awesome player and had previously played for a small finnish team called KKP, but preferred to stay low-profile and so managed to avoid being recognized by many during his time with Broken and Sae. Darky had played with Plan-B, Potter with PoD and Rapture with Dignitas.
In the beginning, I was told that Ferus is a great player, but I didn't know anything about him so I had to trust my teammates' judgement on that. Fortunately he came through strong and made a name for himself fairly quickly. Ferus was always singing some stupid song ("that's the way aha aha I like it...") and Deadmeat serenaded "choooocolate...". I don't know what the hell that was about. The atmosphere in voicecomms was always so relaxed, we often forgot we were playing an important match.
And moving on to other clans. At least us finns are interested why Broken didn't do better and why did Broken call
it quits?
Broken was probably the best RTCW team Finland had to offer alongside Mirage. The ET version, in theory, had just as much potential as GS and DSky, but I have to say the leadership was too temperamental and our teamplay was nowhere near what it should have been. We handled pressure poorly and during a game could lose all motivation in a matter of moments. It was probably just about conflicting personalities (or a personality conflict), but Broken was a bit of an anticlimax when it should have been more. Sure we had success in the early days, but usually lost the bigger matches and couldn't handle the best teams. Ironically, we pulled off an unexpected 1-0 victory over Dignitas once, but that never happened again. Go figure...
You had a minor comeback with Saevus, what happened?
We did, but I didn't. The austrian trio wanted to have another try and I was worried they will just taint the old Saevus name in a catastropic failure if they return from inactivity expecting to perform as well as before. Xionn, Crajsor and Sanctity were recruited and they played for a while. I'm not sure what happened, but eventually zP started playing and the whole comeback was soon dusted off. When I decided to quit playing competitively in 2005, I knew what I meant and that decision has held.
We had a good run together and I rather have the memories than wreck it all in some half-assed comeback. It takes time and dedication to keep up a strong game, something that cannot be conjured out of thin air when you feel like it.
You never attended any LANs yourself. In retrospect, are you bothered by that at all and did you have a chance
to go at any point?
In ET, I was never one bit interested in playing LANs. For me, playing was just about 6v6, participating in cups and being as successful as possible in whatever was available. I guess I just wasn't "that" hardcore. E-star offered us tickets to some LAN I can't even remember anymore but that didn't realize in the end. Everyone was all ready and willing to go, but the idea never did anything for me.
I probably could never play my best in a LAN environment. Back then ET was still a fairly young title and big events probably just didn't care for it yet. Now there's all sorts of money and hardware prizes? Sounds crazy. We were motivated by competition alone.
Biggest disappointments you can think of?
Losing a what was supposed to be a fairly easy match against BlackBugs in RTCW.no premiere. Another one may have been a tie with Pornstars, which was a great strategic decision on their behalf (taking the second map to mp_sub). A bit of a disappointment also was the forfeit we gave to Plan-B in Eurocup VII playoffs. We went inactive when we could have gone quite far after securing victories against teams like mORe and VSE earlier. I guess it was better to quit than to struggle for the heck of it, but it was an opportunity lost anyway.
Also, losing 0-4 to Mirage with Saevus in our first ever lost match was a bit of wake up call. We did redeem ourselves with a 4-0 victory against them in Eurocup, but it was important to remember we were not unbeatable by any means. Gunslingers were the second team to take us down, when they took the decider to fueldump, a map both teams had very little experience of. They knew very well their best chance is there, they took it and managed to beat us, albeit narrowly, which Tosspot seemed to enjoy to the fullest.
Again moving on to different topics. You do the ET comic Just Pub. What inspired you to create it?
Just Pub is a mildly sarcastic interpretation of ET, its side effects, online gaming and the internet, with the occasional popular culture reference. Just Pub was inspired by, believe it or not, illiterate belgians. Well, the Half-Life 2 comic Concerned might have had something to do with it, since it resonates on the same comical pitch as my sense of humor. I don't laugh a lot though. As a matter of fact I hardly ever do. When I watch Gmod Idiot Box I might actually chuckle, but overall, I do find myself to be a bit of a pessimist with a flatlined emotional scale.
However, I have always been a creative person. When I was a kid, I used to draw and write a lot. Others hardly liked to write stories, but I quite enjoyed it. Later on I've channeled my creative needs through the strings of the guitar and Just Pub is simply one outlet for creativity. There is a lot to be made fun of in ET. New releases will emerge once or twice in a while.
You are somewhat known in the finnish scene for your strange and quirky smileys, where did they come from?
When I started hanging around on irc, I swore I will never do a smiling smiley. So instead, I just did ":l", which later got a bit out of hand. The ascii map is full of wonders and one can easily scetch up a Hitler §:-«l or the morbidly obese Kirby.... Blasting X and D with full force is not my thing o_°
Quick questions :v
ET or RTCW?
Gameplaywise, I would have to say RTCW. The action was fast, the maps were brilliantly designed and tight. There were no dead moments. ET on the other hand has a great netcode through etpro, but also has plenty of annoyances and a smaller learning curve, which means the gap between a good player and a great player is way smaller than it was in RTCW.
Best RTCW and ET teams?
Infensus in RTCW. Dignitas for being the trendsetters of high level ET in 2003. I suppose some teams were better years after them, but I much rather give credit to originators than "late bloomers", as one might say.
Your dream team in RTCW and ET?
I never thought about these. For ET, I guess you could throw in sic, mystic, ferus, potter, darkie, replicator and a few others and they would be a pain in the ass to gun down. Great aimers don't automatically equal a great team though, but hey, firepower is always a plus.
Best RTCW and ET players?
For RTCW, SoD probably. He was a great aim and a silly person. As far as ET goes, sic was one of the very few who knew how to make the crosshair both lethal and aesthetically pleasing. He also had an uncanny ability to walk away from impossible situations and was a reliable medic on top of that. He never got the recognition he deserved. Not that he asked for it though.
Do you still have any desire to start playing competitively again? Do you ever miss playing?
Sometimes I get into these nostalgic discussions about how things were, who were playing and when, what was going on, what happened and what didn't et cetera, but I don't feel any need to put myself through the clan gaming thing again. It was both exhausting and rewarding and fit well into my life back then, but these days I could not spare the time or interest to play competitively.
Sometimes I may miss certain days of old RTCW or ET just like I would miss childhood years or a particular time in my life in the past. I got to do what I wanted to do when I was active and I wouldn't ask for more.
Do you still have any contact to your old teammates? Which ones? What are they up to?
Some of my old RTCW teammates from way back are still hanging around on irc actually. None of them play anything except single player games for fun. I still talk to potter sometimes, zeni the Saevus elf might drop in occasionally, I've seen rapture stopping by from time to time, but I haven't seen the rest around in ages.
Sic hasn't been on irc in years and Xes and Atlas are long gone too. some others like mAx used to be around more, but the last I heard from him was something job related, so I guess people are just growing out of playing games when there are other issues to deal with.
Which publics do you like to play on or do you play at all anymore?
Playing ET for me is merely an old habit. And as they say, old habits die hard. Publics are more than enough for me, it's about as much as I want from ET anymore, just shooting around. I play somewhere out there... feeding that old habit, looking for that perfect killing spree.
Is there a new mouse/mousepad analysis coming up some day?
Most likely not. I stopped testing new pads when I noticed I already have what I need. My existing equipment will serve me as long as it lasts.
Any last words?
I don't have any noteworthy last words, so I think I'll throw in a comic relief from the good old RTCW days. Here's a sound clip of TsN-Warwitch going through the rosters of Apical and VSE in a pre-match discussion and well, figuring out how to pronounce my nick. It cracked us up back then, but in all honesty he could not have done any better. tsn_ww02.mp3
Mousepads
ET- Comic
FeuersturmFirst, please introduce yourself to those who may not know you.
I'm a 26 year old guitarist, strict realist, atheist and devoted antitheist. I am strangely likable for a seemingly unlikable person.
The people who might be reading this may know me for my time in ET or as the author of Just Pub comics.
I fully acknowledge the link between tragedy and comedy and live my life always prepared for the worst. This is not by a personal choice, but by natural development.
How did you start playing and had you played any other games before RTCW?
I started with the very first demo of Return To Castle Wolfenstein back in September of 2001. I pretty much took a shot in the dark there while browsing a finnish site looking for a multiplayer fps. Noticed the demo, downloaded and instantly
liked the game, which also ran well on my state of the art rig.
I did not have prior online gaming experience, just games in general. Back then I was actually still semi-interested in what the industry had to offer.
Could you tell me a little bit about your RTCW career?
After playing the first two demos (there was an updated one as well as a post-retail demo) for a few months I bought the game and by then I had already caught the attention of a few people interested in forming a clan.
The scene in Finland was naturally quite small, but incredibly vivid and active. It was a different time. People would all know each other and no one was a stranger on the servers. A v54 would get a response from everyone.
I told myself and others that I am not interested in clans and that I would simply keep playing on publics, but a player called James G managed to be the one who convinced me to start up a clan with him and another older guy called pupukello. I wanted to keep gaming and obligations apart, but I guess that was bound to chance...
James thought of the name Apical, so we went with that. We took in some people straight from the publics. Those who seemed worthy, you know. There was not much else to it, everyone was a beginner basically, but certain people would stand out.
We gathered about 12-14 people in a relatively short period of time, which was too many.. and immediately scrapped off a few. I never even got to know some of them. Those who remained, stayed for a long time.
To make a long story short, towards our more successful days Apical fielded players like Shagi from Broken and Primal from Gunslingers. We eventually participated in, among other things, Eurocup VII and made it to the playoffs, but inactivity got the best of us and we unfortunately had to call it quits at that point.
Was the transition from RTCW to ET obvious and did you like the game from the very beginning?
RTCW would have been a safe choice, but it had already withered severely when ET was about to be released. Servers slowly grew empty leaving me with no choice.
The maptest of ET was quite the abomination and felt like a retarded alpha version of RTCW and really made me think twice about changing the game. Who could forget the character models moving in 1 meter intervals or the nades that went left or right depending on which way you strafe.
I did realize that if I want a more active and eventful Wolfenstein experience, I would have to go with the flow, which I did. A free game has its benefits. There was also a wicked charm in the conveyer belt fragging frenzy of ET and the SMGs which had almost no spread at all. It wasn't an obvious transition, but a necessary one, let's put it that way.
Tell us about your time with ET a bit more elaborately.
It started the same way I started with RTCW a few years earlier - just playing publics. I was just fine keeping it that way. After a week or two however, skidi from Broken asked me to join. Basically Xes, Atlas, Bre and myself from Apical joined forces with Broken and played under their name.
Back then we tried to keep the finnish colours flying high, but we never quite matched the success of GS and DSky, albeit staying right in their wake.
In early 2004 Saevus came to be when Broken, the short-lived Amnesia and an unknown LD all folded pretty much at the same time. I can't believe I still remember how some of this stuff took place.
Top moments and best achievements?
I remember a few great matches. Back in RTCW for instance, I remember playing a damn tough tie with mORe (mouseman, sanctity, sere, one etc.) in either RTCW.no premiere or EC VII (both were being played at the time) and after the match Primal making the comment something along the lines of "next time we meet them, we will win and they will fold!". Little did he know this is exactly what happened... quite the prophet.
Some personal funny stuff from RTCW days would have to include taking out five gs.net players alone in the mp_ice flag room or neatly recapping the same flag in a great EC match against EYE (Summ3l, Sod etc). We tied one round on both maps, but lost 0-2. It was totally worth it though. A solid match, exactly what RTCW was all about.
Not a top moment by any means on our behalf, but needless to say, I will probably never forget the final against Insanity, which earned us the EC X gold. An extraordinary game, albeit a flawed performance.
I also had the "frag of the year 2002". I doubt that counts as anything though, heh, just a curiosity. It was a pretty cool moment nonetheless.
There was also some RTCW match we played with KiH where Lampan broke his keyboard in furious anger. Talk about putting emotion in the game.
Describe your playing style.
In ET, after switching away from smaller mousepads and adopting a different style, I've heard some comments about my movement being "robotic" or "like hand in a jar of fat". I think Capten said it best when he said I play very calm.
Of course in matches my approach must have been somewhat defensive because I was always briefing a lot. I never really made an aware decision to play one way or another, just tried to do what has to be done.
I emphasized slow movements because I play on a low resolution and therefore need stability to detect motion in the distance, so I don't play under sedatives or anything. I probably couldn't play any other way anyway. My sensitivity isn't as low as it may seem. Sometimes people wonder on publics why I move funny, but I can only wonder why they move like electroshocked ADHD patients with parkinson's disease themselves.
Pros and cons as a player?
The ability to harness my equipment to work fully for my favor is my strong point since it allows me to play my best. I am still deadly when this is achieved. It comes with a negative too. This means I am completely dependant on my equipment and need to have everything exactly the way I want it in order to perform well.
It only matters to me on a personal level these days since I don't have to worry about winning or losing a clanwar. So I guess I am not very flexible on that department.
Worst opponents and nicest opponents to play against?
In RTCW, we played a lot with SnapS and RaGE, so we got to know them quite well. I guess u96d was a nice bunch to play with too in the ET days because they gave a good fight usually.
The thing is, most of the time we knew who we were up against and never had to deal with problems or hackers or whatever. The "worst" opponents were in fact the best to play with since we couldn't just run them over.
Saevus was surely one of ET's most legendary clans. Could you tell us how it got started?
Xes was (secretly!) putting together a new team with zeni, so I went with his idea, along with Atlas and sic. Darky and potter were there, as was Raziel, Christa and ferus. Deadmeat was rescued a while later from the captivity of his old team, idle. Saevus was initially supposed to be Epitaph's second coming, but an entirely new name seemed more fitting for an entirely new team.
After Broken's demise, the remaining Apical players were actually trying to resurrect Apical to play ET. We already had sparked the interest of our old teammate Mehukatti and Gestapo's Maverick, two rather known early RTCW names.
My intention was to keep an all-finnish lineup, but Xes thought if we're going to go places, we have to go international. It seemed like an unnecessary decision at the time, but after one or two games it became obvious that we had a great roster together and we should take everything out of the newfound enthusiasm. Everything worked well from the start, no one had to be told what to do and there was not a trace of bitterness or despair left from the broken days of Broken.
Could you tell us about Saevus' players in greater detail?
As mentioned, Xes, Atlas and myself were teammates long before Saevus. Sic was an awesome player and had previously played for a small finnish team called KKP, but preferred to stay low-profile and so managed to avoid being recognized by many during his time with Broken and Sae. Darky had played with Plan-B, Potter with PoD and Rapture with Dignitas.
In the beginning, I was told that Ferus is a great player, but I didn't know anything about him so I had to trust my teammates' judgement on that. Fortunately he came through strong and made a name for himself fairly quickly. Ferus was always singing some stupid song ("that's the way aha aha I like it...") and Deadmeat serenaded "choooocolate...". I don't know what the hell that was about. The atmosphere in voicecomms was always so relaxed, we often forgot we were playing an important match.
And moving on to other clans. At least us finns are interested why Broken didn't do better and why did Broken call
it quits?
Broken was probably the best RTCW team Finland had to offer alongside Mirage. The ET version, in theory, had just as much potential as GS and DSky, but I have to say the leadership was too temperamental and our teamplay was nowhere near what it should have been. We handled pressure poorly and during a game could lose all motivation in a matter of moments. It was probably just about conflicting personalities (or a personality conflict), but Broken was a bit of an anticlimax when it should have been more. Sure we had success in the early days, but usually lost the bigger matches and couldn't handle the best teams. Ironically, we pulled off an unexpected 1-0 victory over Dignitas once, but that never happened again. Go figure...
You had a minor comeback with Saevus, what happened?
We did, but I didn't. The austrian trio wanted to have another try and I was worried they will just taint the old Saevus name in a catastropic failure if they return from inactivity expecting to perform as well as before. Xionn, Crajsor and Sanctity were recruited and they played for a while. I'm not sure what happened, but eventually zP started playing and the whole comeback was soon dusted off. When I decided to quit playing competitively in 2005, I knew what I meant and that decision has held.
We had a good run together and I rather have the memories than wreck it all in some half-assed comeback. It takes time and dedication to keep up a strong game, something that cannot be conjured out of thin air when you feel like it.
You never attended any LANs yourself. In retrospect, are you bothered by that at all and did you have a chance
to go at any point?
In ET, I was never one bit interested in playing LANs. For me, playing was just about 6v6, participating in cups and being as successful as possible in whatever was available. I guess I just wasn't "that" hardcore. E-star offered us tickets to some LAN I can't even remember anymore but that didn't realize in the end. Everyone was all ready and willing to go, but the idea never did anything for me.
I probably could never play my best in a LAN environment. Back then ET was still a fairly young title and big events probably just didn't care for it yet. Now there's all sorts of money and hardware prizes? Sounds crazy. We were motivated by competition alone.
Biggest disappointments you can think of?
Losing a what was supposed to be a fairly easy match against BlackBugs in RTCW.no premiere. Another one may have been a tie with Pornstars, which was a great strategic decision on their behalf (taking the second map to mp_sub). A bit of a disappointment also was the forfeit we gave to Plan-B in Eurocup VII playoffs. We went inactive when we could have gone quite far after securing victories against teams like mORe and VSE earlier. I guess it was better to quit than to struggle for the heck of it, but it was an opportunity lost anyway.
Also, losing 0-4 to Mirage with Saevus in our first ever lost match was a bit of wake up call. We did redeem ourselves with a 4-0 victory against them in Eurocup, but it was important to remember we were not unbeatable by any means. Gunslingers were the second team to take us down, when they took the decider to fueldump, a map both teams had very little experience of. They knew very well their best chance is there, they took it and managed to beat us, albeit narrowly, which Tosspot seemed to enjoy to the fullest.
Again moving on to different topics. You do the ET comic Just Pub. What inspired you to create it?
Just Pub is a mildly sarcastic interpretation of ET, its side effects, online gaming and the internet, with the occasional popular culture reference. Just Pub was inspired by, believe it or not, illiterate belgians. Well, the Half-Life 2 comic Concerned might have had something to do with it, since it resonates on the same comical pitch as my sense of humor. I don't laugh a lot though. As a matter of fact I hardly ever do. When I watch Gmod Idiot Box I might actually chuckle, but overall, I do find myself to be a bit of a pessimist with a flatlined emotional scale.
However, I have always been a creative person. When I was a kid, I used to draw and write a lot. Others hardly liked to write stories, but I quite enjoyed it. Later on I've channeled my creative needs through the strings of the guitar and Just Pub is simply one outlet for creativity. There is a lot to be made fun of in ET. New releases will emerge once or twice in a while.
You are somewhat known in the finnish scene for your strange and quirky smileys, where did they come from?
When I started hanging around on irc, I swore I will never do a smiling smiley. So instead, I just did ":l", which later got a bit out of hand. The ascii map is full of wonders and one can easily scetch up a Hitler §:-«l or the morbidly obese Kirby.... Blasting X and D with full force is not my thing o_°
Quick questions :v
ET or RTCW?
Gameplaywise, I would have to say RTCW. The action was fast, the maps were brilliantly designed and tight. There were no dead moments. ET on the other hand has a great netcode through etpro, but also has plenty of annoyances and a smaller learning curve, which means the gap between a good player and a great player is way smaller than it was in RTCW.
Best RTCW and ET teams?
Infensus in RTCW. Dignitas for being the trendsetters of high level ET in 2003. I suppose some teams were better years after them, but I much rather give credit to originators than "late bloomers", as one might say.
Your dream team in RTCW and ET?
I never thought about these. For ET, I guess you could throw in sic, mystic, ferus, potter, darkie, replicator and a few others and they would be a pain in the ass to gun down. Great aimers don't automatically equal a great team though, but hey, firepower is always a plus.
Best RTCW and ET players?
For RTCW, SoD probably. He was a great aim and a silly person. As far as ET goes, sic was one of the very few who knew how to make the crosshair both lethal and aesthetically pleasing. He also had an uncanny ability to walk away from impossible situations and was a reliable medic on top of that. He never got the recognition he deserved. Not that he asked for it though.
Do you still have any desire to start playing competitively again? Do you ever miss playing?
Sometimes I get into these nostalgic discussions about how things were, who were playing and when, what was going on, what happened and what didn't et cetera, but I don't feel any need to put myself through the clan gaming thing again. It was both exhausting and rewarding and fit well into my life back then, but these days I could not spare the time or interest to play competitively.
Sometimes I may miss certain days of old RTCW or ET just like I would miss childhood years or a particular time in my life in the past. I got to do what I wanted to do when I was active and I wouldn't ask for more.
Do you still have any contact to your old teammates? Which ones? What are they up to?
Some of my old RTCW teammates from way back are still hanging around on irc actually. None of them play anything except single player games for fun. I still talk to potter sometimes, zeni the Saevus elf might drop in occasionally, I've seen rapture stopping by from time to time, but I haven't seen the rest around in ages.
Sic hasn't been on irc in years and Xes and Atlas are long gone too. some others like mAx used to be around more, but the last I heard from him was something job related, so I guess people are just growing out of playing games when there are other issues to deal with.
Which publics do you like to play on or do you play at all anymore?
Playing ET for me is merely an old habit. And as they say, old habits die hard. Publics are more than enough for me, it's about as much as I want from ET anymore, just shooting around. I play somewhere out there... feeding that old habit, looking for that perfect killing spree.
Is there a new mouse/mousepad analysis coming up some day?
Most likely not. I stopped testing new pads when I noticed I already have what I need. My existing equipment will serve me as long as it lasts.
Any last words?
I don't have any noteworthy last words, so I think I'll throw in a comic relief from the good old RTCW days. Here's a sound clip of TsN-Warwitch going through the rosters of Apical and VSE in a pre-match discussion and well, figuring out how to pronounce my nick. It cracked us up back then, but in all honesty he could not have done any better. tsn_ww02.mp3
Mousepads
ET- Comic
good job.
STURRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRM
@ferus song
kc and sunshine band - thats the way i like it
http://users.kymp.net/feuer/tsn_ww02.mp3
good interview though
better undelete that cheater interview, much shorter easier to read
I cant understand how you can take ET this serious -_-
Well said.
must have watched that at least a dozen times :P
Answers to those quick questions seemed to be longer than the answers in average interviews here. :D
seems someone was paying attention to newschool blabbermouthing rather than actual live feedback ;-]]
That part was pretty funny ;)
What game is he talking about?
I love them seriousbusinessmen <3
very typical for the finnish community or perhaps actually the entire ET community. to me it seems very weird to even think this is worth mentioning let alone the fact that aparently to some people they think they stand out for not using sedatives :D but judging from the sort of people i met on the LANs ive been to i sort of understand this statement xD
and i dont think he meant it as a joke! :P
btw you must have been very bored reading so far back :-P although on the other hand its actually still on the main page
but drugs such as?
do you mean coffee, cannabis, energy drinks?
or more like energy "pills" or other pills to help concentration etc?
phihi :)
Surprising to find my name in that roster, but perhaps you put in the ie instead of the y, I don't know but if thats not the case, then I'm very honored to be mentioned among such a crew.
Haven't been on xfire for way to long, but what a niec surprise it is, to see actual oldschool people being interviewed..keep up the good work xfire!
...ow and about living expecting the worst: Word! You'll never be disappointed, I think alot of people would benefit from trying o_°
keep up the good work dudes!