1, Hi Jamie! First of all, I really appreciate your time, so thanks for agreeing to do this interview. Hopefully, this will be an opportunity for everyone to get to know you better, and learn about you cool new game Chopper Mike, on the OUYA.
So, why don’t you start by introducing yourself to our readers?



 

I'm Jamie Lowes. I'm an indie and freelance games developer. I run VAMflax, and the excitingly titled 'Jamie Lowes Development Services LTD.'. For complete details, visit VAMflax.com, jamielowesdev.com, and follow @jamielowesdev on twitter!

I do all the development for VAMflax, and in July 2012 I started writing Chopper Mike, my first self-developed and self-published title!

I started in professional games development in 1997, I went straight from university to working at Codemasters as a programmer. While I was there I worked on Colin McRae Rally 1, 2, and 3, which was pretty cool. I then moved to a smaller company that got shut down, then to the Sega Racing Studio, made Sega Rally 3, then the studio got shut down, then went to Sony(Bigbig Studios), made Motorstorm AE and Little Deviants, then the studio go shut down... It was the third studio shut down that made me think about going freelance!

In my freelance job I have worked with Sega, Codemasters, Midoki, Activision(FreeStyleGames), and others. I enjoy working on so many different titles. And each company uses different tech, so you get to see a lot of different ways of doing things.

 

2, What was the biggest challenge you’ve faced in the industry so far, and if you could do it again what would you do differently?



The biggest challenge for me is trying to get Chopper Mike noticed. It's very hard, but not impossible to get a bit of attention. You are competing with companies that have millions of advertising budget. And then there's you, with a trailer you made yourself on YouTube.. It's crazy!

I wouldn't change anything that I've done so far. It's all a learning exercise, and I've learned tons in the last year. It's nice to try things, whether they succeed or not, and be able to have industry opinions based on facts!

 

3, I am sure there are hundreds, but, is there a specific game you played and thought if you were to design it, you would make it differently?

If so, why, how?



Not really. I mean, I'm picky about UI, especially the times it takes some games to move between screens. But the actual gameplay part, I don't spend time thinking about how to improve other people's games. I'm too busy thinking about mine!!

 

4, In what ways would you like to see games change in the future?



Higher precision controllers, a greater focus on skill-based games, and a culture that acknowledges quality players. So I suppose I would like to see the horribly named 'esports' gain a greater following.



5, On the VAMflax site it says that you’ve worked with some great developers/publishers( sony, codemasters and sega) which was the best to work for and what was your favourite game you worked on in that time?



I love all my clients equally!  :D  My favourite game, apart from Chopper Mike, (of course), was Sega Rally 3. We wrote that from scratch. I turned up on the first day and we just had PCs with Windows and Visual Studio installed. By the end we had a cross platform game that was great fun to play, and we even got to port it to the arcade version. I wrote the code to control the force feedback wheel and motorised seat! That was cool.

 

6,  Also on the VAMflax site, it says you love arcade games, now is this the small scale XBLA games or the classics of old such as Sega Rally and Ridge Racer?



The games from the 90s. Street Fighter 2, Final Fight, Ridge Racer.. It was amazing to go out into town of a Saturday morning and compete against people you didn't know. And the games were so much better than anything you could play at home. It was a golden age of gaming for me, and it's strange to think I lived through the phenomenon, and now it's gone without a trace!



7, So you’ve been out demoing Chopper Mike in GAME, what has the response been to it so far?



Great! I've had brothers fighting over the controller.. People having 'just one more go'. It's cool that people 'get it'. They get the controls pretty quickly, learn the visual language immediately, and so when they see a challenging level for the first time they're all "Oh, you've got to be kidding me!!". So yeah, it gets a reaction, and there's always a lot of smiles  :D

 

8, How would you describe the game to someone that has never seen it before?



I have a blurb for this!

"Chopper Mike is a challenging, fast-paced, arcade helicopter time trial game featuring super smooth graphics and amazing controls."

But yeah, it's a helicopter game, (no, really?). And it's a test of skill. Find the fastest way through the level, and execute that path as best you can. Trying to beat the target times, your own high scores, or your friend's scores gets addictive. The game is set up to be super quick to restart, so you go into this cycle of trying to fly the perfect line, restarting as soon as you go off line a fraction, doing it again and again. It's one of those games you can go into a trance while playing.



9, Chopper Mike will be released for the OUYA console, what have you found this new console like to develop for?



A few months ago it was a bit frantic, as the tools were being developed. Now it's super easy. If you have a Unity project, there's not a whole lot you have to do to it to get it going. The developer forums have been manned by some super helpful people, and there are FAQs now for getting set up. It's simple now.

 

10, Do you use the OUYA pad in any new ways? Say with the touch pad, or is it all with buttons and analogue sticks?



Nope. Just the analogue stick and trigger.



11, It also says that the sound effects were done by hand for Chopper Mike, what were the most fun, and most weird to do?



Ha, yeah. I used sfxr for most of them, and Goldwave for editing. But the best were the recorded from real life effects. The switches in the levels are a recording of a GameCube reset button being pressed. The mother of all sfx was the chopper sound itself. I started recording an RC heli, but that just sounded awful. Then a friend suggested flapping a wallet between your fingers... no joke. I used a notebook, and it worked! I have a video of it here: http://youtu.be/vIx0pNtRPvk

 

12, The final and the biggest question comes: What do you want to do in the future?



Simple. Keep making my own games!