Deze rubriek is geschreven door Dutchy3010.

Vandaag een speciaal interview, namelijk met een Engelse admin van GTAForums.com! Als hij het dus over "het forum", bedoelt hij natuurlijk niet ons forum. Een keer voor de verandering dus! Met trots presenteer ik jullie een interview met Illspirit.

GTA

Q: How did you get interested in GTA?

A: When I first read the previews for the first GTA, it sounded like tons of fun. My favorite type of games before GTA were the more open-ended, exploration based games like Zelda, Castlevania, or Metroid. So between the sandbox style, the dark satire, and the over-the-top gangster movie theme, I just had to try it out.

Q: What is your favorite GTA version?

A: That's a tough question. As far as gameplay goes, GTA2 would have to be my favorite. But with the palette system for the car sprites being so tricky to mod, the original is still the best all around.

Q: What is your favorite Mission from the whole GTA series?

A: Probably the one in GTA2 where you drop a bus full of enemy gang members off to be made into hot dogs.

Q: Do you still play GTA very often, and if so, what versions?

A: I don't really play them very much any more, but will occasionally wander around in San Andreas for a few minutes to look at how the map is put together.

Q: Do you play other games besides GTA, and if so, which?

A: Last few games I've spent much time on were Bully, Unreal Tournament 2004, and Oblivion. Well, those, and running through Castlevania: Symphony of the Night for the 100th or so time. Otherwise, I need to upgrade the PC again or break down and buy a new console.

Q: Which modifications should be tried by every GTA-fan?

A: The mod everyone should try is Burger City for the first GTA. It's probably the most complete conversion of a GTA game ever. So complete, that it's really kind of hard to say what exactly it was converted into. 'Twas very strange and very creative, to say the least.

Myriad Islands is another, though I might be a bit partial there. But tons of other people have put far more work into it than me, so it's definitely worth checking out.

Q: GTA online: MTA or SA-MP?

A: SA-MP, without a doubt.

GTA Modding

Q: How and when did you get involved into GTA modding?

A: Good question. That was so long ago it's hard to say! If I remember correctly, it was about a week or two before the first game came out in the US, and everyone was just figuring out how to change parked cars into tanks and stuff in the .ini.

Q:Which of your achievements in GTA modding are you most proud of?

A: Hmm.. Probably SC2 for GTA2. Unfortunately, events in real life froze its development for like a year. Even then, the "final" version released after GTA3 came out still wasn't totally finished.

Q: Can you name a few of couple of your best known modifications?

A: Snowball City and Spacestation: GTA for the first game are likely the most well known. Unless you count Myriad Islands, but I didn't really do much there.

Q: Who are or have been in your eyes the most influential people in the GTA modding scene?

A: There's so many people, I wouldn't even know where to start. Back in the day, guys like Azz, Henrik Larsson, GTAKreyz, and Alfadog made car sprites into an art form, and inspired everyone to put a lot more work into mods than a quick MS Paint-job. As for mapping, Jevon, Stilton (Ransom), and The Autobahn Crew (Burger City) were my biggest influences back in the 2D days.

Without them, and guys (and a gal) like Schu, Valdez, Tek, and Tiff putting in all the work to make and maintain the old fansites, there wouldn't be a mod scene today. At least not as we know it.

As for the modern 3D age, I don't follow the car or coding scenes very well, but Odie is the father of GTA3D mapping. He lead the way in figuring out how maps are made, and set the standard by which all maps after him were judged.

Then without tool makers such as Steve-M, Spookie, CyQ, Barton Waterduck, Jernej/Delfi, REspawn, Jim Purbrick, Jeff Mathews, and others I surely missed, we wouldn't have been able to mod anything to begin with anyway.

And, of course, PatrickW influenced the scene (not to mention world politics..) with Hot Coffee.

Q: Which talents or skills should one have to become a successful modder?

A: It really depends on which branch of modding one wants to do. Overall, some of the most important things one needs are lots of patience, an eye for detail, and the ability to think outside the box to do things nobody thought possible with the engine.

Q: What are at this moment the most prestigious GTA modding projects?

A: The biggest thing right now has to be SA-MP. There are lots of big projects going on, but none with as many people playing as that.

Q: Which less-known modding tools, should every GTA modder know and use?

A: Not sure what the least-known tool is, but Notepad is probably the most under-rated. When all else fails, everyone should know their way around the text-based data files in a text editor.

Q: What has been the impact of the media hype around the Hot Coffee Mod on the modding community?

A: After the initial shock wore off, the only real impact is that a few people have either stopped modding or just quit devoting so much energy to it because they don't like how Rockstar gave us the cold shoulder. In the long term, the real impact will be seen when (or if) Rockstar releases a PC version of GTA IV, and whether or not it will support mods.

Q:You are a modeller, what do you think of Coden?

A: Coding is cool, I just suck at it. I had lots of fun making missions for the earlier games, but just decided to leave it to the pros when GTA3 came along.

Q: Do you want to learn coding?

A: I would like to learn mission coding and C++, but just don't have the time or motivation to do so.

Forum

Q: How did you came to gtaforums.com ?

A: Originally, I only registered so nobody would steal my name. After a while, GTAF started to have more GTA3 modding stuff than G! so I started actually visiting and spending time here. Then Jev recruited me to work on GTA3mods.com and eventually be an admin, and I've been stuck here since.

Q: How many hour are you on the forums, on an average day?

A: Only a couple anymore. Though if there's a problem, some news, or I'm really bored, I'll be on for much longer.

Q: What is the biggest drawback of a forum?

A: Trying to keep the database size manageable while not wanting to delete anything useful.

Q: What is the best things that happened to you on gtaforums.com?

A: Perhaps the time I banned myself for a few hours.

Q: What is the most fun on the forums?

A: The most fun part are the strange and silly pranks. Next would be trolling in the off-topic forum..

Q: What keeps you coming to the forums?

A: The main reason I visit anymore is just to keep things working somewhat. Otherwise, I'm mostly just waiting for GTAIV info like everyone else.

Q: With which people of the forums do you have the most contact?

A: For the most part, I just hide out in the moderator forum or secret IRC channel these days.

Q: What do you think of WikiGTA.org?

A: Looks like an excellent source for everything GTA-related. Haven't really explored it too much though as my brain is already too full of GTA info.