An interview with outsider game legend Gary Acord. Delight in his design process. Marvel at his mythology. Become a fan all over again.
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In recent years Gary Acord has built a reputation on retrogaming sites through an extensive series of Wolf3D hacks and surreal experiments with DOS-based game creation systems. His recurring subjects include superheroes, half-naked anime girls, ultra-violence, and Pac-Man. Recently we tracked down Mr. Acord, to delve into the mind behind the mystery.Hi, Gary. Recently I have been introduced to your vast catalog of games. I would like to ask you a few questions, if that's all right.
Sure. It will be fine to ask me a few questions regarding the games I designed. I'll try to answer them to the best of my ability. Thanks for showing interest.
First off, I'm curious about their chronology. Many of your games share resources, and you seem to have gone back and revised several of them. Could you tell me in what order you designed them?
Golly. It's hard to remember now. I redid all the games in about 2010, and when I modified the characters or background blocks for one game I oftentimes improved them in the others. However, I believe that Zapak came before Pakdream, and Pakmon was the last of the trilogy.
Why did you go back and tweak your old games?
The games had all been made with [an old version of] Game-Maker, and I got out the newer Game-Maker and decided to upgrade all the games with the newer engine. I looked at the old games, and there were quite a few problems. The enemies moved too fast, and would kill you before you had a chance to finish the levels. I slowed them down. I gave the hero ammunition. I also increased the heroes' movement capacities. My new philosophy was that the hero should be able to move about freely, fight slower moving enemies, and always have weapon capacity.
It was when I made the game Pakmon in 2010 that I decided to go back and utilize some of the things I learned making Pakmon on all the old games. Pakmon was first developed in 2010. It was the last game I did.
That recent? Wow. What caused you to dig up your old tools?
Gary Acord's Pakmon (2010)
A friend of mine named Russell had come to visit me and he brought a version of YoYo Games' Game Maker, which had a Pac-Man game. I got inspired to create a Pac-Man type game, but I didn't really like the style of the YoYo Game Maker. I thought about my old RSD Game-Maker, and all my earlier games, and the fact that I had done Pac-Man like games with Zapak and Pakdream. So I decided that I could do a much better Pac-Man type game than YoYo had allowed, and thought about how I could link together multiple mazes with the large screen capacity. So I created Pakmon.
Gary Acord's Zapak (1993)
Exactly. You're very perceptive. Although I had some Pac-man levels in earlier games such as Zapak and Pakdream, after I designed Pakmon, I brought many of the elements and qualities of that game into the earlier games. The movement capacity of the main character to move up, down, left, or right, to always have a weapon, and to make the movements of the enemies slower so that they can chase without immediately catching you, allowing you time to run away from them, and to make them not so powerful as to immediately kill you without a fight.
Joan Stone's Penguin Pete (1991)
I would argue with the use of the word "most". It is true that some of the games have leftover elements from some of RSD's demo games, but in 2010 I redid most of the games and tried to eliminate or change most of the levels that had originally been in the demo games. I deleted a lot of them that were in the games, and attempted revising the few that were left over. The first few Game-maker games I developed relied on elements from the demo games, which RSD said we could use in our games, but after my first two games I didn't use any more of the demo levels, although sometimes I used levels from the first two games in subsequent games. I attempted to make them unique, though. Anyway, the statement above may tend to make people doubt my credibility, and it is not entirely accurate.
Gary Acord's Icemare (1992)
I don't know if this is the best way to state it. What is a "character swap?" I know you probably mean that Icemare is a version of Penguin Pete with the character swapped to Sergeant Super, but I'm not sure if that's what you said. Also, the enemies and blocks have been redefined and the whole game compiled with the new GM engine. Also, [the documentation states] that, "You are free to enhance Penguin Pete and you may borrow any of its Gameware for use in your GAME-MAKER games" But does this mean that the game you make will forever be called a Penguin Pete game? I don't know if that's entirely fair. Also, Penguin Pete was made with the old Game-Maker engine. Icemare is made with the new GM engine. And a lot of elements of the game are different. The properties of the blocks, the character, and enemies are different. The maps are different. And I’m not sure if the pieces are all still in the game, and I don't think it works like Penguin Pete did. A few of the levels are totally different. It was the first game I designed though, and it did rely more on the demo game than the others.
Gary Acord's Superheroes (1993)
Gosh. This is a difficult question. It really depends on the game engine as to what steps I take in developing a game. With RSD Game-Maker, the game begins with deciding on a title and making a title screen, then you have to develop the character for the game, then you can come up with new ideas for background blocks and enemies. Oftentimes, you get some of the enemies and background blocks from other games you've created. Sometimes, you start a level from scratch. Other times, you import a map from another of your games and use it as a base to make a different map with.
Gary Acord's Strange Worlds III
Most of my fans nowadays are ones who like the games I made using the Wolfenstein game engine. Sites such as Wolfenstein Goodies , The Wolf 3D Dome, and Mr. Lowe’s Wolf 3-D Page carry my games made with the Wolfenstein engine. Also, on my websites I have a lot of followers who download my games and the other games on my site regularly. The site also has download links for about 150 other games, along with my 80 or so games.
Gary Acord's superheroes, Capn Zapn and Major Marvel
I first created Capn Zapn, but later I didn't really like the name. After I created a Sergeant Super, I decided I wanted a character called Major Marvel. Major Marvel wound up looking a lot like Capn Zapn. At the time, I didn't know Capn Zapn would last, and for all I knew people looking at Major Marvel would never see Capn Zapn. So I put my work into Major Marvel and set Capn Zapn aside. However, Capn Zapn continued to have a following, and so I never discontinued the game. But I like your view that possibly there are two parallel worlds, a la DC Comics, wherein Capn Zapn and Zapper reside in one and Major Marvel and Zapman in the other. Also, Sergeant Super would be in the first world, Jaxon Zoose in the second.
The many faces of Zapman (aka Zapper)
The definitive Zapper character is the one in Anyworld. The definitive Zapman character would be the one in level one of Zapman.
Street Wolf character sprite
Yes, I designed the character. He seems to move like no other character. He kind of dances a strange dance. He moves with a rhythm. He somehow took on a personality of his own. I think the wild blonde hairstyle resembled something I saw on some Street Fighter game.—
EJR Tairne is a freelance writer and editor, sometime game theorist, and general grump. He has written lots of stuff for the Gamasutra family of publications. Most if it is pretty grumpy. You can read more grumpy things on his grumpy blog, that he updates whenever he feels like it.
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