Return To Home Page		August 12, 2007

ABOUT ME (David Warner)

Guess what people. Yes this is my very own personal page where you can find out everything (well, not everything, but quite a bit) you ever wanted to know about me. Below are some questions that I get asked frequently, and the responses await you.

WHO AM I? Well I'm a 31 year old network administrator who has grown up with computers since I was 8 years old. I have a Degree in Computer Science from Griffith University on the Gold Coast, which is where I currently reside. At the end of 2004 I completed my Teaching Degree (Secondary) at University of Southern Queensland. I currently work as the Information Technology Manager at one of the largest private schools on the Gold Coast, St Hilda's.

FUTURE AMBITIONS? Nothing, I'm happy with my job, my home life and everything else. I want be in attendance at the MCG when Essendon win a Grand Final.

WHY MAKE THE FUTURE GAMEZ WEB SITE? Initially this site started out as Dreamcast Australia and as a way to learn how to code in HTML. In mid-1999 I changed the web site to concentrate on the PAL Dreamcast system however I also covered major overseas news as it will still be relevant here. In early 2000 I was thinking of changing to multi-format Ozisoft informed me I need to change the name for legal reasons. Good time for a change then. So Future Gamez was born and I began to cover the Playstation 2, Gamecube and XBox as well. Times change however and in mid-2001 I realised that work commitments, owning a home and the site could not be squeezed in together. For this reason I decided to focus back on one single console, the Playstation 2. In future I will shift to also cover the Playstation 3. Concentrating on a single console has allowed more frequent updates, more coverage and more focus for the site. I hope you have, and will continue, enjoyed the ride with me.

WHAT COMPUTERS / GAMING SYSTEMS DO I OWN? From the start I have owned Atari VCS (2600), Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega Master System, Sega MegaDrive (Genesis), Super Nintendo, Sony Playstation, IBM XT, 486 DX2-50, Pentium 75, and Pentium 200 MMX, Neo Geo (no mods), Sega Dreamcast, PIII-533, Playstation 2, Athalon 2600+, Playstation 3 and my pride and joy a Mega Neo Geo (A Neo Geo which has been modded with a debug BIOS, S-Video, Composite video and stereo sound).

WHAT COMPUTER SYSTEM DO I HAVE NOW? I have an Athalon 2600+, Albatron nForce2 Motherboard, 1GB DDR RAM in Dual Channel Mode, 22" Samsung 226BW monitor, Nvidia 6600GT AGP 256Mb Video Card, Panasonic DVD-Rom, Panasonic DVD Burner, Soundblaster Audigy 2 with Logitech 2.1 speakers, 1 x 250GB Maxtor 7200rpm HDD, 2 x 160GB Maxtor 7200rpm HDD, and BigPond Broadband 8MBps Cable Internet.

WHAT ARE/WERE MY FAVE GAMES? In No Particular Order: SSX Tricky, SSX3, Tekken 3, Unreal Tournament, Resident Evil: Code Veronica, Final Fantasy VII, Theme Hospital, Wave Race 64, Metal Gear Solid, Civilization 2/3, Street Fighter 2, Red Alert, Sonic The Hedgehog, Contra 3: Alien Wars, and last but definately not least Sim City 2000.

WHO ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE DEVELOPERS? Capcom, Square-Enix, Rockstar, Insomniac Games, and Naughty Dog.

WHO ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE SINGERS/DJ'S? Eminem, Fat Boy Slim, Madonna, Ice Cube, Michael Jackson.

WHAT ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE BANDS? Prodigy, Scooter, Chemical Brothers, Guns n' Roses and Dire Straits.

WHAT ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE MOVIES? Star Wars (all of them), Blues Brothers, Where Eagles Dare, Predator, The Great Escape, Gallipoli, and Star Trek: First Contact. (OK, that's 7... or 11 with all the Star Wars movies)

WHAT ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE TV SHOWS? Married With Children (Season 1-6 are on DVD in America now!!), Star Trek:TNG (actually all Star Trek TV series really), Seinfeld (Season 1-8 on DVD now), Heroes and Prison Break.

WHAT ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE ACTORS/ACTRESSES? Arnold Schwarzenegger, Vin Diesel, Jim Carrey, Steve Carrell, and Jackie Chan. (Sadly, I can't really say that I like any actresses at the moment.)

WHAT ARE MY FIVE FAVOURITE DIRECTORS? John Woo, John McTiernan, Steven Spielberg, Robert Zemeckis, Sam Raimi.

ARE ELECTRONIC ARTS REALLY AS BAD AS EVERYONE MAKES OUT?
Well.. yes and no.
I mean I think they turn out sensational products, sports titles especially and i don't have a problem with yearly updates etc, especially if you don't buy them every single year but the polish they put on all titles is exceptional...
Having said that they rarely take risks... I mean they acquired some awesome studios like westwood and Bullfrog in the 1990s and then got them doing ports of games rather then the brilliant original content they were doing (like Command and Conquer or Theme Park etc)... So in a sense they are also destroying innovation.
Another example is Ty the Tassie Tiger by Aussie developers Krome, apparently they sold about 600-800,000 copies each for the first 2 titles, but EA only want titles that sell 1 million+ copies so they dumped support for the small developer and the franchise has (fortunately) been picked up by Activision...
So in summary EA make very solid products with very rarely a game you won't enjoy and find high quality production values (the Bond titles are superb), but they also destroy tend to stifle innovation and smaller developers.