Paul Ille [dot] com

I was contacted through my game design site by an old friend about how a group of people were getting together to play CRASH Squad every Friday for the past couple weeks. For those who don’t know, CRASH Squad is a video game modification project for a game called Kingpin that I lead about 7 or 8 years ago…geez time flies. Well, anyways, I joined them last night for a few hours and it was fun. There were about 15 people or so that showed up which is a lot for a game from 1999. There are video games out just this year that can’t get that kind of gathering online. I have to admit I spent most of the time trying to stop myself from wondering why we designed it the way we did, but regardless…fun.

A few days before, I started to install the game and I became nostalgic thinking about that time in my life playing Kingpin online and all the friends I’d made and fun I’d have playing both casually and competitively. I led a clan back then called Assassins Incorporated. AI we called ourselves. We put AI_ in front of each members name. Mine was AI_Tunnleram. We played online together for a while and eventually reached the number 1 spot on the Online Gaming League ladder beating other clans like =LM= and D4RK. Our favorite level to play was Team_Panic made by good ol’ MexicanRadio. I remember the sense of belonging to the community and also the teamwork when playing. It was something that I’m confident everyone who was a part of it remembers.

I remember the names Bloodville, Pharaoh, Hitman, Sniper, Autumn, Jimmy, Allorah…Fat Eddie, Poisonville and Trinity. PlanetKingpin, RedWormCharlie (what a jerkoff that guy was lol) and Leandra (sigh Bubbleologists). There was WildWolf, Rambo, A-C, Morph, Captain Insane, Chitown and Hogie. Oh, and Rayzr (USuck lol), Swat and Young Swat , Tical (who disappeared out of nowhere) and of course Mr. Damage who’s the one organizing the CRASH Squad Friday night games…and so many others I can’t possibly begin to list. Some I still talk to sometimes, some I wish I could and others I’ve lost all touch with altogether. Oh, and let’s not forget the Bah Monkey

There were car trips and late night chats and practices and friendships for several years. There were hours of playing non-stop where bathroom breaks waited through all night game playing sessions. We’d talk about the latest weapon script or trick or score and revelled in the occasional weird situation or crazy hack or anything at all.

CRASH Squad specifically was a lot of fun for me though. Kingpin was what got me involved in game design and it was the first modification I worked on. We put together a team and we created this mod and it was a big thing for the community. There were clans specifically for it and people seemed really gung-ho about it.

Unfortunately, by that time, most people had left the community and only a few unwaivering enthusiasts cared about the game, but it didn’t matter. For me it was more important to complete the project in a positive way. It was a great accomplishment just to finish something considering the lack of help from Kingpin’s developers, the lack of documentation and the fact that the developers seemed to have put everything they could in the executable which made it hard to make anything meaningful as we didn’t have access to that source code.

Basicaly the point of this post is that I miss the old times at the moment. Not that I don’t love my life right now, but I simply miss that part of my past life. I specifically miss playing Bagman (a gametype Kingpin came with) and I miss some of the people, the friendships and the great fun I had being absorbed in it all. I wonder if getting back into game design will be as much fun for me. I’ve been gone for so long and have a whole new set of priorities now…not to mention a simple lack of time and access to my better computer. With Kingpin it was my first online experience, I was in on the ground floor starting with the beta and I wonder if I could get so excited again about a game and burry myself in it.