22 Sep 12, 03:48PM
Today we sit down and chat with the current Project Leader of Assault Cube, ärkefiende. Thanks for reading. Feel free to give suggestions, compliments, complaints. The text is gray because it was easier on the eyes for test readers.
1) What does your name mean? Or what is the origin of it's creation?
ärkefiende is swedish and means arch enemy. Arch Enemy is a Swedish/German female fronted melodic death metal band and one of my favourites. As I played for the ACWCs I used the nick de_Erzfeind as Erzfeind is the German term of arch enemy. You all seriously should listen to some songs of them!
2) What is your opinion on GEMAS? Do you support their existence in Assault Cube?
Played them one or two times and had nearly no fun at all. I´m not for banning GEMA, but I guess you won´t ever see GEMA maps in the official AC package included.
3) What Operating System(s) do you use and why?
All my PCs run Windows 7 and/or OpenSuSE. I like a lot of the Microsoft products and they aren´t as restrictive as the Apple ones. I use Windows at work, so I have to deal with it anyways. On the other side I love Linux and its open source spirit. I chose OpenSuSE as my distribution, because it offers a great range of included software. Another point why I use it is that I feel sympathised with OpenSuSE as it comes right from where I was born/live. A real frankonian Linux distribution!
4) Can you name a few of your favorite bands/music artists?
I´m a big metal head in general and listening all kind of metal music (thrash, folk, death, heavy and so on ...). Beside that I enjoy also music from different genres (hardcore, gothic, rock, jazz, old school hip hop). Some favourites:
Arch Enemy
ASP
Death Angel
Dio
Exodus
Graveyard
Heaven Shall Burn
Iced Earth
In Extremo
Iron Maiden
Kreator
Letzte Instanz
Megadeth
Overkill
Sick Of It All
Sodom
Testament
5) New modes are heavily requested, especially co-op zombies and bomb modes. Has there been any consideration on adding these or other modes in the next release?
There are plenty new modes for the upcoming release. Some singleplayer bot modes like TOSOK, Pistol Franzy, Last Swiss Standing and Team Survivor. There´s also a completely new mode: Survival. In this mode you have to survive waves of bots. Also the often requested Team Last Swiss Standing mode comes for the multiplayer section. We didn´t discuss the modes you named, yet.
6) Another often seen request is the desire for more guns. This gets debated by players for and against, but it seems like one or two new guns wouldn't hurt anyone. Any new guns coming soon?
As some know we already made a new one waiting for its release. It´s a pistol with a three shot burst. It´s stronger than the normal pistol and therefore a primary weapon. It will be released as soon as every other weapon is balanced.
7) What do you like better, Cheetos or Doritos?
Haven´t ever tried both of them. It seems they don´t get sold in Germany.
8) Your clan |BCFH| went through tough times recently where you only had two members remaining. Now the clan seems to be back on it's feet. Plenty of clans are going through slow times currently, do you have any advice for them to continue and re-grow back to a full size active clan?
We´re actually three members (hoooray). We got a lot of up and downs. Probably more downs than ups. I just never gave up, active or not, BCFH won´t extinct. You just shouldn´t give up, trust your members and let their opinions count. And my special advice: reject any join request from other clans, especially the ones from B}ShadowFlameZ, hehe.
9) Lately, it's been tough to find clan matches and even inters. Going on two years without a release seems to have discouraged some players, so they take breaks from the game or leave for good. After this next release, will you try to have faster releases in the future?
"Release early, release often" is a term I hear quite often lately. I think this development philosophy will work best for AC. This also means we have to work on the distribution of this game. Many releases mean a lot updates the users have to install. So some work is needed to ensure they allways got the latest release. It especially means working with the packagers of the biggest Linux distributions.
10) What other video games do you currently play?
I don´t play that much lately (I focussed on the development of AC :) ). But if I do I like to play League of Legends.
11) With more and more Free-To-Play first person shooters coming to the market each year, especially successful IP's like Team Fortress 2, Tribes Ascend, etc...do you think Assault Cube can maintain a large enough community and survive for many many many years to come? If so, why?
I think AC can survive! We´re way different from those games and got our own little niche. We don´t run the F2P concept, we follow the open source spirit. The game runs on every slow machine, it´s simple and you don´t have to put money in this game to become better (even though I´m glad when someone does; donate!). Time will tell if that´s what the people want.
12) Earlier this week, we were informed of a private forum where only hand picked cubers could come and help fix up some aspects of the game, including Undead going by reports. Some feel like this is rewarding bad behavior. And some feel insulted that after years of playing and contributing to the game, that they weren't invited to the private forum. Do you have anything to say to these people?
Beside the longlasting members of AC we decided to invite also guys who don´t think the same as we do. On the other side we also invited newcomers. We wanted to find a good mix of different players. At the moment it´s an experiment. If the responses are great we might add more players. Still EVERY player can contribute, it´s just a different channel for contribution.
13) Do you drink tea? If so, what is your favorite flavor?
I do, it´s chamomile tea.
14) What kind of mobile phone do you have, brand & model?
I own a HTC Evo 3D, running Adroid 4.0 (vendor ROM) on it.
15) What are the specs on your primary computer CPU/GPU/HDD/RAM?
AMD Athlon 64 X2 6400+ Black Edition 3,2 Ghz
Sapphire Radeon HD3870
4 x 1 GB Corsair XMS2 DDR2 @ 800 Mhz CL4
1 TB Western Digital Green Edition 7200 RPM SATA II
320 GB Hitachi 7200 RPM SATA II
16) Each year, more AC players buy new computers that can run the game with hundreds of frames per second. In the future, are you interested in adding significantly improved graphics to Assault Cube?
AssaultCube has been developed to run on the oldest of the oldest computers. I guess you won´t see that much graphic enhancements in AssaultCube, since it uses the old Cube engine. It´s more probably that AC2 will use Cube2, which has great graphics and nice details.
17) What is your favorite weapon in Assault Cube, and why?
It´s the AR. It´s the typical average weapon. Nice accuracy, nice damage and you can use it on nearly every map/situation.
18) What is your favorite official map in Assault Cube, and why?
My favourite is ac_desert. I know it´s overplayed, but it has been the first (official) map I played and I got a lot of good OSOK 1on1 matches there (I only lost one ...).
19) What is your favorite mode in Assault Cube, and why?
I pretty much like OSOK, it´s a mode most games don´t have and I love to hunt my opponents in a 1on1 match.
20) Bukz recently made a thread about adding maps or taking maps out, or both. Which maps would you like to see added to the package, and which maps would you like to see removed?
I´d love to see getting ac_wasteland back. I don´t like ac_aqueous that much, but that doesn´t mean I want it to get removed.
1) What does your name mean? Or what is the origin of it's creation?
ärkefiende is swedish and means arch enemy. Arch Enemy is a Swedish/German female fronted melodic death metal band and one of my favourites. As I played for the ACWCs I used the nick de_Erzfeind as Erzfeind is the German term of arch enemy. You all seriously should listen to some songs of them!
2) What is your opinion on GEMAS? Do you support their existence in Assault Cube?
Played them one or two times and had nearly no fun at all. I´m not for banning GEMA, but I guess you won´t ever see GEMA maps in the official AC package included.
3) What Operating System(s) do you use and why?
All my PCs run Windows 7 and/or OpenSuSE. I like a lot of the Microsoft products and they aren´t as restrictive as the Apple ones. I use Windows at work, so I have to deal with it anyways. On the other side I love Linux and its open source spirit. I chose OpenSuSE as my distribution, because it offers a great range of included software. Another point why I use it is that I feel sympathised with OpenSuSE as it comes right from where I was born/live. A real frankonian Linux distribution!
4) Can you name a few of your favorite bands/music artists?
I´m a big metal head in general and listening all kind of metal music (thrash, folk, death, heavy and so on ...). Beside that I enjoy also music from different genres (hardcore, gothic, rock, jazz, old school hip hop). Some favourites:
Arch Enemy
ASP
Death Angel
Dio
Exodus
Graveyard
Heaven Shall Burn
Iced Earth
In Extremo
Iron Maiden
Kreator
Letzte Instanz
Megadeth
Overkill
Sick Of It All
Sodom
Testament
5) New modes are heavily requested, especially co-op zombies and bomb modes. Has there been any consideration on adding these or other modes in the next release?
There are plenty new modes for the upcoming release. Some singleplayer bot modes like TOSOK, Pistol Franzy, Last Swiss Standing and Team Survivor. There´s also a completely new mode: Survival. In this mode you have to survive waves of bots. Also the often requested Team Last Swiss Standing mode comes for the multiplayer section. We didn´t discuss the modes you named, yet.
6) Another often seen request is the desire for more guns. This gets debated by players for and against, but it seems like one or two new guns wouldn't hurt anyone. Any new guns coming soon?
As some know we already made a new one waiting for its release. It´s a pistol with a three shot burst. It´s stronger than the normal pistol and therefore a primary weapon. It will be released as soon as every other weapon is balanced.
7) What do you like better, Cheetos or Doritos?
Haven´t ever tried both of them. It seems they don´t get sold in Germany.
8) Your clan |BCFH| went through tough times recently where you only had two members remaining. Now the clan seems to be back on it's feet. Plenty of clans are going through slow times currently, do you have any advice for them to continue and re-grow back to a full size active clan?
We´re actually three members (hoooray). We got a lot of up and downs. Probably more downs than ups. I just never gave up, active or not, BCFH won´t extinct. You just shouldn´t give up, trust your members and let their opinions count. And my special advice: reject any join request from other clans, especially the ones from B}ShadowFlameZ, hehe.
9) Lately, it's been tough to find clan matches and even inters. Going on two years without a release seems to have discouraged some players, so they take breaks from the game or leave for good. After this next release, will you try to have faster releases in the future?
"Release early, release often" is a term I hear quite often lately. I think this development philosophy will work best for AC. This also means we have to work on the distribution of this game. Many releases mean a lot updates the users have to install. So some work is needed to ensure they allways got the latest release. It especially means working with the packagers of the biggest Linux distributions.
10) What other video games do you currently play?
I don´t play that much lately (I focussed on the development of AC :) ). But if I do I like to play League of Legends.
11) With more and more Free-To-Play first person shooters coming to the market each year, especially successful IP's like Team Fortress 2, Tribes Ascend, etc...do you think Assault Cube can maintain a large enough community and survive for many many many years to come? If so, why?
I think AC can survive! We´re way different from those games and got our own little niche. We don´t run the F2P concept, we follow the open source spirit. The game runs on every slow machine, it´s simple and you don´t have to put money in this game to become better (even though I´m glad when someone does; donate!). Time will tell if that´s what the people want.
12) Earlier this week, we were informed of a private forum where only hand picked cubers could come and help fix up some aspects of the game, including Undead going by reports. Some feel like this is rewarding bad behavior. And some feel insulted that after years of playing and contributing to the game, that they weren't invited to the private forum. Do you have anything to say to these people?
Beside the longlasting members of AC we decided to invite also guys who don´t think the same as we do. On the other side we also invited newcomers. We wanted to find a good mix of different players. At the moment it´s an experiment. If the responses are great we might add more players. Still EVERY player can contribute, it´s just a different channel for contribution.
13) Do you drink tea? If so, what is your favorite flavor?
I do, it´s chamomile tea.
14) What kind of mobile phone do you have, brand & model?
I own a HTC Evo 3D, running Adroid 4.0 (vendor ROM) on it.
15) What are the specs on your primary computer CPU/GPU/HDD/RAM?
AMD Athlon 64 X2 6400+ Black Edition 3,2 Ghz
Sapphire Radeon HD3870
4 x 1 GB Corsair XMS2 DDR2 @ 800 Mhz CL4
1 TB Western Digital Green Edition 7200 RPM SATA II
320 GB Hitachi 7200 RPM SATA II
16) Each year, more AC players buy new computers that can run the game with hundreds of frames per second. In the future, are you interested in adding significantly improved graphics to Assault Cube?
AssaultCube has been developed to run on the oldest of the oldest computers. I guess you won´t see that much graphic enhancements in AssaultCube, since it uses the old Cube engine. It´s more probably that AC2 will use Cube2, which has great graphics and nice details.
17) What is your favorite weapon in Assault Cube, and why?
It´s the AR. It´s the typical average weapon. Nice accuracy, nice damage and you can use it on nearly every map/situation.
18) What is your favorite official map in Assault Cube, and why?
My favourite is ac_desert. I know it´s overplayed, but it has been the first (official) map I played and I got a lot of good OSOK 1on1 matches there (I only lost one ...).
19) What is your favorite mode in Assault Cube, and why?
I pretty much like OSOK, it´s a mode most games don´t have and I love to hunt my opponents in a 1on1 match.
20) Bukz recently made a thread about adding maps or taking maps out, or both. Which maps would you like to see added to the package, and which maps would you like to see removed?
I´d love to see getting ac_wasteland back. I don´t like ac_aqueous that much, but that doesn´t mean I want it to get removed.
