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Warshaw plans to discuss the development of E.T., as well as his thoughts on how the video game industry has evolved, when he takes to the stage at the Ottawa International Game Conference next week.

He has always said the issue with E.T. was Atari’s financial situation. The company had spent $25 million US on the rights to the E.T. game, which was a serious amount of cash in 1982, and needed the title to make money right away. They gave Warshaw five weeks to finish the game.

“Nobody had ever done a game in less than five months at that time,” said Warshaw, adding that the development was gruelling and took an immense amount of energy to complete. It was particularly hard since Warshaw doesn’t drink caffeine.

“It was done so quickly. They left no time and I was the only person to attempt it. By the end of those five weeks, I was so burnt out.”

Warshaw contends if he had one more week, the game would have been far better than it was and people might think differently of it.

As it was released, the title was horribly flawed, hardly resembled the movie on which it was based, and was barely playable.

Still Warshaw says he enjoys speaking about game development and the industry, and he believes they have come full circle. In the 1980s, he said, games were developed by one designer. Over the years, their development became a complex work of art requiring an entire studio of talent. Now, thanks to the development of mobile gaming and apps, the industry is returning to its roots.

“It used to be one person making these games and then it grew to teams of 50 or 100 people making these games. It got to be a huge thing,” he said. “But with the advent of handheld technology, the big elaborate game is still here, but now there’s a whole separate thing. That style of game, the beauty of it is, it’s the old concept.”



vpilieci@ottawacitizen.com

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