Meet the Devs: Adam Wieser (2015.07.14)

Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment

1. 00:00:00

   it's a sick watch thank you girlfriend got it for me nice I get more compliments on this than anything I've ever owned in my entire life see this watch it's pretty awesome right yep it's got the PlayStation buttons not bad right hey guys thanks for joining us on me the devs I'm James Pew with me today is associate writer Adam Weezer Adam how you doing man good glad to be here yeah thanks for coming on yeah very cool so how did you get involved in Star Citizen so I got involved in Star Citizen I've uh I worked at Chris Roberts production company as Sate pictures 10 11 years ago so that's where I F first met Chris uh I

2. 00:00:49

   met John Shimmel there too he was one of his Executives at the company John's the head of linear content here uh and that's where I also met Dave hadock the the lead writer so um over the years I've stayed you know in close contact with Dave uh I've seen John every once in a while and uh when they were finally looking to build up the writing staff here um in the meantime I'd gone off and i' I'd done some like film and TV work um and had always been been in state of gamer so when this opportunity came up it was it was actually you know just the perfect kind of Confluence of events and uh was lucky enough to to join the team is this the first game you've ever worked on it's the first game yes yeah what uh TV shows and movies were you doing before I got here so uh before this I worked with a with a writing team so there were actually two guys and we we worked for a few years and we we optioned a few scripts and we did the

3. 00:01:37

   entire like go around and Pitch you know kind of like pitch movies to Studios and stuff like that and it was it was a lot of fun nothing ever got made the closest uh closest film we ever got was kind of like had a director had cast all lined up and then the financial crisis hit and the Indie company that was financing it just you know went away like nah yeah yeah sorry it's not not not quite going to happen so um did that for a handful of years then did the same thing uh except in the TV world where you just kind of the same thing go around pitch shows go to networks do do the entire rig a row and it was it was fun but at the end of the day it's uh you know there's not a ton of those jobs out there too and slowly but surely my writing Partners decided that you know they had other things they wanted to pursue and uh it left me kind of just uh sitting here trying to figure out what

4. 00:02:24

   to do so did you grow up playing games said you're always a gamer at heart yeah no I I I I remember when I was young like getting the first like Nintendo system from you know my brother and I got it for Christmas and that just being like a treasured thing and uh my my Nintendo 64 is still my is is still something I I carry with me to the day yeah um so that's that's the one system I have and uh everything else have kind of moved on I've been able to upgrade to but I can't I can't quite uh give that away yet do you ever play any of Chris's older games uh no I haven't actually I I didn't when I was growing up I the PC we had at home didn't quite have the ability that and I was still young enough where I wasn't at the point to be able to try to sweet talk my parents into into upgrading just just to be able to play something more like that they were happy just getting us the 64 and kind of like in the the other Nintendo

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   systems and having us or the Sega uh sitting down and playing with those instead so computer was for work was for school work basically and then they had us they had us on the systems to kind of like uh do do the video game stuff do you have any experience writing sci-fi before this or is this um I've always had a I've always had an interest in sci-fi and some of the uh some of the work uh that I did previously like they they might have like sci-fi twinges but it was never anything that was kind of like Central to that uh and any story it's kind of a and I think that's applicable here too is that I've always been a I've really enjoyed character work and I've really enjoyed you know seeing characters develop and and relationships like that so um for me it was always it was less about the genre and it was more about finding an interesting main character or an interesting kind of like set of characters and then putting in the right environment to really make those relationships uh time so what are some

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   of your favorite sci-fi stories uh so uh when it comes to books I probably the the author I've read the most is Philip K dick when it comes to sci-fi and I know that's it's also strange sci-fi but I've uh that was one of those I I came across a few of his books in in high school and I just couldn't stop so I I think I probably have like 10 to 12 on my shelf right now um so uh I'm finally reading the man on the High Castle too like I just I finally picked that up and i' I've started to go through that and I started to play Wolfenstein this weekend to the new one so it's kind of like a good Confluence of of events right now so yeah from Philip K dick perspective I've always liked the fact that he he was a Sci-Fi guy and he he did talk about future and crazy technology and stuff like that but he was never it was always about the characters too and it was always about the the struggles and

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   everything in the context of of all those different elements so since you're working with David hadock have you read snow crash yet uh yes yeah yeah no he uh he lent that to me years ago years ago i' I've read handful of different Neil Steven St books too but that was the one he's uh he's like you need to check this out uh and also Diamond age too I read that one yeah yeah I definitely recommend that one too um that was actually the first one I I read by Stevenson and it was uh it definitely got me into him and it it you know he was talking about iPad like devices before there were iPad devices and I know he'll always say he just writes a million things and it's only the the two or three things that catch on that people seem to to pull back to but um I've seen him speak a few times too and he's always he's always very intelligent and very very interesting and he wrote a great piece too about um laying the actual like cable under under the you

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   know I think between the US and uh and and uh and Asia and stuff like that to actually transport the you know the early days of the internet back and forth and that was a great one of his great non-fiction pieces too which was both kind of like interesting and science heavy but also yeah it's a anything he writes is always is always pretty interesting also all right man before let you we got some rapid fire questions ready yeah bring them all right favorite movie uh it's so tough but I probably have to say A Clockwork Orange never seen it you should Family Fun favorite video game uh Mario Kart 64 dude that's the best Mario Kart yep it is like people can get all like oh the new one's the best you're wrong Double Dash is terrible yeah but yeah 64 is by far the best new's fun but 64 the maps the levels are just fantastic gameplay even though there's only what eight characters yeah yeah exactly fine perfect you hit someone

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   with a green shell fired straight backwards it's the best feeling in the world yeah and then like on Wario Raceway if you have a uh lightning bolt you wait right to they before they go over that jump hit it they're down that's like puts them back half a lap yep strateg right so so key in that game all right now favorite ship in Star Citizen um I really like well one that I really like is is still in in the works but the uh the Vanguard I think is pretty awesome they they were finishing that upu right as I got started here so I got to see them kind of I was actually on the art side at that point and they called me over like hey take a look at this what do you think about this and it was just cool to see the process behind it but I think it also suits the the kind of gameplay I would uh you know I kind of gravitate forwards sort of the military aspect yeah military but kind of long range bomber too so maybe not the most agile thing out there but I'll roll in with a lot of Firepower and try

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    to do as much damage as I can awesome man well thanks again for joining us hey pleasure once again I'm James Pew this is Adam Weezer you just met a [Music] Dev