Stephen Riesenberger
SR: I like to tell the story about receiving an Atari 2600 for Christmas, 1979, then vowing to work for Atari when I gave the, “what I want to be when I grow up” speech in 4th grade, then fulfilling that promise and the dream when I was hired by Atari Games in 1993.
I can sum up my career with the phrase that some people know: “Jack of all trades is a master of none,” but I think fewer people know the rest of the phrase, “…but oftentimes better than a master of one.” I didn’t have the luxury of going to school for Game Design, I could create art but never considered myself an Artist, could understand and write code but never had the aptitude to get an Engineering degree. What I *was a master of was videogames in general – and a videogame player of above-average skill if I do say so myself.
My resume and portfolio tells the story better than the phrase above, with game genres and
platforms across the spectrum and across the years. I feel grateful for the dream-come-true job
that I have. Even recently, my broad experience in videogames comes in handy when developing
new features or new game pitches in my current role with Zygna on the Emerging Platforms team.
TGN: Where did you grow up, and what, if any, games did you play in your childhood?
SR: If any? A better question with a shorter answer might be, “which games DIDN’T you play”?
In Kansas and California is where I spent my childhood videogame training. Of course we played the aforementioned Atari 2600, and rode our bikes to the 7-11, bowling alley, and Alladin’s Castle to play pinball and arcade games. If you listen to this awesome soundtrack, you can hear exactly what it was like in the larger arcades: Arcade Ambience 1983 (Arcade sounds) – Andy Hofle. I have fond memories of playing all of these arcade games. Even the SMELL of some of the arcades and machines is nostalgic.
Neighborhood friends had Intellivision, Colecovision, Vectrex and tabletop electronic games, then Apple II and DOS PCs, Commodore 64, and NES. We primarily stuck with the Atari 2600 and Commodore 64. I remember being so consumed with the Atari 2600 that I would record marathon sessions of Asteroids and Cosmic Ark on a tape recorder, then playback the recording at 2x speed by holding the play button halfway down.
TGN: What inspired you to become a game developer, and how did you get started in game development?
SR: I think that my answers above make it clear that videogames were infused into my DNA through years and years of joyful play. Even after working in the industry, I’ve continued to play a wide variety of games across a wide variety of platforms. The inspiration to take action was after many years of wandering with no direction – feeling lost after failing at UCSB – then answering ads in the Classified Section of the newspaper, and landing an interview with Atari.
I started on Friday, August 13, 1993 as a Video Lab assistant in the stop-motion production stage. I helped the legendary Pete Kleinow capture images of the dinosaur models, process them on a Macintosh computer in Photoshop, store them on Syquest optical storage discs, then backed up onto a tape drive. I learned more about post-processing of the images, masking the ‘beauty’ shot with a matte shot, and how the shadow would be extracted and composited in the game. I was super proud to collaborate with a patent lawyer in describing and documenting this process in Atari’s Stop motion animation system patent.
TGN: Which game that you’ve worked on are you most proud of, and why?
SR: I had the most fun and I’m the most proud of the work I did as Senior and Lead Designer on the Boom Blox franchise. The game is a triumph for the Nintendo Wii in terms of intuitive motion-controlled gameplay mechanics. I joined the team in mid-development of the original title and was amazed at the universe of opportunities for creative puzzles, tools, and gameplay modes.
I focused primarily on multiplayer competitive modes, but had a blast creating new singleplayer content, like the Crossbow Arcade-inspired Spooky Woods shooting gallery levels.
I went on to Lead the Design effort on the sequel. My team of 7 Designers and I literally created THOUSANDS of levels in order for the best 400 to rise to the top.
My favorite game development story about BBBP was when we were prototyping the new Slingshot tool, and tested it out with Steven Spielberg. We knew that playtest participants struggled with the controls: pinching and pulling back before releasing the button to ‘sling’ the grabbed object, and repeating this motion a few times meant that eventually, the Player’s forearm would be cocked back and their elbow bumping up against the couch or wall behind them. Most veteran developers know to never tell playtesters how to play the game – letting them struggle and learn (or fail) is the best way to determine whether your prototype and game instructions are sufficient or not. I watched while Mr. Spielberg struggled. It was very hot in the playtest room. We added a tutorial and level that helped new players get used to reaching with the slingshot before pinching, pulling, and releasing.
TGN: Is there any video game or game series that you never got to work with, that you wish you could have?
SR: I haven’t yet worked with Virtual or Mixed Reality, but I’m sure a project will come around on that platform.
TGN: Primal Rage is my favorite arcade game, and one of my favorite games from my entire childhood. Tell us more about your work on Primal Rage.
SR: I could go on for pages about Primal Rage:
● Describing the windowless concrete ‘Black Hole’ stop motion animation room
● The Photoshop, DeBabelizer, and RAD (in-house animation tool) post-processing of the
dinosaur images
● The many times Pete had to fix a broken armature in a puppet
● The Sim Earth and Morph inspiration for the world map of Urth and animation in the
game’s intro video
● Editing NPC move tables that would respond to the Player’s movement and distance with
weighted tables
● The frame-by-frame debugging feature of the development cabinet where you could set up
intricate scenarios of special moves, blockstuns, and throws to track down bugs
● Collaborating with GamePro magazine on splash articles, in-depth strategies, and the
full-length Official Player’s Guide
● A brainstorming session where we imagined a Primal Rage Action RPG (ARPG)
● Or even working in the same building as Legends of the Arcade like Dennis Harper, Ed
Logg, and Mike Hally.
TGN: Are there any interesting facts about the development of a game you worked on, that may not be known by many, that you wish to share?
SR: Like many adventure games with a storyline and puzzles, game development has some expected obstacles that are known that the dev team just needs to work to solve. There are unexpected twists that occur during development that require the team to work together to solve.
The best example of this in my career was on the Medal of Honor team – when I joined, they were
using the RenderWare engine, but soon ran into technical limitations that prevented us from
accomplishing our goals of ‘spectacle’ – showcasing the awe-inspiring nightmare of C47 planes flying through enemy gunfire – and ‘drop anywhere’ – a precursor to the airdrop sequence seen in many popular Battle Royale games.
There were internal discussions I wasn’t involved in, but the management decided to give the team a chance to try out a different solution: one that the engineers and artists were convinced would meet all of our game development needs. The decision was made to abandon the RenderWare engine and rebuild the game in the Unreal Engine.
Many of the devs on the team (including myself) had never used the Engine before, and we were
given a mandate: spend a weekend learning the software with a smaller breakout group, and
deliver a playable prototype game, modifying whatever available code, audio, and 3D models we could in order to create a compelling experience.
My smaller breakout team consisted of a cross-section of the larger team, and we worked in a kind of gamejam environment – brainstorming, assigning roles and tasks, and meeting at the beginning, middle, and end of each 12-hour sprint to collaborate, playtest, and make small adjustments in the plan. My role as Lead Designer on the MOD team was the most stressful, but ultimately rewarding part of my time with Medal of Honor, and I captured more of the details in my portfolio.
TGN: What was your favorite computer you have used to develop or design a game on?
SR: I’ve had a MacBook since joining Zynga. With WiFi and VPN, I can connect to my team’s GitHub repository, take video calls, keep up on messages with Slack and email, and I can do this from anywhere with a strong enough WiFi or cellular signal.
TGN: What is your favorite programming language?
SR: Whichever one gets the job done quickly. I feel like coding is my weak spot, but I’ve dabbled enough in C++, C#, Python, Lua, Javascript, and HTML5 to support my engineers.
TGN: Final question, what games have you been enjoying these days?
SR: I play whatever games that are adjacent to the ones I’m working on, but I seem to return to
Angband periodically.
TGN: I would like to thank Stephen for the in depth history of his career and past in gaming! An absolute legend in the industry.
Be sure to visit his website listed in the LINKS section [top right] of this website.
TheGameNarrative 