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 This month, we're taking a closer look at Mike Bazzell, one of the Firaxis alumni that's been working with Sid for the last 15 years.
1. What’s the first game you ever worked on after joining “the industry”?
A two color Macintosh Plus port of the arcade game, “Arkanoid”, work done in 1986 through a college internship for Discovery Software in Annapolis, MD.
2. How long have you been working on Sid Meier titles?
I have been working for Sid on his titles for more than 15 years, since my hiring at MicroProse Software in 1991
3. Out of everything you’ve ever worked on, which one holds that special place in your heart?
“Pirates Gold” for the Sega Genesis, the first game that I worked on at MicroProse Software. Not only has Pirates! always been one of my favorite games, but I am proud of the extent that I went above and beyond anything that was expected of me and of what I and the rest of the production team accomplished as a result. A strait port of the Amiga version was initially tasked (both machines utilized the Motorola 68000 processor), but I insisted that I could re-envision all of the art and interface making it appropriate for that console in the process. They gave me the chance and freedom to do so. Anyone that is familiar with both versions knows the extent graphically that the Genesis version was taken to and how well it visually fit the platform. The amount of game and graphics that we crammed into that cart, as well as the entire team standing our ground for a battery backed up cart that was gluttonous with ROM, in spite of the publisher’s differing plans, makes what we created all the more special.
* A little known fact and the reason that The Sega Genesis version of Pirates! is such a rare cart to find is that the publisher, external from MicroProse Software, at the same time had another Sega Genesis title in production at their own house of business, that of which (if I remember correctly) they manufactured somewhere between 100,000 to 150,000 units of. As a result the number of Genesis’ Pirates Gold! units manufactured was cut down to a mere 50,000.*
4. What’s with all the skulls?
(Laughs out loud) That’s a great question, the answer to which is two-fold. For my entire life I have had an attraction to things that are spooky and bizarre. I’ve eaten it up like it is the most colorful, exciting and wonderful treat hidden away in the shadows of what would be without it, a lackluster world. The first reason stems from that.
The skull, as an icon to me, is the simplest and most perfect representation of horror, because the paramount scariest thing to human kind is and has been throughout history, death and the reality of our own mortality. If you see a human skull “out of place” you instantly know without thinking about it, that that person is not alive.
At the same time that a skull can hold such a grim and surreal representation, even though it is a skull, its features when seen, still recognizably present something that is crucial in our lives; a human face. The face is the focal point of communication and is at the center of who we are in presentation and representation for those we interact with in everyday life. That makes the human skull, secluded beyond frequent visage, all the stranger to view as an abstraction. This brings me to the other reason for “all of the skulls”…
It stems from my artistic training. Thanks to a fantastic high school art teacher, I started experiencing real life figure study at a young age. Extraordinary appreciation and understanding of the human body can be gained through life drawing. In drawing the human figure an artist needs to be aware of how the muscular and skeletal system of the human body functions, is structured and behaves in order to accurately portray believable structure, pose & weight. My admiration derived from these artistic studies over the years, seeing and understanding in more ways than one, that there is so very much more to people than meets the eye, is something that has greatly influenced the utilization and significance of the skull as an icon in my life.
The human skull is not only an expression of my enjoyment of the spooky and bizarre in life and to me the most effective and pinnacle representation of the same, but concurrently is a reflection and meaningful symbol of my artistic understanding and the appreciation and awe that I have for and of the beauty that I see in the human figure as well as a reminder to never read a book by it’s cover.
5. You’re currently tasked to Civilization Revolution. Give us a run down on what you’re working on.
I am the Visual Effects Sub-Lead on Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution. I have created real-time visual FX for four of Firaxis’ games prior to this production and back when we were new to 3D games, was tasked with figuring out how to create particle FX assets for same. I’m your friendly neighborhood virtual pyromaniac! Primarily using 3D particles, volumetrically I create things like fire, smoke, explosions, water splashes and weapon clashes that you see in our games.
As a Sub-lead Artist I work with the project’s Lead Artist to deduce an appropriate look and feel for the visual effects that matches his vision for the game. I also work with that lead artist as well as other sub-lead artists to deduce what visual effects are needed and I manage and organize all visual effect asset production
Besides the sub-lead management I have my hands in almost every aspect of the game creating those visual effects. Aspects of terrain and environments like sparkle on a gold resource, leaves falling from trees, waves crashing to a shore, a volumetric fog or a volcano erupting. Sometimes visual effects can visually convey something that you wouldn’t normally see like the happiness state of a city. Others might be building effects like construction or destruction, chimney smoke, street lamp light. A game might require subtle effects like dusty light shining through a window or something ranging to a far extreme like a nuclear explosion. Effects for vehicles like locomotive steam, a pirate ship’s interaction with the water that it sets in, or an armored tank’s tracks left in the ground behind it are created via visual effects. Visual effects can convey human player and opposing character aspects such as footprints, cold breath, a melee weapon’s clashes, or weapon firing effects and their resulting impacts and explosions. I occasionally supply effects for interface like the blur on the button matching game in pirates on the X-box.
I also work with software engineers, conveying to them what features and abilities I need our visual effects system and tools to have in order for my effects to do what I need them to do. Using those tools I create the effects and put them in the game. For instance, when one of our animators hands off an animated galleon which has a cannon moving as if it is firing, I create a volumetric effect that represents the blast from the end of its barrel. It is saved as a computer file independent from that galleon’s files. Then, in that galleon’s animation I can call that same effect multiple times on any particular frame and time at a specific place on that 3D model. I can even use that same cannon firing effect with a different unit such as a frigate. Just figuring out how to create some of the more complex visual effects can be a wonderful challenge and definitely makes being a Visual Effects Artist all the more exciting and fun.
No matter how abstractly, stylized or realistically that you are portraying a real world effect like fire or an explosion, or even things as small as a drop of water or a candle flame, it still has to be recognizable for what it is supposed to be. One thing that I love about creating Visual FX is the process of achieving that; analyzing what makes that which I am trying to reproduce look as it does and be what it is and examining how those aspects change over time and then creatively deducing the most economic and appropriate way to use particles and geometry to accurately and recognizably convey that which I am reproducing.
6. So when you're 65, do you still see yourself hammering away on videogames?
Absolutely! I have been playing video games my entire life and games are an important part of my life of which I gain a lot of enjoyment out of. I’ll always love video games, so even if I am retired at that age, if there still are buttons, I will still be hammering away them. And there had better not be buttons or wires anywhere for that matter!!! I’d better be able to control games with my mind and I’d better have my dang flying car by then!
My first console was a mid 1970’s retail Pong game and my last will be… well, if you think of how far video games have come over the past thirty years, in another twenty to thirty years I hope they will have seen at least that much advancement, and that what my last console will be would blow my mind if I experienced it today!
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