Here is the link for the interview:
[BF2] Project Reality's Rhino Exclusive Interview - Total Gaming Network
Veritas wrote: Recently I've had the chance to talk to one of the Project Reality Lead Developers, Rhino about the modification and his role in it as well as discussing the mod's future.
Veritas: Hey Rhino, first of all, I just wanted to say thank you for allowing TGN to interview you.
Rhino: Hey there and thanks for the opportunity, TGN has been a great community supporter of PR over the years!
Veritas: So, Your the lead mapper for Project Reality. Tell us a bit about your position and what you do in the PR dev team?
Rhino: Actually I'm now double heading 2 positions as lead mapper and operations lead for PR. As an Operations Lead I'm responsible for compiling all the many different assets into the core build of the mod, as well as sorting out all the different assets needed to get done, how they will be done and by who with many design plans, dead lines etc. As Lead Mapper I work closely with the other PR mappers to make the best quality and fun maps we can for our growing community of fans. I mainly advise each mapper with the best course of action for their work, point out faults and help them fix errors and add features. An example of this is seen on IronTaxi's 'Fools Road' map, where I spent a few days giving the entire map a solid base of textures, overgrowth and undergrowth for him to work on, which saved him around a months worth of work. Here is a quick before and after to show you more of what I mean. Before and After.
Veritas: Tell us how you got started with mapping and into PR development?
Rhino: I first got into mapping with HL2/CSS, made some small maps that never got fully released outside my old clan before BF2 came out. Once BF2 and its editor came out, I had a mess around with mapping for it, never really thinking it would go anywhere. I Made a few small custom maps which never got fully released. DesolatorDan from the (now abandoned) Terranova Sci-Fi BF2 mod saw my work and asked if I would map for his mod. So I began working more closely with that team for a few months and learned a lot more. Unfortunately, Terranova closed down due to lack of staff. It was then that I started playing Project Reality, and got really interested in the mod after enjoying many good times, this was back with PR v0.25. Shortly after playing PR v0.25 I began work on Muttrah City just as a custom map. This slowly lead me to becoming a full developer in PR and where I am today as Operations Lead.
Veritas: Your the person responsible for Qinling, Ghost Train and my favorite PR map of all time, Muttrah. Speaking of which, why did it get removed and will we get Muttrah 2 in v0.8?
Rhino: That is correct, though as lead mapper my responsibilities also include putting work into all the maps that go into PR, which means it's sometimes hard to find time to work on my own projects. The removal of Muttrah City was my decision, the map was developed around the game play in PR v0.3 and it worked brilliantly with v0.3. But by PR v0.5 it was clear that the mod had simply out grown the map. The map was too small and did not promote the kind of game play we wanted in PR, so there was two main choices: do a lot of work on the current version, or scrap it and start fresh, with a much, much larger, more realistic and overall better design. I've been working on the map on and off ever since (over a year now). This was no easy task and I have been pushing the map and myself to the limits.
The PR team has helped tremendously with this, and we have all had to learn new skills and overcome many obstacles to get this map to the point its at now. We have reviewed 100's of real life reference photo's and painstakingly re-created dozens of custom objects based on the real life location of Muttrah City, Oman. What I've done with Muttrah City v2 is something that no mapper in there right mind would try to attempt, and that is creating an urban map in non-symmetrical, unevenly shaped blocks. Most real life cities in the world are not a grid but rather a unique sprawling urban landscape, and this has proved quite a difficult challenge in the BF2 editor. The map has yet a lot of work still to be done on it before its complete but we are hoping it will be finished soon.
Veritas: Which is your favorite map and feature mod's history?
Rhino: Ohhh that's a hard one. I really can't pick a favorite for maps, as I've worked on all of them and I can say that I love most. All the maps in PR offer something different and that's the most fundamental point for me. I'm an all-round player, I love all the different types of combat, from infantry to tanks to jets, each map offers something different. Al Basrah offers that urban and open guerrilla warfare of the insurgents, while Battle for Qinling offers some really awesome tank battles and combined arms. My favorite feature in PR would have to be really just the bi-product of all the features in PR, which is simply the amazing teamwork you can find in public games and how the mod promotes and rewards such teamwork. This was the single most influential part of PR which got me hooked on it since I realized it was there.
Veritas: The question we most want to know is, When can we expect to see PR v0.8?
Rhino: I should have known you were going to ask this hehe. Sorry but we never give out any dates of the release until we are close to finishing and 100% sure as as to when we will be finished. We are a free mod made by volunteers who work in their free time. Anything can happen with real life that can cause problems in the amount of free time we get, which can put back a release by a few weeks or more. Also we have to deal with unexpected bugs and hardware problems popping up. Just recently one of my old hard drive deiced to die, thankfully all of my files were backed up but it did cause us to miss a deadline by a week since I could not compile and do basic testing on the build so then we could send it off to the testers. We know its in the best interest of both the dev team and the community not to give out any dates until we are 100% certain, we do not want to disappoint our dedicated community. We do truly work on a tight time scale to give you our next releases as soon as we possibly can to keep the player base happy with new content and to keep the game play fresh and exciting.
Veritas: Okay, thanks for your time Rhino, best of luck with Muttrah City (v2) and v0.8.
Rhino: It was a pleasure, cheers!
Comment here about the interview
Why not? I wish we could though.
