By Captain Starkiller for BlackOps Station, 2001-02-15

Reign1701A
any ground rules?

Captain Starkiller
Nope... :-)
what brought you into the SFC Community?

Reign1701A:
well shortly after the release of Starfleet Academy (man I loved that game) I saw a small preview for a "sequel" entitled Starfleet Command, so from that point on I waited on the release of it

Captain Starkiller
excellent... was SFA your first Star Trek game?

Reign1701A:
nope, the Star Trek 25th anniversary game for the original 8 bit Nintendo was my very first

Captain Starkiller
What is your current project within SFC?

Reign1701A:
i assume you mean my "niche," currently, I'm assigned at Omega Sector as weapons graphics/sounds chief under the command of Wicked Zombie

Captain Starkiller
And how is working for the old Undead Boy?

Reign1701A:
he's hardly a slave driver, we chat everyday over AIM/AOL about new stuff going on the community, if one of us just created a new texture or model or something, the other is the first one to ever set eyes on it

Captain Starkiller
he is supportive?

Reign1701A:
very, top notch boss and he's very open about criticism, or so he likes to think ;-)

Captain Starkiller
Heheheh... I have talked recently with Lansing of AGT and he has stated that SFC2 poses some new sound issues that were not really a problem in SFC1... do you agree?

Reign1701A:
well I actually don't have SFC as of yet, my parents have not allowed me to buy any PC games since I got 2 Cs on my report card (they expect a lot from me)...but, I have heard that the sounds are all in a zip file, and it is difficult to change them around...this is a disappointment since Taldren did state the game should be even more easily moddable than SFC I

Captain Starkiller
yes, it has been for the most part, but I credit a lot of that to Heaven's Eagle and Remus.... really.

Reign1701A:
yeah, I don't know what I'd do without FMSE...I would be nagging script makers mad ;-)

Captain Starkiller
have you played Armada

Reign1701A:
nope, but I have played the demo, interesting game

Captain Starkiller
Which ERA of Trek do you prefer?

Reign1701A:
TNG, but keep in mind I do have a place in my heart for the TOS/TMP era

Captain Starkiller
What do you think about this "Return to the Pre-TOS Era"?

Reign1701A:
well to be honest I'm not too thrilled about it, seems like too much of a step backwards...TOS is old enough for me :-)

Captain Starkiller
Finally... yeah... are you excited about the NEW OLD Trek series?

Reign1701A:
you mean "series V"?

Captain Starkiller
yeah

Reign1701A:
well I've heard a lot of rumors about it, I really hope it takes place after Voyager, I think Star Trek should keep moving forward not looking back, I believe Star Wars made this mistake when they released "episode IV" first

I am more hopeful about the new movie

Captain Starkiller
Me too...

Captain Starkiller
I, personally, agree completely

Reign1701A:
hehe

Captain Starkiller
So, what kinds of Sound Mods have you produced?

Reign1701A:
TMP/TNG era mainly, I've released several TNG packs actually, each improving on the last, the latest is available at Omega, I was planning on doing a TMP era one but the guy at Starfleet Operations has that covered quite well... I've also done music mods that replace the ambient engine rumble with classic Trek music for SFCI, works pretty well, the only downside is you have to turn off the original game music

Captain Starkiller
Do you take requests?

Reign1701A:
yup, so far in my year of modding I've only gotten about 1 or 2 requests..heheh
i have a huge collection of Star Trek wave's on my computer, so if someone wants a particular sound effect or piece of dialogue, i probably have it
;-)

Captain Starkiller
kewl.

Captain Starkiller
What are your plans now?

Reign1701A:
well, I just finished a re-texture of Maggot's Dominion DN and BC, I just copy and pasted parts of a photo realistic picture i got off of stinsv.com and put them on Maggot's textures, so I plan on releasing that as soon as I get Maggot's permission... as for more "long term," I plan on getting straight As this report card so I can get SFC2, and so far i'm right on track for that... once I get SFC2 I intend to figure out how to mod sounds right away and start releasing SFC2 sound packs

Captain Starkiller
Excellent!!! What do you think of the forums?

Reign1701A:
oh I love them, i go to them everyday to check out the latest happenings, when the forum server is down I get upset, ask WZ, "no forums and no Oreos make Reign go something something"

Captain Starkiller
do you play SFC much?

Reign1701A:
you betchya, you know I'm kind of glad I have no talent for 3D modeling, I get lots of time to play the game

Captain Starkiller
who do you favor in the SFC universe? ...which race?

Reign1701A:
the good old UF of P of course ;-)
i just never found satisfaction in being the bad guys, heheh

Captain Starkiller
who is your usual 'victim'?

Reign1701A:
as in my favorite race to beat up on?

Captain Starkiller
yep;-)

Reign1701A:
well I've modded my game a bunch so the Gorn are now the Borg, the Hydrans are now the Dominion, and the Lyrans are now the Cardassians...so my favorite race to beat up would the Dominion/Hydrans... in the original unmodded version, definitely the Klingons

Captain Starkiller
heheh, kewl.

Captain Starkiller
What kind of computer are you using?

Reign1701A:
well it's an E-Machine, our family recently go it upgraded, she runs at 400mhz, 160 megs, and some really good video card, I don't remember the name of it right now, lol all that matters is she runs SFC beautifully :-)

Captain Starkiller
what is your favorite ship or fleet combination in the game?

Captain Starkiller
what is your fave ship, or fleet combo?

Reign1701A:
i assume you mean the unmodded version of SFC right?

Captain Starkiller
"unmodded"? Really? Do people play it unmodded?

Reign1701A:
lol, nah...but unmodded-the Fed CB, the most powerful heavy cruiser, and happens to be my favorite ship, the Enterprise-A (Taldren model replaced by one of those high poly ones out of course), modded-gotta be the Defiant, loaded down with fusions modified to look like pulse phasers and plasma Rs made to look like quantum torpedoes, she is so much fun to fly, half my missions involve the Defiant!

Captain Starkiller
you have defiant specific graphics and sounds, right?
are those avail for download?

Reign1701A:
yep, available at the Sounds division at Omega, i just combined new weapons textures and sounds to go with them in one zip file and i have 3 different defiant pulse phaser bursts, all with matching fx6 files synchronized with the wavs

Captain Starkiller
do have any additional web page addresses you would like to promote?

Reign1701A:
well, a while ago I put a page up on geocities but never got around to finishing it, I'm just too lazy to maintain a whole website, I highly recommend Omega Sector, and the Dominion of Modders, which has links to even more modeling sites.. it's a PC gamer's dream to have such a large modding community, it's great

Captain Starkiller
true... so, the only page where people can go to see your stuff is http://vod.starfleetuniverse.com/OmegaSector/Sounds/OmegaSounds.html?

Reign1701A:
well, the site has moved a lot recently, in order to make sure you go the right site, go to www.geocities.com/wickedzombie45, it points directly to the newest site location....I believe I have older sound packs in the download archives somewhere on Starfleet Universe...other than that, nope no one else has hosted my stuff

Captain Starkiller
Is SFU going to be continuing to host for you in addition to Zombie?

Reign1701A:
well I don't think SFU accepts actual files anymore since their server is down, all my latest stuff will be hosted by WZ, if he ever gets around to updating the site, lol, but currently we are discussing a "partnership" with the Newships Project so hopefully poor WZ won't have to manage a website and continue to dazzle us with his modeling skills everyday :-)

Captain Starkiller
very nice. Anything else you would like to add?

Reign1701A:
yeah, one day I'll make a new mesh, but by then the SFC series will be ancient, lol, until then, I intend to continue to create new weapons effects, textures, and sound effects for this awesome game we all know and love as SFC

Captain Starkiller
Thanks for the interview man! I will get this posted tonight!!!