Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Ok, welcome. Thanks for coming.
I'm glad to see [that] everyone's here.
We've got some pretty exciting stuff [to show], at least I think so.
So, first we're going to start with introductions.
My name is Matt Ownby and I'm kinda the "software guy."
and this is Warren, and I'm gonna let him introduce himself.
(from audience) "Watson!"
I'm Warren Ondras of the Dragon's Lair Project. Some of you probably know me as Warren O.
I do software development in IT as kind of my main thing.
(unintelligible) from fixing cables and that sort of thing (unintelligible) I'm kinda the hardware guy on this project.
So... back over to Matt.
So a little bit about me. I've got two kids [and] one on the way.
I've been married about seven years,
I've got a computer science degree in computer science (redundant!)
and I started with computers way back in 1982 on the Apple ][+.
[audience goes wild with excitement]
.. and I'm a software developer professionally.
and the reason I'm dressed up is just because I like to dress up. I know it's a gaming convention so I shouldn't be [dressed up] but here I am.
And there's a third person who's on our project.
He's in the UK and couldn't be here. His name's Neil.
So, some history: why I'm here.
So way back in 1999, I was on vacation in Germany.
And I was sitting in the family truck just kinda waiting
for my family to get back from wherever they were
and I started remembering when I was child how I used to play Dragon's Lair.
And I thought, "Whoa, it's 1999. Technology's come a long way."
"I bet those old Dragon's Lair machines.. I bet you can probably find those discs if you want to."
So then I started thinking, "You know I bet you could get laserdisc players, and
discs, and I bet you could control that from a computer and actually play the game!"
And then I started getting excited because I thought "Whoa, I
would love to see the disc again and play the game again!"
And so I came home and I started researching and I found the Dragon's Lair
Project web site and basically found the laserdisc collection community.
and I started... you know.. asking people what's it going to take to get this
game running, and asking more questions and started learning about emulation.
Probably in the year 2000, I guess, is when I wrote
the first version of the emulator called DAPHNE.
.. which is what you uhm..
.. basically what you use to play Dragon's Lair and other laserdisc games.
[applause]
So just so know who uh... how many people are familiar with DAPHNE?
Really?
Ok, that's good.
So, moving forward in time, there was...
the problem with laserdisc games is that the laserdisc players basically
failed really easily and the laserdiscs rot really easily too.
and so this company came up with a card called the hi-tech mechanical card
and that basically let you replace the original laserdisc player with a Sony laserdisc player.
and then after a while, another group of people in
Australia came up with this thing called LaserAce
which allowed you to use more players as replacements and it supported more games.
so it was kinda making progress.
Just for my curiosity, how many people have one of these cards, hi-tech or laserace?
Well, I can see why you're here then.
Ok, so, moving in time some more,
I was at an earlier California Extreme
I think it was probably 5 years ago,
and this guy here, Brendon Zeidler, brought his Freedom Fighter cabinet
and the laserdisc player wasn't working very well
and I really wanted to see that game
'cause it's really rare and really cool
and I was like really annoyed the way the laserdisc player was working
like pfffffffft...
This .. if.. if someone doesn't do something, these games are going to be lost forever
especially this one 'cause that player is virtual impossible..
you can't even find it and trying to fix it is really hard too.
So after the show, I was sitting there talking with Chip
who's back there in the corner,
and we started discussing you know this idea of
what if we just replaced laserdisc players completely?
instead of you know trying to keep using newer versions of..
newer iterations of laserdisc players, why not just replace them completely and solve the problem once and for all?
And at the time I was very reluctant because it sounded like a really hard job.
And I knew nothing about electronics.
So...
So, there was a definite need.
So, who can tell me, in their opinion, what is
missing in the existing solutions that have today?
Like the Hi-Tech card, or the LaserAce cards?
Is there anything missing? What's missing?
(audience) Future.
Wh-wh-what?
Future?
I uh um.. yeah.
Ok. Do you wanna elaborate on that?
It's just not as reliable a [solution].
I mean, you're still dealing with laser rot.
So dealing with laser rot...
The other problem is laserdisc players are not manufactured anymore
laserdiscs are not being manufactured anymore
So it's obsolete technology.
Obs uh.. yeah, obsolutely.
And uh.. and people...
there are few out there that are even willing to fix the things anymore.
It is not worth their time and effort, you know.
So there's a lack of expertise.
A few other reasons I came up with is...
the games like Freedom Fighter, Star Rider, Cube Quest...
I don't think there's any kind of replacement solutions for those
'cause I don't think LaserAce supported them.
And even games like Firefox which LaserAce does support has...
poor performance in my opinion.
It uses skipping but it's not as fast as the original.
Hey Matt...
Yes?
Kindof another thing is you can't get LaserAce cards anymore anyway.
That's right. Well, you might be able to on Ebay.
[crowd groans in disgust at the thought]
Alright.
So, I just wanna talk a little bit about...
I'm gonna tie this back in but I thought this was pretty interesting
since I'm involved with emulators and DAPHNE.
So it sounded like some people here are familiar with DAPHNE.
I'm assuming about pretty much everyone is familiar with MAME?
Is that right?
YES!!!
Ok.
So... you may have noticed, if you've ever posted on MAME message boards
or even if you've posted on DAPHNE message boards
that there is kind of a tension between the MAME developers and the users.
Right? Has anyone noticed that?
So who can describe the tension to me?
"Where can I download ROMs?"
[crowd laughs]
"What about laserdisc images?"
"Why aren't you working harder?"
Where can I download ROMs/laserdisc images?
Add this feature.
"Why are you making it so hard for me to use your software?"
"It's your fault."
"Why are you making it so hard... hehe.. okay."
"I want more tech support." "You've [asked that] ten thousand times."
Tech support... Repeated questions.. alright. Exactly.
So.. think about this. Why do you think this tension exists?
People want something for nothing.
People want something for nothing? Anyone else have any ideas.
Leslie?
(Leslie) We want answers.
People want answers?
[audience laughter]
Okay, so...
Maybe some people do want something for nothing
but I would say that the reason the tension exists is because
the users of the emulators have goals that are not being met by the emulator.
Like.. we all have goals.
Everyone has different goals.
But the emulators aren't meeting the goal.
And so the user's like "Oh uh err... it would be nice if it did this but I know I got it for free. Maybe you could add this feature."
And then... so the user isn't having their goals met.
Now the developer on the other hand
they have different goals than the user.
Their goal is... they basically just wanted to...
Who knows what their goal is?
Maybe they want to solve a neat puzzle, maybe they wanted to relive their one pet game from their childhood.
But their goal, unfortunately, is not to help the end user succeed in using their program.
Like the MAME developerse, they're not trying..
They're not in the business of trying to help the user use their program.
And frankly, I'm not in the business of helping people use DAPHNE either, unfortunately.
That's the problem with the whole emulation community. That's why the tension exists.
Which I thought was important to talk about because now we get into the next idea.
So basically, I was troubled by this situation because...
I don't like having people mad at me.
I don't like having that people say "Oh ,those DAPHNE developers are such jerks."
"They're mean and they don't help people."
I like to have people appreciate my work and not be mad.
So, I was looking for a project where I could actually make helping the user reach their goal my goal.
Because if I help the user reach their goal then everyone's happy, right?
Assuming that I get something in return, right?
So, probably about a year ago I started reading these design books dealing with software.
Because I'm a professional software developer.
And if you haven't noticed, software usually has pretty lousy design.
And so I was interested in being a better designer.
So I started reading these books.
I read one called "About Face" and another one called "The Inmates are Running the Asylum".
Really really interesting to me....
So my question is.. to you...
What do you think makes people love or hate any product? Who's got some ideas?
What makes a product loved or despisable?
(audience) Quality. (audience) Ease of use.
Quality. Ease of use.
(audience) Intuitiveness.
Intuitiveness.
(audience) solving the problem.
What's that? Solving the.. ah! Solving the problem.
(audience) Compelling.
Compelling.
So I would say based on what I read in the book.. it all boils down to...
If it helps you meet your goal, you're gonna love it.
If it doesn't help you meet your goal, you might still use it...
and tolerate it... but you're not going to like it.
And maybe even despise it a little bit. You might resent that you have to use it at all.
Okay.
So, one of the things that the design book mentions
is that if you try to please everybody... whom do you end up pleasing?
No one.
So, if trying to please everyone is not a good idea because you will never succeed.
So whom should... if we're designing a product...
pretend like we're all designers...
whom should we try to please if we're not trying to please everyone?
(audience) Ourselves.
Ourselves?
Well, you're not making it for yourself. You're making it for someone else.
So what the book says is that you shouldn't try to please everyone,
you shouldn't even try to please most people,
you should just focus on just one specific type of person, and try to make them 100% ecstatic.
And you will be successful if you do that.
So what I did was I started interviewing people.
I made a request for interviews like... "Ok, I'm working on this laserdisc replacement project.."
"and I wanna make it something that is really cool that the user really likes."
so I started asking "What's their goals?"
"What are you trying to do?"
"What kind of problems do you have today?"
And I was...
I took all the interviews and I broke them...
I started to see patterns.
and I broke it down into about four different types of people.
which I call "personas."
And personas are basically fake people
that I just made up that represent these patterns.
So I just came up with names out of nowhere, they don't mean anything.
So you've got Ed, Evan, Lester, and Mitch.
Now Ed, he's the Nostalgic type of person.
He wants everything to Just Work the way it did back in 1983 when lasergames were brand new.
He wants to relive his childhood, and he wants to
be able to have to have his friends come over and see how his childhood was like.
So hopefully that's gonna sound like some of your goals, right?
Hopefully you have some of those goals too.
'Cause otherwise my interviews were a complete disaster.
So that's Ed.
Now, Evan, his goals are a little bit different.
He likes to take old beat-up arcade games and restore them.
Now hopefully some of you are like that too.
You like to take old games and restore them and make them brand new.
His goals are a little bit different because he doesn't
necessarily want to play the games or see them running
he just wants to you know.. the joy is in the journey.
Restore the game, make it look awesome.
Take something that was almost dead and bring it back.
Do a service to the community.
So that's the second guy.
Now the third guy, I called Lester.
He's kind of like a .. tinkerer.
He likes to modify things
uh.. you know he might..
replace the monitor in an original game with a newer monitior.
which some people would think was.. you know..
a total bad idea 'cause they want to keep it original
bad he doesn't mind if it's original.
He likes to kind of explore and tinker.
And then the fourth guy is this Mitch guy.
He's the type of guy that collect arcade boards.. rare boards..
and dumps the ROM images..
he (cough) preserving everything.
Oh, right there.
He can identify.
(chip) I'm a Mitch.
So he's like the.. he's like the.. you know...
He wants to have like a museum. So he can go back later and you know, these are how the ROMs were...
he doesn't wanna have anything lost. He wants to preserve _everything_.
So he doesn't even necessarily wanna play the games, he just wants to preserve the games.
Ok.. so those are the four personas.
Remember, they are fake people.
and remember what I said before that...
If I try to please all four of them, there.. none of them are gonna be pleased.
So the question to you is..
If I have to choose one of them, which one do I design for?
(audience) Ed. (Chip) Me!
That's right! It is Ed.
Actually, that means I'm right. 'Cause I chose Ed too.
So, Ed's Goals.
I said it all already,
But his goals is he wants authenticity.
Anything that I'm gonna make, it has to look exactly like the original.
When he powers on, it has to have the same pauses, the same blank screens..
maybe even the frame should jitter a little bit like the original laserdisc players did.