When I was small I would always either play with my toys or watch cartoons on tv. Up to the age 10 I lived in a neighborhood with flats, where no kids played outside, that’s why I often stayed home and watched cartoons/anime & series like, Looney Tunes, Pokémon, Dragon ball Z & Power Rangers. I still have the Ninja Megazord, Thunder Megazord and the Power Blaster at home.
What I liked about those series was the freedom the characters had, that not everything needed to be within the rules, that the hero could adapt and save himself from the difficult situation.
Later on my father got me hooked on Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan movies which made me want to do sports as well. But that didn’t last long as the schedule was irregular and travel time and costs were high.
Before moving out of our home, we did not have internet and our PC was pretty old. My father would only buy games where we could learn something from, like “Robbie Konijn” (Primary school, 1998) or “Learn Arabic”. For me the Learn Arabic game was the most fun, because it had a simple high score meter. I could keep playing and beat my little brother and older sister.
After moving to our new home we got both a better PC and internet. For me this was a mind blowing and exciting moment of my life. Yes, I already knew what the internet was and that you could play games, but I always played at my cousin’s house or at an internet café, this was my PC and could play without going to a cousins house.
And so my free online MMO hunt began, I played quite a lot of those games, Conquer online, Rohan, Soul of the Ultimate Nation, Gunz and many more, yet I never played WoW(I could not pay the monthly fee, and my father would not pay for it). I went as far as burning my own video card.
I played quite a lot of single player games after I got my hands on Age of Empires 2. I got fascinated by managing and conquering places. I felt like the king/lord of that nation and I as the king can be the only ruler. Even now my most favorite games are management games. I have more than 500+ hours in Civilization 5, 100+ in factorio and many other management games above 50+ hours.
At the age of 15 I got enough money to buy my own PS3, that’s when I truly started gaming. My friend gave me Demon Souls and I just kept playing and playing. Having my own character like MMO, but not forces to be online and keeping up with the server, yet it is difficult enough to keep playing and don’t get bored after a certain level. For me it was my second mind blown experience that I had. After that I played many other titles, God of War, Uncharted, Last of Us, Dark Souls, Dragon’s Dogma, Mafia etc.
Well just like any kid that plays to much games, I got my fair share of troubles. I would get bad grades and not be allowed to play games, or I would get in a fight with my parents because I couldn’t become anything with just gaming.
Ironically, whether it was because of the fights or because I was introduced to gaming relatively late I don’t know, but I still ended up becoming a game designer.
Gaming for me was something else, I could see the effort the creators put into the games that I played. I could see/feel when developers have put their soul in those games. I wanted to be part of it. I wanted to make my own games, to give other players that same smile I got when playing a good game.
Now that I’m older and studying Game Design I’ve gained another goal: to make people think. Through my gaming experience, especially when it comes to shooters, you are always the Western superman that kills (Arabic Muslim) terrorists.
I want to change that, I would like to one day work on a big project where I make a game from another perspective. I want the player to see and feel what those that got invaded felt and saw. What they have been through and how they saw the world in those times.
I want to make a point that there is no such thing as good and evil in war or religious fights.
I ended up writing more than I thought, yet I hope this gives a good picture about who I am as a person and Game Designer.
