> To whomever is in charge (namely, the editor, I would assume!):

In charge, sure . . . NOT!

> I realize that IE is baldly, er, boldly going where no Mag has gone before,
> but there is a teeny tiny little gripe or two I have with Volume Three of
> the mag. THE INTERVIEW STANK LIKE . . . MY WEEK OLD DEAD GOLDFISH . . .

> Anyway, getting back to what I was saying, what I MEANT to say was that I
> prefer the interview in the format it was in Volume TWO of Interactive
> Entertainment. Please, I believe that it is a MORAL IMPERATIVE that
> somebody says something about this; thus, I am saying something. I
> preferred being able to go about it in a "Choose Your Own Adventure" sort
> of style, and I REALLY enjoyed the way the questions one had already
> "asked" were highlighted in red. It was cookin'!

<Sigh!> Yeah, the interview was . . . not good. There are any number of
complicated explanations, but the long and the short of it is . . . we
screwed up. We didn't shoot enough video of Roberta to make a good
interactive out of it, and by the time we realized it, we had already
committed ourselves to running it. So we had to settle for running what
we had in the format we did. It wasn't our choice, and believe me, we
have no intentions of moving the format away from the interactive. (In
fact, we are trying to make the interactive interview even better. Look
for the hidden button on the interview screen for a tool that will make
navigating the interview even easier.)

As far as the video quality goes, we were using a different development
package than the one we normally use because it allowed us to create the
wipes we used in the video. Unfortunately, we found a bug. This
undocumented feature causes the video to compress at the wrong frame
rate -- in this case, at around 1 frame per 8 seconds. As you may know,
this is not the most ideal speed for high-quality digital video :) We will
recompile and run the Roberta Williams interview again in an upcoming
episode, and we will track her down for another interview in a couple of
months. The folks at Sierra tell us she's really busy with Phantasmagoria,
though, so don't count on seeing her again until after that project (and
possibly KQ7, as well) is complete.

> Ready for gripe number two? No? Tough bananas. Please put something in
> the credits, like pictures or music so I don't fall asleep reading the
> names of the ingenious people who are instrumental in putting the amazing
> piece of electro-literature that is IE into production. Please? If y'all
> don't, I will hold my breath until I turn BLUE! By the way, in case you
> wonder, I made this letter so long and convoluted to ensure that it is
> too difficult to edit and print in the Letters section. So there -- take
> that! That is how upset I am over the interview thing.
>
> C.B.
> Monroe, LA

Hah! Don't count on it! In the space taken up by even one article, we could
probably fit every letter you've ever written in your life! Make them as
long and convoluted as you like -- unless you specifically ask us not to,
we will run your letters, especially when they're as good as this one.

As far as the credits go: we're working on it. We have to convince the
publisher that people actually care who we are first, then find the time
in our busy production schedule to develop the format, then write the code
to run it, take the pictures/video, acquire the music . . .