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About . Personal Details: . |
Photograph taken on the 26th August 2007
Photograph taken on the 22th August 2007 |
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About Me: . Hi, my name is Paul James Mannering and I have been programming computer games since the age of 14 (the year 1999). When people ask me why I do this it is quite simple. I love games (playing them and making them). The first thing that inspired me to take this route in life was when I acquired a Sony Playstation One console (in 1998). It was the first time I'd experienced true 3D game environments and the idea of creating my own, for the rest of the world to play, was all the inspiration I needed. Back in the day I started off by trying to learn C++ and created a few simple text based games. However, starting off with C++ as my first programming language was a bit of a mistake. It was hard, being thrown in at the deep end, and eventually I threw in the towel. That was until we started doing some Visual Basic at school. As a side project I developed a simple card game called Target Cards (the aim was to draw up to 5 cards from a pack, then add them up to get as close to the target number as possible).
Target Cards, developed in Visual Basic (2000).
Suddenly with this simpler language under my belt, and my first true graphical game, the C++ didn't seem so daunting. So I gave it another shot. This time it all made sense, and the only hiccup was getting my head around the idea of pointers (one of C++'s most powerful features). Next came the step up in class. Moving from the console to understanding the complexity of an operating system is enormous, and something which there are few good books on for beginners (although the .NET framework has come a long way to shortening this gap since). I started off with some simple Microsoft Windows MFC based projects, but this just seemed pointless as you could do most of it much easier in Visual Basic. But then at the age of 16 (When I started doing my A-levels), I brought a book on Directx 8 (Game Programming All-in-one, 1st Edition) and made the dream of creating 3D worlds a reality...well it was a start anyway (I couldn't model 3D geometry of my own then so use your imagination). Again, the step up in difficultly was hard to get my head around (especially while doing my A-levels at the same time), but I persisted. As a side project I also learned how to use 3D Studio Max (using the 30-day free demo), although I later used Maya extensively at University, and experimented with the Half-Life Hammer Editor to create a few maps for counterstrike.
Click on this picture for more Half Life map screenshots (2002)
Then just as I started University (in 2004) I brought a book called Programming a Multiplayer FPS in Directx, written by Vaughan Young. Somehow this book made everything to do with the C++game programming easy to understand, and it was the catalyst I needed to not only create my own simple FPS, but also to develop my own game engine, to power all my future games (if you're reading this Vaughan I can't thank you enough).
Early books that were a great help along the way
Then time passed (2 years), and the end result was a 3D shader based game engine, which I called Project Realism (written in C++, using Directx 9.0c), and an accompanying game editor called the PREditor (Written in MFC...so it did come in handy in the end). The only thing missing though was a game to show it off. Now at University, I was set a final year project to complete my degree. The only thought in my head was to write a 3D computer game, one as close to commercially quality as I could program in 6 months. The game that resulted was called Boy Racer, a 3D street racing game based on bashed up old cars (something not seen very often in the gleaming world of most 3D racers). For this I teamed up with an Artist called Andrew Alston (see the illustration of me above for all the information you need on him) and 2 other sound/3D modellers. The demo can be downloaded from the Boy Racer website, now hosted here.
Boy Racer, released March 2007
After Boy Racer was finished I needed a new challenge in life. While looking for a job in the commercial games industry (in the South East of England), I began work on updating my game engine (PREngine) to take advantage of the new hardware that had began to sweep through the PC landscape. Namely dual core processors, and Shader Model 3 GPU's. However development stopped on PREngine 2 after just 6 months due to alternate commitments with my first job in the games industry.
Which brings me to the present. I'm currently working at Zoë Mode (formally known as Kuju Brighton) as a programmer. The games I've worked on here (that have shipped) include:
For more information about these games, see the games I've worked on page here. |
Top 10 Games:
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Games Machines Owned: .
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Skills: .
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Books on Shelf: . C++
My Book Shelf (Photograph taken 2009)
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