TE: Do you keep up with the modding community for the Civ games?
SM: To a certain extent; I don't follow it that closely. But I'm certainly aware that it's an active, vibrant community and it's been a significant part of the charm of Civ ever since Civ 2, when that was made part of the game. In general, I think the rise of communities like that has been one of the big stories of the past four or five years. I think The Sims has been a big part of that. Now with MMOs, we see guilds and things like that.
The whole idea of interacting with people through a computer game was very much a foreign concept. The whole reason we played computer games was to get away from other people a few years ago. But to see that arise has added another dimension to gaming. It's not just for antisocial people anymore. You can play games and be social and interact with other people. And modding is one dimension of that. It feeds into that desire that all gamers have to be designers. You get to make that mod or that level and really feel like you made a game.
TE: You're a big figure in the gaming world, and you have a career that many have paid close attention to for nearly 20 years. So what's something that nobody knows about you?
SM: There are lots of things people don't know about me. They probably don't know I'm getting serious about playing the guitar. That's my latest hobby. I went to see [Eric Clapton] a couple months ago - I was inspired.
But I guess what people don't realize is that I'm a person. I think people that play the games think that I am the game, or to be a game designer you have to be obsessed or weird. When I go to a trade show there are a lot of people that go, "Oh! You're like a normal person, a regular guy." So I hope the message that sends is that you can be a game designer and still be a normal, sane person. There can be a balance.
I won't name any names, but I think there are certainly some personalities in the game industry that have traded on their eccentricity to get attention. So for a while there has been this perception that to be big in game design you have to have this out-there personality. I don't buy that. We're trying to identify with our players and figure out what they want, and we have to be normal to do that.
Jeremy Monken is the former interactive entertainment editor for The Examiner and a lifelong student of all things comics and videogames. He currently freelances, designs and works on his comic strip, "Striving for Mediocrity," which can be found on his personal blog, The Church of the Red Barrel.
