Your name is Howard Scott Warshaw. It's January 11th 1981, and it's your first day working for Atari. You know that everyone is smoking dope all day, and you want to fit in. So you bring your own joint, so you won't stand out. You have two new office mates who you are excited and nervous to meet. Todd comes in and shuts the door and tells you he is going to start to smoke. What do you do?
[[Leave the office --> leave the office]]
[[Show him your joint --> show him your joint]]
It's 1982. You've worked at Atari for a year and have yet to make a hit. The parties are great, but you need to be creatively stimulated to want to stay. Ray Kassar (the CEO and your boss) comes to you and proposes your next project. The company has gotten the rights to the arcade classic //Star Castle// and they want you to make the port for the Atari 2600. What do you do?
[[A port? No way --> A port? No way]]
[[Let's see what we can do... --> Create the game]]
You tell him that it's fine, and you leave the office. You sit out in the break room, and see a man walk through wearing just pants and nothing else. He goes to the fridge, pulls out a beer, and then walks away.
You have alienated your office mates, and are less of a team member. You have been freaked out by odd co workers, and lose moral in the company.
[[To the future --> The Future]]
You pull out your own joint from your pocket, and tell him you'll join in. Todd examines the joint, and chuckles a bit. He tells you he'll be smoking some ''real'' stuff. This is a sign of the time to come working here.
You have successfully bonded with your office mates. Your morale is increased.
[[To the future --> The Future]]
You tell Ray this isn't the project for you, but Todd jumps in and takes the opportunity. You sit back down at your desk.
Ray doesn't come to you with anything else, and you leave Atari within the year.
GAME OVER.
You tell Ray you'll give it your best shot, and start planning the game. It starts off being an identical game, but then you make something completely different.
You create //Yar's Revenge// and have a huge hit on your hands. It's the jumpstart you need to keep going, and become a household name.
[[Moving on up --> Moving up]]
You have //Yar's Revenge// under your belt, and it's time to get more ambitious. Atari has the rights to //Raiders of the Lost Ark// and you can make the game. You go to Ray, and with confidence, he lets you make the game.
The next day you come into work with a bullwhip and wearing a fedora. You are committed to making a game that feels like playing as Indiana Jones. But some of your coworkers look at you and laugh. You are the laughing stock of the company.
[[Continue wearing the hat --> Being Indiana]]
[[Put everything in your car --> Releasing the game]]
You don't care about what they say, and continue on making the game your way. (And in the process you pick up some of the women around the office with the bullwhip)
You use this sensory experiment to make the //Raiders of the Lost Ark// game and Spielburg personally thanks you. Steven Spielburg likes your game! But more importantly, you have not just monitary success, your game is critically aclaimed. It goes down like //Yar's Revenge// as one of the best games for the Atari 2600, and you are no longer the laughing stock of the office.
[[Time for a new Speilburg adventure --> The release of ET]]
Embarrassed, you put your bullwhip back in your car and go back to the office. You work on the rest of the game with general difficulty, but it's released on time and in quota.
Speilburg plays the game, and he doesn't like what you did. He thinks you know nothing about being an action star, and the game controls like nonsense. Because of this, the game monitarily doesn't do as well as you hoped. Critics could care less, calling it mediocre. It's not a bad game, but it's not great. In turn, Speilburg asks for you to not design the next film tie in he makes.
GAME OVER
The movie //ET// is about to be released. It's predicted to be the biggest hit of Speilburg's career, and Atari jumps on the chance to make the game tie in. You're sitting at your desk, and you get a call from Ray asking if you can make the //ET// game in time for Christmas. This means you have 5 weeks to work on the game. Normally, a game takes 5 months to make, and you took years to make //Raiders of the Lost Ark// which was your last hit.
[[Refuse --> No way]]
[[Ask for more time --> Make ET with more time]]
[[Absolutely! I'm amazing --> Make ET in the allotted time]]
You tell Ray that's impossible, and he argues with you. At the end of the argument, you pack your bags and leave, because working for a man who expects that much is too high a cost to pay for your creativity.
GAME OVER
You ask Ray if you can have more time. You convince him //ET// will be just as great as //Raiders of the Lost Ark// if you give them equal amounts of time. Spielburg loves your work already and you convince Ray you can get Spielburg on board with more time. After a long back and forth, Ray relunctantly agrees. You have a week to make your idea to pitch to Spielburg, and then go to meet with him.
[[Pitch to Spielburg --> The Pitch]]
You tell Ray absolutely, and he gives you two days to make your concept, because then you're getting on a plane to pitch to him. You work every second to create an idea that's new and fresh for the gaming market.
[[Pitch to Spielburg --> Your crazy idea]]
A week of work, and now you're here pitching your crazy idea to Spielburg. You have the idea to make a game about what it could be like to be ET, and be alienated by society for what you have and what you are. You convince him this inovative idea can be done gracefully if you take the time you took for //Raiders of the Lost Ark//. By playing the card of the game he likes, you convince him that this will be great.
So you get to work on the game, and put all your effort into making ET.
[[Problems occur --> The Crash Hits Atari]]
Two days of work, and now you're here pitching your crazy idea to Spielburg. You have the idea to make a game about what it could be like to be ET, and be alienated by society for what you have and what you are. You propose a 3d plane of existance, which had never been done before. Spielburg resists, suggesting you make a game like Pac-Man. You tell him you need to innovate, and that this game is innovation.
[[Remind Speilburg of //Raiders// --> Your Idea Wins]]
[[Go with his idea --> Speilburg Wins]]
You remind Spielburg you've made him happy in the past, no doubt you can make him happy again. He agrees, and you move on with making your game.
[[Let's Make ET --> The process]]
After a lot of thought, you know 5 weeks isn't enough time to make something crazy innovative. So you settle for Speilburg's idea.
[[Bump in the road --> You make ET]]
This game is really a testimate to your patience. You work round the clock to make it, moving a work station to your home so that you never have to stop working. This goes on for 5 weeks, with very little sleep or breaks to keep your sanity and even tact in check. The only thing left is for Speilburg to play the game, so that it will be released with his approval.
He plays the final game, and even appears in interviews praising the game. It's ready for the christmas market and you've achieved a lofty, and insane goal.
[[But uh-oh... --> Games Unsold]]
You've been working on your game, and keeping yourself together fairly well. But something terrible happens. The video game crash of 1983. You don't directly get the blunt of blame, but you see people around the office being laid off and watch the company get smaller and smaller.
You leave before your game is ever finished. You remain an unremembered figure of the gaming industry.
GAME OVER
You release the game after working on your project for the 5 weeks. Because it's really just a reskin of an older game, it doesn't take a whole lot of work. Speilburg likes your game, and in interviews praises your ability to adapt and change to the ideas he has, while still being a creative yourself.
The game is considered mediocre at best, but no one seems to care around the office. Atari doesn't really profit but doesn't really take a hit. But something else crazy occurs.
[[The crash --> The Crash of Atari]]
With the huge losses Atari takes, it starts falling and falling. Suddenly, left and right, programmers are laid off. You have enough success and are well loved enough to last only another year. By the time Atari is sold and divided, you, Howard Scott Warshaw, have left Atari, and have left programming games altogether.
[[Years later... --> The landfill]]
Kids who recieve this game hate it. It's meet with harsh critical reviews. It undersells the 23 million dollars Atari spends to get these rights. Stores start sending mass amounts of unsold cartridges back to Atari, your's being among them. Emotionally, it's a lot to take. Your ego takes a hit, but you still have enough confidence to make new games, and keep working for Atari.
[[Unforseen cirumstances.. --> The Crash of 1983]]
It's 2013, you have gotten back on your feet. You are now a psychotherapist for people in Silicon Valley, and that feels amazing. Because you were one of those game designers in the high pressure society, you can really help them. But you still hear so many people claim how your game was the worst video game in history. You know the legend, that your game was so bad Atari had to bury so many of them in the dessert. By this time, you've battles your demons and the rumors don't bother you.
But something crazy happens. A filmmaker, Zak Penn, comes to you with this idea. He has funded a crew to go out into the place where it is rumored all the cartridges he made were buried. You have been invited to do the movie with him, and tell the stories of the game and your time at Atari.
[[Take the offer --> Seeing your past.]]
[[Refuse --> Painful memories]]
With the huge losses Atari takes, it starts falling and falling. Suddenly, left and right, programmers are laid off. You have enough success and are well loved enough to last only another year. By the time Atari is sold and divided, you, Howard Scott Warshaw, have left Atari, and have left programming games altogether.
With the lack of any creative fulfillment in your life, you fail. Life has forgotten you. History will forget you.
GAME OVER
You accept, and because of this you bring up a lot of old memories. Your work is much more validated by seeing all the old places you haven't visited in 20 years. And the day arrives. They think they are going to reach the uncovery point of the game. You go out to the landfill sight, no idea what to expect. And it happens.
Thousands show up to see this. Among the guests is author Ernest Cline, who wrote //Ready Player One// who shows up in a Delorian borrowed from George RR Martin. You created something that brings all these people together in a positive manner. No one is there to bash you. They all adore you in fact, it's like meeting a celebrity.
Then they manage to uncover 1,300 ET cartridges. The crowd goes wild. They give you the very first one. People are taking them, and asking you to sign them. It's so much, you burst into tears.
[[What does this mean? --> The end result]]
You respectfully decline his offer. Therefore, when the documentary comes out, your absence is felt. You can't combat anyone's retelling of your life. It's too painful to watch.
You are not remembered foundly, and never get to experience the community that might have loved you.
GAME OVER
You are remembered foundly by a large community. People love you. Your biggest failure is legendary. Your games have been classified as works of art. And you couldn't have wished for things to have gone better.
THE END
YOU WIN!