This is my Interveiw I sent to Joel "FPS Doug" Gardiner, who played a main role in the Pure Pwange Series.
1. How did you get involved with Pure Pwnage?
I’ve been long time friends with the producers Jarett Cale and Geoff Lapaire for many years. We had worked together on some small filming projects before here in Calgary. They were both out in Toronto by the time the series started taking off and wanted to start bringing in more characters. They knew I had the perfect look and ability to pull off a crazy frag fanatic fps player, so the next time Jarett was back in Calgary, me and him filmed the very first fpsdoug segment. Which actually has never been seen because we lost the tape :P
2. What is your favorite game of all time?
That’s a tough question and one I get asked all the time. I guess it really depends on what kind of mood I'm in when I get asked it lol. For sheer fun and excitement the original ice hockey for the NES is awesome to pull out at LAN parties. For competitive play - smash bros, America’s army, and of course counter strike. And back when I was cracked out on mmo’s I still have some good memories from the original EverQuest. But there are countless platformers, puzzle games, and endless Miyamoto games that could easily make this list if I was answering these questions at another time of the day :P
3. Do you teach n00bs your sweet skills on CSS or COD4?
I get asked my gamertag and steam name on average over 200 times a day (not shittin’ you lol). Unfortunately it’s pretty much impossible to decide to just start giving that info out to random people. Especially the way steam works and how intrusive it is.
We sometimes set up events at Pure Pwnage to give certain members of the community opportunities to play with the crew. Just last weekend we had a TF2 night with the gamer army and I had a blast!
4. What is your favorite Pure Pwnage moment of all time?
When I got to smash my TV. It had been giving me grief the entire year I lived in Toronto and I couldn’t wait to destroy it lol.
5. Do you have any plans to get into any other acting?
Yes. In fact production has started on two new projects that I will be starring in. One is a short film that I wrote and will be directing and another is a new internet series called Budz, which will hopefully be coming online within 2008. I also just launched a new production company called Sum Productions Inc. (www.sumproductions.com). It’s one of the first online production companies, helping other independent artists put together the resources they need to produce and market their work.
Most likely the next thing you will see from me though is a graphic novel that I co-wrote with Jeff Hodgson (Deathstriker6666) titled “Lore”. It’s currently being illustrated and should be released by late June.
6. Are you planning on going to any gaming expos this year? If so, which ones?
Unfortunately with where I live and the amount of time I put into personal projects, along with holding down a full time job, it’s really hard for me to make it out to any of these events. I’ve missed out on so many already that it just makes me sad to think about it lol. Still crossing my fingers for PAX though *cough* Jerry, Mike *cough* ;)
7. What games are you playing currently?
Two awesome games that just came out and I haven’t been able to put down are of course Super smash Brawl, and just the other day the sequel to what was in my mind the best console fps of 2007 was released - Rainbow 6:Vegas 2.
I’ve also been getting my usual dose of TF2. I picked up Mass Effect a couple of weeks ago, but that hasn’t seen the inside of my 360 in a couple of days and I of course still love to pop in Rock Band whenever a killer pack gets released. (c’mon Zeppelin and Tool!)
8. What game are you most anticipating for 2008?
I was looking forward to Brawl the most, followed by:
RB6: Vegas 2, Grand Theft Auto IV, Mario Kart on Wii. I think Spore will be interesting. Brother’s in Arms Hell’s Highway, for nostalgic reasons – Bionic Commando Rearmed. Battlefield Heroes is going to be a hilarious free shooter coming out from EA. Far Cry 2, Tom Clancy’s End War, Gears of War 2, Ghostbusters, and Left 4 Dead.
It should be a pretty good year.
9. How many times did you have to re-shoot a "BOOM! HEADSHOT!" scene?
Lol. Ah not too many that’s for sure. Usually those are good in one or two takes ☺
10. How are you feeling about the current gaming community?
It’s getting better....In terms of how it’s becoming more integrated and accepted in our society with the creation of gaming leagues and more and more sponsors taking note of how huge it’s becoming, setting up more and more events each year, I think is amazing and I couldn’t be happier!
However, I still get down every once awhile about the actual communities themselves. Flamers, griefers, hackers - all these idiots are still out there and in my opinion still ruining a lot of good online experiences. Recently I’ve been noticing a lot of rampant racism happening which is disturbing when the majority of the time something like your race is completely unknown so I’m still trying to get my head around that one. Let’s just say that I never plug my mic in on my 360 anymore and the only time I’ll go on a vent channel is with my own team or rl buddies.
11. What changes in the gaming industry would you like to see?
It’s very rare for a good game to come out on pc these days because it seems like the majority of gaming companies are concentrating where the money is at the moment – MMO’s. And the sad thing is that there isn’t even a half decent one out there. There still isn’t a MMO that compares to the open end gameplay of the original Ultima Online or even Everquest for that matter. Today there is no penalty for death therefore no fear of dying, which for me takes away the rush of it. Letting the community police itself is something MMO’s got away from and I don’t understand why.
Getting away from MMO’s entirely ( I’m glad I did lol) is something I wish all gaming companies would do and for them to start thinking of ways of building real communities across all genres - Which means continuing to support games they’ve already released! Nothing sucks more then when a great game comes out but then doesn’t get the support it needs and the community dies out.
12. What website do you find yourself visiting over and over again?
Heh, well I have this cool little widget on my desktop that keeps me up to date with all my gaming news from sites like ds and xbox fanboy, ign.com, gamespot, metacritic.com, etc. I’m also trolling torrent sites all day looking for whatever catches my eye. I’m a movie nut so I’m downloading 24/7 heh.
13. What is your favorite console at the moment?
I’d have to say 360. Wii has really only come out with 3 or 4 good games and right now my ps3 plays more blu-ray disks then games. :/
14. I know acting and gaming are two of your biggest passions, how do you balance these out?
Well I like to clump it all into one category and just call it filming. To be honest I do more writing than anything else – screen plays, short stories, graphic novels. Filming is my number one priority, it’s my career and really my one true passion, but I will always make time for gaming. It’s something I fell in love with over 20 years ago and will always take great interest in my life. It can captivate me just as much if not more than a movie can.
15. Have you been to pwned. com? How do you like it? Any suggestions?
Someone had mentioned it to me before but I forgot about it until Xchrom0someXX contacted me reminding me. I think it’s awesome! I love seeing sites like this. This is what the gaming industry needs - more tools like this to create bigger and better gaming communities. Going to be added to the list of sites I frequent for sure.
