June 29, 1989
Yesterday was hectic. Robert Florczak delivered a revised box art sketch. Rob Martyn and I spent half an hour at the Mac rewriting the back-of-box copy while Brian sat behind us and dryly interjected: “Five minutes… ten minutes… Can we print it?… Are we done yet?”
The moment it came out of the LaserWriter, Brian wrote the date and time on it and it disappeared into his folder. When he brought it to Nancy, she was too exhausted to argue. “You’ve worn us down,” she said.
Now Latricia is complaining because the girl in the picture has breasts and the guy is grasping her wrist. At this point, I’m counting on Brian to steamroll over any and all objections put forward by Marketing, Art, Sales, and anyfuckingone else.
Roland and I spent the morning trying to put POP on a 3.5″ disk, but for some reason we couldn’t get it to work. We’ll try again next week.
Spent the night fixing bugs, backing up, making disks, etc. in preparation for my early-morning departure. I haven’t gotten up at 6:30 AM in ages. Now I’m on the plane to New York, toting an Apple IIc in my carry-on, along with about eight pounds of CDs I grabbed off my shelf at the last minute (Scheherezade, Walküre, Götterdämmerung, Aida, Lawrence of Arabia, Ella Fitzgerald singing “Night in Tunisia,” and anything else that seemed like it might be useful).
I promised Brian a final version by July 26, a month from now. I showed him the schedule I’d made up. He read it through carefully, then looked at me with that amused smile that could mean anything. Brian and I have an understanding. Only, I’m not sure what it is.
Rob is a great guy. It was fun working together on the box copy under the gun like that. This project is still 90% solitary work, but I’ve really come to treasure that remaining (and increasing) percentage of human bonding.
The flip side of that is the incredible frustration of dealing with people like Latricia, who seem put on this earth just to make life miserable. (“It’s like we’re all playing in a sandbox and she comes over and wrecks our sand castle,” I told Brian when he informed me of her latest Anti-Bondage campaign. “Why does she do it? Because it’s there!”) But the flip side of the flip side is the bond of “us against the world,” which makes it all worth it.
Whatever instinct made me want to become a movie director was right. This is life the way it should be lived. Holing up alone in a room with my muse is half a life at best. Maybe some people are cut out for it, but I now realize that I’m not one of them. I’m having too much fun. My interpersonal skills still aren’t up to the level of my solitary work habits – I’ve got years of nerd-dom to make up for – but I like this road I’m on.
June 30, 1989
Took the 1:08 train into the city with Emily and bought a CD player at Harvey’s on 45th Street (the Chinese salesman was impressed that I was buying it for my dad). Spent the evening showing Dad the game and listening to “Persian” music for inspiration. Dad was really impressed by the game, and even more by the CD player.
Dad is in a bad state because of his business worries and the stress between him and Mom. I think the best way to cheer him up is to concentrate on making this music happen.
“It’s a big job,” Dad said. “What if we can’t get in all done in three days?”
I said: “Then we have to scale it down to a size that we can do in three days.”
Robert called to say Lance had come into the office looking for me, looking glum. He’s just gotten a really high salary offer from some company in Mountain View, which Broderbund probably won’t be able to compete with. If Lance quits and takes this other job, he won’t be able to do POP, and there’s no one else at Broderbund who’s available that I’d trust to do it.
I could call Brian/Bill on Monday and tell them I won’t sign anything until I know who they’re going to give the job to… but I don’t want to look like I’m the gun Lance is holding to their heads in order to get a raise. It’s tricky.
July 1, 1989
God, this music-making is grueling.
The Apple II is a piece of shit. Kyle’s sound routines are a piece of shit. His user interface is a piece of shit. The music we play on the CD player for inspiration sounds fucking awesome. Maurice Jarre’s rousing overture to Lawrence of Arabia – amazing. Then when we try to recapture some of that drive and ferocity on the Apple II, it sounds like a bunch of frogs’ croaking being drowned out by the crinkling of cellophane wrappers. It’s depressing.
Even so, today we managed to come up with a Princess theme and a Vizier theme that aren’t too bad. Also a heartbeat-like “hourglass” theme that interweaves nicely with the Princess theme, and a “staircase” theme with a nice Eastern twist to it. But if you step back and give it a fresh hearing, it still sounds like shit.
The part I’m most worried about is the opening titles. 30 whole seconds to fill, and so far we’ve got nothing. And tomorrow is our last full day – I’m leaving on the 5pm flight Monday.
It’s great to be in New York in the summertime during such beautiful weather, but we’ve hardly left the apartment. I’m serious, this is depressing.
July 2, 1989
I’ve never seen Dad so tired and fragile. It’s terrible how this last year of KVC/Atlantic has aged him. Sometimes, when he gets excited about a new musical idea, his old energy shines out briefly; but in repose, the exhaustion shows in his face and in the way he sits.
This weekend of music-making has been a good change of pace for him, but he’s worried about my imminent departure (I already changed my ticket to give us an extra day). I know he’s afraid of not finishing in time, of letting me down. So in a way, I’ve added to his burdens. And me – maniacal auteur taking precedence over dutiful son – I’m pushing him as hard as he can take, hoping that my tireless cheerfulness will somehow cheer him up.
(They’re taking out a second mortgage on the house!)
July 3, 1989
I think we’re over the hump. Nearly all the music is done, and it’s fine – better than I’d hoped for, once I got over the initial disappointment of remembering what a piece of shit this machine is. There’s an opening-titles crescendo that’s genuinely thrilling. (Or at least, Dad and I have talked ourselves into believing it is – remember, this is an Apple II.)
Robert had better be blown away. The sad thing is, probably very few other people at Broderbund will be – they’re used to Mac and Amiga and Atari ST music. Oh well. Somewhere, someone must appreciate this.
I’ll miss the San Francisco 4th of July fireworks, but it was worth it.
July 5, 1989
[Back in SF] Fixed that eerie bug in the music routines. It was Roland who came up with the answer – I’d relocated Kyle’s sound routines so that the page boundaries fell in different places and subtly changed the timing. I never would have thought of that. Anyway, the music’s in now, mostly, and it’s gotten a great response so far (from Brian, Greg and Robert).
Bill offered 9% at 50,000 units, 10% at 100,000. I plan to counter-offer 10% at 30,000 units. The difference isn’t worth blowing the deal for, but it’s not chicken feed either.
It’s still not clear whether Lance will stay on at Broderbund to do the conversion.
