In the late 1980’s Jordan Mechner single-handedly designed and programmed the original Apple II version of Prince of Persia and several other groundbreaking games. He published his development journals and technical design documents on his web site.
The journals touch on:
- The development of the stop-motion animation techniques used so effectively in PoP
- The tension in Jordan’s life between his two callings: game development and feature film scriptwriting / directing.
- The difficulties involved in developing and selling a new game idea.
- A view into the late 80’s / early 90’s pre-web game development business.
Although many games are now written by large teams of people, in the end, a lot of the business, artistic, and technical issues Jordan writes about remain relevant. I highly recommend these journals for anyone interested in an inside view of game development. (Or anyone interested in trying to break into Hollywood. :-) )