»Interview with Jabo and Zilmar of Project64
By Redah

Redah: there we go
Redah: you both have a few minutes to spare?
Zilmar: yer
Jabo: yesh
Redah: okidoki, we're off then
Jabo: just let me know if you are copying verbatim what we say :)
Redah: try to answer as lengthy as possible... because that's fun :o)
Redah: well I’ll just take out the timestamps and spell-check and de-IRC everything
Redah: e.g. 'cuz' will be 'because' :o)
Jabo: Okie sounds cool


Meeting
Redah: Okay, we’ll start off a bit personal then
Redah: Where did you two meet?
Jabo: In a bar :)
Jabo: Just kidding
Redah: That’s what I thought :oP
Jabo: Nah it was IRC, private channel #CricketNE got me involved a while ago
Redah: Cricket? As in the sport?
Jabo: Nah he's a person
Zilmar: Cricket knew both of us off IRC
Redah: Aha
Jabo: Hehe well there is a long story after that :)
Zilmar: Cricket: Be nice to Jabo
Zilmar: Cricket: He's cool :P
Zilmar: Zilmar: Jabo ?
Zilmar: Cricket: The friend I was telling you about
Zilmar: Cricket: That is working on a n64 emu
Zilmar: Zilmar: Oh ok
Zilmar: Cricket: Chat with him... Tell me what you think of him :)
Jabo: whoa
Zilmar: Session Start: Thu Sep 23 13:04:55 1999
Jabo: This is why I started logging things this year :-) You never know where it will be useful
Redah: Hahaha
Jabo: Damn September 1999
Jabo: Wow
Zilmar: Cricket: whatcha think of sir Jabo?
Zilmar: Zilmar: Maybe a touch arrogant... but seems to be very intelligent
Zilmar: Zilmar: But I guess I will find out more latter
Zilmar: Cricket: He is a little arrogant
Zilmar: Cricket: Which is odd, because I tend to hang with people laid back such as myself
Zilmar: Zilmar: As long as he is willing to work in a team... I do not care that much... but when arrogance stops them working in a group it matters
Zilmar: Cricket: True... so very true
Zilmar: There you go, that was my first meeting with Jabo
Zilmar: I do not think he is arrogant at all now... Or really when I got to know him... It was just a first impression
Redah: Haha
Jabo: Hehe :)
Redah: What did you think of Zilmar, Jabo?
Jabo: The type of person I wish other people I know were more like in real life
Redah: That's something different :o)
Jabo: Well I’ve never met someone with the same desire, dedication, and ability
Redah: Yes, from what I’ve heard, Zilmar, you are very dedicated to PJ
Jabo: Yah I appreciate it more than I would if I just joined PJ as my first emu


PJ History... and girls
Redah: So when did PJ start? In September, or was it a while later?
Zilmar: I started working on PJ64 about March 98 I think
Jabo: I joined in late December 1999, or January 2000 I don't recall exactly
Redah: Oh, so you started it on your own Zilmar? I didn't know that
Redah: Did you have other team members before, that left?
Zilmar: Yer, we had another team member who joined me about 8 months/a year after I started...
Zilmar: But he got busy with other projects and life and just did not have much time to help
Redah: Yeah, I know the feeling
Jabo: At that point is when I think I stepped in to work with Zilmar
Redah: Especially if a woman runs into your life :o)
Redah: Speaking of which, do any of you have a girl, fiancée?
Zilmar: Nope single
Jabo: Same here
Redah: Aww
Redah: I’m sure many single women will be reading this
Redah: So, who knows :o)
Jabo: Heh just haven't found that 'special' someone I guess :)
Jabo: Or vice versa.


Jabo: My dealings with N64 emulation started in July or August of 1999
Jabo: After I was getting bored with my NES emulator I had started 6-7 months prior
Jabo: I started working with Phrodide, former author of Sunset. That's a long ass story in itself
Jabo: Azimer also worked with us on that emulator
Zilmar: Jabo: would you be interested in me joining your project? Just wondering.
Zilmar: Zilmar: hmm... I do not think we really need any one else...
Redah: Heh, that turned out to be quite different :o)
Jabo: Well Phrodide was quite a busy person, but he was very talented
Zilmar: Zilmar: what is wrong with your current emu?
Zilmar: Jabo: I’m quitting
Redah: Heh, this is interesting stuff :o)
Jabo: It gets way more interesting
Redah: How, Jabo ?
Jabo: You have Zilmar's side, and my side :)
Jabo: Which both tell a long story


Jabo: Well RCP was Phro's previous partner, I don’t know if people knew that
Jabo: He quit working with him and worked on TRWin
Jabo: So I was finding out more and more as time went along
Redah: I never knew so many different emu authors used to work together on the same projects
Zilmar: I started #n64emudev so we could talk freely...
Zilmar: Basically all the emu writers had really great contact then
Jabo: Well what happened was I was the graphics programmer for Eclipse, I wanted to have nothing to do with the CPU
Jabo: There were points where I did CPU work, mostly compiler things since I have a general love of them and writing assembly code
Zilmar: Hehe, Jabo was never meant to do a gfx plug-in... The other member was meant to do that... but Jabo liked to work on it... so I let him... glad he did now
Redah: Yeah, hehehe
Jabo: Yah the story behind PJ is strange, it like fell into place so nicely
Zilmar: Anyone linked to Phrodide seem to have a complicated background
Redah: :o)
Zilmar: And I have way to many links with lots of different emu writers


More girls?
Jabo: So ask more questions :)
Jabo: There are lots of details to that stuff
Jabo: Or you can start something new
Redah: Well, I had 10 basic questions
Redah: And you're still discussing #1
Redah: But that means it's going well :o)
Jabo: I can't help it, I’m so damn complex haha :)
Redah: Haha
Redah: I’m trying to throw you two off track by randomly inserting other questions like if you have girls :oP
Jabo: I actually want a girlfriend
Zilmar: Was that question 3?
Zilmar: About the girls
Redah: Actually that was #5 :o)


Behind the scenes
Jabo: Getting into n64 emulation wasn't an easy task back than
Jabo: Now it's incredibly easier to make contacts and gather information
Jabo: Back in 'the day' you had to talk to people, get involved in projects etc
Redah: Yes, nowadays there's a lot of source available
Redah: What do you think of other N64 emulators, compared to PJ64 ?
Redah: Do you envy some?
Jabo: I don't envy emulators, my goal is what the N64 produces
Redah: But, when you were working on PJ, and a new Nemu got released, or when Daedalus saw the light...
Redah: ...You never thought "damn, I want that too?"
Redah: Or did you feel like PJ was ahead
Jabo: Well I can't remember the last time a new Nemu was released
Jabo: One of the advantages I felt with PJ was something I enjoyed with Jnes
Jabo: I didn't release something until it was good
Jabo: Where I see lots of emulators releasing builds that don't do anything
Zilmar: I would like to see a good product... I talk to most of the n64 emu writers and have helped most of them at some stage... I enjoy talking to smart people... I do not care about the actual emus... Just the people who write them
Redah: Zilmar, same here, that's why I wanted to see a profile sketch in this interview about you two. But that seems hard to do with die-hard coders ;o)
Redah: Before PJ 1.0, there were many internal builds (0.5 etc)?
Zilmar: We are up to internal build 45...
Redah: And who knew about PJ? I know that when Zilmar was asking me for sub domains for something 'mysteriously' I didn't know what he was talking about
Jabo: Well the two of us did obviously, other 'close' contacts did as well
Jabo: Basically anyone who had anything to do with an emulator knew about PJ
Redah: Azimer too, I guess. If I remember correctly he was constantly telling that *something* was bound to happen
Zilmar: Basically every n64 emu writer... probably one or two from most of the main emu news pages... and a couple of other regular IRC people


Jabo: Some people thought the day would never actually come when we released it
Zilmar: Hehe probably most
Jabo: The thought never actually crossed my mind, kind of strange though
Jabo: I was more into working on it than the idea of releasing it
Jabo: I think that's why we waited so long
Redah: So you thought about keeping PJ for yourselves?
Jabo: I think that was our original intention, but at some point it occurred to us we had something a lot of people would enjoy
Zilmar: Well my original plan was to release when Game Cube was out... but since it got delayed and other time reasons we did when we did
Jabo: Yer that is the point
Redah: Well I’m glad you did, you've offered my girlfriend lots of fun in bust-a-move :o)
Jabo: Hehe
Zilmar: I did not really want to release an emu that people would just avoid buying a game because they could play it on their PC
Zilmar: Basically all people who would buy the games now would have
Zilmar: So I do not have that ethical problem as well


UltraHLE and 3Dfx
Redah: Well, the N64 has been 'dead' for quite a while now, in my opinion
Zilmar: The n64 is basically dead
Redah: Don't read my mind, please :o)
Zilmar: If it was a really highly popular system making a lot of money I doubt PJ64 would have been released yet
Jabo: Yah the whole incident over UltraHLE really sent shock-waves because it was released when the system was thriving
Jabo: Zelda64 is probably the best game on the system, and UltraHLE played it perfectly at the time
Jabo: Like months after it went on sale
Redah: Yes, and at time it was great with the gfx cards that ruled the market at that point
Redah: People even bought 3Dfx cards for it
Jabo: Yah it's a shame what happened to 3Dfx, their cards are really good
Jabo: Just an example of how strong the drivers need to be when generic API's like Direct3D are used
Redah: Now we're on this subject, you ever worked with RealityMan/Epsilon?
Redah: Or exchanged info?
Jabo: I never have talked to either of them
Zilmar: I talked to RM originally before he got involved with UltraHLE
Jabo: Didn't he write NSFE?
Zilmar: Yup, and Reality64
Jabo: Ok, it's hard to keep track of these people sometimes :P
Zilmar: I was given a good log which was between epsilon and psx team at the time... and I learnt a lot about him from that
Zilmar: He spent a year on that and could not get a demo working
Zilmar: He was going to drop his code and port TR because he could not get it working
Zilmar: Then he started working with epsilon
Zilmar: It was so hard to tell if the emu was real or not because RM had no idea of technical questions...
Zilmar: But the screen shots looked great
Jabo: Epsilon is the person behind UltraHLE as far as I know, the CPU core, graphics, and audio
Zilmar: Yer he had Mario running before he talked to RM as far as I understand it
Redah: Yes, that's what most people think, and, what in my opinion also is the reason why UltraHLE died when Epsilon left
Zilmar: Epsilon is a brilliant gfx programmer
Jabo: Yah UltraHLE teaches us a valuable lesson about why using proprietary API's works out better in the short-term


Zilmar: From what people have told me that at that time glide was very close to the n64 as way as blending goes and why he would have used it...
Jabo: Like almost every 3Dfx card can run it perfectly
Zilmar: I mean compared to d3d or OGL at the time
Zilmar: But Jabo is the gfx guy not me
Jabo: Glide has great blending, but I'd say the Riva TNT has just as good capabilities if not better
Jabo: nVidia's OpenGL extension is really nice
Jabo: I can talk about this all night :)
Jabo: I've done this for the last 2 years hehe
Redah: Haha, you could tell me a whole lot about it and I wouldn't understand a damn thing about it :o)
Zilmar: We are just doing what you told us to do
Redah: Yeah, I’m not saying it's not fun, but I guess I’ll have to do some heavy editing now :oP
Jabo: Lol
Jabo: Oh yah :)
Zilmar: Yer it might need some... on the other hand maybe you could just leave it in chaos and release it as is
Jabo: Anything else I can add to this? I feel like I’ve left out tons of stuff
Redah: Add to what? To Question #1? :o)
Jabo: I could go on about d3d/gl/glide all night too :)
Jabo: Food for thought about 3Dfx though...
Redah: Food!
Redah: Yes, I have a question about food too !


'Food'
*** Redah will ignore Jabo for the time being :oP
Jabo: Haha
Redah: What do you eat or drink to keep yourselves coding?
Zilmar: What I eat when I am coding... no idea what I eat normally I guess... usually stop programming when I make food
Jabo: Yah same here...
Redah: No :o), I mean:
Redah: I always have a few cans of Fanta and a big bag of chips when working on websites. How about you, any stimulating products?
Jabo: I drink water usually
Zilmar: I generally drink water or codial...
Zilmar: Do not really eat much junk food
Redah: (you hear that girls? healthy!)
Jabo: I found at one point Gatorade helps, so I drank that for a while
Jabo: Like gives you sugar so you can think clearer
Jabo: But it also decays your body... so I gave that up after a while


School... and programming skills
Redah: Zilmar, you're out of school... what did you study, and what job do you have now?
Redah: And, Jabo, you're still in school... what do you study, and do you have a side job?
Zilmar: Did a bachelor of information systems... work as a communication programmer... other then I am starting to look at getting out of programming as a job
Jabo: I’m a computer science major, right now the only interesting thing I do now is DSP research at my school for some companies
Jabo: I can't mention those companies, I’m under NDA :)
Redah: Hehehe
Jabo: I’m entering my junior year though
Redah: Will you show/have you shown PJ on your resume?
Jabo: More than likely, depends on the job and company
Zilmar: Depends on the job I am going for... but yer it probably get a mention
Jabo: If nothing to do with programming... PJ represents quite the effort for 2 people
Jabo: I think that alone should be a nice reference
Redah: Yeah, that's what I thought too
Zilmar: Yer I would use it as a great achievement that I have done... and as a demonstration of dedication
Zilmar: So even for a non-programming job it would be of some use
Redah: Yeah, dedication, but also cunning
Zilmar: Hehe, well I started PJ64 so I could learn to program
Zilmar: I only knew very basic C when I started. I wanted to start an emu so I did
Redah: I know very basic VB. You think there's hope? :o)
Zilmar: I was originally going to look at psx... but I had no psx games
Jabo: When I started my first emu I only knew Visual basic
Jabo: Err wait that's not true
*** Jabo wakes up
Zilmar: I learn C at uni... before that I did know some basic and VB but that was crap all
Jabo: When I started jnes I knew a decent amount of C, and I had been doing win32 programming for about a year
Zilmar: Yer I had never touched win32 or ASM
Zilmar: I spent the first couple of months just learning how to do a gui in C
Jabo: My first language was visual basic, going from that to C was a pain
Zilmar: My first language was Amos
Zilmar: Some crappy basic with gfx add on for the Amiga
Redah: Ah
Redah: I knew some Commodore64 BASIC :o)
Zilmar: And I copied programs from a programming book about Amiga basic and thought I was a programmer :P
Redah: Lol
Redah: I know that feeling
Jabo: Hehe
Redah: I copied paaaaaaages of code from the C64 manual
Redah: And then all I got was a bouncing ball on the screen :o/
Redah: Wasn't even able to save it either :o(


The wrap-up
Redah: This went, well, completely out of control :o)
Redah: It was fun and interesting though :oP
Jabo: Haha
Jabo: Nah if you are cool with the answers I guess we are done
Zilmar: Hehe, probably a little longer then you expected too
Zilmar: So that was all the questions ?
Redah: I got 2 more quick questions
Jabo: I don't think all of this should necessarily be on the page :)
Redah: I'll probably color-code each one of us... any color you'd prefer? :o)
Jabo: Nah, just don't give me hot pink
Redah: (That's a sneaky way of asking what color is your favorite)
Jabo: Oh
Jabo: Blue! :)
Redah: Haha
Jabo: Or grey
Redah: Hot pink is nice
Redah: Unless it's on a GBA, then nobody seems to want to buy it anymore :o)
Jabo: Yellow sucks too :)
Zilmar: Yellow is not to bad on black... but sucks otherwise
Zilmar: I do not care what color


Redah: OK, then the FINAL one... for all the girlies out there:
*** Jabo does not want online dating requests
Redah: *drum roll*
Redah: Do you like pets and/or kids?
Jabo: Heh
Jabo: I like pets that don't piss me off or get in my way
Jabo: Kids can drive you friggin’ nuts, not my idea of fun at this time in life :)
Jabo: Gold fish are cool
Redah: I think your score just dropped drastically :o)
*** Jabo rephrases it
Jabo: I like gold fish :)
Jabo: Okay, plain and simple ;)
Zilmar: I like cats, but have two dogs at the moment
Jabo: I like cats as well, and small dogs
Jabo: A cat scratched me once though
Redah: Cats seem to hate me
Redah: And my old rabbit too... maybe because I always let the dogs chase it, but still...it shouldn't bite me
Jabo: Yah I gave up on them since that


Wait, there’s more!
Zilmar: Ah .. I just found a good log
Redah: Oi :o)
Zilmar: Not sure how applicable it is ..
Zilmar: But my first conversation with Jabo
Redah: Ooo
Redah: Send it to me, and I’ll include it in a link
Jabo: Hah, I hope I didn't say something dumb, I hate it when I see myself talking out my ass :)
Redah: Jabo, good thing you're never in #Emulation64 then
Redah: We record everything for our famous IRC Quotes :o)
Jabo: Haha
Jabo: Nah I don't do it often
Zilmar: Heh my #emulation64 log is like 4mb
Zilmar: Session Start: Fri Aug 13 13:35:41 1999
Zilmar: *** Now talking in #emulation64
Zilmar: *** Topic is 'Emulation64 | www.emulation64.com | Mystery emu = TRWin | RELEASE time= ???'
Zilmar: that is the start of my #emulation64 log


Jabo: So we done than Redah?
Redah: Yeah, I guess we are
Redah: I'll need to hire a team to organize this though
*** Redah sighs looking at the task ahead
Redah: :o)
Zilmar: Hehe
Redah: Mental note to self: never ask people about what they do best
Zilmar: I have nothing against releasing it as is... but might just be hard to read
Jabo: Well you can leave out most question 1
Redah: You know, now that you're shuffling thru logs anyway
Redah: Has either of you ever thought of writing some background on PJ ?
Redah: And put it on PJ64.net
Jabo: Yah but than it looks like we like to talk about ourselves :)
*** Redah frowns at Jabo's remark
Zilmar: Well I think it would be boring if Jabo or me wrote it or miss important things
Zilmar: Just cause it is so common to us
Zilmar: Hehe, me and Jabo do not have big ego's


The end
*** A little while later...
Redah: Oh, dang, we need to properly say goodbye :o)


Redah: So, thanks for your time, both of you
Redah: It's been a pleasure :o)
Jabo: Mmk no prob ;)
Zilmar: Yer it has been fun
Redah: If you want, I’ll bug you sometime and dig out your pasts so you can put it on PJ64
Redah: Now, for your final words:
Jabo: hehe
Redah: Anything you'd like to say to people reading this?
Redah: Anything we should know about PJ's future?
Jabo: Yah give me a sec
Jabo: Well basically I want to say this:
Jabo: Don't be afraid to cross the street, but at the same time, look both ways
Redah: ...
Redah: That's... deep
Jabo: Don't take that literally
Jabo: :)
*** Jabo- doesn't practice crossing the street :)
Zilmar: Remember to always respect yourself, your parents and god


Zilmar: Redah, did you get what expected in the interview with us?
Redah: Zilmar, actually I've always tried to get to know the authors behind the emu itself
Redah: Because you'll be bugged for tech. interviews by more sites then you'll ever want
Redah: It was quite successful tonight :o)
Jabo: Yah no one asks me about GFX stats
Jabo: Someone should do that -hint-
Zilmar: Hehe, the funny thing is so many people knew me before PJ64... just did not know I was doing it
Zilmar: I have been well known in the scene for a long time


Redah: Well dudes, I’m off to sleep now
Redah: 6 AM damnit :o)
Redah: Thanks for the time again :o)
Jabo: Okay kick me and Zilmar out :)
Zilmar: Okay cya
Redah: Always wanted to do that :o)