Editor's Note: I have been acquainted with the documentary's co-writer and co-director, and this interview's subject, David L Craddock for many years. He sent an early work-in-progress version of the documentary for me to view. I received no compensation for this or for anything associated with the film, and no one behind the documentary has any control over what I write about the film, including this interview.
Last week, I posted some impressions of a "work-in-progress" version of FPS: First Person Shooter, an upcoming documentary on the history of the first-person shooter game genre. Overall, I very much enjoyed watching it, and definitely would recommend anyone who is interested in the genre, or in game development in general, to check it out.
I did have some questions about the making of the film so I sent some via email to its co-writer and co-director David L Craddock. He talks about how he got involved in the making of the documentary, why the film puts the majority of its time into the games made in the 1990s, and much more.
First, how did you become involved in the documentary?
In March or April of 2021 (time’s been a blur since 2020; not sure why…) I received an email out of the blue from a guy called Robin Block. Robin introduced himself as the founder of CREATORVC, a production company focused on creating documentaries for fandoms. The company had made several critically and commercially successful documentaries before FPS, such as In Search of the Last Action Heroes about action movies and stars from the ‘80s and ‘90sl; the In Search of Darkness trilogy about ‘80s horror movies; and so on. Robin was working with Richard Moss, a writer I’d long admired, to make a documentary about first-person shooters.
Richard, who had written a great deep dive on FPS games, recommended me based on a book I wrote called Rocket Jump: Quake and the Golden Era of First-Person Shooters, which is available to read for free on Shacknews. We arranged an interview, and he offered me an advisory position. I accepted and attended every weekly meeting, offering suggestions or insights when asked for them. Eventually I worked my way up to a producer position. I wasn’t aiming to climb any ladder; it happened, I think, based on the input I gave and the Rolodex of FPS developers I brought to the table: John Romero, John Carmack, Cliff Bleszinski, Warren Spector—you name them, and I’ve likely talked to them for various projects.
When our Kickstarter launched in 2021, Robin offered me a director’s position. He appreciated my knowledge of the genre and thought I was the right person to help shape the film alongside Chris Stratton, our editor and my co-director, and now a close friend. I accepted, and Chris, Richard, and I formed a three-person creative team: Richard and I wrote scripts as the film’s co-writers, and Chris and I worked to transform words on pages into compelling segments and, ultimately, a cohesive story. I'd also like to give credit to the rest of our team, who handled everything from marketing to interview logistics: Robin Block, James Evans, Dominic Wallis, Clayton Benge, and many others. It takes a village to make a movie, and we made a great one.
Where do you think the appeal of the first-person shooter gaming genre comes from?
Great question! This is a multi-faceted answer. First up is the fast-paced and visceral nature of FPS games. Most players were introduced to the genre through Wolfenstein 3D or Doom, and there’s a reason those games took off: they were fast, they were exciting and atmospheric, they tickled the imagination, and everything about them—movement, shooting, everything—felt great.
Second is their accessibility. If your computer is up to snuff, or if you have the right console, anyone can understand the objective of most FPS games: if it moves, shoot it. There are deeper stories and game systems, such as those found in System Shock and Deus Ex, but anyone can grasp the first and simplest rule.
Third is the technology that powers them. Since Wolfenstein 3D (even further back, really, but I’ll let the movie tell that story), first-person shooters have demanded cutting-edge hardware. When you buy a new console or upgrade your gaming PC with more RAM or a new video card, running the latest and greatest FPS games is the best way to show off your new hardware.
Were you surprised at how much influence movies have had on first-person shooter games?
Yes and no. Yes, because I didn’t know until years earlier, while writing Rocket Jump, that most of Duke Nukem’s lines, for instance, had been lifted from movies. It was fun learning about other ties between games and movies while interviewing the all-star cast of 48 contributors featured in the movie. No, because games and movies have been linked for a long time. You and I have covered the game industry for decades, so we know that developers and publishers have always compared games to movies. “Cinematic” is a term used to describe a game’s production values; that word has its roots in “cinema.” The connection has always been there, and FPS games are great demonstrations of how the best qualities of both mediums (stunning audiovisuals, engaging stories, and interactivity) can synthesize to create experiences that no other medium can offer.
The documentary spent a good chunk of time talking to people who helped develop pre-Wolfenstein 3D FPS games. Were they aware of their influence in the genre?
Not at all. Greg Thompson, Dave Lebling, and Maze War’s other co-creators didn’t know they had something special on their hands. They were just a group of high schoolers, and later college kids, who had access to computers and were looking for a way to test the capabilities of those machines. David A. Smith, the creator of The Colony, had a better idea of what he had. He’d never played the sort of story he was crafting. But the computer sector of the industry was much smaller back then, especially the Mac scene. Even so, The Colony was a marvel, but it didn’t make waves like id Software’s formative classics. Those hit because more people had PCs running DOS than had Macs, and because Wolf 3D and Doom (and even Quake) offered their first episodes for free.
Obviously, id Software had perhaps the biggest influence in the launch of the FPS genre. Was it hard to get all those former id Software team members to talk about their early games?
Not at all. I’ve always found id’s co-founders and designers to be open books about their experiences. The hardest part was making sure I asked the right questions to get the most interesting stories out of them in the 2-3 hours we budgeted for most interviews.
I noticed that there were no interviews with people from Valve that directly worked on Half-Life and Half-Life 2 in the documentary. Did Valve simply not wish to participate?
We reached out to the powers that be at Valve but never heard back. Robin Walker and John Cook, two of Team Fortress’s co-creators, were great resources. Valve hired them to make Team Fortress Classic for Half-Life, with the long-term goal of making Half-Life as active a platform for mods as Quake. Robin and John helped out on Half-Life, Half-Life 2, The Orange Box, and other games, so they could offer insight into the dev team’s goals, struggles, and ambitions. (Robin was the director of 2020’s Half-Life: Alyx. We talked to him about it, but decided we needed to focus more on earlier games and left the Alyx material on the cutting-room floor.)
What were some of the more surprising things you learned about FPS games while making this documentary?
I’m always surprised to learn how serendipitous game development was and, in many ways, still is. I’ve worked in game development off and on for 15 years and have written about it for nearly 20, so I know game development rarely happens in a linear fashion: characters first, then art, then levels, and so on. Even the best development schedules can go awry, and creative people tend to work on what moves them on any given day.
Despite all that, it’s always cool to learn how many things came to be through sheer ambition, and often on a whim. John Romero and Tom Hall repeatedly asked John Carmack to add secret walls to Wolf 3D, and Carmack refused because implementing that feature would make his code sloppy. Eventually, Carmack realized it was more important to offer more value to players than it was to keep his code base pristine, and he implemented the push-wall secrets we know today.
The vast majority of the documentary concentrated on the 1990s FPS games. Was there a reason for this?
Two reasons. First, we polled our backers after our 2021 Kickstarter and asked what they wanted to see most. The majority asked for a focus on games from the ‘90s and early 2000s. Second, CREATORVC’s documentaries tend to move in a linear fashion, starting from an early game or film, then the next, then the next, and so on. There was so much innovation in the FPS space in the ‘90s (and the ‘70s and ‘80s, as FPS shows you), and those games built the foundation modern games stand on, so we chose to shine the brightest spotlight on the forebears of the genre.
If the documentary is successful, could we see a sequel?
Possibly. If we do a sequel, it won’t be another 4.5-hour epic. This movie took two years of our lives and was exhausting to make. Rewarding! But exhausting. I have ideas for a sequel, but they’ll have to wait until we’ve all had a chance to rest.
Are there any plans to offer the documentary to a streaming service at some point?
Too early to tell, but I’d love to see it happen.
Finally, you are now working for one of the people you interviewed, John Romero. How did this come about and what can you tell us about what you are doing at Romero Games?
I’ve known John for years. I’ve interviewed him for articles, books, and now for FPS. Recently, he asked me to read some early chapters of his book, DOOM GUY, and offer feedback on them as a writer and as a fan. In his book, he credits me in the acknowledgments as “the foremost chronicler” of FPS games and history. Very humbling! He and his wife, Brenda Romero, announced that their company would be working on a new FPS and have been trying to recruit me since last fall.
I’ve always got several irons in the fire, but the game looked too enticing to pass up, so I joined the team as a writer earlier this summer. Too early to say anything concrete, but I can guarantee that fans of any Romero-made FPS game will love what the team is creating.
I want to thank David for taking the time to answer my questions. You can preorder FPS: First Person Shooter at the documentary's official website from now until August 1.
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