Old School Gamer Magazine chats with Romain Claude, Lead Game Designer of “Splasher,†a retro-inspired platform shooter that successfully combines elements from Super Mario Brothers and Splatoon in an awesome way, effectively marrying both the retro and modern gameplay worlds in a super fun way.
Old School Gamer Magazine: How did you get involved in gaming?
Romain Claude: When I was 7, we were in 1994 but I didn’t know anything about the existence of video games at the time. It was summer and my parents visited friends of theirs in Corsica, where we spent 3 weeks of vacation. Their daughter, who was roughly the same age than me had a NES with Super Mario Bros (and an Indiana Jones game I barely remember). From the second I took the controller and saw that I was able to control a moving character on the TV screen, I knew that my life was about to change forever. It was not just a toy, but a revolutionary new form of expression. From that day I never stop thinking about video games, day and night.
OSGM: What are your fondest childhood gaming memories?
Claude: The one I mentioned above, but I think that what came after that, such as frequently discovering new games at friends’ houses on NES, Super NES, Genesis or even an old Amstrad CPC in an uncle attic, was kind of the golden age for me. My brain had an insatiable need of constantly find new games to play, anywhere, anytime. Then I actually built most of my gaming culture on PS1 & PS2. My first contact with 3D games, like Crash Bandicoot and Tomb Raider (the two games my parents got with the PlayStation in 1996) was actually the second blast in my gamer’s life.
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports.
Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders.
His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023.
Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief.
Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale.
Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.
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