I found a page with English-translation available here. I copied and pasted the article below, sans pictures.
Stephen Baker
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Posted on August 6, 2012
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Stephen Baker is an author who has left his memory in the history of the games. A footprint that began to mark when he convinced a company like Hasbro to dare to publish the game HeroQuest . Unknown authors like almost all previous games XXI century (and as almost all authors who make games for Habro even today), we present one of the few interviews he ever gave.
About Stephen Baker less is known than he deserves his work, as with so many other authors of games for years. He began working as a manager for the British company Games Workshop in August 1984. Two years later he was signed by the section in that country of the multinational toy MB , had a risky idea: Post a game style theme of Games Workshop of fantasy adventure, mixing elements of the board and role, but with the power of Hasbro (owner of MB since 1984) to enable production with high quality materials, including miniatures and all kinds of components.
A board game so new and expensive was not well seen by the company in principle. The process was not easy, but the result in 1989 is historic and worthy for many reasons: HeroQuest .
After the success would come more games Stephen Baker who have passed into history playful, stellar Crusade , Battle Masters ... - extensions and almost all of them, of which Stephen however was not the most responsible in many cases.
Theirs was also the custom in 1991 of MB to adapt to board the TV game show Knightmare - titled Rescue Talismán in Spain.
Stephen Baker left MB in 1992. He worked for other brands ( Bluebird , Schmidt Spiele ) and participated in various projects of toys and games, several of them published in editions in Castilian.
It is at those times, after leaving MB , where appropriate the interview that we show below.
The interview dates from 1998 and is made by the author and expert on Italian games Andrea Angiolino ( invited Cordoba Not only Parcheesi - Eutopía 2008, co - author of Wings of war among other games ) for the magazine Kaos Magazine , an Italian publishing then during the Nuremberg Fair that year. In La Tana dei Goblin remains the Italian text originally published interview.
We present an adaptation to the Castilian, by maloib in heroquest.es , which have made some corrections and added images, and includes a section extending rearward and continuing with the author's work from 1998 to the present:
Interview with Stephen Baker
Interview with Stephen Baker by Andrea Angiolino . The legendary author of bestsellers such as HeroQuest and Cruzada Estelar reveals the background of his brilliant career. The meeting with Stephen Baker at the international toy fair in Nuremberg (Germany), which is presented as research and development director of the British firm Bluebird. This fair, a showcase for all businesses in the area of any game or toy, is a continuous coming and going of stands; but Stephen Baker gives us a bit of your precious time to tell his career as author. A part of the press he read the magazine Kaos, makes us some compliments and tells us that there is no independent magazine RPGs like ours [Kaos Magazine] in England. After the interview began.
1. Kaos: - The story of HeroQuest and Stellar Crusade when belonged to the team of Games Workshop starts, right?
Stephen Baker: - I was manager of a GW store, but when I played those games was not part of his team . I started working full time for GW in 1984, since 1982 I was already working with them part -time on weekends. My real job was as a clerk banking since I finished my studies, but worked with GW weekends to expand my collection of games [ GW is one of those companies who prefer to pay their employees with products rather than money - note interviewer ]. In 1984 they took my regularly and after three months I became store manager. Two years later I received a phone call from someone who worked for the English section of Milton Bradley. He had seen advertising GW and thought it was a kind of "shop molds" was looking for some wooden games, and some game testers. Anyway I volunteered as a game tester: I enjoyed a week's holiday GW to go to test prototypes of games MB, giving advice on their plans. At the end of the week, Roger Ford, then vice president of research and development, I was asked if I wanted to continue with them full time. Obviously I said yes. I joined MB in 1986 and started working with " Mysteries of Beijing ", a game created by Mary Danby , which worked very well in France for some years. Then I worked with " Inkognito " helping to set it up. I also spent three days in Venice to collaborate with Alex Randolph details on the game system.
3. Kaos - Why, in creating HeroQuest, you decide to mix a classic board game with some elements of RPG?
SB - My intention was to create a game that for an adult was a true RPG. The player fetch the evil sorcerer role would be the DJ (Gamemaster) and even dispusiera a "display manager". It is a game with the mechanisms of a board game but is self-presented as an RPG. And this, to me, was an idea that many people would like. In the field of fantasy, existing games were regarded as something that you headed into the darkness. On the contrary, I liked the idea of creating a game of " style Talisman " [classic game of Robert Harris ] designed for people between nine and eleven years. And I wanted to make a game that had flavor RPG, where there must be collaboration even if the collaboration between players is not regulated. There is no objective "win or lose": the assigned mission must be completed and it is also necessary to improve more and more the character to the following items is more powerful. We did some meetings in MB to examine the prototype. We argued for weeks with management. The day before the decisive meeting had much concern about the costs and difficulties in production. The night before the meeting took the decision to make a single board, with a map, where to use each time, several sets. It was like having a new board every time, for several stagings ... Besides other matters, write the different missions was fun. Returning to the subject of the board, the problem is that if you explain the role playing fantasy games or who do not know them and even are neither interested in listening, the message must reach them the soon as possible. I came to these meetings with a large box and began to draw from it a lot of parts and components. Actually, it was as if I had a single map made pieces, but the marketing men were more reassured if they showed a board and explain to them that this was a classic board game and they did not have to make mental efforts change the chip to another kind of games. This helps the marketing, advertising on TV and everything else. It is better to get an idea right away that create confusion. Instead, the concept of mounting rooms with spare parts remained in Advanced HeroQuest .
4. Kaos - The last game that you mentioned is your idea?
SB - No, this is not, was fully developed by staff GW , 18 months later. At the time the agreement was kept open this possibility. HeroQuest was launched in 1989 and gained recognition as "Family Game of the Year" in the UK. Approximately 126,000 units were sold during the course of the first year. Then he also edited in France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Spain, Scandinavia, Switzerland and subsequently in the United States, Greece and covering all markets MB . In two years, HeroQuest and Cruzada Estelar became a significant part of the business of MB Europe .
5. Kaos - Do you think HeroQuest is totally yours? After you were the creator, the development was entrusted to a team?
SB - I invented and I personally participated in much of the development, with the help of Ben Rathbone . He still works in MB , in particular he worked on a lot of ideas expansions.
[youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2BXmQ-EwmI
]
Announcement HeroQuest with its first two expansions.
6. Kaos - You mentioned Stellar Crusade. How did this game?
SB - After the success of HeroQuest , it seemed natural to think of some below. The most obvious choice was to create a version with a science fiction backdrop, continuing work background that GW and Citadel had devised together with Warhammer 40,000 and Space Marines. The idea of Star Crusade focused on several points. The first, ensure the success of HeroQuest , which had been the first "original" game of this type. Surely, he had been Talisman , but never became a product with TV advertising. The success of HeroQuest prompted me to create a game with a board consisting of four separate parts which could rotate. However, I laid special emphasis on the fact that in the illustration on the cover of the box seemed like a conventional board. As with HeroQuest , several elements of scenario existed on the board giving a three dimensional effect. In HeroQuest had furniture pieces made of plastic and cardboard; in Stellar Crusade I arranged a central cross section. The board was something "half and half" was not exactly a collection of rooms and corridors loose in separate sections, but the four parties could be combined to change the layout and even arrange them in a row or otherwise. The second major objective was the fact that although many people liked them HeroQuest , the player who played the evil sorcerer (DJ) was a little limited in their actions. There were two views: the children liked the role of evil sorcerer (DJ) by the sense of power it offered. They had their secrets, were the only ones who know where everything was placed. But the price they had to pay in return was not acting as active players, were rather passive. With Stellar Crusade , I wanted the player wicked become more dynamic: thus also had goals and even could win. Hence the idea of "blip" markers, which can really be an effective system of hidden movements, or at least movements in the Marines players do not know what some markers represent emerged. The game works: is my favorite among those who have invented. Marines must cooperate together, and that is not always easy. The missions do not allow always relieving each other so easily. The combination of cards for different Marine commanders allows everyone to play their own style of combat. Also letters of alien player makes it fun. In the expansions I tried to create missions that survival was needed more than others, the game is usually more like a series of scenarios Space Hulk [of Richard Halliwell ]. Who loved this game could go gradualmentea promoting its marines from captain to higher ranks, obtaining turn over equipment cards. They made two expansions of Stellar Crusade , dedicated to Eldar and Dreadnought. I often wondered if it was possible to overcome the missions of the expansion of the Dreadnought. Especially in the latter scenario, in which the very factory that manufactures the Dreadnought and can build new attacking. If you killed one, the player could make another ally themselves with those pieces. This is a very difficult stage, but the Marines can win. It is not easy, a lot of people say it is almost impossible but the trick is not to destroy the Dreadnought! The scenario is based on the battle of Stalingrad during World War II, where the Germans attacked a tank factory which did not stop out new ones.
7. Kaos - And Stellar Crusade succeeded.
SB - Yes, it was great since it was launched in England in 1990 or was it in '91? No, it was in 90. After two years created Battlemasters do not know if arrived in Italy ...
8. Kaos - Yes. It was a game aimed at children rather ...
SB - This is a very simple war game. The aim was to offer more than 100 models in one box. This is a much less strategic game, but strategies exist, pure luck is not enough. A skilled player can defend a mediocre player. It was designed to play a game in an hour without much trouble.
9. Kaos - Also on Battlemasters, you are the only author?
SB - Yes And then I created other games. Die Schlacht der Dinosaurier for Schmidt Spiele and I also worked for them with other titles like World of Korak , The Village Terror , the Kingdom of the Dragon [published in Spain by Diset] ... I have also tried to develop ideas loose, three - dimensional effects, given nice ... based systems where a lot of throwing dice to hit and then to defend game. I liked to keep these items in some games I designed.
10. Kaos - How did you continue your career?
SB - In 1992 I left Milton Bradley and became autonomous. A year and a half later I Die Schlacht der Dinosaurier and other titles Schmidt . I worked a lot with Roger Ford , who had left MB two years before me. After two and a half years, in 1995, I joined Bluebird [ a British company dedicated to toys - note the interviewee r] to help them redesign their range of games and work in the area of children 's toys. And this has been what I've been doing mainly the last three years: considerably strengthen its range of games. Last year we launched Havoc . Again, the idea was not very different from any of the other games I've created in the past. The gameplay is very simple: get the youngest what games GW are for adults and experts. We have put on the market a wide range of good miniatures, and even painted, and a system of rules that allow anyone to perform a battle with all the typical elements of the most complex three - dimensional wargames. But in this case the rules are much simpler. From my perspective, I try to create games that I would play or who would have liked to play when I was a child. When I started playing wargames and board games, she was seven or eight years I made very simple games, and when I got bored, I invented additional rules or exchanged for more complex games. But if those easiest games had not existed, I would have never started playing. So I think it's a shame when sometimes in the atmosphere between players, the simplest titles are treated with little consideration or indifference. And I like to believe that, over the years, HeroQuest and Cruzada Estelar have attracted new people to the world of RPGs.
Kaos - That is very true for a lot of our readers. Thank you for your time and also for the wonderful evenings we have spent with Stellar Crusade, fighting aliens ...
In late 1998, not long after the interview we've read, Stephen Baker returned to Hasbro and in 2000 went to live in the United States near the company headquarters. He has worked in publishing many games since then classic company as Monopoly, Cluedo, Life Game, games subseal Avalon Hill, etc. and also new games although we can not always find their trail - Hasbro insists on not accredit the authors of their products.
In 2001 we know that Stephen Baker colaboraró in relaunching the classic Axis & Allies (1981) creating Axis & Allies: Pacific alongside Rob Daviau and the author of the original game Larry Harris Jr .
In 2002 he participates in the recreation of Risk (Albert Lamorisse, 1957) themed films of The Lord of the Rings , getting one of the best versions of Risk of recent times.
In 2003 it published its extent, also the work of the same team.
He is responsible for Risk: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy Edition in 2003.
Also in 2003 Stephen Baker published his game Battle Ball .
His great modern creation is Heroscape , designed in team by Stephen Baker , Rob Daviau & Craig Van Ness , and first published in 2004 in the USA and then in other countries, coming to Spain in 2005 by Hasbro Iberia .
The game had a huge global launch and many extensions and continuations, in which Stephen Baker continued to work.
Heroscape had great success among the amateur public, being Finalist 2005 JdA the board game of the year in Spain.
Heroscape began produced, always within Hasbro , the subseal MB and then moved to subseal Wizard of the Coast . Stephen Baker was the creator and developer of the game and its expansions to date.
The last published version of the game was adapted to the theme of Dungeons & Dragons ( Wizards of the Coast maintains the rights of all the games that follow the wake of the original role playing D & D Gary Gygax and Dave Arnold ).
But in 2010 Wizards of the Coast announced the closure of the line Heroscape , having decided to focus almost exclusively on its flagship products ( D & D and Magic: The Gathering of Richard Garfield ). The fondness Heroscape however still very much alive worldwide.
[Youtube: http: //www.youtube.com/watch? V = UNIKHtncnmc]
Heroscape announcement (in English).
Since then, nothing more we work or the person of Stephen Baker , beyond their successive positions within the company Hasbro : Design Manager ( from 1998-2005 ), Director of Product Design ( from 2005 to 2010 - working in preschool products , children, families and adults on all platforms including DVD and electronic games ), and as a director and Senior director Product Design since January 2011. resides near the center of Hasbro in Pawtucket, Providence County (Rhode Island , USA).
In his own words, says Steve Baker about himself:
"Husband, father, designer, player, historian and a kind of big boy.
Self - taught, a creative leader with experience in all apectos design and development of toys and games."
We play us!
Statistics: Posted by Daedalus — Yesterday, 8:33 pm