Easily one of the cornerstones of the drama that unfolded throughout the episode was your alliance with Luge, Doc and Amped. By banding together, you protected each other and at least, tried, to sway the judge’s to see faults in other members. Do you think your alliance, at all, helped you to win the game?
You know, it’s difficult to say whether the alliance really changed things in the end. If you look back at the show, we actually never succeeded in swaying the judges’ decision in any of the eliminations. But that was never really the purpose of the alliance. It was more of a pact of friendship with people that got along with each other the best. And in the end, those people that I formed the alliance with are still the ones I talk to the most now that the show is over.
What are your feelings on the final challenge? Almost immediately, you were trailing Naucious and Amped, but slowly came back and then grabbed the lead. During the Uncharted 2: Among Thieves playthrough, it seemed like Naucious was on your tail the entire time. What was on your mind during the challenge? At any time, did you think you would be overtaken by Naucious or Amped?
The final challenge was more of a ‘marathon’ where the other challenges were ‘sprints’. Sure, I started out behind, but my attention to detail really helped me retain the lead throughout the other 3 stages of the challenge. I knew to set the 3rd puzzle upright rather than horizontally. In the final challenge, it was really distracting that the other competitors were playing right next to me and I could essentially ‘screen-watch’ to see how much of a lead I still had.
When do you start working for Sony?
April 19th
Undoubtedly, there are countless scores of gamers that watched the series who are very envious of your position. Playing unreleased games for a job would be any average gamer’s dream. Do you share these sentiments? Or rather, is this just the first step of your journey into the gaming industry? Where do you want to go, from here?
A game tester’s job shouldn’t be discounted in the least. It is a very integral part of the development and refinement process. Without testers, games would never be shipped, and would be unplayable. But the way I look at it is that I don’t want to get settled in this position. Although I value what they do, I have aspirations of moving into localization or some other branch of Sony. That’s one of the huge advantages of working for a large company as such, the ability to do lateral-transfers.
What do you have to say to the critics of the show?
What I have to say to them now, and what I would have had to say to them at the beginning of the series are two completely different things. I think that you’ll see that the vast majority of critics received the series as a whole very well. At the beginning when it was airing, they weren’t quite sure what to make of it, because they were assuming that it was going to be something different. But once they sat down and watched it through, they saw the direction that Sony had taken and understood where the show was going with everything. I’d just like to say to the critics that I hope they enjoyed watching the show as much as I enjoyed making it!
It is quite obvious that The Tester made your dream of working in the videogame industry come true. Did you honestly believe you would win the competition, when you initially entered?
I honestly had no clue that I was going to win the competition in the beginning. It wasn’t really until the finale, or right before it that I had any idea that there was even a chance of me coming out on top. That’s when I realized that my fate wasn’t in the hands of the judges anymore, that it rested entirely upon my own shoulders. Strangely pressuring, no? But it was more of a sense of relief knowing that the competition was essentially mine for the taking.
