GBAtemp Extraordinaire
5 QUESTIONS TO A LEGENDARY TEMPER
FAST6191
Since 2002, GBAtemp has been a community-powered site, and nothing is more important to the site than its user base. With this new editorial feature, we're bringing the spotlight to you! We've decided to ask a set of simple questions to a
Legendary Temper: a long-standing member of the community, someone who has made important contributions, or who bears significance to the history of the site or the forums. This may include staff and non-staff members. We'll try to make this a weekly feature, but with over
500,000 members now, it may take a while for
you to be featured
The person featured in our latest entry hardly needs an introduction. With the highest post count (and probably word count!) on the forum, and one of the longest-tenured of the Magazine Staff, it's FAST6191!
- Who are you, and what do you do in real life?
I go by FAST6191 in these circles of the internet. In real life I am nominally supposed to be a forensic materials engineer (tell you why something fell over, why it will fall over, how it was made... and also then make it when you find nobody makes/sells it any more) but there is very little call for that these days so I mostly fix a lot of computers and electronics and that is more side hustle/hobby.
- How did you find yourself joining GBAtemp?
My first dalliances with emulation were in the late 90s and that then included GB/GBC which meant I was there when the GBA started up, and got emulation (although my PC at the time was not so geared to do well at it so "was at a friend's" actually was the case). Searches on anything there routinely led to this site but it would be a while longer before I became an accountless lurker (also how I still do most of the internet), though I had myself a GBA flash cart by this point. Then the day I signed up there was a only registered members can view attempt to curb bandwidth use. Eventually I thought I would try stage 3 of the internet and actually contribute something.
- What's the most exciting/interesting/crazy thing or event that you've witnessed throughout your GBAtemp years?
I always like being in the thick of it for new hacks, new hacks gone wide/useful to the masses, emulation becoming viable, and if it is not at the same time then when ROMs get able to be pulled apart. I certainly get why people like the polished and reliable stuff, and homebrew that "could be commercial" (or better yet could be commercial but for the lawyers and finance types)
- What part of the video game industry are you currently interested in, or excited about?
The death of local co-op, death of mid tier games, focus on "online experiences" and general rush to make things wide appeal and inoffensive means very little is all that appealing and I mostly wait on whatever does manage to make it through the traps of mediocrity as far as new games. On the other hand all the stuff being done to expand old games way beyond what those back then could dream of, replicate consoles at transistor level, interface old consoles with new tech, replicate and enhance old controllers, fix things new and old, plumb the depths of unknown pins/hidden functionality on new and old... that keeps me paying attention.
- Do you have a message for the staff, an opinion you want to share with the community, or anything else you would like to say?
Just keep on pulling things apart, fixing things, adapting things to your own will and resisting the "you shouldn't do that" calls from the self interested, their blind followers and sycophants playing to both of those.
Thanks for reading! We hope you enjoyed this new editorial feature. If you think you qualify for Legendary Temper, feel free to leave a comment in this thread and your turn may eventually come.
Make sure to check out our previous Legendary Tempers!
