Excelsior, O Readers! As promised, here begins a behind-the-scenes look at life at Atari, back in The Day. The Day of the Jaguar, that ill-fated console of shattered hopes and dreams that wasn't the Dreamcast.
 
How did this begin? I moved to California from Hawai'i by following a friend.
BJ West (http://www.bjwest.net/ ), formerly of San Jose, CA, migrated to Honolulu to work at Ditto's, the copy shop (which is actually the Hawai'i branch of Kinko's, but by a coincidence that proves that the universe is a goofy place, there already was a copy shop named Kinko's in Hawai'i, so the mainland Kinko's had to change its name -- which has nothing to do with this story, *ahem*). I was on staff, we became friends, and he and his girlfriend lived there for about a year before deciding they were going back to Cali, Cali, Cali (yo, I don't think so). I flew the coop alongside them, and ended up in San Jose, living semi-on my own for the first time in my life.
 
BJ landed a job at Atari due to his credentials and talent as an artist, and eventually hired me on to work with him (based on quasi-nepotism and a smidgen of talent on my part) as a junior artist. After putting in the hours on titles like AvP, Hoverstrike, and the like, we were awarded the opportunity to create our own IP. Needless to say, we jumped on this like a trampoline made of taffy. Our eyes were bright, our spirits were high, and our future was dim. If we'd known then what we know now, we'd have hightailed it for the horizon. Instead, we pushed on and developed what we'd later call Black ICE\White Noise... a "cyberpunk adventure". 
 
And it's here that our story truly begins.