The Making of Prince of Persia: Journals 1985-1993

by Jordan Mechner

  Hell. I wish I’d never messed with that VBLANK stuff.

  August 30, 1989

  Drove into work early this morning and fixed the game. Brian was a little bummed, and Kevin was kind of a pain in the ass about it, but it got fixed. We won’t lose more than a day. Maybe not even that.

  My first day off in ages. Corey came into the city and we went to see sex, lies and videotape. Pretty unusual movie. I’m impressed, actually. The heart it revealed wasn’t one of the biggest and warmest I’ve ever encountered, but it was revealed, which is more than you can say for most movies, especially first movies by 26-year-olds.

  August 31, 1989

  Robert just called from a pay phone on Elm St. He’s At Yale. In New Haven. Wow… For some reason that phone call drove it home. I wish I were just starting Yale. Or even better, that we were both starting Yale together.

  It was eight years ago that I did what Robert’s doing. Makes me feel old.

  September 5, 1989

  A good day’s work with Roland. The 3.5” version is done – thank God. Now it’s really over.

  The POP documentation is in, looks great. David K. gave me a box flat to take home. Eval disks are back from HLS. All the pieces are coming together.

  Tony Trono said while cutting my hair: “Listen, the most important thing is that you have a good time. You’re only young once! In five years you’ll be 30. That’s the time of life when you stop asking a lot of questions and start to accept certain things and not try to change them. For now – have some fun! This time of your life will never come again.”

  This from a man who’s all of 33. But he’s right. I’ve somehow gotten into the habit of worrying, in every situation: What’s the right thing to do? What’s the best thing? What could go wrong here, how can I avoid it going wrong? Fuck that! I’ve been working my butt off all year. If I don’t reap some of the rewards now, when will I?

  I’m ready to enter my grasshopper phase. Someone please tell me how to do that?

  September 6, 1989

  Oliver found a bug in POP. I’m bummed – it was one I’d fixed once, too, and it somehow got undone. But it’s shippable, even with the bug, so that’s probably what they’ll decide to do. Shit.

  For kicks, I reread the last version of In the Dark. You know what? It isn’t bad. A year and half of writing, and 45 minutes to read it. I don’t feel much urge to rewrite it – it’ll never be great – but it’s a valid document of my first attempt at a screenplay. The next one will be better.

  September 7, 1989

  Got a letter from Robert. Boy, it makes me wistful. I wish I were just starting Yale. Here I am full of this feeling of impending change, of being young and on the brink of some thrilling new adventure… and I have nothing planned.

  They signed off POP today. Brian invited the boys from QA to his office backyard for root beer and champagne. Bill was there too. It really is over.

  Brian gave me the pitch again about doing a sequel. I know it’s a great opportunity to make some fast bucks for a few months’ work, but, jeez… I don’t care about that. I want something new and exciting and momentous to happen.

  Maybe all I need is a vacation.

  Maybe it’s partly the weather. It feels like fall. Smells like fall. Makes me feel like classes should be starting.

  I just want everything to change. Now. Is that too much to ask?

  September 8, 1989

  Brian took me into the warehouse and showed me the cartons of POP boxes and manuals. He let me steal half a dozen to take home.

  September 11, 1989

  Virginia called with an offer from James Alex to option In the Dark for 18 months against a purchase price of $40,000.

  The price is ignominiously low – I think it’s even below Guild minimum – but more important, who is this guy? And where is his funding coming from?

  I didn’t like it when Virginia said “Just trust me.” And “You owe me.” I do owe her, but I hated like hell to hear her say it.

  September 12, 1989

  Gary Cosay never heard of James Alex. He offered to advise me as a favor, but he won’t be officially representing me.

  Brian got a call from Henry Yamamoto, who wants all Japanese rights for POP, including Nintendo (!) It would be better for me financially if Broderbund USA does the Nintendo version, but this is a good development because it’ll create urgency for Alan to get the ball rolling. Kind of like a bidding war.

  September 13, 1989

  Found out from Virginia that the mysterious “brothers” backing James Alex are Jack and Bob Abramoff, Orthodox Jews who’ve made three films in Lesotho (independent monarchy landlocked by South Africa), including Red Scorpion, and are looking for their fourth. They’re talking about making In the Dark for $7 million.

  Brian is happy as a clam. Alan’s going to make an offer on Nintendo POP this week. Denis wants Broderbund France to start on the Atari and Amiga conversions right away. Henry is eager to get going. Applefest is next weekend.

  Everything is beautiful…

  September 28, 1989

  Home from Paris.

  POP snuck on the 19th as scheduled. Everyone says it was a big hit at Applefest – they sold out of all 84 copies they brought. (Couldn’t they have brought a few more??) The release has been postponed until Oct. 3 in order to allow a full 2-week sneak.

  Lance is making great strides on the IBM version. Broderbund France wants to do Amiga, Atari and Amstrad versions. Henry and Alan are hot to trot. Things are looking good.

  Doug told Tomi: “Jordan’s financial problems are over.”

  I signed the In the Dark option and sent it off. It’s only $1,500, but it’s kind of thrilling – the first time I’ve been paid for writing fiction. I guess this makes me a professional writer. Virginia says Mary (Pet Sematary) Lambert is interested in directing, Paramount is considering picking it up for distribution (a “negative pickup”), and Jack and Jim want to start shooting before Christmas.

  There were three Broderbund Sneak Preview boxes waiting for me when I got back. (I’m still on their VIP list, so I get a copy of every new release.) One of them was Prince of Persia. That was actually a bigger thrill than anything else.

  October 2, 1989

  Played Prince of Persia. It felt strange and unfamiliar. And great. Just three weeks’ distance, but what a difference it makes.

  October 8, 1989

  Adam Derman is dead. A couple of weeks ago he went to the doctor because he’d been having headaches, and they found out his whole body was riddled with cancer. It was too late to do anything. He was 23.

  October 13, 1989

  A Broderbund day. Finally got that source code documentation finished, sent it off to Japan and France.

  Met with Scott and Dane and Nicki to talk about Mac POP. They asked for 7% royalty. That seems fair.

  An Uneasy Quiet

  October 18, 1989

  Ten minutes before three a.m. I woke up and lay in bed, foggy and apprehensive. Waiting for the shaking to start.

  Then it shook – or rolled, or rumbled – and I lay there with my heart racing, not sure if I’d dreamt it. I got up and turned on the TV and waited for them to say something about an earthquake, and when they didn’t I went back to bed.

  I couldn’t get back to sleep. Fifteen minutes later, the next one hit. That one gave the building a good shake. Now I’m sitting out here in the living room in front of the TV, listening to the audio from KCBS and the calls coming in to confirm the times and magnitudes: 4.2 at 2:53, 5.0 at 3:14.

  The weirdest thing is the way you feel them before they hit. It’s like when you’ve been on a boat all day, and you go to sleep that night and as you’re drifting off you feel the pitching and rolling just as if you were still on the water.

  �
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  The big one hit yesterday, just after 5 pm. I was home, at my Mac. When the shaking started I got up and stood in the doorway until the CD I’d been listening to (¡Oye Listen! Compacto Caliente) started to skip. The power went out. The SPA Karateka plaque fell. The bookcases moved away from the wall. CDs cascaded onto the floor. Car alarms and other alarms started going off down in the street. I couldn’t believe it when I heard later on the radio that it had only lasted 15 seconds.

  It stopped and I stood there dazed. The window opposite mine went up and the building manager’s face peered out. We looked at each other until he went away. There was smoke and sirens and people were pouring out into the streets. I felt an overwhelming urge to get outside. As I passed the hall table I stepped around Tomi’s huge mirror, lying shattered on the floor. I hadn’t heard it fall.

  I took the stairs down. Huge cracks had appeared in all the walls, including over my doorway, and there was plaster on the carpet.

  Downstairs, I met the manager and two girls I’d never seen before. The tall blond one (from 201) put her hand on my shoulder and said “Are you OK? You look terrible!” Soon there was a little group gathered in front of the building. In ten minutes I’d met more of my neighbors than in fifteen months of living here.

  The blond girl had a Walkman and passed on information as it came in. We didn’t know how bad it was or when it had struck. For all we knew, LA had been leveled and we’d just felt the tail end of it. The numbers started coming in: 5.5, 5.6, 5.9. The baseball game was called. The traffic flow picked up – back to normal rush hour. The car alarms and smoke alarms stopped and everything was quiet. Only there was this strange dark cloud on the horizon over Oakland.

  I went upstairs and checked the damage. The phone and power were still out. I rejoined the people outside. Bob (the manager) and Larry (the owner) were making a quick inspection of the building. I wondered where Tomi was. She’d been supposed to meet Rob Finkelstein in Menlo Park to watch the game on TV. I looked around and there she was, coming down the sidewalk. I’d never been so happy to see someone.

  We sat in her car and listened to the radio. When we heard that some buildings had fallen down south of Market, and a 50-foot section of the Bay Bridge had collapsed, it finally started to sink in that we were in the middle of a major event. By now they were calling it 6.9 or 7.0.

  I took Tomi upstairs and showed her the damage. She was impressed. It seemed like it would be a good idea to get out of the city, but the radio was telling everyone to stay put, and the prospect of getting stuck in a mass exodus of bumper-to-bumper traffic was not appealing. In the end we decided to risk it. I felt very disloyal, walking out the front door past my fellow neighbors with a suitcase. “Gettin’ out of town, huh?” said Larry the building owner, with the contempt of a true San Franciscan. “Smart.”

  That drive was scary. All the signal lights were out, and rush-hour traffic through the Presidio was heavier than usual. I didn’t know if Tomi had gone ahead or was waiting behind; I cursed myself for having let us get separated. It seemed like a real possibility that traffic would grind to a complete halt (was the bridge even open?) and we’d have to abandon our cars. If that happened, we’d never find each other. As I came over the hill I saw fires burning in the Marina.

  Then, with relief, I saw Tomi had pulled over on Lyon St. Once we got on the Golden Gate Bridge it was smooth sailing. We went to her house in Mill Valley and sat watching the TV news coverage as the incredible footage started coming in. Me with a growing sense of loss at having left the city, wishing I’d stayed to be part of it. But it was good to have power and food. We went to the movies, in the earthquake-proof Sequoia Twin.

  October 19, 1989

  Back in the city. Took a walk down to the Marina to see the burned-out buildings and make sure Larry Hing’s was still standing. (It was.) The power was still out in places, and a lot of streets were closed off, but by and large it looked like people were going about their lives as usual.

  The extent of the damage in my building: no hot water, no elevator, no lights in the lobby or stairwell, and the fire escape is sealed off as a “Restricted Zone.”

  November 20, 1989

  NYU film school application arrived. I’ve started to fill it out. How terrifying.

  Robert is in town. We drove to Berkeley for dinner. (Crossed the Bay Bridge for the first time since the quake.) He’s euphoric at having escaped the industrial park and started a new life at Yale. That’s part of why I’m so eager to go to NYU.

  November 21, 1989

  Virginia called to give me the post-mortem on In the Dark. She is no longer involved. She says James Alex is crazy and self-destructive and they could have made this movie, but he blew it by getting involved with the Abramoff brothers, and so on.

  November 28, 1989

  George called and asked if I wanted to fly out and drive from Texas to L.A. with him this weekend. I said sure, why not. It’ll get me out of the house, and give me the chance to check out some film schools.

  November 30, 1989

  [Texas] Sitting on the curb outside exit C-2 on the upper level of Dallas Fort Worth airport. My plane got in at three, I missed the 3:30 bus, and the next one doesn’t leave till 5:30. It’s a two-hour bus ride and I’m not even sure of being met at the end of it. I have no way of contacting George. His phone has been disconnected, and who knows if he’ll get any of the messages I’ve left at the Texasville inn. In other words: a typical George situation.

  December 1, 1989

  Spent the day with George and Cindy getting the last few shots for George’s documentary. Rusty Lindeman, celebrated wildcatter and first citizen of Wichita Falls (and the model for Jeff Bridges’ character in the movie), and his daughter took us out to lunch.

  Rusty said: “I’ve never paid rent or made a payment on a house. Never in my life.” As in, why pay good money to live in someone else’s house when there’s so much land around and you can build one yourself? He gave me a toothbrush. “The dentist gives me one ever’ time I see him, and they just keep on building up in the glove compartment of my pickup.”

  December 2, 1989

  [Albuquerque] Freezing my butt off in the McDonald’s parking lot, waiting for Janice Kim to show up. She works nights at Video World down the block. We’re going to have a cup of coffee and then hit the road again.

  George wants to drive straight through the night. I think he’s crazy. We’ve been on the road since 8 this morning and he’s snoring within 30 seconds every time he closes his eyes. If he falls asleep at the wheel we will both die.

  December 3, 1989

  [Pasadena] Yes, you read it right. Despite all my resistance, George wore me down and we drove straight through the night. We took turns napping in the passenger seat, stopping only once (I pulled over to the side of the road 100 miles from LA, just before sunrise, and slept for an hour). We pulled up in front of the Castle Green Apts. at 8 a.m., 24 hours and two time zones after we left Archer City.

  December 4, 1989

  With George in L.A. Checked out AFI. I’ll still apply, but I’m pretty sure I’d rather go to NYU. I didn’t get a sense of the excitement or community of a large university. It was just a beautiful bunch of buildings in the Hollywood hills, next to a Catholic girls’ school. When class is over you go to the parking lot and get in your car and drive to the Hamburger Hamlet, or home, or something.

  December 12, 1989

  [Back in SF] A great review in Computer Gaming World, by Charles Ardai. He called POP “the Star Wars of its field.” I’m quoting it heavily in my resumé. Also got a plug in Bob Schwabach’s syndicated column, which should help Christmas sales.

  Alan Weiss, back from Japan, says Tosei is eager to do the Game Boy conversion but is waffling on Nintendo. We discussed the possibility of doing Sega and NEC versions instead. It’s a tough sell.
In any case, Game Boy looks like it’s happening, which is great news. They can’t start till March, but they hope to finish by June.

  Danny Gorlin has offered to do the Amiga conversion.

  January 10, 1990

  Larry Turman agreed to write me a recommendation for NYU. He thinks NYU and USC are the best schools. His son Andrew just started at USC.

  Prince of Persia won “Game of the Year” from Computer Entertainer magazine, according to Brian.

  January 11, 1990

  Made a six-minute demo tape of POP on the Broderbund video editing console, to submit to film schools. It took me six hours.

  Late dinner with Roland at Marin Joe’s. We stayed past midnight discussing our past and future in the industry. I proposed that when he’s done with Print Shop Companion, we start a software company together. I’ll design the games (starting with POP 2) and he can program them.

  The truth is, I like going into the office every week. I’d go crazy if I had to sit at home all the time. Anyway, it’s another gumball in the gumball machine of life.

  I pitched Bill McDonagh on Amiga POP. I asked for $20,000 advances, to pass on to Danny Gorlin.

  “Can we collateralize it against your other royalties?” he asked. I said sure, why not. He beamed like a kid: “What a guy! Even I can’t think of a reason to say no to that.”

  January 16, 1990

  Stopped by Broderbund to pick up my December royalty check: $4,000.

  Scott and Nicki came by. They’re already six weeks behind on the Mac conversion. I broke it to Nicki that her graphics weren’t good enough and we’d have to get someone else. She was crushed. It was terrible. I’ve never felt so awful.

  January 21, 1990

  Idea for POP 2: Shadow Man! I even drew up a sketch for the package front. It shows the Shadow Man standing alone on a craggy cliff, backlit by the full moon. It’s bold, as sequels go. But will it play in Persia?

  January 25, 1990

  A week of Broderbund days. Monday I signed the Amiga contract with Danny Gorlin and had lunch with Ed Bernstein. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I spent sitting at an IBM screen pushing pixels in an attempt to get Jim St. Louis’s EGA versions of my original Apple character animations to look decent.