,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, An interview of Abula (kuski of month on April 2002): ''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' -= When did you start playing? =- As my bio (not online currently though) tells I started on February 1999. It's not that easy question but I choose the month when I started to beat times. I tested and played some when Across 1.0 was released (it came on October 1997). I finished most of the levels but Expert System was something impossible. My friend's (not any known Across dude) big brother's friend has been finished the level and we were so keen to see the replay. The time was over 3 minutes. First he didn't want to show it but after a while, me Tuska and that third friend got to watch it, amazing rec. As I told at first it wasn't about time beating. Just feeling the bumps, the loops etc. It's still same and we call it 'cruising'. Then came a tiny break (maybe a few months) and we got Across 1.2 from our class mate. Across 1.2 published on April 1998, maybe a few months later we already had been finished all levels (we mean me, Tuska, Carju and Ultra). Or actually Tuska wasn't that interested to finish all, he still has Apple Harvest skipped in Across. Hehe was exciting level I remember. After finished all levels we stopped playing so much. Occasionally I was cruising but that's all. Then after some period (can vary from two weeks to two months, I really don't remember anymore) Carju came to Tuska's place with a paper where was written a few of his times. Warm Up 16 seconds, Flat Track 22 secs Twin Peaks 37 secs and a couple more. Me and Tuska were confused: we haven't ever thought that some stupid could finish the level multiple times just to beat own times, what's the sense of it?! In that time only beating levels (own made and internals) was everything we got when playing the game. Anyway we were bored and decided to try a bit to beat Carju's times. Tuska started to rule in short levels and the rest of had to try to get records of longer levels (Tuska always has hated long levels). Same time we found the Across official page (it's written in the level after all internals). I'm not sure if we found it even earlier because I remember downloading the level packs and cruising them all weekend at Tuska's home (you know I got my computer in 2000 and I had to play in my friend's houses). Anyway we found the WR times something unbeliable that we didn't even notice them I think. The table was maybe #300 when we started to check it regularly. Under WR table there was a few links, PeXi's Across site was one of them. We went there and found three replays: Over and Under 34 secs, Headbanger 1:06 and Curvaceous 38 secs. We watched them and..you know the feeling. After that we started to seek all replays from Across web pages. We got only a few, in that time it was very rare to share replays on web. Also in PeXi's site there was a total time list. The concept was brilliant and we started to hoyl for own total time. Tuska hoyled single sick times (at least compared to our own ones) and me, Carju and Ultra improved the longer levels to get lower total time. Carju was leading as long as he played and I was third (still hadn't own computer). I wrote my times to real paper and counted the total every night at home manually with calculator. Here is a scan one of those paper: http://moposite.com/images/misc/kuva.php?kuva=ekaA.jpg&thumb=0 I still have all those papers, anyone willing to buy?-) Those were the times, we bring your papers to school, to sport fields to everywhere and compared our times. Made team records list to paper etc. We also made own levels to irl battle (other player tries to beat other's time, no time limit, and when he did it it was another player's turn). Some of those levels are in Hoyla Mission, somebody might have heard about levels called "Kisma". We still go in for them, have like 300 levels nowadays under competing, not too active anymore, once in two months or something). Finally we found more replays and even the famous KGB site where were expert replays to all internal levels. That was the heaven, most of the best feelings in my (elma) life. We drew the levels to paper to find new styles. I remember well when me and Carju were thinking about the routes in Circuitous and Apple Harvest in biology lesson. Back to question: I started maybe even in 1997 but serious time beating oriented playing started in early 1999. I don't consider me as a newbie. -= Ex-teams and why did you change teams? =- Me, Carju, Tuska and Ultra were a good group, everybody hoyled and we knew each other well so it was obvious to found a team. Team name was a problem. FAST was the first we thought about, Finnish Across Supercrossers Team. We were thinking about it for weeks and after all we took MC, Mahti Crossers. Bad or good, anyway we took it. Carju was the first one who stopped. He didn't want to waste time to this game and wanted to concentrate to his sport hobby and to school, bullshit I would say ;). After that we thought we could get some new player to join our team. We took a look to total time list and saw some dude without a team from Kemi, Markku. He was appeared to the third position from nowhere. Pretty many teams were asked him to join their teams but we decided to try too. I wrote pretty long email, maybe 300 lines to tell facts and our future plans etc. Surprisingly he bacame interested, espeacilly after I bragged with my cool replays which I had collected on #across. So he joined us and took like 39 records out of 42, it was on January 2000, just before Elma was published. Tuska still had Warm Up, The steppes and some. Same time it was so cool to be an expert team but the problem was that we couldn't compete inside the team, Markku was too good for us. Almost immediately after Markku joined us Ultra stopped playing (he played some Elma also but not that seriously, maybe for two months). He deleted his Across and Elma but took back-ups. He took the game back many times and deleted it angrily. He tried so much to stop but it was very hard for him. Nowadays he plays very rare and only at my place or at Tuska's. He still likes to play Hi-Flyer with Nitro patch. Thus Elma came on February 2000 and MC was in hoyling mood. We got seven World Records in first Elma table: 14. Loop-de-Loop - Tuska 18,94 20. Upside Down - Markku 1:10,29 30. Pipe - Abula 35,30 32. Steep Corner - Markku 45,10 45. Sink - Tuska 35,18 46. Bowling - Markku 1:14,58 51. Tricks Abound - Markku 1:01,18 It was a huge surprise that even I got a WR. Later we drove more WRs, played contests, made the MC site, those normal things. I myself made that punahai's Across page (the picture is on Moposite in Info - Moposite) with famous MC studios songs. In December 2000 mr joined to MC. We had long conversations in IRC and he was welcome to our team. In three weeks, just after WCup3 stopped, Markku decided to say goodbye. He had reached everything he wanted. Three months ago Markku joined to #across again and told he might make a comeback after his compulsory army service. Will be interesting to see if he will do it. So MC was again three members: Abula, Tuska and mr. Tuska started to lose his hoyling spirit. OLP and EML came. Tuska's the last Elma success were in EML where he didn't lose any matches (no one has ever noticed that, but he is the only one with skint0r who didn't lose any, or do I remember totally wrong here?) and he left the team officially in November 2001. After that I concentrated to improving the sites and mr hoyled. It was all same to the summer of 2002 when MC came to end of it's history. I didn't play internal levels but mr did and he wanted competition and styles. We sought new members but seemed like no one was available. I got an idea that FM and MC could join and team name would be FMC. Karlis, Jokke and mr were in the army and we wouldn't able to have much talk about the team merging. For Tisk and Jokke (Tisk, Jokke and Karlis were the only ones left in the FM anymore after psy and Sathy formed own team . and Stene, Ufo, Dr_Luni was retired) the idea was good but Karlis didn't like it. Karlis was having a bad time with Elma and almost quitted whole game. Luckily we had FEM (Finnish Elma Meeting) and great time there so Karlis agreed (you know he was so drunk of course) the fusion. We didn't take the FMC name but FM. So this far MC is ended and FM includes five players: Tisk, mr, Abula, Karlis and Jokke. Our team page is under construction and will be up pretty soon. We are having great time hoyling wcup and it seems good in the future. -= Current total? =- 45:05,32 And the compulsory explanation: I have never been too good to do long level tricks. Some of my greatest times: 1:54 Zig Zag, 35 Freefall, 1:36 Animal Farm and 2:07 Apple Harvest. Also these days I see all WR recs so it isn't fair to other people if I made superb times anyway. I like more external contest such as cups and battles. -= Top5 newest and olderst personal records? =- I guess we mean internal levels. Top5 oldest: 21. Apr 2000 - ZigZag 1:54,64 16. May 2000 - Animal Farm 1:36,90 17. May 2000 - Spiral 0:48,02 19. May 2000 - Haircut 0:50,10 24. May 2000 - Over and Under 0:32,29 Top5 newest: 29. Aug 2002 - Tricks Abound 0:54,40 27. Aug 2002 - Slalom 0:42,79 26. Aug 2002 - Enduro 0:55,19 26. Aug 2002 - Quick Round 0:49,90 22. Aug 2002 - Jaws 1:11,68 Actually there are only three more recoreds I have driven in year 2002 besides those. -= Across Career briefly. Any WRs?, World Cup I and II and so on.. =- I understand the word career that I should have some success somewhere. Well I did a few good times in AP levels (psy's old contest which isn't online anymore :( ). I participated to few events in wcups but no points. I got my computer when Elma came so before that I hadn't got too much playing time to get any great results. No WRs to me, but Tuska got one in Enigma (Across 1.0). It was a big day in our Across/Elma life. He phoned me after every top6 times and when he made the WR we yelled in the phone and I cycled to his place (2km) quickly. Markku beat the time very easily in a few hours but luckily Tuska hoyled it back to him and Markku promised not to beat it again. After two years, when mr was already in our team, beat the time and asked Tuska if he could send in the time. Tuska gave his permission and now mr has the WR. Aniway the style is Tuska's :-]. Back in Across I made the first version of my Elma page, I did it maybe two months after I got my own computer. I remember when I talked to Karlis in #across and promised to make a superb Acorss/Elma site, so I did ;). The page contained info, cool new type of contests and the MC Studios section. For those who don't know about MC Studios, it's an Elma band making cover songs. Well, it hasn't been active in two years but anyway. You can download the songs on Moposite (Stuff - Media - Audio). That was the beginning of my sites). -= Elma career? =- WRs: - Pipe 35,30 #001 - Loop-de-Loop 18,33 #038 - Loop-de-Loop 18,30 #039-#040 Me, Ultra and Tuska played quite much Elma in multi mode and had over 10 multi WRs in one table which is pretty good. In that time Tumex hosted the site at http://elastomania.cjb.net. Also I had Lab Pro multi WR driven with mr about 6 months ago. I didn't take Wcup3 seriously but in Wcup4 I'm doing well. I think no one would have believed I'm in top10 after 5 events, haven't you? In battles and some normal external contests I have done some good times but mostly I just beat base times that the hoster of them gets more activity to his page when someone beats them. In OLP I have pretty good total time and in battles I have done well too. Total time is bad 45 minutes. Should I consider Moposite to my Elma career? Well I have been improving it with fellow players for over three years now. More about it later in this interview. -= Do you still like Across? Why/why not =- Playing Across is fun because it's so easy to beat your records. Unfortunately Across doesn't work too well in my computer (XP). Actually I haven't played it on my own computer since I installed XP, only watched some replays. But when visiting Tuska I pretty often play Across. 1.0 with the biggest bike is so hilarious. Newbies should test it. Download the Across 1.0 from Moposite - Info - Across, adjust the options and make the bige the biggest it can be and play. Levels like Double Trouble and Slalom are fun to drive, just to get laughing. -= How did you get Across/Elma? Was it your worst mistake? or the best? =- Tuska copied it from our class mate. I get Across from Tuska. Elma I downloaded from web, onlainari gave the link I think. I was already gave money to Balázs though and I also have two official Elma CDs. I must say it's one of the best. I have had so much fun with all these things around the scene, many friends (even in real life). I can't understand people saying it was bad thing to get the game. They should stop the playing if they think so or are they addicted for real? -= Favourite internals / most irritating internals =- Favourite ones must be Steppes and Headbanger. Tunnel Terror is good for cruising too. I dislike speedloops such as Sink, Steep Corner and Bumpy Journey. I hardly ever cruise them. -= Your own best WRs? =- So hard to choose ;). I have had only Pipe and Loop-de-Loop. Pipe was in first table so I must say Loop. I remember nothing about Pipe, maybe I hoyled some to get team record, didn't even want to get a superb time. I was so sure I won't get any WRs and then Balázs mailed me and asked to send my state.dat and the replay to him, I was so confused. Loop-de-Loop: DeG's Loop WR was one of the oldest back then. It was 18,35. I had 18,70 or something and wanted to get a team record, Markku or Tuska had 18,64 or something. I hoyled some and pretty easily did 18,5x. I thought a better time and hoyled more, got 18,40. Then I realized I could WR in it. It's an amazing feeling, it just couldn't be true. In first evening I played maybe 8 hours, got top10 18,38-18,50 maybe. I knew I can do it. Second day, it was a school day of course like the earlier day also. Normal day but the last hours was sport, football. I remember I was tired like hell but still I had to hoyl, whole day. That evening I played for 10 hours about. At middle night the miracle happened. I did 18,33! I didn't stop yet and improved to 18,30. But I sent in that 18,33 because I wanted to have two times new WR. So it appeared to the WR table and after that I heard DirtyCash also known as \DC had driven 18,34. It was very old WR and now two guys had broken it. Lucky me I can say. Then to next table I sent that 18,30. It was up only for one table untill Jeppe improved 0,01. Today the WR is 17,98... I have had quite many multi WRs too. Warm Up, Animal Farm, Hang Tight, Labyrinth Pro, Loop-de-Loop, Twin Peaks etc. Must be over 20 levels. All my WR replays are available to download on Moposite (Downloads - Replays - Old WRs). ps. some people think I'm very good player (maybe because of battles or WCup) but for real I'm not. At least I couldn't take WRs eventhough I were allowed. WCup and Battles are not extreme hoyling, you don't have to drive the very best drive without any small tiny mistakes. I think I'm like MP (he has the best total time of guys who have never had a WR) but a little bit worse. -= Best WRs in your opinion? =- I hope this doesn't mean scene corrupting but I want so bad to say what world records I like most. This is public information then so not fair to anyone I guess. I don't say whether the record is hoyled or having some sick style. Islands in the Sky, New Wave, Upside Down, Headbanger and He He. -= What's the limit of WR times? =- This is an interesting questions, always been fun to analyze the times and the possibilities to improve them. There are two facts: you can always improve and there is a limit. If people have been improving Flat Track and Warm Up WRs for ages it's damn sure no human can ever reach the limit in Lab Pro and Apple Harvest for example. But on the second hand we can say for 99% sure that WR total time won't ever go under 30 minutes unless we allow some radical changes to the time beating (like faster bike or something). So 30 mins is impossible, so is 31 mins too. Even 35 I would say is unreachable. In my opinion 37 minutes is the limit, WR total time is currently 38:50, it will go under 38 minutes but I can't believe it would go under 37 mins anymore. There are only a few levels where people might improve much. Lab Pro, Zig Zag, Serpents Tale, Pipe, Apple Harvest and that's it. It will be extreme hard to go under 38 minutes anyway, the asia wave (crazy japanese fellows) we need to do that. Saveload patch (more later about it) would make it easier to drive perfect drives. When all styles are invented it's only matter of hoyling. One 0,01 can be always done better, but will there be enough sick people to hoyl one level for 6 months to improve one 0,01? Well, I think and hope that yes. -= Are there some kind of external contests you like? What kind of contests do you like? Are there any new competitions you would like to see? =- Battles, WCup, AP levels. I'm pretty good at those but that's all I'm good at. In FEM I came second just after dz and in IRC I have had some success too. In fact I don't play them often and don't know why :). WCup is fun, especially when playing in FM, the best WCup team ever. psy made the AP levels, I happened to take records there now and then but then psy took off them because thought they are too crappy :(. The levels have many secret styles and most of them are hard enough, some of them even too hard though. -= Best lgr in your mind? What lgr do you use? =- Across.lgr but for it isn't that important thing. Default.lgr is ok too. Those are the best for hoyling I think. The most beautiful lgrs are Horror, Bugman and Cemetery. -= Mention some good things you have gotten with Across/elma? =- Three kind of friends: first category is for people like PeXi and Tuska. Well I knew Tuska before Across but the game get we closer I'm pretty sure. We were just normal class mates. PeXi is one of the few best real life friends of mine and I didn't know him before Across, strange. Second caregory is for team mates and people I chat the most on IRC which may become good real life friends in the future. The third category is for the fellows I meet everyday at #across from around the world who I may meet in the future. There are like 100 people that belond to the 3rd category. We have a special community (in #across) not hardly many other games have same kind of. The drama is funny to follow and participate. Knowledge and experience of making web sites and actually all kind of computer stuff. I didn't even have own computer three years ago and I bought this just because of Elma. I must say I have learned quite much things in those years and I'm still doing. I have made (with much help of other people) a site which I can be proud of. Fame: people know my name. Organizing stuff: to be the main updater of the big web site needs some skills (I don't say I would have that) in organizing and I've become better in it. The last but not the least satisfaction of driving best times, watching cool replays and cruising great levels. Elma is relaxing and good to fill to boring periods of the days. This maybe is the purpose of the game? -= Mention some bad things you have gotten from Across/elma? =- Jealousness: must be something related to Moposite. That's all I tell about it here. Waste of time: mostly when you hoyl for five hours without even finish the level once eventhough you still learn to drive the level better but I must admit you can do more things in 5 hours than just hoyl one level without any existing results. There could be even more useless activities but anyway. Physical problems such as hurt in wrists, fingers, back and eyes. Luckily I do some sport sometimes so it's not that bad. Lost some money to computer and internet costs. Lower grades in school, almost failed exams but I don't whine more because I've reached what I wanted and I'm studing at university the subject I want. -= What is the most frustrating thing you have faced in your career? =- Hard to say, I don't remember any times I have tried very much and without success. Neither I have had any computer crashes. It must be something related to Moposite, maybe asking the updates everyday ten times by other people but I've got used to it so hm. First time I made the Lab Pro bounce I didn't fail to the uphill so it can't be that either. Well I made Headbanger pipe just after Karlis told me in IRC to try it. I tried one try and made the pipe but died at 55 secs (I didn't drive it slowly) but because it came so quickly I didn't feel so bad. It would be extreme cool to go to #across to brag "57,12", people would have yelled so much. Also I have experienced quite a many cheating issues, they are not too funny. -= The biggest mistake of your Elma career? =- Two of them maybe are when I sent wrong replays to elg and Gazoline about three years ago when I was replay trading newbie. Those were pure accident and I fixed them immediately they joined back to #across but they were angry as hell. My mistakes. Another mistake was when I released WCup302 level, it had some secret route to drive the level to 12 seconds or something so I had to edit it and reupload and tell to everybody to download it again. Not so big mistakes I admit. -= Cheating, what feelings? Do you use level unlocker/nitro etc? =- You can read some stuff on Moposite (Stuff - Illegality) but personally I want to say some things (this is nothing official or something like that). Nitro was useful, everybody used it and it couldn't be detected. I used it to merge replays and to see bigger map, of course some fun driving when it came out. We wanted to illegalize it after people found out the possibilities to cheat with it for real. Nowadays merging is included to the newest patch so there is no use for Nitro anymore. Level unlocker should be published on Moposite in my opinion but PeXi doesn't want that. There's only bad things to not to upload it: unfair to to some people who don't irc etc. You can find the unlocker on the web very easily, any sites are spreading it. Unlocker is good in WCup but that's almost the only place I've used it. I don't know anyone who wouldn't use it. Well maybe one guy. Hibernatus' new 1.11h patches aren't on Moposite currently because they are not tested too well with bugs and errors. We will release it on Moposite when it's 100% ready. Thus I don't consider as cheating when using 1.11h patch. Cheating in general: of course it's one of the worst thing in the game. Luckily it's not that normal than in some other games because we have close community, everybody knows everybody. All cheating things are big spectals in the scene. mrDJ and Weird-AAL's cheating was pretty easily detected, so is replay merging usually. But the biggest problem is save & load patch IF it exists. It would make playing so much easier if you could save good start in Lab Pro and then just load the start and try to get perfect bounce, for example. Even pretty bad players could get WR times with it. Save & load patch would (or will?) ruin the scene, there aren't many choices after that, closed scene could be a solution where only a few players would let in (our friends etc.), maybe only 50 people. I know that would be cruel but there aren't many other solutions. Maybe some monitoring feature to Elma but but. Only people like Hibernatus could help with this problem, we will see. When Dr_Luni played he was kept one of the best players (well he is) and he only drove WCup and one internal level (Tunnel Terror). Luni dominated WCup but he has the the best WCup team back to him and he played like lunatic every event. Nowadays the dominator of the WCup is DarMoeD. He has had same success than Luni did. But there's something more: Dr_Luni had a team and therefore many many other styles (people psy, Karlis, Jokke were helping him). Another thing is that DarMoeD is ruling total time and WR lists. No one has ever had 14 WRs in one table like DMD just had. He has only 20 seconds worse total time than WR's, that's something very very very amazing. TorInge is also great internalist but he's in the shadow of DMD now. dz had so awesome total, then came TorInge and now we have DMD who is just crushing the times. After these facts people have started to think if he cheated, with save & load patch. It's natural and human to think so. But there is no any proofs he would cheat so please, people please stop to tell your stupidity to DMD, he has heard enough your comments. Think a bit if you would be such a great player and the only you get is load of shit. A while ago I found out mrickx cheated one WR in the past. I have met the guy in real life and he's very nice man. He's also an important in the scene, doing great statistics and having a big role in Czezh Republic. I don't want to think about it too much, it hurts. Real life friendships are more important things than cheating in the game. It was so much easier when mrDJ and Weird-AAL cheated. Hopefully we are again more near to ideal scene where no one cheats, maybe further.. -= Elma tuning, have you tested? Opinion about it? =- For people who don't know about Elma tuning I tell it's about changing your graphic card settings which affect to all kind of things in computer. Some settings can make some bounces easier to do etc. For example some people can't do the Animal Farm trick or Sink start or Hang Tight turning with their graphic cards. They just can buy a new card and hope the best or change the settings of his current card. According to these facts I don't see the tuning so bad. It's so small things that for most of the situations it has no sense to adjust, only to some WRs. Adjusting your system and all kind of settings is boring as hell in my opinion. Elma is just a simple game where you want to only hoyl and not to tune your computer. But because Elma is programmed like it is and we have different systems I think we just have to accept it. It's good that you can achive almost nothing (in practise) with these so you don't have to learn to do it if you wanted to get good results. Also adjusting the settings take much time so this is also one reason that makes it even more useless. MGen told about this about one year ago but not many were interested in. DarMoeD was second one telling about it surprisingly everybody got interested. Of course some people thought immediately that's the reason of DMD's archievements and started to call this tuning as cheating. As far as I have talked with DMD about this he told me that he has changed his settings only to 2-3 WRs he has made (Hi Flyer at least) so it isn't a big deal after all. I myself tested it for like 10 minutes. I saw some effects but thought it's extreme boring and stopped. I lost 10 mins of valuable hoyling time there! Well actually there is one small adjust that makes me able to drive at the same time when being connected to internet. Before Elma was lagging a bit. You can adjust your DirectX settings to make Elma runs smoother: http://moposite.com/mopolauta/viewtopic.php?t=534 -= Best kuskis and teams? What are the things you value in another kuski/team? =- I think I have nothing to add to these questions so let's take it shortly. For me kuski isn't only the player but also possible level designer, web site maker, graphic artists etc. The people who belong to non-playing categories are the minority of the scene and there wouldn't be any playing around if those other fellow kuskis didn't exist, therefore their job should be appreciated (am I the right person to tell this?). You will realize it some day if you hadn't already, I promise. MUe made great stuff but unfortunately he has semi-retired. Currently BarTek is taking MUe's place but because he is pretty .. ehm .. well let's call it not-so-wise guy people find it difficult to give respect to him. PeXi, me, and all other dudes with their Elma sites are doing a big role in the scene so remember them. More: mrickx, MGen, Hibernatus, GuyB, Petri. About best players. The only that matters is the best time driven in beforehand defined time without cheating, the result. In battles the time is 10-30 minutes, in WCup it's 7 days and in WRs 100 forever. The result is up to hoyling power, skills, styles and luck. Some of the players have only one of those and they can't get insane times therefore. If people with hoyling power get the correct styles and enough time to play you can't beat them. Skills mean also the efficiency, how many hours you need to beat the WR. Battles are for extreme quick style finding. I list here some players belonging to those categories in my opinion. The deepest apologizes to people I forgot (maybe they don't belong to here if I don't remember them?) Hoyling power: ciph, Cloud, DarMoeD, Dr_Luni, dz, Jeppe, Karlis, kuiva, MadMan, mengerle, MGen, mr, Nostrada, psy, SoGe, TomCat, Trabi, Uube, ZeiZei, ZiuteK, zyntifox, \DC Skills: Champi0N, DarMoeD, dz, Jeppe, Jokke, Kingkong, MadMan, Markku, Mick, MP, mrickx, Nostrada, TorInge, pajen, psy, swos, zeth, zyntifox Styles: dz, IRK, Jokke, Joni, Markku, Nostrada, psy, ramone, swos Some people appreciate only the guys with skills but remember Elma is matter of results not efficiency :]. I think I'm pretty good in all of those but not expert in any of them. I can't hoyl to maximum, I have found some nice styles but not always and skills of course because I play so much. I'm quite good at battles. In the scene there are three kind of teams: inactive (one player playing for maximum) teams, the ones based on only hoyling and the ones based on friendships. Not many people want to be in the first team. Some people play Elma just to get fame and good results, for other people Elma is also friends. For me Elma is friendships and therefore I'm in a team where I know everybody and have even met each of the members in real life. My first team, MC, was mainly same kind of. I don't deny the fact we wanted Markku to join our team because of his great playing skills but fortunately it wasn't a bad action. If your team members are even great players you just have to be happy, those teams are rare. FM is one of them and maybe also the only one? Just tell me one more team with good results and that every member knows all the other members. We must be the only team having a team potret where each of us are posering (well I'm sleeping for half). REM is a good team but only dz and mrickx have met. Ok maybe I'm taking this too serious, Elma isn't this much to all of you and people don't even has opportunities to meet. Many national teams, ., ż etc are good examples of teams I like more than EM, IC where you only hoyl. I just noticed there aren't many pure hoyling teams anymore which is nice. People has realized that it hurts too much when your team members spread your replays and all kind of stuff like this. Hopefully EM and IC guys don't go too mad because of my comments but the members of them (well at least of EM) have been in so many teams, made new ones and splitted again. Thus my advice is to make friends and then found a team. Hm, did I make this shortly after all? -= Your best achievements? =- Moposite, Loop-de-Loop WR, 32 and 31 minutes OLP total time limit breaks, FEM02 battles, several multi WR in past -= Do you do any other neat finger-related stuff like playing violin, repairing watches, pick pocketing etc? Writing stuff in school, math etc :]. So nothing special. Many of the best players play some instrument, guitar for example. Maybe that's why I this poor? psy, Jokke and Markku are playing at least. -= How much did you play in your sickest period? How much these days? =- It must be when I decided to fix my sleeping rhythm and was awake one night. What else could I have done than play Elma? So Steppes at first, I hoyled 16 hours and made a team record which is still my best time (14,21). I learned the trick and can do it almost everytime now so it was worth it. After that record I started to play Tunnel Terror which I played 8 hours so it was 24 hours Elma without any more than 2 mins breaks. In Tunnel Terror I didn't get a tr but pretty close to it, 1:06,52 which was very good time back then. I wanted to get those TRs but I also wanted to experience the feeling of extreme hoyling. This hoyling period was done over two years ago. Nowadays during the WCup I play averagely three hours in a day. Actually it isn't more than before WCup or after it. I have always loved to cruise the levels and I do it quite much, it's relaxing. The only different during WC is that I hoyl 3h not cruise. In the future I might try this 24h total time contest. -= Have you had Elma dreams? =- Not many if we mean the dreams you have when sleeping. But in school I have been wondering the new possible styles and never they have worked when I got to home to test them. I have had some dreams about Elma people. Some boring ones, once about psy's home and something, nothing interesting anyway. Edit: Strange, after writing answer to this question yesterday I immediately saw an Elma dream at last night (I hardly ever even normal dreams). It was about the WC level 410 where the results were like this: 1. kuiva 14,70 2. PeXi 14,81 3. Fulgore 14,82 4. Jokke 39,81 5. Karlis 42,80 6. Abula 42,81 etc. There was a button in the level where you could turn ofo the lights (?!) and therefore you didn't have to collect one apple which was on top of the high bookshelf because you couln't see it. No one (except FIN) did know about this trick untill now. Of course we were pissed off but 411 was already released so the hoyling continued. -= Strengts and weaknesses as a player? What moves you like/dislike? =- I found the second fastest style and can make a good drive with it, that's why I have some good results in battles. I have some hoyling power too but not any extreme. I can do top10 drives in WCup but not top3, maybe a few time during the cup with luck but nothing like DMD, Karlis, kuiva, Jokke etc. I can't hoyl 10h like Karlis, nor I can do those impossible tricks like Enigma, Freefall and Headbanger, that's why my total time is bad. To be the best isn't so big motivator for me, simply because I know I can't be with current energy and time resources. I'm not good at copying styles, I like more doing in my own way (psy is the most supreme example of that type). Steppes 12 seconds style is invented by me. Or well I think Karlis invented it before me but he never told it to us. So I found the style, tried like 10 hours and gave it to Tuska. Tuska tried it 10 hours too and didn't make it. Then we gave the style to Markku and he immediately drove a WR. After that Tuska improved a bit. Also I found out the Zig Zag jump style to get the apple next flower. I gave the style to onla and he drove the WR. Of course some smaller tricks like that Tunnel Terror I recently posted to Mopolauta, find it yourself. I like bouncing, driving in semi-tight pipes and medium fast levels. I dislike slow and speed levels but I can play them anyway. I'm not any expert with Alovolt or Brutal volt, not bad either. I just started to use brake in left alt (because of wc408), hopefully it will give me better times in the future. I have never been that good with brakes like Champi0N for example, look at his replays. I prefer pressing gas instead of slowing. -= Tips for average players? =- Play more. Check replays, train. Play much, 2 hours isn't much. I'm developing a Mopo school to Moposite where you can train to become a better player. -= Best memories with Elma? =- When seeing the first professional replays, each of us has experienced it and it was wonderful feeling, you can't feel this anymore with Elma when you know the styles and the possibilities of the players. Maybe some new styles in internal levels and some impsybility replays still give me same satisfaction but not too often anyway. First replays we found on PeXi's page, also checking this, the best Across page was also great time. When Tuska drove his (or our) first WR to Enigma (Across 1.0). I was always been thinking that no one of us (MC guys) will ever do anything like this, not even near to WR and then Tuska did it. The joy and happy. I'm not sure if even driving my own WR, Loop-de-Loop, was that good thing. Markku's join to sucky newbie team, MC. I wrote 500 lines long emails to him telling about everything including my plans about upcoming team site (Punahai) and so on. Also I had some sweet replays that Markku was interested in but many other better teams were also asked him with much better replays. I think we had the right spirit etc. Unfortunately Markku was too good player to us, we weren't able to fight with him in internal levels (or maybe Tuska was in a few) but he still stayed in MC. I was a newbie and so proub of this great player in our team. Having a great time in MC studios recording sessions where we made many Elma cover songs with nice lyrics. We get awesome feedback and had fun when making them so there's one very good memory. Creating Elma sites, publishing them and updating stuff. When the first green version of Moposite was released I was so proud of it. I had put much effort to it and I had kept my promises (I still would like to find the logs between me and Karlis were I tell about my plans to create the best Elma site out there, the log between me and psy I have found). All new things to Moposite and huge updates are big things to me, that's why I keep on doing them. Seeing WR table updates has always been one of the greatest things in Elma. The times are so amazing and when you know the people behind the times it's so fascinating. Nowaways I'm even able to watch the replays of them. To see replays gives satisfaction of course but after that you can't guess the styles and discuss with other people with them, that's the bad part of it. Meeting Elma people in real life, more later in this interview. First battles as a participater and also as the arranger. Mopobattles requires much work but they are still fun to organize. Doing well when participating yourself and beating people who has better total time than you is comfortable. -= First time at #across? =- I even remember my host back then (~heiklas@kastelli.edu.ouka.fi). Thus I started to irc at school. We got some simple unix guides where was told stuff like using Pine (email soft), reading News groups, changing your password and also using IRC. Me, Carju, Ultra and Tuska connected to IRC at the same time and were chatting at #across. I would like to read those logs too, anyone? I don't remember much but I chatted with Karlis and psy and tried to learn some English. After a while we started to chat at Tuska's place too. Once we came to online when people were waiting for WCup results and the atmosphere, well you know, was so eager. Petri came second and me and Tuska thought long time should we congratulate him, well we did and he didn't bite us. Note that during the first months we didn't even know about Mirc but used Telnet. Mostly we chatted with psy and Karlis as far as I remember. When I got my own computer I started to irc more and these days almost 24/7. There are some smaller private channels too but I can't tell them. Actually I'm in four Elma channels (also #battle, #rhyme, #elma.hu and #elastomania.cz now and then) currently. I think I will use IRC for long time. Being at #across I have decreased because of the time I used to be there just talking shit and wasting valuable time. -= Best Elma friends? =- It's not fun or fair to list people you like more than others but because I know this is interesting I'll do it. Most likely I forget some guys, don't get mad. I don't list the people who don't play anymore like Markku, Tuska etc. Not in any particular order (or actually in the order they came up to my mind): PeXi, mr, Karlis, Tisk, Sathy, psy, Jokke, tura, dz, MGen, mrickx, Tapzu, MP, Petri, Stikky, Hibernatus, skint0r, zo3non, Kumiorava. Those are the guys I have talked with some other things than just Elma, roughly though. Just come to talk in private chat :). -= Thoughts about Elma meetings? =- The best thing of Elma that you might get real life friends. I hope I can participate to upcoming Elma meetings as many as possible even in abroad. mr and mrickx have slept at my place. Tapzu, Jamo and Radon visited me also when they cycled to Artic Ocean. Of course I have met Tuska, Carju, Ultra, PeXi and Fulgore. Also AnJo guy was playing a year ago who lives in Oulu. And Rampage. mr was here about one year ago. We hoyled multi, OLP and made statistics. Very nice time it was. With mrickx we didn't do that much Elma things, well maybe 3 hours :]. In summer 2001 I was in Nokia at Toble's place with Tuska and PeXi. I saw Karlis, Tisk, kuiva, bluu, Nikke, Mikko and of course Toble and lusu there. In summer 2002 we had a great meeting in Lammi where the participaters were Karlis, me, Tisk, Jokke, dz, mrickx, Orcc, kuiva and mr. You can read more about the finnish Elma meetings on Moposite (Community - Meetings). Everybody is welcome to Oulu to meet me and other Elma fellows :-]. -= What do YOU think should be improved in an eventual new version of Elma? =- Most of my hopes are listed on Moposite (Info - Elasto Mania - New versions?) but I can highlight a few of them: - Diverse statistics - Only sky as background - Better cheating protection Actually I don't want so hard new versions because there are still so much work with current version. I won't convert Moposite to Elma 2.0 for 99% sure. It would be too much work, changing all lists and stuff. -= Do you have a life when playing Elma? =- Because the question is about my own opinion I can say Yes :]. For me a good life is doing what you enjoy. But in common language life means things outside of the computer so then I must say I'm quite a no-lifer. I use much time with computers, I'm even studing computer science in the university. I think quite many people think I'm the most low life nerd in the scene and in the very deepest hole of it. It's good for people who want to think "Ehm, I use quite much computer, but hell, Abula uses even more than me! So I don't have to worry about it." I was also thinking in that way when I wasn't in the deepest hole but when being there I can't think in that way anymore. I pretend to have life when going to school, having time with friends and doing sport but I always know that the computer is waiting with active private chats in IRC and new posts on the Mopolauta. Am I joking? Decide yourself. -= How about battles? =- I don't play often them but I like still. I'm almost always busy at computer and therefore don't want to waste 30 minutes to it. Anyway when playing I usually do very well. Almost everytime in top3 and even victories come occasionally. Battles are very good contest to see who has skills, not just hoyling power. About the battle history: I think I'm one of first 10 battle players ever. MUe, me, Petri, onlainari, Tuska I remember at least. Also I have had hundreds battles in rean life at Tuska's home, at my place and some in PeXi's. They are a little bit different because only one computer available to use but they rock too. -= You've got some negative feedback about playing Elma from your friends? =- I have only one friend who hasn't finished internal levels, he is chinese. Everytime he call me and asks "Tja, what are you doing?" - "Guess." - "OMG, of course again, anyway I was calling because..." and this happens four times in a week averagily. It doesn't annoy me at all, rather hilarious. My mother doesn't complain either because she knows I'm doing useful stuff too and got friends. Well I'm 19 so it isn't that big deal anyway. She has never given any strict rules to me. -= What games do you like beside Elma? =- I play only Elma and very rarely Across. Before them I played some Civ, SimCity, Stunts, Slicks, Worms, Minebomber, Skijump and Need For Speed 2. I have never been that computer game fream untill Across. Last time I played some different game was GTA3 when I tested 15 minutes it (maybe three months ago). I didn't kill people or something but just wanted to drive without any mistakes, it was quite fun for those couple of minutes. I have also played some Tetris at my granma's but not much. -= Did you buy Elma? Why not? =- Across I didn't but warezed it. Elma I bought because $10 wasn't too much for the thousands of hours I have used to the software. I hope more Elma HC fans will send their money to Balázs to show their appreciation. Think about the amount of joy you have gotten because of his game. -= Have you thought about if you could stop playing Elma soon, or anytime? =- Brieftly: I can't. If I wanted I should delete 10% of computer stuff, stop ircing and meeting PeXi. Due to these facts I can tell stopping to be in Elma scene is impossible for me. More likely is decreasing the time with Elma but it won't happen before I go to army, meet a nice girl or go to full-time job. Though I have thought many times when doing something else (like collecting ice-hockey cards) that I won't stop it but still I have stopped so you can't ever say 100% sure for the future. -= What gets you still playing Elma =- People around it and I want to improve Moposite all the time. -= Are you at the top of your career now? If not, when? =- Everyday I'm doing better, because I haven't decreased the playing time. -= Forecast the future of Elma. How the scene will be in five years? =- More players from Asia, much bigger scene, more Elma news in world media, World Cup 6 starting, Elma criminal organization growing, you need to use more money to get hardware for Elma (because new OSs don't support stuff you need for playing, World Wide Elma meetings with Elma lectures, real professional players who gets paid for. -= Was it a surprise to be voted for the kuski of month? If it was who should have won in your opinion and why? =- No because in the poll there weren't any serious opponents :). Or in the second hand it was because I thought people vote only for kuskis who only hoyl. I didn't do any particular things in that month I guess. -= Mopolauta, thoughts? =- I am the creator and the administrator of the current board, I reload it about 100 times in a day and read all posts. I hope more people will come to discuss with us. Some people might think the rules are too strict etc. but I want to have the board clean and therefore usefull people who doesn't read every post. There is this tiny community (about 50 people) who read every post but that's not all, many guest all the time visiting the board and finding tips / help etc. When I find time I will install new mods to Mopolauta so the board will be even better, advanced statistics and other interesting stuff. -= Opinions about Elma Crime, MUe's animations and stuff like that. =- That kind of stuff keep the scene alive. Hopefully more people will make them eventhough the feedback is often too negative. Elma music, texts, pictures etc. I have seen Elma Crime 6-8 times, there are very hilarious parts but also many things I see no fun. Karlifox's name rocks. I bet Hungarian fellows had great time making the movie and in the future not many will make same, it needs so much effort. -= You are the updater of Moposite page. How it's feeling? =- I try to tell all interesting things about Moposite but because it's so obvious for me I might miss some important parts. Don't hesitate to ask on Mopolauta (Feedback forum) whenever you find something to ask. Many people have asked me how much time Moposite requires. Of course it varies whether I want to make it or not but average could be 3 hours in a day. There are days over 10h and days for only one hour. Hardly ever it's 0h. Before I got 24/7 internet connection I used much more time but because the site wasn't that advanced nor automatic the results were about the same than these days. At least dz remembers the days when I updated about 10 sections in every 3 days. I think the best weeks have over 80 hours for the site. During 2-3 years the longest break was one week without doing anything. I bet most of you have no idea the amount of time the big site needs. There are always stuff you need to fix/edit etc eventhough I wouldn't update. Also I get like 50 mails (Elma related) everyday where people asking questions, asking to fix their state.dats and so. Those take at least one hour in a day too. Also 50% of being at #across is for me helping other people. I have decreased to be there because I simply have no time. Just try yourself, create even a small site and update it regularly for 6 months, it's not easy, usually we give up in a few months (I have done it also in other pages of mine). Usually all new things I don't tell beforehand. Thus when developing new sections and stuff to the site I can't update that often and people think I'm lazy. After 100h I release the new section, people check it and don't remember anymore those weeks without updates :). Sorry if I sound so negative and bitter. A few examples of the amount of times to use to normal update: - Kinglist: 15 hours - Records section: 1 hour - Links: 3 hours - LOM: 4 hours - Mopobattles: 4 hours (including 30mins of battling and making the level) - New levels: too much Because there are more sections and pages all the time and I still have this 24 hours in a day for living, Moposite needs more updaters. Recently Jokke started to update Replays section which is really great but we still need more staff. When I go to army and have a real job I can't used this much time to Elma, maybe 10 times less. In year 2007 Moposite hopefully is much more automatic and have 100 new sections eventhough it's already too hard to invent new ones but I have about 10 in my pocket. MopoShop, MopoSchool, MopoRadio, MopoTests, MopoAdventure etc. Don't ask more about them or when they will come, maybe not in 5 years. I won't tell more. In 2007 we have 15 active updaters, meetings every three months, 5000 visitors everyday and ads in the media. OR if some new undetectable cheating is found the Moposite maybe will get closed only to small group (people we know well) but this will happen only if it's the only opportunity. Don't cheat, don't ruin the scene. In year 2007 there are also much more statistics, contests and levels. I think some people are a bit scared about the fact the Moposite has too big role in the scene and if I stop to update the scene dies. It's true in my opinion too but when (read if) I'll stop I give all the codes and stuff to person who can keep on the site, PeXi for example. Maybe half of sections get closed but anyway not the whole site. Moposite might have some Microsoft (monopoly) status in the scene that destroys smaller sites. I started from beginning too (or maybe PeXi helped a bit) and have give much effort to the site. Many other sites are copying stuff and ideas from Moposite, I don't mind that much. I try to not be copying anything from smaller sites or at least I ask them before. Did you know Moposite was the first site where was sections "Contests", "Cup" or "Stuff"? I try to participate to all kind of contests on other sites, advertise them etc. I just try to make one great site without killing smaller ones, just try harder or something :|. Moposite has sponsors and ads (click them occasionally please) which give some money to us. It's not too fun to pay expensive server and domain fees. The banners give about $100-200 in a year plus some awesome donations. If we get extra money we will buy WCup prizes and stuff like that. More on Mopolauta: http://moposite.com/mopolauta/viewtopic.php?t=409 I must be one of the biggest freaks of Elma but I don't get the joy of updates on Moposite, this is what I used to think about but I'm pretty sure I get at least as much satisfaction when updating the site as a normal user who only check the updates. I like WR table update and Replays. Also Records section is cool because I know nothing about the times untill they are up. I find Links section the most boring ;]. Moposite name? When me and PeXi decided to merge our sites to one big we also wanted to have own domain and therefore the name. We thought about "kyltti", "vasara", "laatikko" etc. when the word "mopo" came up to our minds. Unfortunately mopo.com was already registered. We even checked if they can sell it but the prize was (or is) $10 000 so we need to find another one and chose the Moposite. The site part is boring I know but back then it sounded good. Where I find the motivation to update Moposite? What I do I do it well could be my motto. Thus I want to get Moposite as perfect as I can, improve it all the time and in some beautiful day to get it ready (not possible, I know) when I can move to new project. Of course this isn't the only reason but I like the game we play and in this place I get all info and stuff that this kind of freak wants. I like making web sites and when about 1000 people are checking everyday what have I done it's pretty cool. Actually damn cool when thinking more now, thanks. -= What's your favorite Elma website (not Moposite)? =- GuyB's Danish Page and dz's page, I like the number of lines in their news and the personal stats of dz. DarMoeD had some nice stats too about his times. psy had nice page in the past but he has lost his motivation to update it. I like his old AP levels but unfortunately psy doesn't. -= Your relation to OLP? =- I had the best OLP total time in the beginning of it. Spice Paradise (second level in the pack) is made by me. Most of the levels aren't good in my opinion but I played it quite much anyway. I dislike the name of it, because people mess up it with official top10 level packs. I like more Lost Internals. -= Why that nick? =- About 4-5 years ago three friends started to play Quake in LAN (stupid game). It was the first place for us to have own nicks. Tuska, Carju and Abula they were. At fist it was Abula Butalulu but shortened it quite soon. I'm playing Across/Elma with my real first name but in IRC/sites/contests and so on I have this sweet nick. If I remember correct I used "Abula" first time in psymorph's Across page. -= Your real life. Do you have it (school/work, other interests etc)? =- You decide whether I have or not, I don't care much. I'm studing at university computer sciense (Oulun Tietoteekkarit, Oulu Information Engineering Students) which contains mainly math, physics, some English, Finnish (and damn Swedish) and of course computer stuff such as proramming, hardware theory etc. I don't work currently, no time, no interests and no motivation. Or maybe somebody can call Moposite as working without any big salary. In a few years I will be working I'm pretty sure, after the compulsory militar service (start on July 2003 and will last 6-12 months). Other interests..? Well I do sports (skiing, skating, football, running, tennis and cycling mostly), listening to music (oh, not possible, what a stranger I am), go in for culinarism etc. All these I do with my real life friends, I don't like to be alone. I make and update also some other web sites, www.pulu.org. -= Write something about the game, fellow kuskis, Moposite, #across, etc =- Read the interview above. Abula, 3th October 2002