Name: Mika Oja
Date of Birth: 02.11.1982
Location: Oulu, Finland
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To put myself in a nutshell, I would use the following expressions: Creative Thinker, Logical Problem Solver and Social Animal. My animal is the wolf and likewise I'm a responsible member of my pack, greatly honoring those who hunt with me. As a person I'm not exactly optimistic but definitely not pessimistic either. I don't stress about things, cause I always know I can sort them out eventually and when I truly set my mind to doing something I pursue my goal like a wolf pack pursues its prey. I follow the social principle of mutual fairness and respect. My core philosophy can be expressed as "Know what you want and work towards it. If you don't you have no right to complain about your part."
This aspect of me is the most important for myself. I divide my design philopsophy into two parts: there's content and there's mechanics. In my philopsophy, the latter always supports the former but either of these can be my starting viewpoint for a design. For my designs, theme is important and it sets the atmosphere of the game and this atmosphere is sacred - everything in the game that breaks it must go. If the game is more mechanic-oriented, this rule might be weaker but I still prefer to hold on to it. Whereas theme is important to give the game strong atmosphere, mechanics are there to make the game fun to play. In my view, fun to play means fair but challenging. I highly dislike illogical "secrets" in games as well as hidden mechanics that are not fully explained to the player (imagine playing a boardgame without full knowledge of the rules). I like to give my players the tools they need to meet the challenge that my game provides, without forcing them to read through dozens of unofficial guides. The player's own skill should always be the deciding factor, not his ability to stumble upon some secret information accidentally.
My design history reaches all the way back to the beginning of 90's when for the first time I figured I want to create my very own pen and paper roleplaying game system. Of course, as you might well imagine, with all the patience of a ten-year old the project really didn't get anywhere. With age comes knowledge and patience however, and I did indeed finish my first RPG system a few years later. This wasn't of course very impressive either but we played it, and it was fun at the time. There were other silly designs which were either extensions of commercial systems, or my very own creations but none of these seem very impressive these days, as you might've guessed. Some of things on the other hand did stick, and indeed, it was during these years that I started the design of my very first serious game world. At the late 90's I actually managed to do a rather working system and create another world which I'm still holding on to. All this time I was interested in computer game design as well, but didn't have either the knowledge or patience to learn game programming. When I started my university studies at 2001 to get a master's degree in information technology one of the main reasons was to learn programming proper. Well that didn't turn out as neatly as I had thouhgt but at least all this time I have been designing games or game worlds. Now as the end of my studies I actually, finally do know some programming but I'm even more design-oriented as I was in the beginning. So, I don't think I'll ever be a game programmer but the dream of becoming a designer is just growing stronger and stronger.
I write several kinds of things: fiction, articles, music reviews and game guides. Out of these I feel I should be writing way more fiction and reviews that I'm doing right now. Fiction in itself is very important to me. My stories are often dark, even violent and cruel. Insanity and other dark sides of the human mind are typical themes in my writings but my characters aren't just raving lunatics or slaves of desire. I would rather call them either lost or insightful, depending on the point I'm trying to drive through with the story. I draw my inspiration from music, especially intriguing song titles or lyrics, and my stories are usually loaded with emotional content while the story itself is but a framework. I focus on people, picking only a few central pieces for my stories and telling the story through them. This kind of human drama is what I enjoy most as a reader as well so I guess it's natural for me to write it. I am actually kind of interested in play writing because it is one of the most interesting ways to portray drama that focuses around people and its limitations are an interesting challenge. Might as well stop here and let my works speak for me. Shortly about reading: I don't read much.
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Favourite authors: Douglas Adams, Robert E. Howard, George R.R. Martin
Favourite books: Kalevala, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, The Song of Ice and Fire saga
Gaming is hands down my most favourite activity. Especially if there's a social aspect involved. Computer games, console games, board games, card games, miniatures and role-playing games are all on my list. To start with one category, I'll go deeper into computer and console games first. The genres I'm into are (Japanese) RPG, Strategy/Tactics, Fighting and Action. As a player I'm rather fanatic, typically not content with just finishing a game. Most of the time I want to do face every challenge a game has to offer if it can be done within reasonable amount of time (several hundred hours). Overall I like my games challenging as long as they are fair. My RPGs should be served with interesting characters with some depth to them. Out of computer games, I typically like my fighting games social and the rest enjoyed mostly alone. I consider myself a serious fighting game player and if I had more resources (i.e. time and money) I would be travelling around looking for opponents and tournaments. I'm also highly intrigued by horror games and while I rarely play them (need to be in the right mood), I'm totally enthusiastic about them.
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Favourite RPGs: Xenogears, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 & 4, Star Ocean: Till the End of Time, Planescape: Torment
Favourite strategy: Heroes of Might and Magic 3, Alpha Centauri, Total Annihilation
Favourite fighting: Virtua Fighter 5, Soul Calibur IV, Tekken 5 Dark Resurrection
Favourite action: Devil May Cry series
Favourite horror: Project Zero series
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About board, card and miniature games, I like 'em rough. I enjoy cracking my brain planning moves and figuring out what my opponents are up to. Strong theme in a game is always a plus, but hardly necessary if there's intense competition going on. I'm more into mind games than number crunching, but both are good to go. Some people complain I don't know how to play just for fun, but for me, the challenge is the fun. Light-hearted, non-serious gaming isn't really my thing. I do enjoy cooperative games though, if the game itself is challenging enough.
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Favourite board games: Descent: Journeys in the Dark, A Game of Thrones, Battlestar Galactica
Favourite card games: Tichu, Once Upon a Time, Dominion
Favourite miniature games: Battlefleet Gothic, Warhammer 40,000
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For role-playing games, I enjoy all kinds as long as the company is good. Just like in works of fiction, I also enjoy human drama most in role-playing games and while game mastering, I put a lot of emphasis on relations between the player characters as well as non-player characters. I usually play either fantasy or science fiction. I typically game master games in my own settings, using whatever rule system I find suitable.
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Favourite game systems/settings: TriStat dX, World of Darkness
I draw a lot of inspirational strength from music. Most of the stuff I listen to ranges from sad to grim, but there are some rather interesting exceptions. I have a tendency to like music that kind of goes nowhere. Slow music with little changes is something I enjoy quite often but overall I listen to whatever fits the mood I'm in. By looking through my album collection, one might get the impression that my mood is most of the time rather grim but that's not exactly true. It's just that the darker atmospheres get through to me rather easily. If we go into genres, most of the stuff I listen to is some kind of metal but there's also rock, jazz, electric etc. I don't disregard anything based on genre alone but there are certainly things that I consider big turn-offs. Too technical progressive metal (aka instrumental wanking) is one of these, and irritating vocalists are another. I like to be rather analytic about music, which led me to start writing album reviews to the internet.
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Absolute favourite artists: Neurosis, Shiina Ringo
Links of interest:
Korroosio - Here's where my reviews have been published
My RateYourMusic.com page - A wider view to my taste in music
Save the least for last. Not to say movies and TV series don't play a huge part in my life but if I had to give up one, these would go. I like my movies how I like my music: slow-paced and atmospheric. More or less same goes for TV series. I enjoy intelligent movies with either interesting characters or an intriguing theme but also some that are just fun to watch. I know a movie has been great if it has either affected my mood greatly, inspired me in some way or turned my brain inside out. These days I'm more into TV series though, because their longer duration allows the characters to grow way beyond what they can ever be in movies. I also have to confess that I like anime as well.
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Favourite directors: Akira Kurosawa, David Lynch
Favourite movies: Shichinin no Samurai, The Godfather, Lost Highway
Favourite TV series: Gilmore Girls, Twin Peaks, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly
Favourite anime: X TV, Rurouni Kenshin