“They’re Paying Me to Do This? Cool!”
I’m pleased as punch to provide to y’all our interview with industry icon Rebecca Ann Heineman — a co-founder of Interplay, current head of Olde Sküül Games, and a woman with a hand in countless hundreds of games over the course of a nearly forty year career. Needless to say, we specifically chose to bother her with questions regarding one of her least-flattering / most infamous projects: The 3DO’s crippled conversion of DOOM, published by Art Data Interactive in 1995. Of course, we inquired about a range of other subjects and points in time from her career as well, so as not to make her hate us completely. Joking aside, it turned out to be an awesome and insightful interview, and her willingness to make herself so accessible / open with details of her life and career was hugely appreciated.
In a first for us, this interview was conducted over a call on Discord, and summarily required editing on my part to include some visual accompaniments / to fill in for some technical errors on my end. It’s also a format that requires transcribing to text on my end, for the benefit of those who can’t access or parse the original audio for themselves. But with this more direct line of communication; we did gain the abilities to further explain some of our odder questions, to follow up more immediately to some of Becky’s answers, and to even crack each other up a good handful of times over the course of the hour. I’m not sure as of yet that this’ll be the preferred format moving forward for future interviews, but I’ve certainly taken note of some of the benefits (as well as the drawbacks, in the form of how much more work it entails on my end). In any case, I do hope that it makes for informative and entertaining viewing, and that our conversation helps to shed some light on the details of Rebecca’s historic career and works.
A word of warning: There will be accounts of some distressing experiences in this interview. Rebecca’s story of recognizing her gender identity from a young age, being made to run away from home, and surviving / escaping from poverty may hit close to home for some, and be seen as potentially triggering. Mrs. Heineman shares these stories in the hopes of providing a personal context, as well as potentially inspiring and encouraging folk in similar situations to what she once endured. Her work on the board of directors for GLAAD in the past several years should additionally speak to her advocating for and supporting fellow transgender individuals, and serve to highlight the ability of queer folk to persevere through adversity in order to lift each other up and effect change — within our industry and beyond. Becky is a true unsung hero of the game development business, and it’s our personal hope that her life story serves as a shining example of where talent and tenacity can take you, even in the face of detractors and tough obstacles along the way.
I would also use this space to make an additional ask: That when referring back to the histories and life events of trans folk before they were able to present with their chosen names and pronouns, that their current names and pronouns should still be used retroactively, in order to respect and honor their preferred identities. It’s a subject which we discuss during the course of the interview, and which Becky is uniquely entitled to weigh in on; given her deadname being a matter of credited record, her attempts to distance herself from it as early as the 1980s, and the penchant of some her detractors to insist on addressing her by these out-of-date identifiers — as an attempt to degrade and invalidate her. But Becky does not suffer fools, and raises some compelling arguments against these bad faith conventions.
A full text transcript of this interview will eventually be provided here. It’s simply a matter of my needing to put in the work of typing it all out myself. Please to bear with me, folks.
Rebecca can be found on Twitter at @BurgerBecky, on YouTube as ‘RebeccaHeineman,’ and at her personal webpage; www.BurgerBecky.com. She currently owns and operates Olde Sküül Games, as well as updating her webcomic Sailor Ranko.
