Rick has announced his retirement. He will take questions from the media at this point.


Reporter Alpha: Rick, this comes as a surprise. Your known to make rash decisions, is this one of them?

Ric: …
I see my reputation precedes me. Indeed, I agree that I am the biggest flip flop to hit the big time since John Kerry, but this decision was not made in an acute moment in time, but rather thought about over a few weeks.


Reporter Bravo: Never the less, you were quite smitten by Project Reality, you have even spent time writing protocols and giving feedback to the players and developers. Why retire now?

Ric: The reasons are two fold.
1. RL stuff needs a lot of focus at this point. Starting a business in the first quarter of 07.
2. With the sudden serge of Armed Assault, I’ll be spending my free time reviewing the game and learning the layout of the island and that sort of thing. Essentially, I am selling my BF2 stocks in order to download the most shares from Armed Assault one day. Does that make sense?


Media: …

Rick: Plus I had to uninstall the game after it rejected the latest patch, and that was three weeks ago. So It is easy to hold out when the game is unassessable.

Reporter Charlie: So you will be playing Armed Assault. When?

Ric: Most likely in the early spring of 07. First I’ll wait for the U.S. version and go from there. Hopefully RL social recreational activities will be more tempting than setting in a chair for hours. Granted I consider the social aspects the same, but I like to move around.

Reporter Delta: Will you be playing any other games in the meantime?

Ric: Negative.


Reporter Bravo: What were your favorites aspect towards BF2?

Ric: The human concept of course. This was my first on-line game, so this was like adding a fourth dimension.
Once I stumbled into the TG community, the aspect of playing with competent/ mature players who leaned more toward a simulated type of gameplay really illuminated this fourth dimension. Indeed, until then I was ready to hang the game up.

When or lose, I enjoyed playing with humans who were having fun match after match.

I also enjoyed the scrims. IMO, planning the tactics with comrades and studying your area of operations and what equipment you will have is some fun role-playing, and more fun than playing the game itself.


Reporter Delta: any particular scrim moment you remember or care to share?

Ric: Best moment would be at the Mash pit with the Global Conflict scrim. The Platoon leader, Santa, gave the Irreg squad a raid mission. The mission was to fly the Seahawk over to Power plant and acquire the T-90.
I gave the percentage of success rate at 20%. But with planning and preparation we did it, and with help of Aries of course.
After giving the tank to Snail, so that he would prevail, we moved to our next AO.

Furthermore, I enjoyed the TGvsTG Tac Mod scrim. I was disappointed in the turn out, blasted PoE2 did that, but we had a very immersive three games, with Wake Island being awesome and memorable.

Lastly one time, on a casual night I was the only player left and captured a flag giving the team a spawn point. That was neat.

Reporter Charlie: But Ric, it is common for the opposite team to allow this so that the game continues.

Ric: …

No, no, not this particular occasion. I checked the AAR. Next question.

Media: …


Report Echo: Ric, you commonly speak of Aires. How much do you believe the “gaming gods” play into the game.

Ric: Tons. Let’s go back to the raid mission I just described. The first live ‘spawn in’ was waved off. I had spawned in at a location farthest from the chopper, thus ruining the raid. The second live spawn, I was less than thirty meters form the chopper. So unlike Old Ben would have you believe, I believe luck plays a role in a warrior’s ability to get the damn job done.


Reporter Foxtrot: What will you not miss, Ric?

Ric: prone spamming, jets that move very slowly yet do not fall, gunships that are impervious to small arm fire, not being able to see more than 200 meters on a clear day, bunny hopien, medic saturation, and immature gamers. The game design allows players to not be dependent on other members in the platoon to get the job done. The more I think about it, I really should have gone with a different game and researched this more.

Reporter Foxtrot: /looks at notes and says: What about scanner and uav? You b. and moaned about that for some time. In fact here is a quote from when you first found about this aspect. ‘Ahh man, the scanner totally negates the sniper nest, ahh WTF.’

Ric: Yeah, good intell, but my last vanillia game was months ago, so I have been playing other mods and have stay way from arcade land. Next question.

Reporter: Alpha: Any bad moments in a scrim?

Ric: Yeah, the I. Forest TG vs. TG scrim. My sound system was on the fritz so I could only hear VOIP messages and not the sound on the battleforrest . The coolness of that map allowed six flags as CBs. The enemy COs [Sassy, The Dude, LuckyShot] wisely chose to hold three flags and crowd the frontline, thus allowing a would be assaulting team to go on defense. The village flag was known as the meat grinder, and I was thoroughly minced.

Reporter Delta: /looks at notes. Ric, we do not have “The Dude” down in our CO logs or any were else. Could you clarify that?

Ric: Yeah, The Dude stays on the down low, next question.


Reporter Bravo: Any regrets before hanging up the boots:

Ric: Without a doubt not leading a TG Platoon into battle against another faction.
I had my chances but did not take them.

Plus, I have made rash decisions that would be described as Immature. That bothers me. Evidently I have a wee bit of a Napoleon complex so I get pissed when I, thinking I have paid my dues, and get disrespected when I believe I am in the right.

Reporter Bravo: Ric, your 5 foot 3 in RL, why would you not have a Napoleon complex?

Ric: …

Media: …



Reporter Charlie: There are rumors of a re match with the BF2C faction, would you be interested in coming out of retirement for that.

Rick: I have been spending these last few weeks down at the Irreg ship located in the TG port waiting for my discharge papers, so I have heard nothing of these rumors.
To answer, negative, after watching the footage, that is a big negative. That type of gameplay is unattractive to me.

Reporter Delta: What will you take from BF2 in your RL aspects?

Ric: Good question. The biggest thing is to step up and get a handle on things, cause if you do not, then maybe no one does.
Treat strangers with respect and try to be a team player. This is the best way to befriend others and network. People remember when you do them right. Actually playing the game has improved my RL confidence. So that is good.

Reporter Delta: What will you take to the Island at Armed Assault?

Ric: … everything E-Male taught me.

Reporter Delta: Any thing specific?

Ric: The games are so different… I reckon it would be the basic blocking and tackling and small squad mechanized/fluid movements learned at BF2. Sadly, BF2 is made to be played without infantry squads working together, but rather separate in other AOs. So Armed Assault will be a different animal altogether.

Reporter Alpha: Will you be spending some time in the TG Forums after retirement?

Ric: I am trying to get my post per day down, but I’ll most likely keep giving more reputation to Steeler and his posts to keep me occupied while on the forums.


Reporter Charlie: Any last words?

Ric: Here’s to 2007 baby! Thanks TG for a good tour of duty.

/all smiles
/Ric waves goodbye and exits.