It’s always good to welcome a new dev to the RIFT team, but it’s especially fun when it’s someone you feel like you already know. Long-time player RoughRaptors (now to be known as SupermanSocks), a very vocal member of the Community, was a familiar face for us here on the team. When his resume slid across our desks, we were very excited to bring him into the fold.
Now that RoughRaptors has settled in, Community Manager Ocho sat down to grill him ask him a few questions about what it’s like to have his dream job!
Ocho: How long have you been playing RIFT?
RR: I tried RIFT in one of the beta events, although I can’t remember which. I started playing seriously day one of Head Start, which was February 24th, 2011 I think? So about three and a half years and still going strong!
Ocho: How did you find out about RIFT? What made you want to start playing?
RR: I found out about RIFT through another MMO actually. My guild at the time was going to switch to RIFT, and I decided to join them. I didn’t know much about the game to start, but soon became interested in the versatility of the Soul system, which is something I had never seen before in an MMO. It didn’t take long to learn more about aspects (both PvP and PvE) within the game I thought sounded like fun. I decided to follow my guild and give it a try … and fell in love.
Ocho: What’s your history with RIFT, what are some of your favorite moments in game?
RR: I can definitely say I have a very long and rich history within the game of RIFT. I started in a very small, unknown guild before being recruited into a larger progression raiding guild around June of 2011, <Breaking Bads> (BB). That’s when my hardcore raiding history for RIFT started. This was a very tight-knit, friendly group of people. It was easy to get hooked on the content because we were such close friends and had so much fun together (even while progressing on new content).
After BB disbanded, I was still hooked on raiding. I moved up into a larger guild <No Quarter>, and despite much controversy, we became the top guild in the world at the end of Chocolate RIFT. Along the way, I realized that being a not-so-nice person in RIFT was, well … not so nice. I had a major attitude adjustment both in-game and in real life (and have become a nicer and more helpful person for it).
I left the guild shortly after Storm Legion was released due to some internal political disagreements for another raiding guild, <Addiction>. Recently, the RIFT section of <Addiction> was disbanded, and I moved on to my current guild, <Vendetta>.
Needless to say, I’ve had my ups and downs being in so many guilds over the years, especially with how guild politics can sometimes be near the top-end, but I’m still here and doing my best when it comes to new content coming out. Back to BB, though: we joked around a ton, we sang songs after important boss kills, we even had a musician in the guild and he would sing songs during raids and play the guitar, and it was absolutely hilarious to listen to and raid at the same time. I guess I could go with the typical “My favorite moment was when we world first-ed X boss”, but in reality, it was when I was with my friends. That’s all anyone should need in an MMO to keep them going – a strong set of friends.
Of course I’ve done more than raid with my time in RIFT. I helped test new content before it was released to the public, wrote a lot of Warrior guides, streamed via Twitch, and created YouTube videos (including a new series that just concluded Tier 2 boss guides, RawRR: Raiding along with RoughRaptors). I also spent a lot of time talking to the developers, giving constructive criticism regarding aspects of the game that they wanted to be tested.
Ocho: How have you changed over the course of playing RIFT?
RR: I’ve changed a lot. If you knew me at the launch of RIFT, you might have noticed I was a little rough around the edges. I was a bit of a troll. Over time, I sort of mellowed out and realized that I should focus more on being constructive and helping others, as trolling kept people from taking what I said seriously. This transition happened around the release of Free-to-Play, so you can say that I went from “RR#1TrollWorld” to the person I am now in the span of about two years.
Now I try to give as much constructive feedback as possible, I write guides to help new players, I answer PMs in-game and on the forums, and post video guides to help out players progressing in raid content. I mean, sure, some troll still exists in me, but really who doesn’t have a little bit of troll living inside?
Ocho: What made you want to become part of the RIFT team?
When I was a kid, my dad and I would play games together, and by kid, I mean child – about three or four years old. He started me off on the good stuff: Doom, Wolfenstein, Duke Nukem … what 4-year-old could pass up on those kinds of games?
I’ve been a gamer ever since, and straight out of high school I went off and got an Associate’s Degree in Game Development. With that experience, I decided to continue my education toward a degree in Computer Science. During college, I played many, many MMOs, and RIFT was what really stuck with me. This was only enhanced by the RIFT team and Trion in general, though. After playing so much and getting to know the developers through testing, podcasts, and streams, I learned a bit about the culture here and what it’s like. Everyone was nice, everyone was willing to listen to
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