Series FMHVibe interviews Pablo Marquez

[Dec]

Hi Pablo thank you for agreeing to do this interview.

Firstly please can you sum yourself up for people who may not have heard of you.

My name is Pablo Marquez, I joined SI about 8 months ago to work as platform programmer. I've been working mainly on FMH and Android.

I'm a massive fan of Football Manager. I think the first time I played the game I became instantly hooked. My first experience with the game was in 1993 on my AMIGA 500. After that, I played pretty much all the versions on different platforms: DOS/Windows/Mac/IPHONE.

I've spent so much time playing the game that at some point I was seriously worried about it. Playing the game too much was affecting my performance at the school and later at the university. For example, when I was in my first year at the university I showed the game to a friend and that was a big mistake; from that moment on, we got together to play the game as much as possible. Our addiction to that particular version of the game reached unacceptable levels for both of us: my friend would stay all night playing the game with me and then go to his job without sleeping anything and I would skip calculus and algebra lessons to have more time to play the game. We kept playing like that for some time but eventually we had to stop and take care of other things.

Needless to say my friend is still playing the game, though not as much as in the good old days.

Eventually, after much playing games, I wanted to make my own games and that's how I got into learning how to make them.

While I was at the university I made a game that became very popular in my country and other Spanish speaking countries, it was an online role playing game called "Argentum Online". That was a great experience and opened many new opportunities for my career. Eventually I got a job in the games industry and I've been working on games for a few years now.

What is it like working on Football Manager?

Personally, working on Football Manager is fulfilling a childhood dream.

I grew up playing this game and I remember during all these years I've always had a strong desire to improve the game. Back then if you asked me how I would improve the game I could actually tell you exactly what I would do. The funny thing is that all those silently wished features eventually were implemented during the following years. Sports Interactive has done an excellent job during all these years, I think FM13 is the best iteration of the game. Nowadays it is not so easy to answer a question like "how would you improve the game?" because FM has pretty much everything all their fans wanted to see in the game.

What do you think the most rewarding part of the job is?

I feel really lucky to have been given the chance to work with people that I admire (SI's team) and it's very rewarding to work on my favourite game.

If you could give a person one tip for getting into games development what would it be?

Sometimes people underestimate what they can do on their own. I think the best way to get into games development is to find friends/people with common interests and work hard to create a game. This will involve many hours of research, learning and hard work. If you do it, if you manage to build a game in this way, you will have done the first step into games development.

From then on, the choice is yours: create your own company or get a professional job in the industry.

To get a job in the game industry:

Learn what are your strong skills that might be valuable in the industry and work very hard to improve them as much as possible. If you want to be a programmer, get a degree in computer sciences from a good university, it'll give you a great technical background that will be very much appreciated by all companies (all industries) when you have to look for a job.

No matter what you choose, be aware that you will have to work very hard and this fact doesn't have to discourage you.

Who do you support in real life?

I support many teams, but the closest one to my heart is "San Lorenzo de Almagro". San Lorenzo have won the Argentinean premier league 10 times, but in the present the team is struggling to avoid the relegation.

Other teams I support are: Rosenborg in Norway and Bordeaux in France. I lived in Norway and France and I went to their stadiums to see them play football.

Who are you currently managing in FMH2013?

In the past I played FMH12 on the IPHONE with Sheffield Wednesday, that didn't go very well

At the moment I'm playing only FM13 Classic with CHESTER. In the first season I won the "Blue Square Bet North" and I'm not doing too bad in the second season in the "Blue Square Bet Premier".

I really enjoy FMC and I think it's very good.

Feel free to add me as a friend on steam: morgolock

I very much look forward to playing FMH13 on my S3, I usually choose lower league teams as you might have noticed. Only real challenges for me :-)

What is your favourite part of FMH?

The fact that you have it in your pocket and you can play it anytime no matter where you are.

If you were a player in FMH2013 what would your best attribute be?

Difficult question, I don't really know the answer

I guess it would change from save to save, but it would be one of these: teamwork, technique or leadership.

Can you tell us your favourite FMH related story please?

For my holidays, on December 2011, I went to the north of Norway with my girlfriend. We took a train from Trondheim to Bodø, we arrived to Bodø on the 24th of December. It was raining and very windy, all the shops were closed and there was absolutely nothing to do.

The problem was that to leave the city we had to wait two days to get a flight to our final destination Tromsø.

This was the perfect opportunity to play FMH. To the amazement of my girlfriend I got my phone out of my pocket and started a new save with Sheff Wed, I played a few seasons but I eventually got sacked.

Do you have any secret tips for managing a club in FMH?

Not really. Enjoy the game!

Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions and we wish you luck in the future for FMH2013's release, FMHVibe.co.uk

Thank you! It was great talking to you.

This post has been promoted to an article

[zelatansyedmovic]

Great interview

I will love to see more interviews here.

[Franco]

Helps create FMH, respect gained. Plays as Wednesday, respect lost.

[MisterZhifei]

Yeah, I agree with zelatansyedmovic, I'd love to see more like this.

Seems like a nice guy, but at first I was disappointed as I thought it said Rafael Marquez!

[Dec]

We have done these interviews before with Miles, Marc and Stu.