In the hot seat this week is Tony Yeboah, the slightly famous footballer. He’s retired these days, but bless him, he’s still a sprightly chap and here we go for a nice interview with him. On the other hand perhaps I’m making this up…
[drop2]Who are you, where are you and how old are you?
I’m Chris Eden-Pratt, I live in Hull (or ‘ull to the locals) and I’m 31 and a half.
Hell? Oh, sorry I read that wrong. Hull.
There’s no place like it… Honestly.
Indeed. Your TSA and PSN ID is hugely different to your actual name. What was the source of inspiration for you?
Well in the days of dial up, when I had a 14.4k modem, don’t you know, I needed an alias for my spangly new Yahoo! email account. I wanted to name myself after the greatest footballer (ever to come out of Ghana) ever, Tony Yeboah, but some git had beaten me to it!
So I shortened it to tonyyeb. And so it has been this for every other account I’ve created. Benefit is it is always available (though I know you will go round registering it before me now) but people always think I’m Chinese or something and that my real name is Tony.
So wait… You’re NOT chinese? But you always sound chinese when playing games…
With my lovely Yorkshire twang I’m sure you didn’t really think that.
You really have no idea how my mind does(n’t) work…
No one does.
Games! How did you first start playing games?
When I was 5 my brother had a Tandy TRS-80 which was quite simply amazing… in 1985. I would type in the games in the built in BASIC programming language from a code book and he would play them!
Gosh, you’re so old!
Yeah… But not as old as Ro6afc11!
True. The Grand Daddy of TSA… Which side did you choose to take in the Sega vs. Nintendo wars?
Well from the TRS-80 came a host of Spectrums (48, 128, +2, +2A, +3 – with the disk drive!), then I got the best games machine ever. An Amiga 500! Then a A600, CD32 and then onto PCs.
My first console was a PS1, out of the first batch. Again my brother had one and showed me Destruction Derby, and I was sold instantly. So to answer your question, neither!
Oh, an Amiga 500? So you’re all set for GTA V, then?
I loved that article just cause it mention the Amiga. I love them!
I’m sure plenty of the younger ones were just like “What’s a Miga?”
Yeah, and they probably Googled it without safe search on and found lots of Spanish ladies.
There’s worse things to find. So you got your PS1, and never looked back? Have you had anything but a Sony machine since then? Or just went through a PS2 and on to a PS3.
Got a PS2 just to play GTA 3. Had a Wii for a bit, but hasn’t just about everyone now?
The PS3 came after finding that my recently upgraded PC wouldn’t play GTA IV! In a fit of fury I put the parts of my PC up for sale and bought a PS3 and a copy of GTA IV. A moment of madness that actually turned out to be a sensible decision!
Which has been the most enjoyable GTA game so far for you?
Vice City, I’d have to say. The most nuts of all the GTAs.
To be honest, I’ve no idea about the 3D ones. They didn’t catch me the same way the old 2D ones did.
I tend to agree, but the depth of the newer ones is something else. Though, as you will have seen from my Twitter avatars, I like my retro gaming.
Indeed you do. You’ve got an old F1 game currently, isn’t it?
Yeah it is Geoff Crammond’s Microprose Grand Prix, a PC/Amiga game, still played by quite a few people!
Can it do online multiplayer?
I think I read about a hack that allowed it but at the time of release I think you could use a dial up modem on the PC version and only “take it in turns” on the Amiga version!
Ha! Really?
Yeah no way could anything handle split screens. You would do your 10 laps say while the AI drove your friends, then your friend would take over their car while the AI drove yours!
Still, a clever way around the limitation, I guess… What’s your favourite game of all time? would have segued to that, but I was feeling a little lazy.
Such a tricky question. Of all time it has to be Indy Heat on the Amiga, but of this generation it is Gran Turismo 5 and the game I’ve spent most time playing is Battlefield 2 on the PC. So a mixed bag…
Laziness to the rescue, so I won’t torture you for a more definitive answer than that. However, I will ask if you’ve played Battlefield 3, and how you think the game series has progressed/regressed?
On PC, BF2 was all about multiplayer. I don’t recall there being a single player. 98% of people who buy BF3 will be getting it for the MP (I know cc_star is in the 2% that hasn’t!). So while the single player isn’t great the MP is very good. Really enjoying it, especially when online with some TSA community peeps!
I believe the BF series was all bot matches offline until Bad Company came along. So yeah, BF2 was 100% multiplayer. I take it you’ve been playing on PS3, rather than PC,then?
Yeah my PC is a work laptop so its limited to the games it can run… I mean I’m not allowed games on it!
Is there anything good which you can categorically deny having played on there in recent times?
A free copy of Portal from Steam? But it really is limited to just my software development stuff.
OllyBobs
Nice to meet you Tonyyeb!
posem
it’s always good to meet another face behind a name! :D
Tomhlord
He’s right, paint is expensive…
tonyyeb
Damn right! B&Q Colours range isn’t bad and it goes on nicely ;)
Tomhlord
But a real-life TSA Go-Karting Meet….hell ys!
Tomhlord
*e
maneorix
Yes please. Just so I can beat Jambo again, outside of DiRT3, I don’t think I’ll be doing it anytime soon :(
tonycawley
Tonyyeb, aka the fake tony, aka tony 2 aka tony the 2nd. I’m the only real tony in these parts ;-)
tonyyeb
I admit it, I’m not really a Tony… I’m just an imposter. But imitation is the best form of flattery ;)
Ro6afc11
So it’s Sunday morning, the grandkids are running rings around me. I get 5 mins to have a sit down, browse through some news, sport & TSA. Oh look, Meet the Reader this week is tonyyeb, could be good. Hold on a minute, turns out I’m being used as some sort of benchmark for age. Well I hope you feel better about being so old but thankfully not as old as me :P
Was still a good read though I suppose.
tonyyeb
Sorry you became the butt of a joke Rob… But I was thinking of you when we did the interview… I asked Teffers to make the text in a nice large font for you ;)
spooferbarnabas
Good read, nice to meet you chris. A real life TSA go-karting meet would be great although i’d get battered as i’ve never done it before. I’d vote paintballing personally because i’m pretty damn good at that :)
tonyyeb
It would be great to do either or both! But at 13/14 stone I’m already at a disadvantage for karting… and at 6′ I stand out a bit in paintballing! Oh look at me making excuses already ;)
maneorix
Oh the fun of lapping you :D
G_The_Enemy14
Best one yet! My mum’s from hull so I kinda support them :D
gaffers101
Only 31 still a youngster!! Nice to find out a bit about buddy.
tonyyeb
Thanks but listening to some of the TSAgents chatting on Twitter about getting Uni and A-Level assignments in on time etc… Makes me nearly twice some of their age! Plenty of gaming left in this old boy!
Jumping Monks
I do enjoy reading these articles. No idea why, as I’ll instantly forget most things I read, and I’m never going to meet the people in question anyway. Still, good article this.