The Making of Karateka

by Jordan Mechner

About this journal: My basic intention is to write down, at the end of each day, what happened — what I did, thought, felt, and so forth — so I can read it, years from now, and remember what it was like.

Basically, I want to write what I’ll want to read later. I’ll probably get better at that with practice.

April 15, 1982 At dinner Ben, Katie and I were talking about life goals and majors. Then, about an hour ago, up in Ben’s room, the idea hit me: What about being a writer? Instant reaction: You could never pull it off. Memory of Dad saying: “Writing’s very useful; it can help you in whatever you do.” The problem: Almost everybody fails. Can I write? Am I any good? Could I succeed? I could always do it on the side, say, while writing computer programs. Jeez, it’d be fun to write a short story. Just to try it. See how it works out.

For the last couple of hours I’ve been re-allocating my disk space, cramming as many games as possible onto each floppy disk and re-initializing others. It’s hot, messy, tedious work, even with FID. I wish I had two drives. Now I’ve got a lot of blank disks — but some may be years old, and I’m not so sure about their reliability. I wish all my disks were brand-new, clean, never-been-used (Dyson or Verbatim or Scotch – not Maxell). Neatly labeled, with no half-removed stickiness of previous labels underneath. My crazy perfectionistic mindset.

This afternoon the doorbell rang a whole lot of times and Emily didn’t get it, so I did. As I got to the door I thought: “Should I ask who it is before I open it? Oh well, if it’s a burglar, what’s he gonna do, force his way in?” So I just threw it open. It was a burglar. He was a big guy in a grey sweatshirt. He didn’t seem pleased to see me. “Uh,” he said, “do you need somebody to take care of your lawn?” He had a croaky, raspy voice. I said no. He left in a hurry. We don’t have a lawn.

February 16, 1983 Experiments I’d like to see done (if not actually do them): 1) Is beauty heritable? 2) Does chilling the skin increase susceptibility to pain? 3) What is motion sickness? 4) What is movie motion sickness?

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I’m glad I’ve been keeping this journal. Looking back, I realize I was pretty lonely and miserable most of freshman year. These are definitely the best times since I arrived at Yale.

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You know how banging your hand hurts more when it’s cold out than when it’s warm? The other day a possible explanation occurred to me: It’s not that your pain receptors are sensitized by cold. It’s that when it’s cold, you tend to hit things harder. Your hand is numbed by cold, so it takes a fraction of a second longer for you to realize you’ve banged it against the wall and withdraw it.

Moviemaking has been basically the same job, the same art form, since 1920. To help create a new art form that could become as ascendant as movies are now – now that’s a calling! And it’d suit my temperament perfectly. For the first time, I think I see a path ahead of me.

I must go for computing. Not only is it right at my fingertips, there for the taking, but it’s a booming field. Out of the explosion there must certainly come branches that will interest me. If I become a filmmaker, it would be too painful to watch neat-o things happening with computer graphics and video entertainment and realize I’d missed my chance to be part of it. Whereas if I go with computers, I can still admire and enjoy movies and get psyched about them as I do now. Perhaps I could even “go in the side door” with computer games/video games/“interactive movies” and get from that what I’d hoped to get from movies.

June 25, 1983 Reflections on Jedi, one month later: The principals – Luke, Han, Leia, even Darth – have lost their personalities. This is because each of them started out as a one-note caricature.

Luke lost his boyish competitiveness and grew up. Han lost his selfishness and became a caring human being. Leia lost her haughtiness and became kissable. Darth turned out to have some good in him after all. The trouble is, the faults these characters overcame were the only identifying characteristics they had. Without them, they lost their edge. Character development only works if the characters are develop-able.

OK: I won’t drop everything and try to make it as a director in Hollywood. I’ll stick with computers and get into Hollywood through the back door, so to speak, as computer programs become more and more like movies. But I’ll be keeping in touch with Hollywood all the while, through the film society, Insdorf’s courses, and whatnot. That’s my life plan.

Playing Choplifter (with Vanessa and David) to the Raiders soundtrack really impressed upon me the importance of music. It’s a shame there’s no way to put real music into video games. Maybe the CD players will make it possible. Till then, the Apple is hopeless; the Atari and coin-op games offer slightly better possibilities. In time, in time.

July 23, 1983 It’s been a Karateka day. I Versa’d and DRAXed all twelve BLOCK shapes. It really is a joy to work on something I enjoy working on. It seems too good to be true after Alphabet. I can’t wait to get up tomorrow morning and work on it some more.

When I think about movies, the film society, Yale, friends, girls, I immediately realize that to enjoy them, I’ll have to give up Karateka, even if only temporarily. “Working mode” really does have a destructive effect when it’s prolonged for more than a week or two. It dulls the world; it makes anything but the thing I’m working on lose its power to reinforce.

September 12, 1983 Browsed for an hour in Bookworld after dinner, bringing myself up to date on the latest developments in various technologies, and the latest opinions of various movie critics. An interview with George Miller in Starlog – “Anyone who wants to understand Star Wars should read The Hero With A Thousand Faces” – prompted me to buy the book. It’s hard reading; the guy [Joseph Campbell] is so erudite, his prose so ornate, his footnotes frequent and long. But it’s amazing stuff. I like it, I like it.

September 18, 1983 [Reflections after seeing Dumbo] I guess the secret is to have big, powerful, resonant themes underlying small, everyday, believable actions. If the themes are missing, you get a trivial, boring story. But if the actions are as grandiose as the themes, you get a myth, which is harder for contemporary audiences to identify with. What you need to do is translate the myth into modern, small-scale terms.

September 28, 1983 Tried to work on Karateka, but I just was not in the mood. This is not good. Should I force myself to just sit in front of the computer until it’s finished? I might end up hating it. But if I wait until the “mood” strikes me, I may never get back to it at all.

Remember at the end of the summer, Karateka was going to be my #1 priority? Instead, I’ve completely lost momentum. I’m at zero MPH. I have no clue where to start. The once-habitual behavior of booting up the program and getting to the current place now seems alien.

As long as the game is unfinished, there’s a shadow hanging over everything I do. I’m waiting for it to be done; I can’t let go and live life fully until it’s out of the way.

I’m living my life like someone trying to run without ever taking both feet off the ground at the same time. Always trying to come up with the best answer, the thing to do, without ever just letting go and saying “What the fuck!” and making something up and running with it and seeing where it takes me.

If I’m always afraid of doing the wrong thing, making a second-best move, I’ll never get anywhere. Some people sabotage their projects whenever they approach success. (I fought that demon and won.) Some people have unrealistically high hopes and keep crashing and burning. My demon is timidity. Chickenshithood, first degree. Do yourself a favor, J. Next time it occurs to you to do something scary, something that makes you quake in your boots – just fucking do it.

It’s just not possible to come up with a design that will please a theoretical target audience, like “If they liked Star Wars, they’ll love this.” As Gary aptly said once, almost angrily, when I remarked (about some proposed flaw in Karateka) something like “Oh, they won’t mind”: “Who are they? It’s us.” You can’t do good work in an art form you don’t love yourself. I still do, sometimes, really get into a video game – Lode Runner, Dr. Creep – and it’s that part of me that I’ve got to aim at pleasing. If I can’t satisfy myself, I won’t satisfy anyone else.