Who was Maurice Hale?

[Quasar]

If you take a look at the back of the original Doom instruction manual, someone named Maurice Hale is listed alongside Shawn Green as "testing and technical support."

I can't find any information on this guy. Usual go-to places like MobyGames have nothing. I don't even remember this guy being mentioned in Masters of Doom, even though it goes as far to mention how frustrating Kevin, Adrian, and Romero's self-invented sport of "office destruction" was for Donna Jackson.

Anybody have a clue?

EDIT: Couple of facts...

• Was possibly sysop of a Dallas BBS called "Professional Manuscripts"
  
• This was apparently already an FAQ in rec.games.computer.doom.misc back in 1994
  

[Xaser]

Alternative thread title: Who the hale is Maurice?

[Linguica]

I searched Google Groups feel like this has gotta be the same guy, right? Dallas-Fort Worth area in 1994?

=============================================================================
* Forwarded by Maurice Hale (1:124/1205)
* Area : DFW_OS2 (DFW_OS2)
* From : Maurice Hale, 1:124/1205 (19 Jul 94 22:43)
* To : All
* Subj : Boot Manager and Dos 6.0
=============================================================================
Hello All!

I have a rather interesting dilemma. I have 2 hard drives 1) 345 partitioned
into drives C: (101-FAT) and E:(227MB HPFS), and 2) 170mb partitioned into drives D: (97mbFAT) and F:(65mb HPFS). I am using Boot Manager and would like to know if I can boot DOS 6.0 using the Boot Manager.

Currently, I have drive C: setup for DOS, and drive F: running OS/2. This doesn't work, drive F: boots OS/2 fine without a hitch, however when I boot drive C: (MSDOS), I get "Non-system Disk...". I _know_ that the C: is formatted for DOS, because I am able to boot with it, when I disable the Boot Manager, by setting the C: partition active. :(

When I first went to OS/2 I had my system set up to do this, and it was working, but at that time I only had 1 HD, partitioned into 2 drives with one running HPFS, and the other FAT. Now this doesn't work.

HELP !!

If you can help, my Internet address is:
mauric...@aries.dhs.texas.gov

Thanks in advance.
Maurice

[Linguica]

Also here's someone asking the same question in 1996 lol https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.games.computer.quake.playing/pxjn1b4WRck/cEgck1Y1Ma8J

[fraggle]

"Testing" implies he was a tester, possibly tasked with playing the game and find bugs.

"Technical support" suggests he was maybe helping customers fix problems - perhaps phone support? Id actually had a tech support phone number that was listed in helpme.txt:

Technical Support: 303-339-7111
(7AM - 11PM, 7 days a week, Closed holidays)

My guess is that he was a general dogsbody hired to do non-technical work. Id was a pretty small company and I guess they put him in the credits just so that he'd feel part of the team.

[GreyGhost]

fraggle said:

My guess is that he was a general dogsbody hired to do non-technical work. Id was a pretty small company and I guess they put him in the credits just so that he'd feel part of the team.

I'm sort of leaning towards the "general dogsbody" theory, since I have a slightly later version of the instruction manual (with SKINFACE on the back cover instead of plain black) which credits Shawn Green and David Osborn for testing & tech support.

Who was David Osborn?

[Doominator2]

GreyGhost said:

Who was David Osborn?

Well, now you've raised a whole different thread topic.

[FireFish]

Linguica said:

I searched Google Groups feel like this has gotta be the same guy, right? Dallas-Fort Worth area in 1994?

An e-mail address ending in .gov seems so out of place for such things...
The GOV was on to DOOM and made it into middle-east-simulator 2.5d.gov i tells ya ! >:]

[Memfis]

Eventually we will go after all the janitors that worked at id in the past.

[jmickle66666666]

we gotta dox everyone who worked on doom

[dew]

Memfis said:

Eventually we will go after all the janitors that worked at id in the past.

Bonus points for also getting them deported.

[ASD]

Linguica said:

Also here's someone asking the same question in 1996 lol https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.games.computer.quake.playing/pxjn1b4WRck/cEgck1Y1Ma8J

Hello RRWARD.

[Clonehunter]

I don't know, this is a fairly interesting topic. If he was bug hunting, he could have found some game breakers and saved the game we all know and love. I suppose Osborn too.

[Maes]

Memfis said:

Eventually we will go after all the janitors that worked at id in the past.

Rumor has it that Doomguy's character was inspired after a janitor. Hmm......could....could it be?!

[Du Mhan Yhu]

Hello,

I was as surprised as you to hear the name Maurice Hale, so I opened up an original registered copy of DOOM from 1993 and took a picture of the credits page, which was the back of the manual. The page you saw is probably from the Australian distributor Manaccom who carried DOOM many months after we published it (in 1994, basically). You can see the manual back art is black on the Manaccom version.

Maurice was a temp tech support guy we had for a few months in 1994. He took American McGee’s place after we moved American onto the DOOM II team in 1994. If you look carefully you’ll see our credit list was always “id Software is…” instead of “DOOM was made by…”. This wording allowed us to describe who was working on a game at that time instead of giving credit to who created the actual product – a really bad choice in my opinion. Otherwise, we would have had Special Thanks to Tom Hall in the DOOM manual.

Paul Radek’s name is misspelled on the Australian box, too.

Regards,

John
----------------------------------------------------
John Romero
Romero Games LLC
john@romero.com
Ben Lomond, CA

Edit: Attached in the email was this aswell;

http://i.imgur.com/rXtQ2eQ.jpg

[GreyGhost]

I might well have got my manuals mixed up at some point, but this is what's currently in my Manaccom Doom box. There's a second copy in one of my mail order boxes with an invoice dated 10 Feb 94.


(1100x1700 - 515k)

[Quasar]

GreyGhost said:

I might well have got my manuals mixed up at some point, but this is what's currently in my Manaccom Doom box. There's a second copy in one of my mail order boxes with an invoice dated 10 Feb 94.

Could I get you to take a good pic of the front of that? :P I have some fixing to do on the wiki with this info.

Thanks for the help guys.

[Du Mhan Yhu]

Rofl, I just noticed the manuals in mine and GreyGhost's posts differed.


Edit: Does anyone have a photo of the Paul Radek misspelling?

[RUSH]

So wait, let me get this straight. Maurice is only on the back credits for the Australian release manual and no other? Also, which manual does David Osborn appear on and what did he do?

[Du Mhan Yhu]

RUSH said:

So wait, let me get this straight. Maurice is only on the back credits for the Australian release manual and no other? Also, which manual does David Osborn appear on and what did he do?

Awaiting that response as we speak, I'll post it once it comes.

[GreyGhost]

Quasar said:

Could I get you to take a good pic of the front of that? :P I have some fixing to do on the wiki with this info.

Here you go, I scanned my second copy which has fewer creases. It's the same basic black background with the only noticeable difference being the letters "TM" next to the logos, which suggests I've got my manuals mixed up at some point, since I don't think the id Software logo was registered in Australia at that point in time, though the Doom logo was. Apologies for the white wedge in that scan, someone did a halfhearted job of trimming the manual square.


(1100x1700 - 234k)

Du Mhan Yhu said:

Edit: Does anyone have a photo of the Paul Radek misspelling?

Here you go. Probably the tattiest Doom manual in my collection.


(1090x1705 - 301k)

RUSH said:

So wait, let me get this straight. Maurice is only on the back credits for the Australian release manual and no other?

That's how it appears to be.

Also, which manual does David Osborn appear on and what did he do?

The mail order manual (AFAIK), Testing & Tech Support.

[VGA]

You guys ... are crazy!!!

[fraggle]

Somewhere out there, a former id Software temp is getting on with his life, completely unaware of the attention that a bunch of people are paying to his career from 20 years ago.

[Quasar]

fraggle said:

Somewhere out there, a former id Software temp is getting on with his life, completely unaware of the attention that a bunch of people are paying to his career from 20 years ago.

Just wanted to find out if he should have a page on the wiki ;) Probably not, based on this info (mention in the instruction manual article is worthwhile by itself).

Someday he'll google himself and have a good laugh when this shows up, probably.

[printz]

Quasar said:

Someday he'll google himself and have a good laugh when this shows up, probably.

I have a feeling his name is covered up by a sportsman, so he won't easily find himself unless it's the same guy.

[Du Mhan Yhu]

In response to David Osborn:

I wrote;
On Nov 29, 2014, at 12:10 PM, <Blanked@yahoo.com> wrote:

Now you've raised one final question;


Who was David Osborn? I'm assuming he had the same role as Maurice Hale?


Once again, thanks in advance.

-------------------------------------------------------
John wrote;

Yep, I believe so. He was very short term. He got sick constantly. ;)

John
----------------------------------------------------
John Romero
Romero Games LLC
john@romero.com
Ben Lomond, CA

Edit: Nothing really informative, still worth a post being from Romero, though.

[RUSH]

Ahh okay perfect. Thanks for the information guys. Always love learning new facts about Doom :)

[SYS]

Jammy Fliggins moved a single vertex om E1M3, lets find out his favorite flavor of ice cream and if he prefers boxers to briefs.

[Gez]

SYS said:

Jammy Fliggins moved a single vertex om E1M3, lets find out his favorite flavor of ice cream and if he prefers boxers to briefs.

Pistachio and commando.

[Maes]

Y'all behave like groupies that try to get pubic hair/cock photos/molds of their favorite rockstars :-p