Leandro Dubost & Lucas Metz aka Treeble
Leandro Dubost and Lucas Metz interviewed by Torry Gromball in July 2002

Torry: "What made you decide to try the level editor?"Lucas Metz

Lucas: "Obssession. I am so obssessed with Lara that I decided, after playing some of the custom levels, I wanted to create something. Then I started to make rooms in circles and the result was Young Driver, my first level ever. Nothing really good, but not that bad. I was proud of that, and nothing would change my mind. Did you know I never read the messages that Michael Prager posted on the forums, with titles like "Level listing sorted by Author" etc. I always thought: "Fool. He thinks he will be able to do it." But then, once again I was wrong. I went to check his site, and there it was, LOTS of levels I didn't have before knowing the address that now is "top of my mind": www.trle.net."

Niteroi

Leandro: "Since 1996, when I started to play Tomb Raider, I wanted to build tombs for Lara to raid. So, when Core Design released the level editor with Tomb Raider Chronicles, I started to build levels immediately."

Torry: "Do you have any prior programming knowledge or experience?"Caxias

Lucas: "No. I tried to use Turbo Pascal's unofficial editor before buying TR5 (I bought it only in April 2001). But, no success. I even asked for help, but it was simply too hard for me. I might go back one day..."

Leandro: "I almost can type something in MS Word!"

Torry: "Was the editor manual available in your own language? (which is Portugese I am told)"

Lucas: "No, it wasn't and is still not. I really doubt it will ever be. Actually, I didn't read that thing (that's why only two levels later lights would appear and only in my seventh level pulling a lever would show which door you just opened)."

Leandro: "Nope, but I could read it without problems."

Niteroi

Torry: "What, in your opinion designates a great level?"

Lucas: "Creativity and nice texturing. Good lighting helps too, but I actually don't mind about that."

Leandro: "Creativity."

Torry: "What is the hardest thing to do when designing a level?"

Lucas: "The hardest thing I am still to see (never did), and so I can't say what it is, but when I design my levels I usually have problems with the WAD creation -- that's simply boring and it becomes annoying after the first TRWest crash where you lose all your work."

Leandro: "Build rooms with a nice architeture (the level editor didn't help much here)."

Leandro Dubost

Torry: "What do you do when you are not level designing?"Caxias

Lucas: "I watch TV, study, eat (a lot), and sometimes I listen to some music (rave, dance and techno. Sometimes I listen to new metal)."

Leandro: "Playing games, reading books, sleeping..."

Torry: "Are you happy with the review process?"

Lucas: "Actually, no, I am not. Some criteria could be changed to better ones - but here lies the problem: if you change the criteria, all the reviewers would have to review everything again: about 7000 new reviews, only for some changes. Now it's too late."

Leandro: "Yes, I think I am."

Torry: "Do the both of you live in the same city and if not, where do you live and how did you meet?"

Niteroi

Lucas: "No. Leandro lives in Rio de Janeiro and I live in Rio Grande do Sul. We're very far, really far. We never met actually, but we know each other as if we were real life friends - at least, I think so. It's past one year we first exchanged e-mails, at that time, Theresa's forums were the best place to be and Leandro started Raiding Zone."

Leandro: "I live in Niteroi, Lucas in somewhere in the south of Brazil (I forget the city.... We met when I started my site Raiding Zone and Lucas asked if he could join the site team. I accepted, as you can see."

Torry: "Are you still at school and if so what year are you in and what are you studying?"The Quest for the Seraph 3 - by Leandro Dubost

Leandro: "I am, but I don't know how to tell you in wich year I am, because here in Brazil the grades are diferent from the USA, Europe, et cetera. But, in the brazilian grade, I'm in the 3rd year of the second grade. And I'm studying everything: biology, chemestry (argh!), maths, portuguese, geography, history, and a lot of others."

Vendetta - by Lucas Metz

Lucas: "Yes. As Leandro said, our school system is completely different from the others. I am also at the third year of the second grade, and this is the final one. There's also a third grade, but that depends on what you intend to be. I study about every subject, and that is simply boring... but I specially HATE Geography."

Torry: " I would say that they were in the final year of High School (ed)"

So these are our two Brazilian friends, who knows, maybe one day we can sit down with, have a beer and a yarn and say, remember the old editor forum???