Podcast Interview: Faulconer Productions Music…

Lisa, from Faulconer Productions Music, talks about audio for indie games and the benefits specific music can have for a game…

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/faulconer-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/faulconer-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Rob from University of Advancing Technology…

Rob, from University of Advancing Technology, talks about game development at UAT

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/uat-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/uat-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Renee from SMU Game Development Guild Hall…

Renee, from the Guildhall at SMU, talks about game development at SMU

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/smuguildhall-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/smuguildhall-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Elisa from Digipen…

Elisa, from Digipen, talks about the benefits of Digipen

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/digipen-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/digipen-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Developing an MMO via Multiverse…

Allen, from Multiverse, talks about indies developing MMOs (PC, Browser-Based, etc.) really quickly 🙂

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/multiverse-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/multiverse-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Sam from Perforce Software — Source Control

Sam, from Perforce Software, talks about source control for indie game developers…

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/perforce-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/perforce-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Founder of FMOD…

Brett, founder of Firelight Technologies…makers of FMOD, talks about the benefits of FMOD…

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/fmod-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/fmod-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Deborah…Product Manager from Garage Games

Deborah, from Garage Games, talks about the benefits of the Torque Game Engine for Indie Game Developers…

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/garagegames-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/garagegames-podcast.mp3

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Podcast Interview: Zach from the UT Video Game Archive

Zach, from the UT Video Game Archive, talks about archiving video game history and how indie game developers can get their games archived…

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/gamearchive-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/gamearchive-podcast.mp3

Show Notes:
Interview with Zach, the archivist from the UT video game archive.

Interview was conducted at the Austin Game Developers Conference

Their purpose is to preserve and document game history, through preserving games as well as documents and materials that are produced in the process of game development.

They preserve games themselves as well as design documents, correspondence between different teams working on a game, conceptual art, audio files, and occasionally some actual code.
Since they are trying to build their collection now, it’s a little restrictive when the get stuff. They plan that once their collection gets a little bit more established they will open it entirely to the public. The public will be able to browse through the inventory lists and request items.
There is a website you can visit now to get abreast of what’s going on or to submit things:
http://www.cah.utexas.edu/projects/videogamearchive/

Recently the archive was sent a dvd from tangent games. On it was all the code to one of their games, along with design notes, artwork, different versions of the game, assets, and tools.

The design documents and hand written notes are what Zach considers the most interesting items to look at. The hand written notes let you see how the person thinks. The correspondence between different teams is also very interesting.

Warren Spector from Ion Storm sent a submission. Zach enjoyed looking at the design notes and seeing how much feedback he had gotten and seeing how Warren managed to synthesize it into one working design document.

www.utvideogamearchive.org (both links take you to the same page)

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Podcast Interview: Ryan talks about Designing Mushroom Men

Ryan, on the team of Mushroom Men, talks about designing for the Wii…

You can download the podcast here…
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/mushroommen-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/mushroommen-podcast.mp3

Show Notes:
You are listening to the Indie Game development Podcast show, visit www.indiegamepod.com for more podcasts. This interview is inspired by a quake meet up between the Austin Game Developers conference.

I’m here at Austin GDC, and with me is today’s special guest, how about you introduce yourself?

I’m Ryan Madison, the lead designer on Mushroom Men from Red Fly studio

And, what’s the game about and what platform is it on

Well the game is on Nintendo Wii and Mushroom and the Spore Wars, and its about a young mushroom name Axe who doesn’t really know where he is in the world or who he is or where he came from. He’s sort of exploring his identity and then he finds himself in the middle of the Spore Wars which is a war between edible mushrooms and poisonous mushrooms.

And what inspired the game?

Uh, the game was developed over a course of a couple of years by the founders of Red Fly studio Dan Warthik, Christ Taylor. They were really interested in doing a game that harkins back to the old platformers from the days past of Mario even up to the odd World Series. I’m just doing something that was a little but more quirky, a little bit more weird than usual and trying to create specially these interesting characters in a large human environment

Now, since you’re doing design, umm, I guess, what did you have to keep in mind as you were developing and designing for the Wii

One of the things we were trying to do is kind of hold to the core values we had for the game which was making really really cool environments in a combination of the human world and the mushroom world. And really pushing the players to explore the environment and to umm you know, not only explore the environment but the systems as well… have fun in the combat … and have fun trying to collect things through out the world. So, constantly thinking about those aspects and trying to make sure that the game was always focusing on one of those particular things was definitely something we kept in mind through out the development process.

What were some of the challenges you encountered as you designed levels for the game?

Well one of the biggest things we were trying to do is to diversify the environment a little bit, showing the large human world, the small mushroom environments as well as a combination of the two. Um, so trying to develop the scale at first was really difficult, but once we achieved that it was a matter of implementing the game play inside of that scale. One of the levels that is most fun for me is this large shed that you get to use your sticky hand tool in and that’s a great tool to use especially fun in that particular level is because it allows players to be so creative with what they do throughout the game or throughout the navigation in that particular area. So they get to move around, grapple a tight tool, and they get to move around the way they want to and sort of accomplish the objectives the way they want to. And, I think for me that was actually one of the fun aspects of development where were just constantly seeing the creativity out of the developers that were working in the game in that particular level.

As a designer what are the challenges that you usually encounter as you design levels?

Umm

And whats the best way to overcome them?

There’s a lot of challenges, they differ from project to project. For us it was again harking back into those core values I mentioned earlier. You know really trying to make sure we were constantly achieving the sort of visual style of the game, allowing players to push through in a creative way. You know balancing combat vs puzzle vs navigation (platforming navigation) because something we’re trying to do is create a hybrid action platform of the game, so we’re trying to create a good balance between those aspects.
And ways to solve it, I think one of the best things people can do is to test the game, blind test it to bring people in that haven’t played it before. For them to actually sit down and be able to, sort of tell you whether or not you’re achieving your goals, because we get so wrapped up in the development as it gets close to the game that often we forget, you know, what it is we’re looking at in what particular area. So just having someone say ‘Oh I’ve been doing a lot of combat for the past 5 minutes I really would’ve expected this to be (illegible) some navigation or some platforming in between maybe a puzzle here or something else. Just trying to make sure that we’ve got a really good balance of those things, I think that one of the biggest challenges and the best solution is just getting people to play it.

And so what’s next in store for the game, is it on shelves yet, is it (illegible) released?

Game’s coming out at the end of November there’s a PS version as well which is really exciting. It is going to be released a little bit before the Wii version. They’re completely separate games, from there the sky’s the limit, we’ve got a lot of ideas for ways to push the franchise, it’s a really interesting thing, there’re just a lot of opportunities. So we’re really excited about where we can push it next.

And what would the top three learning experiences or learning lessons which you got from developing this game?

Well, just to kind of outline it at a really high level, I think that the top three would be like I mentioned earlier would be blind testing, its huge, getting people into play your game, and making sure that they sort of get it, is really really big. Another one is, just learning how to work really well with the artists and the programmers, as a designer. And if you’re one of those other disciplines learning how to work well with designers, artists and programmers. And I think the last would be learning the limits of your team and of your platform and seeing how far you can push those.

And is there a website already up, where they can visit?

Yes, go to mushroommen.com for more information

Thank you very much

Thank you

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