Experimental Game Dev Podcast Show

Podcast Interview: Founder of Wadjet Eye Games

David, from Wadjet Eye Games, talks about starting an indie studio…developing games like “The Shivah” to the Blackwell Series…

You can download the podcast here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/wadjet-eye-games-podcast.mp3

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

Special Thanks to PlayFirst for setting up this interview and a few other upcoming interviews…they provided excellent developers and allowed them to share some really useful information…

0:00 – 5:00
Wadget Eye Games

Works on casual adventure games. Inspired by the old Lucas Arts Adventure Games

Shiva
Took a month to finish

Released it for free. Then decided to sell it. Worked on improving the game, added some polish to the game.

5:00 – 10:00
Blackwell Legacy

Learned a lot more about team management.

Had little money to work with…

10:00 – 15:00
Have to look for team member loyalty…and have to let undedicated people to let go…
For the folks that stuck with him, they are getting paid more…

List of warning signs to let folks to let go…
cannot keep in touch with contact

As a team leader, needs to definitely touch base with them

So it’s not just them, you need to keep in touch with them

All use MSN…chat on MSN, etc.

Be friendly, etc. with folks working with you

Doing outsourcing …
doing it with local people.

15:00 – 20:00
Released the game and slept for a week

Be pleasant to people even when they criticize you

Be nice, because if you’re not…can come back and haunt you

Finishing the game is not the end

That is only half the battle…

25:00 – 30:00
Approached by Playfirst to do an adventure game for the casual game market

Benefits of partnering with Playfirst…
Immense resources
Whole staff doing art
Whole staff doing PR
Whole staff doing engineering

Can now make the games he wants to make

Now has extra money coming in so can fun Blackwell while doing the game

Game doing for Playfirst is NDA…cannot talk about release date either

30:00 – 32:00
Future of Studio…
Wants to get into publishing
Wants to help other people doing indie games

Top suggestion for aspiring indies…
Just start on a game, get it out there
Uses AGS (Adventure Game Studio) to make adventure games…

Podcast Interview: Dream Chronicles Developer…

Miguel, from Kat Games, talks about developing adventure games for the casual games market.

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

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

Special Thanks to PlayFirst for setting up this interview and a few other upcoming interviews…they provided excellent developers and allowed them to share some really useful information…

Show Notes:
Founder of Kat Games (www.katgames.com) and developer of Dream Chronicles 1 & 2

Made an adventure game in the casual games genre

Played adventure games in the 90s…those were more challenging.

Had to find a way to make a new adventure game that is simple enough for the
casual gaming audience

Went through PlayFirst

Before they pitched the game, had a prototype done in Director

Challenge was how to make an adventure game that was easy to start and fun enough to keep people
playing.

People compare hidden objects with adventure games.

Design Suggestions:
Make sure there is little text
Make sure there is eye and ear candy
Have an uplifting experience from the first click

Had extensive play testing when developing the game

Avoided text by making every level self contained

Had to make sure the story elements were split properly to appeal to Casual Game audience…

Playfirst helped them get solid Audio

The studio is based in Spain…and PlayFirst is in San Francisco…so some challenges in working
with PlayFirst.

How PlayFirst helped the game:
a) Offered Professional Usability Testing

Did user testing through game

Benefits of going through a publisher vs. self-publishing…
Did self-publish previous games. But this case, the project was more expensive, so risk was higher.

Hopes that current adventure games will expand the adventure game market for casual game players

Feels adventure games are more gratifying than hidden object games. With adventure games, there is more of a hook.

IGF Finalist Interview: Iron Dukes

Another quick interview from GDC 2008…one of the developers of Iron Dukes

http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/iron-dukes-podcast.mp3

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

Show Notes:
Simple Flash RPG…won
Best Browser Game award
Star Control 2
Paper Prototyping
First tested out paper prototypes on self
Casual RPG
Try to be able to level up in 10-15 minutes
Idea is to have players have quick success and quick action
If you die, that’s ok…equipment is still persistent

Did some rough prototypes in Flash
Worked on converting in-browser game…into .exe version

Current goal is to finish up Iron Dukes and get out to market…

Looking to do online and multiplayer capabilities of flash

Advice for other indies…
Start small
Smaller design is much more effective
Start small and continually expand from there
Can give players something loose and allow folks to create their own story 🙂

IGF Finalist interview: Tale of Tales’

Another quick interview from GDC 2008…

The developers of Tale of Tales talk about their game…

You can download the podcast here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/tale-of-tales-podcast.mp3

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

Show Notes:
Based on the Fairy Tale of Little Red Riding Hood…
But altered and a little darker.

Have an MMO called the “Endless Forest”

This is a “Short Horror Game”

Making a rich environment and dropping the player inside it…and not force-feeding the story

First two games made were very light.

No games out there to satisfy emotions they wanted…so they made this game to fulfill desire to
see games that cover emotions not yet expressed in other games.

Big challenges to game….decide on what to do and what to outsource to others.

Looking for folks that they don’t have to manage.

IGF useful for play testing a game

Things they will change baed on feedback at IGF…
Find better ways to communicate thing without text

Next Steps:
Improve the game

About to release another game. A small experimental game…called “The Graveyard”

Nuances of these types of games…
It isn’t a casual game, but do value casual gameplay
Casual Gameplay with Mature Content
Have fun ways to convey gruesome things without violence
It’s more about a psychological story that is in your head…so play with interactivity to inspire the
player’s imagination

It’s important that a work of art is about the player…so leave things open enough to interpret things for
their own lives.

Wants to take interactivity to enhance that

Suggestions for indies…
1) Make what you want to make
2) Make what’s inside you
3) A game is a conversation…try things out

IGF Finalist Interview: Fez

Another quick interview from GDC 2008…an interview with Some of Fez’s Developers

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

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

Show Notes:
Fez is a multi-dimensional platformer…
IGF Finalist

Won award for “Excellence in Visual Art”

Visual Arts inspired by Spirited Away

The top challenges while developing the game…
a) Optimization issues…ways to optimization of pixel rendering
b) Getting it done even while doing the project on the side

Expect to release the final version within a year.

Suggestions for indie game developers out there…
a) Make it…find the right people and get it done
b) Show it to as many people as you can, listen to them and act accordingly 🙂

Podcast Interview: Josh from the MIT Gambit Game Lab…

Another quick interview from GDC 2008…

Josh, a student at the MIT Gambit Game Lab…talks about creating experimental games.

Specifically, he talks about developing a Facebook game…

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

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

Show Notes:
0:00 – 5:00
Josh from Singapore-MIT Gambit Game Lab
An experimental gameplay lab
Focuses on interesting games that couldn’t exist in the market yet
Created a Facebook game
Has a resource management game
Having an ant colony and resource management
Did a paper prototyping

Design Process principles is…
“Fail Early, Fail Often”

Started with paper prototyping early on.

Wrestled with whether should have public or private information.

Tested people in the lab, classmates, etc.

Do a search for “Eat Wars”

5:00 – 10:00
Issues with designing for Facebook…
There are people with varying levels of commitment
Have to design for people and their friends

Need to design for multiple play styles

Have room now for players that are more aggressive and cooperative

Looking for ways for players to be more social

Get more points for convincing players to bring friends in

Accomodating people’s natural habits on Facebook

In the future…
May work on other game platforms
Looking into Flickr Games
Opportunities for different types of games is very exciting

Sychronous vs. Asychronous gaming…
Need to have a balance between letting folks advance and letting people grief their friends at 3 AM in the morning

Systems where you can plan ahead and moves at one time and it acts that way later on in the game

10:00 – 11:30
Favorite Game on Facebook…
Scrabulous
Parking Wars

Podcast Interview: Joe Lieberman from ArcadeTown

Another quick interview from GDC 2008…

Joe, author of the Indie Developer’s Guide to Selling Games, talks about current opportunities for indie game developers out there…

You can download the podcast here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/vgsmart-2-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here…
http://www.indiegamepod.com/dewplayer.swf?mp3=http://www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/vgsmart-2-podcast.mp3

Show Notes:
0:00 – 5:00
Joe Lieberman
VGSmart Guy
Does marketing for arcadetown.com

Oppotunities for indies…
always need to find the new thing and getting to the new thing first

Indies have been pushed out of the match-3, Diner Dash, games, etc….

So find new markets for competition

Suggestions for where indies can compete…
Lots of genres and old games that can be rethoughts and reskinned…
Like bringing a casual adventure game onto the market
Bringing casual sim games and casual RPG games
Make something new and original that has already been done

Indie MMO opportunities…
feel it is viable to make an indie MMO

But odds are that indies will do it wrong

Not going to compete with World of Warcraft

You can make money as an Indie MMO…as long as you don’t try to compete with those guys…

Ways to do Indie Marketing…
1) Grass Roots
2) Blogs
3) Can still get into magazines and newstands

Need to make a solid product

Made
Indie Developer’s Guide to Selling Games

Last Message…
Keep at it, it’s rough 🙂

***

Take care,
Action

Podcast Interview: PMOG Founder

Here’s a quick interview that happened at GDC 2008…

Justin, from GameLayers and the founder of the Passively Multiplayer Online Game (www.pmog.com) talks about developing and designing the unique game…

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

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

Show Notes:
0-5:00
PMOG.com
Passively Multiplayer Game
Installed as a Firefox Toolbar
Started as an experiment

Builds a player profile based on your surfing/browsing habits

Game Designer Victoria…innovated and created something where folks can leave traps and other
suprises on websites for other players in the system

Wanted to build a game that used everyday actions to play the game

Wanted people to just play as they went about their lives

Having a toolbar in Firefox was a huge breakthrough for the game bacause it allowed for a passive
playing experience

5:00 – 9:00
Interesting Game Mechanics

Players can create missions in the game and allow other folks to play these missions…and so it allows
folks to learn topics by following a mission

There are hundreds and hundreds of missions played

People can lay traps as they create missions. So people use these missions to prank each other.

Two or three surprises as they developed the product…like learning how communities taking place

There is a huge potential for games that are integrated in everyday life.

Your everyday actions help to create new ways to interact and engage with them.

Hopes that games are made open so games can communicate with each other.

Envisions that there is a meta game that works with all games

Take care,
Action

Podcast Interview: Ego City Developers and 2008 Mobile IGF Finalists…

Hey folks,

Tobin and Steve, from Punch Entertainment, talk about developing mobile games and their flagship product Ego City

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

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

Show Notes:
0:00 – 5:00
Two developers from the Ego City mobile game
an IGF Mobile finalist

Started into mobile games at the beginning of the industry in North America

Challenges for the initial mobile games…was developing for handsets with very limited capabilities

Also, did not realize how difficult it would be to port games to mobile…and making them work across many handsets

Did a multi-player title with Box Sports Racing…did this a few years ago…and realized how hard it was to do multi-player in mobile. Gave a reality check

The main challenge was to figure out how to get networking to work across different handsets…because networking worked differently on different handsets

Also, was hard to network across different carrier networks

After that first multi-player games several years ago, came to conclusion to focus on more single player games…did feel that community games would be the future, but would immediately
work on single player games…

There are a lot of large business challenges in the space…the marketing and sales channel is very challenging to overcome…because carriers control distribution
Carriers are more into taking already-successful brands and bet on them…they do not want to risk effort on new titles, etc.

5:00 – 10:00
Tried to do another multiplayer game before ego city…did something that worked with bluetooth…but by the time got to market….bluetooth devices needed to make the game work were not available…

Design goals for Ego City was to leverage the mobile space…and focus on the strengths of mobile…mobility and connectivity
So the goal was to focus on a community game

Question was…
How do you create a social game in mobile space that allows people to social/connect with each other?
So developed a system so that when communicated or interacted with other people in the game…would create a change on your ego as well as theirs

Asynchronous gaming vs. synchronous gaming and
how it relates to Ego City design…focus on PASSIVE multi-player design. So when you are off-line, your ego can interact with others…the AI your ego gets is based on the stuff you did in game earlier.

10:00 – 15:00
Changes to the initial design of Ego City
Development process was challenging because of hardware issues
But also found that could put in more customization after initial design
Pleased with that
Was able to add different features like chatting, blogging, and social aspects
End result was way more ambitious than initially started

User testing for Ego City…
most important thing is to make sure game is really fun
Target demographic was teens on up
The biggest change as a result of play testing was…
trying to match a social site like Facebook with the mobile experience

Initial idea was to make something that would complement a social networking site
But in the end, developing something that was its own social site

Other thing realized was that people wanted to do a lot more things with their avatars

15:00 – 20:00
Empowered avatars to do a lot of interaction with others…like
debate with each other, flirt with each other, fight with each other, hug with each other, etc.
There is a lot of interactivity between avatars

Borrowing and learning from mobile games in Japan and Asia
They do wish North America had the handset capabilities of phones in Japan and Asia
could do a lot more stuff with the game

Inspired mainly by Nintendo and most of their games

Games with micro-transactions…inspiring future features for the game

Through actions, can change personality and unlock rewards based on gameplay instead of just buying features

How flirting and fighting works in the game…
Can create interaction by doing something

Can always trigger competitions by giving folks gifts … like if give flowers, triggers a flirt competition.

The website will complement the mobile experience. The flirt and fight club will happen on the website and augment mobility.

Ego avatar helps to express identity and visuals convey what to expect the person

20:00 – 25:00
How does the website relate to the game itself?
Helps to extend the initial experience

Is Ego City in the same design space as Facebook … or is it a different design space?
Not interested in building a competing social network like Facebook. It’s about gaming…and built a community around that.
Wanted to integrate Ego City into current social networks…released a Facebook app to promote Ego city

May eventually allow egos to interact with other Egos on Facebook

Gaia Online released something on Facebook…and it took off.
Is the goal to extend Ego City into Facebook and to get folks to join Ego City
Yeah, goal is to promote the Ego City…and at the same time, the goal is to allow folks that have egos they are working on…
and carry it into other parts of their digital world (like Facebook or other places they hang).

Each platform offers advantages…
Mobile allows for quick messaging

Websites have different experience…sitting down and spending more time. So can have a longer game experience

With Facebook, with “Ego Mail” app…a great way to take your ego and share it with friends.

25:00 – 30:00
Are there any nuances and differences to developing a mobile community vs. a web community?
A lot of these questions are unanswered…cuz pioneering the space.
The main focus is on support once the folks buy the game.

Have a set up where other folks can interact with your ego even when you are off-line…so folks can interact with your ego…and you make
friends while you are off-line

Is this a whole new design space … for mobile vs. developing for the web?
It is a little different because your ego can interact with other folks…even though you are off-line. So it was developing an AI personality
that allows your ego to interact with others properly when you are offline…

That was the main design challenge.

Learn from game actions you take online to develop a personality ai that gets used for your ego when you are off-line

Also realized that to do a good mobile, not necessarily about graphics…it’s about focusing on the FUN factor that takes advantage of mobile features

30:00 – 35:00
Another challenge for mobile is designing a game that works on many handsets

How does Google Android relate to doing mobile games? Google Android is promising…but hopes that it is more than just another platform
Will have to wait and see

Where do you see the future of Ego City going?
Find more things for the Egos to do
That will be more clubs (Fight and Flirt Clubs)…lounges coming out related to having fun and dancing

What about building missions in the game? Is that relevant to the mobile space…or is it too real-time to work in the mobile game space?
Well, it’s a good time to talk about the other real-time game, Mobile Battles…where you do battle others and do have missions to unlock fe
atures. That other game does offer
more opportunities for missions

Mobile experience can only offer so many maps or missions. Developed a way to make something that works with mobile and web. So you play mobile…and if liked that,
then can continue the experience on the web.

Aside from these 2 games, are there any other games you’re working on?
There are other games getting done, but these 2 are the main ones we can talk about

35:00 – 40:00
Where do you see the future of mobile game development going?
Seeing ports of console games where core experience ported to mobile experience
There are 1 or 2 experiences….that are everlasting…
You want to be powerful
you want to have a social circle, friends

Future of innovation in mobile…is taking those core experiences…and figure out how to make it work in the mobile space
Finding that core experience *and delivering it in a new way that is unique to mobile*

Business model challenges for mobile games…
cannot offer stuff for free because of carriers

40:00 – 45:00
Their favorite mobile games…
Games from Gameloft like Prince of Persia, Splinter Cell that took core experience and ported it to mobile

What are your last suggestions for indie game developers looking to get into mobile…
a) There are porting challenges to overcome
b) Need to think about ways to get marketing and distribution; hopefully carriers will be more open to innovative titles in the future

Rookie Series: Podcast Interview: Bouncy Qubes Developer

Hi,

We’re going to experiment with a few new types of podcasts to see how best to help indie developers. One series will be interviews related to new and interesting game development mediums.

Another series revolves around “Rookie Indie Game Developers”….Indie developers that have released their first game.

Oscar, from iikgames.com, is the first interviewee in this series 🙂

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

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

Show Notes:
Podcast:
0:00 – 5:00
Introduces self
Oscar from http://www.iikgames.com/
Talks about getting into games (by first playing them)
Decided to go Online indie game developer so could reach folks directly
Not many publishers in Mexico so it’s easier to go Indie
First game is Bouncy Qubes
Did several games before, but did not have any intention of selling them
Took 1.5 years to finish the game
Developers on the team are all in Mexico too
Work with family on the games
Most difficult part of designing the game was dealing with the game mechanics related to changing the color

5:00 – 10:00
Art style was inspired by Nintendo games
Issues with Game Mechanics while designing first game…
Initially had a keyboard and that was very hard for users
Switched to mouse
Issues with developing a game for Vista
Integrated it with the “Game Explorer” in Vista
Security issues with Vista…
Was saving all game data in program files directory, but Vista does not allow that,
So had to save elsewhere on the user’s hard drive…saved into the Application Data directory

10:00 – 15:00
Tested game as much as possible so that can have responsive and usable game
Tested on very low end machines
When released game, focused on Marketing
Likes the book “Indie Developer’s Guide to Selling Games” by Joseph Lieberman
Sends to several shareware sites to promote games
Right now, focused on porting game system to Mac OS

15:00 – 20:00
Goal is to make innovative, fun, and original games to the casual market
Favorite Games:
Chronic Logic Games
Professor Fizzwizzle Games
Last words for Indie Game Developers
Try out indie game development, it’s worth it
Constantly Improve Skills and Do your Best

Take care,
Action