Tiny Subversions

Apple just posted a job listing for a "Senior Games Developer" over on Gamasutra.

My post about Braid sparked a very interesting discussion about the nature of fun. In particular, Gillian noted that

Bubble Bobble would approach pure, unadulterated fun if you could save your progress rather than start over at level one each time you play/die.

She's hit on something very important about games, or at least something that has been central to my thinking about games for about two months, and neatly ties back into Braid.

Back in January, Brian Moriarty presented at my alma mater an updated version of his Psalm 46 lecture from GDC 2002. It's a brilliant lecture, and it has more in common with James Burke's Connections series than your standard GDC talk. You can get the mp3 here.

Anyway, the much-simplified gist of the talk is that things (read: works of art) which inspire awe are endlessly giving. They don't need to withhold anything from the viewer/reader/participant because they have so much to give.

Jon Blow has said at GDC that the infinite time control of Braid was partly inspired by this lecture: why do platformers insist on taking things away from their players, instead of giving freely? Games that have used time control in the past made it a limited resource, and yet it's the most fun part of the game. Why would you do that? Are you afraid that your game won't stand up to infinite resources? And if that's the case, does that just mean your game sucks at its core?

A similar situation comes up when you look at Half-Life 2. Almost anyone will agree that the most fun thing about that game is the gravity gun. And originally, the developers were planning to make it sort of a prize near the end of the game. But at some point during development, they paused and said, "Wait a minute. This is the most fun thing about our game. Why are we letting players use it for only the last 25% of the experience?" And then they put it right at the beginning, just after the intro levels.

Gillian's right: if Bubble Bobble let you explore it for all it was worth instead of punishing you for making a mistake, it would be a better game.

Labels: design, innovation

I saw Jon Blow's Braid for the first time at the 2005 Indie Game Jam. He had brought it along to show to people. I remember looking at it over his shoulder and thinking, "Huh. Cool." Then just a week later he gave a presentation about it at EGW and I was far more intrigued.

I finally got to play a beta version at the IGF booth at GDC last year, and I have to say that it was one of the best games I have ever played. I just instantly fell in love with it. It's not that it's pure, unadulterated fun (although it is quite fun). Rather, it's a game that presents its gameplay as a commentary on the tired genre of platformers. It's nothing short of amazing.

Anyway, the game isn't out quite yet. But there's a really eloquent preview at Arthouse Games that is well worth reading. Still, words don't do it justice. I am eagerly awaiting its official release. In the meantime, you can check out the official Braid blog.

Labels: games, indie, innovation

So at the most recent Boston Postmortem meeting, somebody asked me if I was going to organize a Boston birds-of-a-feather meeting at GDC. My immediate, reflexive response was, "Hell no. I'm not wasting my time meeting with Boston-area developers at GDC."

That might sound mean, but think about it this way: I can see these people any time I want. GDC is an opportunity to spend time hanging out with people that I only get to see once a year.

The only situation where I would want to spend time with a Boston developer at GDC is if that developer is (a) someone I've never met before, or (b) someone I know, who is introducing me to someone I don't know. In the case of (a), I spend a few minutes getting that person's contact info and then I say, "I'll call you after GDC and we can get lunch sometime." In the case of (b), I'm not spending much time with the Boston person anyway.

Labels: gdc, networking

I was inspired by a post on kottke.org this morning in which he counted out the percentage of female speakers at various web/tech conferences. Eyeballing it, it seems like the average of those conferences was about 12% female speakers.

So I went to the list of speakers for GDC 2007, and counted. This is an approximate number, as it's a hand count. The site lists 739 speakers, however, some of them are entities like the Serious Game Advisory Board and Speaker TBD. So I skipped them, and counted a total of 735 human speakers. Of those, I counted 73 that are female. Which means that 9.93% of speakers at GDC 2007 are women. (Again, I'm not claiming accuracy. I'm sure there were some gender-ambiguous names I screwed up, although I did bother to check on the bio of the people I wasn't sure about.)

Anecdotally, many of those female speakers were students or professors, which is really great, but at the same time they're not professional developers. That means that while the future of women in the game industry might be brighter, it doesn't reflect on the current reality.

On a related note, consider that, according to CMP's 2006 Game Developer Salary Survey, women in the fields of programming, art, and production make about 10% less money than men (in design they were reported to make 5% more).

Anyway, the 9.93% seems to put the game industry about on par with the rest of technology in terms of gender diversity. On the other hand, the game industry is not just a tech industry: it's also part of the entertainment industry. And while my Google-fu was not able to dig up any studies on gender diversity in Hollywood, I am pretty sure that the numbers close to 50%, at least industry-wide.

Labels: gdc, women_in_games

Whee. My schedule for GDC is looking really, really full this year. Here are the events that I'm speaking at or otherwise helping organize:

Monday, 4:15pm. IGDA Curriculum Workshop, SIG Overview Panel.

Wednesday, 2:30pm. Experimental Gameplay Sessions, presenting the Boston Game Jam results.

Friday, 10:30am. Facilitating the Bloggers/Journos Group Gathering.

Friday, 11:45am. Giving a talk called "Tips & Tricks On Making a Lasting Impression" at the Game Career Seminar.

Labels: gdc

Kim Pallister asked me to take over the Bloggers Group Gathering from him, since he's got a talk scheduled at the same time. If you've never been to one, these gatherings are just an informal meeting for an hour at GDC where people with similar interests do a meet-and-greet.

So, all you games bloggers out there who are attending GDC: come to the IGDA booth at 10:30am on Friday 3/9 and get your mingle on! I will be happy to facilitate introductions, and there will probably be stickers or name tags on which you can identify your blog.

Labels: gdc

A sad day: according to Joystiq, this Monday, the Sony-hosted Amplitude servers are going dark.

Amplitude is one of my top five favorite games of all time. Although I can't say I've really used the online play since 2004, so I won't really miss the servers. Still, there's a lot of really cool fan-made remix levels available on the servers, so if you own the game, it's worth logging on to grab them before they go dark forever.

Labels: boston

Actress Jenna Fischer, who plays Pam on the U.S. version of The Office, has written a fantastic column about how to break into the film and TV industry. Much of the advice holds true for people trying to break into the game industry. I'm going to excerpt parts of her column and show how they relate to the games business.

My first piece of advice to someone who is serious about being a professional television or film actor is this: Move to Los Angeles.

This echoes one of the first things a person who wants to make video games must do: move somewhere that there's a lot of game companies. Even if you don't have a job there. You've got to take that leap, and if you're not willing to take that leap then you're not passionate enough about the industry in the first place: you'll do yourself a favor by finding another kind of job.

I had a college professor who said, "If you can think of anything else you are passionate about besides acting, do that. Your life will be better for it."

Replace "acting" with "making video games" (not playing: making) and you have some good advice right there.

It isn't "who you know." It just doesn't work that way.

I'll have to respectfully disagree on this one. Maybe the film industry is different than every other industry in the world? I doubt it. Actually, she refutes herself in the next paragraph anyway:

Here is how I got "discovered." I had been living in L.A. for about two years when a friend wrote a TV script and wanted to do a live stage version as a way of attracting TV producers. He asked me to play a small role. It meant lots of rehearsal for very little stage time and no pay. Along the way I questioned why I had agreed to do it, but it was very funny and he was a friend, so I agreed. After our third performance, his manager approached me and asked if I had representation. [emphasis mine]

So there you go. It was a friend who helped her break in. I think what she meant was that you don't need to know a movie producer or something. But knowing your fellow n00bs is very important.

Now that sounds easy, right? Well, that was after two years of working as a temp, doing every acting gig I could find for free, borrowing money to buy a new engine for my car, and wearing a pair of shoes with a hole in them because I couldn't afford anything else.

Reminds me of when I was working in QA.

I developed a relationship with [a casting person]— not because I met her at a party and we "schmoozed," but because I had proven to her over the course of many years that I was a reliable and serious actor capable of providing a consistent body of work.

Yeah! Networking is about building relationships, not sucking up to people.

I have a great acting coach who says that success in Hollywood is based on one thing: opportunity meets readiness. You cannot always control the opportunities, but you can control the readiness. So study your craft, take it seriously. Do every play, every showcase, every short film, every student film you can get. Swallow your pride. Be willing to work for nothing in things you think are stupid. Make work for yourself. Make your own luck. Don't complain. Hopefully, the work will find you if you are ready.

Holy shit. Make Your Own Luck. That is so important. That's going to be the title of a future networking article here.

But yes: build mods, take every small contract job you can get, volunteer, do whatever it takes. Just go out there and work, even if nobody is asking for the work.

Labels: breakingin

Gamasutra just posted a great interview with Harmonix COO and all-around cool guy Mike Dornbrook on the topic of their acquisition by MTV.

Labels: boston, industry

So right after last year's GDC, Ian Schreiber sent me a bunch of notes he took as advice for people attending. That was his first GDC, so he didn't take a lot of the stuff for granted that I typically do. (Update: Kim just pointed me to some of his GDC advice! And you should also check out this page with Damian's advice, too.)

Anyway, I was a bum and didn't post the notes. But since GDC '07 is coming up in a month (!!!!), now seems like a good time to post his advice. It's great stuff. Pay attention.

• Take public transportation, not a car. You're trapped on a bus or tram with other game developers, giving you time to chat.
• For sessions where there's an audience microphone set up, grab a seat near it. If you have an intelligent question, you'll be first in line.
• For sessions without a microphone (this happened during the first two days at SGS), sit in the front row. You'll be more alert, and when you raise your hand you always seem to get called on first since you're the first one anyone on stage sees.
• Take a backpack with you. It's an easy place to dump swag or book purchases, and it makes you recognizable if you choose a backpack that stands out (or decorate it with buttons or such).
• Take a physical notebook and lots of pens. If someone near you needs to borrow a pen, you can cover them, and now they owe you a favor. If you need to write something down (like a URL that you mention to someone), you can just scribble it on your paper and give it to them.
• Take notes during the sessions. Offer to share with other people who either missed a good session, or were there but didn't take notes. Great excuse to send follow-up emails when the other person asked you to in the first place :)
• Carry a cell phone with you. If you don't have one, rent one for the week. It's very useful to be reachable at all hours, since it's so hard to find a specific person in the crowd even when you've arranged to meet them.
• But... always remember to turn the phone off before you enter sessions. I don't think I made it through a single session without SOMEONE'S phone going off, and it was annoying.
• Darius advised in an earlier article to avoid the booth crawl, and not worry about getting swag at GDC. I would amend that -- if you're unemployed, ignore swag; but if you work at a company, I think it's worth spending the Booth Crawl time slot getting some stuff for the poor folksback at the office who didn't get to attend. It makes your team happy when the first thing you do on returning is hand out a bunch of free stuff; in particular it makes them not mind so much when you ask to go again next year :)
• Darius also advised taking two lunches so you can offer one to someone with a classic pass; that's borderline, as you mentioned. I'd also point out that it's perfectly legal to take a box lunch when you've already got lunch plans elsewhere.

Labels: gdc, networking

As I believe I've mentioned before, the video game that I play the most by far is Handmark Backgammon for my Treo 600. The UI is superb, and the AI is really pretty tricky even at Intermediate difficulty.

I have logged well over 10,000 games of backgammon on this thing. I know this because it keeps track of some basic statistics:

• how many points I've won
• how many points the AI has won
• a frequency chart of how often each possible double roll has occurred for either player (two 6's, two 5's, etc)

The mere fact that I know what my long-term score is versus the AI is what drives me to continue playing: I like to widen the point margin between my score and the AI's (in my favor, of course).

The fact that the game stores these sorts of metrics and makes them available to me has significantly increased the value of the game over time. And yet it's really simple code! Just keep a few counters here and there and you're done.

Seen in that light, the question I ask is: why don't they add a whole bunch more statistics? Here's a list of things that would be trivial metrics to add.

• A frequency chart showing how often I win certain point amounts, and a comparison chart for the AI. This would be interesting, as I feel like I win fewer games than the AI does, but I'm better at wagering, so I get more points per game.
• A count of how many games each player has won by forfeit versus actual win. I feel like the AI is better than me at forcing a win through wagering.
• A frequency chart for every possible die roll, not just the doubles. This would help confirm my suspicion that on harder difficulty the AI just rolls better.
• A frequency chart for the length of time each game has taken. It would be cool to know that the average game of backgammon I play takes 3 minutes, and that 70% of all games are in the 2 to 4 minute range, or whatever.

Stats like that would just push the game over the top, giving me an endless supply of variables to optimize my play along.

Deep metrics make good games better. Obviously metrics won't make a bad game good. And also, the metrics only make the games better for the nerdy, numbers-oriented players like me. On the other hand, when you consider how easy it is to record basic metrics, especially for simple games, it's practically a no-lose situation to just go ahead and implement it.

Labels: metrics

I'll be giving a talk on networking at the Game Developers Exchange (GDX) at Savannah College of Art and Design on April 27. Here's the synopsis of my talk:

When you're a new college graduate trying to get a job in video games, often effective networking is the difference between a QA job and unemployment. In this session, you'll learn how to meet people, how to make friends, what you have to offer, when to call in a favor, and what NOT to do: all illustrated with real-life examples.

I've given a similar talk at the Game Career Seminar at VGXPO back in the Fall, and will give another such talk at GDC in a few weeks. I'm hoping to get this talk progressively tighter and more interesting each time I do it, because I get the feeling I'll be giving it a lot!

Labels: speaking

There's a great article on Gamasutra about the history of EA. For some reason, I did not know that Trip Hawkins used the money he got as an Apple employee from Apple's IPO to found the company.

Labels: know_your_history

I apologize for my dearth of posts this month. I will continue to post very little until after GDC.

This is due mostly to GDC prep, and to a Super Secret Project that I'll talk about at the beginning of March.

Labels: admin

Some more crazy legal action is happening between RedOctane/Activision and TAC over Guitar Hero.

Now, while the reports say that the lawsuit is being filed in part against three ex-developers of Guitar Hero II, these devs did not work for Harmonix, but rather, for RedOctane. You can see it at the Moby Games entry.

Some of you industry n00bs out there might be wondering, "But, don't all the developers work at Harmonix?" No--for pretty much every game there are people who worked on the game for the publishers who are given development credit. Except instead of titles like programmer or lead designer or associate producer, they have titles like "brand manager" or "licensing associate" or "logistics specialist."

Anyway, here's a business rule for you that I just made up: as the success of your product increases exponentially, your probability of being sued increases linearly. (Note how coy I am being about the values of coefficients for this shoddily constructed relationship.)

Labels: business, law, publishers

So back in September I posted a design experiment on this blog.

Well, much to my delight, Petri Purho actually created a game (loosely) based around my challenge! It's called The Truth About Game Development. He made it in 7 days, as the EGP does--apparently, he makes one such experimental game every month. That's awesome!

First reaction: this is totally freaking sweet. The production values are actually very slick. Its aesthetics are very reminiscent of Kyle Gabler's EGP games, and actually bears a fair amount of resemblance to The Crowd.

What's the game about? Well, you're a producer (I can only assume Executive Producer!) working at a Kafkaesque game company where the game developers are your slaves. You can control things like their salary (by default $3/hr) and the amount of your budget you put into graphics, gameplay, and marketing. Killing developers makes them work faster. "Fear of death is the best motivator," the game tells you.

An especially nice touch is the random events. I got one saying (paraphrased), "Hey, one of the peons has figured out that a wacky controller will get the game more publicity. Shall we get the slaves working on it at higher development cost?"

I haven't figured out exactly how to win the game yet, but it's a quick play and a pretty small download at 8.1 MB. Give it a try! It's funny, and delightfully cynical.

It's also weird, because I was just telling someone on Sunday how much I want to make a game about the game development process. This is more of a satire of the process, but it's a pretty effective satire.

Labels: design, games