John Asks:
Which is better in your opinion, working in-house for a big game company or working for a small development group? Between a big house and small house I think most likely it's better to work at a big house for security. Ie, your job will be around and also for your resume, it's better to say I worked at Westwood, or Origin then Joe Blow's Software Guys. Unless JBSG happens to be the next Id but more likely JBSG will turn out to go under. Most small developers do.
This page is old. Go read the newer version.
Do you know what it really takes to make a video game? Do you know why a game costs $60 or even $80. Making a game takes a ton of work.
Sometimes I think I should try to teach a class in it in high school. Creating a game might be something that some students might want to do and having a class about it would allow them to experience what it really takes to make a game. It's not just about having fun, it's about lots and lots of work. It's about reports, schedules, budgets, tradeoffs, teamwork. All the things I wasn't taught in high school or college for that matter.
Most people think that a game starts when someone has a great idea for a game. The problem is that almost everyone in the industry and every game player thinks they have a great idea for a game. Someone has to be convinced that your idea is the one idea that should get done. This is done by pitching the game whether you're an internal team (a team that is internal to the game publisher) or an external development team (a team not owned by any publishing company but that does products on contract for a publisher.)
To pitch a game you have to create pitch materials. The better your materials the better your chance of getting your game approved. Usually the minimum materials are a small report 2 or 3 pages describing the game briefly. If you can't describe the game briefly then you are unlikely to be able to keep the attention of the people you are trying to sell the game to. Most of them are not game players. Another common pitch material is the storyboard. Storyboards attempt to show the game with pictures. Good looking storyboards definitely make an impression over those teams that don't have them. Even better than storyboards is an actual demo of the game.
What many people don't realize is that the game they pitch must be able to be done in a certain amount of time within a certain budget. Lets say you wanted to make a 3D Fighting game with 20 different characters and 1 background for each character. An intro video introducing the game and a video ending for each character when that character wins the game. How much time and how many people is that going to require.
Lets guess that each character will take 1 month to create in 3D and animate. Each background also takes 1 month. The 3D programming we guess will take 1 year. The intro video will take 4 months and each ending video will take 1 month. Add it up.<ul>
That's 20+20+12+4+20 = 76 months. In other words, if one person could do all the work by themselves it would take them 6 years to make the game. Of course 6 years is too long to take to make a game. If you started today, in 6 years the video game systems that people have at home would probably have been replaced. Instead of a Sony Playstation they'd have a Sony Playstation 2 or maybe even 3 and your game would have no market anymore.
Most publishers would like a game to take about 1 year. So if you wanted to get your game done in a year you're going to need at least 7 people. 76 months / 7 = 10.8 months or almost 1 year.
How much do 7 people cost for a year? Well an artist can cost anywhere from $30,000 a year to $100,000 a year depending on their experience. A programmer from $40,000 to $100,000. Lets just guess and assume you get 6 artists for $45,000 each and one programmer for $65,000. That's $45,000*6 + $65,000 = $335,000. But wait, people need benefits like health insurance, they need supplies like paper and pencils. They need a place to work like an office with a desk, a phone and a chair. You also have to pay certain taxes in addition to the taxes that each person on the team pays. All that adds up to around 30% of their salary. So, $335,000*30% = $100,500. Your total cost is now $335,000+$100,500 = $440,000. Okay, now you need equipment and software. Each artist and programmer needs at least one computer. A reasonable computer with monitor will cost at least $3000. Artists need software and 3D software can be very expensive. Lets say you decide to use 3D Studio Max. That's $3500. They may need a copy of Photoshop or some other painting software which is about $600. Your programmer will need a an editor $200, and a development system, $30,000. So the total for equipment so far is
Total so far, $516,500.
Now lets say you ask a publisher for $516,500 and they agree to give it to you to make the game. What did you forget? Well some things that come to mind, music and sound effects for one. Also, your schedule probably didn't take into account all the communication that needs to go on between team members so they are all working as a team. Do you need someone to lead the team? Do you need a art director to organize the artists and make sure that all the artwork in the game has a consistent look? You could ask one of your 6 artists to do it but then they will be busy managing the other artists and won't have as much time to get their work done. Who is going to pay the bills, do the payroll, order the equipment and software. Whoever does it will have less time for working on the game. What about a network? Are you going to have a network so that people can share there work with each other without having to use lots of floppy disks?
Lets add one more artist as art director and because they are the art director they command a higher salary of $60,000. You also hire a producer or manager to both organize the team and pay the bills and manage the other money matters. (Maybe you don't like the idea of hiring a manager and instead you want to manage. Now your time is taken up by managing so you are going to need to hire someone else to do the work you no longer have time for. Either way it's going to require another person). You need to contract out for music and sound effects. That can easily cost $60,000 to $80,000.
Lets add that in.<ul>
New total = $4000+3500+6000+70000+52000+78000+516500 = $730,000
Lets say you ask for $730,000 from a publisher and they give it to you. You now have enough money to pay your team for exactly one year and no more. If you forgot something tough luck. If it takes 16 months instead of 12 you're going to go hungry for 4 of those months or your going to have to re−negotiate with your publisher and they are going to want something in return for your failure to deliver your game within the time and budget you originally promised. They might for example lower your royalties or they might demand a part of your company. They might ask you all to take a 50% pay cut until you finish.
Lets take a look at royalties. Most games by external developers are done on an advance against royalties arrangement. That means that the $730,000 they gave you is an advance against your royalties. Maybe you got 15% royalties and the game sells for a suggested list price of $49.95. You don't get 15% of $49.95. You get 15% of net so if the list price is $49.95 the wholesale price is probably 45% of that or $22.48. If this is a Sony Playstation or Sega Saturn game they both charge around $8.00 per disc sold as a licensing fee so the net price is $14.48. 15% of that is $2.17. Your team gets $2.17 per unit sold. You got an advance of $730,000. $730,000 / $2.17 = 336,406 units. You must sell 336,406 units before your team will see any more money than they already got. Not very many games sell 336,406 units. Maybe only the top 10 games on any platform.
Another issue that comes up here is the feeling that the publisher is being greedy. The typical point of view of the developer, you, is that you are going to do all the work and they are getting 85% of that $14.48. You feel like you should get more. I know I often felt this way. Here's the other point of view. From the view of the publisher they put in $730,000 and probably several $100,000 more on marketing and plus they also need to pay sales people and marketing people and producers etc. Lets say they spent a total of $1,500,000 on your game. What have you spent? You've spent $0. They are risking $1.5 million dollars on you. If you or your team fails they are out $1.5 million dollars. On the other hand you risk nothing. If you fail you already got from them $730,000 dollars. That hardly seems fair. The reason they get all the money is that they are the people taking all the risk. That actually brings up another point, if you want a better deal, lower their risk. For example if you develop the game entirely on your own and then once it's finished you go to them and they decide to publish it you can usually get a much better deal. The reason is that they don't have to risk as much money. Of course they still have to risk all the money they will spend of advertising and duplication and distribution and sales. Unfortunately most people can't make a product on their own. It takes too long and too many people.
Design is going to be different for different types of games. For the type of game I like to make, action games or action adventure games, I personally believe the best way to design is by storyboard and sketches. I've seen teams make huge documents 300 to 400 pages long for their games and I personally don't think it works. Nobody wants to read a 300 document. Instead you probably need some kind of outline just so you can make sure you've got everything listed. Then you need to design each world and each character and each object. Each item will need two basic things, a visual design and a behavioral design. The visual design would be designed by the artists. This is one way to get your artists involved in the game. Give them a basic idea of what you want to do with the game and then give them a couple of days to go off and sketch settings or characters or objects. Then have a big meeting and decide which of their ideas you want to actually use in the game. Once you've chosen, have the artists make much more detailed color version of those items. You see this type of thing in movie production. The #1 reason you need this is you need to make sure everybody understands what everybody is trying to make and a visual picture is your blueprint. In other words, "make what you see in the picture".
The perfect example of this is the original Star Wars. If you look in to the making of Star Wars you will see lots of paintings by a guy named Ralph McQuarrie. I used to think those painting were made after the movies since they looks so close to scenes in the movies but actually the opposite is true. Mr. McQuarrie drew those paintings and then from those paintings people made the movie. If you think about it you can see why this is so important. It takes lots of people to make movies and video games and without images like these nobody will have the same idea for how to make their particular piece of a level or scene.
Secondly you need behavioral design. This is best done with sketches. In the movies this would be the black and white sketches that show each scene and camera angle. In a game these would be sketches that show each item and character and all their moves and behaviors with notes giving details for things like timing, speed, distance, power etc. While working in Zombie Revenge at Sega I saw hundreds of these sketches. Every motion needed for every character had a sketch describing the motion BEFORE it was created.
Levels also need to be sketched. These should look like blueprints or top down maps that show where each item/door/character etc should be. Having worked both ways I personally believe levels should be laid out on paper by game designers and THEN those designs should be handed off to artists so the artist can build the level based on the game designers blue print. This lets the game designer make sure the level is designed to be fun, fair, not frustrating, etc and lets the artist make it look beautiful. Some of you are going to think you can just jump into a map editor or 3d program and start creating a level. I could happen but I've never seen a really good level come out this way on time. The problem is without a blueprint you have no idea where you are going or when you're done. You'll just keep noodling and noodling until you get bored and start working on something else. If you have a blueprint you'll have a specific goal in mind. You'll know when you are finished and when you are not. You'll know what other things need to be created for the level before the level is even built.
The successful companies where great products are made on time the designer is at the top of the heap. From the designers the game is made. That means they must be good people capable of leading, of creating designs that are possible, of not creating frivolous un−thought−through designs that the team implements and then have to be thrown away. They need to be aware that from their designs, thousands of dollars will be spent implementing them and that bad decisions from them will cost lots of money and possibly the entire project.
to be continued...
Parappa the Rapper is one of my favorite games because the songs and humor are so dang catchy. You can find out more about it at http://www.sony.co.jp. If you can't deal with the Japanese then you can find some info about it at http://www.videogamespot.com. It should be out in America soon. Until then you'll have to get the Japanese version.
Below is a bunch of sounds, icons and backgrounds suitable for use as a Desktop Theme. They are all copyright Sony.
Here's a Parappa doll I found in a game store in Japan. There are actually quite a few Parappa merchandise.
Click here to download my Parappa Theme files.
Um Jammer Lammy is the sequel to Parappa the Rapper. It's arguable whether or not it's as good as the original. The songs are not as funny (except for maybe stage 3) but I will say that the game grew on me. It's got 7 stages instead of 6. If you finish those 7 you get to play 6 of them again as Parappa, usually with new music. There are also 2 player cooperative modes and competitive modes as well. Overall I've grown quite fond if it.
On a recent trip to Japan I saw (and bought) lots of Parappa and Lammy merchandise.
| This is a guitar I saw at Yokohama Worldporter, a new mall in Yokohama Japan. Next to it there was also a Hello Kitty guitar. For those of you that can't convert yen to dollars the easiest way is to think of yen and cents so the guitar here is 30600 cents or about $306.00 |  |
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This is a flashing PJ Berry that would go on a key chain or phone strap. |
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Here are some pens and mechanical pencils. Ewe, Ahhh, Cool. 😊 |
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These are celphone covers. I find it kind of strange that in
Japan there are hundreds of styles of celphones or keitai denwa and
yet clearly these covers would only match a certain model.
Keitai means portable. |
These are metal pins.
These are phone straps. In Japan, every celphone has a place to attach a strap. There are thousands of straps to pick from as well as tons of other celphone accessories like antennas with LEDs in them so that they flash when you are making or receiving a call. Also various items that can sense when the phone is receiving a call and act based on that. For example there are Doraemon, Pikachu and Hello Kitty stuffed animals that you set your phone in a pocket on their stomachs and when the phone rings the stuffed animal rocks and sings.
What I don't understand is why this hasn't happened in the USA? You'd think it's a business opportunity waiting to happen. One problem is that the celphone companies don't put the little notch on the phones so that you could attach a strap. I suppose another problem is that U.S. phones have been so large that most people wouldn't use a strap with them. In Japan, most of the phones are very small and are practically seen as a fashion statement.
The things on the right above snap on to the strap. Here's an example from the phone I got on my last trip.
Note that if you visit Japan and you would like a phone, go to the nearest Tu-Ka office. (pronounced Tsu-Ka) Ask for a "pre paid" phone. You need no ID etc. As of early 2000 the phones cost 4800yen (or about $48) Note that you have no choices in models. One of my friend believes that this service is their way of getting rid of old models as models more than 6 months old are out of fashion. Some simple English instructions will come with the phone. Anyway, you also need to buy "pre paid" service cards. They are 3000yen each (about $30) and give you 30 minutes of service. To activate one dial 1400 (to dial, type the number and press the button that looks like a phone with the handset up) When you hear the recording press 1. Type in the number on the card and press #. The number will be repeated in Japanese. Press # again to verify and you will now have 30 minutes of service. The cards are only good for 60 days from the time of purchase and if you don't use the phone for more than 120 days they will cancel it and you'll have to buy another. Still it's a pretty cheap way to get a phone in Japan for connecting with friends.
Here are some plastic toys. Clearly they are Fun, not boring 😊
Here is my nephew, Ricky, playing the new Um Jammer Lammy game just released by Namco. It's basically the same game as the home game except instead of a playstation controller you use a guitar. X, O, Square and Triangle are in the middle. On the neck is a slider that acts as L1 and near the bottom is a scratch disc that acts like R1. The patterns in the game have been changed so as not to make it too hard to play with the guitar controller.
A few other things I picked up. I did find the soundtrack to the Um Jammer Lammy game.
Note that there are at least 4 Parappa / Lammy related music CD
available. The Parappa Game soundtrack has a cover similar to the
Japanese version of the game (see picture at top). The first Lammy CD
out is the CD on the left. Unfortunately it is Milkcan doing all the
songs from the game. Not what I was looking for. The next CD,
"I Scream. PJ & Parappa" is a collection of songs based on
the
games but sung by PJ and Parappa. The actual Lammy game soundtrack is
the right most CD. It includes all the Parappa versions of the Lammy
songs including the Chop Chop Master Onion song with Parappa which I have
not actually found in the game. Personally I think the Lammy version
of the songs could have had the guitar parts mixed a little higher but
still
overall they're pretty good.
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For Christmas my friend Scott got me this clock. It's similar to many of the character clocks in Japan. When the alarm goes of it plays a digital recording. This one plays the Um Jammer Lammy theme from the title of the game. When you turn the alarm off she says one of three things. Either "Okay", "Thank You" or "All Right!" |
I did see quite a few other things like Lammy dolls, Lammy pillows, Lammy mouse pads, T−shirts (all too small for me)
2000/05/18:
Many people have asked me where you can get this stuff. Other than going to Japan and getting it yourself (you can go round trip to Japan for under $600) I was told by TokyoPop that they will pretty much special order anything for you. They would like you to have a model number or IPC number but otherwise they said they can find things even without that information. I have not used them but if you have good luck with them please tell me. You can find their website at http://www.tokyopop.com.
2000/12/15:
I'm back in Japan and I found a few more things.
These are "Mousepet Sets". Each set comes with 2 items. The item on the left clips to your mouse cable near the mouse and wiggles around as you use your mouse. The item on the right sits on the top edge of your monitor. The PJ Berry one can hold a card in his hands.
Well if you didn't know, starting last May a Parappa TV cartoon series started and with it lots of new merchandise hit the stores. I posted some links here.
Well this month, on August 28th the new Playstaion 2 game comes out and so there is/was a big promotion going on at McDonalds in Japan where I picked up the following stuff for you Parappa fans.
I had never seen an EXTRA LARGE size drink in Japan before but now along with this promotion McDonalds now has super sized drinks. I think this is one of the signs that Japan will follow America into obeseness.
These are 2 of the happy meal toys (or happy set as they are called in Japan). I would guess they are meant to clip on your belt. On Parappa you can pull the strap and he waves his arms as the strap recoils. The Piposaru monkey's hat light lights up if you press it.
The promotion is actually not just Parappa. On July 8th Piposaru (Saru Getchu 2 : Ape Escape 2) came out and later this year Tororo to Kyuujitsu (My Day off with Tororo) comes out. Sorry to burst all you Parappa fans bubbles but Tororo the Cat from Dokodemo Isshou (Everywhere Together) is way more popular than Parappa and all his toys sold out in the first couple of days.
There were also several toys you could just buy. No other purchase required. About $3 each. These are phone buddies (for lack of a better word). You pick one (or two) and with the strap in the middle they attach to your cell phone. (see above for earlier examples)
Here are two nurigurumi (stuffed animals) I also picked up. The Piposaru has *grasping hands*. Papappa doesn't do anything except sniff the fries and look cute. Dang that monkey is ugly. The big deal with Piposaru is that in the game you chase the monkeys with a vacuum cleaner and you suck their pants off. I guess that's supposed to be funny. I don't think it sold well.
Finally McDonalds was also running a card game kind of like Pokemon cards or Magic the Gathering cards. For each meal you'd get a pack of cards. Each pack had like 2 game cards and 1 prize card. The prize being like if you got 3 of the same prize cards you got what's on them like a free hamburger. Here's the backs of the game cards.
The pictures on the cards are from their respective PS2 games. I've got to admit I'm curious about the new Tororo game but I will definitely get Parappa 2 in a couple of weeks.
As for you Parappa fans there is also a flashed out website here.
Parappa 2 came out for Playstation 2. No idea if it's supposed to be released in the states. Of course I picked it up.
Being a Parappa fan I love it but honestly it's just more of the same so if you didn't like the original or Lammy then you probably won't like this one.
I totally dig the music and for those of you than don't know De La Soul is featured on the soundtrack and there's a Party Mix CD coming out next week. I'm digging the music this time. Not that I didn't love most of the songs on the other games. Maybe it's just these are fresh. Here's a sample I whipped up.
I finished the game in about 3 hours. I only failed level 5 once and level 8 (the last) about 10 times before I finished. No idea if there is more. No special options appeared though Parappa's hat turned blue. Maybe I have to go for "awesome" rating on all levels if that's possible in this version.
There's a bonus game if you do well on any level. It's always the same came though where you smash things with Chop Chop Master Onion and his Ko−tamanegis. (Kow, rhymes with mow, tama rhymes with mama, negis would rhyme with keg then keys. It means Little Onion's in Japanese)
Some things which took a little getting used to. Before each level (clearly stuck in as an after thought) you get a boombox that comes up on the screen, kisses you and then makes you practice before you can continue. It's probably a good thing making it easy to pass the levels but it's also kind of not so cool in a way.
Another is that when you mess up and go down (or up) a level. Like from "Good" to "Bad" or "Bad" to "Awful" the music stops, the character you are rapping with says something like "Getting Worse" and then the music picks up in a different spot. As far as I can tell each time that happens 2 measures get added to the song (or you could look at it as going back 2 measures). This gives you a chance to recover from your mistake but it's disconcerting because of the major interruption in the flow of the music.
More stuff has come out since then.
These cookies came out each with a toy inside. They pretty much sold out immediately. My friend, Junko, who's also into Parappa, called me and told me to about them and that they would be sold out quick. I went to 6 different convenience stores until I found a supply.
The cookies have little prints on them. I ate them all. I wonder if they are singing in my stomach.
Here are the toys as printed on the back of the box.
I picked up 1, 5, 7 and 8.
There is also another set of toys out. They are only $1.50 each if you can find them.
A free one came with the game but I suspect that's a "until supplies last" kind of thing.
On other thing my friends Junko was able to scam is a Parappa Uchiwa (a fan). Pretty cool.
A few more things I picked up recently.
This is a set of post-it notes. They are each about 1x1 inch. Pretty small. You can see from the holes on the left this set is meant to go into an organizer.
This set of itty-bitty stationary is also meant to go into an organizer. I guess when you really need to write that secret letter since they are too small to actually mail.
Small stickers for letters and envelopes are very popular in Japan. I suppose stickers are popular in the states too as there are sticker shops here and there but it feels like it's a bigger thing here.
You might notice some of these characters are not from the games. Instead they are from the TV cartoon series.
Here's a close-up of a few of the stickers.
I've tried 3 times and each time I learned something new. I hope next time I'll be successful. What did I learn?
(1) The first time my company was called Echidna. I learned that being underfunded is bad. I can't tell you how much we were getting paid directly. Let's just say 2 of 3 of us were each getting paid 1/4 of what I consider the average game programmer's salary. The 3rd person, me, was getting paid by the other 2 to help out. I was basically living off credit cards. By the end of the project my credit cards were completely maxxed out and I had to take a real job.
Why did we do such a thing? Because we were naive. We were just out of school, we didn't have alot of experience, we needed the money and we thought it was a deal. It seemed like alot of money at the time.
(1.5) Between the first and second times I did some contract work. That time I learned that I can't work out of my house. Maybe you can but I can't. I get restless. I wasn't getting any work done at home and a friend offered me some space at his office. I thought about it but at first my thoughts were that I didn't have time to move my computer and desk and supplies somewhere since I was behind schedule. A friend suggested that if I wasn't getting anything done at home then what did I have to lose by trying it. So, I tried it and it ended up making all the difference. All of a sudden I was productive. I believe there are several reasons.
One is that I believe it's important to have a change of location. At home it felt like at any time I could be working. I could do things like watch TV for an hour or two because I would tell myself that I could work later, my work is just in the other room. My office was in my bedroom so waking up I could just get out of bed and sit at my desk without taking a shower etc. On the one hand I felt like I was ALWAYS at work. One the other hand it always felt like I could just wait a few more minutes. As soon as Scooby Doo is over I'll start, really. It just didn't work.
Another reason is that I need to see other people. At my friend's office there were 6 other people. That meant I had some social interaction. I was surprised how much I needed that to be productive. Without that social interaction, talking to people and seeing other people working, I always felt restless for other people's company. I also see this happen when people are working overtime. When lots of people are working overtime I feel like part of a team trying to achieve a common goal. If there are only a few people working overtime, especially if they are not near me, I feel like I'm the only one that cares about the project and soon, if I feel that nobody else cares, then I'll eventually stop caring myself.
The last is just having a place to call work. This is the place I work. While I'm here I'm working. While I'm not here I'm not working. I need that distinction.
(2) The second time I started a company it was called Seven. A few things I learned there: (1) Never except a fixed amount of money for an unspecified amount of work. This was obvious at the time but we were anxious to get started on something so we excepted. (2) Partners are generally bad. Not bad people just a bad idea. You can hear this advice from many many different people. There are several problems with partners. Is it an equal partnership? Will you have to put in the same amount of effort? For example a programmer may have to work 11 hours a day to get his work done. The accounting partner might only have to work 2 hours a week to get his work done especially for a small company. Sooner or later this kind of issue will cause a painful break in the partnership. Another is direction, some partners might want to do one type of game where as another might want to do something else, maybe not even games. I believe this is what happened at Id. It also happened at Seven and Big Grub and caused no end of frustration for everybody involved.
(3) The last time I started a company was with Big Grub. This time there were four partners. Again we had the direction problem. Which type of game should we do next or should we do something other than games etc. Which small side projects should we take on. The big lesson I think I learned is that it is very very important to have a good Director. The Game Director is my definition for the person that has the vision of the final game in his head and it is his job to direct everybody to create it. That would mean the best Game Director would be someone who is both the main game designer and also the game's manager (schedules, budget, etc.) That's a very hard person to find. People that design don't usually want to manage and people that manage aren't generally qualified to design. That person also needs to authority to direct. I believe that can be next to impossible with partners. Equal partners can generally say, "screw you I don't want to do that I want to do this." Employee's can't do that. Next time I start a company I will definitely be the Game Director and not a programmer unless I find someone who's design and management skills I truly believe in. Consider the Game Director to be just like a movie director. He should talk to the Art Director to get the art style he wants for his vision. He should talk to the music director to make sure he gets the music that matches his vision. He should talk to the programmers and make sure they can create his vision and how he needs to adjust it to fit reality. You can't have the art director directing the art separate from the game director directing the game. The game director should look over the shoulders of each person on the team on a daily basis to see that each person is creating things that fit his vision. He needs to manage everybody so the project is finished on time and so they are always working toward a common goal. If a programmer needs certain artwork by next week the game director should make sure somebody is creating that art.
This is important. If you've read some of my other pages you should have already read about how much work making a video game can be. That means it's important you start with something you can actually finish with a reasonable number of resources, in a reasonable amount of time and therefore with a reasonable budget.
The bigger the game you want to make the more important it is you have a very detailed plan. For example if you're making a game with 10 levels and your plan says about as much as
"Level 3 - The Ice Level"
This level will be slippery. It will have 3 to 5 monsters made of ice and the player will be able to throw snowballs.
That's NOT ENOUGH! If the game is large, you need to know every little thing you are going to need for that level so you can get a true idea of what it's going to cost in time and in resources. You need to know for example that monster #1 will have 3 attack anims, 2 idles and 1 death, 1 reaction and 1 defense. You need to know what each attack will be. You need to know what weapons will effect this monsters The best way to do this is to diagram it with sketches similar to a storyboard for a movie. Stick figures are fine but the sketches should have enough detail that someone can take it and create the needed animations and implement the needed programming by looking at these storyboards. If the first attack only happens whe n the player is carrying the XYZ banana then note that on the sketch. On the other hand if you are doing a Tetris clone maybe you can wing it. Still if you take a look at a good Tetris type game like Tetris Attack or Tetrissphere, an awful lot of work when into making those games as polished as they are with several puzzle levels, tutorials, bonuses, characters, sounds, music etc. It probably easily took 6 months, 2 programmers, 1 musician and 2 or 3 artists to make them that polished.
Note: some people will disagree with this in that they don't feel it's necessary to put down all those details. I suppose I agree to an extent. I think it's important to do it for each level before each level starts. That means you could get away with detailing just the first level and then while the first level is being implemented you can detail the second level. Just remember that if you find that the 1st level had 100 things to do which was going to take 5000 man hours (about 3 months for 5 people), then if you plan on having 30 levels it's going to take 150000 man hours and if you forgot 25% of the items in the first level then your estimates are going to be way off.
You think you are going to be the next Id. You're going to make a game as good as Quake and right off the bat you'll be driving Ferrari's in no time. Well I'm sorry to inform you but Quake is Id's 5th or 6th game. They started with a smaller game and using the funds and technology from that game they were able to develop the next and so on.
Do the same. Start with a smaller game. If your dream game is to make a 30 level game with every feature known to man and tons of graphics and video and music and ... This time start with something smaller. Try a 3 level game or try a game that re−uses alot of graphics or both. Then, after you shipped it, make your next game a little bigger. Build your way up.
You're out of luck here. Either (1) your the type of person that can get money from anybody (sell snow to an Eskimo) If you're that type of person you win! Please get me some money too 😉 (2) you know somebody that will give you money like a rich relative or you have a connection at a publisher (3) You're nobody. In this case the best way to get money is to first make a really good playable demo. Depending on the game you might be able to do something like this in a VRML like tool or in Director but most publishers are going to still need a type (1) person to sell your game or you're going to have to make a really really good demo. Also, a publisher is going to want to know that you've got a good team in place. A bunch of friends who say they'll quit their day job when you get a contract is not good enough. Neither is a bunch of people that have never created a commercial game. Look at it this way, if you had 4 million dollars would you give half of it to a group like yours? What would it take to make you comfortable to give somebody 2 million dollars considering that most games don't make there money back?
Everybody only pays attention to the hits. Quake, Doom, C&C, Mario 64 etc. Those are the exception not the rule. Every year something like 5000 entertainment products come out. How many of them have you heard of? Most of them you probably haven't because they didn't make any money. Even within all the games you have heard of possibly half didn't make money.
Therefore, don't create a plan that only works if your game is one of the top ten games of the year. In the movies 2 or 3 hits a year fund another 20 titles and didn't make money. The game industry should be so lucky.
At least at the top. As mentioned above, the number one person you need is a good Game Director. Hopefully that is you but remember it will be a full time project. Don't think you are going to have time to do more than manage and design. You won't. Of course you need an experienced lead programmer, and an experienced art director. The rest of the people can probably have less experience assuming the two leads are capable of leading and teaching others. On the other hand it should be fairly obvious that experienced people should in general be able to get things done on time, to spec and give reasonable estimates. (Come to think of it I'm not so sure that's true, check your references before you assume that a particular person's experience is actually all that valuable)
It may sound glamorous to have an SGI and Alias on your desk or an Intergraph machine with a 6 thousand dollar video card in it but in the whole scheme of things, 3 artist with SGIs and Alias = 5 artists with a PC and 3DSMax. Everything else being equal, 5 artists will out perform 3 or another way to look at it, with the money use save you can afford to pay for outside video or for when you have those late deadlines and you're short on cash. I've worked with all the major packages, Softimage, Alias, 3DSMax, Lightwave. Any of them are fine for making games. They all have their quirks and no matter which one you use you'll find something you hate about it, your programmers will find something they hate about it, and your artists will find something they hate about it so don't think if you had just bought X instead of Y things would be better.
Some things not to skimp on.
1) Buy large monitors. Today's software requires lots of screen real estate. 19−21 inch monitors are a must for production.
2) Don't skimp on memory. At least 512Meg per computer or more. In fact if you're used to working with SGIs with 512Meg or more of memory then get that much memory for your PC and run NT and it will feel about the same if not faster.
3) Buy reliable equipment. Remember that time is money. If somebody's machine is not working and they are idle for 3 days, at $30 an hour that's 30*8*3 = $720 dollars in the toilet. Maybe you shouldn't have bought from the garage down the street. This is especially true of the network equipment. I worked at one company were the network went down at least once a week for a few hours. That company had about 45 people. That means one hour cost them at least 45 * 30 or $1350. After a few weeks they already lost more than they saved by using cheap hardware.
Have a real schedule and weekly meetings and make sure people stay on schedule. If the schedule is unrealistic then fix the schedule. If the schedule is realistic and one person just can't seem to meet it you've got a problem. Also, people in the game industry are often at work from 10am to 12am or longer. That doesn't mean they are working more than 8 hours a day. They may come in at 10am, take a 2 hour lunch, a 1.5 hour dinner, play an hour of Quake, browse the net for 1.5 hours. That's only 9 hours. That's still good. My point is they aren't working 14 hours a day. What's my point? My point is that I've seen several people at various companies come in at 10:30 or 11 and leave at 8 and still do all of the above not work stuff. In their head they think they were working hard because they stayed until 8pm (ie, past 6) and they spend all their time at work. In reality they only put in about 5 hours and they did things they should be doing outside of work at work. Call them on it.
If there is somebody who is clearly not up to the task get rid of them immediately. Don't wait and put if off because it's unpleasant. People that don't cut it bring down the entire team. Other's will resent the fact that they are getting paid the same or at all even though their work is crap or is always having to be redone or is always late. That makes them less productive too.
By this I mean that I don't agree with the books that say programmers need offices. I've worked both ways and for the most part I believe that making entertainment software is different from making other types of software. You wouldn't make a movie with the director in his office and the camera man in his and each actor in another. You're making something that not only has to be functional but it has to be fun, entertaining and beautiful. That comes from people being together and collaborating, working together to make things their best. You might be able to have an engine programmer not interact with the team but your detail programmers, the people that make things work using the engine, need to be in constant communication with the artists and designers and that means in the same room within talking distance.
Realize that your team is working their asses off for you and that they are trying to make something great. Support them. Stock the fridge with drinks and snacks (if you figure out the cost for this you'll see it's actually pretty small) If they are staying late to meet a deadline get them dinner. Make sure they have what they need to get the job done. Whether it's software, hardware, a new chair, whatever.
Also, never take credit for other people's work. If the press comes in, show off the team, don't forget anybody. There's no better feeling than getting noticed for doing a good job and no worse feeling than getting overlooked or having somebody else take credit for your work.
Be honest with your team. Don't promise them things you can't deliver on.
Make the game playable as soon as possible and then finish the first level of the game. FINISH IT! If its got voice put the voice in. If it supposed to tally your score at the end put that in. If it needs a HUD (Head's Up Display) implement it. If it's supposed to have a map then do it. Dialog, put it in. Video? That too. That first level should be ready to ship before you do the second level. Ready to ship means there is NOTHING LEFT TO DO. If you've still got a list of things yet to be done (like go through the level and add hints, or, add the final bonus crates) then you are NOT finished. Why? Because until that level is finished and shippable you won't know how long it actually takes to finish a level. You won't know what things you forgot. You won't know whether or not all the things you wanted in the level will actually fit. In order for that level to be shippable you will need every piece of your engine in place and you will have had to do each thing you will ever have to do on your game at least once. That means you will have to solve your problems now instead of later when it's too late. You will also find out things you forgot to plan for which means that sooner rather than later your schedule will become more realistic as you see what's left to do. Also, once you have a FINISHED level you have something you can show the press and impress them. Nothing is more uninspiring that an half finished level with crappy place holder art, no music, no or bad sound effects and that crashes every time you touch the pink tile because pink tiles aren't implemented yet.
I'm sure there are a million more things that should be listed. For now, these are the things I think are important to start and have a successful game company. Feel free to tell me I'm full of it.
Daniel Asks:
My name is Daniel Stein, for my high school Senior Project I am programming a computer game. I was wondering if you could answer a few questions for me. My research question is "What are the most important techniques to use in creating a successful computer game?". I was wondering if you could answer a few questions to help me with my research? Feel free to answer as many or as few questions as you want. Any information you can give will be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time.What aspects make a computer game interesting?
Ryan Asks:
Hi, I'm wandering how to make a game by myself... I don't want to sell it I just want to test my skills or something... Have you played "Astroids"??? Well a kid made it by himself and I want to know how to put a game together and maybe give it to my friends. But I've asked lots of people but would not mail me.. maybe they think I won't be able to..
Sami asks:
You said that for making games you need at least $750,500 but how did John Romero and team start when they didn't have this money. They are very rich today. If I want to make a game and want to become rich from it I have to learn C and that's what I'm doing now. but I want to make the graphics and the art and the sound in one computer like a Pentium 300 mhz or Digital 400 mhz. Can I do that and why does it take the programmer 1 year of programming?
Randy Asks:
My name is Randy and also write video games. Problem is I don't do it for a living yet. I see that you have been doing video game programming for quite some time now, and was wondering if you could lend an ear and maybe some advice. No don't worry I don't have any coding questions or anything like that. I have been a programmer for several years. As you probably already know this type of work is very suckful and boring.
Alan asks:
Can you make games with Visual Basic 5.0 and what's the process? Also, Do I need 3D Studio Max for graphics?
Answer:
Hi Alan You can make games with Visual Basic 5.0. RPGs, Puzzle games, Board games and even some simulations are good ideas for VB5.0. For example Pirates (by Microprose) was written in Basic.
