IGF and GDC 08

Well, I'm off on the road to GDC. This year should be interesting because Axiom Overdrive is up for an IGF award. It's really cool to have someone acknowledge your work, especially since the love comes from a really crap/broken build submitted like 4 months ago. The game has come leaps and bounds in that time, so for them to see the potential back then is great.

With the nomination comes lovely people willing to actually put a mic (email?) in front of you and give a shit what you have to say. That's cool, since I don't have an announcement of starting a new studio, bitching about a game review I didn't like, leaving an old studio, pledging that I won't make crap games anymore, or any of the other completely ridiculous things people get press for nowadays. Seriously, whatever happen to getting press for releasing a game?!? Speaking of, what's with people mentioning that they "might be doing something, someday, that might be remotely interesting, but I can't tell you for the next 2-5 years!??" I mean, I understand press releases for actual up-coming games or something that's actually in development, but a blurb that you're thinking about doing something cool with maybe one bad concept drawing?!!? I don't get it...

(Is this the point where I write - deep breath?)

So yeah, a couple of people give a shit what I have to say. GAMEDEV.NET have an interview up, where I babble, attempting to answer their questions in an interested, yet still printable manner.

I'll also be appearing on G4's Xplay. They've already put up part one of a multi-part piece (or at least it better be), where my interview verbage is mysteriously absent, but you can see me playing Axiom in the b-roll. I assume it's because my interview is being used for the other parts of the coverage. I'll assume that for now, instead of getting really pissed that someone who wasn't even supposed to be in the piece, threw a tantrum and horned-in (even attempting to have me cut out entirely, when told to look for me). But I'm not gonna be bitter, because if some people need to act like that and need to do that kind of thing to get ahead, well good luck with that. I like to live off of the merits of what I do versus shoving others down, at this point in my life...

(oh wait, this is where I say it... DEEP BREATH!)

So... GDC.

Yeah, I can't wait to get into the conferences where everybody bitches about innovation, poor production practices, capturing the customer, "indie" vs. "casual", etc. Last year was interesting because there were solid surprises and the "next gen wars" were just about to happen. Now, a year later, with X360 the undeclared winner, Wii the fan favorite and PS3 wondering WTF happen, it'll be interesting to see if any significant announcements are made. I mean, since there's no more E3 (don't pretend that press-only bullshit is E3... 'cause it's not), GDC is one of the only times the biz can get any concentrated exposure during the year.

We shall see. Check back for the stink.

Not Dead Yet

Now, I know what you must be thinking... "This guy's just fallen off the face of the Earth," or "Well, I guess that's it, no more bitter blog, since he's all happy-slappy with his friggin kiddies." Well, not true. Not that my kids don't make me happy, but that doesn't mean I don't have more bitter diatribes to go off on in this very location, just I've been so busy with so many things.

One of the things is getting read for the GDC. There's a myriad of bullshit going on with my project, but having an unfinished / broken version of your game recognized out of a field of 175+ entrants is nothing to sniff at. I was looking at the game the other day and even though the Team Page on the website lists a ton (okay 12) people, the game has largely been made by 5 full-time members and I'm pretty proud of what's there.

One of the other things taking up my time lately is a new Wii project, of all things. Now, it's not that I inherently have have something against the Wii per se, but I find it to be just like every other Nintendo home platform post-SNES. It's targeted at kids and fanboys who like to wax nostalgic about a bygone Nintendo that they grew up with, and the only products that sell on it really are Nintendo products, because of said fanboys who believe that Nintendo can do no wrong and everyone else is crap. They can't pull their heads out of their asses and realize that Nintendo's been making the same fucking games for the past 20 years, so they better be fucking getting it right!

So, before a bunch of you get your panties in a bunch and say, "fuck that Tony, what game has he done that ever reached the greatness of Mario Galaxy?" Realize I'm mainly bitching that my game making efforts will more than likely be in vein or at least only sell enough to cover the cost of development, because Nintendo fanboys only buy "Big N" games. Don't believe me? Look at sales charts for DS games. Look at sales charts for Wii games, Gamecube games, etc. It's not just a quality issue, it's the "Nintendo factor". Also, I find game making is unfortunately filled with many more obstacles than just coming up with ideas and executing them. Most of my career has been either firefighter and/or fighting the process of making games and narrow-minded people who control the strings.

(deep breath)

So, anyway, yeah... been real busy and all that. In addition to making games at work and the kids keeping the wife and I up (we're talking NEVER more than 30 minutes in a row without dealing with something, 24/7), I'm trying to get my own games and game engine on the go at home. When I do find time, it's interesting... relearning to program, learning a new programming language and seeing my little snippets of code come to life.

Yeah, it may look like fricken Geometry Wars on the surface, but it's not. I wanted to do the "vector thing" long before seeing GeoWars, but unfortunately didn't. So, I'm just using the art I did previously as placeholder, until I swap it out for some other style that's hopefully new and fresh. At the very least not the over-done (yet still cool in some games) GeoWars retro-vector look.

So, Expect more verbage about my side-projects, when I'm not bitchin' about my day job, but in the meantime expect more kibitzing about game dev and especially about the unwashed masses I'm sure I'll encounter at GDC08.

Escaped the Plantation

So, when I started making games 25 years ago, there was no such thing as an "indie scene", every game was done by "small teams" and almost every game was "innovative", because there was no one pointing their pretentious fingers stating otherwise.

As time went on, games got bigger, teams got bigger, budgets got bigger, but I'm not sure if every part of games got better. The games I was working on in particular seemed to be ever increasingly focused on "popcorn moments", big spectacle that's largely non-interactive. I spent the majority of my time on my last game, as a cinematographer. The "powers that be" didn't care about the "game" part of the game, they mainly cared about epic moments and schedules. Then, when they did care about the game, they decided they knew more about tuning a game than a 20-year vet who's mainstay was tuning million-unit sellers. The game turned out okay and of course got unfairly slammed by the press, but that's a subject for another blog ("When Producers and Publishers Get in Their Own Way" and "Reviewers, Jaded and Loving It")

Another game was a license where, sure on the surface it seemed like you could make a game of it, but in reality, if you were to do the license justice you wouldn't be making some cliche-riddled shooter. I never wanted to be on this project, and said as much, but inherited the mess and tried to make a go of it. When it was obvious that it was gonna be a lot of hard work and end up being "okay" and slammed by the public (because that's what asshole smarty-pants reviewers and sniping little pricks on forums do), I had to get away from that. (Heh, another article, "Wasting Your Time Making Other People's Properties Great")

Feeling quite burnt from the past 6 years at The Collective, with perpetual crunch, no appreciation for the effort and obviously nothing interesting or exciting coming down the pipe except more B-level licenses, I thought, "well, might as well go back to a big publisher." Enter Rockstar San Diego, an experience so non-eventful, I don't even put it on my resume, even though it was 8 months out of my life I'll never get back. (Granted Midnight Club: LA looks like it's coming along).

Completely discouraged by what games and game development had become, I thought, "must be time for me to get out." It's a sad thought, but it happens to people all the time. Many a talented (and even more untalented) people "give up" on the videogame buisness, every day.

• Some people leave because it's not all fun and games, like it looks like from the outside.
• Some people leave because it's not the safe haven for wanna-be novelists, directors, Pixar animator wanna-be's or the "I have an idea, I can do that better" people who have been "playing games for years".
• Some people leave because they realize their time is up. They're out of ideas, have no passion for the work and just want to "move on".

Most people leave because the machinery that runs the "business" side of the videogame business is broken. It's run largely by people with the wrong understanding of games and a total reactionary approach towards customer service. Notice I didn't say they had the wrong motivations. Anyone that doesn't think the business should expand and make money is an IDIOT. Yes, you with the need to be this bullshit "starving artist martyr" are an idiot. The very thing that you love would go away if it weren't for its expansion into "casual" or "sports jocks" or whatever genre that's mass market that you don't like. You wouldn't be able to sustain an enviable lifestyle if it weren't for the EA's of the world, so STFU and let them do what they do, as long as they don't impede on what you do...

(deep breath)

So... where was I? Oh yeah, quiting the biz. So, there I was, thinking of doing the deed, when it occurred to me; I made games by myself before. I'm not some chump that needs a giant team to make a game. But how can I sustain a wife and twins on the way in Orange County off of some side project?

Enter XBLA.

Seeing "little games", "indie games" flourish on a console was just the light I needed... the path was shown to the Underground Railroad! Freedom was ahead, just head for the river, go north and don't look back!

So, I contacted a friend of mine, Simon Hallam, programmer-extraordinare, ex-RARE dude and come-to-find-out, an inventor/designer/producer. His game, Wik: Fable of Souls, was on XBLA (as well as PC), and was doing pretty well. Well enough for the 360 to be a viable platform for Reflexive. My intention was to get advice from Simon, but it ended up being beneficial for all parties to join Reflexive and help bring their next project, Axiom Overdrive, to XBLA.

Here we are, 18 months later and I'm still "indie". It's been eye-opening to see a different side of the biz. It's also been rejuvinating to see a lot of "little ideas" pan out for people. It has made me realize that "there are no small games, just small minded people at publishers". I'll be chronicling some of the development of Axiom and other indie games, as well as some of the tirades eluded to in this post here at The Factor.

In the meantime, I've thrown down the cotton, escaped the plantation and hopefully, will never look back...

-Twitch