Understanding Games

Wow, its been a long time since I've blogged.
Academia life took too much of my precious time :p

Now, for the interesting links I want to share:

Its a series of Flash games that introduces the basics of games.
Understanding Games Part 1
Understanding Games Part 2
Understanding Games Part 3
Understanding Games Part 4

Done by Pixalate, it teaches the wonderful world of game design while playing some simple Flash games.

Definitely recommended for all to try. Because its both educational AND entertaining :D


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Removing Busywork

Richard Garfield wrote an article on how busywork is removed in games and the examples from the history of famous games.


Click on Read More for the full post.



LINK to Full article

"

Busywork in a game are the things done that are necessary to play, but not really part of the fun. As with most definitions, this will have some gray areas, but to illustrate, some of the things that I would consider busy work are:

• Shuffling and dealing
• Banking in a game like Monopoly
• Setting up a complicated board game

Where it starts to get muddy is when the busywork is incorporated with play. An example of this is a game in which one player is so far ahead that they are definitely going to win; playing that game out to its bitter end would be busywork. Also, one could argue that the beginning of a game like Monopoly has a lot of busywork. If I am going to roll, move, and buy if possible then the game in some sense starts at the point the first decisions are made: trading, buying houses, or at least choosing not to purchase a property. What happens until them could be called busywork, though players may enjoy seeing the “start” of the game unfold.

The historical drive to remove busywork has made it so that most classic games play pretty efficiently relative to modern games. Some examples of where I would say history has driven out busywork would be in backgammon and chess. In backgammon, a game in which you race your pieces around the board and the first person to remove all their pieces wins the race, the ancestors had you start with your pieces off the board. Later, the game was played where pieces began on the board. Later pieces began on the board in an advanced position. Later the doubling cube was added which made runaway games possible to truncate. In chess, originally the pieces did not move as far as they do now, where they sweep across the board. Also, the difference between eastern and western chesses are defined mostly by how the games handled the pawns gumming up the works – eastern chess removed many pawns so there was room to move, and western chess created the “double move” that you can do when you first move a pawn.

Often there will be resistance to removing busywork from a game on many grounds. Generally the people playing the game have made their peace with whatever the mechanic is, or have even learned to enjoy it. It is certainly easy to believe that some modest amount of busywork can be worth the cost for whatever benefit is being given. The tactile pleasure of shuffling a deck may be worth the shuffling. The awe of looking over an elaborate military game might be worth the setup time. However, frequently when the busywork is removed there will be a lot of new players interested in playing, and a lot of old players who don't look back. This has happened very recently with prepainted miniatures in the hobby market. In Wizards there was a group of game designers advocating them long before they became popular, and they never managed to overcome the people entrenched in the old system where all miniatures needed to be painted. After all, the old school believed that was one of the big appeals of the game form. That may have been true, but the ability to buy decent looking prepainted miniatures opened up the game form to far more people. I imagine there was similar resistance among the players to changes in chess that moved it along – undoubtedly some players enjoyed the original game, which by modern chess standards plods along, and resisted changes.

The gaming form that can most learn from this is computer gaming – specifically, but not limited to, roleplaying games. From the early days of MMRPGS I have longed to see the “busywork” removed – the travel time, the boring combats, the tedious inventory management. Cynics have responded that once you remove all that you are left with nothing (try playing progress quest, a free online game, to see the most succinct argument to that end). I personally don't believe that – I think some care needs to be taken, similar to the care that one could imagine being exercised in chess where someone might advocate doing away with all the pawns, or making them move like queens. Entrenched players often respond that they like these elements, and somehow can keep a straight face saying that while holding the move button down for ages as they lumber around an artificial world. They claim that getting rid of the travel would hurt their feeling of immersion. They say this as their character dies and they respawn and go out to search for the corpse.

In recent years you can see the forces that remove busywork playing out here as well, however. Every generation of these games introduces more and more tools to speed travel up or keep combat and other play experiences fresh and interesting. What I am waiting for is for one of these games to be designed with reducing this busywork being not something done incrementally, to be a little better than the competition, but boldly making it the foundation upon which their game is built, jumping directly to the endpoint of this evolutionary process. But, as it is, it looks like I may just have to wait for the game form to crawl there.

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Story Flow

An Adventure we will go....

A few months ago, I've ask a friend(he's a Game Master for my weekly D&D sessions) on his method of making game campaigns for Dungeons and Dragons Role Playing Game.

His method uses Story Flow. Treating the campaign like a single story. He gave me this flow on how he made his game campaigns:

Story -> Setting -> Plot -> Flow (and hooks)-> End







Click on Read More for more details.

1. Story
   First, you have to make up a story for it.
   Is it an adventure for fame and glory, or a quest to save the world from the clutches of an evil overlord? It can be anything.
   The story form the basis for the campaign. It gives motivation and reason for the player characters to involve in the story.
   
   
2. Setting
   Where is the story set in? The time period, the culture, the people, every details of the world or at least some aspect of it have to be prepared.
   Even thought its a fantasy world, you still need to prepare the setting of your campaign. It helps if you can describe and let the players interact with your world during a session. It foster role playing and make the campaign more interesting, at least it won't be a boring hack and slash session.
   
   
3. Plot
   The plot twist.An important element to keep the story interesting.
   Having your ever dependable NPC turning out to be a spy for the enemy or having the city suddenly engulf with zombie inducing plague. Whatever needed to spice things up :)
   
   
4. Flow (and hooks)
   The story flow. How the story or campaign goes.
   If players stray too far away from the story flow, you can use hooks to pull them back.
   Hooks are ways to pull the players into to the story.
   For example, if the game is set in a desert and you want the players to solve a quest in a certain area, but the players wants to go someplace else. You can make a great sand storm that traps the players in that area, thus forcing them to concentrate on the quest.
   
   
5. End
   The ending. You need to know how the campaign ends.
   Making things up without knowing how things going to end will make the campaign draggy.
   

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1 hour interview with Brett Bibby

Found an interesting 1 hour interview with Brett Bibby of Gamebrains with some MMU students for their project.

Click on Read More for some snippets of the interview.



LINK to full transcript


"

Eliecia : Since your company is licensed developers for the varieties of platforms like PlayStation 2, Gamecube, Game Boy Advance, Windows and OS X platforms, so why you focused on Playstation 2 and Gamecube only?

Mr. Brett : Because the PC market has actually been in declined for awhile and I think that console games which includes Gameboy are growing more rapidly than other segments in the last few years even while the world economy was actually quite depressed, and the video games market sets a lot of record and this is mostly due to the extension of the market from the hardcore gamers into less hardcore types of games and gamers. So, console platforms are the ideal platform to do that.

If you think about a PC, I mean even your own PC right. They are probably stuffed in the corner. It’s not very comfortable. The monitors are not very good, like the spec is not the greatest it can be. So, when you make a console game even though the hardware maybe less powerful than a PC that you might have but from a developer’s point of view. We know that everyone in the world that owns that machine has the same hardware so that means we can exploit every last bit of the hardware.

For example our Backyard Baseball 2007 PC game, we don’t push the envelope too much because there are so many PCs out there and we have to decide what is the minimum spec PC that you can run on. And it’s very costly and time consuming to support multiple versions of something. Well, I mean multiple platforms and multiple versions on the same platform.

For instance, you may have the latest dual core Intel CPU, 2 GB of RAMs, NViDia 68 graphic card, but the next guy doest. So that means I make a game, I’m standing in a scene. So, are you going to make all trees higher polygons? The rocks, the ground? What about the grass? The textures, everything. So, you can imagine the developer’s headache to have to develop so many different of assets just to cater to, you know a certain level of graphic card. So it’s really difficult to provide an optimum experience on PC to every user. We always have to make sacrifices or trade-offs.

The only people that get away with doing something more is something like ID Software can do for DOOM. They can do something really hardcore and customers know they are pushing its bleeding edge technology and probably won’t run really well on their machine if it’s older but most people don’t have that luxuries so we have to target on a very lower level of machine. You know, different resolution, different everything. It’s a real mess to develop. That’s why you see in the world, lots of PC developers or lots of multi-platform console developers, that you don’t really mix that much. People are using PCs but there’s not much specialties. Specialties as console.

Eliecia : Does that means that GameBrains focused on the International market compared to the local market? Because here in Malaysia, online PC games are more popular compared to console games. Each of us has computers and fast internet connection like Streamyx and we prefer a more interactive game that we can communicate with others on the net. So why GameBrains doesn’t try to make a online PC game?

Mr. Brett : Because that market is still nothing. Hehe. I mean, I heard the THQ’s Warhammer 40,000 : Dawn Of War is the best selling game ever in Malaysia and they localized it to Bahasa Melayu. It was sold like, 20000 units or 30000 units so I mean, for an average game of war even not that much marketing can easily do 300,000 units to 500,000 units. So, a couple thousands of units is nothing. It may seem like there’s a lot of games here but there’s not.

Eliecia : Does that mean that the games that GameBrains developed are not marketed in Malaysia?

Mr. Brett : They can still buy it here, but we don’t really care. The focus for us is North America for sure. North America represents traditionally the majority of the share, they are getting less but for a really really good game that everybody knows they will still probably make 55% to 60% of the market, and then Europe the second, Japan is the third and then the rest of the world. So, if you eliminate Canada, US, all the EU countries and Japan, so you are left with 15% of the market for the rest of the planet. So you are talking about 150 to 160 over countries only represent a few thousand units. If you think about at it, it’s worth doing but it’s not worth focusing.

Eliecia : So, do you mean that the local games development companies in Malaysia have to focus at the International market? They have to ship their good out?

Mr. Brett : GameBrains. That what GameBrains does. If you want to make games at a certain level, I don’t think you can make money on PC only games in Malaysia at a certain level. If you wanna make a casual game in Malaysia for PC, for Malaysia, probably can.

Eliecia : Yeah, but you don’t earn much profit right?

Mr. Brett : Well, you might but you need a really tiny team. Hehe. I mean we’ve got about 22 to 23 people here, and the Playstation2 development kit alone is about 70 000 ringgit. So, if you have 5 programmers and 70, 000 ringgit, it’s already 350, 000 right? So, 350 000 ringgit there and if development takes a year and you people are not making much money, salary wise, a big team is going to set you back at least 100 000 ringgit a month. So, got a year of that, that’s 1.2 million ringgit, and 350 000 for dev kits, and 3D MAX which is 12 000 ringgit per copy, so you have to pay 12 000 times how many artist and your programming environment also cost money. License fees, everything. You can’t use pirate softwares in development, it’s not right.

So, the total is like easily 2 to 3 million ringgit just to make one game. Easily, that’s pretty cheap actually that’s why you see like in US standards the US currency is 3 to 5 million US but here is 3 – 5 million ringgit so the cost is advantage to us but US publishers won’t pay you US rates to develop here, right? That doesn’t make sense. I mean, there’s a famous analogy that I like to use to help people understands business and risks.

So imagine you work at a Bank and you are the project manager and you want to do a new program to print the statements for the Bank. Let’s say you build it up locally and they want to charge about 100 000 ringgit. So, your budget is 100 000 ringgit and you got a company locally that will do it for 100 000 ringgit. But some company in Nigeria will do it for 20 000 ringgit. Will you do it? There is no advantage, and you personally don’t get the 80 000 ringgit savings so there is no incentive to do business with company at the other side of the world. When you sleep they work, when you work they sleep. So, you can never call them, you can’t see them. You only get emails everyday. So, if the project fails you will certainly lose your job. The bank will be unhappy, you know it’s a loss.

But there’s a company that’s just down the street, you can table talk with them, you can drop in anytime, you can have meeting with them, they can come and show you power point slides all the time, so if they fails, nobody’s going to blame you because there was a local, whatever sense of trust in that local company right? Also, if they fail you can have a legal back-in. You can sue them at the Malaysian court against a Malaysian company so you know you have some recourse.

So, you can see that, where the stuff is done in any industry, where the market is, is where the people that provide the market are stationed. So, their incentive is just to stay local. So, the Publisher in LA they want to do business with developers in LA or in Austin Texas, right? They can always grab a flight over there or drive all the way over there if they want to. So, I think that understanding the business risks help you to understand the business models for the whole industry. So, a casual game that has very little risk for you to develop the whole thing, so nobody pays you to do it, so that’s why you can do that kind of thing here or anywhere easily. You can upload it and then people can buy it, and then they can pay. So the risk is very low. So you have to think through that.

Eliecia : So, is there any local Game Publisher or Game Publishing company in Malaysia?

Mr. Brett : Umm, there is a few. There is like, New Era or something like that. There’s a couple but there must be localization and then published and I don’t think that they are doing spectacularly well but I’m sure they are making some money. But there’s also a very big divide between publication and development. Like, Imagine you going into a book store, the people that make the books are very removed from the people that write the books. That makes sense. I mean like, you got Dan Brown and you got book publishers. Book publishers are all bout shipping units to the store, buying paper, buying ink, printing it, getting it out, doing some promotion, But Dan Brown could be on a sail boat somewhere in the Caribbean writing a book.

You know what I mean? The content is always developed very independently of the distribution change. Same as movies, books, video games, so when you look at the people, my point is that I wouldn’t look at the Malaysian publishers and think that, assume that they are involved in development. They are probably very separated. I mean I’ve been here for 12 years, GameBrains has been here for 8 years and I don’t know anything about Malaysian Publishers. I mean, they don’t talk to us, we don’t talk to them. It’s just that we are not in the same business or market together.

Eliecia : But the local games development company could not afford to contact the overseas publishers and they can not make it to the International market so they have to start with the local market first. So, what do you think about this?

Mr. Brett : I don’t think that’s a bad idea. I just don’t know that you can translate the success in one into success of another. I mean, look at Bollywood right? So how come Bollywood movies are all over US screen cinemas, you know what I mean? And there are famous Chinese film makers, why don’t they take the world by storm? I mean, I don’t think that you can just say that success in one market means you can be successful in another market. If I make a game truly targeted at local market, I don’t know those will appeal to American consumers, right? I’m not saying it’s not helpful but I will be cautious about predicting success and translating that from one market to another.

There are plenty of French game developers who are successful in French that you’ve never heard of. And so forth in Germany, Russia, Korea, China, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, lots of local local games company. Maybe bits of PC get out. So, you can be successful in one market but it does not, usually. I think like to international. You can go international, or you want to go local, but doing both is tricky, in my opinion.

Eliecia : How many units per game (in average) that GameBrains can ship per year?

Mr. Brett : Uhh, this is, mostly what we’ve been making so far is we work with the publishers to do a licensed based titles. The sale of your product is completely limited by how many they manufactured. So it’s kind of different model. So, what they do is, like we did “Buffy the Vampire Slayers” for FOX Televisions. So they will look at the market, they will look at the development cost and they know that it’s kind of fad product. It builds up momentum, you push it out, people buy it and then you wanna cut it. So because there is a long lean time for manufacturing, if you order like, say you game is selling well, you think you wanna restock the game. If you ordered today it will takes 8 to 10 weeks to actually get the new units on the shelf.

So the problem you have is, if the game sells really well, you practically need to re-order the first day itself in order to replenish the stock when it’s needed, right? But most people don’t do that. Most people will like, sale go and by the time the people realized that they should re-order it’s probably too late.

So, what you see is, the publisher will pick a number of units they want to make, the development cost, they will find the window and schedule to push the game out and they wont make anymore. So in our case, of the first 9 games that we’ve done, are completely sold out world wide. You cannot buy them anymore. You can only buy them used, and the publishers wont make them anymore. They actually make only one batch for every those nine games. So, to them, its like we make X units, we sell them and after they recover the development fees, marketing, whatever, they will make a profit, they will just take that profit and they will just move to a new game. They won’t bother to resell the current game.

So, also another factor in this business. So, everything we produced is sold out. But you know, we could have sold a lot more if they make more initially, they made a wrong guess. They’d say “Wow, we can make money here” and they definitely don’t want to make too many because when the price drops, the consumer feels that the game value is not that good, this publisher is making faux price games. So they always want to leave the public warning more and then move to new stock, new games. That makes a retailer happy. People like Wal-Mart, you know. They will take the game, and sell through and there will be new game and that will sell through and there will be a new game, and that will sell through. So, its like to convince somebody to carry a game to second round is very tough. There are always pessimistic. Pessimists. They are always sold out. So the first 9 games we sold a bout 1.2 million units, roughly.

Eliecia : 1.2 million for the nine games?

Mr. Brett : Yup. For the first nine. So that generated about 30 million US Dollar itself. So the gross revenue is easily over 100 million ringgit.

Eliecia : Okay, so according to our research, the biggest issue in establishing a games development company in Malaysia is the funding problem. So, can you please tell me how GameBrains solve this?

Mr. Brett : Can you first tell me about your research? Cause I disagree with that section that’s the problem

Eliecia : We got the information from the online newspaper, The Star Online : TechCentral. It said that funding is one of the biggest issue and it state that you’ve got some Angel Investors in the past and some funding from the Malaysian Government.

Aeris : Because we think that we need a lot of money to make a game development company. What if we got the human resources but don’t have the money to start up?

Mr. Brett : Anyway, I disagree. Money is not the problem. It’s the human resources. It’s the problem. Yes. GameBrains started with no money, It’s just me one guy and we did a demo, we got it out, we got a deal, we plough all the money back in, back in, back in, We were profitable after 60 days. We didn’t take any money for like, years. Like all that stuff you see on the website was only late stage. For the first 6 to 7 games we did it on our own, with no essentials or capitals of any kind. The only money is just invested by myself that was literally like I didn’t get pay, no pay cheque. I got my pay cheque like few thousands a year. It’s like this month I got my pay cheque I will buy a PC. This month I got my pay cheque I will hire another guy. This month I got my pay cheque I’ll buy one copy of Photoshop and we will start texturing, whatever.

So the business will grow organically. And if I can do it as a foreigner, I mean in Malaysia, anybody can do it what. I mean if you want to make games, you can make Pocket PC games for free. You can go to Microsoft.Com and download Visual Studio or Visual C++ for Pocket PC embedded in C++ and all that. You can download that for free. You can download the emulators to emulate that PDAs. You can develop a Pocket PC game. You can go to Hadango.com and you can sign up and upload your game there. You can get sales and you can get cheque every month.

So, what I think that is, Malaysians always scream that they want money but I think that that’s a shortcoming of the Malaysian mindset. Especially when you look around Malaysia, I see loads and loads and loads of businesses, especially Chinese businesses that I doubt that seriously the Government give them any money but they seem to be doing quite well. So, if they can do it. Why cant you? I don’t understand. Why people want to have doubts.

Also, a follow up to that is that, I’ve been told by some groups that, “We want money, we want money” and I’ve actually offered them money and then, they go away. It’s more like a convenient excuse. So I think, funding is an excuse. I think, If you wanna do it, you can do it. I’ve done it. And I can point to a thousands of businesses that I can see from my window, they might not be game businesses but they also did it right? I wan to sell food, I just get tables, chairs, plates, and thing to cook, I need buy a wok, I need to buy some plate wares, did Government give me that money? No. And I bet its more expensive to set up a coffee shop than to develop a simple casual game and get it online. So, what are they talking bout?

Aeris : May I know what’s the title of the first game you developed?

Mr. Brett : 720° Skateboarding

Eliecia : Do you mean that the local graduates do not meet the requirements of the IT industry?

Mr. Brett : Yes. They do not meet the requirements.

Eliecia : What’s your opinion on this? About the local graduates and the local technology?

Mr. Brett : Errr.. Its' bad. Hehe. I think that the universities, there’s a vast of students that I demanded a refund. I think the universities aren't doing a good job, of developing good co-curriculums. They are creating a bunch of “Mouse Monkeys”. They want to teach people applications. Businesses can care less whether you know the application or not. I get resumes all the times that lists every programming acronym language you can imagine. Yet, they can't program a single one of them.
I can ask him a question about any language and what they study and they never can't tell me that they learnt anything. Seriously. It's dismal. We give them exam, I give them an exam for programmers here that most 13 year old of the United states could ace and that usual average is about 1 out of 4 questions right here. And this is for the 4 year degree. It is a appalling. It's a appalling what they teach people.

As Artists, tell me about colour theory. How does a human eye work? They cant tell me. Tell me about light, contrast, shadows, they can't tell me. Tell me about motion, they can't tell me. Tell me who René Magritte is they have no fucking clue. Programmers don't know what’s subordinates. They don’t know anything about data structures, algorithms. It is ridiculous. *cough* And MMU is one of the worst so… it's really appalling. I can care, anybody can come in here and say I know MAYA. I can care less. I know MAX. I can care less. What I want to know is to describe to me the muscles of the upper torso. Tell me how they affect lighting and tell me how they affect motion. Show me that you know color theory. Tell me about full view vision. Tell me about how people see. Tell me about complementary colours and contrasting colors. Tell me about warm colors and cold colors. What are they. What they suppose to make you feel? Is there psychological impact on that? I'll hire that person in a second. And that's what western education only teaches, focus heavy on theory. And then if you know the theory of course you can learn an application right? If you think about it, right?

If you set down on a 3D package say “Okay, ummm.. I know how I want this arm to move because I know motion. I know motion I know the theory of the motion. I know how people think this object should move.” So yeah, figure it out which part to click on and to rotate and whatever. That’s like 30 seconds of learning. You know? The tools don't matter. Only the theoretical, the basic knowledge you need to actually build upon, is all that matters.

Same thing with programming right? Programming theory. If you know like I can have a sorting algorithm right? Like I got A, B and C and I want to sort them. I wanna to do whatever. It's just like anything, you know, its like I wanna…If I can cook pasta at my house I can probably go to your house and cook too, right? Whereas if you think about it, the school teaches you here is the exact pan you need. And It's like they teach you to grab this, go to here, go to the sink, put this on, do this, do that, whatever. You are not learning how to make a pasta, You are learning how to be a robot, you know? Just do this do that. So, then if I take you to a different kitchen and ask you to make pasta it’s like, you'll be like wow, “The sink isn't where I expected it to be or whatever. You don’t think that you need to know about the pasta is too wet or too dry, this is how it works, this is how long needs to cook, this is why we cook it this long at this temperature to release the flavors and the aroma. You don't know that, all you know is turn it on and wait for 30 minutes and just serve it. That doesn't mean you are cook. Heh, you know.

You're Mouse Monkey. That's why I call them Mouse Monkeys, they are stupid, they are idiots, they are pointless. It's like theory is everything. And the people we hired here from MMU are the people that brought nothing from MMU with them. It's what they learnt beyond their education, that they are hired. They were already fairly brilliant in what they did and they sought other sources of education and things. So when they came in, they actually known these things. But the things they learn were not from MMU. There were on their own.

Eliecia : Is the Malaysian Government being supportive to the local games development company? What has the Government and MSC did so far?

Mr. Brett : I mean, I think the Government is actually quite great. I mean, I grow up in Silicon Valley. The thought that the Government would even care or try to help you, or even meet with you and ask you like, “What are the issues you are facing” and “What we can do to help”, you know.. it’s just, unheard of in the west. So I think that’s one of the things that’s great about Malaysia. They are actually very proactive. They come, they see us all the time. They come down and meet up with us at least once a month and ask us like, you know, any recommendations, any ideas, or suggestions or things they can do. We gave a lot of feedbacks for the 9th Malaysian plan for the last 2 years before it was actually put forward.

The ministry consults to us as well where they should allocate the money, how it should be spent and stuff like that. I think that’s really great. I think that it’s really sad how critical, what’s that word.. *cough* You know, I think that people are quite cynical about their Government. You know, they assume it’s all like under handed, bribe-based business, some ministers driving new Mercedes instead of giving people the money this and that. I’m sure stuff like that goes on but I never have any such experiences. I’ve never pay any bribe, I’ve never been asked for a bribe. It’s all been very regiment and it’s all on board. And it’s all really really positive. Even when we apply for grants and stuff like that, it was really really well executed and well done. The people that brought to inspect our grant applications and to take us to task on different things is really outstanding. Really really outstanding. So, so I think the Government is great.

Eliecia : Can you please explain what kind of help has the Government give to GameBrains? What did they do to support GameBrains?

Mr. Brett : Ummm, we’ll say that nothing we’ve got from the Government has been that helpful to us or has been required. Like I said, we did the first 6 titles without any Government assistance whatsoever. Mostly, we got involved with the Government as a way of showing support. So like, MSC status doesn’t really do anything for us, but we became a MSC status company really just to get more involved, not to get something. I think that’s one of the problems of, a lot of with businesses in Malaysia is that they always want something. I find that really appalling as well. It’s like they very cynical and they just want something. They always have their hands out and they are always saying, “What can you do for me?” but, that’s kindda ridiculous, you know, it’s capitalism. It’s like you’re doing something because you want the benefit.

So, no further, if you look into the Chinese community and you’ll realize that they are successful in spite of the Government not because of it? You know, they’re discriminated against in schooling, you know there’s a lot of things where like reverse of prominent actions in Malaysia, right? They favors the Malays heavily yet the Chinese are very successful. So it shows you that you don’t need the Government to be successful. Just go do it.

So I find it very odd when it comes to MSC especially and technology and stuff and somehow somehow people feel it’s Government’s responsibilities to provide them a living and fundings and all kinds of other things. I think that it’s great that the Government does stuff but it’s just extra stuff. It’s just icing on the cake. You know, it’s not a requirement. Like I said I grow up in Silicon Valley and it’s just a big flat piece of orchard and people turn it into technical powerhouses, so just get off your ass and do it. Just get it done.

Eliecia : But, from your website right, I found out that you get funding from the MSC and MDeC, so is that the only thing that they did to help GameBrains?

Mr. Brett : Yeah, we applied for some funding to buy the Playstation2 development kit and other stuff and it was great. It was helpful. It wasn’t required, but it was there. We took advantage of it. I’m saying it’s great but I just don’t want people to give the impression that GameBrains wouldn’t be GameBrains without it. We would. We are already doing it. It was just more like, you know we could contribute, we could help give back something. I know that they gave us money but in return, we gave back a lot.

You know, we’ve worked as partners we’ve provide some of the technology we developed. We meet people like you guys, *laugh* I mean, we write a lot of papers, we consult the Government a lot so, for me it’s just like working closely together. By them giving in us the money and they get involved with our business, and we can use that as a way to work with them to help them understand the business better. As opposed to just let them go off, and do their own things. It just, you know it’s going to be very private, very non-public, non transparent process. So for us, it’s just a way for us to develop a closer relationship with the Government to help them understand what it takes for a company like GameBrains to be successful. But the grant money didn’t, didn’t… err… it wasn’t a requirement. We’re already have investors and fundings and so they are just another source of funding that we used.

Eliecia : GameBrains has been in Malaysia for 8 years until now, so what kind of barriers you faced besides financial, technology and manpower problems?

Mr. Brett : The number one problem is manpower. We don’t have any technology problems.

Eliecia : I mean, besides that. Besides financial, manpower and technology.

Mr. Brett : Right. Obviously, I think probably just Marketing and Promotions. You know, getting…Most Americans, I mean, America is a big place, I grow up there, Americas are really ignorant of the outside world, and the reasons why are pretty to understand, I mean if say you want to watch the news right, like from 5.00 to 5.30 is Local News. Local news is like, literally your town. 5.30 to 6.00 is County News, that will be like, equivalent to Klang Valley news, right. Then from 6.00 to 6.30 will be State News, news about California. Then 6.30 to 7.00 will be National News. And so you know, you’ve already watching the televisions for 2 fucking hours just to figure out what’s happening. By the time it gets to International people will just like, too much. So much happening, so much going on, and I mean, like I said I grow up in Silicon Valley, good God there are so much freaking news. It’s like, I’m not very much a news person anyway, and there’s so many other things to do, so many activities, people play all kinds of sports.

So, if you grow up in the States it’s really easy to understand why they are so naïve about the rest of the world, it’s because the US is such a huge place and there are so much happening there already, it’s really tough to put your mind outside of that. So when you ask somebody from US, like US Publishers, you know, “Hey we’re from Malaysia”. They probably couldn’t find it on the map. They probably don’t even know where it is. They probably know it’s Asia only because it’s “MALAY-SIA” and there’s “ASIA” . Like, it’s some asian country, something like that. They might know it’s west of them but they don’t know much more than that.

So we spent A LOT of time and effort, educating people,as to, you know, where we are, what we can do. What we have done in the past. That kind of thing, and it’s tough. We use to keep early on,we started out working 7, 7.30am in the morning, and we still do quite a bit just so we overlap the US time zone a bit, so we come in, we call them. It’s like late in their day, very early in our day. It’s just like a contact, “Hi, how are u doing”. And they expect that when they want to talk to you, they want to talk to you NOW. They don’t want to like check their watch and figure out what time they wanna call you. So, you have to work really really hard with that. I think that’s one challenge that everybody misses.

You know, when you set up a game development business, if you gonna deal with publishers, you need to think about, you know phone services that forward calls to your house, or your cellphone 24 hours a day. And you need like, what we have cameras there live on the net showing our studios. You gotta do a lot of things to help people feel that you are just down the street. You are just there. If they want to get you, they can get you. Never mind just call GameBrains and it rings to my phone, never mind it’s middle of the night. You wake up, you answer the phone, “GameBrains!” *laughs* You want them to not think that you are not just there. And that to me is also a single biggest point of failure for other Malaysian developers, or Asian developers to speak with. They don’t think through that, that they need literally need 24/7 available.

So, money is not, money, manpower, technology, honestly, manpower is probably the biggest problem but that one is really not apparent to anyone of the outside. So, the three problems you said it, I would actually say that really aren’t really the big problems. I wouldn’t focus on those. If I did, I would only focus on manpower. It scratch technology, it scratch money, so its literally marketing presents and manpower. This are the 2 issues.

Eliecia : In your opinion, how can Malaysian’s Game Developers companies improve our Games Industry? How do we get in par with the International companies? For example, like Blizzard Entertainment?

Mr. Brett : Uhm.. I’m not a big fan of out sourcing. This is one of the things that sadly gone into the 9th Malaysian Plan which I don’t agree with. The idea is that we could get started making like, arts and stuff for games and we could attract other game companies into Malaysia. I mean, it’s good but I don’t, I think it’s also a recipe for disasters. Like CodeMasters coming in, this company coming in, that company coming in. It sounds good, but the reality is they wont bring any knowledge and skill with them. They will just create a spot and go make me trees, go make me cars. Oh, so you make a tree, so make me more trees, more trees, more trees, you know, it’s like it would be a factory. So it’s hard to believe that a graduate who get a job say, Codemaster. Yeah, they gonna learn how to make trees, but I don’t know is that going to ever translate into great, you know like pre to your questionnaires, say Blizzard. I don’t think that you can take a bunch of ex-codemasters Malaysian staff and make a Blizzard. Cuz all you going be able to do is make trees, rocks, cars, do some animations. Stuff like that.

So, I’m a big proponent of, you’ve gotta do it all. You’ve gotta learn, I mean learn just art. Or You can learn just coding. But this an isolation they are just islands. It doesn’t do anything. It’s important to do the whole thing. From the idea, to the final delivery. So, Game Design, Product Management, Project Management, Technology, Art, Art Theory, delivering, you know clearing the accounts, doing business transactions, hearing back directly from your customers. That’s what really important. That’s what gets you the skill to gain through inside into how the game industry works, and how to make great games and then you can develop. So, my idea is that you need to grow, start small and do everything, from end to end and then go after bigger and better things. I think that’s the only way that Malaysia can ever become a world famous development. Otherwise you are just an out sourcing house.

Eliecia : What do you think about the future of games development in Malaysia?

Mr. Brett : Uhm… I’d say it’s a task up right now. I think that, I think that there is huge opportunities out there that nobody seems want to take advantage of. The fact that the Government does offer some support is amazing but I wont rally around that. At the end of the day, you can give a bunch of people who don’t know what they are doing money, they will lose the money. It’s not, money doesn’t do anything. It’s like if you don’t know how to make a great game nobody’s gonna buy it. So you wont make any money. So, if I give you, okay, it’s like, if I give you a 1000 bucks go make a casual game. The game sucks you never sold any. Then you’re just gonna come back to me and give me another 1000 bucks so that I can make another game. So I give you another 1000, you make another game nobody buys it, then you make another, and another and another. What are we doing ? I mean, it’s like, if you cant, the money is just like to make something. But you’re trying to make an entertainment.

So, I can pay you to write a book but that doesn’t mean you are a good writer. So, you gotta be a good writer first. So, writing Lord Of The Rings isn’t the best first project for you. You know, maybe you should write a short story. A one page story and practice your craft. Then two page and a short story then something something. You know, you gotta grow it into something. So that’s why I think. I think if the Malaysians people pursue that, I think they can be wildly successful, but if they look for handouts or foreign company, or you know they looking for something like free ticket to get there, then they missed the point f the exercise. They didn’t learn anything

Eliecia : So you mean we have to start from small like how GameBrains start from four people and build up from there?

Mr. Brett : Yes.

Eliecia : That means that we have to start developing easy games and slowly move to platform?

Mr. Brett : You can develop a casual game, you can develop mobile games, you can develop Pocket PC game, you can develop board games, right? Why does it have to be digital? Yoy know, even like the games design we do it here for original products, we actually, I would actually create a board game of the game and I’ll play it. I’ll try to understand the rules and mechanics, and I’ll try to isolate each piece. And isolate the mechanic from the genre from the story from art from everything, you know it’s the holistic view. You must have the holistic view. If you don’t, you’ll fail.

Eliecia : Lastly, what is your word of encouragements or advice to the current or future games developer in Malaysia?

Mr. Brett : Just do it man. Hehe. It’s like, it’s all out there. It’s like, we don’t learn for free as well, you know. It’s like, I can say if you wanna make a Pocket PC game then go make one. Even a programmer making his own art it can be done. Make a trivia game. Just start simple. People always wanna go like “Okay I wanna make an MMORPG game “ Oh my god, like even for a company that has a lot of experience and skills doesn’t guarantee that they will be successful. So, if you start small, the important thing is to take the idea, and get it produced. You wanna make a board game. Get some card board, get some spare glue, do it, do it by hand, develop the packaging, develop a small little promotional site for the game and try to sell it. Give it away. Give it to somebody. Get their feedback. Learn. You know, because Malaysia still has the cost advantage. It is cheap. It is easy to do. There is no excuse. You know. Its so much easier to make stuff here, than it is in the west. Yet people make stuff in the west and then people over here point to them, and then imagine that they have some benifits that you don’t have it here. You’ve got more benefits here. It’s easier to do it here than in Silicon Valley. Way easier. I don’t know what. People just need to do it.

Eliecia : How can GameBrains be so successful? As we all know, GameBrains is one of the top games development company in Malaysia. What are the special steps taken?

Mr. Brett : Same. Started small, started with just one person, me, and I actually got, I actually developed the demo, did all the art, developed all the tools, did everything, did my pitch, got the project, then hired three guys,. Taught them what I knew, worked with everybody, worked in a room, its 10 by 10, we sat all basically in the same table and I thought them everything I ever learnt in development then I hired a few more people, we all sat in the same room, and shared the knowledge,and thought them but always doing the smallest, simplest project we could do. First game we did was only three months. Took us about 6 months to finish, it was like, 3, 4 month project, by the time we hired everybody, got up to speed, took us up to 6 months to get it out, Second project we did was only about 2,3 months long, third project was also 2, 3 months, so we did small projects and practiced.
Development is easy, shipping is hard. So that’s the key, it’s to make sure you know what the end looks like.

Once you know what the end looks like, then you can do it again and then set it a little further, right? It’s just like running, jogging ,working out. You know what I mean? It’s like, the first time you go for a jog, you go for a jog, then like okay, wow, that was too long, or too short right? Then you do it again, and again until it becomes easy. Then you increase the distance then you keep doing it, so there’s a beginning, a middle and the end. So you know what the end looks like. You know what its like to finish something. That’s very important. Very Important.

Shin Shen : You said started alone right, but developing a game has a lot of different stages right? You need programming, you need to do the art, and maybe some animating. So, when you started it, you just do it alone?

Mr. Brett : Yes. Yeah, You mean for GameBrains? I mean, I’ve been doing this for 20 over years, and GameBrains is only 8. And, yeah, I mean, if GameBrains is tanked tomorrow I’d still be doing the same thing. I might go out do a board game. Just sitting around design it in my house, go down to the local store get some matt board, cut it out manually, get some zip lock bags, make my little pieces, you know, I will do it.. if you’re not willing to invest in yourself, then, there is no point.

Shin Shen : So, those skills, art and programming, you learnt it from?

Mr. Brett : Myself. Actually my background is Electrical Electronic Engineering. I never took a programming course in my life. Never taken an art course at all. But I made loads of art, loads of code. I lead the programming team here now, so you could do it yourself, it’s just knowledge what. It’s just information. It’s not hard.

Aifa : Do you have any new plans for the next console games?

Mr. Brett : Yeah, we already got 3 more games. I can’t tell you what they are but we have 3 more games that will be released over the next 12 months.


Aifa : For which console?

Mr. Brett : PS2, GameCube, PC, XBOX, Macintosh, we also will be doing Wii I think.

Aifa : Oh, Wii? Not XBOX 360°?

Mr. Brett : Nope. We’re not really interested in next gen at this point. There’s no market, there’s no money, So it’s a money losing proposition at the moment. But erm, in the future, you know, when the market is there.. right now, there’s a fair amount of opportunity at current gen consoles, so perhaps in the next three years? It’s different. So, anything else?


Eliecia : So, you never thought of marketing the games you developed in Malaysia?

Mr. Brett : Nope.

Eliecia : Not at all?

Mr. Brett : Yeah.

Eliecia : No wonder that most of the people here, the Malaysians, they don’t know that there are games developers in Malaysia. They thought that Malaysia doesn’t make games.

Mr. Brett : Yeah. I mean we see our games sometimes at the pirate shops but you know, heh.

Aeris : Yeah, what do you think about piracy?

Mr. Brett : I don’t mind piracy. I mind if you develop games using pirate software. That’s wrong. We don’t use pirate software here. Everything is fully licensed. So I don’t mind people playing pirate games because if I was to eliminate piracy they would stop playing games. When the day comes, that they could afford their games, then yes, I would oppose piracy. Like in Singapore, piracy is bad because Singaporean can afford a game on a Singaporean salary but if we charge 300 ringgit for a game in Malaysia no one will buy.

Eliecia : GameBrains doesn’t use any copy protection? Any “Anti-Piracy” technology?

Mr. Brett : Nope. Cause it’s nothing. I mean, PC, GameCube and PS2 combined pirate sales in Malaysia of one of our games is probably like 3000 units. Who cares. Heh. Its nothing. More important is to establish game players. I’ll figure out how to charge them later. But if I we eliminate piracy they will just become non game players, and it’ll be very difficult to convince them to play games later.

Difficult means expensive. I’ll spend a lot of money marketing to them to convince them too come back into the game play. So, I don’t think piracy is that bad. But when you can afford it its bad. Businesses should not use pirate software. If they need pirate software because they can not afford it then they should not be in business, the profit margin is too small. Its not right. It’s not right. Yeah, I think people who use pirate software in business and get caught should get much stiffer penalties than they have now. There’s no excuse.

Eliecia : But, normally, the Government, they don’t check whether business companies use original software or not. Malaysians, the businesses like Cyber Cafes, they just just pirated softwares.

Mr. Brett : I don’t have any knowledge on that. Everybody I know uses real software. Cause it’s really its not right. I would report somebody in a second if I knew they were using. Go and do a new line of business get a better business plan cause if you can’t afford the software you need to make your staff productive then you’re in the wrong business.

Shin Shen : Is it very costly to use the original softwares in your company?

Mr. Brett : It is. It is, which is why if you were to think about it. Like, why would I hire somebody, like a fresh graduate from a university who doesn’t have good grasp of color, of art. I’m hiring artist, I want a real fucking artist, cause I’m spending at least 12000 ringgit for the license, 3 to 4 thousand ringgit for the PC, plus Photoshop and others, its probably 20000 ringgit minimum just to hire them, So, you know, I want somebody who is good at what they do. Good at what they do doesn’t mean they know how to use the application. Cause what’s the point. I can come and say ok, go make me a tree and yeah you know 3D Studio Max and you could make that tree in an hour, but if it’s a piece of shit you have to remake it, heh. So its not really an hour isn’t it? You know, its like, I look at a lot of the demo reels and they’re just awful. They’re really really awful. So it’ like they got free software but this just shows you free software doesn’t result in good quality art.

So if you don’t know how to make art, a 100000 dollar package isn’t going to help you. You know what I mean? And it’s really common that a lot of fresh artist could remake something 20-30-40 times you know they get upset and said I just don’t wanna make it again. Ok, then quit. Go on, I’ll find someone who can. If you can’t understand how to make something correct,if you can’t have that vision in your head, the tool is pointless.

So we spent a lot of money to hire people, you know, fresh grads, I think, a lot of people don’t realize that. Programmers cost us about 100000 to hire one. So, you know, I’m looking for a real programmer, I’m looking for somebody who’s gonna be here for the next 10 years and build great software with me and you know, there’s out entry level salary, a couple of thousand of ringgit a month is nothing. Its like. Its like spare change on the floor. I want somebody who is a good programmer. They got to know programming, they got to know art. They got to know design, whatever position I hire them for. I don’t care if they don’t know how to use a 3D package, cause if they know what they want to make, the rest will come very easily.

                                                              
                                                               "

*this interview is slightly abridged, to make it readable

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As a Game Designer, in meeting with a client

Something I've pickup after having several meetings with a Japanese client.

In meetings with a client,

1. Don’t give clients ideas
   -In a game development project, its OK if the clients give inputs on features he wants when the project is still in early production stage. But when development reach the middle of production, its best not to ask for ideas for 'improving' the game. The middle of the production stage is the time when you cut down on the features not adding them.
   
   
2. Be decisive
   -As the game designer, you must be decisive on the features that can be done. Don't make empty promises that you can't deliver (and even if it can be done, doesn't mean you have the manpower and time to do it).
   
   
3. Print out designs on paper
   - If you have several design variation, and you want the client to choose one. Its best to have them printed out and gave it to the client to review them overnight.
   If its need to be approve immediately, print them out and paste them of the walls (or place on the floor). Let the client go thru them. This is a good chance to discuss with the client on the design variations, or the client can look thru it for themselves.
   
   
4. Always leave a email/paper trail.
   - Put things in black and white, and get the client to sign it. It can be meeting minutes, design specs, design document.
   So that the client can't turn the tables on us. Saying that he didn't agreed to things already done.
   If the client just gave verbal approval only, they can change their mind and demands something else in the future.
   Best if there's a clause in contract stating that if producer/client doesn't sign, the project can't continue forward.
   
   

( ._.)Ø

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Memory hack

Definition from counter-hack.net:
Memory Hack: When games are ran, their code is mapped in memory. This can be useful to hackers, giving them the ability to do everything from enhancing their characters speed, to gaining the position of enemies.


This is really bad for online games. As hackers can easily modify their characters to gain god-like weapons and abilities.

This kind of hacking usually happens because the client program itself stores most of the game data to lessen the strain on the game server.


An interesting concept to handle this is by storing the attributes of characters and events in the game server, the client will take the values from the game server and process it. There won't be much stress on the game server as for this it only does balancing and checking only, and lets the client handles all the calculations.

( ._.)Ø

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A good game designer needs good communication skills

Somehow people listen to you when you're holding a machete



A good game designer needs good communication skills. This is because they must be the ‘middle man’ to the different part of the development team. They must able to communicate ideas to programmers, artists, sound engineers, UI team, the producers, and occasionally clients.

Game designers must be able to convey instructions, requests, and informations between the teams. So that there are no misinformation and the project can proceed following the designer's vision, and not other people's.


( ._.)Ø

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How do you handle Double Login?

A common situation in online games, where a same account ID being login twice at the same time.



Situation:
User A logs into a game using his account ID. After a few minutes, user B enters into the game using user A's account login (user B could have borrowed or stolen user A's account ID). How do you handle this situation?

From server side, there are a few ways to handle double login:

1. Push out the earlier login
   Kicking out user A and let user B enter the game. User A have to login again (and kick out user B from the game) to enter the game again.
   A common practice in local game servers, but it can turn into a pushing war between the 2 users. Currently, the most effective solution.
   
   
2. Deny the new login
   User B cannot enter the game as long as user A is logged in the game. But this could lead to problems like user B is logged in for a long period of time and user A (the owner of the account) cannot enter the game.
   
   
3. Can enter from other PC with the same login
   When user A enters the game, he is issued an electronic key(Key A). As long as he has the key, he can move freely within game.
   When user B enters the game(with user A's account ID), as long as user B uses a different computer (with different IP address), he also was issued a key (Key B).
   This solution seems favorable, but is not recommended for online games that have paid subscription.
   

In the end, the best way is always to take good care of your account ID, including never reveal your password to anyone.

By the way, Game Masters doesn't need to know your password when you're reporting problems to them, all they need is your account ID and they can find out everything else from the database. So beware of scammers!!


( ._.)Ø

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Golden rule of gaming

Continuation from my last post, these are some rules you have to remember as the game organiser or Game master.

1.You are the Game master

• You set the rules, you enforce them.

2.If the game doesn’t go well, immediately stop or switch

• The reason for using games in the classroom is to make learning fun. If the situation is becoming hostile (kids getting too involved in the game) or the kids are not having fun, stop or switch to another game.

3.Keep the game exciting, quick and fun

• Kids have short attention span, so keep the games fast and exciting.

4.Know your game

• Before you start the game of your choice, make sure that you know how to play that game. It can be frustrating to the kids and yourself if the game stop midway because of problems or disputes over the game rules.

*Golden rule of gaming by Tom Vasel


( ._.)Ø

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Using games to teach by Tom Vasel

Continuation from my notes from Tom Vasel's talk on "Using Games to Teach".



Why use games in the classroom
-change of pace
-fun for students
-fun for teachers
-an excellent way to teach

• English
  
• Thinking skill
  
• Logic
  
• Social skill
  
• Strategy
  

“Don’ts” when teaching with games
-don’t win at all cost. This isn’t about the best player
-don’t allow fights between the students
-don’t allow ‘friendly’ cooperation
-don’t let the game slow down.
Keep the game moving, keep downtime to a minimum
-don’t be rigid an un-flexible
-don’t worry about finishing the game


“Do’s” when teaching with games
-keep it fair
-do simplify if necessary, but realize that children are smarter than you think
-do change the rule if necessary
-do explain everything thoroughly in English
-do enforce penalties and rewards
-do improvise
-do setup and prepare
-do play a variety of games



and remember, when choosing a game (be it a board game or party games);
If the game rules are too complex, it will spoil the game.


( ._.)Ø

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Can a game company succeed in Malaysia?

Can a game company succeed in Malaysia?
- Yes, there are case studies of successful game companies out there. The problems that all face are the same (mostly time and finance) but they can be overcome with judicious application of insight, knowledge and experience in the game industry and market. If game companies outside of malaysia can overcome these problems, then so can we. In my opinion, the best way to go is the garage games concept.

- Forget about doing a AAA title or competing with the big boys already established out there, they have the money, time, resources, experience, man power, marketing strength, brand power, connections, established channels, knowledge and expertise to beat the crap out of any small upstart company that fantasize about matching them competitively.

- Do small games for niche markets to keep development and production costs low so you don't have such a high break even number while building up your knowledge, experience and expertise.

- Remember that there is no fast profit to be made in game development, the key to success is sustainability and the more games you develop and publish the better your next games are and the greater the chance that one of them makes a big hit that will bring you the desired success.

- Organise your finances properly and ensure that you have enough margin to keep yourself solvent and working on a second game/project during the long wait for the first completed game's income to roll in.

- Know the capabilities of your team and DO NOT be greedy and take on a project that you and your existing team is ill prepared to handle, it is not easy to quickly expand your company for a hoped for big project as you can't find good developers on the spur of the moment and scheduling will get f@(ked up. Develop games that your team know about, if they play FPS and hates RPG, for gods sake don't make an RPG, make an FPS instead.

- Research and know the industry and the market throughly, so as not to rely on the hyped up crap that is frequently bandied around by those who relies on hearsay for their news as it is in THEIR best interest to keep the hype up, however false it may be (easiest way to tell this people from the really informed ones is to watch out for the buzz words 'i hear...' or 'so and so told me...').

- Take a big grain of salt when reading published business and market reports of the game industry as alot of hype and self interest are normally weighted into them, the best and most accurate indicators are the users, independent organizations like IGDA, forums and actual market statistics, but you need to know how to weed out the chaff from the grains.

- Remember that although IT skills are required to develop a game, the game industry as a business and market is NOT an IT business or an IT market. It is an ENTERTAINMENT business and market. The only parts IT principles should play in is the development pipeline for the technology and management of game content and assets. This is a problem that many game development managers in Malaysia still don't understand. Applying IT based business and market principles to the game business and market is a sure fire way to failure, unless you are developing middle wares, game code solutions and game engines or components for others to make games out of.... in that case you aren't a real true blue game developer, you develop technology for the use of the game industry, you don't develop games.



Written by ShaDee of Phoenix Game Studio

Source: IGDA forum

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Tips for making games by Tom Vasel

1.If you make a game, playtest it with people you don’t know.

- In regards to playtesting, having non-related people giving opinions is important. They don't have anything to lose or gain, so most of the time their remarks are honest.


2.If people says your game is bad, its true.

-You're making games for the public, you must not be stuck in a selfish attitude. Even though you think your game is cool, others may not. Remember that your making games for the people, not for yourself.


3.Accept criticism.

-Something all game makers should have, its a bumpy road in making a game, you have to take it and learn from it.


4.If you’re designing your own game, its necessary to have other people do it for you.

-Its always a problem when game designers always have this 'once of a lifetime' game odea but dosn't have the know-how of implementing it. You can always hire other people to make it for you :D


5.Remember that your game has a small chance for company to receive them

-Be prepared to be rejected, no matter how cool or unique your game is, if the game publishers are not interested, you'll have a hard time selling it to him.


6.When you’re designing your own game, the theme is fairly important.

- Most game companies sees a game by the theme first, before gameplay. So you have to prepare to make games with not just impressive gameplay, but also with an interesting theme. But be prepared when you give your game to a company, that they might change the theme.


7.The rules,

-You know the rules, but the players don’t. The rules need to cover everything. Go over them, have some one else go over them. Make sure the rules are good.


8.You need to think of every possibilities

-While making the game, make sure it can handle every gameplay situation possible. You don't want your game to break down just because some player did something weird or stupid XD


9.When making a game, your game have to be fun, where everybody have fun.


10.‘Judge a book by its cover’,

-When designing your own game, its very important to make the game look nice, most people will look at a game that have good components.


11.When designing your own game, talk to others,

-There are many forums online that have many game designers and developers converge and talk on different issues. You can always go to these places and ask for their opinions and advice for your game.
International Game Developers Association
Board Game Designers Forum





I went to Tom Vasel's talk on "Using Games to Teach" at Gamecon1(DEC 3rd and 4th 2005). These are the tips he has given on making your own games.

The tips are from him, but the explanations are from what I can remember from the talk :p

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Always prepare an escape plan

An advice from a colleague of mine in my office (an experience Game Master)....
In whatever campaign you play, as a GM, you must always prepare an escape plan for your story.
Usually done by giving the players small random items or events. Like a distant sounds, they saw a car moving, etc

He also gave some examples:

"A player of mine(in one of his campaigns, Shadowrun) made a car, really fast but weak. He made it for fast escapes and loves it. I (as The Boss) gave him an envelope that looks and feels like empty and told him not to open it until the mission ends. The next session I had another GM take over as I had things to do. That day the guy's car was wrecked. He came and complained to me. I remembered about the envelop and told him to open it, there's a letter inside written by The Boss. The Boss has been interested in his car and had it secretly switched with a look-alike to study it. So the car that was wrecked was a fake, and his real car is safely in the garage."

Another example:
"I had the players raid a factory and kill the boss there. But I had planed for the boss (really strong) to survive. While the players was outside the factory, I told them that they saw a truck going inside the factory. The players storm the place just as the truck entered the compound. Somehow they managed to defeat the boss(some really good rolls), and they celebrated. I told them when one of them kicked the body over, they notice the body was a fake and that they have been fighting a robot. Suddenly the truck outside started and leaves the compound, it was the boss running away."

These are just some examples of preparing escape plans, when you're stuck in a bind, these helps you a lot. Always prepare something for the unexpected. Be it some small envelop or a distant noise, these insignificant things gives you alternatives to fall back to.


( ._.)Ø

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Jasonlam604.com

A step in mobile game development.........

A source I found that is really good in teaching making games in J2ME.
You can download the book J2ME & Gaming by Jason Lam for free in pdf version.
Try it out, I've have and it had helped me made a game in J2ME :p



Link

Download the book



and.....
Related links for J2ME for games
Resources primarily for J2ME development


Download J2ME Wireless Toolkit 2.2



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Quote of the week - Want to be a Game Designer?

"
If you want to be a Game Designer,
Stop dreaming and start doing it now!
                               "
--Psychotic EwA


No more talk about how you want to make the next best game, or creating a new genre.
If you're passionate about it, you should start doing something now.
Either start design or make a game of your own or join a game project.
If you want to take it further, sign up to work with a game company as a trainee/intern or game tester.
Do something NOW!!

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Bullets are invisible

In truth, most games that feature guns never really animated the bullets that comes out of it. We see explosions, smoke effects and opponent being hit, but no bullet animation.
Its confirmed in the codes(on the game that my team is handling), that there is no bullet object or animation.
The bullets fired are just variables and the hit is calculated directly.
So it creates less strain on the game engine.

The processing power saved can be allocated to the graphics and animations (more special effects w00t).

But still, this doesn't mean you can cheat other bullet animations.
Logically you can't see the normal bullets because they are too fast to be seen :p
Other slow moving ones still need to be shown, to signify that they are slow.

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Quote of the week - Tutorials

"
In game design,
help people in game,
without (having them) looking at manual

-- Akimoto-san
TanTanTown

                               "


He's referring to the setup of help section or tutorial within a game.
It should either be:
1. An in-game tutorial, going step-by-step teaching the player how to play the game.
2. Giving it in an explanation type (a demo) of how the game is played.
3. Using the 'Help' button, putting a help button on every page (screen) so that the player can click on it for explanations on features he or she don't understand.

He's right by the way, our current game design isn't prepared for a tutorial (for lack of manpower and time).
The guy can't speak english, so he talks to us thru a translator.
We're lucky in a sense, since he have experience in art (graphic design). While he can't speak out his ideas clearly to us, he draws it out on the white board. Which is a good thing as we can understand the visual aspect of his idea.

But his cocky attitude of 'teaching us' on how to make the game makes it hard for me to actually 'like' him. It feels like he's on a power trip, flaunting his experiences in the game industry back in Japan.

The meetings with him were pretty much stressful.


There is a saying, “we should take the good with the bad”
and I learned something new today :)
While he's giving us good advice on game making, he's also giving us hell by requesting a lot of complex features.
I can only blame the management, for promising to him that “it can be done”. (=_=)”



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Artists are Your best friends

As game developers, the artists are your best friends.
During design, you need the artist to create a "visual" for your clients. It helps convey your concepts and lets your clients see what you see.

Usually they (artists) will one-up you by doing the art their way, in what they claim to make it looking good "visually". It is not wrong, as long as it suits the concept and structure of the game. In fact, you should promote it, having creativity outside of the box is good when you're still in design stage.

But you really have to put your foot down when their art designs conflicted with your game design, because its what they drawn out (the concept art, the character model, etc) is shown to the client.

The client won't look at your level design, what he'll look at is the artists impression of how the level will look like. It what the artists draws is different from what you originally designed, the whole design process will get screw up. The client will want what he sees in the concept art and rejects your original designs.

Working with artists is a give and take situation, you have to give space in your designs for their “creativity”, while they have to accept that looking good “visually” is not always important when you're making a computer game.

All this is in the design stage, when you go to development stage, its a whole different situation :D
I talk more about it.....IF I can survive the design stage :p


Jya Ne

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Google SketchUp

I've been having problems conveying my concepts and views to the artists on the concept of my game maps. Its kinda hard telling people why certain objects are placed in in a map. People always have different views of how a place should be.
It doesn't matter if you think having piles of crates or warehouses is normal in factory/industrial area, they will argue with you that its "visually" doesn't suit the map, and changed the out door scene into an indoor (inside of factory) one.

In the end the artists always draws and modeled the things that they want and generaly screws all of my level designs. Just because they can't get what my original idea nad concept looks like.

Recently, my supervisor for the game dev project, Azfar introduced an interesting tool to me.
A simple program called Google SketchUp.

Its a really powerful tool for quickly and easily creating, viewing and modifying simple 3D models.
With SketchUp, I'm able to convey what my vision looks like in full 3D, than just top down view layouts or lists of measurements of areas.


A sample I did, its more of a obstacle course and have no relation to the game my company is doing XD

Give it a try, it might help you in your game dev projects.

Jya ne

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I'm an over-eager 'student'

I went to a meeting with a Japanese client today.
I'm suppose to be the assistant to the Game designer,
but somehow I'm screwing up by butting in with ideas without thinking about the limitations in the game.

I look like a damn "over-eager game student", as some game developers might call them.
even our client, Mr Akimoto seems to realized this,
but he's kind enough to help out by giving ideas while giving space for limitations.
A professional indeed :)

There's a phrase Mr Akimoto used while explaining what he thinks is important in designing a game map,
"Like planting a single flower in the middle and have everthing else revolves around it"
to put it more bluntly, the translator says:
"like putting in the Eiffel tower, and the players will think the area is Paris"

Another point Mr Akimoto sees as important is the harmony of the objects in the game map, instead of item filling the map, the items should be natural and balance out the feel of the map's theme.

I've learned a lot today. Now have to go back redesigning the game maps :p

Thats all for now :p
Jya ne

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