chuanl

Old chinese proverb:

天下烏鴉一樣黑
[ "All crows in th' sky are black" ..! ]


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I suppose Kickstarter is going through growing pains at the moment. Where exactly do you draw the line between being an open crowd -sourcing site which helps to get unique and quirky projects off the ground or a user -mediated commercial marketplace? Game developers want the latter but in doing so appeal to the altruistic conceits of the former.

Without the community's generosity and trust [ ..! ] nothing would be possible. I think developers ought to keep that in mind when going in with their pitches and sporks. Ultimately though as with other platforms people will find ways to justify gaming the system for their own cause and maybe at the expense of the greater good.

It's exactly how we've been taught to appreciate life -- that we're somehow special and that we 'deserve' this & that as individuals with our own internal narrative. And it's no different w/ games developers and their dreams.

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To this end "Project CARS" more inclusive model seems to be worth watching. You pay a small amount but everybody gets to be involved if they want: from initial pre -production right through to profit sharing. There are no opaque charts and promises involved, and furthermore people who contribute more also get more of a stake.

Maybe that's the turning point -- as everybody wants to be a games developer but there are limited opportunities or resources to go around. Doing the whole start -up thing of having an office and business cards and all that meta -life stuff is just a measure of success. It has nothing to do with creativity or making stuff.

Just look at all the shit that gets done on GitHub where people collaborate ad hoc and feed back to each other. It's really inspiring and creating the infrastructure for the next web. Then consider how as games developers we're still obsessed w/ the old ways of running a business and forsaking what we create in doing so.


-- Chuan

@cura

I actually wasn't even thinking about games when I mentioned blue sky projects. I suppose that comes from wanting to believe that the essence & worth of Kickstarter is in promoting ideas of creativity beyond what we take for granted. If you could siphon just a tiny bit of the internet's attention / support into bringing something into the world -- what would it be?

In that respect another iPhone game / 50k podcast / or 200K documentary on indie games seems like a somewhat boring and cynical way to use it. Especially so when the producers already have the means. With the stacks of games and media that we have it's seems to be just a matter of 'more' instead of making something unique.


-- Chuan

@HeyAndrei

Also: I have a Unity Pro license and it comes w/ 2 -simultaneous installs. So if you're a bit resourceful you can make the most of it. Take a look at the SVN solution as well as would save you almost enough to buy another license if so inclined.

@HeyAndrei

I'm not here to shave your balls & ask you for your "starving artist" card -- but rather to just ask the fundamental question of what is actually stopping you from making the game you want to make? Perhaps naively, I want to believe that Kickstarter can be a resource where people w/ pie in the sky { crazy batshit } ideas can continue to find the means to bootstrap those ideas which otherwise would be completely impossible / or implausible.

The very fact that Kickstarter & crowd sourcing can be such an enabling phenomenon is quite heartening though it's very quickly becoming just another channel for established developers to hock their bundles and maintain their status quo. I think that irks me the most because I do want to see those genuine freakish bursts of wild creativity come to fruition as anti -dote to how most of life normally works. It's about maintaining that power to surprise and enable.

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As for food: I would actually encourage you to spend more money there, as well as feeding your head. Being healthy is one of the most important things, and going to see films or exposing oneself to books and other media can only be good for creativity. I probably eat out too much myself, and have champagne tastes that go with beer pockets -- but it keeps me really happy and engaged w/ the world.

However, when you can be more resourceful w/ your money then why not? Given the choice between working in the dedicated office for a month or having a Unity Pro license I know which way I'd flow. This has more to do w/ priorities than doing without and another strategy could be to have a staged release so that you re -coup some of the money from PC sales before deployment on iPhone or iPad. God knows there's enough coverage on this site alone to make it work for you guys.


-- Chuan

@Platronic


Be realistic -- we're talking about 4 people here and there's nothing to stop them from meeting up at a cafe every week as we did. I hazard it's how alot of agile iPhone development gets done. It's just more unusual to see stuff like David Jaffe's "Twisted Metal" on PSN made that way. Even in a big games company, people tend to use collaboration tools like email / wikis / Perforce rather than walk around and hang out at other people's desks.

The best part about being together is undeniably being able to spur each other on when you've done something cool. Those moments can be extremely creative, though arguably it's just as important that members of the team have enough time and space to fork their own opinions or ideas, and avoid groupthink which can easily happen especially if there's a dominant personality in amongst there.

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I'm criticising the simple fact that the numbers just don't add up. Whichever way you want to spin it: it's either terrible accounting, or the most creative bookeeping.! It's also ignoring the most important thing which has gone unspoken -- which is that there's already a pipeline from previous games which have been made and published through Steam & the appstore.

From a purely business standpoint, why would you forgo the existing tools, libraries and assets that were used to create the original "Auditorium" and follow up iOS games when it would make things easier / quicker and therefore cheaper to produce the sequel? It doesn't make sense for a small team to waste time re -factoring everything to work with Unity Pro if paradoxically they aren't already using it.


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Basecamp is also pretty useless for game development. Believe me, we evaluated that as one of the first options but it lacks any meaningful features beyond a pretty facade that isn't superceded by Zimbra Collaboration Suite { which is open source } or any number of free online solutions. Furthermore it's also common to wasting about half an hour each day updating the todo lists and whatnot, when you could just be a bit more mindful of each other, pay attention to commits and get things done.

At least Zimbra integrates tasks, and actions into email so that time leaks are minimised. Speak to developers, and most will tell you that a couple of hours goes by each day just getting to parity on email. You could even use Twitter / Google Docs / IM to schedule and keep informed. Just because it doesn't say it's not a project management tool doesn't mean you can't use it as one.

Where's the punk ethic? Be resourceful -- Carmack actually broke into his junior high school to steal an Apple ][ to learn programming back in the day. That's passion right there ., and if you want to do it you will find a way. And it's not like you don't have access to all the tools already on the internet either ..!


-- Chuan

@SixtyHertz

I know what you mean about the whole SOA thing -- and turning gold into lead. Also is Juro Watari still at Sega? I'd love to see him design something new as he seems to be pretty quiet since "Virtual On : Force" and the memorial pack. Such an amazing sense for gameplay and some really unique ideas as well.


-- Chuan

+ Lastly ., stop hanging around w/ you lawyer each month.
You know that shit's bad for you ..!

@HeyAndrei


I loved "Auditorium" when it came out -- but sorry ., these costings just don't ring true for how an independent developer would do things. As a team of four we created a prototype for a binaural / head -tracking audio game in the course of 2 months on a budget of $5K and that included wages for 2 x sound designers, as well as 2 x programmers:


+ First of all you don't need to get the most expensive Unity Pro
package and it doesn't cost even that much for two seats. Asset
server and team tools are non -essential and can be replaced w/
SVN if you flush the cache before building a project.

+ Having a workspace is nice to focus, but you should really consider
if that extra productivity is worth the $1450 per month? I think not,
and there are also lots of flexible shared hacker spaces nowadays
and co -renting is another option.

+ There's only four of you as well so the benefits of an office are
minimal compared to cost. Tiger Style made their games using Skype
with a larger team and Slightly Mad were able to produce "NFS: Shift"
for X360 / PS3 as well using a distributed development model.

+ More money flushed down the drain w/ Basecamp. Why do you even
want or need this considering you plan to work in the same location?
Otherwise, just set up MediaWiki or another collaboration tool of your
choice and put that $450 / per month hosting to good use. That's
a complete waste for the static { lolcat -less } site that's on there.

+ Also the utilities don't add up either. More likely, the breakdown
is probably estimated to cover personal rent and expenditure and
I can understand that -- but be honest and show it. What the hell
did you guys do with all the money from your games on Steam as
well. At 7USD a pop after the cost of development that money
should have been saved for the next development period no?


Apologies if I sound a little harsh but I just get the feeling that some people who already have the money and means { re: Steam } are gaming the whole Kickstarter audience post -Schafer. I'd rather see it used for more experimental or purely artistic projects that would not have been commercially viable otherwise. Good luck.!


-- Chuan