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Here’s a little SECRET that will make you RICH beyond your WILDE$T DREAM$!

Ever wondered how the BIG TIME GAME DESIGNERS got their start?

Do you want to make BIG BUCKS?

Do you want to TRAVEL to beautiful and exotic locales?

Do you want to make a living PLAYING GAMES?

Are you tired of working for a pointy-haired BOSS in a faceless CORPORATION?

Then read the rest of these proceedings for the KEYS to HAPPINESS!

OK, perhaps I’m getting a little carried way. But I have been able to make a living as a freelance game designer, traveling to clients in Sydney, Johannesburg, Amsterdam, as well as many interesting places in the US and Canada. One of the most common things I’m called upon to do is to evaluate and comment on a game in progress, or a game proposal. Although the GDC 2001 tutorial will also cover what makes a game great, the initial question is what factors are important in getting a game out the door in the first place. After seeing many proposals and games in progress, some patterns start to become apparent. Here are some that may help you become an INTERNATIONAL GAME DESIGNER too – or at least learn to think like one!

Many people focus on what makes a game financially successful, or perhaps on what makes it a great game, whether or not it is a market success. But there’s a more practical concern: will the game get finished in the first place? If a game never makes it to market, it doesn’t matter much whether it was a great game, and it surely won’t earn any money.

There are five major factors I’ve found that affect whether a game is carried through to completion. Some of these factors may not apply to your specific situation, since there are so many different kinds of interactive titles out there and so many different ways to make them. But they’re as close to universal as I’ve found. Let’s examine them one at a time, with some case studies to illustrate what I mean.

"I don’t care to belong to any club that will have me as a member." – Groucho Marx

The first thing I look at is the team. This is a habit I learned when working as the primary person reviewing outside game submissions at some of my previous full-time jobs, at LucasArts, The 3DO Company, and Dreamworks Interactive. If the team is good, most of the rest of the hurdles are easier to clear. It’s not easy to evaluate a team, since there are so many variables. Some of the best indicators are fairly simple. Has the team worked together before? Have they had successes? Do they have an apparent respect for each other? If the answer to all three of these questions is yes, it’s a good start.

There are other more subtle variables that can affect a team. It is very rare that an entire team moves intact from one project to another. The gain or loss of a single team member can change the dynamics of a team significantly, particularly if that person is in a leadership position. A team has had success with one genre of game may not be right for a different one, so it’s best to be wary if, for example, a group that has just done a great job with an action game based on a licensed character wants to do an RPG with their own original concepts. Even if a team is moving off of one game to start a similar one, there can be stresses. Good teams are made up of ambitious, bright people eager for new challenges. Problems can arise if there’s no room for creative, technical, or career advancement.

A recent job of mine involved review of a project underway at MyIsland.com, a new startup in the Seattle area. MyIsland is run by Ron Gilbert and Shelly Day, who I had worked with at LucasArts before they went off to start Humongous Entertainment. Needless to say, their track record is already impressive, but I was pleased to see that they had been able to assemble a project team composed primarily of people who had worked together before on various award-winning kid’s titles. Their new project is ambitious, but the team appears to have just the right expertise to pull it off. It was clear from the banter among the team that they like and respect each other. There are so many problems that abound when starting up a new company, not to mention a new project, that it’s strongly recommended to minimize other variables by using an experienced team.

"While the miser is merely a capitalist gone mad, the capitalist is a rational miser." – Karl Marx (no relation to Groucho)

Another critical factor is money. Everyone knows that money is the root of all… er, game development. It seems an obvious factor, but many games stall out in development due to a lack of funds. Certainly as a freelancer I’ve learned to be cautious when told, "We don’t have the money yet, but we’re sure it will be raised in time." When money gets tight partway through a project then features start dropping out too, and sometimes a project reaches a point where it is so crippled by budget cuts that it cannot be released, and all the money spent on it to date is thrown out in the name of thrift. Another common problem is when a team is too optimistic about budget or schedule, and runs out of money or time with the game yet incomplete. Although this is really a planning problem it often looks like a money problem. This is much more likely to happen with an inexperienced team, hence the importance of making sure the team is right before proceeding.

Oddly, too much money can be a problem too. Having limited funds helps focus the design. The best projects are budged by a "rational miser" – someone careful not to overspend, but willing to invest more when a proper opportunity presents itself (see Flexibility, below).

Another client of mine, Health Media Labs of Washington, D.C. has found an unusual approach to funding game development. I’m the designer for their game, which is now nearing completion. It’s an educational title, crafted to teach 9-12 year olds about nutrition as they build a colony on Mars. In order to expand the initial settlement and build new ones, the health of the colonists must be maintained through good diet. It’s a great example of how computer games can be good for kids to help offset the bad press the industry has been getting in recent years. But good press isn’t reason enough to fund a title. In this case, the project is being funded by a grant from the National Institute of Health. It’s a great way to pay for the game’s development as well as testing to ensure that it actually does help teach kids about the Food Pyramid, nutrients and vitamins, and balanced diets. Now we’re free to approach publishers about releasing it as a commercial title, without having to run the risk of providing development funds. Given the difficulty in getting a publisher to commit to funding new titles, turning to the government for money is a promising alternative. I know of other games in development with funding from both the US and Canadian governments now. Which brings us naturally to our next topic…

"In politics people give you what they think you deserve, and deny you what they think you want." - Cecil Parkinson, British politician.

I’m not talking about governmental politics, although that obviously may have some impact on our game development. Rather, I speak of the internal company politics that at its best can speed development along, and at its worst look rather like the Dilbert comic strip. This is such a large topic that it deserves a lecture or two all of its own, but for now suffice it to say that it can be disastrous to ignore the political realities of your company, whether you’re the CEO or a newly hired tester. Perhaps the only time it’s OK to remain blissfully ignorant is when you’re a member of a team led by someone who is undeniably on your side, and who is both experienced in shielding the team from problems and good at resolving issues with upper management. There are a few producers and executive producers out there with these impressive qualities – if you’re lucky enough to know one, they deserve your loyalty!

If you’ve had a project cancelled due to political infighting, you know what I’m talking about. If not, perhaps a few words of caution can help prepare you to see the worst coming. In regards to whether a title gets completed, the key issue is often one of confidence. Someone holds the reigns to the resources needed to complete the project. If that person doesn’t (or worse, those people don’t) believe in the project and its team, they may cut off those resources, or start to micromanage the project. Conversely, if the development team has no confidence in the management of the company, then they may become demoralized, or even quit to join other companies that appear to be more attractive. There is no one way to fix internal political problems, but one essential ingredient of healthy companies is good communication. Talk to people. If you’re in company or project management, make sure the individuals on the teams know what’s happening, and listen to their concerns. If you’re one of the people on a team, make a point of approaching others in the company for a reality check on whether everything is as it appears. It’s easy to become so immersed in a project that you don’t realize some key person has lost confidence. Every company and team has some political issues – it’s human nature. But they don’t have to overwhelm the team members or scuttle the project.

Horror stories of office politics are legion. I’ve seen promising projects in trouble for all sorts of reasons – a new manager wants to implement his own "stamp" on a group, a team member disagreeing with the games’ direction so much that he sabotaged the project, even the old "classic" of a failed office romance. Some companies have more intrigue than a daytime soap opera. The only way I’ve found to notice this kind of problem before it becomes a disaster is to stay alert and keep lines of communication open, and develop a sixth sense about office politics through painful experience. I won’t name names with these horror stories, but I may be able to tell you more if approached in person and plied with single malt scotch.

"Change alone is unchanging" – Heraclitus, notable ancient Greek guy.

One of the important factors in getting a game finished is the ability to change. Every game team I’ve worked with has come up with some features halfway through development that weren’t in the original design. How they respond to those new features often spells the difference between completing the game and getting trapped in an endless series of revisions. I have found that too little flexibility results in a final game that is less than it could have been, while too much flexibility means the game is never finished. In particular I’ve seen games that lacked a coherent vision, and ended up trying to be all things to all people, or merely failed at being of interest to anyone. Sometimes this can scuttle a game project, when it becomes apparent that the team or the team’s leader has changed course too many times and will never reach a destination.

Some of the best games, both in critical and financial terms, went through tremendous changes during their development. Sid Meier, one of the most successful game developers in the world, makes an institution of change. Recently this caused him to shelve a game about Dinosaurs that had been in development for many months. He knows enough about the design and development process to have the courage to change games when they’re not working, and even though this means sometimes games will be shelved indefinitely, effectively dead, it also means the ones that are finished will be the better for it. So this particular factor has two sides – insufficient flexibility will hurt the quality of a game, too much flexibility may keep it from ever being completed.

One recent client of mine was I-Imagine, of Johannesburg, South Africa. I wasn’t aware that there were any game development companies in that country, and when I met them at E3 last year I was intrigued. I ended up coming out to their headquarters to review the game they had in progress, a racing game for the X-Box called Chase. It’s always a difficult thing to come into a company as an outsider and critique a design. If they are unwilling to accept suggestions of changes, my time is wasted and I have failed. But if they have no direction of their own and are dependent on an outsider to provide it, they’re unlikely to finish the game because after I leave someone else will come along with a different opinion, and floundering is a likely result.

Happily, the I-Imagine team knew what was good about their concept, and also knew where they needed help. We had a great week of brainstorming and design, and ended up with some new directions for the game’s storyline and structure. In the months since my visit I’m pleased to see that the team has moved forward, changing and improving upon my suggestions, but clearly understanding and preserving the reasoning behind them too. They’ve always had a very clear vision for what kind of game they want to have, and are willing to change to meet it as long as they don’t compromise that vision. It’s that kind of flexibility that makes for a great game.

"I’m a pessimist because of intelligence, and an optimist because of will." Antonio Gramsci, Italian political theorist

I’ve saved the most important for last. No title is ever completed without at least one determined individual on the team, and preferably an entire determined team. Willpower, the desire and determination to proceed, is the single most critical factor in getting a game done. Where there is will, problems with all the other factors mentioned above have been overcome. If there is no will, the project will run out of steam and not be completed. It’s not an easy thing to teach, but it’s critical.

When people wanting to break into the games industry approach me, I’ve found that the best measure of whether they will succeed is not in their talent, their connections, or their education. It’s simple a matter of how badly they want it. Everyone I’ve met who felt they clearly had to be in game development has made it. The ones who heard it was a quick way to riches, or an easy way to make a living have not. Hmm, perhaps that opening email wasn’t telling the whole story…

What about the game’s genre? The gameplay? Innovation? Aren’t those important factors in deciding whether a game gets made?

Sadly, no. At least, not in many cases. One reason why there are a lot of bad games on the market is that the quality of the game itself is often secondary to the decision to make it. My tutorial at this GDC will also focus on analyzing completed games and understanding what makes them successful – or not!

For more articles on designing, producing, and writing for games, see my web site at www.theinspiracy.com.

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