Disqus - Latest Comments for joshuadallman

Re: Blogging In A New Gaming World

joshuadallman — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 18:24:56 -0000

These are indeed exciting times to be making games or developing as indie. My own industry path has mirrored these macro trends - from indie (GarageGames), to commercial (Luma), to social (Playdom / Digital Chocolate), and now to social-mobile (TinyCo / Z2Live). Glad to see you on board with social-mobile! I'd almost go as far as to say it's everything I dreamed about when I first started as an indie. Remember how you've been saying games should be free all along? We're finally there.

Re: Flashbang Guys Getting It Right

joshuadallman — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 04:07:08 -0000

I'd also be interested in hearing about not just developers successful indies of all kinds. For example, not just developers but publishers, virtual worlds, social gaming. Big Fish Games started out of a garage with 2 guys, that's about as indie as it gets. Last month SuperSecret picked up $10 million VC funding, making it one of the best funded independent virtual worlds. And Zynga was formed by 6 guys less than 2 years ago and now has 46 million monthly active players, 4 times more than WoW's 12 million! I'd love to hear insights into these companies, or again, any indies off the obvious path in general.

Re: Flashbang Guys Getting It Right

joshuadallman — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 12:32:52 -0000

The whole history of Dynamix is in the book "High Score" (which I just found through google books, hence my reference) pages 144-147. There's even a picture of you and the gang at the top :)

http://books.google.com/boo...

Re: Flashbang Guys Getting It Right

joshuadallman — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 12:20:18 -0000

Only six games a year? Slackers. Jeff had 'em beat in '89 with 8 games released that year. :)

Re: Flashbang Guys Getting It Right

joshuadallman — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 02:30:30 -0000

Mathew Wegner and the guys at Flashbang are awesome. I'd love to see more highlights of indies "making it big" on this site. Great pick.

As an aside, a friend emailed me a while ago and thought his bronto-in-a-jetpack game ripped off my turtle-in-a-jetpack-game which came first. Guess the meme of putting reptiles in jetpacks is a more common one than you'd think!

Re: Putting Your Game On OS-X and Linux is Not Enough

joshuadallman — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:21:40 -0000

Porting costs, even with Torque, and to a micro-sized developer every dollar counts. My strategy was to develop the Windows version, test that out on the market to gauge publisher and player interest, then if the test went well to port to OS-X. That way if the game didn't stick, I could move on without wasting coder and QA dollars to port to platforms that it won't do any better on than the original platform. Even so I still have platform envy as I'm still on the old 3 at best.

Re: Putting Your Game On OS-X and Linux is Not Enough

joshuadallman — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:10:13 -0000

My latest game runs on Windows only. I should have used your game engine instead. I think I have platform envy.

Re: Game Pricing, Look Out Below

joshuadallman — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 03:18:15 -0000

It's about damn time!!!

A game dev team is not unlike a small band, and a single small game (Flash-sized) is not unlike a song, both in what it offers (a quick enjoyable replayable experience) and what it takes to create (a few people and a few months).

Most casual games are more than Flash-sized / "song-sized" games, but they are also well short of being an "album" worth $20. With casual games it's like you get one song (one level / central game mechanic), then a bunch of "re-mixes" of that song (further levels with small variations, like a euro-mix variation of a song). So $10 is a great price point to go - more than a song, less than an album of unique songs.

To go outside of gaming and compare to other forms of entertainment (a point we sometimes forget!), it seems like DVD's are at about that $10 price-point, and a casual game definitely doesn't have the production value and quality of a multimillion dollar Hollywood movie (even the indie movies are MM's), so it's a good price. Casual games at $20 are selling at a price higher than many Hollywood DVD's!

The recession only underscores the need to price things at a point that is competitive with other things that consumers can do with their $10 as they'll be far more choosy how they spend their money now that they have less of it.

Hard times force innovation. At $20 we've gotten lazy. The feeling of entitlement is high. Instead of feeling entitled to certain prices and profits, we should be bootstrapping and shooting for the best designed content (good game design does not cost money), best development practices (reducing inefficiencies saves money), and being more competitive with other forms of media entertainment and diversion.

I see this price reduction as nothing but opportunity. Opportunity for new customers, broader reach, greater acceptance... heck, if casual game budgets have been spiraling out of control (following a parallel path to their AAA big budget counterparts, now up to $60 a game retail), maybe this will put a check on that, reducing budgets, which put indies more in the game and more competitive with the big studios.

One last point, this one regarding global markets. The US is not the only country buying and playing games -- ok, it's one of the biggest markets, but there's still a whole huge world of people out there, and casual games more than most are "games for everyone." Consider that here in South Africa, the largest bill is 200 Rand, or $20. To put that into context, we were previously selling casual games at such a high price that you have to use the biggest bank note in South Africa to buy one. That's expensive. Maybe not to a US audience, but certainly to a South African audience, and to a global audience whose pockets are not as rich as American ones. Consider yet another side effect of the price drop is an increase in the adoption of the market to worldwide markets. 200 Rand can buy a lot of food here. It should be able to buy more than one downloaded Diner Dash.

Bravo to Reflexive / Amazon for taking the leap!

By the way, there's a great thread of discussion on this topic on the IndieGamer forums: http://forums.indiegamer.co...

Josh

Re: One Way To Divide Your Company Equity At Start Up

joshuadallman — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:59:42 -0000

Great blog topic, I actually read one very similar about a month ago, though cannot find the link for the life of me. The author of the other blog took the controversial viewpoint that no, not everyone in the startup is equal, your lead entrepreneur should have a higher percent than say a marketing person, and he submitted an equation to figure out a non-scientific but nonetheless quantitative way to split up the pie fairly - like yours, though based on role, not wage (though wage is tied to role). If anyone knows the blog I'm referring to please post it here, though I'd like to at least back the concept behind it. Splitting the pie evenly is simple, but unless you've got true founding partners, it likely isn't the best way to do it.

Re: How Much Work Does It Take To Become A Great Game Developer?

joshuadallman — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 03:43:30 -0000

Here's two quotes from an article I really enjoyed:

"If the activities that lead to greatness were easy and fun, then everyone would do them and no one could distinguish the best from the rest. The reality that deliberate practice is hard can even be seen as good news. It means that most people won't do it. So your willingness to do it will distinguish you all the more."

"What you want - really, deeply want - is fundamental because deliberate practice is an investment: The costs come now, the benefits later. The more you want something, the easier it will be for you to sustain the needed effort until the payoff starts to arrive. But if you're pursuing something that you don't truly want and are competing against others whose desire is deep, you can guess the outcome."

- Why Talent is Overrated, CNN

http://money.cnn.com/2008/1...

Re: How Much Work Does It Take To Become A Great Game Developer?

joshuadallman — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 02:48:27 -0000

Playing games -- even non-video games -- is definitely important to learning game design. However, I wouldn't stop at board games -- ANY kind of play can help! Famously, Keita Takahashi (of Katamari Damacy fame) has gone on to design children's playgrounds, starting with one in Nottingham, UK! How cool is that.

Re: How Much Work Does It Take To Become A Great Game Developer?

joshuadallman — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 03:37:54 -0000

Great advice and so true. I've been trying to make it as an indie for 5 years now, I hadn't even realized I crossed that threshold until I was asked how long I've been doing this. As a struggling-to-succeed indie you definitely have spats of soul searching where you wonder if you're going to make it given that you've put in so much time and blood and sweat towards that end. It's painful to read about "quick success" stories like iShoot, and the effect is clear when talented and smart co-workers of mine, passionate about game development, read quick-buck stories like this and chase after them instead of just making the games they want to make, thinking they can do overnight what others have worked years for and failed to do. With stories like this in many markets, I end up second-guessing myself all the time -- is X the emerging hot market I should get into, or is Y? Or is it Z, which I previously dismissed as being behind the curve and over-saturated -- maybe I was wrong? All this second-guessing takes a back seat when you take the bird's eye view and see that success simply takes time (and hard work, but especially time). Given that I'm at the 5 year mark and have made less than $100 on sales from my games that I've spent years and tens of thousands of dollars on, I like Randy's "7 year" yardstick better than the "5 year" one :) 5 down, 2 to go... I wouldn't say that time has flown by, there have been too many struggles for that, but I would say that there is no other way I would have liked to have spent my time here on earth than making games, so success or not, the process is its own reward. Games are my joy.

A last anecdote, when I was signing games for the GarageGames Game Store, I ran into a curious pattern. I'd often find a hot-shit game from an indie developer whose game got lots of great press in the indie game scene, and I'd play the game, and it would have that little pearl of brilliance that's at the center of truly great game design, and I would join the ranks in declaring the game brilliant. Oftentimes this would be among the first games a designer would make. Since we were trying to sign up a ton of indie games, I'd check the developer's other games that they made after the superstar one. They made one great game, so their others should be awesome too, right? Boy was I wrong. Time after time, the developers other games would SUCK. Ironically, due to the success of their first game, they'd have more budget to make subsequent games, but they'd all lack that pearl of brilliance that was in the first one. Why is this? Well, essentially the developer got LUCKY with a game mechanic or formula that just plain clicked with people. But because they were new, even though they stumbled upon this magic gameplay for this one game, they'd be unable to ever repeat the success, because they didn't understand gameplay on deep enough of a level to deconstruct and repeat it. I would rather skip the quick success and have a string of learning projects, so that I may one day CONSISTENTLY make successful games, as opposed to getting lucky with the quick one-off, not understanding my luck, then never being able to repeat it. I think the same can happen in film, too, when a first-time director makes a brilliant first film, with all subsequent films lacking. I have more respect for a PopCap that can consistently churn out quality addicting intriguing games than an indie who gets one hit followed by a string of lackluster follow-ups.

Re: What Is My Game’s Sales Potential?

joshuadallman — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 03:04:01 -0000

To add to the anecdotal snips comment, it's important when you're reading such pieces to recognize the difference between a "case study" and a "break-out game." NPR, Wall Street Journal, Forbes, mainstream gaming press (GameSpot etc) are all likely to feature break-out games, but written in a way to give the impression that they're average case studies. When a flash game gets fought over by publishers for the right to take it to XBLA / PSN / WiiWare, that is definitely a break-out game. When a middle-of-the-pack game / developer talks about their game, sales, and the experience of releasing it, that's a case study. Oftentimes people read a piece - like how much some of those first iPhone games made - and think they're case studies of average games, instead of the break-out games that they are (and I don't mean Arkanoid!).

Re: What Is My Game’s Sales Potential?

joshuadallman — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 07:05:04 -0000

Some of the biggest indie games of the past year didn't give a shit about how much they would make. They were labors of love and it shows through in the quality of the final product. World of Goo, Crayon Physics Deluxe, Cave Story... any indie would kill to get the kind of publicity and sales these games have enjoyed. And yet the sales of these games could never be guessed at prior to their release. Make what you love and love what you make. There's no better recipe for success than that.

P.S. On the "a lot more options" front I just wanted to add a few: Flash-based Virtual Worlds like Webkinz, scratch-card POS publishers like Cherry Credits, free-to-play microtransaction publishers like juggernaut Nexon, and finally web-based 3D games like InstantAction, all of which are emerging platforms for 2008-2009.

Re: Odds and Ends

joshuadallman — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 04:15:34 -0000

Thanks for linking to Jeremy's article which I may otherwise have missed. The tech notes on the differences between iPod versions, especially with regard to sound, were particularly interesting. I'm glad to see options other than Torque being aired as game engine possibilities for iPod too, since I'm not happy with a per-title licensing fee either (paying to release freeware games on a per title basis? That doesn't help developers). New developers should also be aware what those of us following the iPod saga already know: that it's not a holy grail of quick cash as the early news reports hyped. Great article Jeremy.

TGEA winning the Frontline award is a huge, huge, huge honor, especially to beat out half million dollar engines. Everyone who's worked on TGEA including present employees, contributing community members, and the company founders (who had the vision to make an advanced engine for $150 bucks in the first place) should all be proud. One thing I'm not happy about is the pushing of TGEA over TGE, supposedly superior in every way including backwards compatibility. Well TGEA is great for people in industrialized countries who can afford a new computer every 1-2 years, but for the rest of the world with more dated computers, TGEA won't be as compatible as TGE, despite claims to the contrary. It won't even run on my brand new Toshiba laptop which is only a year old. Regardless, a well deserved award that all in the Torque community can be proud of.

The podcasting of game articles is wickedly cool -- look for some of my articles to appear in coming weeks as well :)

By the way, happy 2009!

Josh

Re: Why I Don’t Own Stock In Game Publishers

joshuadallman — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 03:32:53 -0000

There are different platforms for different demographics which address different areas of needs. As Jeff said traditional publishing is not going away it's just maxed out. It will be transcended by more mobile and connected platforms, but it will be a transcendence that includes its predecessor, not simply moves beyond it. Sony was already forward-thinking in this area years ago when they put out the PSP with the idea of having it connect back up to the Playstation 2 and 3 and network (Nintendo to a lesser extent with their Game Boy).

Traditional box publishing is still too profitable and lucrative to investors to just disappear from the business landscape. Look at some numbers. Super Mario Galaxy, 7.3 million units. Ratchet & Clank Future, 1.3 million. Zelda Twilight Princess, 6.4 million. Jak 3, 1.7 million. God of War 2, 2.3 million. I'm not saying these are impressive but multiply these by $50 or $60 per title and you have a pile of cash waiting to be divided up by publishers, distributors, developers, console makers, etc. Just as buying stuffed animals will never go out of style despite the virtual online ones, buying boxed games as a point of sale purchase will always be a lucrative business. Moreover, even in the US broadband penetration is only at about 50%, whereas the number of people who go to brick and mortar stores to shop is probably close to 100%. Couple already high broadband adoption (people who want it the most already have it) with a slowing economy (less money for luxury services like broadband) and the adoption rate is already slowing and will likely at some point just level off, disappointing those purely in the digital distribution camp who see only the sky as the limit. Additionally, the rest of the world has yet to catch up on broadband adoption rates too (here in South Africa, fast and reliable internet is as rare as gold so guess what, everyone plays offline boxed PC and console games). In short, boxed games are not going away just like cash isn't going away because of debit cards, there will always be a need, the point is to see the opportunity for what it is, which is a more limited one than publishers would have their investors believe. But then, that's all part of the game of creating perceived value for your company.

Re: Why I Don’t Own Stock In Game Publishers

joshuadallman — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:10:43 -0000

To me the most exciting opportunity in this post is "the type of content the mass market wants is different than what the publishers are giving them." Though obvious to those of us enlightened about broader markets than 18-24 y.o. hardcore males, I predict it'll take another decade before the game industry catches up to this fact - they're just too rooted culturally in that damn 18-24 male market. In the meantime, there is, has been, and will continue to be an opportunity so big you could drive a Mack truck through for indies. Indies don't need to make a better game, they need to make different games than what the mainstream is offering.

As for "[indies] just need passion and creativity, and they can kick the ass of any of the big companies" there are tons of examples exactly this: Blow (1 guy), N (1 guy), Victi/Vigil on Steam (2 man team), World of Goo (2 man team), Cave Story (1 guy), Buccaneer on Steam (2 man team), Audiosurf (1 guy), Portal (group of students), Aveyond (1 gal), Mount & Blade (1 small team), Dwarf Fortress (2 guys), Darwinia (2 guys), Crayon Physics (1 guy), Everyday Shooter (1 guy), Alien Hominid (2 guys), Gish (2 guys), Immortal Defense (1 guy), Fez (1 guy), Gesundheit! (1 guy), Battleships Forever (1 guy), Line Rider (1 guy), Galcon (1 guy), Samorost (1 person), Grow Cube (1 person), Flow (1 person), and that's just off the top of my head. Indies, look at this list, then tell me it can't be done. It can be, and these people did it!

Re: Right About Lively, PC Mag Closes, Corporate Speak

joshuadallman — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 05:17:46 -0000

Not surprised about Lively, it was a turkey from the beginning. It's another case of a company creating a product and then trying to create demand for the product, instead of having a user base just dying to get their hands on the product as soon as it comes out because it fills such a great need. I was going to send you a note when I read the Lively news to say that you were right, but you're usually two steps ahead of me anyway :)

I would feel nostalgic too about PC Magazine closing down, except that when they first started it really was more of a hobbyist or trade magazine, and once they went into the mainstream (when computers themselves went mainstream), it became a giant advertisement bible with no news specialized enough for me to keep interest. And while print continues to move online, it's continuing to do so in interesting ways - take the print magazine National Geographic, which just got into games with its first title "Herod's Lost Tomb" and plans to continue long from there.

As for the "bullshit-speak" by THQ, I've heard the same type of PR spin from the head of nearly every company I've ever worked for, and I guess you expect it after a while. Still, it is funny to hear, especially that last line, “given the current economic environment.” There was an article just 2 days ago stating just the opposite: "thriving video game industry hits right buttons in troubled economy" (http://www.dallasnews.com/s...

EA's quarterly sales went from $640m to almost $900m and the THQ prez is saying “given the current economic environment"?!?! Given the current economic environment, dude, you should be raking in cash hand over fist!!!

Re: The Art of Backing Off

joshuadallman — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 06:53:59 -0000

It's great to hear a seasoned industry game designer promote the idea of "backing off" - that is, that it's not just a concept for new designers and new games, but a concept for every stage in your career as a designer.

I learned this lesson when first making games, and I am amazed to continue to learn it now too (just when I thought I already knew it). I have worked on designing 5 games here in South Africa, and 4 of the 5 have had their scope scaled back from my original design proposition, sometimes significantly. Not that the extra features and such weren't of value, but you have to look at the economy of the game design per the timeframe and budget that you have, and what's relevant to the core concept and what's not.

One game became simply too "high concept" and was scaled back to be more earthly and return to its root design idea of just being fun; another game had features that couldn't meet technical and budget limitations, so we're saving those extra features for a sequel or expansion; another game got designed too late after the prototype was already designed and complete, and there was too much to change (though many design changes still made it in); and the final game got literally doubled in development time simply by adding more features, we then kept those extra features which gave the most return for the investment and are saving the rest for a future sequel.

I'm now doing some contract work with a new game developer who's making the same (yet inevitable) mistake - trying to put too much in, then not getting what's really important right. Hopefully my experience can lead him to a more "backed off" game design, which will inevitably lead to a better core gameplay experience.

As you (Jeff) have said to me, gamers don't buy games by the ounce, they buy games based on their experience with them and the experiences of others. Cram too many back of box marketing bullet points into a game and you can lose sight of what that core experience is.

In a sense, "backing off" is not just about making something different than what you originally intended, but about looking at what you are making differently. When you back off, you see less of the details (feature bullet points) and more of the overall picture (core gameplay experience), and that leads you to a better game.

Re: Push Button Labs Initial Site Goes Live

joshuadallman — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 02:21:15 -0000

Two words: HELL YEAH!!!!!

OK I'll expand. Way to go guys, I can't wait to see the reaction to the official unveiling. Site looks great and http://pushbuttonlabs.com/a... looks like a pro-bowl game with the historic best players in the league. Rock on, with guitars and all.

Re: Donkey Kong Gang, Reflexive Acquisition, Paul Graham Agrees

joshuadallman — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 03:48:29 -0000

About the graffiti stuff, very cool. I would never have though Eugene to be so hip and urban. Just kidding. Tell Jonathan to google "graffiti rasty" and check out his stuff, he is a local graffiti artist here in South Africa and his brilliant work is all over town (most of it is sanctioned). And of course, good luck to Jon in his studies.

About Reflexive, I am floored. Absolutely, congrats to them, especially James Smith and Russ Carrol. But to poke at the issue with a sharp stick, is this good for developers? It's a natural conclusion that an Amazon-owned Reflexive will be more risk-adverse towards publishing unproven content (innovative gameplay, rough around the edges production quality, unknown aka indie development teams). Is it a good thing that there's one less independent publisher on the market? So we now have Real, Amazon, and Big Fish Games. Real has the highest standards and requirements of them all, Big Fish Games will publish nearly anything that is publishable (a game a day!), and though Amazon's long term strategy has been "long tail" with books, will we see the same with games, or will they close up to anything but the tried and true? I don't know the answers, I'm just asking questions for my reaction. Good onto them, but the last thing the world needs is another non-game corporation buying a small passionately run game company to stock its portfolio and increase its attractiveness to investors.

Brilliant Paul Graham article, thanks for the link. For me, the "money shot" concept was here: "If we've learned one thing from funding so many startups, it's that they succeed or fail based on the qualities of the founders. The economy has some effect, certainly, but as a predictor of success it's rounding error compared to the founders. Which means that what matters is who you are, not when you do it. If you're the right sort of person, you'll win even in a bad economy. And if you're not, a good economy won't save you." Brilliant stuff. Should be a springboard of encouragement for any indie contemplating jumping out into their own. As said, if you're the right sort of person, you'll make it work. Do it!!!

Re: Glad to See Phil Harrison Agrees With Me Nine Years Later

joshuadallman — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 01:49:23 -0000

Hahaha thanks for the laugh of the day! Visionaries are rarely recognized by the mainstream. Ralph Nader predicted the collapse of Freddie Mac and Fannie May 8 years ago. Seems like the mainstream is always a decade behind. Here's the the next leading edge!

Re: Design Crutch: Artificial Obstruction In Games

joshuadallman — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 11:18:12 -0000

Just to play devil's advocate, consider that the developers of Rock Band 2 WANT you to go onto the internet to unlock all the songs, as a super under-handed way to help build player community. Afterall, the internet and cheat codes on it have become such a mainstay that's it's hard to argue that it's truly a barrier. We can go on the internet on on phones, our computers, our iPods, our microwaves, etc etc. How hard is it to look up the cheat codes? And yet every user looking them up, is another win for the developer (more traffic, more eyeballs, more search words for their game, etc).

Every point you make about Rock Band is valid though. What's "cheap" is to use essential game content as unlockables, instead of providing bonus content as unlockables. If I have to unlock a character, that sucks. If I get a bonus skin for a character for completing a special task, that's awesome. It's non-essential.

I also disagree that the old NES games are more fun by re-winding them. I'm a huge fan of old NES and SNES ROMS in particular, I have played every single one (it took an entire summer). As a specific example, I played through Super Metroid with rewinds, and without. The experience of playing (and beating) the game without rewinds was tons more satisfying than with. It got to where I was over-using the rewinds so much that it became more about the rewinds than the game. In terms of "fourth wall" and all that, every time I rewound it reminded me I was playing a game, instead of immersing me in it.

I submit to principles of balance and variety. That is, forcing players to restart 3 levels is ONE EXTREME. But, allowing players to arbitrarily start over at any point from any point is ANOTHER EXTREME. You've got your hardcore-hardcores on one side, and your hardcore-casuals on the other. Between the two there is a balance. Being a good game designer means finding that sweet spot. On the topic of variety, why can't you have your cake and eat it too? Doom had everything from whiz-through-the-game-easy to see all the game content, to still-having-nightmares-hard to challenge and have bragging rights. No difficulty level variance? Bad designer, no twinkie. Come on, even bowling has an easy mode with no gutterballs for "just fun." Why can't all games do the same?

An intriguing design tactic is to design a game to allow both kinds of play, without overtly having a difficulty selection. Example: the new Mega Man 9. Bosses are very difficult. If you're good, you can beat them with the standard number of lives you're allotted. If you suck, instead of making the bosses easier, you can collect more power-ups before hand, which gives you the ability to re-fill your life during the battle, so that even the worst players, if they save up enough energy, can persevere -- and still have the feeling of reward the tougher players get from beating that super hard boss.

World of Goo handles the "fourth wall" thing brilliantly by integrating rewinds into the game design. On some levels there's little "take back a move" lightning bugs. Click one and the bug disappears, and so does your last move. It keeps you immersed in the game while providing an intuitive difficulty level selector.

For my part, in Shelled Online, there's some single player mission levels that are tough. Really tough. Instead of making them easier, I allow you to skip them. You can even go straight to the boss of the game, without even playing level 1. However, it does not know which levels you've completed and which you haven't - it just doesn't force you to complete all of them to see all of the game content. Stuck on a level? No problem, skip it and go back when you're a more well versed player.

Re: Interaction and Sierra Magazine Archive

joshuadallman — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 08:54:01 -0000

Wow, publishers with their own magazines, that's a new lesson in game history for me. For me, the take-away lesson here is the importance of publishers and developers to develop a close relationship with their customers and fans. Nowadays that happens on the internet via the whole idea of "community building" but it's a lesson many game companies forget. This hit home strongest for me when I was at the last Casual Game Conference in Seattle, and one of the top casual game developers in the industry told me that they have a huge list of customers they maintain a relationship with who tries out their new games and gives them feedback. They said that this feedback was ABSOLUTELY VITAL to refining the game to get it ready for the broader market; that they learn all kinds of things from this feedback that they don't on their own. Game developers should strive to increase the "circulation" of their own fan base... this is an area I need to focus on myself as I develop in the future.

Re: Don’t Fear the Economy, Start Your Company Now

joshuadallman — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 08:52:54 -0000

The Sunday paper here in South Africa had this in big letters on the front cover: DON'T PANIC. It was straight out of Douglas Adams. In small print, "...says leading banking and political leaders." Life imitates art once again.

When people are depressed, they want to escape. What better way than entertainment? What better entertainment is there than games that immerse you in a whole new world? When gas is up, crime is up, and more people are jobless and at home, what better thing to do at home than play games? Sad but true, recessions are good for the entertainment industry. When people are fat, they go do other things than play games (travel, spend discretionary income freely, etc). I think free/cheap game models will be that much more powerful in this "new economy." People don't have $60 to spend on the latest shader overkill. $5 downloads are more like it. Wii got it right (World of Goo anyone?).

I am reading about people taking all their money out of their bank account to buy gold bullion bars. I am doing the same. Except my gold bullion bars are my games. And I have been doing it all along. It's an investment that no banker can sink. Good game design is recession-proof.