Things abound here at Double Cluepon these days.

We recently placed an ad for a comic artist. That goes well. Now that our Art Department is fully staffed I personally don’t have to do all the resume vetting. Sandalphon and Uriel, they both have a passion for the IP and are not about to hand it off to just anyone. I have the utmost confidence in them.

While they vet the resumes, I am still the one setting things up for interviews. I love doing interviews with people. It’s always a thrill to meet new folks.

However, in doing the usual slog through our various feeds, I came across some blurbing on twitter, which referenced this article. The problem with twitter, overall is that it often leads to Chicken Little moments, especially in what has become a soundbyte culture.

The article is quite telling. However, based on the copious amounts of research I have personally done before founding Double Cluepon I can say this much: I don’t see why it should come as a surprise to anyone. Let me explain why:

  • No business plan: This is the big red flag in the whole article. While there is nothing wrong with wanting to start building a game, not having a plan, and not understanding the basic things like revenue streams, cost analysis and the not so trivial matter of where it comes in, and where it goes out will lead you down this road. In other words, if you do not have even a one sheet plan for it, you shouldn’t wonder why after a few years its in the state it is in. This is in no way a reflection on the developer of Golemizer. He even concedes that the experience has opened him up to new things. Im simply pointing out that when you start a complex project open ended, the result will more than likely be chaos on some scale, and open to interpretation.
  • No monetization plan: This should be a subheading under business plan. I mention it because the article mentions that it never became a “day job”. Well, it couldn’t become a day job without a clear plan of how to make money for it.
  • Lack of structure, and organization to leverage the game’s development: In short, he spent money to “get stuff done”, tried to keep it a solo effort. This is fine and all, but if you want to really do this on a level where you can make it a “job” then you have to let go a bit and realize you cannot do it all yourself.

Anyone contemplating making a beast of a game should read this. While the numbers are a bit large in terms of the team you need, the sweat, blood and tear quotient the author relates is about right. Double Cluepon is not one or two. We are a team of about 8 or 9 if you count contracts and such. Possibly moving to 10 or more at some point. I guess the point I want to get across here is: you can make an MMORPG with a small team. It wont necessarily take 2 years per se, because technology and IDE’s have improved a lot. But that wont save you from development hell if you aren’t careful. Creating an MMORPG is something that requires that you surrender control to a group. Even then it’s hard to do unless you know how to be task oriented, and milestone driven. Puzzle Pirates and Ragnarok were not built with Game Maker. They were architected. Slowly, somewhat cathedral like. While we want to change some of that with stuff like StoryTeller and SWF Conduit, it wont change some of the simple and basic facts when dealing with multiplayer goal seeking games: you have to be detail, task, and milstone driven.  You have to know how to manage a team. You have to know how to keep people moving. You have to have a clearly defined structure, and more importantly….you need leaders and smart people.

Anything less than total and complete commitment to the milestones, the next ledge, and motivation is tantamount to standing up one day in your basement and saying “Wow, I should make a game, it would be SO COOL“.  Which is exactly what happens in a majority of projects that go on these field trips for MMORPGS. While Emerald Kingdom is taking a year or two of actual development time, understand this: the spec, the design, monetization plan, the idea work, the planning…well, that was about 6 years of work. Starting with a notepad file, and eventually a mediawiki. Even then, the principles of Double Cluepon meet face to face every week to two weeks to cover progress, refine the ideas, and move along. Dawdling is asking for a slow death.

If there is one thing I have learned: you do not actually create MMORPG’s. You build a bunch of tools to create an MMORPG. It’s easy for a team to get discouraged, or off track when you don’t have anything for months that you can sandbox in. That’s why so many MMO projects fall by the wayside. Keeping on point, and your eyes on the prize with one person is hard enough…doing it with 10 is even more difficult.

It takes a team. It takes willingness to sacrifice. It takes the ability to convey your passion. More importantly, as a small business it takes your willingness to surrender control to a group you have tested, and trust implicitly. It takes an untold amount of patience and a sincere realization that conflicts can and will occur, and that you have to be strong enough and smart enough to understand that those can be key moments of kickass design choices. For instance: death in Emerald Kingdom was a very very hotly debated topic. I felt it should be included. Hands down. I had one or two other supporters. The rest of the company called me nuts. Raguel, our Dev director came up with an idea that compromised. I wont go into it…but I will say this: I didn’t get my perma death. The folks against me didnt get exactly what they felt it should be either. But both sides came to the conclusion that Raguel was right, he had an awesome idea…and it would serve both camps. More importantly: I was able to recognize the solution as one which would ultimately benefit the game and the company….but more importantly the audience.

In short, the conflict sparked great design from where we sit. How many people do you know have a loud debate over something…only to fork code? In other words: how many times have you seen a creative group argue to the point of everyone picking up their ball and going home?

In closing, I personally applaud the author of Golemizer. It takes a yard of spinal fortitude to embark on these kinds of games. It takes two more yards of spinal fortitude to do it solo. But, I am not surprised it turned into a learning exercise.

Double Cluepon, well…I don’t know what the future holds exactly. Nobody can see the future. I do know this: we have a business plan, we are an actual business. We have secured funding from a few sources, and we are all on track, and moving toward our goal. I have tried to assemble the best habits, people, and structure to make sure Emerald Kingdom is a success. That’s why I know & believe in my heart it will bear fruit. Sometimes you have to make sure you have your gun loaded for Bear…or better yet rabid elephant: because you will only get one shot at it before you get trampled into nothing.

Food for thought.

Az.