Life at an underground game company.
Posts tagged business models
Plans for the New Year.
21 year ago
We have plenty of things on deck for 2011. While I can’t give you a ton of details, as some of this is still in the staging phase…I can tell you…
Emerald Kingdom will be going into a closed, followed by an open beta. Do not ask us for a date. One thing I have learned is that giving dates is always a bad idea. Right now, StoryTeller is talking to the server, and world development has taken somewhat of a primary seat.
We will be incorporating our art studio as a separate entity. Test Room Thirty Seven. While TRTS will be primarily doing work for Double Cluepon, we also recognize there are a lot of underground game developers who could use professional art services, without having to pay several thousand dollars. I have been tightening up the business model for TRTS, and plan to get it incorporated soon. What does this mean for the underground/indie game developers in Chicago? It could wind up meaning quite a bit actually. Our goal is to provide economical and sliding scale artwork for game developers who can’t draw. One of the things I learned early on, from speaking to other developers (as well as our own) is that some of them would have been making their own games sooner if they could draw, or had access to an artist. Many more would use an art studio, or an artist if it was not stupidly priced. We see a market here. But more than that, we see a community waiting here.
I am personally working on a project to pull indie/underground game development under a more inclusive umbrella. One of the things we have discovered here at Double Cluepon is the rather fragmented indie/underground scene, here in Chicago. We have a number of little groups. That’s okay. But there is no representation, no cohesive underground/indie movement. Like Seattle was for Grunge, Chicago could be for indie games. Chicago is the spot where many game greats were founded. Midway, Williams, Bungie…Some of this has faltered. To that end, I have been speaking with a number of other indie developers, and want to speak to more. Between myself, and some core people we are looking to start some kind of a non profit indie trade group or union. Between folks here at Double Cluepon, and friends of ours in indie games…we think we have a winner here. Please note: we are not looking to form a clique or club. We want an honest to goodness indie non profit. Some of the points I and others have talked about are:
- To promote and foster underground and indie game development within the Chicago area, without undue influence: We want indies to be able to experiment, explore and create new stuff. There is plenty of time for cookie cutter stuff later.
- To help indie gamers market themselves to broader markets: We have noted a lot of good indie game devs should definitely have more exposure than they do. One person can have a hard time, however…a group might have a better go.
- To help indie gamers put together, and assemble tools needed to monetize their efforts: This is a biggie. One thing we have identified, and need to do more work on is helping indie gamers make money from their efforts. One developer we spoke to had serious issues attaching prices to his games. Because ultimately it can be hard to figure out what it’s worth to others, versus what it’s worth to you.
- To promote connections between artists, sound and music artists, and developers in order to promote better quality indie games: What good is a community if you cannot network with others?
- To provide a basic infrastructure for all members. (legal, web, protection, representation): This is something so crucial, and yet overlooked. While Tim Langdell has been pushed back, there are always 50 more to take his place. One person facing an idiotic lawsuit is one thing. Facing a whole community is another. Another thing is, simply helping developers get organized, learning how to manage basic business paperwork. How to incorporate, how to LLC, how to set themselves up so they don’t get overwhelmed later on. we think there should be more organized indies, not less. Additionally, Making the industry “safe” for newcomers will help foster its growth.
- Create an organization with a repeatable model: what we do here should be repeatable in NYC, or LA, or Dallas…or even in places as small as O’Fallon Illinois, or St. Charles, MO. Our organization model should definitely be open source. We should be promoting indies elsewhere, starting with right here. Don’t smack me for the cliche but…it fits: We need to act locally and think globally. If we can make this a successful and independent effort, we need to make sure others can do the same elsewhere.
That said: if you’re an indie game developer in Chicago, and want to know more about this, and perhaps get involved you should email Azrael. ( AT doublecluepon.com ) We definitely want to talk about this idea more. We need more ideas, and we need more eyeballs on this.
In closing, we are ready and waiting for 2011 to come along. We can’t wait.
The great Farmville wars.
01 year ago
by Azrael
in Double Cluepon
Raph Koster is correct. Farmville is a game. In the same vein that Tamagotchi’s are a game. In many ways, Farmville is the Tamagotchi of the internet and online gaming. I stated as much in the comments.
I believe much of the resentment comes from the fact that the folks at Zynga are pretty arrogant, and somewhat boorish. I get a sense that many object to their success on the grounds of them somehow not yet “Paying their dues” in the game development world. All I can say to that is: game development is not about paying your dues, or seeking to be a rockstar in the field. For us here, it has always been about one thing: design. We are not interested in this “Rockstar celebrity” status that seems to be the goal of so many. We just want to make cool stuff. We here actually reject the celebrity and somewhat destructive star system that has grown out of the game industry.
Raph illustrates a very important point, that a rose by any other name will still smell as sweet. You can claim Farmville is not a game all you want, that don’t make it so. The issue with Farmville is not about whether or not it’s a game. It’s more about people’s perceptions of Zynga and it’s principles, and before you dismiss that let me just throw out there, the same argument could be made about:
- World of Warcraft: All blizzard did was roll up and package stuff that worked from other games previous to WoW, like EQ and UO. They didnt really make a game so much as concatenate other games into some polished boxed product with a million dollar marketing campaign. Blizzard is not really a game company, just a sweatshop for coders tying stuff together.
- Every Asian Free to Play MMORPG: All (fill in the blank with company of your choice) is take (X Feature(s)) and (Y Pricing model) or (Z cash shop) and put some new graphics on it. They are not a real game company.
- etc etc etc.
This preoccupation with Farmville is nothing more than a beef with the owners, and not with the actual product. All it does it polarize people more. As Cuppy said awhile back, social is a mechanic, and its not about chat. I think that is also part of the issue, to be honest. Core game developers got their shorts pulled up over their head and tied in a knot by Zynga. I think there are some serious hard feelings over this. Zynga got to the trough first and it has a great many folks up in arms.
To help put this into a better context: I feel some of that resentment as well. When I heard Metaplace closed, and that their new focus was Facebook games…I was (and still am) quite upset by that. The Metaplace engine is capable of so much more than doling out (what I consider to be) mind numbing chore related games. I was disappointed, but at no time did I resort to retreating to an indefensible stance of “Metaplace does not make games”.
The game industry is at a crossroads. There have been many before, and there will be ever more in the future. Defining social is done. The major players are upset that the defining was done by someone other than them, and those people are not exactly always cool. So be it. But, now it’s time to incorporate this exciting new area into what’s being done in the here and now.
Recrimination does not make good games. Let’s move on.
The sadness that is metaplace.
22 years ago
We liked metaplace. We are sorry to hear it’s going to pass into the pages of game history. What we are even more sorry to hear is that a small indie company is letting a really great opportunity pass it by. Again.
I realize that sometimes it’s just impossible, legally to do what I am about to suggest. But, it’s something every game developer should commit to. Raph and Metaplace should release the source. Why? The prevailing attitude is to shut things down, and lock out the players who were there for you. The common attitude of “If I can’t make money off this, then nobody can” needs to go away in the game industry.
Games like metaplace are about the content. They are not about the code. Metaplace was many things. But above all else, it was a unique content channel. Where is the harm in releasing the machine that projected the content? It’s like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. It makes less sense when you analogize it like this:
Imagine if a movie theater, having shown a really bad movie decided not only to not show the movie again…but to lock up the projectors so nobody else would ever risk looking at that film again. It’s ridiculous. It’s the content. As much as we admire Raph, we are left wondering why he has not figured this out. Or maybe he has, but is legally obligated not to release anything in the way of source. Either way, it’s a loss for indie gaming.
Indie game studio’s lose when someone’s great new idea goes bust, and all is lost. Metaplace could not make a go of it, okay. Who’s to say nobody else could? That is the tragedy here.
Emerald Kingdom will be a Flash client, with some extra’s. One of the things we discovered early on is, the real only Flash oriented multiplayer server was one that cost more money than we felt it was worth. To that end, our programmer decided to do our own. While some of it will be Emerald Kingdom specific, the code may be reusable to others. When we stablize Emerald Kingdom, and get into our regular release groove, the day will come when we release the source to our servers. Maybe even some of the nifty AS code we are coming up with for the client. Why?
Because: it’s the content, not the code. People don’t pay you because you run a Linux, or FreeBSD backend with some clever code. They pay you for the content, the enjoyment you provide. Yes, the client server makes that possible. But the fact is, without content…a server and a client are just arbitrary bit of code that run.
The server that runs WoW, nobody cares about it, (Except maybe shard operators) and it would be a meaningless bit of code without the content. Same with any server code out there. It’s about the content. It’s about creating avenues for people to create or play in content. The code is worthless without the content to draw and drive people. But, here again, we have another company shutting the doors, and locking out the people.
None of the regular folks who play Metaplace care about *how* it works, only that it *does* work. There are also many folks in Metaplace, programmers, designers, artists who have spent a great deal of time scripting, drawing, etc…there are also people capable of taking the code, and running with that ball where someone else could not. That’s the true tragedy of this. The ball, having been dropped…has been taken by the referee and locked in a vault so nobody can ever play again. We feel this is the bigger loss, the larger tragedy in all of this.
From one indie to another, we hope whatever Metaplace, Inc has in store for the future works out well. We wish Raph Koster luck. We admire the hell out of the man. We use “The Rules” as one of our guides. This can be a nasty business, but it can also be a rewarding one. We don’t expect Emerald Kingdom to be the next WoW. But we know it will be fun.
We also know that we enjoyed Metaplace, and were seriously contemplating its use as a business channel. Godspeed, Metaplace.
Player Punishment.
02 years ago
One of the big problems we have with the way most modern games operate is that it seems to have become the norm, even somewhat fashionable and acceptable to punish players rather than fixing problems. This extends to everything from design flaws to business model flaws.
Indie’s hold an advantage in this regard. Being smaller and without the burden of idiotic policies, they can flex and react to issues much faster than a major corporation. An indie game developer who has developed not only their game, but a vibrant community…has a type of pseudo partnership with the people who play their games. Players in turn, almost always understand that what happens to the company can affect them as well. This can lead to pure magic.
Let’s take a case in point. We found this on Slashdot. It breaks our heart, despite never having played BH. A few days ago, I specifically addressed this very issue when I said: “We want people to pay to enhance their gaming experience, as opposed to wanting people to pay to enable their gaming experience.”. And the issue with EA hits this nail on the head. What’s more telling is that many of the comments from the players to the effect of: if you needed money, we as a group would have stepped up to the plate.
The fact of the matter is, the developer does not “get it”. You can see this from their response:
“We don’t really need money as much as a sustainable business model for the game.”
If you did not do your homework in regard to your business model, your first step is to figure out where you went wrong, without alienating your player base. It might well involve putting more of a financial burden on the players, but a player who loves a game will work with you to make it better. Punishing the player for your mistake is never ever the answer.
At the core of this though, is a much deeper concern. Big dev houses are seeing micro transactional business models as the “new thing”, but they have very little understanding of it. Calling Battlefield: Heroes a MT based game is a bit disingenuous now. Why? Because as we stated earlier: payment should enhance the game play, not enable it. If you want to enable game play via payment, then micro transactional is not for you. In that case, a monthly or other subscription option is the business model you should be using. B:H has basically lost a lot of value to it’s player base. This is unfortunate. As I said, it breaks our heart to see satisfied players thrown under the bus because someone did not do their homework. But it’s situations like this that have the potential to jade players away from the micro transaction model of payment.
