Critical Game Design

Recently I viewed two videos from very prominent game designers. The first was a talk by Dave Perry, designer of such games as Earthworm Jim and MDK. The second video featured Will Wright, the man responsible for the many Sims and Sims spinoffs. The two men discussed game design, and what game design was composed of, outside the obvious. Perry shared his ideas on graphics and sound in games, and how they've advanced through the decades. He also showed a video by a student that dove into emotion and immersion in games. Wright likened games to toys. He discussed how he has always viewed his game designs as toy designs.

Having read many works by both of these designers, and viewed these videos, I can say with absolute resolution that I agree with every thing they say. Not simply because they are clearly geniuses in their field, but also because what they say can be very easily seen in the reactions of people playing their games.

Perry has stressed before creating games with meaning and emotion. These are the games that have lasting appeal. I firmly believe that when a player can make an emotional investment in the game, it is massively more successful than simply being a game. It triggers different thought patterns and feelings. It can educate and motivate. It is not something to be won or lost, but instead something to be experienced. When we design games, we need to consider this. We need to look at what deep connections our game can form with our players.

Wright considers his games as toys. This may seem in stark contrast to Perry's ideals, but actually isn't. Think about the toys you had growing up. These are things you can pick up and manipulate. You can feel them in your hands. Chances are, you can remember a great deal of detail about these things. Wright claims that his games, The Sims in particular, bring about the same feelings in their players. The players are given the unique ability to create their game. To have personal investment in it. They construct their creations inside the game, and then play with them. They are toys.

What Perry and Wright say go hand in hand. Perry stresses emotion in games, and Wright claims that games are toys. I claim that toys invoke emotion. That's what we need in games.

The most impacting games in the future will be the ones we have stake in. We will be connected, either because of an emotional involvement in the story, or because we had a hand in its creation.

The Law and Games

Nintendo arrived on the game scene early. Very early. Nintendo was established in 1889 and began making playing cards. It wasn’t until nearly a century later in 1975 did Nintendo enter the electronic game arena. Another 15 years later, Nintendo dominates the home video game market. With Nintendo’s domination of the market came a slew of legal battles. These battles arose because Nintendo’s unprecedented advance demonstrated to the rest of the business that the home market was massive, and the fight for those dollars was one of cunning and quick actions.

The companies vying for control understood that there were millions of dollars at stake. They also understood that any money they were after, others were after as well. With such a large stake of money, the companies knew they’d have to have to fight for every penny.

Consumer’s likes and dislikes were well established by this point. Arcade games had become very popular during the previous decade, and console game manufacturers knew the popular ones. If they were to make any money, they’d need to produce what the population wanted. Naturally this leads to similar products being made by various different companies. And of course, this leads to copyright infringement claims.

The first such claim came when Data East accused Epyx of copying their karate game, Karate Champ. Originally, Epyx was found in violation of Data East’s copyrights, but an appeals judge overturned the decision. Atari, however, locked in a battle with Nintendo, would not be so fortunate.

Atari and Nintendo have a long history of legal battles. It began when Nintendo accused Atari of illegally obtaining and using the security code to Nintendo’s Nintendo Entertainment System. Later, the suit would be over a well-known game called Tetris. Because of some miscommunications between the game’s creator, Alexey Pajitnov, and London businessman Robert Stein, multiple licenses to the game were sold. Each company receiving the license was unaware that the exact same license was sold to other companies. Atari and Nintendo both received licenses.

According to author Steven Kent (2001), “Atari released its Tengen version of Tetris in May, 1989; Nintendo released its version one month later” (p. 379). Again, two companies found themselves in a legal battle over similar games. Both Atari and Nintendo claimed that they owned the rights to manufacture the game. Kent (2001) claims that because of Nintendo’s weight, the judge determined the company was an almost sure-fire win, and ordered Atari to recall all of their Tetris cartridges. The matter never went to trial, and Nintendo was deemed to own the rights to the game. Atari was never allowed to sell the game they produced.

References

Kent, S.L. (2001). The Ultimate History of Video Games. New York: Three Rivers Press

Surviving in the Industry

Bethesda Softworks was founded in 1985 and got its start with sports games for the Commodore 64, NES, Atari and DOS. After the first couple of titles were released by Bethesda, the company began developing games almost exclusively for the PC. I think this partially helped them to survive (more on what really did later). The PC market was quickly growing, and mostly immune to the problems plaguing the console wars. Bethesda’s successful franchise,The Elder Scrolls, is still thriving today.

Another company that began around the same time was Sir-Tech. Sir-Tech was founded in 1980, and like Bethesda, began creating games for various consoles, as well as PC and Apple systems. The company’s most popular series, Wizardry, performed quite well. Unlike Bethesda, however, the company did not survive. Sir-Tech shut down in 2001 (it began the process in 1998); its sister company Sir-Tech Canada closing in 2003.

I believe what allowed Bethesda to stay afloat when Sir-Tech sank was not quality or quantity of games. Both produced quality games during the same time period. Though Bethesda didn’t create its first role-playing game until Sir-Tech had already developed quite a few, both franchises sold very well. Instead, I think it was the market savvy of Bethesda that allowed it to remain strong, instead of withering like Sir-Tech.

Robert Sirotek, co-founder of Sir-Tech, was quoted by Jason Bates of IGN (1998) as saying that, “The state of affairs in the industry at large has not been exactly healthy, and if the industry were a little more mature, and people conducted their business affairs in a more responsible fashion, we may have decided to proceed [instead of closing].” This quote tells me that the Sir-Tech management was not prepared to deal with the realities of a cutthroat business. Bethesda, on the other hand, saw the market for what it was and sold to ZeniMax Media in 1999, shortly before Sir-Tech sank. With the sale, Bethesda was able to develop and publish Morrowind and Oblivion, the most successful installments in the Elder Scrolls series.

Having played and absolutely loved both the Elder Scrolls and the Wizardryseries, I can say both companies produce brilliant games. Unfortunately, in the entertainment business, great works of art are not always enough. Bethesda survived when Sir-Tech died because Bethesda was able to make wise business decisions. It’s a great shame; I dearly miss Sir-Tech.

References
Bates, J. (1998, October). Sir-Tech’s Last Words. Retrieved from http://pc.ign.com/articles/065/065299p1.html

The 1980's Collapse of the Video Game Industry

In the late 1970's and early 1980's, the Video Game Industry suffered a painful collapse. I believe a pair of factors contributed to this collapse. Firstly, the industry was seeing an unprecedented flooding of console and game manufacturers, reducing competition (a counterintuitive thought), and creating a supply mountain and a demand valley. Secondly, financial institutions reacted poorly to the state of the market, created a panic, and caused a video game value depression.

Atari had its original 2600, and 5200. Coleco Industries released the ColecoVision and Coleco Gemini. Fairchild released their Channel F as the Channel F System II. Magnavox created the Odyessy, Mattel had Intelivision, Bally had the Astrocade, and more. The consumer market was saturated with consoles and games. Competition vanished, with most new consoles being clones of others. There was no need to compete on a technological level. Instead, companies competed on marketing and pricing. Steven Kent (2001) writes that:

Atari had deeply rooted problems that eventually infected the entire video-game industry. During its heyday, Atari become top-heavy with marketers and other executives. As several ex-Atari people later described the situation, the company had entirely abandoned its carefree youth and become a home for MBAs. (p. 235)

Coupled with the explosion of console creators, there is an even larger collection of game developers. Video Game History, an article at The Dot Eaters (n.d.) claims that, "There are 50 companies publishing games for the 2600 in 1982, companies such as 20th Century Fox, Avalon Hill, CommaVid, Froggo, Milton Bradley, Parker Brothers, Quaker Oats, Sega, Spectravision, Tigervision, Wizard Video Games and Xonox" ("Player 3 Stage 6: The Great Videogame Crash" para. 4).

The massive influx of console and game developers caused a surplus of products that the populace was not prepared to meet. Supply went way up, and demand stayed low. This caused an accompanying drop in the value of consoles and games. Kent (2001) remarks that, "On December 7, 1982, Atari announced that it expected a 10 to 15 percent increase in sales in the fourth quarter. Until that announcement, Atari executives had been talking about an increase of 50 percent. . . . By the time the New York Stock Exchange closed on December 8, Warner stock had fallen 16 3/4 points to 35 1/8 and the video-game industry had begun to collapse" (p. 234). The sheer number of consoles and games were suddenly not worth the plastic that contained them.

The beauty of American commercialism has an ugly side, and the video game industry witnessed this first hand. Decreased competition and market saturation caused the industry to collapse. Fortunately, the collapse paved the way for influx of foreign creations, including the wildly successful Nintendo Entertainment System.

References

Kent, S.L. (2001). The Ultimate History of Video Games. New York: Three Rivers Press

Video Game History 101. (n.d.). Retrieved from The Dot Eaters from http:// www.thedoteaters.com/p3_stage6.php

Home Arcade

So I've decided to build my own arcade cabinet for my basement. Not sure what actually prompted this. It's always been something I've considered, but somehow now it actually seems like a good idea. So first things first, I'm going to collect some web links to help me.

http://mamedev.org/ - HQ for MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator). Some hardcore folks believe that emulating these machines, instead of using original boards, is evil. Evil or not, it's cheaper and a lot easier to find and complete.

http://www.tmsoft.com/article-arcade.htm - A nice step-by-step article on building a home arcade cabinet. Complete with prices.

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/how_build_kickass_mame_arcade_rig_old_pc_pics - Another step-by-step guide, this one by popular Maximum PC magazine.

http://www.happcontrols.com/ - Appears to be an online store for arcade/vending machine parts.

http://www.arcadedepot.com/ - Another store.

http://arcadeshop.com/parts.htm - Yet another.

I'm going to look these over and come up with a plan and a budget.

Early Mistakes In Video Game History

The expansion of games from mainly mechanical to electronic means was inevitable. It was not an easy transition, however. There were roadblocks around every turn, and the future was never clear. The electronic game industry was new, and so were the customers, so creating stirring games was a challenge. Some strategies worked, and others failed. Being able to look back on the industry as it first emerged grants us 20/20 vision on what went right, and what went wrong. Armed with this view, we can take a look and see how we might have done things differently.

I think the biggest change that could have been made would have been a shift in the target market earlier. Though electronic games first appeared as a competitor for mechanical pinball, they didn’t need to stay there. Because electronic games were placed right along side pinball machines, they suffered the same negative press. The games were introduced into an already crowded market space, when they could have opened the doors on completely uncontested market space a lot sooner.

The market space I speak of is the home entertainment market. Kent (2001) noted that although the Magnavox Odyssey dove into this space early on, the poor decision to advertise the system in such a way that made it appear to only work on Magnavox televisions, and the exclusive deal with Magnavox retailers stifled the system’s growth (80). The market sat uncontested for three years until Atari entered in 1975 with Home Pong. During those years, Atari made great strides in video entertainment with arcade Pong and others, but missed out on the valuable opportunity.

The technology was already available. The transition from mechanical to electronic games meant that sizes and weights were already coming down. This meant that systems became smaller and easier to maintain. Magnavox had already proven, though crudely, that arcade machines could work on home televisions. The home market was ripe.

Directly delivering these games into the home would have avoided the problems surrounding the games residing in pool halls and bars. Marketing to children would have come next naturally, and a lot sooner than Bushnell’s Chuck-E-Cheese’s. I think Atari would have experienced unrestrained growth in the fresh market space had they seen the opportunity earlier on.

Video games in the home are a common thing now, but at the time it was unheard of. Having witnessed what happened at the beginning of the industry, I say I would have hit the home market a lot sooner.

References

Kent, S.L. (2001). The Ultimate History of Video Games. New York: Three Rivers Press