Australian Gamer Feature :: Game Connect AP 2007

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Game Connect AP 2007

AJ attends the premier conference, exhibition and networking event for the ASIA Pacific Game Industry.

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This year I was lucky enough to get to go along to Game Connect, and the annual Asia Pacific game developers conference which was being run alongside eGames. The conference was run over 3 days, with topics for programmers, artists, producers and managers. Each day was broken into 5 parts with 3 sessions running in parallel. If you add that up, that is a lot of information being dished out. I was only able to get to the Saturday sessions, which was a shame, because Thursday and Friday had a lot of great stuff going on. Thursday featured 2 development forums covering the topics of the current Australian skills shortage and the other covering issues to do with investment in the industry. Day one of the actual conference presentations was Friday and saw presentations from PS3 development techniques, Mobile phone development, casual game development and audio production, presented by folks from Microsoft, SCE, Konami and Epic Games.

At least I managed to make it to Saturday. Having recovered from a wedding the day before, I dragged myself down to the Conference and plonked myself down and tried to absorb as much as my hangover would allow me. Saturday had sessions on developing for Vista, MMO production, audio production (from AG friend Mick Gordon), tools and tech and many other topics. In between presentations we had a chance to view a small collection of games and meet some of the developers and exhibitors in the exhibition hall. But more of that later.

The main exhibition hall.

For me, the most interesting presentation was from the guys at Net Devil who came all the way from Colorado USA to give a presentation on the future of MMO development, or the not-future of MMO development depending on how pessimistic you are. Scott Brown and Hermann Peterscheck gave an interesting insight into some of the pitfalls facing the future of MMO development in the games industry. Using the historic gold rush as an analogy, they illustrated how the boom in MMO development will almost certainly lead to an inevitable bust. One day the gold will run out, in a manner of speaking, and we�ll be left with hundreds of deserted universes, with nothing but virtual tumbleweeds and virtual ghosts to fill the void. Fortunately, they still see a lot of promise in the genre, providing that people are realistic about the goals they set, and don�t set out to make the next World of Warcraft on one tenth of the budget.

They also focused quite a bit of time on discussing contracts and ensuring that contracts with publishers are sufficiently flexible to allow for movement in the outcomes of the project. As they pointed out, contracts with publishers often detail exactly what features are to be implemented in the game, and penalties usually apply for not meeting those requirements. The end result is that features that do not necessarily make for a good game are forced through production simply to satisfy a contractual obligation. As contracts are expensive to modify and would usually result in loss of royalties or some other penalty, it is best to develop contracts which provide regular milestones, but that those milestones are not set in concrete until sometime down the track. This means that features that obviously do not make sense to the publisher or the developer do not get forced through just because a contract demands it. The freedom for the publisher and developer to work together, rather than against each other, should mean a better game as a result.

Another important element of game development discussed was on team size. As they put it, 9 women can�t make a baby in 1 month - an interesting analogy, but one that does apply fairly accurately to software development as a whole. The key, as they see it, is to keep the team as small as possible for as long as possible to ensure a coherent end-goal and a focused development path. A team which can work together well and can produce a prototype quickly will not only result in a more positive response from a publisher, but will give the project a more focused target to move towards. As the team gets larger, communication gets more complicated, and the focus becomes diluted by too many opinions. In addition to this, they also highlighted the importance of having a realistic goal for your game. As they put it, it�s ok to make a small game. Not every game needs to have 9 million subscribers. It�s ok to have 50,000 if that is the number that will make the game profitable. A small team means lower costs which means it is easier to make a positive return. In their case, Jumpgate Evolution only has a development team of about 10 people, whereas Lego universe � a much larger project � has 60. The right number for the job is the most important thing.

Another key factor was to ensure that your game is actually fun as soon as possible. There is no point spending 3 years building a game, to finally get it playable and discover it is crap and no fun. Take short cuts, hard code quests, use middleware, hack code � do whatever it takes to get something running that you can play and say �hell yeah, this is fun�, or �uggh, this sucks, let�s go build something else�. The point being, the sooner you can find out if you�re onto a winner or a loser, the sooner you can decide what course of action to take. It�s easier to ditch a project after 3 months with 6 developers than it is after 3 years with 60.

There was a wide selection of presentations and speakers over the weekend.

The other interesting presentation was given by the guys at 2k Australia about the highs and lows of developing the PC version of Bioshock. This presentation was very much in contrast with that given by Net Devil. This was a warts and all review of the development of Bioshock. Starting with the difficulties faced by a team spread across 3 continents, Martin Slater and Will Marshall, discussed in gory detail all the problems they encountered, and what they took away and learnt from for next time. Interestingly, they guys seemed to really enjoy working with folks from the US and the UK who provided a great resource for learning and for discussing ideas. Whilst I am sure it caused a lot of issues, it sounds as though it was a great experience.

What surprised me most was to hear about the launch problems from the other side of the fence. To hear developers complaining about their customers as some sort of necessary evil was quite disheartening. As a background, the Bioshock disc was released without an executable, and users were required to register online and download an executable to run the game. As they put it, they were more concerned about not having the game cracked in the first week then they were about causing problems for users. Rather than be understanding of people who paid $100 to play the game, and had trouble downloading the exe from 2K, the presenter went on a rant how their customers go to online forums to complain about having to go online to download the exe� as if that is somehow relevant. Whilst I am all for stamping out piracy, why must it always be at the expense of the paying user? The fact is that once again developers have shown contempt for paying users by making them jump through hoops to play the game, yet pirates can play without any hassle at all. The upsetting thing for me is to hear that this developer at least perceives all users as pirates and that �if you give them any opportunity (to pirate the game) they will (rather than pay for it)�. The barrage that legitimate fans of Bioshock copped because of a broken and unproven anti-piracy method was just unbelievable and frankly disappointing. There are no stupid users, only stupid software, Mr. Slater.

After an extremely professional and well planned presentation by Net Devil, the guys from 2K really looked quite amateurish. If it wasn�t attacking consumers over their failed anti-piracy methods, it was attacking PC users for being too picky about their UI and control schemes. Their apparent view that the customer is the enemy was in stark contrast to Net Devil who seemed to clearly have a focus on making the best experience possible for the end user, right down to ensuring that online delivery for their games is as easy and usable as possible. Maybe that is just what I took away from it, but I didn�t really appreciate the �cowboy� show put on by 2k Australia.

During the lunch break I had a good opportunity to have a look at the mini-eGames in the expo hall. I had a good opportunity to get hands on with games like Looney Tunes Acme Arsenal (made locally by Redtribe) and De Blob for Wii, both which look like great games. Whilst I am sure Looney Tunes would�ve been a lot better had I run through the tutorial level, or had a manual, the game itself �looked� to be fairly fun. With the little hands on time I had it was unclear how much use had been made of the license, beyond having Daffy, Bugs and Co as playable characters, however. The camera angles were certainly a frustration as is typical of these sorts of 3D-platform adventures (I�m looking at you Simpsons, Lego Star Wars), but the array of weapons, collectibles and playable characters certainly gave the impression of a fully fleshed out Looney Tunes experience. It�s a shame that I found the game almost impossible to play while I was sitting there, and upon returning home and reading some reviews, it appears I wasn�t the only one. It�s a shame to say that the reception has been less than promising from critics. The game is already available in the US, but we won�t get to see a local release until January, but I look forward to having a look when it comes in.

Hands on time with De Blob.

The other game I had an opportunity to have a gander at was the novel de Blob from Blue Tongue (another local). Originally the game was made for PC game by a bunch of students in the Netherlands, and I believe is still available for free download. At Game Connect I got a chance to have a play at the Wii version of the game, and whilst it appears on the surface to be a Katamari clone, it is far from it. The game basically has you bouncing around as a blob of paint (or something covered in paint perhaps?), and splashing buildings all over a cityscape in various bright colours. The game certainly fits well into the style of games we�ve come to expect from the Wii, and unfortunately I don�t know how long the game will maintain its appeal. Still, the game is fun to pick up and play, and whilst the controls are a little difficult to get used to, the game looks like it will be another worthy addition to the Wii catalog.

The last event of the schedule was a light hearted debate over whether the PS3 or the 360 would produce the greatest games in the future. Curiously, the Wii was omitted from the original debate schedule, but thankfully saw representation at the table when the time rolled around. Unsurprisingly, the debate quickly reduced itself to a tag team battle with PS3 and Xbox in one corner and the Wii in the other. I�d imagine this is why the Wii was originally left out of the debate, as in the end it was a no contest. Representing the 360 was Cameron Dunn from Transmission Games, representing the PS3 was Tony Albrecht from Pandemic and for the Wii, David Hewitt from Tantalus. For some reason I neglected to remember that my camera took video until about 5 minutes in, which was a shame because the opening arguments were pretty damned amusing. The arguments went back and forth about as you would expect, with the pro-power camp versus the pro-innovation camp. It probably didn�t help that you had two programmers arguing the future of game design against� well� a game designer. The video is about 30 minutes long. Check it out below.

All up I�d say Game Connect was very much a success. A wide range of topics were covered and by some pretty high profile developers, so I am sure that a lot of the attendees would have learnt a great deal. A lot of the content went well over my head, but I guess that is why I am not a real game developer. One thing is for sure, it certainly gave me a good understanding of the vast array of issues that developers go through just to release a game that us reviewers stamp with a number.

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