Last post of the year

Well, the project is moving slower than I expected (and I expected it to be slow to begin with).  Nevermind.  I just merged two dungeon environments into one, so technically speaking, I have 25% of the environment set.  If I keep at the current rate I may be able to finish right before September.

I am also now considering Shiva3D as well as Unity3D as a candidate for a 3D engine to make a short action side-game that reuses the 3D models I had prerendered.

I really want to finish in early August though, to commemorate 5 years since my registering on Lemmasoft forums and taking my first steps as a game-maker... from small experimental text-and-pictures visual novels, to slightly more complicated simulations, and now an RPG hybrid.  Many developers took 10 or 15 years of industry experience before deciding to go independent.  We live in an exciting time that I can go head to head with them at the same points of entry:  PC, iOS, Android, XBLIG (if available in your country).

Five years also marks a generational shift, whether it's a console life-cycle, an automobile full model year change, or even the population of a forum.

So with this work, I will be deciding what I will be doing next as far as serious hobbies go, depending on the end result and reception.

Happy Holidays!

The West will save the ACG (anime, comic, game) industry

I've been thinking about in-game advertising, and I have a somewhat reasonable idea to propose.  Instead of some random crap being advertised, how about tying up with fellow VN makers and let them advertise through your game?

With the increasing popularity of pay-what-you-want schemes and crazy sales that destroy any sense of value (i.e. Steam's 5 indie games for $5 which essentially puts even desktop games at the same price points as iphone apps and XBLIG games), we could be looking at a future where majority of the audience would rather not pay for games (in fact it could be happening now).  iTunes is a captive market because unless the phone is jailbroken, it's easy enough to purchase something on impulse since the user accounts and credit card info have already been entered.  The problem is exposure.  So I'm thinking... instead of the usual convention of having the mobile version advertise the desktop version of the game... how about have the desktop version advertise the mobile version instead?  Or have the desktop version of some other game advertise the mobile version of a related but different game?

I've read that Android is so rife with piracy that one might as well treat it the same as a desktop market (I don't think Unity Android Pro should be so expensive, because I expect Android developers to get even less ROI compared to iOS devs.).

I'm thinking a pay version of the game will get a dedicated high speed direct download, be ad-free, and contain extras (i.e. wallpapers and strategy guide in the package).  While a free version can be offered on a dedicated torrent and will force the player to sit through a a sponsor's message (which can be skipped on subsequent play-through using persistent data) before playing the game.  That sponsor's message can be the iTunes version of a fellow VN maker... or it can even be propaganda of a political or activist nature (yeah I'm thinking of writing a 1,000 word essay regarding the problems of one's country).  Maybe a game can be so good that players will indulge the developer ranting and rambling in his soapbox for a few minutes.  This can be in addition to a blog post and probably will even be more effective than a blog post.

As technology matures and digital goods and services follow the general trend of paid --> free (e.g. game engines such as Unity), the patronage model must be bolstered if we want to keep the things we love around.  Maybe not the consumers themselves, but somebody has to be around to fund and maintain such things.  I used to be intrigued by Taiwanese single-player RPGs such as Heroine Anthem since they resembled JRPGs so much... guess what?  They're gone now, replaced by generic MMORPGS.  I also used to enjoy the anime works of Gonzo since they really catered to Western tastes... well guess what?  They too are largely gone now, and their crazy narratives have been replaced by generic moe shows.  Unlike other arts that can be supplemented by live performances, the digital media arts -- especially animation, comics, games only have print runs and digital distribution as their only source of revenue.  And unlike the performance arts, the digital media arts can be created by introverted, ugly people in their bedrooms -- as long as they have brilliant minds and artistic talent.  And I want to reward them for it.  (Beautiful people are essentially getting paid for being born with the traits to begin with).

Japan enjoyed a recent boom in cultural exports, but I think the ACG industry in Japan is dying a slow death.  The population is growing old, the yen remains too strong, the young workforce (after what's left of the NEETs) is unmotivated.  I sincerely believe the future of anime will be more western-commissioned works such as Iron Man.  The same goes for games and manga as well, if Korea (or even China) doesn't beat them to it.



I hope to be among the second wave of "Western" (well I'm Asian, but raised in the West) developed JRPGs. The first wave was after the release of the popular Final Fantasy VII.  Right now JRPGs are very unpopular, so the only western-developed JRPGs are either RPGMaker clones or parody games (usually RPGMaker parody games).  I want to make a genuine game in the JRPG (or more like, SRPG) spirit.

Before the game turned feminine...

...it used to be your conventional mecha game.  The original idea was to have a squadron of bipedal walking armored suits (piloted by girls of course!), and after spending time in the garage upgrading and customizing, you send them off to engage in turn-based battle.  Before I decided to up the ante with commercial-quality graphics, I was content with a top-down symbolic layout, as if the units were chess pieces.  So not surprisingly, the first version of the HUD I came up with was very chessboard-like:

An early HUD prototype from earlier this year.  The game couldn't have possibly been called 'Elspeth's Garden'... more like 'Mecha General'

It wasn't the first time that a game concept got totally overhauled.  The main reason it got changed so drastically to its current state was because of the real investment I decided to inject into the project.  Jake's Battle Engine was so flexible, it really encouraged you to go all-out with graphics and animation.  So instead of everything being represented by symbols on a chessboard, it would be much more exciting to actually get to see the units animated.  There was no way I would be hand-animating hundreds of frames by hand, thus a big portion of the budget was allocated for 3D models since it would be more efficient to animate them once then render out isometric camera angles.  I then thought I might as well spend money modelling my favorite things instead of ugly mecha -- and that included different girls in various costumes.  Thus, mecha were out;  gothloli girls were in.

Now, since mecha were out, I needed some machines to be their replacements... something which were simple enough to model myself so I won't have to inflate the budget.  And that is how airships came into being!

Airships! (Don't mind the broken moves)

Elspeth's Garden will be a Trilogy.

I think I've come up with an optimum way to distribute this project.  By breaking the project into 3 parts I will be able to truly maximize the limited resources that I have, not to mention that the feedback I get from the first segment can be used to greatly enhance the subsequent sections (rather than have the entire 15-hour or so experience suffering from a fundamental design flaw -- it's better to get feedback and catch things early).  Also, with the way consumers expect lower prices even with their RPGs (see Breath of Death vs Aphelion), you just have to design around the lower price point after all.

So the breakup will be the following:

1.)  Book I - free (covers about 5 hours).  This will serve as the shareware aspect and demo replacement.
2.)  Book II - covers the next 5 hours.  I'll probably sell it for 4.99 in the beginning.  I will have it ready to go when Book I is released, but I will tweak it first based on feedback from Book I to know what my audience wants.
3.)  Book III - covers the final 5 hours.  I will have a prototype when Book I is released, but will await feedback from Books I and II to make sure that the epitome of gameplay is reached.  Also probably will sell for 4.99.

I will have to split the levelling system so you play as different characters and in new environments for each Book.  That means they don't really get to level up much (probably max would be Level 5, seeing that even a full-length SRPG such as Valkyria Chronicles have your team at just Level 15 by the end game).  The upside is that there won't be much balance / grinding issues since I can really tweak the stats to the minutest number, since the difference between Level 1 and 5 is not as big as, say Level 10 and Level 40.

I will also have the opportunity to release each episode for a small price (~1.99-2.99) for the Android marketplace.  I sincerely hope this would be a wiser move than selling a full game for the 'expensive' price of 5.99.

Another upside is that I can really concentrate better on 5-hour playtesting sessions rather than 15-hour ones!  And most importantly, having a set of 3 self-contained games gives me 3 times the opportunity to market the franchise!

After Book III is released I can overhaul Books I and II and release an improved Special Edition complete package -- free for those who bought Books II and III of course!  If I can get additional help, I'd like the complete trilogy set to be in full HD 720p and using a full 3D engine, using the actual models instead of prerenders for smoother animations.

The single player narrative game is dying.

I am kind of saddened to see the epic single player experience fading away, as more companies... even independent developers, try to make it big in the social and online space.  I understand that they're reaching markets not traditionally attracted to core games, but these games are not for me.  I like to fully escape and be fully immersed in worlds only dreamed of by brilliant creators... and I want to enjoy them in solitude, not to be ruined by other players.  To me, social and online games are essentially the developers giving us a playground, and telling the children... now go play here, we don't care if there's bullying.  Single player games on the other hand are like novels which while you can share your experiences with other people, the actual experiences are treasured only by you and you alone.


The statistics show the decline of AAA action-adventures to be replaced by games that depend heavily on multiplayer online component.  Look at Enslaved -- this game was penned by a Hollywood writer and was originally meant to be a film.  Since Hollywood projects must be guaranteed to be hits before they are greenlighted, it was turned down.  So they made a game of it -- a AAA game.  And it tanked.  Boy, did it tank.  The reason was the the experience was not compelling enough to be worth more than a rental.  The fact that it was single-player only was its main curse.


The thing is that unlike games, movies can be shown in theaters, where people can pay for a single viewing session.  Games are not at that point yet (see OnLive).  Only diehards buy movie DVDs.  But game disks are usually bought.  If you have a single-player game that can be finished in an evening (and many commercial games fall into that category), if the experience isn't an absolute blast, then the player would want to recover some of that $60 spent.  Hence the booming used game sales.

I think therefore that the cost of experiencing single-player games should be closer to that of renting movies.  And since games provide more hours of entertainment and interactivity, then no one can argue the superior worth of games as an immersive entertainment medium.  But in order to do that, the costs of developing games must be cheaper.  That is why I am part of the movement in pioneering delivery of immersive experiences as efficiently as possible.  How am I doing that?  By presenting story in visual novel style.

You don't need the voices of Hollywood actors being lipsynced to 13,000-poly motion-captured models in a dynamically-lit scene with HDR bloom.

You just need pictures.  And text.

There... the perfect 'cutscene'.  All hail visual novels!

I am not an "indie dev"

Apparently there are people who complain that everyone who's trying to make a game calls themselves an independent developer, and that the label should only refer to people or small companies who actually manage to sustain a full-time living with games.

I actually agree.  Right now I am more of a hobbyist developer.  And until Elspeth's Garden becomes well-known enough to be monetized, it is more of a hobby game than an indie game.  What doesn't change is that a few people who are working on aspects of this game are professionals.  I can only hope that I am a good project leader so that all this effort will be worth it.

Talking about monetization, I am not sure yet.  I am still not confident enough to sell a game at "full price" (which these days for an indie game is $10 to $20).  I do still want to recover my development costs, however.  Back in the day, games released by garage coders were called Shareware.  I actually like the premise -- you don't just give away a demo, but a self-contained extended experience which could be anywhere from 1/3 of a game to the full game itself.  It was only when corporations latched on to the term to label their 'crippleware' (software that can only be fully useable when registered) as Shareware that the term lost favor then faded away.  Nowadays people just release demos and trials.  The problem is I don't know what to offer for a registered copy.  And the contents which I'm working with... overwhelming as they are already... are not really enough to provide for bonus materials.  I've already dropped event CGs, full multiple path plots, and romantic subplots -- preferring instead the simplicity of a straightforward story with win/lose scenarios.  I might as well pour all the assets to make a compelling first play-through for the user and hope that alone will make for good replayability.

What I am also sure is that I will keep on iterating and polishing the gameplay and story to be worthy of the graphics, and I won't release it until I am more than satisfied with its fun factor.

First recorded test - dummy enemies!

Oh happy day!

Elspeth's Garden is progressing really well.  I'm slowly implementing features on the basic battle system, so there is no shortage of things to do even with the art I have so far.

Unlike a month or two ago where I usually just wait, now I have enough materials to occupy me indefinitely.  I can continue to polish the gameplay, add more features and subsections, or even finally start adding in the story elements (I tend to want to design around battle stages first).   Which reminds me, I should finally decide on the optimum method to display 2D sprites, then start tracing from the design spec sheet and create them already.

The best news is that I received a whole package of environmental sprites that really put this game on another level graphics-wise.  In addition, the main character model for the adventure-game-like sections is currently being worked on.

Once I have enough materials, I can upload a gameplay video.  But right now, there's so much to do, and most of it is in my court!

I should be more humble.

So I was reading yet another Minecraft editorial and the new info that stuck out to me was how humble Notch was, and how from everything about the way the game was presented starting from the website comes the conveyance that this was a simple but deep game, made by a simple but good guy.  Here's a person who is enjoying rockstar status but not acting like a rockstar.

Me?  I'm nobody.  And yet why the hell do I always have to have a tinge of arrogance in my posts?  Why am I so hell-bent on conquering the world?  Maybe it's because I'm so desparately trying hard to achieve something that stands out in the sea of mediocrity.  I used to have low self-esteem, so maybe this is the pendulum swinging in the opposite direction.

The biggest realization I had that I'm nobody was when I stopped being helpful in an online forum I used to be so active in.  I expected people will miss my presence and my help but guess what?  They didn't.  Oh well.  (But just because I ceasing being proactive didn't mean that I should adopt an asshole or troll mentality).

I have to become more like Notch.  Maybe not in skill (it's impossible), but in attitude.  Or another alternative is to become anonymous then only come out of the woodwork if there's success and someone wants an interview (I wish.).

In any case, from now on I'm just going to talk about the project or any larger topic of interest.

Creating new IP is hard.

I've been wondering lately what makes a project popular.  It's familiarity.  If it's in the top ten, or a bestseller, then people will trust that the experience must indeed be good.

For a new endeavor, it's easier to drum up support if it's based on an existing work that people are already familiar with.  That's why movies not based off anything like comics, novels, or games are rare.  If you're making a game, it's easier to make a sequel, a remake, or a translation, than something totally new from scratch.  It also explains why it's easier to get a group together making a fanwork than something original -- the people in the group share their love for the source material, so they all strive to make sure to recreate the feel of the original. 

That's not the case in original works, where the source is usually a single person, and it's really dependent upon that person to communicate and inspire other team members.  If the entirety of that vision is not yet communicated, then it's understandable if hardly anyone is interested.  So what ends up happening is that only the creator is enthusiastic about the work.  It's really lucky to have other people interested enough to work for free, but usually help will only come if you pay people, such as commissioning freelancers.  And even then, you might not really need to divulge the entire vision, but only the elements needed to get the art assets designed on spec.  It isn't just that the freelancers have other projects they're working on... they may also have experienced their fair share of failed projects so it's really hard -- as a near-professional -- to really get your entire heart into any project that looks mildly promising.

The best I could do is to strive to surprise and delight people with the resulting work -- even with the freelancers I'm working with -- to see how their art is unexpectedly adopted in innovative ways.  That's the main reason why I'm holding off on posting any artwork until I have enough resources to convey the full force of my vision.

The game just got more expensive, yikes.

So I finally sat down and calculated the projected costs of this project, taking into account the ideal number of characters and backgrounds I would want, as well as other assistance such as music and programming help.  It turns out the cost will near $10K.

This figure does not include the 3 entire dungeon levels which I already tossed aside (or merged elements into the existing dungeon plans), as well as a dozen or so planned music tracks which I decided to forgo in favor of more remixes.  In other words, that figure is the result after the cost-cutting.  I also decided to give up event CGs and plan to re-use existing backgrounds for most everything (using efficient compositing to make sure no two screens look too much alike).

It's high for a hobby project, but this is nothing in comparison to some hidden object games which rack up art bills in the tens of thousands.  I have about 5 people I'm contracting, and if each person gets about $1200-$2000 worth of workload, it's not hard to see why the bill will tally up like that.  And in fact I still think that they're being affordable with me because I'm an unknown beginner game-maker.  I've seen the costs other people charge for other work -- and they are still within the bounds of 'indie' level -- and they're definitely unaffordable given my personal budget.  I feel lucky with the level of talent that I have, so what I can do is to make the best game I can make.

Purpose.

Why am I spending thousands out of my own pocket to make a commercial downloadable PC game in a niche market?  Though I am doing my best, it isn't guaranteed that the final product will be flawless.
In fact, it might not even be 1/1,000 the grand idea that is residing in my head (or was, before cost-cutting came into play).  I can only hope that it won't suck, and am prepared to enlist dozens of beta-testers to ensure that.

I am not even sure if I can make a viable living out of this, and that was not the original purpose.  Truth be told, I dislike business stuff.  Managing cashflow, customer support -- those are stressful things which I've had the luck to perform in real-life work.  I am approaching making games from the "artistic" standpoint rather than the business standpoint.  Indeed, take one look at the news and any sane individual who wants quick cash will not want to hop into the games industry at all.

Despite being an "artistic" work, I would also want my game to be entertaining, so people who try it (and hopefully buy it) will appreciate the effort put into it. It should be a good game, as games go, without my needing to explain "Oh stupid player, you should have understood my brilliance in wanting to do it that [obnoxiously unintuitive] way!"  I'm already stating now that the demo will be a small separate campaign from the main game... that's how much I would want people to at least try what I will offer and enjoy what is offered for free without feeling pressured into a sales maneuver.

But I still haven't answered the original question.  Why don't I just release a freeware game?  I want to make a game with more polish than I am capable of providing by myself.  And if you use the professional services of people, they sort of expect you to make a professional product out of it.  And that is just healthy.  Attaching a price tag to this game will already send a signal of what kind of market this game will be competing in.  It will create a perception of value that most freeware games cannot create.  Some freeware games created in a span of years by geniuses exist of course, but I'm no genius, and I will certainly not want to take multiple years on any project (done that before).

I want to recreate the "high" or elation that one feels when you release a product that you know is good to the world.  It is great for your first freeware release, but after a while, you start to doubt yourself or even lose magic as more and more polished works get released and crowd the marketplace.  A first commercial work may be my last grab at a sense of validation and legitimacy before I am permanently buried in the sea of works of varying quality that people just don't appreciate.

Or it could be just that I'm just craving for that 'first sale' moment when I can finally tick the checkbox in my list of Life Achievements to Accomplish and legitimately label myself as a full-fledged game developer, regardless of whether I want to maintain that status for the rest of my life.

For that end, I am designing Elspeth's Garden to have a long tail.  If it will be pirated, it will be preserved.  If/when I disappear from the blogosphere, my statement will still live on.

One Year Deadline!

The goal of this blog is to record the development of Elspeth's Garden, my first commercial endeavor. The purpose of this journal is two-fold:

-1.) To establish a proof of copyright. One of the risks of developing entirely in secret is if suddenly a more powerful entity releases a work that is very similar in theme, characters or mechanics to your own; you can't suddenly say "B-but I thought of it first!" Ideas are a dime a dozen anyway. But at least by jotting things down on the internet, there will be a permanent record just in the unlikely chance that there be a conflict of interest.

-2.) To serve as a learning manual for first-time developers taking their first steps in making a commercial game. It is assumed that you have already a couple of freeware or forum games under your belt, so you know the basics of designing and making a game even if you're not a programmer -- I believe using off-the-shelf engines even if it's just Game Maker or Ren'Py is perfectly alright. The trick is how to make the experience shine while using limited tools and budget.

At this point in writing, I have finished pre-production and have just started commissioning the art and music assets to be used in Elspeth's Garden. I will not be showing these assets until the last possible moment, so that I have time to tweak them until the overall motif is delivered just the way I like it. I gave myself a deadline of August 2011 to get the finished game out, so I hope to have a beta with final assets by May-June or earlier.

So what is Elspeth's Garden going to be like? It's going to be a steampunk tactical RPG - visual novel hybrid. When I first thought of the idea I wanted to have a game featuring lots of anime girls and lots of apes... little did I know that Bioshock Infinite and Planet of the Apes remake were under development, both of which seem to have the style that I'm aiming for. But, yes, I was inspired partly by the original Planet of the Apes trilogy, as well as elements from Brave New World, Grapes of Wrath, and Crest of the Stars.

Originally, I wanted to make a Disgaea-style pure SRPG with mostly dialogue cutscenes, but as it turns out I don't have the time or money to commission the art for dozens of battle stages. So more story will be used to supplement the lack of battles (when compared to a regular SRPG). If I can still have random dungeons I will use them, but right now I have a limited list of campaign maps. But the game will be more of a 'casual tactical RPG', lasting about 5-8 hours playtime.

The indie dev support forums recommend that you don't make an RPG for your first game. Well this is my first major game and unfortunately I'm making a tactical game of all things. At least I followed their advice and decided to stick to a recommended budget of $5K instead of blowing tens of thousands on a new IP that has 90% chance of never recovering its investment. Later on I will want to polish up the presentation and marketing a bit and present a more solid businesslike presence, but right now, since I'm doing this out-of-pocket, it's going to be treated as a hobby until I have something sellable.

In anycase, here goes the first step.