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The Indie Game Commandments

Posted by Zonk on from the thou-shalt-not-make-a-movie-game dept.

simoniker writes "As part of an in-depth postmortem of Xbox title Stubbs The Zombie over at Gamasutra, company founder and Bungie co-founder Alex Seropian has revealed his own personal 'indie game commandments' when setting up his new firm: 'First Commandment: We shall establish our game's creative direction... Second commandment: We shall own our intellectual property... Third commandment: We shall not let a third party determine our success, such as the publisher who's doing (or not doing) the marketing, or the funding source (likely a publisher) making demands that are not in-line with our goals... Fourth Commandment: We shall have a small manageable team. We don't want 50 employees making one game over three years in house (we want low overhead), and we don't want to suffer the churn of ramping up and down for projects.'"

23 comments

  1. India game commandments by krell · · Score: 2, Funny

    1. Do not eat curry while playing game.

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    Where were you when the voynix came?
    1. Re:India game commandments by A.Chwunbee · · Score: 0, Funny

      Sahib, I am finding you're grammer is totaly in the pit! Should b: "Do not be eating the curry while playing, you foolish fellow".

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      select * from base where originalOwner = 'you' and currentOwner != 'us'.
      0 rows returned.
  2. Sounds like a great set of commandments.... by unheard02 · · Score: 0

    Now if they can just stick too them.

    --
    "If you have legs and are flammable, you are never blocking a fire exit." -- Mitch Hedberg
  3. Translation by neonprimetime · · Score: 2, Funny
    'First Commandment: We shall establish our game's creative direction... Second commandment: We shall own our intellectual property... Third commandment: We shall not let a third party determine our success, such as the publisher who's doing (or not doing) the marketing, or the funding source (likely a publisher) making demands that are not in-line with our goals... Fourth Commandment: We shall have a small manageable team. We don't want 50 employees making one game over three years in house (we want low overhead), and we don't want to suffer the churn of ramping up and down for projects.'"

    1. We will not create re-makes of classic games.
    2. We will sue anybody who tries to make a rip-off version of one of our games.
    3. We will not blame others for our own failures.
    4. We are just going to hire a couple /.ers and work them 18 hour days.
    1. Re:Translation by chrismcdirty · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I interpreted #2 as "We will not let a publisher run our intellectual property into the ground with a series mind-numbing sequels."

      --
      It's like sex, except I'm having it!
    2. Re:Translation by andrewman327 · · Score: 2, Insightful
      I am sure that the OSS fanboys on /. are going to love Rule #2. I should ammend my sig to read: "Information wants its damn latte. NOW!"

      It is too bad that IP theft and misuse has grown to be such a concern that ownership has to be enshrined in commandment form.

      --
      Information wants a fueled airplane waiting at the hangar and no one gets hurt.
    3. Re:Translation by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      I assume you mean that with misuse or theft but this seems to refer to the fact that most publishers are unwilling to sign up for games when the developer doesn't sign over all rights to the IP so they can dump you and hand it to Crystal Dynamics if they want to.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  4. #4 is the Lorne Lanning Commandment by Moryath · · Score: 2, Insightful

    When you reach the end of the game's development, fire EVERYBODY so you can keep the royalties for yourself.

    Then shut down your studio and claim you're going to make movies, rather than finish what had been an enjoyable series.

  5. bean counters by Nf1nk · · Score: 2, Insightful

    So basicaly his comandments are
    don't let the bean counters near the talent.
    don't let the sales vultures near the talent.
    don't worry about the numbers, the game is good because we have talent.

    Its arrogant, and I bet it would be fun to work there, but I can't see this as something that can be sustained in todays culture.
    The sales vultures and bean counters need to justifie their existance to other dep[artments.

    --
    I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
    1. Re:bean counters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Yes, but that's the whole point of his founding wideload to begin with. With a wholey independent development company that can sustain itself on moderatly successful games, it gives them the freedom to experiment and develop the sorts of games they'd like to develop. The beauty is, any game they deliver to a publisher will make the bean-counters and sales vultures happy, since the publisher won't have to put the kind of cash into development that they normally do.

      So while, say, a development studio owned by EA could never adopt this method and be sustained in today's culture as you say, a studio like wideload can still thrive.

      Also, if you rtfa you'll find that he's not as arrogant as your summerizing of his first few commandments would paint him.

  6. TFA by mugnyte · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ...is a nice mea culpa of past mistakes. However, I feel some of the situation he learns from is staged by the decisions made early in the process. If they'd hired a full time producer, a contractor "wrangler" and perhaps an admin or two, then their headcount would've been 16, the burn rate probably closer to 150/month, but the excess stress of the game (the "crunch time" finale) could've been reduced (it never goes away).
      The game itself looks cute and well made, although I'm beginning to join the "repackaging an FPS engine sucks" camp.

    1. Re:TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      ...is a nice mea culpa of past mistakes. However, I feel some of the situation he learns from is staged by the decisions made early in the process. If they'd hired a full time producer, a contractor "wrangler"

      As someone who's spent a lot of time (in a different industry) on contractor-heavy projects, it was a little amusing to read that he had the exact same list of complaints we always do--and a little surprising that he didn't see these things coming ahead of time. I assume they're universal problems. Contractors always slip on dates, so you always end up with serious internal "crunch time" when you use them . . . sometimes worse than normal, since at some points we've had not just less time to finish, but more work, to do things we expected contractors to supply, simply to keep things moving.

      Managing contractors well takes administrative overhead, just as any other type of management. Try to cut that overhead, and your gambling with your project's costs and timelines.

  7. Left one out.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We will not use an anti-piracy system that will alienate a large portion of our audiance (Starforce).

    That is what turned me away from the buying the game on the PC.

    I use an optical drive emulator for legal (protect my game CDs), quasi legal (pirate broken CDs that the company will not replace), and of course illegal reasons. However To play Stubs, or any other game that uses Starforce, you have to compleatly disable any emulators, as well as often having problems with your real drives.

    1. Re:Left one out.... by AcidLacedPenguiN · · Score: 3, Funny

      Agreed. Starforce is absolutely killing the PC game industry. I don't know about anyone else, but when I see broken starforce games on the torrents, I'll download them JUST TO SPITE those Russian mafia crooks who made it. That's even if I have no interest in the game!

      --
      disclaimer: I've been known to store numbers in my ass for which to dig out when quantities are required.
    2. Re:Left one out.... by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      That's nonsense, I'm running both Daemon Tools and SF-crippled games on my machine. Never had any copy protection complain about the DTs.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
    3. Re:Left one out.... by asretfroodle · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but you won't be able to use them to run the game, which is what he said he does. Starforce does prevent him from using the product the way he wants to.

  8. Interesting interpretation via Bungie by thatguywhoiam · · Score: 3, Insightful
    * First Commandment: We shall establish our game's creative direction.

    Check. Marathon: great art direction, a cogent storyline with development potential. Myth: also great art direction, compelling gameplay mechanic for RTS, fantastic atmospheric storyline.

    * Second commandment: We shall own our intellectual property.

    Check. All original development done by Bungie, with in-house artists and designers. They even bought the company that composed the music for Myth.

    * Third commandment: We shall not let a third party determine our success, such as the publisher who's doing (or not doing) the marketing, or the funding source (likely a publisher) making demands that are not in-line with our goals.

    Aaaaand here's his mea culpa. Microsoft buys Bungie, dramatically alters scope of Halo, makes it a one-platform-launch. Delays game for years. Alters art direction, ends up being a pale shadow of the Marathon design. Myth is sold to a 3rd party developer who produces a lacklustre sequel. Halo is a great success - the only success, really - for Xbox. Crawls onto other platforms much later, the last of which is the Mac - four years after it was demo'd on a blue and white G3 tower at Macworld.

    * Fourth Commandment: We shall have a small manageable team. We don't want 50 employees making one game over three years in house (we want low overhead), and we don't want to suffer the churn of ramping up and down for projects.

    Can't comment. Maybe Stubbs suffered from this.

    --
    If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
    1. Re:Interesting interpretation via Bungie by Funkcikle · · Score: 1
      Can't comment. Maybe Stubbs suffered from this.

      Stubbs suffered from being a bit dull and boring. But hurrah for fabulous cut scenes! Add more shiny!
    2. Re:Interesting interpretation via Bungie by Ford+Prefect · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Aaaaand here's his mea culpa. Microsoft buys Bungie, dramatically alters scope of Halo, makes it a one-platform-launch. Delays game for years. Alters art direction, ends up being a pale shadow of the Marathon design. Myth is sold to a 3rd party developer who produces a lacklustre sequel. Halo is a great success - the only success, really - for Xbox. Crawls onto other platforms much later, the last of which is the Mac - four years after it was demo'd on a blue and white G3 tower at Macworld.

      There's a fascinating video from Bungie out there somewhere, demonstrating various stages in the development of Halo. It becomes immediately obvious that it was a rather tortured project, with little cohesive game direction behind it, and wildly changing ideas as to what the final product should be. Starting as an RTS, moving to third-person, and so on. The stunning films produced for MacWorld and E3 on are revealed as smoke-and-mirrors - there was a work-in-progress engine there, some nice vehicle physics and some semi-working weapons, but no AI, no missions, and most importantly - no game.

      Probably the only thing that really made it through intact to the Xbox FPS was the art direction. (Compare the video from E3 2000 with parts of the final game. Pretty close.) The gamers' nebulous ideal of an earth-shattering Halo, which Microsoft allegedly killed, suppressed or altered, actually never really existed.

      Original goals for Halo: hazy. Obviously he's not making that mistake again.

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    3. Re:Interesting interpretation via Bungie by __aajqwr7439 · · Score: 1

      There's a fascinating video from Bungie out there somewhere...

      Is this the one? If no, it's still got some pretty interesting commentary.

      DN

    4. Re:Interesting interpretation via Bungie by Ford+Prefect · · Score: 2, Informative

      That's a bit of it, yes - the second half also makes for interesting viewing!

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      Tedious Bloggy Stuff - hooray?
  9. You can dream it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... but that doesn't make it so.

  10. Bungie not the best to comment by tygerstripes · · Score: 1

    If anyone has the right to specify these commandments, it's Introversion (Uplink, Darwinia).

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