Priceless Memories, Now Just 99¢

I was a child of the late 70s and early 80s, and personally I think it was a great time to grow up. I was 10 years old when Star Wars was released. Could that have been timed any better? Plus, even though I had to be subjected to disco, I wouldn't actually start developing a taste for music until the fad had long passed. I didn't think I watched that much TV back then, but looking back at the top shows of 1978 (Laverne and Shirley, Three's Company, Mork and Mindy, Happy Days, and What's Happening!), I guess I did considering I knew them all, and many more, pretty well. (Speaking of which, you mean to tell me "Soap" never got higher than #13?)

As I've mentioned here and elsewhere a few times, that was around the same time I started to learn programming, on my dad's hulking NorthStar Horizon computer. I loved that beast. It came with some version of BASIC -- I have no idea which version now, but I remember I picked it up pretty quickly. But I had no idea what kind of door had been opened until my dad bought me an amazing treasure of a book:



David H. Ahl's 1978 book, a collection of 101 games written in BASIC, was the perfect kind of resource for an 11 year old -- a book teaching programming and patience in the context of lots and lots of games. Some of them, of course, stretched the definition of game -- I'm not sure how much fun you can have with a program that prints out a calendar, or endlessly repeats words in a sine wave, but what the hell, I mean, people were into biorhythms back then after all, so who knows.

I remember some of them vividly. Acey Ducey, Football, Hammurabi, even Hockey. And, of course, Super Star Trek, the game that would eventually lead to "Missions of the Reliant" some 16 years later (although truth is the first versions of Star Trek started appearing in the late sixties). Looking back now, many were just horribly bad games, as far as games go. But they were still a new experience, and I learned BASIC just by going through many of them and typing them in, line by line, hoping I wouldn't make any typos along the way. Meanwhile, I became familiar with the names of things and places I hadn't heard of before and knew nothing about, like Ahl's magazine "Creative Computing", some town called Morristown, New Jersey, and a strange place called "Decatur". Mostly, I remember that the games were programmed in a way that made them play like dialogues between myself and the author or computer, since so much of the experience was communicated through text.

The AtariArchives.org website is a fantastic archive of books from that time period, along with its sister site, AtariMagazines.com, a computer magazine archive with articles from Creative Computing, Hi-Res, Compute!, and more. I was stunned when I first found the site and discovered the entire BASIC Computer Games book had been scanned in PDF format, from the front cover through to the back. I've kept the link in my bookmarks for years now, returning once in a while to make sure it was still around. It would be nice if the whole thing was available as a single PDF download, but that probably violates some agreement. I toyed with the idea of just downloading all of the PDFs for it in case the site ever disappeared, but at around 185 files, I wasn't about to put in the time.

It was during a recent visit that I finally noticed a link tucked at the bottom of the index page:

"You may be able to buy a pre-owned, printed copy of the book from amazon.com."

I clicked it, and I was amazed to find how many used copies were available -- a number of them, in very good condition, were available for 99 cents. $3.99 for the shipping, of course, but could you really argue with owning, once again, a copy of a book with such personal historical significance for less than the cost of a cup of coffee?

(Looking back now at the link, I see there is even one available now for only 33 cents. 33 cents! And another for just 61 cents that is, as keenly noted by the seller, "Ready to read.")

Well, I could hardly pass that up, sucker that I am for such things.

So the book arrived the other day, and it was a strangely disorienting experience flipping through those pages again. It's in fairly good shape, a copy that used to be owned by a school library at Holdrege Middle School, which I'm guessing is this one in Holdrege, Nebraska. The card holder, still on the inside front page, indicates it was actually last checked out in 2006, if you can believe that. Prior to that, it hadn't been checked out since 1996, but I'm even surprised it was checked out that late. I wonder if the kids who checked it out then learned much of anything, that being the year of Quake, Diablo, and Marathon Infinity. I'm guessing Poetry probably wasn't a big hit then.

I don't know what I'll do with this book, probably stick it on a shelf in my office next to the other keepers from days gone by. Still, it's comforting to know it's there, a hard copy of a memory that won't disappear if a web host decides to pull the plug one day. Sometimes, a link to an online PDF just isn't enough. And for 99 cents, who could argue?

IF@AGDC

So apparently the powers that be at the Austin GDC were curious enough about modern interactive fiction to give it the floor (part of it anyway), for a few minutes at least. I received notice the other day that my proposal for a talk on "game design innovations in IF" was accepted for presentation during the Game Writers Summit. I'm pretty happy about that, especially considering that last year I found the Game Writers Summit to be the most interesting part of AGDC. I'm curious to see how many people are intrigued enough by the topic to attend. I'm hoping it's more than four.

Of course, the e-mail notice was soon followed by one of those "Oh shit" moments. I suppose this means I actually have to do it now.

That happens on occasion in the day job. We submit grants all the time for various ambitious research projects, and we're pretty used to rejection. But, occasionally, we do just enough to bullshit our way past the review committees and the work gets funded. Yayz. Except usually it's quickly followed by a collective, audible *gulp*.

So, we'll see how this goes. Many thanks to the people who supported this and helped with the editing. I'll be preparing the talk throughout the summer, so if anyone is interested to see how it evolves, just let me know and I'll keep you updated on it. Below is the synopsis of the talk that will appear in the program guide, which is pretty similar to what I had posted earlier. If you're interested in seeing the whole abstract, just drop me a line and I'll e-mail it to you.

"What's old is new again: game design innovations in interactive fiction"

Synopsis: The modern commercial game industry is frequently criticized for a reluctance toward innovation. Although independent game developers, to a certain extent, have accepted the challenge of advancing innovation in game design, another small but devoted group of individuals has been doing this for years, behind the scenes, in a genre largely overlooked in gaming circles: interactive fiction, formerly known as text adventures. A closer look at the many ways in which this medium has evolved over the years will reveal a number of techniques and strategies that game developers, mainstream and independent alike, might consider exploring and translating to their own genres and projects.

The One Thing He Forgot To Mention

It's blog post number 100, so time to catch my breath. Crazy string of weeks there from April through mid-May, trying to make deadlines, having those deadlines pushed back, trying to make the deadlines again, and so forth. Some successes, some failures, but you can't argue with the fact that deadlines are great for getting shit done, even if you don't get it all done.

It's a little weird because my day job is filled with deadlines. Basically, it's like a slow march from one deadline to the next, and every so often I get caught up in it and spend massive amounts of time working like crazy to finish under the wire. But that's work. This was a deadline for a hobby. None of the panic, despair, and regret to deal with. It was a very different experience.

One of those deadlines was for the last Utah Indie Night, back at the end of April. I missed the last couple, so it was nice to be back, and to have another rare opportunity to present Vespers in public -- even if we didn't get everything for the full demo done. TRC had some nice things to say, which I appreciated, even if the game isn't very playable yet. Now that Aaron Reed has finished Blue Lacuna, it's now down to me and Jay to see who finishes last. Sorry, Jay, that flying car is all mine, so better start saving up now.

On a related note, at the start of the Utah Indie Night there was a short presentation by Darius Ouderkirk on how to choose an indie game project, with the key being a project that you can finish and release. As Jay blogged, it was simple but hit a lot of very good points -- even if, as pointed out to me later, he hasn't shipped a game himself yet (d'oh!). It was filled with good advice; a collection of fairly common sense approaches that have been mentioned in one context or another in various places around the 'tubes, but assembled and presented in a nice way.

But as I think about it now, there was one thing he forgot to mention.

With most projects, especially those you put a lot of yourself into over an extended period of time, there are peaks and valleys. And sometimes, those valleys can really suck. Sometimes, as Jay mentioned in another of his blogs, it has a lot to do with motivation. All games have fun parts and tedious parts, and those tedious parts can start to feel like chores after a while. Designing and implementing dialog boxes. Placing endless numbers of decorative objects, like walls or leaves. Modifying terrain. It can get pretty dull, but there are ways to fight through it, mixing the dull parts in with the fun parts. The target is always in front of you, so you just plug away until you get there.

But then there's the other type of valley: the periods of self-doubt that grow insidiously the longer you work on a project. Often you end up spending so much time working with all of the pieces at the microscopic level that you go long periods without taking a step back to see things at the macroscopic level. But then sometimes, when you do, the view doesn't seem so pretty anymore.

The usual questions start popping up, questions like "What am I doing?", or "Why am I doing this?" You have a clear view of all of the flaws, and none of the virtues. Nothing looks as good as you thought. The game doesn't seem very fun. The interface sucks. And of course, nobody is going to want to play it.

And that can be a really deep valley, because now you're not just dealing with the motivation to push through the boring crap, you're dealing with the motivation for the whole project. It's the kind of valley that can kill a project.

Of course, as with many things, it's never as good or as bad as you think, and sometimes it just takes a little perseverance to get through those periods. Maybe getting back to the microscopic level until the bad mojo passes. Or maybe taking a little time off from things and recharging the batteries. Or, perhaps, using the opportunity to get other people involved -- letting fresh eyes take a look at things to see what works and what doesn't, recalibrating your inner barometer.

I don't know what proportion of game projects go through valleys like these, but I imagine it's fairly high. I think it's probably more of an issue for individual developers and smaller indie groups, since there are fewer eyes looking at things from wider angles. Regardless, I think it's an important issue to mention to aspiring developers. Hell, it applies to anyone working on any kind of creative project. Be ready to hit at least one, and decide whether you're gonna suck it up and fight through it, or let the project wither away.

So I'm in one of those valleys right now. The closer it seems that we get to a working demo, the less I think this is actually going to work. It's hard to imagine people thinking the game is fun. The performance will stink, the animations and voice acting will disappoint, and the interface will be nothing but a confusing mess. What's to love?

I've taken about a week off from the game, but I'll be getting back to it soon. And I think maybe the best thing to do right now is to start getting some new eyes to look at the game. Do some testing, see if it really does stink. Maybe see what parts can be improved, and what parts just don't work at all. It's getting to be that time. And so I may need some help with that.

Deadlines Are Just Rough Guesses, Anyway

So a couple of deadlines have been extended, much to my relief. Perhaps.

The deadline for IndieCade, the annual independent games festival/competition, was extended from April 30th to May 15th. This is good because I really had no chance of having something close to submission-worthy by the end of April. It's still up in the air if I can have the demo ready by the 15th, but at least I'll have another shot.

Additionally, the submission deadline for the Austin GDC conference (for presentations) was just extended from today to Wednesday, May 13th. I've spoken with a couple of people about a presentation already, and I've prepared a draft of my abstract, so the extension will allow me/us to edit and refine it a bit more. Although I've submitted many abstracts for scientific research conferences in the past, I've never prepared an abstract quite like this before, so it feels like I'm heading into uncharted territory.

The working title right now is, "Lessons from a forgotten genre: game design innovations in interactive fiction." It was fairly tough to nail down, given the 80-character limit, but I think it gets the essential idea across. I have some reservations about using the word "forgotten", but I haven't come up with a better alternative yet, and it has a certain degree of hyperbole that might draw some attention.

I'll offer a preview of the abstract here; feel free to comment or criticize as desired.

The modern commercial game industry is frequently criticized for a reluctance toward innovation, owing largely to the risk-averse approach taken by many mainstream developers. Although the independent game development community, to a certain extent, has accepted the challenge of advancing innovation in game design, gameplay, and storytelling, another small but devoted group of individuals has done precisely this for decades, behind the scenes, in a genre largely overlooked in game development circles: interactive fiction (IF), also known as text adventures. A closer look at the many ways in which this medium has evolved over the years will reveal a remarkable number of techniques and strategies that game developers, mainstream and independent alike, might consider exploring and translating to their own genres and projects.

If there is any actual interest in reviewing the abstract and perhaps offering some suggestions, let me know. Rather than post it all here, drop me an e-mail (slcrubes at gmail dot com) and I'll see if I can make a full draft available.

Austin GDC Submission Deadline Soon

As I cram for tomorrow's combined Indiecade/Utah Indie Gamers Night deadlines, another looms close on the horizon. The deadline for submissions to the Austin Game Developers Conference, or AGDC, is coming up in a little over a week. This is not a deadline for game submissions, but rather submissions for lectures, classes, or panel discussions.

I went to last year's conference and had a great time. It's much smaller than the main GDC in San Francisco, but there's a lot of great activity and opportunities to meet and talk with people. While GDC is probably overwhelming, AGDC is considerably more welcoming and relaxed (and less expensive). I'm planning on going again this year, and depending on when the IGF Showcase deadline is, perhaps submitting a demo of Vespers.

But one thing I thought about doing for last year's conference, and am now planning on submitting for this year's go-around, is a talk or discussion on interactive fiction, and what the commercial game industry might learn from it. Although my thoughts on the subject are not very concrete or coherent yet, I still believe strongly that the relatively older genre of IF, having been through decades of production, experimentation, and iteration, has a surprising amount to offer to commercial game designers and developers.

I know last September there were a couple of people that were interested in this idea to some extent, and perhaps it would be more interesting as a panel discussion than as a lecture. So as I think about this idea some more and start to formulate an abstract for submission, I'd like to know if others out there, who are planning on (or considering) going to AGDC this year, would be interested in participating in a discussion like this. It might be fun.

In any case, back to the grind. Lots of good stuff implemented, but still so much more left to do...

Indie Gaming on NPR

NPR's On The Media is running a story this weekend on the independent computer gaming scene called, "DIY Gaming". It's free to listen to or download on NPR's site, if you're interested.

Pretty standard stuff, although it concentrates mostly on the console scene, with a particular discussion of Microsoft and XNA. There was a nice portion at the end on Chen's "Flow" and "Flower", but in general it was not a very deep discussion, and it really didn't go into the PC indie scene at all -- except for a mention of how designing games just for computers, rather than consoles, is too limiting and not "the big leagues", based on the size of the user base. There was some mention of the creativity and experimentation in the indie world, and how this should eventually revitalize the mainstream industry, but all in all a relatively shallow discussion.

Still, it's nice to see the indie scene getting some more mainstream attention.

The Early April Vespers Thing

Turns out February kind of kicked me right in the family jewels, which is why there was no end of February update -- or much of anything, for that matter. We ended up getting very little done in general, to be honest, but it was for a whole variety of justifiable reasons and so as a group we just tried to put that month behind us. I also officially aged yet again during that time, but I've already passed the point where I should really be going public with that.

Then there was March, which ended up looking a lot like February, at least on the outside. But March actually did not suck, and we did make considerable progress on a number of fronts. But between all of the progress on the game and the travelling and extra work for the day job, blogging became the odd man out. Thus, the end of March update has been pushed into April. But there is much to discuss.

I ended up spending a large chunk of February wrestling with Torque's GUI system. We wanted to create a new set of GUI borders to use throughout the game, for small in-game windows like the text output window and the inventory window. Torque has a nice built-in system for re-sizing windows and their borders, so in some cases you can create a small image file for your border that contains only the critical parts -- the corners and a small portion of the top/bottom and left/right sides. Then the engine uses this to create the full window border at whatever size you specify, stretching the sides as much as needed. Problem is, this only works with border images that can be stretched. Since N.R.'s spiffy new border is most definitely not stretchable, we needed to revert to just a basic bitmap image of the whole border. For the text output window, though, we allow the window to be resized to three different sizes, so now we need three new bitmaps. Not a big deal, but it does mean more images, more memory, and more drive space. Oh, and for some ridiculous reason doing so completely screwed up the inventory window.

The inventory window, when visible, is supposed to sit on top of the text output window. So when the text output window is changed from one size to another, the inventory window position needs to be adjusted. This would seem like a straightforward problem, but I think I spent about two weeks trying to get it to work right. Rather than bore you with the details, suffice it to say that the more I think I know about Torque's GUI system, the less I actually seem to.



We also spent some time fixing up other GUI windows and adding some more environmental decorations, such as snow drifts in the cloister and on the front entrance. Things are looking nicer, but all in all not a very productive month.

March was far kinder than February. On the NPC front, Lem finished his work on Lucca, while Shawn finished up Constantin and Matteo, which means I've been spending a lot of my time exporting animations, putting in the code for each, and getting the timing of the audio just right. It's a lot more work than it seems at first, especially since things never seem to turn out right the first time. But it's also very gratifying to see animations and audio playing together in response to a command. It's one of the things that makes this feel like a real game.

N.R., meanwhile, has churned out the last of the main monastery structures, the stables and the infirmary. Neither of these are approachable until Day Two of the game (Act III), which is beyond the demo, so for now the structures will stay relatively empty. But he did a really nice job keeping the same structural themes throughout. And I think the stables will fit very nicely with 3d-diggers's Horse Pack, which we will be incorporating.

The infirmary.

We did have to make one relatively minor change to the game from Jason's original text version. In the original, the player can climb a ladder in the stables up through an opening in the roof. The roof, then, is dealt with as a single "room" or location in the game. This is generally not a problem in 3D, but it becomes complicated when you need to account for where the player is in space. Up on the roof, the player could move around to any of the four sides of the building, which would really complicate one of the puzzles in the game. It's another example of something which is much easier to implement in text than in 3D.

So instead of allowing the player onto the roof, we decided instead to make a hayloft inside the stables, and to use this location instead of the roof as the destination for the ladder. We'll then be able to use bales of hay to create a relatively small space for the player to move around, instead of the larger open space up on the roof, and it shouldn't have any measurable effect on the puzzle involving this location.

The stables, with the hayloft.

Finally, after much debate, we decided to implement the cat from the original text game. The cat has mostly symbolic meaning in the original, but due to some more 3D-related complications, we were thinking previously that we might just leave it out. Jason later convinced me it would be worth the effort, if only to lend a nice atmospheric touch to the game. So N.R. designed and built the model, and Lem got to work rigging and animating it. In the end, I'm really glad we did it -- even if it ends up being only a tiny, insignificant part of the game.



What's up Next?

April has arrived much sooner than expected, and with it comes two big deadlines, which just happen to be on the same day: April 30th is the next Utah Indie Game Dev Night, and it's also the submission date for this year's IndiCade. Although the game is obviously nowhere near done yet, we are closing in on being finished with Act I, which is to be our "demo" of the game. And since IndieCade permits and encourages the submission of works in progress, our plan has been to submit the complete Act I as an example of a "finished, playable level" from the game.

We had also planned on being done with Act I for the next Utah Indie Game Dev Night, so the fact that these both fall on the same day is helpful. But there is still a huge amount of work to be done to reach that point, and with the day job remaining extremely busy, I'm not sure yet if we'll really be able to do it. But the gauntlet has been thrown down, and we have taken it up. We'll see if we're up to the challenge.

XYZZY Awards Rescheduled

Due to a last-minute scheduling conflict, the XYZZY awards ceremony is being rescheduled for Saturday, March 28th at 3PM EDT. Same location, on ifMUD (http://ifmud.port4000.com), which itself is a fun experience. Come check it out if you're interested to hear about some of the best IF of the past year.

XYZZY Awards Tomorrow

Just a quick reminder that this year's XYZZY Awards for interactive fiction will be announced tomorrow, Saturday, March 14th, at 3:00 PM Eastern time. As usual, the format will be a gathering on ifMUD (http://ifmud.port4000.com), so head on over and get yourself an account if you don't have one already.

Come drop by and enjoy the ceremonies!

More info about the XYZZY's can be found here.

UPDATE: The awards ceremony will be rescheduled...at a date to be determined. Check the XYZZY site for further information.

Gaming on the iPhone: Natural Selection In Real-Time

It all started with a link. It always does.

I can't even remember now where I first saw the link, but I was easily drawn in by the shiny little object: "Mystery House", the 1980 aventure game by Ken and Roberta Williams of On-Line Systems (later Sierra On-Line, later later Sierra), had been ported to the iPhone by Artsiness (Josef W. Wankerl), in all of its original white-on-black lineart glory. This is the game that GamePro tagged the 51st Most Important Video Game of All Time -- nine spots after E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, although I guess that's fair since it wasn't the list of Best Video Games of All Time.

My first thought was, How cool. What a sweet idea, even if today's iPhone casual gamers barely give it notice, or even scoff at the concept.

Then, I saw that the game was being sold in the App Store for $5.99. Of note, the original Mystery House game had been released into the public domain back in 1987.

The responses, in the comments section and in their forums, were not unexpected -- ranging from "We need more nostalgic games like this. Just not $5.99" to "$5.99?! You’ve got to be frickin’ kidding me." Purchasing it was essentially lowered to TOFTT status, mostly because of the price tag.

Well, that and (as one person pointed out) you can play the game right now just as it appeared on the old Apple //e by clicking a single link for free and kicking back, which is a pretty good point. It's just not on the iPhone, which doesn't seem worth the $5.99 entry ticket.

Ignoring for a minute the fact that Mystery House can be played for free online, I find the larger pricing issue interesting, given the relatively young age of the iPhone/iPod Touch gaming scene. $5.99 was probably okay a few months ago when the App Store was still fairly new, but over time this price point has become almost unheard of.

Along similar lines, there is that story circulating just about everywhere about the match-3 iPhone game Dapple, whose author (Owen Goss) recently blogged about the sales performance of the game. Briefly, it took him about 6 months to make, with a budget of about $32,000, and revenue from the first month after release totaled about $535 -- despite good reviews and some decent exposure. There are a lot of factors that have contributed to this, of course, but it is interesting to note that the game went on sale originally for $4.99 in the App Store, and I imagine that had at least some role in its sales performance.

The reaction to this has generally been, "No kidding, really?" It is, after all, yet another match-3 game in a market already oversaturated with similar games. Yes, it had good reviews, yes, it has some original gameplay elements, and yes, it was featured on Kotaku. But there's not a whole lot to make it stand out, and at this point it just seems like another drop in the iPhone App Store ocean. So at $4.99, it isn't terribly surprising that more people haven't been tempted to TOFTT.

But that's where things have begun to settle, just a short time after the App Store started featuring games for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Five bucks is to the iPhone what sixty bucks is to the PC: the high end of the price scale. And the expectation is that, if you're gonna tempt someone to fork over a Lincoln for your hard work, it had better be something special.

I'm not sure why, I just find that fascinating.

This is especially true in light of Jeff Tunnell's comments last week about the challenge of the iPhone market (and, as I just now notice, Jeff has pertinent new comments about Goss's experience posted today). The iPhone is a relatively easy platform for developing games, where you can generally create a game with a small budget and short development time, and be looking at potentially large returns. But the market has become so crowded with casual games that it has become incredibly hard to get your game noticed.

And because it's an open marketplace, prices have gone down and down. The price point of $5.99 or $4.99 is now basically too high, which seems silly given how low that is, comparatively speaking. There are enough games out there now for $1.99 or $0.99 -- and many free games as well -- to choke out the more "expensive" ones.

This is in contrast with the mainstream PC gaming industry, where budgets and prices have generally gone up. But unlike the PC game market, where indies can make games for less and, as a result, charge less and generate sales that way, there's no longer much room for indies to undercut the competition on the iPhone platform.

So how in the world do you actually make back your costs on an iPhone game when you're charging just 99 cents for it? More sales helps, naturally, but you can't just hope to have sales in the tens of thousands. Hope and luck need to be taken out of the equation.

I don't have the answers, but I imagine it takes strategy, planning, and effort. As Tunnell says, don't put all your games in one market if you can help it. Cultivate a community, if you can, like the way Wolfire Games is doing (and elevating to an artform, if I may say). There are many approaches to take, some of which may work and some of which may not. The challenge to the indies is to figure it all out, if they can. It's just another form of natural selection at work.