Rafael Van Daele-Hunt, Game Designer
Posted in Company, Game Design, Industry, People on September 17th, 2008 by Rafael
This blog is going to be tricky. What I’d like to write is detailed discussions of the design decisions that arise in the course of developing this game. Not only does that seem most likely to interest you, the readers we someday hope to have; it would also help me organize my thoughts and steal ideas gather inspiration from your comments. However, our game is a BIG SEEKRIT, so I’ll have to come up with some way to disguise it for blog purposes. Perhaps a simple substitution code in which “artichoke” means “ship” and “umbrella” means “laser cannon”¹….
And who am I? Well, I was lead programmer for a bunch of games that you haven’t heard of. Not because they were terrible, but because they were solidly mediocre. Any why would anyone play such a game, when sitting right next to it on the shelf is a similar but superior game for the same price?
Before I entered the game industry, I used to wonder why there were so many unremarkable games. Why would anyone propose such a game? Why would anyone spend years of their lives developing it? Bad, I could understand: bad can happen through honest incompetence, or even a really creative, fresh idea that just doesn’t pan out. Bad can be noble. But average?
I concluded that people didn’t know in advance that their game was going to be merely ok. They must have been trying for “great” and run out of money, ideas, or talent. Then I joined the biz, and it turns out that it does sometimes happen that way. More frequent, though, are projects where almost everyone involved knows from the start that the result will be pap. So why are they made? Well, some publishers believe that also-rans bring reliable profits. Many Developers are just desperate for whatever project they can get, to avoid going bankrupt, and they live from the hope that someday, they’ll get the chance to work on something that they can be proud of.
Screw someday. I am sick of working on mediocre games, and that’s why I’m here today, working on this game with these people. I probably won’t get things right the first time — even talented, experienced designers can fail, and I’ve got nothing going for me but a big mouth so far — but I will not rest until this game is worth playing. Or until I discover that I just don’t have it in me, in which case I will sink into depressed obscurity (and hey! What better place to blog from?). Either way, it will be a ride.
Want to watch?
–Rafael
¹ There are no actual laser cannon in the game, although there may be umbrellas. (back)
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