Making a Video Game from Start to Finish: A 100,000,000 Mile Up Perspective

Ok, because I really have respect for the fact that this DigiPen student took the time to write an article which he thought would be useful to others. At the same time, I think rather than calling it a guide for beginners, it needs to be considered a view from outer-space of the game development process.

The trouble with beginners is that they're not really even ready for that view. If anything it abstracts away what is hard about all of it. That what makes you "grow to hate it" or "love it" by the end. All that hard stuff in between.

So, if you want to make a game you need to start by writing a design document? Probably not. What you need to do first is figure out where your skills lie. Are you a good artist? Can you program? Can you make up a fun board game with paper, pen, and scissors? If you cannot do any of these, or not willing to take the time to learn them, then you ought not even start making a document.

The Design Document ends up being a starting description of your game. Designers tend to be the drivers of this document. Those people need to understand how to create games, create relationships between user and the underlying game system. They need to describe those feedback loops, their behaviors, and all of that makes up how the game works. Do not confuse how it works with how it is coded.

The other thing is that typically at a pitch you'll need some sort of prototype of your game. This means that you're already too late to the game if you wait to think about your technical design document and engine until after the fact. Most pitches I've heard include prototype and information on feasibility.

The trouble is, in this beginners guide, a beginner is never actually given an instruction how to figure out which area they might be interested in. Art, design, engineering? Ok, maybe you want to do it all. What must you start to learn to make this possible.

This article actually encourages what I see as "I want to make a game, tell me what to do," email message that I so frequently see on game related email list serves.

Ummm... are you an engineer? Go learn programming languages, and techniques related to game development. Don't expect to find example code for everything you want. Learn how to read documentation and integrate that code. Check out open source engines and libraries.

Are you an artist? Make some concept art for a game, turn that into pixel are and low polygon models. Do some texturing of your models. Learn how to export them what that means for what you've created. Talk to an engineer about how to get those into an engine.

Designer? Make games. Try to tell people about them, explain how they work. Write descriptions of them. Make some levels for an existing game. Learn how to script. Talk to an engineer about what is hard to do. Talk to an artist and get them to make some things that would fit into your games.

Manageability is the key for beginners, not interstellar travel visions.

Game Career Guide - Making a Video Game from Start to Finish: An Overview for Beginners

Game development starts with an idea or inspiration. It's kind of like magic. You think, "Hey, what if there were a game like this, and like that, and with elements of this?"

But building a game is like any other formidable task, like building a cathedral or writing a novel or painting a picture. Building a video game takes passion. It takes dedication. Some might even say it takes obsession. It takes a great deal of your time, energy, and thought. It's never finished. Even when it's technically finished, you find things, new things, little things, that you could correct or change or fix.

It's a very demanding and highly stressful endeavor. If you don't love it completely, with all its misgivings, you'll quickly grow to hate it.
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The Game Design Document
One of the first things you need is a game design document.
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The Pitch
When you pitch your game to a publisher, you give the publisher a short presentation that describes your idea, target demographic (the people who will be most interested in the game), and why your idea is the one they should fund, instead of any hundreds of others. It's often helpful to have a demo, a rough and incomplete version of your game, so that you can effectively communicate what your game will be like. In other words, by the time you are ready to pitch an idea to a publisher, you should already have some kind of working game. It doesn't have to be a great big years-long finished product, but it does have to be playable. Publishers aren't interested in ideas alone. They want to see a prototype.
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The Technical Design Document
One of the first and most basic requirements of any game that has just started production is a technical design document.
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The Engine
Now that the game has been described inside and out, you can start assembling the pieces that were laid out in the technical design document to form the most critical part of your game, the engine.
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Content and Art
In addition to the engine, a video game must have content and art. Ideally, the content of a game -- that is, the levels, characters, music, and art, which includes textures, 3D models, and animations -- will be separate from the game engine, allowing the developers to easily make modifications to them as the needs of the project change.
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Focus Testing
At some point in production, the game theoretically begins to resemble the vision that the designers had for it. It's at this point that it becomes critically important to start focus testing.
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Launchpad
Now that the game is ready to ship, you're ready to begin your career as an internationally acclaimed rockstar game developer.

The Escapist: Schizophrenic on Game Development

I'm constantly wondering why The Escapist pretends to be more targeted at gamers and "not into the development side of things." Then they go and do something like this. My overall opinion at this point is that their recent web-redesign (which I was sad to see go, but understand why it did so) has also thrown them into a tumult to reach new audiences.

Regardless the recent piece is mostly about game development with an excellent piece about XNA, and Erin Hoffman weighs in on Scrum/Agile and another piece on using middleware... which I guess fits into an Agile model, but the title doesn't really help because you think you're going to read about Agile, but instead you're just reading about something else.

The Escapist - The DNA of XNA

In the world of science, DNA is a recent discovery. In the world of game development, XNA is even newer. Simply put, XNA is an easy-to-use software suite. It lets you make games for both the PC and Xbox 360. First announced as an initiative at the Game Developers Conference in 2004, the project was led by J Allard. By the end of 2005, the proof of concept was up and running. At the 2006 GDC, Microsoft released the completed XNA framework.

XNA makes game development more accessible. "It's really about providing the same tools, the same libraries, the same capabilities of both platforms," says Dave Mitchell, Director of XNA's marketing department. "So you can write your game once and have it run on both platforms. The real sweet spot is casual games."

It all started when Microsoft decided to build their technologies specifically with developers in mind. Mitchell says XNA came about when Microsoft realized the small-time developers, people new to development, were encountering "the 'country-club mentality.' You sort of have to know someone to break in [to console development]."

It's a big catch-22: Developers need at least one game under their belt to attract a publisher, but developing that first game without a publisher's substantial investment is usually impossible. "We just saw all of these complexities and challenges," Mitchell says, "among indies, hobbyists, students, university settings, in particular, of building a pipeline of creativity to come into the industry." After identifying that problem, Mitchell recalls looking across the rest of Microsoft for answers. "One of the things we take great pride in is really engaging with the hobbyist and enthusiast level with a lot of our technology and arming and equipping them." Visual Studio Express serves as one example.

"We really then set off to see what we could do to open up the Xbox 360 as a console," he says. "We were asked internally, can you make games on Windows? Sure, check. Can you do that on a console device? No, you really can't without getting thousands and thousands of dollars in equipment. And, of course, getting an agreement in order to get to that point."

So, in the beginning, the XNA team wanted to democratize game development. XNA represents the first time in the 31-year history of console gaming that retail units are also development boxes.
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As for Microsoft's competitors, Mitchell can't speak for the other console manufactures' ability to support a technology like XNA, which might allow user-created games to run on a PS3 or a Wii. "For the overall health of the industry, I certainly hope that they look to enable some of that." Considering what XNA has the potential to do, we can only hope other shops lift their licensed curtains, as well.

The Escapist - Scrumming It

It's true: making games is hard.

When it comes to finding an effective management paradigm, the game industry is still young. That youth is a double-edged sword: Game companies appear (and disappear) so rapidly that new methodologies can be fully implemented and tested in a short time-frame, leading to faster innovation and open-minded approach, while simultaneously insisting rebelliously that no previously described method from predecessor industries in either entertainment or software science could fully apply to game development. They just don't understand us, man!

To some extent this is true. Game development, especially at the AAA level, mixes some of the most difficult elements of software design and development with the uncertainty and volatile creativity that drives every other entertainment business. It doesn't help that games did not gradually or gracefully develop, they exploded.

In the earliest days of game development, the average team was 2.5 people, and most of the early games for the Atari 2600 were one-man bands. Some of the earliest mid-'80s hits by familiar names such as Namco boasted development teams of four or five.

By 1988, teams expanded; Sierra's King's Quest IV had 17 names on its credits, many appearing more than once. A transition in a single decade from teams of five to teams of 20 doesn't seem like much, with single developers still covering multiple bases, but it was the first critical step in differentiating between old-style development - work designers like Howard Scott Warshaw called "authorship" - and modern development, where people management and communication became essential not just to the success of a game, but to its basic completion.
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Neither Scrum nor any new production methodology provides a complete recipe for a successful game; there is no such thing. Making games is hard. What these new methodologies do, and perhaps more importantly, what they indicate, is responsiveness to the development process, and working smart as well as working hard. Ultimately, what remains fascinating about Scrum is its simplicity and common-sense approach as a toolbox for managers, the same way compilers and libraries are tools for programmers. Scrum, in addition to being its own method, in recent years has become the gold standard for attentive process. That there is great interest in this new batch of tools, and great interest in advancing process in the way we advance technology, may be a sign we're growing up.

The Escapist - The Small And Agile Approach

For decades, every game was a unique snowflake. Teams started from scratch every time, reinventing the wheel with every game, as each one required a new engine, new art, new everything, and that all had to happen before the designers got to the part where they made a fun game. Times are changing, though, and the craft has advanced enough that third-party developers can specialize in art, physics or engine design, and enterprising game companies can focus entirely on the hard part: actually making a good game.
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The rise of middleware means Remedy can stay small and agile, while making a game that might be better than one they could make in-house. "I think Havok is a perfect example," he says. "Today, it would be crazy ... to write your own physics module." While it was common several years ago to write your own physics, today it's unlikely you'll compete with the top packages, and you'll have to fund a much larger team to build out your own physics engine. He also called NaturalMotion's Euphoria system "very interesting," adding, "We are not using it at the moment, but that's something I can clearly see is the way of the future," partly because it's a good engine, and partly because something like Euphoria can replace a lot of animators. This seems to be a natural progression for the industry, he says, and while he wasn't authorized to tell me exactly what middleware Remedy was licensing, he was adept at discussing the various packages and how they fit into their overall development strategy.

Strike Out? Nintendo and WiiWare

Oh man. I wake up this morning, and for a moment I think to myself that I'm going to have to revise this paper I've just submitted, because Nintendo has managed to step up to the plate...

I was excited about the opportunity to proven wrong, that they might be able to lower their barriers to entry. Then Level Up had to go and dash my hopes against the rocks with the actual interview with Fils-Aime. "'First, the development tools and SDKs [software development kits] that enable developers to participate are already available,' he replied, referring to the standard tools that Nintendo sells to its licensees." Strike One.

DAMN IT. So the amusing thing is that to get in a position to buy these SDK's and development kits (later mentioned as "darn near free" - Strike Two) you are actually unlikely to get without a publishing company backing you. While it might be interesting and possible to hear that Nintendo will remove some of these restrictions, it doesn't sound like it. Basically it's an opportunity for established developers to bring games to Nintendo's electronic distribution stream. What the hell about that is "indy"? What they should have said is, "Established developers can create small teams with small budgets and big ideas to bring original games to the marketplace." That's not what they said though. They actually sounded magnanimous, much like Microsoft did with the release of XNA Express. Only Microsoft actually released it to the general public. Nintendo has not. Strike Three.

I honestly don't see how this is any different from what Sony has done already. This isn't big news, this is catch up. If Nintendo had opened up a little, that would be something. That would be big news. Now I get to hear about "user generated content" on the Wii for the next month. I just have to decide now if I argue or not.

*SIGH* That's what I get for having hopes this early in the morning.

Nintendo Press Room - NINTENDO'S WIIWARE PAVES THE WAY FOR FRESH GAMES, COOL CONSUMER EXPERIENCES

"Independent developers armed with small budgets and big ideas will be able to get their original games into the marketplace to see if we can find the next smash hit," says Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime. "WiiWare brings new levels of creativity and value to the ever-growing population of Wii owners."

The possibilities for WiiWare are limited only by the imaginations of developers. WiiWare provides game creators a simple method by which they can get their games to the public. This approach, combined with the remarkable motion controls of the Wii Remote and Nunchuk, will give birth to fresh takes on established genres, as well as original ideas that currently exist only in developers' minds. The reduced barriers to development provide developers the freedom to create and an inexpensive, clearly defined path to reach consumers who will ultimately determine which game will become the Next Big Thing.

Level Up: EXCLUSIVE: What is WiiWare? Level Up Gets the Scoop On Nintendo's Brand New Bag

A month or so before the March Game Developers Conference, Nintendo's PR agency approached us about a hush-hush new content initiative that the company had been cooking up, and wanted to know whether or not we'd be interested in being the first to get the lowdown. We were. But GDC came and went without any more information. From then on, we'd check in with Nintendo from time to time, but no new information was forthcoming, not even about when new information might be forthcoming. So we began to despair. But on Monday, the folks at Golin Harris PR reached out to us again to inform us that the time was now, that the offer was still on the table, and that Nintendo of America president Reginald Fils-Aime would be available to speak with us Tuesday afternoon. We spoke with him, and here's what we learned.

What's more interesting is that Nintendo isn't only seeking WiiWare from established publishers and developers like Ubisoft and Sega. At a Nintendo developer's conference earlier this week, the company informed attendees that it was seeking from indie developers as well. Shorter, original, more creative games from small teams with big ideas; these are the buzzwords that you'll be hearing from Nintendo when its Wednesday announcement goes wide. Fils-Aime told us that while Nintendo, as the retailer, would itself determine the appropriate pricing for each game on a per-title bases, the games themselves would not be vetted by Nintendo. Instead, Nintendo would only check the games for bugs and compatibility, with developers and publishers responsible for securing an E for Everyone, E10+ for Everyone 10 or older, T for Teen or M for Mature rating from the Entertainment Software Rating Board--Adults Only titles like Manhunt 2 aren't welcome. Look for the first WiiWare titles from Nintendo and third-parties to become available next year.

Level Up: EXCLUSIVE: Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime Tells Level Up About His Big Plans For a Little WiiWare

"A couple of GDCs [Game Developers Conferences] ago, Mr. Iwata hinted at downloadable content; that we wanted to help young, promising developers overcome the limitations of small budgets and team sizes to bring their games to the Wii."

Would this mean a price cut for development kits, we inquired? Or would there be a new set of tools and libraries--easier to use, but less fully-featured--aimed at the indie and hobbyist game developer? No. "First, the development tools and SDKs [software development kits] that enable developers to participate are already available," he replied, referring to the standard tools that Nintendo sells to its licensees. "We enable the marketplace where consumers can buy these games using Wii Points. Developers and publishers bring their ideas for games and marketing to entertain and entice consumers." As for a price cut, Fils-Aime insisted that Wii dev kits are already plenty cheap. "All our SDKs and dev tools are already--I don't want to call them inexpensive--they're darn near free to developers. This is unlike our competitors, where you have to spend a lot of money building high-res assets to be competitive. So in that sense, there's almost no cost to developers; the tools are already available at rock-bottom prices. We're providing the venue and light of day for games that might not have gotten attention otherwise."

Fils-Aime also stressed that all WiiWare content, unlike that on the Virtual Console, would be brand new games. "WiiWare content is new content. It can come from Reggie's Videogame Garage or from EA." (Don't get your hopes up, fanboys; Fils-Aime has no plans to personally make any WiiWare games.) As for pricing, he reiterated that while Nintendo would make the final decision on the pricing of individual games, it would do so in consultation with the developer and/or publisher, with no predetermined limit on the high-end of pricing. In short, having conquered the kids, the Alpha Moms and the non-gamers, the Wii is now going after the brand new downloadable game market currently occupied by Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation Network. The resulting fireworks should be interesting to watch.

Gamesindustry.biz - Nintendo Set to Unveil new WiiWare Initiative

Nintendo is set to reveal details of its WiiWare downloadable games initiative later today, according to Newsweek games blog Level Up.

WiiWare titles will be available from the Wii Shop Channel in exchange for Wii Points, as Virtual Console games currently are. However, the WiiWare games will be original titles designed specifically for Wii

According to Newsweek Nintendo held a developers' conference earlier this week, where attendees were informed that games are sought from independent studios as well as established companies such as Ubisoft and SEGA.

Nintendo will decide how much each game should cost, but will not vet the games beyond checking for bugs and compatibility. It will be the responsibility of publishers to obtain age ratings for the games, and no Adults Only-rated titles will be allowed.

Joystiq - Nintendo takes wraps off of WiiWare

Nintendo is the latest on the indie console-development bandwagon with WiiWare, a "game-creation service that will allow developers large and small to create new downloadable video game content" that the company announced this morning.

The company is making it clear that they're looking for little guys to make games for the console, though it's currently unclear exactly how that will be done. Interestingly, Reggie Fils-Amie told N'Gai Croal of Newsweek that the games would be checked for bugs but not vetted by Nintendo.

User Comment #2 - I'm not quite sure how you can call this jumping on the User Generated Content bandwagon. There's no mention of hobbyists or home development, or anything akin to XNA (which many would argue isn't a pure example of UGC either). They may be courting the casual games market or encouraging development from small indie developers, but this is still very much focussed on professional development not end-users from my reading.

Getting Sappy about Penny Arcade

I can't really help myself. I get sappy when I think about Penny Arcade (PA). If I'm a "fan" of anyone in the video game industry (and it's really hard to think about them as "in it," because in many ways they're are both at the margins and in the center at the same time.), I'm a fan of these guys.

I guess it goes back to my undergrad years. These guys started PA when I was an undergrad sort of in the video game industry sort of not. I was coding a lot and playing a lot of games. I was still living in the dorms, the CS computer lab had just gotten a super sweet color laser printer. I managed to print too many of these comics, which I periodically pasted on the door to my room.

While I was at JPL they were a staple of my coding diet. When I was working for 3D Pipeline it was like water. When I was doing tools development it was like air. It just makes me happy to see that they've done so well for themselves, bootstrapping PA from what it was to what it is now. Time and again they continue to tell it like it is.

I was sad that their ire managed to fall recently on some developers which I'd spent nearly three years with, but I also understand what they were saying.

Anyway, the following interview on The Onion's AV club is fun. It is interesting to see them making the transition more to the development side. I'm sure it will totally change their perspective on games.

The Onion / AV Club - Penny Arcade's Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik

AVC: At the same time, do you ever think, "Maybe we should be a little clearer about this," or "Maybe we should make it easier to understand this reference?"

JH: It's rare that we ever do that. I mean, there are a lot of jokes we do where we'll look at each other and say, "Is this a little too obscure? I mean, are people really aware of this game, or this particular game issue, this news clip?" And it comes down to, if the joke is funny, if we laugh at it, we just roll with it, and sort of trust that our readers will do their homework to find out why it's funny. Or we [explain it] in a news post, or something like that. It might sound silly, but we really focus on making the joke first, and then we don't really worry about, "Well, how is this going to come across?" If we laugh, then—that's so hard to do. It's rare we ever turn down a comic, man. If we've got something that makes us laugh, we just have to go with it.

AVC: And it is nice to have the news post to refer back to.

JH: The news posts are good because game news, like the gamer consciousness, is constantly in flux. And the news is worthless even two or three days beyond its shelf date. We started doing the posts sort of on accident, like we had to fill some space on the site, but now, it's absolutely critical if you're going back through the archives.
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AVC: Would you like to do more things with the Web or the technology it offers?

MK: I think it goes back to what Jerry said. We're not really very ambitious.

JH: Which is true.

MK: We want to enjoy ourselves.

JH: Yeah. We're not trying to revolutionize or change anything. So we never really think about that.
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AVC: What are your roles on the development team?

MK: Jerry is writing everything, the whole game. I designed all the characters, and the enemies, and the environments—pretty much everything you see, I drew at some point. And we know Penny Arcade better than anybody, so we're involved daily with the developers talking about the game and how it should play, and that sort of thing.

But we really are trying to leave the actual gameplay up to them. They're the experts in that field. We can make it look like Penny Arcade, and we're trusting them to make it fun to play.

AVC: As you work on this, are you finding it's harder than you expected?

MK: The amount of work and planning is really overwhelming. We're used to conceptualizing a project, completing the writing, and then finalizing the comic in the space of four or five hours, total. And we've been writing and drawing for this game for how long?

JH: Months! I mean, from the very first storyboards and stuff, probably a year. [Long sigh.] It's been a learning experience to actually see how a game like that comes together. I mean, it really is sort of like a trip through the sausage factory. We were not prepared, I don't think, for the process.

AVC: So are you more sympathetic to developers now?

MK: Absolutely.

JH: Well, I think… Well…

MK: I am.

AVC: The gaming community doesn't have many spokesmen, and since you're essentially writing an editorial cartoon—and getting into fights with Jack Thompson—you seem to be filling that job. Are you comfortable in that role?

JH: I'm comfortable speaking. The gaming community is too vast to have a spokesperson. I definitely think that the things I say represent a viewpoint that exists in the gaming community. But the gaming community isn't monolithic, in that way. I don't think it can have one spokesperson.

GameDeveloper Magazine and Gamasutra 3 Months Behind

At least I beat someone to the punch. Of course if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to listen, does it make a sound? Apparently not for Gamasutra or GameDeveloper Magazine.

At least it is someone respected in the industry saying these things, but for the most part his punchline is one in the same with my own, "So, Sony? Nintendo? The time has come for you to feel the winds of change. It's your game to lose, and your princess is going to be in another castle if you don't choose wisely. It's time to open things up a bit."

Gamasutra - Opinion: Why Indies Can't Thrive On Consoles

Imagine the following unlikely scenario: the movie theaters of America are divided into three groups, each of which requires a different aspect ratio and delivery format for any movie showing in it. Perhaps the three different formats don’t actually encourage easy conversion between them.

Just think what a chilling effect that would have on some filmmakers who wanted a shot at showing their independent movies nationwide.
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The ham-fisted point I’m trying to make is that the same chilling effect is currently happening with downloadable games for consoles. While Microsoft has a clear outreach channel for independent games with Xbox Live Arcade, the company hasn’t been working with Sony or Nintendo to create standards so that those games are available to PlayStation 3 and Wii owners.
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It seems that Sony’s PlayStation 3 E-Distribution Initiative is keenly focused on first-party or second-party exclusives, such as Super Rub-A-Dub, fl0w, and Blast Factor, which take advantage of the PlayStation 3 hardware in some way. These are all fine titles, but they’re emblematic of a Sony-centric portfolio.
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Why isn’t that happening? I can only presume it’s because Sony has not set up a good mechanism for more loosely tied indies to easily and swiftly convert their games. Things are even worse in Nintendo’s corner, where retro titles are spouting out by the gallon, but new downloadable games are completely absent as of press time.
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Oddly, both Nintendo’s and Sony’s reluctance to come out swinging in this area seems to be down to insularity or issues relating to corporate control. Why not relax a little and give the consumer a bit more choice and make indie development much more viable along the way?

The Wii-volution will not be Televised: The XNA-cution of a Business Model

But we can now. All we have to do is sell our souls to Microsoft's C#, Windows Vista, and Direct X 10 API for this opportunity. All Microsoft gets out of it is an ability to disrupt the business model that has until recently kept them at the middle of the pack and gain the efforts of the hordes of developers itching to try their game development skills on a piece of next generation console hardware. Does it mean that they've given up control of distribution? Heck no. But there is a contest if you're interested.

So, Sony? Nintendo? The time has come for you to feel the winds of change. It's your game to lose, and your princess is going to be in another castle if you don't choose wisely. It's time to open things up a bit.

Sony, Homebrew, and the PSP/PS3 - A Dose of REALITY CALL

Everyone seems to be picking up on some of Phil Harrison's comments on Slashdot the other day. Oddly he comments on precisely the issue that I pitched to "The Escapist Magazine" a few months back, which they declined...

Anyway, hopefully he doesn't regret the comment, which was relatively brief, but has spurred a firestorm of media reaction. Most of it has been positive, but picked up on the differentiation of "Homebrew is sometimes a misused term and so for the purposes of this answer I will exclude pirates and hackers with illegal intentions from the definition." This was exactly what I was getting at when I pitched to The Escapist that emulation and the frequent homebrew emphasis of getting emulators up and running on homebrew systems as a process that tends to hinder rather then enable the homebrew scene.

I think one important difference that should be made and seems to be getting conflated in the coverage of this is that Sony has yet to actually announce anything here. The comparison to Microsoft and XNA has been made, but XNA Express is actually available to developers right now. Today. Not some vague plan in the future. We hear rumblings like this all the time from Sony and Nintendo, but as of now we haven't seen a single indicator that something will be released even in the next six months. By that time XNA Express will have been available for nearly a year.

That being said, Nintendo and Sony could benefit from releasing tools that don't require developers to be locked into a proprietary language like C#, which Microsoft has done. It would also be nice if they were interested in supporting open standards like OpenGL, Cg, or any of the other various standards, in favor of Microsoft's DX10 thrust.

All in all it is nice to hear executives at Sony thinking about this.

I'll actually be giving a talk at MiT5 (Media in Transition) at MIT this weekend in Boston on this very topic.

Slashdot - Phil Harrison Answers Your Questions

4.) 'Homebrew Gaming' by Anonymous Coward, maynard, and flitty
If someone manages to get homebrew games running on the PS3, will there be firmware updates to stop this kind of development, to protect your software developers, or is homebrew something you are planning on and even encouraging? Is there a chance that the policy of restricting access to PS3 graphics hardware (via the hypervisor) could be revised to encourage us homebrew developers? How does this strategy differ from your strategy with PSP homebrew? Has Sony considered offering kernel patches and an RSX optimized OpenGL library for PS3/Linux?

Phil Harrison: Now, let me first say that Homebrew is sometimes a misused term and so for the purposes of this answer I will exclude pirates and hackers with illegal intentions from the definition.

I fully support the notion of game development at home using powerful tools available to anyone. We were one of the first companies to recognize this in 1996 with Net Yaroze on PS1. It's a vital, crucial aspect of the future growth of our industry and links well to the subtext of my earlier answers. When I started making games on the Commodore 64 in the 1980's, the way I learned to make games was by re-writing games that appeared in magazines. Really the best bit about a C64 was when you turned it on it said "Ready?" with a flashing cursor - inviting you to experiment. You'd spend hours typing in the code, line-by-line, and then countless hours debugging it to make it work and then you'd realise the game was rubbish after all that effort! The next step was to re-write aspects of the game to change the graphics, the sound, the control system or the speed of the gameplay until you'd created something completely new. I might share this with a few friends but not for commercial gain at that time. But the process itself was invaluable in helping me learn to program, to design graphics, animations or sounds and was really the way I opened doors to get into the industry. Now, those industry doors are largely closed by the nature of the video game systems themselves being closed. So, if we can make certain aspects of PS3 open to the independent game development community, we will do our industry a service by providing opportunities for the next generation of creative and technical talent. Now having said all that, we still have to protect the investment and intellectual property rights of the industry so we will always seek the best ways to secure and protect our devices from piracy and unauthorized hacking that damages the business.

Gamasutra - Sony's Harrison Embraces Homebrew Development

Harrison prefaced his answer to the question of whether firmware updates would prevent the running of homebrew software by stating that he would “exclude pirates and hackers with illegal intentions” from the definition of homebrew.

Although the phrase homebrew has never commonly been understood to include such activities, Harrison’s implication that it might could explain Sony’s continual aggressive attempts to lock out unlicensed software from use on the PSP.

In regards to the PlayStation 3, Harrison appears more sympathetic, saying, "I fully support the notion of game development at home using powerful tools available to anyone. We were one of the first companies to recognize this in 1996 with Net Yaroze on PS one. It's a vital, crucial aspect of the future growth of our industry."
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"The process itself was invaluable in helping me learn to program, to design graphics, animations or sounds and was really the way I opened doors to get into the industry. Now, those industry doors are largely closed by the nature of the video game systems themselves being closed", he admitted.

"So, if we can make certain aspects of PS3 open to the independent game development community, we will do our industry a service by providing opportunities for the next generation of creative and technical talent", stated Harrison.

GameDaily.BIZ - Harrison: Homebrew Development Vital to Future Growth of Industry

Harrison also talked a bit about his own vision for the future of the industry. "I want to see the audience of people who play videogames, of any type, on any device, include practically anyone on the planet. Whether it be an immersive action game that appeals primarily to young adults, or a casual game that is enjoyed by the entire family, I hope that videogames and electronic forms of interactive entertainment continue to expand to new audiences, all the time. Linked to that, I want to see videogames given more credibility as a mainstream form of entertainment through appropriate cultural commentary and criticism," he said.

"What I hope is that 20 years from now... videogames as a pastime will be given the same cultural and social currency as a book, a film, a TV show or a piece of architecture," he added. "After all, the popular culture creators of 20 years from now will all, largely, have grown up playing, or at least being intimately aware of, videogames. The writers and commentators on those same popular culture creators will all have had the same experience playing videogames growing up - at which point the circle is complete. I don't think there is a culmination to this overall vision - it will be a constant process. Each successive platform brings new technology to the experience of games and helps expand the audience still further. I hope PS3 will be seen 20 years from now as a crucial influence in the growth of our industry."

GamesIndustry.BIZ - Harrison hints at PlayStation 3 homebrew plans

"I fully support the notion of game development at home using powerful tools available to anyone," Harrison said in an interview with Slashdot.

"We were one of the first companies to recognise this in 1996 with Net Yaroze on PS1. It's a vital, crucial aspect of the future growth of our industry."
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But he admits that these days the doors into the industry that might be opened by going through that process "are largely closed by the nature of the videogame systems themselves being closed".

"So, if we can make certain aspects of PS3 open to the independent game development community, we will do our industry a service by providing opportunities for the next generation of creative and technical talent," he added.

While Sony has encouraged legitimate independent development in some areas - notably with Net Yaroze with, in this generation, Beyond Playstation - it has been accused of adopting a heavy-handed strategy in its dealings with PSP developers, with legitimate or at least non-threatening projects often struck down by firmware updates designed to lock out pirates and the hackers who facilitate piracy.

Harrison's interest in allowing for homebrew development puts Sony on a similar path to Microsoft, which recently launched its XNA package of tools. XNA offers the ability to develop games on both PC and Xbox 360, with a complementary educational focus that will plug game development modules into a number of university courses.

User Generated "CONTENT" (?)

So, there has been a whole lot going on recently about Game 3.0 (apparently Web 2.0 meets Video Games) (And it's really Game 1.0 = Games on Carts/CD's, Game 2.0 = Game 1.0 + Networking, Game 3.0 = Game 2.0 + User Content). As much as I am a fan of thinking about games as media, in particular because console video game systems dominate the game world so much, this isn't quite the same.

So, let's take YouTube for example. You have the ability (perhaps against other media corporations desires otherwise) to take their content and mash it your own way. Perhaps it's just a simple Anime + Music = AMV (Anime Music Video). Perhaps it's your own custom shot or computer generated material set to music. The point is that you have the ability to pull that content from somewhere else and put it at your disposal.

It's not quite the same for video games. It's especially not so much the same for video games. So, I'd like to remix that last Spidey level and redistribute on YouGame. ... ... Ummm... where do I start? Not quite the same.

Now, Little Big Planet "empowers" users by providing them with a world which they can do these things. But what if I want to change a basic mechanic to customize it a bit more? What if I want to make Little Big Nudie Planet? Not to sleight the guys making Little Big Planet, they're doing a phenomenal job, we just have to realize that it's not the same as YouTube.

This is also complicated by the fact that Web 2.0 is founded on a whole lot of things that Game 3.0 just hasn't done. Open API's, Open Protocols, things like XML, and a whole bunch of other things that really empowers users. In the case of console video games you have none of this foundational material.

In many ways I see XNA as having a greater YouTube potential, because though you end up having to do more work, as people develop tools and pieces, you'll see more (and more different) examples of this.

Nintendo and Sony (though Sony seems to be talking a lot) haven't really figured out that they're going to have to open up more than they have to really embrace this idea, and really, if they don't, MS is the one who is going to win.

What publishers are really worried about is:

Making the Social Connection: How Small Developers and Publishers Can Take On Game Industry Giants

But... Even these comments fail to really engage with the barriers of access to the technologies that really offer the most opportunity for companies to make money and build sustainable work environments.

Making the Social Connection: How Small Developers and Publishers Can Take On Game Industry Giants

According to the NPD Group, total computer and video game industry sales hit $13.5 billion in 2006, almost a 20 percent increase from the year before. The vast majority of those sales came from titles released by major publishers and distributors, not from smaller, independent developers. While we depend on the likes of EA and Ubisoft to deliver blockbusters like The Sims and Rainbow Six, we often don't recognize the importance of indie developers in fueling the creative engine of game design and production.
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Remaining independent means taking on all the costs of creating, producing, marketing and distributing a title. These costs are high, and a crowded marketplace makes it even more challenging for independent developers to make their presence known. In addition, many smaller firms are made up of just a few employees, whose skills skew toward programming or animation rather than sales or business development.
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Not necessarily. Since the late 1990s, some small companies have gone the direct route, selling their games online or making their titles open source as a means by which to generate a player base. For example, Positech Games, based in the U.K., was recently highlighted on the popular developers' forum GameDeveloper.net, for its claims to have reached the $100,000 mark purely through online sales.
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Social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook have transformed the way that independent filmmakers and musicians reach new audiences and sell their work. The next wave of social networking, a trend Sony Computer Entertainment calls "Game 3.0," will change the way independent game creators take their games to market.
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But these sites lack a crucial element – game developer participation. FairShare, a new technology my company announced at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) this year, is, amongst other things, designed to connect developers with players through game-related social networking. An engine that runs underneath gaming portals, FairShare lets players sample new games through a try-before-you-buy option. It offers incentives for players to share, recommend and give feedback on new games, and it gives developers a chance to sell games, gain visibility and build their reputations among the game aficionado community.

The Game 3.0 future for independent developers will be rooted in social networks, where developers can make their games available online, players can try, buy, share, and offer feedback on the games, and developers can respond, making changes or developing new titles based on that feedback.

Just as Facebook and Myspace make every participant an owner of his or her own content on the Web, a Game 3.0 style portal must provide a sense of ownership for both players and developers. For indies, the Game 3.0 trend opens new opportunities for connecting with gamers who want to buy their titles, as well as the chance to build communities with other developers and gamers.

Game publishers threatened by user-generated content

Got an idea for a video, a song, a podcast, a game? Make it, put it online, and people will find it. We all benefit from the mind-bogglingly wide variety of stuff to consume, and the competition increases quality for everyone. The dinosaurs who have become rich off outmoded means of production and distribution are quaking in terror. Some, like SCEA president Phil Harrison, are making attempts to adapt and thrive.

What Do Media Executives Fear?

User-generated content was named by 57 percent of respondents as one of the top three issues they face today. More that 70 percent believed that social media would continue to grow, while only 3 percent said they viewed social media as a fad.
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"Traditional, established content providers will have to adapt and develop new business and monetization models in order to keep revenue streams flowing. The key to success will be identifying new forms of content that can complement their traditional strengths."