Plan for Phil Carlisle

Hi Shannon! :)

There is something cathartic about attending the IGC every year. The amazing thing is that each year I learn something fundamentally new about developing games as an indie.

Some times its a hard lesson, sometimes its just reaffirming my own feelings about how it is to be "indie", sometimes its just plain reality check time.

This year definitely falls into that last category.

Essentially, this year has seen me finally find a game where I can truly get behind it and get it shipped. This is after a *lot* of trying different games ideas out and prototyping my ass off.

So what revelation have I gotten around to learning this year?

That even with all of the best intentions there are no guarantees to game development. That if I really want to make a business, I have to be smarter about the choices I make when considering games to make.

Now this isnt something new to me, when I was at Team17 we used to start projects and put years into them before finally admitting they werent working. This is exactly the same at many huge developers and I guess is a universal issue.

So now there is this dilemma of choosing games that you would love to play yourself, versus choosing games that make commercial sense.

But thats really the wrong way to think about it, because I know from experience that you can enjoy making a game even if you wouldnt always play it yourself. I'm not saying you dont care about it, but that you dont have to be precious about it being only *your* game.

Games are intended for other people to play too!

Of course you have to follow your intuition when developing individual mechanics to know if theyre fun. But honestly, as you grow more skilled as a developer, you can learn to have fun with any part of making a game, as long as you have the right attitude.

So whats next for me?

Well, primarily it will be shipping Air Ace, which is my *baby*, but you know what? It probably doesnt really make any commercial sense to do this game. I've sat and thought it through many many times and I still dont have a clear idea of how to actually make money on the game itself.

This kind of makes it a labour of love rather than a good commercial decision. Which I'm ok with, but in order to actually make a long-term business, I have to start to think about exactly *what* games we work on.

So the plans for the future?

First up, is to flesh out the content on the new AIR ACE website.. check it out at

www.airaceonline.com

This really is time to ante up and throw my chips in the business of game dev. I cant specify exactly what that means right now, but lets just say that a few of us have heard the message and will be acting on the advice received in the very near future.

So this christmas will be spent trying to get Air Ace shipped (the online version just now) and finishing off the code required for the singleplayer.

I'm also desperate to ship the AI Pack right now, because its too much to just let it rot or let someone else take over that niche with a product which offers less functionality.

That and contract work plus my usual day job should see me busy for the near term :)

Take care and great to see you all out at the IGC for those who attended!