Blog for Phillip Daigle at GarageGames.com

Pimpin' GGE

Phillip Daigle — 2007-02-09T21:09:58+00:00

So I figured that it would be fun to see how popular The Great Games Experiment would be if I posted it to digg, as seen here:

http://digg.com/tech_news/Garage_Games_starts_Social_Networking_site

Unfortunately everyone in my office was either not present or too busy to 'Digg' it, and my efforts have been fruitless so far. Check the page often, however, as I will make it my mission this afternoon to at the very least make it reach the front page.

Bold claims, but I am bolder still!

Regards, Daigle

Testers are a many splendored thing.

Phillip Daigle — 2007-02-08T22:02:16+00:00

Space Trader is in closed beta now, and I'm ridiculously excited about that. If you haven't yet signed up for a shot at it, head over to playSpaceTrader and get yourself set up. Don't worry, we won't shackle you or anything - that will happen plenty once we launch the game and grip thousands of people with addiction.

Now that we're in beta, it became apparent that beta testers are a rare resource akin to gold or uranium. Sure you can get people to PLAY your game - but can you get them to TEST it? There's a difference. Here's an example of someone trying to play a game:

Quote:
"The game crashed on level three."

And here's an example of someone testing the game:

Quote:
"The game crashed and threw me back to desktop on level three when I tried talking to the farmer AFTER I recieved the golden egg from Supergoose, but BEFORE I'd polished it with the +5 Rag of Brilliance."

Now, don't get me wrong - we want people to play the game. That's key. But great tester are like a magnificent Guatemalan Cow of Paradise - rare and beautiful. Also useful, because I hear those cows can haul, like, a ton of stuff. Are YOU a Cow of Paradise? If you think so, prove it! Prove that you deserve the suffix "of Paradise"!

My blog update today is shorter than usual, but I'm ill. And I don't mean in the hip hop sense, I mean in the immune system sense. Gross.

Regards, Daigle

Alpha Beta Gaga

Phillip Daigle — 2007-01-26T18:13:15+00:00

We're going to be entering closed beta very soon.

This excites and tickles me in new and exciting ways. Space Trader is my first actual title since beginning work in the games industry, and the experience so far has been exhilarating. Before working on Space Trader I'd lent by hand to open source projects like Freecraft, and later Stratagus, but working full time on a game project is a totally different experience.

Ever since I was a young lad I've always wanted to have my name stamped on the credits of something that the world saw. Of course, it had to meet certain requirements - it had to be enjoyable, it had to be something that I myself would want to play, and it had to be cool. I would have been pretty upset if my name were on the credits of some sort of art exhibit where paintings of sobbing kittens were being mocked and laughed at by a circle of their feline peers - a clowder of ridicule, if you will. However, I'm pretty glad to say that Space Trader fits my requirements pretty well.

Like I mentioned earlier, we're going to be starting our closed beta very soon. This means we need testers - a never ending supply of them. As such, I am using this journal entry as a platform to recruit people into our soon-to-be burgeoning horde of testers and fans. If you head over to this particular web site that I am loosely affiliated with, you can sign up for a spot in the beta.

Regards, Daigle

Simple Games

Phillip Daigle — 2007-01-25T01:58:23+00:00

Reposted from my HermitWorks Entertainment

I feel that there exists a barrier of entry to games these days. Many PC games seem almost more effort than they're worth just to get to the point where you're actually at the game part, even the so-called 'Casual' ones. They need to be better than that. They need to become simpler. They need to not be a hassle. Today I'm going to share my thoughts on the matter.

Everyone is trying to grab 'Casual Gamers'. They're an elusive breed of gamer, commonly found around the Popcap website, and can be seen once in awhile playing Solitaire in the wild to pass the time. Why is everyone trying to nab them? Because they're probably the biggest gaming audience out there. Why are few succeeding? Because they're difficult to please.

PC gaming is hard. You have to install things. You have to swap discs. Type in long CD keys. Update drivers. Upgrade components. Do you have the right version of Direct X installed? Reboot, then. No, reboot again. In some cases, you have to install restrictive software that runs in the background to make sure you're not a criminal. Innocent until proven guilty is not a term you hear in this domain.

Console gaming, on the other hand, is getting easier and easier every day. Every next generation console has an online play feature that takes the pain out of trying to find other players. No installing, no configuring, no CD keys, no draconian security measures - you just pop in a disc and ride on into the night, as it were. The controls are simple - and they can be illustrated easily since you can be assured that every controller people use will look the same.

This is perfect, since 'Casual Gamers' have a very low tolerance for annoyance. Installing stuff isn't fun. Downloading a huge file isn't any way to get people interested in your game. Configuring my controls? I just want to play, can't you see? I thought the whole reason we're playing on computers is because we don't have to take the hour and a half it takes to set up the board and argue over house rules for a riveting game of Monopoly.

And then in the category of the game play itself, traditional PC Games tend to be an order of magnitude more complex than console games. To be fair, this is why some people prefer PC titles, but 'Casual Gamers' aren't really the type to spend an hour in a tutorial mission. And add unintuitive game elements... just because regular gamers have been indoctrinated with quite literally twenty years of typical gaming conventions doesn't mean that 'Casual Gamers' know that you should rocket jump up to that ledge in order to take out that robot sniper. Or even how to.

Yes, console games seem like the obvious choice if you want to nab 'Casual Gamers'.

But problem with console gaming is that people aren't sitting in front of a console all the time. People ARE sitting in front of their computers all the time, whether it's for work or to keep in touch with their myriads of friends via messaging services. It's a wonder that PC gaming is still so unrefined in the face of this. So how do you grab those people who are on their computers anyway, but tend to avoid most PC games because they're annoyingly complex?

Keep it simple, stupid.

Stop making them download installers. Don't even require them to install anything at all. Skip that 'CONFIGURE THINE CONTROLS NOW, AVATAR!' screen and design your title so they don't even have to. If the game isn't something that you can pick up and play within a couple minutes, it probably shouldn't be considered 'Casual'.

What about depth?

Games can be simple and accomplish all the above stated goals, and yet still have depth. The trick is letting players move at their own pace. Bejeweled is an excellent example of this. It's a fairly simple game - just match up the colors of gems by swapping a couple around at a time. Pretty easy. A new player can whip through a handful of rounds in a few minutes, and get the flow of the game easily. But as they continue to play, they realize that they should be strategically picking certain colors in certain areas to maximize points. They slowly, at their own pace, move themselves into the deeper complexity of the game. They start timing things, aiming for bonuses, etc. etc.. This is excellent, because now you have a veteran player that's addicted to your game, and all they had to do was click on a few links to start playing.

Puzzle games have it a little easier, sure. Let's talk about a console title that accomplishes the same. Super Smash Bros. is a great game full of color and action, yet at the same time it's supremely simple. Someone new to this title can literally play it with a joystick and a single attack button. As they play, they realize more and more the importance of jumping, ducking, dodging, and blocking. These skills are not required by the player immediately after starting the game, but they evolve on their own. Eventually they begin to grasp the importance of items, and how they come into play in versus matches, and so on. I use Super Smash Bros. here as an example because while it starts off as a simple, casual game it's still got enough depth to be played at tournament levels around the world.

Those are two titles that I feel exemplify the whole 'Casual Game' market. Easy to pick up and play, easy to learn, almost no time wasted configuring or installing anything.

Too Long, Didn't Read

Everyone enjoys a good summary. If you want to have a 'Casual Game', it should be simple. Minimal effort on the part of the user when it comes to setting up. Intuitive in every way possible. Optionally, it should have a depth to it that isn't forced upon the player immediately.

Traditionally this is much easier to do on consoles and with simple flash games. Larger games have problems with this. There's a trick involved to making it work, and Space Trader is going to show you how very soon.

Regards, Daigle

"Tighten up those graphics a little bit!"

Phillip Daigle — 2007-01-24T00:30:41+00:00

Reposted from my HermitWorks Entertainment Blog

For my very first blog entry, I would like to draw you attention to a particular video that has been floating around this morass known as the internet for awhile. It's an advertisement that was featured on American television awhile ago, and most likely is still featured.

Click Here

As you can see, it illustrates the example of two young men that graduated from Westwood College, and have become successful Game Designers/Testers/Graphical Tighteners even after they received almost support from their parents.

The way they present game development in this ad is completely accurate. Getting into the industry is as simple as they portray - going to school for an intensive two week course followed by your immediate hiring by a major game development company is commonplace in the industry. Unless you live in Texas or Massachusetts, in which case this field of work has no use for you.

Actually.

It's nothing like that, in reality. Game development is hard work on every front, and it takes a lot of skill to produce something that attracts people. Every title is a struggle in its own way, and it can be extremely taxing on everyone involved.

But we wouldn't do it if it weren't fun!

Hi, I'm Phillip Daigle and I'm Assistant Producer here at HermitWorks Entertainment. I've worked here a year now, and I've had a great time working with the people here since my start. Previously I was involved in the tech industry, working in IT, Management, and all manner of soul crushing employment. Now I help make games.

Space Trader is my first title, and I'm glad that my first game is something as fun and engaging as this. It's something that I would want to play at home in my spare time, and I often do. It's a game that I want to share with my friends and family, in order to point at it and say "I helped create this!" before sitting them down to give it a shot. So it's no surprise when I think that Space Trader will be a pretty big hit, especially when you see the amazing technology we're introducing with it.

I am being 100% serious when I say that socks will be blown off in liberal measure, individuals will be floored, etc. etc.

Look here in the future for writings about what it's like to work in a small developer environment like HermitWorks. I promise I'll have something interesting to say from time to time, and you would be ashamed of yourself if you missed it and then later it became some sort of hilarious internet meme.

Regards, Daigle.