Adventure is a Good Way of Putting It
Author of this post: Erin Robinson | About Blog Authors »
I run a video game studio out of my apartment. I have three employees, two of whom I’ve been working with since 2005. We’ve never met. They’re in Latvia, the Netherlands, and Japan. My boss, Dave Gilbert, lives in New York City. Right now I’m making him a game with a five-figure budget. I’ve never met him, either.
This is the extent of my knowledge of the games industry. I’ve learned from experience that all you need are a handful of dedicated individuals to create a memorable game. Heck, you don’t even need money. I’ve made two freeware games and my website just had its 250,000th pageview. I don’t quite understand what I’ve tapped into here, but my bank account depends on my finding the answer.
All I have are a few guesses. I started making games three years ago for one reason: no one was making the kind of games I wanted to play. I grew up with imaginative, puzzle-based games like Myst and Riven, as well as some point-and-click adventure games like King’s Quest and the later Zork titles. There was something about puzzle solving that was, in a word, satisfying.
Adventure games had nearly died out by 1998, and as a result I stopped playing games almost entirely. I didn’t see the appeal of online play, and my recent attempts to play Half Life 2 have resulted in nothing but motion sickness and getting blown up.
It’s only in the past few months that I’ve become aware of the entire independent gaming movement, particularly the emergence of casual games. Their low budgets and 2D mechanics make them a tempting entry point for start-up companies, even those with a small, almost Goonies-like assembly of workers.
I love the challenge and flexibility of being an independent game developer. Despite the fact that I just graduated university with a completely unrelated degree, my dream is to run a successful casual gaming company. As I try out the words “target market” and “click reward ratio” for the first time, it’s becoming clear to me that I need some outside help.
I’m about to start my academic career at the Sessions Online School of Game Art. They’re teaching me everything: character animation, 3D modelling, and the workings of the games industry itself. I’m as nervous as anyone on their first day of school, but I know that everything I learn will push me closer towards my goal. And believe it or not, it goes beyond selling games.
Ultimately, I want to challenge the notion of “games for women.” Thus far, attempts to court women gamers have focused on games with domestic, consumerist, and cutesy themes: the gaming equivalent of cotton candy. In addition to being far too narrow a scope, it’s a little insulting. My goal is to create games that are smart, funny, and memorable, and enjoyable to anyone who likes a challenge. And it’s time to get started.
July 27th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
Congrats on more fame with the guest blog, Erin. However, A goonies-like team? I’m wondering which one is Chunk?
July 28th, 2008 at 12:59 am
Thanks SSH!
And let’s just say I hope Vince doesn’t read this.
July 28th, 2008 at 6:37 am
I’ve been doing some research on games marketed at women, and found a fairly helpful spring board in the form of http://www.theesa.com/facts/pdfs/ESA_EF_2008.pdf
It’s a pretty big PDF, though, just a heads up. It’s the ESA’s report on the breakdown of age and gender across various game mediums.
July 29th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Hey William, thank you for sharing that!
I read the whole thing, and some of those findings are quite unexpected. The two biggest surprises for me were the number of women gamers, and the fact that “adventure” games still make up about 5% of the PC games market. It’d be interesting to hear what classified a game as “adventure”, but either way it’s encouraging to hear.
July 30th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Woo! Erin’s famous!
If your team is the Goonies what does that make me? Mikey’s dad?
July 31st, 2008 at 2:30 am
Hey! It’s a glandular problem!
July 31st, 2008 at 5:56 pm
Man, I need to watch that movie again. :-,
August 17th, 2008 at 5:05 am
Erin, you are sooo awe-inspiring!!! You have just made me realise I can achieve my small game business as well. I have just recently acquired a fantastic partner in the business, my best friend who I met 3 months ago!! I LOVE your games so much, and I get you on the scope of games, to not have so much ‘fluffy, cotton candy’ type games, but a much wider scope that inputs what you described (smart, memorable…) such as the nanobots in the setting (1 room background), I would have not realised it was made by a woman so it makes me VERY proud of you, being a woman myself. It just goes to prove women can do anything and have all sorts of concepts. Its good to be zany and to let the imagination go wild so good on you!
I would like to talk to you via AGS and discuss games (and the good old memories of kings quest, torins passage, Amon Ra, Colonels Bequest, eco quest… etc etc). I am very excited to have ‘met’ you and it makes me believe more that women can do it! I started to think about this sort of career 3 years ago and am just getting into the gist of things specially since meeting my friend who lives close by, and losing my job recently. Slowly learning the scripting and bettering my graphic artwork. Please feel welcome to send me a message on AGS - gypsysnail, thats me.
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:15 pm
Hi, Erin,
I’m a fellow student at Sessions Online School of Game Art. It was a pleasure to read your blog this morning.
My husband and I enjoyed the “Blackwell Unbound” game–good story, fun characters with witty dialog, and a logical solution. The details in the art were terrific! Especially liked the ’70s apartment decorations–oh, man, we had forgotten that EVERYBODY had a melted-candle.
I look forward to seeing your new project!
September 15th, 2008 at 9:03 pm
Wow, I’m sorry I didn’t see these posts sooner! Thank you very much to both gypsysnail and Betsy for your kind words.
Gypsysnail, hopefully I can get in touch with you soon, and Betsy, I’m glad you enjoyed the details of the “Unbound” apartment. I basically called my mom and asked her to list all of the cliched 1970s decorating fads she could think of. The candle was one of them, although I decided against including a lava lamp. The macrame was a bit of a surprise, since we certainly had some hanging in our kitchen long after the 70s…
September 24th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
That is a pretty awesome adventure. I am sure that it leads to all sorts of interesting situations.
My husband and I leave on September 30th to backpack to various countries around the world for a year or so.
As we have been planning for our adventure we have been updating a blog. http://www.nomadbackpackers.com
Let me know if you want us to check out any video games in a certain country or region we plan on going to.
Natalie
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:53 pm
[...] doing a monthly-ish guest blog for the good people at Notes on Game Dev. My first contribution is here, titled “Adventure is a Good Way of Putting It.” Future postings will be filed under [...]