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Guide for Launching New Adventure Game Studio

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I think there should be some kind of guide for people attempting to launch a new adventure game development studio. Let’s say you have a team of talented and capable adventure game fans interested in making their own game but lacking exposure, experience and funding.

What should be done before attempting a Kickstarter campaign? Kickstarter is a great way to promote a game and get known, as well as get funding, but should it be the first step?

How big a fan base should one have before attempting a Kickstarter?

If someone is unknown but has created a playable demo, is it advised to jump right ahead and launch a Kickstarter?

Once a Kickstarter has been launched, what is the best advice for marketing a campaign? If someone isn’t already famous, how do you get your campaign noticed?

I hate that Kickstarter seems to primarily reward already well-known developers, and I want to see it used more for jump starting brand new adventure game studios.

     
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”...in 2001, I mailed Jonathan Ackley who directed The Curse of Monkey Island to ask him how to get into the position to be able to make such fine games. And to my amazement he replied and told me in a pretty long and friendly mail that the best way is to make your own game and show it around.”

     

Recently finished: Four Last Things 4/5, Edna & Harvey: The Breakout 5/5, Chains of Satinav 3,95/5, A Vampyre Story 88, Sam Peters 3/5, Broken Sword 1 4,5/5, Broken Sword 2 4,3/5, Broken Sword 3 85, Broken Sword 5 81, Gray Matter 4/5\nCurrently playing: Broken Sword 4, Keepsake (Let\‘s Play), Callahan\‘s Crosstime Saloon (post-Community Playthrough)\nLooking forward to: A Playwright’s Tale

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I’m actually in an AG personal project on my free time, and so I read a lot of stuff about adventure games (that’s how I discovered adventuregamers.com).

A great list of resources is on PixelProspector.

http://www.pixelprospector.com/indie-resources/

It’s not only about AG games, it focuses on the vast indie industry.
The most interesting to me is the gathering of post-mortems and indie’s experiences, i.e. Joshua Nuernberger’s Gemini Rue or Wadjet Eye’s The Blackwell Convergence.
I think it definitly deserves a look.  Cool

Also you can find some nice developers blogs, like Simon Mesnard (ASA: A Space Adventure) or Christopher Bischoff (STASIS), with a lot of interesting stuff.  Smile

     
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We spent 10 years making games for no pay and releasing them for free - we built a fan base, and cultivated relatioships with people.  When we went to Kickstarter, we had not only a playable demo, fully voiced, full soundtrack, but we had videos, promotional materials, and I humped around everywhere to talk about the game - talk to people directly, help out with demo hints…. it’s a lot of work.  You really have to establish yourself - and not just say “Our game is cool!  Our writer is a genius!”  Don’t tell.  Show.


Bt

     
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Blackthorne - 07 June 2013 10:33 AM

We spent 10 years making games for no pay and releasing them for free - we built a fan base, and cultivated relatioships with people.  When we went to Kickstarter, we had not only a playable demo, fully voiced, full soundtrack, but we had videos, promotional materials, and I humped around everywhere to talk about the game - talk to people directly, help out with demo hints…. it’s a lot of work.  You really have to establish yourself - and not just say “Our game is cool!  Our writer is a genius!”  Don’t tell.  Show.


Bt

Great advice.

It’s not to say that first time developers can’t be successful and shouldn’t try their luck with Kickstarter, but you’re definitely setting yourself up for an uphill battle, and ultimately people will expect you to show MORE stuff up front in order to prove you have what it takes.

     
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Lambonius - 07 June 2013 10:56 AM

It’s not to say that first time developers can’t be successful and shouldn’t try their luck with Kickstarter, but you’re definitely setting yourself up for an uphill battle, and ultimately people will expect you to show MORE stuff up front in order to prove you have what it takes.

First time developers REALLY shouldn’t try their luck with crowd-funding. It would be a waste of time (and possibly money). Both theirs and of people they catch some attention of.

My advice is to worry about your ability to make games first, and about exposure later. Much later.

     

www.hardydev.com - blogging about indie and underground adventures

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Ascovel - 07 June 2013 08:22 PM
Lambonius - 07 June 2013 10:56 AM

It’s not to say that first time developers can’t be successful and shouldn’t try their luck with Kickstarter, but you’re definitely setting yourself up for an uphill battle, and ultimately people will expect you to show MORE stuff up front in order to prove you have what it takes.

First time developers REALLY shouldn’t try their luck with crowd-funding. It would be a waste of time (and possibly money). Both theirs and of people they catch some attention of.

My advice is to worry about your ability to make games first, and about exposure later. Much later.

I completely agree.  I just didn’t want to totally rule it out either, as it certainly COULD work, if all the stars were aligned, so to speak.

     
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I think Kickstarter is fine for first-time developers if they’ve put in a considerable amount of time and effort and actually have something to show before trying to crowdfund the rest of the development. A small playable demo is something I think isn’t used often enough.

     

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Kasper F. Nielsen - 07 June 2013 11:47 PM

I think Kickstarter is fine for first-time developers if they’ve put in a considerable amount of time and effort and actually have something to show before trying to crowdfund the rest of the development. A small playable demo is something I think isn’t used often enough.

Exactly.

I think the best example should be of Lilly Looking Through. A game made by ostensibly two people, a husband and a wife.

They started the project and made the game engine and produced a great demo before anyone had heard ANYTHING about their project.

So when people did start to take notice, all they could do was be blown away by a beautifully realised and executed adventure game demo.

Then they went onto Kickstarter and asked for a modest amount, that I don’t doubt 70% of the people who played the demo were happy to help with, and now they are a matter of months away from completing it and i couldn’t be more excited.

Modesty, hard work, and low expectations until you are truly confident you can blow people away with something tangible, are all the secretes to success.

So to sum up. work, work, work, and worry about exposure when what you have built is brilliant enough to get positive responses.

Unless you are rich…you can just “start” a game studio. not without experience and tons of game ideas and prototypes in your back pocket. You have to create your own game, and try your best to make it something special, and go from there.

     
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Idrisguitar - 08 June 2013 07:37 AM
Kasper F. Nielsen - 07 June 2013 11:47 PM

I think Kickstarter is fine for first-time developers if they’ve put in a considerable amount of time and effort and actually have something to show before trying to crowdfund the rest of the development. A small playable demo is something I think isn’t used often enough.

Exactly.

I think the best example should be of Lilly Looking Through. A game made by ostensibly two people, a husband and a wife.

They started the project and made the game engine and produced a great demo before anyone had heard ANYTHING about their project.

So when people did start to take notice, all they could do was be blown away by a beautifully realised and executed adventure game demo.

Then they went onto Kickstarter and asked for a modest amount, that I don’t doubt 70% of the people who played the demo were happy to help with, and now they are a matter of months away from completing it and i couldn’t be more excited.

Modesty, hard work, and low expectations until you are truly confident you can blow people away with something tangible, are all the secretes to success.

So to sum up. work, work, work, and worry about exposure when what you have built is brilliant enough to get positive responses.

That’s highly misleading. You forgot to mention the creators of Lilly are seasoned Disney animators. No amateur can get to where they are just by “work, work, work”.

Maybe I wasn’t clear enough. I meant that creators with no prior experience completing projects like games (or movies) are better off - MUCH better off - not going into the whole promotion and crowd-funding thing. No at this stage!

And you need exactly zero budget to realize a beautiful game. The original Nelly Cootalot which sequel is currently on Kickstarter was done like that. And it’s one of my favorite adventure games of the past decade.

A crowd-funding campaign is huge risk - takes a lot of your time, diverts focus from actually making something, sets you in a “marketing a product” mindset, can damage your reputation, can damage others financially. Do it only after several years of experience in creating entertainment projects under your belt.

Be humble about your first projects, people. Don’t make yourself fail before you even start. Take a look at the Double Fine Adventure (Broken Age) documentary series. Such an experienced team (Tim Shafer!) yet they completely underestimated the budget, the production time (which what - tripled by now?). What would you do if your expensive crowd-funded project suddenly run out of crowd-funders money in the middle of production?

     

www.hardydev.com - blogging about indie and underground adventures

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Ascovel - 09 June 2013 04:13 AM
Idrisguitar - 08 June 2013 07:37 AM
Kasper F. Nielsen - 07 June 2013 11:47 PM

I think Kickstarter is fine for first-time developers if they’ve put in a considerable amount of time and effort and actually have something to show before trying to crowdfund the rest of the development. A small playable demo is something I think isn’t used often enough.

Exactly.

I think the best example should be of Lilly Looking Through. A game made by ostensibly two people, a husband and a wife.

They started the project and made the game engine and produced a great demo before anyone had heard ANYTHING about their project.

So when people did start to take notice, all they could do was be blown away by a beautifully realised and executed adventure game demo.

Then they went onto Kickstarter and asked for a modest amount, that I don’t doubt 70% of the people who played the demo were happy to help with, and now they are a matter of months away from completing it and i couldn’t be more excited.

Modesty, hard work, and low expectations until you are truly confident you can blow people away with something tangible, are all the secretes to success.

So to sum up. work, work, work, and worry about exposure when what you have built is brilliant enough to get positive responses.

That’s highly misleading. You forgot to mention the creators of Lilly are seasoned Disney animators. No amateur can get to where they are just by “work, work, work”.

Maybe I wasn’t clear enough. I meant that creators with no prior experience completing projects like games (or movies) are better off - MUCH better off - not going into the whole promotion and crowd-funding thing. No at this stage!

And you need exactly zero budget to realize a beautiful game. The original Nelly Cootalot which sequel is currently on Kickstarter was done like that. And it’s one of my favorite adventure games of the past decade.

A crowd-funding campaign is huge risk - takes a lot of your time, diverts focus from actually making something, sets you in a “marketing a product” mindset, can damage your reputation, can damage others financially. Do it only after several years of experience in creating entertainment projects under your belt.

Be humble about your first projects, people. Don’t make yourself fail before you even start. Take a look at the Double Fine Adventure (Broken Age) documentary series. Such an experienced team (Tim Shafer!) yet they completely underestimated the budget, the production time (which what - tripled by now?). What would you do if your expensive crowd-funded project suddenly run out of crowd-funders money in the middle of production?

anyone who played the demo and enjoyed it (i am sure most did) did not care what those guys did before. my main point was that if you have something truly great to show, reputation doesn’t matter.

they would have met their modest goal with that charming demo even if they had zero experience in my opinion.

     
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Yet people who consider starting their own campaign should care.

The true goal of a developer is not meeting the financial goal of a campaign, it’s not making a nice demo, but making a game to the end and hopefully starting a self-sufficient game studio.

There have been already multiple KS I’m-making-a-game campaigns where the money got wasted/or didn’t suffice for finishing their respective projects. It’s something that will happen on a much larger scale now after the DFA craze I’m afraid.

Crowd-funding is great, only not for the first projects. Not for people without experience.

     

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Ascovel - 09 June 2013 08:29 AM

Yet people who consider starting their own campaign should care.

The true goal of a developer is not meeting the financial goal of a campaign, it’s not making a nice demo, but making a game to the end and hopefully starting a self-sufficient game studio.

There have been already multiple KS I’m-making-a-game campaigns where the money got wasted/or didn’t suffice for finishing their respective projects. It’s something that will happen on a much larger scale now after the DFA craze I’m afraid.

Crowd-funding is great, only not for the first projects. Not for people without experience.

Lilly looking through is their first project. Animators or designers in busy large scale pipelines means nothing compared to creating a game from scratch on your own.

The reason why most of us trusted that project and backed it was not because of their CV but because of the fully realised demo put into the public eye.

It demonstrated a an engine capable of realising their artistic vision, gameplay that was already focueds and enjoyable, and overall instilled a confidence that these guys knew what they were doing.

Your point is true. but you might be missing my point. I’m saying that having tangible proof on your computer to be played that a developer knows exactly what they are doing and will be creating something special can be a big boon to a kickstarter to help you complete the game.

By no means am i inviting every first time developer to release a badly realised demo and expect people to throw money at you. But Geeta Games weren’t household names, and had never led teams, they just created something that proved to people they were the real deal.

Anyone with enough talent and hard work can do that, regardless of whether you worked as a bin man all your life. You just need to prove yourself with something tangible before ever considering kickstarter.

And even though i think you disagree a great demo IS tangible enough proof in my opinion, as getting to that point requires most of the technical and creative work to be done, lowering any future risk of collapse.

I would rather back a campaign with a fully realised demo, over a pitch by a famous old industry professional. You can PLAY the game in question, you can see it and experience it, and know where its at. That’s WAY less risky than trusting an old hand who is hoping to make a millions off his reputation.

An example would be that Obsidian kickstarter that broke even DFA’s record. They haven’t made a good game in years. It was off reputation and promises alone. Sure the game will come, but what if its to their usual standard? Alpha Protocol was their last original IP…that has me more skeptical than a small team asking for $18k after releasing a breathtaking demo to the world.

It’s all my personal opinion of course, I just wanted to explain my reasoning fully. I Don’t want to elongate the debate needlessly.

 

     
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I think you got me wrong, I agree with what you say about the importance of passion, discipline etc. I’m not opposing any of this. You can have a lot of skill and talent without working in the entertainment industry. Even have bolder, more interesting ideas. And surely everyone deserves a chance. But that doesn’t have anything to do with the need to use Kickstarter. You don’t have to use Kickstarter at all to make games. And most definitely you don’t need to go to Kickstarter with your first project.

My purpose in this thread was simply to warn inexperienced developers (especially young people) from starting out by focusing on showing off their talents to the Internet (that includes demos, campaigns, promotions, crowd-funding) and trying to blow people away with bits of this and that instead of starting simple, small and learning the production process through and through. As fun as making a good impression quickly sounds, that’s actually a direct way to derail your dream project if you don’t have the necessary perspective of what it takes to secure a consistent quality of work until the end. If you’ll invest time and energy (and your ego) into promising people a quality you won’t be able to maintain, you may later suffer the consequences for years.

Again, I have a huge respect for Geeta. But one really shouldn’t compare them to typical first time developers. Geeta are professionals that went indie. From the Geeta website:

Steve Hoogendyk is the Game Designer, Programmer, and Creative Director of Lilly Looking Through.

He has worked 6 years in film on such movies as Harry Potter, Alice in Wonderland, and The Chronicles of Narnia, as well as Animated features including Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and Walt Disney’s Bolt .  With over 8 years experience in Video Games, he worked as a production designer,  game designer, and artist on many adventure games including Myst 3:Exile™, RealMyst™, and Uru™: Ages Beyond Myst.

That means experience not only in working in games, specifically adventure games, but also having seen how million-dollar projects are organized. Finally, Lilly Looking Through had a professional publisher since a long time into production, has enjoyed the benefits of that and will go instantly in retail once completed.

Geeta is simply not a good example to show to an average guy who wants to make a game.

     

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Idrisguitar - 09 June 2013 09:06 AM

The reason why most of us trusted that project and backed it was not because of their CV but because of the fully realised demo put into the public eye.

...


Anyone with enough talent and hard work can do that, regardless of whether you worked as a bin man all your life. You just need to prove yourself with something tangible before ever considering kickstarter.

I think basically you two are saying the same thing.
But I’d like to put emphasis on the “hard work” part.
Having worked in any field for several years and having finished a product within a professional team means a lot of practice and experience.
While you have to wear several hats when doing your very own game that’s one less field you have to worry about and it’s not unlikely that you got to know a lot of experts in other fields who you can turn to if you need someone to help you out. (And be it for nothing more than an estimate.)

Someone starting out from scratch with no experience will most of the time need several years to even get to that point.
(Unless they are very good judges of their own abilities early on and are able to use those accordingly. )


edit: What he said.
Wink

     
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Just because you don’t /need/ to go to Kickstarter with your first project doesn’t mean it’s not a financially solid decision on the creators behalf. For some it could be seen as a pre-order system with added exposure from news outlets.

If you have a solid product on your hands I don’t get why you should be humble and release it for free or not go to Kickstarter just because you haven’t released anything prior to this.

I’m not saying any random person should go to Kickstarter, but if what you’ve got is a great game, even if it’s your first, then why not?

     

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