Game Publishing/Business

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Fuzzy Bug — Thu, 29 May 2008 02:59:06 GMT

Don't forget the money side of things. How much will it cost? What's the target market? How many do you expect to sell? How much profit? How much cash do you need? How much of a return can I expect?

And make sure the figures aren't just hopeful, plucked out of the air ones!

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Qu — Fri, 23 May 2008 03:42:05 GMT

Another thing I'd do is make darn sure the art was up-to-scratch.

Unless you've got some completely novel gameplay idea (the example that springs to mind is Portal), you really need the pretty pictures. As much as I believe in gameplay, and think it is the most important element of the game, the simple fact is that your potential employers aren't going to give your demo enough time for them to really get into the game.

Therefore you need good art, to hold their attention long enough for them to realise "Hey, this is fun!". Please note: That doesn't mean you need massive next-gen graphics. But your art needs to be professional enough to hold their eye. Consider the atmosphere of your promo level, and tailor the textures and lighting to reflect it.

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Exadon — Wed, 21 May 2008 00:30:17 GMT

That is correct ...and I was just looking for any feedback on things you felt were worth it (ofcourse the demo as stated above)

my resume is sub par though so I doubt it would be a selling point

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

drodbert — Tue, 20 May 2008 20:47:28 GMT

Thanks for your detailed response Shawn. Sounds pretty brutal.

One question, when you say "you need some supporting materials in addition to the game itself", do you mean some kind of document that answers the "Who are you and what experience do you have" questions? Like a set of resumes for the team and some kind of company background?

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Shawn Hargreaves — Tue, 20 May 2008 18:16:35 GMT

George Clingerman:
If it's not in the game and I need a document to explain my idea of what I WOULD have put in the game, I'm not ready for investors.

I don't know if you need a formal design document, but I do think you need some supporting materials in addition to the game itself.

If I was going to invest in a company, no matter how much I liked their demo I would also want answers to some questions like:

Who are you? How many people? Who makes the decisions? Are you a bunch of kids who are about to go off to college next year and lose interest in this project? Are you a group of friends who are going to fall out with each other and be unable to finish the project? How do I know you're going to stick with this to give me a return on my investment?

What is your track record? Any other finished games? Do you have any experience of testing, localization, and suchlike issues? If not, how are you going to get that?

How much work is left to be done on the game? What additional things are planned for it? How much is that going to cost? I'd want to see financial numbers to convince me you've thought everything through properly.

The other thing to bear in mind is that people with lots of money tend to be very, very busy. It is unlikely they will play your game for 30 minutes: more likely you will get 5, but they might even quit after 60 seconds if you haven't grabbed their attention.

So giving them a full version of an actual game is probably not a good idea. A real game starts the player out gradually, has a copyright screen, some menus, then a tutorial that introduces the gameplay. Most games only start to get really fun by level 2 or 3. But in a sales pitch, if your copyright screen takes 10 seconds and then your main menu takes 20, you've wasted half your initial pitch time for no gain at all! It's much better to make a special build that takes out everything that could possibly slow things down, and makes 100% sure they will see the things you most want them to see straight from the outset. When I was pitching game ideas we would often also build a special level just for the sales pitch. Forget it making sense or having a good progression of difficulty: we would just pile all the cool stuff right into the first 10 seconds to make sure they got to see it all. We'd also tweak it to be ridiculously easy to make sure they didn't die before they got to see everything we wanted them to (if they die and have to respawn, that might be it: they might well not have time to play through again to get past that monster to the next part of your carefully constructed level).

I've been on the other side of that a few times in the past, for instance I once made it into the annual meeting of all the directors at Eidos to demo a prototype. It all went wrong: took too long to drive from the start point to the interesting bit of the level, then I died and respawned in a boring place, and after literally about 30 seconds we got the "ok, thanks guys, we'll let you know". And of course they never got back in touch :-) I learned a lot from that about the importance of constructing a demo to make sure all your good stuff is visible right from the outset...

The final problem is, how do you even get your game in front of these people? This is again not a document, but it is possibly the most important thing of all. You have 30 seconds (maybe talking to someone you met at a conference, or in the subject line of an email) to grab their attention and make them want to look at your demo.

This would not be a good email:

> Subject: "Game demo"

> Hello, please check out this demo for a game I've been working on.

> Attachment: game.zip (90 megabytes)

That tells me nothing to make me want to unzip it.

But an email with a couple of pages of design document text and pictures isn't good either: busy execs probably wouldn't bother to read so much information.

If you can come up with a description of your game that is short enough to fit in an email subject line, but interesting enough to make someone want to look further, that's a hugely important part of getting your foot in the door so that someone will take a look at your full demo.

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

The ZMan — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:35:39 GMT

Find out their goals for the possible investement. Is it to return a profit or just pure altruism.

If its profit you better show up with a business plan that is well researched.

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Exadon — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:09:12 GMT

very good points, thanks for your input

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

George Clingerman — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:01:00 GMT

What else would be needed? I wouldn't present anything less than a completed game. Only thing that should need to be done to get it released is updated sounds, music and art assets. No documentation should be necessary to explain or add to what they are seeing.

If it's not in the game and I need a document to explain my idea of what I WOULD have put in the game, I'm not ready for investors.

Now if the game development tools weren't all free, this would be a different scenario. Obviously some funding would be needed if you actually had any startup costs. But when there is no cost and you don't take the time to invest your own time completely into something, how can you ask someone to invest their money?

So nope, no documentation. The game should speak for itself.

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Exadon — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:54:49 GMT

George Clingerman:
Seeing how everything you need to make a game demo is free, I think I as an investor would be extremely disappointed coming to me just to pitch an idea. Would definitely show a a serious lack of motivation on your part.

If I was to pitch an idea, I would turn on my laptop, hand the father and son controllers and say have fun. Anything less would just be silly on my part.

Would you prepare any documents with the demo? or just let the demo do the talking

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

George Clingerman — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:45:59 GMT

Seeing how everything you need to make a game demo is free, I think I as an investor would be extremely disappointed coming to me just to pitch an idea. Would definitely show a a serious lack of motivation on your part.

If I was to pitch an idea, I would turn on my laptop, hand the father and son controllers and say have fun. Anything less would just be silly on my part.

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

The ZMan — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:30:02 GMT

Google 'Elevator Pitch' (though technically thats more like 1 minute). That will give you lots of information on how to pitch a business idea in a short period of time. Its not an easy skill to aquire.

Re: You have 30 mins or less...go

Dugor — Mon, 19 May 2008 10:44:10 GMT

You tell him that you could save the world if he funded the idea.

You have 30 mins or less...go

Exadon — Mon, 19 May 2008 10:41:53 GMT

Let’s say you have a friend who’s father just won the lottery. 50 million or so. His father gave each of his kids one million dollars…but would be more then willing to give them more if they were to start a worth wild company/business of their own.

Your friend has been living off the million and not really motivated to do much else…but has agreed to meet with you (and perhaps bring his father as well) to hear your ideas on creating a development studio for small games.

They give you 30 mins or less to convey your ideas. What do you say, what do you bring?

What can you do to sell yourself to your friend and his father,

Discuss your ideas