Off Topic New Company??

[Manship97]

Before i start, I just want to say that it's only an idea, so don't hate please

Now, my idea:

I'm into gaming, mainly sports, but i don't mind other genres besides sport. I also like money as i'm sure you do as well

I think it would be awesome to create a new video game creating/developing company. It may seem a little far fetched at first, but just think about it, if we all help out, all pitch in, it will lift off, hopefully to become successful.

So basically, I'm asking if anybody wants to set up a new video game manufacture. Feel free to comment with questions about it, let me know what you think of it (please don't be harsh), or that you're interested

[Dec]

I do a games development course and I really think you need to research this. Publishing isn't the easiest thing hence why only big companies do it, but it is also becoming less needed with the rise of apps, actual making is a lot harder than you think. You need 3D modellers, sound engineers, GUI/HUD designers, graphic designers then actual coders.

No offence but you're living in a dream. If life was that easy then everyone would do it.

[Manship97]

thanks for the advice. i know it isnt easy. and no offence at you either, but i bet someone who is in an important role in a big games company got told he was living in a dream land before he started.

or if not actually making a company, just coming together to pitch a new idea of a game to a company.

like i said, just an idea

[Dec]

Probably but he probably had a skillset and money needed. You are underestimating the amount of work needed to even do a pitch. "I want a game like COD but with robots" doesn't count. My game pitch for College was over 24 pages long and still only got a pass, that included market/target audience research, a HCD, Alpha map walkthroughs, PCs, NPCs, Controller mappings, Story and much more.

Plus do you know how much money it costs to set it up with industry standard software alone? Then you'd have to hire people and get Apple license (£99) to even get your game on the market.

[Manship97]

why do you assume my pitch would have been whatever you said about COD, i know the compnaies aren't stupid.

[rayjayokocha]

Probably but he probably had a skillset and money needed. You are underestimating the amount of work needed to even do a pitch. "I want a game like COD but with robots" doesn't count. My game pitch for College was over 24 pages long and still only got a pass, that included market/target audience research, a HCD, Alpha map walkthroughs, PCs, NPCs, Controller mappings, Story and much more.

Plus do you know how much money it costs to set it up with industry standard software alone? Then you'd have to hire people and get Apple license (£99) to even get your game on the market.

No offence Dec, but you can do 50 pages for a pitch/report and it may cover what needs to be covered, but one thing i learnt from college is that it's not how much you do, it's about the detail you put in.

You can do a bit on all the bits you need to talk about, but if there's not enough depth, you won't get anything above a pass. I know this because we had lads in my college who was doing 30 page essays but only getting passes/merits then someone would do 20 pages and get a distinction, and that was purely because they touched on all the parts needed, but just done it more in depth.

Yes they moaned like girls about it, but they knew what they had to do to get a distinction and never done it, so it was their own fault.

Am not saying you never done that, you might have but the grading might be more strict

As for the idea, i play 2 games, Trophy Manager and Funky Snooker, both are great games, but both have their faults. If your serious about this you need to accept constructive criticism and community opinions. It's a guarantee that you won't please everyone, and that's something you'll have to live with.

If your doing it for the money, then your doing it for the wrong reason. Both of the games i play have money grabbing owners who'll do anything to squeeze a few quid out of you.

There's nothing wrong way making money from it, but when your not listening to your users, you have to expect them to be peeved off.

What kind of game are you looking to make? If your looking to do an online Football Management game, then don't bother as Trophy Manager will blitz you out of the park.

why do you assume my pitch would have been whatever you said about COD, i know the compnaies aren't stupid.

I think it was a general example mate.

[Manship97]

thanks, and i know i wont please everyone i dunno about the game type, havent thought about in depth, just wanted to get the idea accros

[Dec]

I know Ray but I only covered the minimum to get a pass and still did 24 pages. The ones who got a distinction did over 50!

[rayjayokocha]

I know Ray but I only covered the minimum to get a pass and still did 24 pages. The ones who got a distinction did over 50!

Ah right, that makes sense :lol: I could of got more merits/distinctions if i tried but i couldn't be bothered haha.

[Dec]

I am the same, I have mostly merits but cannot be bothered on some so have passes . The fact is creating a game isn't easy at all, even a pitch isn't the quickest thing and if you're after a quick buck you may as well stop now.

[Franco]

Wouldn't it be best to have some ideas to throw around first before you go about shooting these ideas? Not having a go but I'd have thought people who begin games companies have a few ideas at first to get them under way.

[Jens]

Mate, you're 14

It's way to early to think about this kind of stuff, just enjoy being a school kid. Also, the business side would murder you

Economics 101: have an idea, then get a million dollar-worth investor.

[Ali]

Sorry, but let the guy have his dream. Yeah, it might not go anywhere but people are allowed to have aspirations. I say go for it mate, if you believe you have something that can revolutionise the industry, make it happen.

Minecraft anyone?

[whyelse]

The guy who wrote minecraft could code and use PS (not very well but could use it ). He has started his own game development company because he got people to code and others to use PS so they will be focused on their own part. You could use the uk version of kickstarter (can never remember the name) to get some cash to start if you really want

[Dec]

Difference is he could code and knew people who also could . Also he had an idea .

[Ceirdiff]

Creating a game is easy, as is publishing - by far the biggest problem is getting word of your game out there. I could name countless games with a tiny development team of just a few people that were insanely popular - VVVVVV, World of Goo, Spacechem, Minecraft (obv...), Angry Birds, Braid, Osmos to name a few.

Why do you need industry standard software? Eclipse is basically there - it was originally commercial software from IBM and it has all the debugging tools that you'll need built in, plus well developed plugins for major languages other than Java (these days high-level languages such as python are becoming far more commonly used for games outside of the engine which needs to be a blazingly fast low level language, C++ or Java).

You don't need 3D modellers, especially if it's a 2D game, otherwise you create placeholder art until you have finished at least the prototype to know whether the game is fun or not. Not much point in sound engineers when you have software such as bfxr available, and any self-respecting programmer should be learning how to use the mixer lib of their preferred library.

Again, GUI designers - the programmers can program in ugly looking stuff at least until the prototype is done.

What you're saying about game design documents is a bit outdated dec, maybe it happens at the massive companies, but these days most indie companies (including myself, but I have so far neglected to publish any of my games) work on a prototyping basis. That is, we take a ridiculously high-level such as python and code out an interesting game mechanic in 100-200 lines of code to see if it feels fun. If it does then create more related prototypes and further develop the current one until it's much more in-depth to give you a real clue to how it feels; otherwise just create more prototypes.

Whenever you want to add more mini-games or non-standard features into your game you prototype those separately - for example when I was working out how I wanted crafting to work in my new game (runescape style would take an inane amount of effort for so many half-stages and because it's plain boring; minecraft style still didn't really offer me the flexibility I wanted, so instead of just gave the player a knife and let them cut things up and stuff - you'd have to see it ;D) I prototyped that extensibly before finally converting the code over to a more suitable format.

I will say though, you have no hope of setting up a games company unless you are very experienced in art/music and are able to produce such assets on an industrial scale and know a programmer very well, or are a (at minimum) decent programmer yourself.