My friend Chris Cross from Tarver Games, makers of the excellent Ghosts Attack for iPhone, has started a blog. It’s a blend of business and pleasure. By business, I mean updates on Tarver’s development efforts. By pleasure I mean donkeys, monkeys, and classic cars. He’s a hilarious and smart guy, so I encourage you to check it out!
Category: Game Developers
AIAS to Induct Mark Cerny into its Hall of Fame
The Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences (AIAS) has announced that Mark Cerny will be its 13th inductee into its hall of fame. I’m totally jazzed by this news. I have the utmost respect for Cerny and think he’s an amazing talent. For whatever reason, he’s always flown under the radar compared to his contemporaries and has been woefully underrated by Joe Gamer. Thankfully the AIAS is here to bring this awesome talent to everyone’s attention. Since I’m a Cerny mark, I implore you to read this lengthy bit from the AIAS’ press release:
In 1985 Cerny joined Sega, relocating to its Tokyo offices and transitioning from arcade games to cartridge-based games for home systems. At the time, he spoke no Japanese, however he quickly became proficient in the language. In addition to creating conventional games such as Shooting Gallery for the Sega Master System, Cerny worked in the extreme high-tech end of the 1980’s console business, setting up a line of 3-D games using active shutter glasses, and an online games network — both projects ahead of their time. After three years in Tokyo he returned to the US, where he founded and managed the Sega Technical Institute and oversaw the development of Sonic the Hedgehog 2.
Cerny joined Universal Studios in 1994 to set up product development at their interactive group, as VP and later President. Shifting to a producer role, Cerny managed the design and development of the Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon series for PlayStation, focusing on enhancing the games’ appeal for the Japanese market. The games were blockbuster hits, selling over 30 million units internationally. In Japan, the Crash Bandicoot series became the most successful foreign developed, character-based video game of all time, a distinction it still holds today.
In 1998, Cerny founded Cerny Games where he consulted on behalf of Universal Studios of subsequent Spyro the Dragon and Crash Bandicoot titles. He then worked with Insomniac and Naughty Dog on their debut titles for PlayStation 2 as engine programmer for Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy and game designer for Ratchet & Clank.
His resume is pretty awesome, don’t you agree? Congrats to Mr. Cerny for this well deserved honor.
Square Enix’s Tetsuya Nomura Has Two New Games in the Pipe
Square Enix’s Tetsuya Nomura — the James Brown of the gaming industry for being one of the hardest working men in the business — has two games in the pipe. With his work on Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep nearly done, the renowned character designer and game director still has Final Fantasy XIII Versus on his plate…which of course isn’t enough for him. Translating a recent issue of Famitsu, Andriasang quoted Nomura as saying:
There’s a title that’s yet to be shown that’s progressing faster than expected. Development is progressing smoothly. Voice recording has started. It’s not totally new, but there’s one more more unannounced title. Please look forward to the announcement.
Any guesses as to what Nomura is working on?
Akira Yamaoka Leaves Konami?
Akira Yamaoka might not be a familiar name in your gaming household, but you definitely know the games he’s most famous for: the Silent Hill series. He has composed the music for all the Silent Hill games and has served as the series’ producer since SH3. According to Aeropause, Yamaoka has left the building:
After sixteen years at the company, Akira Yamaoka has left Konami.
It would appear that he has left the company entirely rather than moving to another international division. As you would expect, there has been no formal confirmation from Konami, so right now this is an unconfirmed rumour — albeit one generated from a pretty reliable source.
I’m a little stunned by this one. I always thought Yamaoka would be a lifer at Konami, similar to Kojima and Igarashi. He’s been attached to the Silent Hill series since the beginning and it’ll be weird (but cool) to see him doing something else.
The news is a bit personal for me, since Akira was the first Japanese developer to greet me with a friendly hug instead of a professional handshake. This one time (not at band camp), we ditched a GDC party to go dancing. It was cool watching a sound designer and music composer dance.
Gas Powered Games’ Chris Taylor Talks Working with Square Enix, Challenges in the New Economy, Going Digital, and More
From Total Annihilation to Dungeon Siege to Supreme Commander, Chris Taylor has a long and storied history with real-time strategy games. Gas Powered Games’ founder and lead designer on the upcoming Supreme Commander 2
Raymond Padilla: Hey Chris! How is the funniest man in game development doing these days?
Chris Taylor: Keeping the dream alive, as I like to say!
RP: You’re hard at work on Supreme Commander 2. While lots of people are excited about the game, I’m really interested in your experiences working with Square Enix. From your dealings, what are the differences between working with a Western publisher and a Japanese one?
CT: They’ve been really great to work with, and they’ve easily been among the best publishers we’ve ever worked with. Truly a pleasure.
RP: Did you ever get the “token white guy” feeling during business meetings with Square Enix?
CT: LOL… Come here Ray… can I have a hug?
Gas Powered Games’ Chris Taylor on How Gaming Has Changed
You’d never know this from his boyish good looks, but Gas Powered Games founder Chris Taylor has been in game development for more than two decades. Starting way back in 1988, someone thought it would be funny to hire a Canadian guy to work on baseball games. Since then, Taylor has made a huge name for himself with games like Total Annihilation, Dungeon Siege, and Supreme Commander.
Chris and his team are busy working on Supreme Commander 2, but he generously gave me some time to answer a few questions. Talking about the changes he’s seen in 21 years in the business, Taylor said:
Well, our target market has changed. The whole business has opened up to include many new types of players. It used to be 18-35 yr. old males, and now the rest of the world is playing games. This is a very good thing, but it also means that we have to think differently about what gaming is. We also play online now more than ever, but not in a competitive way, it’s actually about playing together, which I think is a great change. We also play on more devices than ever, and are focusing less and less about technology whizbang, and more on the actual gameplay, characters and story. And I guess I would be insane not to mention the increase in computing power, and visuals. I started out on a TRS-80 with 128×48 pixels, that were black and white no less…
My full interview Grandmaster Sexay Chris Taylor will run on Monday. Be sure to come back and check it out!
Supreme Commander 2 Walkthrough with Chris Taylor
Gas Powered Games founder and lead designer Chris Taylor — the funniest man in game development — gives an excellent walkthrough of his upcoming game, Supreme Commander 2
I’ve been chatting with Chris lately and I will have a full interview with this handsome man soon. In the meantime, let me know what you think of this walkthrough video.
Lorne Lanning Talks Oddworld’s Future, Reaching New Fans Through Digital Distribution, Citizen Siege, Social Gaming, and More
One of the most wonderfully imaginative developers in the business, Oddworld Inhabitants (Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee, Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath) has been a little quiet for the last few years. Its recent PSN releases indicate that the company is ready to make a move. Oddworld looks poised to shake things up in the near future, doing it with its trademark creativity and independence (naturally!). I recently caught up with company co-founder Lorne Lanning to talk about what’s going on with Oddworld, what the PSN releases mean to him, social gaming, being a creative developer in a harsh economic climate, the status of Citizen Siege, working with Electronic Arts, and more. While he didn’t say anything outright, it’s pretty clear where he thinks the gaming business is going and how he thinks Oddworld should approach it.
Raymond Padilla: First off, how are you doing? What’s new and exciting with you, Lorne?
Lorne Lanning: Doing great, in spite of the economy, which definitely makes all efforts more challenging.
We’re working on something new / something different, but we haven’t been able to talk about it yet — hope to in the not too distant future.
RP: With Abe’s Oddysee and Abe’s Exoddus hitting the PlayStation Network, your games have a chance to reach a whole new generation of players. How does it feel to introduce Abe to gamers that could barely hold a controller when the games were originally released?
LL: You mean, beyond feeling old?!? Beyond that, of course it’s a joy to see the fan mail from new players that have just discovered these games. A bit time machine’ish I should say. The feedback is fresh, it’s new to them, so there’s something that feels very much like it did when the games first came out. A lot of people got passionate about Abe. Now we’re seeing it again, and it’s the same vibe and reaction of newness, but a different generation. A bit Déjà to the last millennium.
When I see them write, “I remember my father used to play, but I was too young” it’s a serious testament to just how quickly time flies and how quickly the times change. We’re thrilled that the Abe games are finding a new audience, especially considering that we didn’t even foresee the future of digital distribution back when we originally built these games. I mean, most people still didn’t know what www.com meant back in ‘94 when we started building Abe. Strange how different a world it already is today.
Final Fantasy XIII Release Date and Developer Announcement Video
As many of you expected, Square Enix has announced the North American release date for Final Fantasy XIII
Aside from being hosted by a total tool, the video is pretty slick. I love that it features the game and its creators. March 9, 2010 is just around the corner. I’m pretty sure I’ll have Dragon Age out of my system by the time FFXIII is released. I can’t wait!
Are you psyched for FFXIII? Is it a day one purchase for you? What did you think of the developer video?
Oddworld’s Lorne Lanning on Reaching a New Audience on PSN
A few weeks ago, I wrote about Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee and Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus hitting Sony’s PlayStation Network. These are two fantastic games from one of the most creative and imaginative developers in the business: Oddworld Inhabitants. I recently asked company co-founder Lorne Lanning what it was like reaching a whole new generation of gamers through PSN. He told me:
It’s a joy to see the fan mail from new players that have just discovered these games. A bit time machine’ish I should say. The feedback is fresh, it’s new to them, so there’s something that feels very much like it did when the games first came out. A lot of people got passionate about Abe. Now we’re seeing it again, and it’s the same vibe and reaction of newness, but a different generation. A bit Déjà to the last millenium.
When I see them write, “I remember my father used to play, but I was too young” it’s a serious testament to just how quickly time flies and how quickly the times change. We’re thrilled that the Abe games are finding a new audience, especially considering that we didn’t even foresee the future of digital distribution back when we originally built these games. I mean, most people still didn’t know what www.com meant back in ’94 when we started building Abe. Strange how different a world it already is today.
Strange? How about odd?!? Bwahahahahaha!!! Seriously though, this is just a snippet from my conversation with Lorne. He went over a wide variety of topics with me and his answers were most interesting (some of them even juicy!). Stay tuned for my full interview with Oddworld Inhabitants’ Lorne Lanning!
For now, I wanted to see if any of you have downloaded these Abe re-releases or if you’re planning to. Anyone digging the Oddworld universe more than a decade after it was revealed? Are you excited by the possibilities of more Oddworld games in the future?