The new magical order

from JoeUser Forums

As mentioned last week on November 1st I’ll be resuming my traditional position as Executive Producer and lead designer (the position I held on our previous games) so that someone who can dedicate their full attention to Elemental can succeed me. 

My successor, Kael (Derek Paxton), is well known in the Civilization community for Fall from Heaven, a rich, fantasy-based mod.  If anyone is qualified to take over the reigns of Elemental, it’s him.

In addition, we recently brought on something we haven’t previously done, an Associate Producer. This is something we should have done on Elemental but we were still structured like we were when our games were just a half dozen people projects.  Toby Sarnelle was recently added to the Elemental project to work with Kael.  They shall bring order to the chaos. :)

I want to emphasize that I’m not going anywhere. I’ll still be part of the project and posting plenty but my journals will increasingly be about the part of the game I’ll be involved in most – the computer AI.   For v1.1, I’ve started handing the producing efforts to Toby in preparation for Kael’s arrival on November 1.

So how does game design differ from being a producer?  Let me give you a few examples from v1.1’s work.

The Design:

v1.1 technology tree has a cavalry sub-tree now.  The design calls for the new technologies to give new abilities to your existing cavalry units such as “Charge” and “Evade” (to evade arrows).

Producing:

v1.1 engine doesn’t support adding abilities to existing units. Alternative proposal: Those techs provide new types of mounts: (e.g. War Horse) that do have these abilities.

The Compromise

The Executive Producer thus has to make the call as to whether that is an acceptable workaround or if they are willing to increase the budget and due date for the release in order to extend the engine to support that.

Those are the kinds of calls that have to be made all the time in game development.  The challenge is making the right judgment call on when to implement the work around and when to spend the time/money to update the engine.  On a new game, this can be perilous (as we have already seen) because you make the wrong call on something and you can cripple the entire game experience.  This is why sequels tend to be better because you already have a feeling for what game mechanics will work and which ones won’t.

It’s also why the Designer and the Producer are generally not the same person. Checks and balances.  One of my funnest experiences (on development) was with Demigod.  On that project, I was the Executive Producer, Mike Marr (GPG) was the designer and Bartosz Kijanka (GPG) was the producer.  One of the reasons why Demigod is such a good game was because of how effectively the 3 of us were able to work together.

The importance of the triumvirate

These days, it seems like everyone wants to be a “game designer”. People ask me what does it take to be a game designer? The answer is you had better have a good handle on how games are actually made.  Anyone can sit down and whip up a 300 page design document outlining their ultimate sci-fi vs. fantasy real time strategy/RPG/FPS game. What makes someone a good designer is how well they can design something that can actually be made profitably: Time, Scope, Budget.  So for starters, make sure you know how to program. Have you ever made your own game? Have you ever made a substantial mod? These are important basic skills to get started.  Hence, people who want to be game designers, IMO, should get a degree in computer science or some other technical field – not “game design”.

Similarly, if you want to be a Game Producer, the key skills here are project management. Can you make sure your artists, developers, balancers, etc. are all moving according to schedule? It’s like juggling. :)

In my case, I’m a good but not great game designer. I’m a good but not great Game Producer. My “special” skill is that I’m good (but not great) across the breadth of game creation.  This is an important skill if you want to start your own game studio but can be detrimental once it becomes successful because you need to begin stepping back to replace “good” with “great” at the earliest opportunity and that can be hard to do.

Anyway…

I don’t really have a particular point I’m trying to make in this rambling journal other than to give those of you who are interested in the game industry a glimpse of what things are like.

127,496 views 64 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

Always nice to hear from you, Frogboy.  I find these little glimpses into the dark realm of game creation to be quite interesting.  I'm very excited to see what you have in store for us with 1.1 and the future expansions.

Keep up the great work.  I, for one, certainly appreciate all the work you put into the game and all your hours of dedication.

 

Cheers,

Ishantil

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

"These days, it seems like everyone wants to be a “game designer”."

I am fairly confident that this will be taken amiss but I do think that it is important to post and, with any luck, it will remain posted and not start some sort of flame war. That said, it is not my intention to start a flame war but to post a very concise and bold point that has become more and more the case in recent years.

Everyone doesn't want to be a game designer, everyone just has a whole bunch of neat little ideas lurking about in their heads. Everyone doesn't want to be a computer and/or network technician either, everyone just wants to have some idea on how things work. Unfortunately, our games have been less and less complete, in many ways, and this is a continuing trend. Moreover, technical support for our games, because they are less and less complete, is also almost absent where it isn't atrocious and players are forced to find workarounds because issues simply will not get fixed. A third and final point of note here is that even though many PC users choose to know little about how their systems and technology works there is a definite argument to be made about companies using that information and providing 'bare bones' support for their technology, viz. 'server side' issues.

I understand that I have backed none of this with game examples; I have done this because for the trolls and staunch defenders of how things are there cannot be enough examples and for the people who understand they are already nodding their heads about this and remembering examples from their own experience. I have also done this because the point isn't the games that are broken from the top down but that our hobby, gaming, is breaking from the top down. So, here is my point. Vast quantities of feedback do not mean that people want to be designers and bug reports do not mean that people want to be technicians: players are forced to do the work that the companies clearly aren't doing and are trying to fill themselves in with information that they will not be given.

There are many reasons why things are wrong and there is little point in analysing what is wrong until we collectively admit that. This means the companies as well and this especially means that the company that gave us the Gamers' Bill of Rights needs to be at the point of that. People have been criticising Stardock seemingly non-stop since the launch of Elemental and I think that is where all of these intensely personal dev journals are coming from. That's ok, Frogboy is demonstrating something very important that we should all respect. I just hope that he can go one further and look at the culture around him, around gaming companies, and put teeth on the aforementioned document.

Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Frogboy, with all these changes, will there be room for someone to handle a formal bug tracking list, and provide feed back that they are being worked on, or will be worked on? Seeing many updates with no resolution for what to us meer mortals seems like simple bugs, and then getting no feedback on those leads to IMHO a lot of frustration for us.. 

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Thank you for the update.  I was very curious what the changes would look like and the time table for these changes.  The addition of another talnted producer is excellent news.  I can see that E:WoM is on the right track.

 

Good luck!!!

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Thanks for that inside viewpoint Brad. I'm trying to get out of my current existence and get into game design/development. I have a degree in Computer Science, but I am planning on doing a 2 year specialised course (if I can hi-jack someone elses empty schedule).

On the subject of postponing the new patch for heavier engine modification, my purely personal opinion as a games consumer is that implementing the unit abilities is well worth the wait. Judging from many of the sentiments put forward in the forums, I would say that there are quite a few people who might agree with me on that. From a budget/business perspective - don't ask me. :grin:

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Very interesting post. :)

Looking forward to the new horsies!

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

The Design:
v1.1 technology tree has a cavalry sub-tree now.  The design calls for the new technologies to give new abilities to your existing cavalry units such as “Charge” and “Evade” (to evade arrows).
End of quote

YES!
Producing:
v1.1 engine doesn’t support adding abilities to existing units. Alternative proposal: Those techs provide new types of mounts: (e.g. War Horse) that do have these abilities.
End of quote
Well, that sounds acceptable in this instance. In some cases, it's better from a simulationist perspective. But it somewhat limits the potential of the cavalry tree to branch. And this weakness of the engine seems like something that ought to be nipped in the bud early if possible; that's a capability that could be valuable for lots of things. And requiring new equipment all the time is also liable to clutter the interface
The Compromise
The Executive Producer thus has to make the call as to whether that is an acceptable workaround or if they are willing to increase the budget and due date for the release in order to extend the engine to support that.
End of quote
So... what's the compromise in this case?

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

Cruxador made the posti was going to make.

Thanks for saving me some work :)

 

So, i hope you upgraded the engine. Its an ability that just invaluable going forward.

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

Thx for this update.  I know only a little about producing or designing games. These views behind the curtain are very interesting.  

Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

Maybe some people are better game designers than others. Maybe they have a more imaginative ideas with bigger forsight on what it will take a project. The idea of creating a world where theres only 2 races that are actually very similar in gameplay and creating a world that is bleak should be big no no's off the bat in a turn based fantasy strategy.

Reply #12 from Elemental Forums Top

Good reading, and I love the ideas about the tech tree actually developing your army abilities more. Will this be extended into other areas? Magic seems to stand out here.

 

Now if you can all just get the factions right - different factions have markedly different abilities etc - then I reckon things will really pick up. Someone along these lines someone should be posting articles on the right way to go about fixing bad game launches.

Reply #13 from Elemental Forums Top

Producing:
v1.1 engine doesn’t support adding abilities to existing units. Alternative proposal: Those techs provide new types of mounts: (e.g. War Horse) that do have these abilities.
The Compromise
The Executive Producer thus has to make the call as to whether that is an acceptable workaround or if they are willing to increase the budget and due date for the release in order to extend the engine to support that.
End of quote

Yah, but could there not be other equipment to produce these effects? It would sound a bit dumb if you needed a special horse for charging.

Why not a war horse saddle to add the Charge ability (got to have a solid seat for that kinda impact) and horse armor (barding) for Evade / Arrow protection.
It's the same principle of an item giving an ability. A visible item and it kinda makes sense.
A change to the unit designer to allow attaching them shouldn't be too excessive.  Just like "parts" in the ship designer could have hardpoints themselves, so would the horse have hardpoints for saddle / armor (barding) / horseshoes / stirrups (not a given and important for actually fighting on a horse).

Different kind of horses should still be research items because not every breed could carry horse armor and an armored knight and still move in a battle.
War Horses indeed. Maybe some hidden stat on the horse item that modifies how long the cooldown after a Charge attack is.
Maybe only the war horse would have a hardpoint for barding.
Even better: there could be different sub trees to research towards faster or stronger (armor / endurance) horses. You rarely get both in breeding.

And it's awesome to see at least some military tech tree growing a bit deeper. Right now it's entirely too easy to research everything which eliminates "choice" from research.
Ranged weapons also have a lot of potential for a deeper tech tree.  A crossbow animation would be a great start because there's only so much you can do with bows.

Reply #14 from Elemental Forums Top

Woaw ! Kael to direct the future of Elemental, for real ?

It's one of the best things that could happen to the game.

 

Does it means that theere is some truth to the rumors that the next Fall From Heaven game would be made using Elemental engine  . :D

 

Reply #15 from Elemental Forums Top

A few tangentially related ideas:

 

On the Horse Branch: I'd suggest that Horse Archery should probably be its own branch also, due to the potential of overpowering.

 

Will Infantry units get special parts of the tree, such as Pike Formation for anti-cavalry? 

 

In regards to the requiring new equipment- I had this idea.

 

Why not dump designing individual pieces of armor, in favor of suits of armor, and shields?   That might simplify things, and also might help artists be more creative- as its easier to design coherent suits of armor, then it is to design coherent pieces.  My experience with Soul Calibur 4 customization taught me this.  Keep Magical rings/bracers/etc separate though.

 

 

Reply #16 from Elemental Forums Top

v1.1 engine doesn’t support adding abilities to existing units.
End of quote

Does that mean that the future (as in, post-1.1) versions of the engine will support this?

Reply #17 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Werewindlefr, reply 16

v1.1 engine doesn’t support adding abilities to existing units.


Does that mean that the future (as in, post-1.1) versions of the engine will support this?
End of Werewindlefr's quote

Let's hope so! :)

Reply #18 from Elemental Forums Top


On that project, I was the Executive Producer, Mike Marr (GPG) was the designer and Bartosz Kijanka (GPG) was the producer.  One of the reasons why Demigod is such a good game was because of how effectively the 3 of us were able to work together.
The importance of the triumvirate
End of quote

Not funny -_-

Reply #19 from Elemental Forums Top

Well if your interested in ideas you could make a white horse! Maybe one for speed and not so much for evade. :)

 

On another note you could also make one that increases AC for the units.

Reply #20 from Elemental Forums Top

Frogboy,  The greatest leaders generally are people who surround themselves with excellence.  They bring into their inner circle (leadership team) individuals who are actually better than they are (at various tasks, responsibilities, etc.)  That's wisdom that borders on genius.  Refreshing to read your journal - how open you are about, well, you!  I, for one, appreciate what you do, and how you are going about it.  Thank you.

 

 

BTW, if my opinion matters on this decision: I would prefer waiting longer for the update, so as to make time to update the engine to allow us players to be able to modify items, unit, etc., in the game.  I am a proponent of allowing maximum 'customization' of the game. 

Reply #21 from Elemental Forums Top

I've always figured that the Producer was the spider in the middle of the gamedeveloper web that ties things together, but I've never understood what's so hard about it. I thought it went like this:

 

Brad: "Boogie, speed it up. You're lagging behind. The balancers/QA needs something to do."

Brad: "Artists. I need a Warhorse and a Warhorse with armor in 1 week. After that, add some Shader Model 4.0 stuff".

Brad: "Balancers. Can you go the magic route and defeat all other factions on the hardest difficulty?   Summary of your testing on my desk in 2 days."

And that kind of work sounds like something anybody can do ;P

 

 

About upgrading the engine vs workaround. Workaround now but upgrade the engine in time for the 1st expansion.

If you have to choose though, then as I don't have the game and isn't affected, upgrade it :P

 

I'm curious though, how much work is it to add that functionality to the engine?

Reply #22 from Elemental Forums Top

As a software developer myself (not games though), I believe any work that you don't want to be in the final product shouldn't be done.  Why?

 

1) It takes time to work on a temporary solution, test it, and then later if you remove it, you have to retest again to make sure by removing that functionality you haven't broken anything.

2) If you give people something, they will complain when it is gone.  (Especially modders who have created 5 different warhorse units for their different race mods)

 

Now, maybe it wasn't the intention to remove warhorses afterwards, but this is still a pretty good rule of thumb as far as development goes.

Reply #23 from Elemental Forums Top

as far as I can tell, Warhorses could still give extra HP and armor ... (after the engine is made better) ... in lieu of no longer being needed to "unlock" the new abilities.

But yea, my vote is for getting it (the way you want it) the first time.

Reply #24 from Elemental Forums Top

I want to emphasize that I’m not going anywhere. I’ll still be part of the project and posting plenty but my journals will increasingly be about the part of the game I’ll be involved in most – the computer AI.

End of quote

 

Thanks all spirits and ghosts. I mean that you do more ai journals and that you stay in contact with the playerbase. 

I think actually you should extend the engine in a way that abilitys can be granted not only by equipment and tech but also spells and other abilitys - atleast for the tactical battles. Like giving the "evade" ability with the hast spell.

Reply #25 from Elemental Forums Top

if you want to be a "VIDEO game designer" you need computer programming skills

But for example, if you want to be a "board game designer" you do not need programming skills.

Sorry but It frustrate me so much when people asume that "Game Design" = "Video game Design"

Yes there are other types of games than video games that still exist (board games and sports are some example). In fact, video games are the last kind of game to appear in human history.