blog: developer blog #16

Aug 07, 2009 Derek Smart

Taking The Long Way Back

Well, both of our new games, two years in the making, launch next week. It has been quite a journey full of aggravation, enlightenment, disillusionment, sadness, anxiety, stress – and every emotion you can possibly imagine when going through game development and dealing with publishers, distributors, contractors, gamers, anti-social misfits (the kind you’d probably throw gasoline on or light your cigar on if they were on fire) posing as gamers and everyone in between. And their dog.

How do I do it? I bury my head in the sand and just get on with it, treating everything else as noise. The only way I know how.

And on most days, the soft and soothing voice of Laura Pausini croons in the background. I don’t speak Spanish, so I have no frigging clue what the heck she’s going on about. But darn, she sounds good. So I bought an Spanish/English dictionary, language CDs, flash cards. The works. Now that I pretty much know what she’s going on about, it is still pretty much the standard fare – but the appeal and attraction lies in the way she sings.

I remember when I first met Laura. It was at a music store. Her Escucha album had been dropped in the jazz section where I was browsing for new music. So I picked it up and this Spanish lady standing next to me said “She’s really good”. So I flipped it over, took one look at the list of songs. And put the CD in my hand-basket. I had no clue what I had just picked up. I moved on; safe in the thought that a total stranger had just made my wallet lighter.

When I got to my car and started playing it, I found that by the time I made the thirty minute drive home, I had listened to “Escucha atento” and “Háblame” about a dozen times. I was madly in love with an artist I had met in passing and on the recommendation of a total stranger – someone I’d never see again in this lifetime.

By the time the dust settled that day, via AmazonMP3, I owned every single album she ever made. There was no going back now -might as well go all in.

As I type this, Laura is crooning “Un Dia Sin Ti” track #10 from her “Las Cosas Que Vives” 1996 album. This iteration is her umpteenth – and I’ve only been in this room for about an hour. And any minute now my daughter is going to saunter in and ask the inevitable “Dad, how many times have you listened to that?”.

I was quite young and naive when I started out and 1989 seems like it happened yesterday. The memories of my first game being a near disaster (no thanks to the old guard at Take Two (TTWO) – all of whom are no longer at the company) back in 1996 and the scars from that engagement still run deep. Every now and again, I’d look at the box of that first Battlecruiser 3000AD product on my shelf and wonder if given the chance whether I’d do it all again. And I’d think, Hell Yeah!!!

But I’ve grown older now. I’m twenty years in and have a wife, a kid, a nice fenced house on the banks of a lake, debt, a relatively bad back, a goatee, White hairs in places I didn’t know hair could grow, a small and dedicated dev team of mostly trustworthy friends, fourteen (100% self-funded) games under my belt and legions of fans around the world. I think I’ve done well for myself all things considered. It could’ve been worse. I guess. A lot of people go through a life less ordinary and with nothing to show for the three score and ten we’re supposedly given.

In our business, persistence, credibility and dedication are key. Back in 1996 when – without my permission or authorization as required by my contract – Take Two made the fateful decision to release my game while still in BETA and not quite ready for commercial release, had I given up where would I be today? Given the history of my other friends who started out with me about the same time or who got there before me, I’d probably be out of the business completely or have switched jobs or laid off due to studio closures and such more times that my car has miles. No, I chose to build and pave my own road. Then subsequently hopped on the ride to destinations unknown.

It has been quite a ride. And a little known fact to most in the biz – as well as gamers – is that my first game actually did make money. In fact, it is right there – neatly tucked inside Take Two’s SEC filing that was to take the company public.

My first game appealed to a group of gamers who somehow saw what I was trying to do. As with that kindly stranger who made me bring Laura home to what has become an unhealthy relationship bordering on obbsessive compulsive listening (wot?), these early gamers were the very ones who spread the word about the game. Though those words were sometimes lost in translation, those who wanted to get their meaning stuck with the game. Since 1996, I have released no less than twelve games across two series of games. Why? Because a group of gamers keep buying them due to the fact that we all share the same idea of what a high-end game and engaging but albeit niche experience space combat means.

As the years gained on my rapidly deteriorating desire to remain in the game development industry, I found myself becoming more and more disillusioned by what goes on around me and the direction that the industry proper has taken. Gamers – the lifeblood of our very existence in the business – have been relegated to numbers in a spreadsheet that some suit somewhere in a brightly lit room is dedicated to updating on an hourly basis. Video game retailers having braced a firm vice like grip around the throats of our publishers and distributors in a subjective stance, reducing the industry to nothing more than a mafia-like mob rife with protection money (a.k.a MDFs), bribery – and begging. Those actions trickle down to us the developers and gamers who keep the wheels turning by churning out our creative works.

My games have a distinct design philosophy. I develop and design games for me. Nobody else. Just me. It just so happens that I sell those games to a group of gamers who want to play them. If I’m not likely to play it, I’m not likely to want to build it.

That said, when I decided to take a break from space combat games and do something else but set within my established game world, I had a choice of what type of game to do. Adventure? Nope. RPG? Nope. RTS? Nope. Casual browser game? Aw, hell no!

Since I already had my mind set on building a space/planetary combat MMO in the vein of my established games, I already knew what technologies needed to be rebuilt, revised, enhanced etc. The first of those was the planetary terrain engine, then the first person dynamics engine etc. All of these and then some would be needed for Galactic Command Online, our MMO and final (yay!! no more two year bum rush to do new game) game.

As the development of those engines progressed, it hit me that it was a major financial undertaking that would completely deplete the company’s entire financial resources – including the bulk of my own personal holdings.

So since the terrain and first person dynamics engine were largely completed and a ton of art assets well on their way to being completed, I made the decision to develop a game out of them. That would be our stepping stone. And with reusable technologies the costs would be amortized across the games they would power. And so “All Aspect Warfare” was born more than two years and a few million dollars ago.

I already touched on how “Angle Of Attack” came about in an earlier blog. Basically our potential publisher (now out of business) had asked us to create it due to the AAW game being so massive in scope, that a dedicated smaller, lighter aerial combat game could stand on its own. So when they folded, we got saddled with not one but two games. The rest is history.

Both of the “All Aspects” games launching next week have a different premise but they still have my signature design of high-end and rewarding gameplay. And once again – as with all my previous games – a number of gamers used to the standard cookie-cutter fare churning out on a monthly basis by those other guys, won’t get it.

I don’t care. They’re not my demographic.

It is hard to understand why a developer makes the decisions that he makes. But in life, you will always have those who agree or disagree with you. And if you’re famous and a public figure like myself, the signal to noise ratio can be overwhelming when everyone becomes a critic and think they know more than you do. Despite the fact that some of these are folks who either never left home – ever – or who have their failures nicely tucked away in anonymity and shame.

But why ask why? The director of a movie, the writer of a book, the producer of a play – or anyone who works in a creative field doesn’t owe anyone (except maybe the suits at top paying the bills) an explanation of why they do things the way they do. To this day, if you pull up George Lucas on Google you will find folks who after MANY years are still pissed about Jar-Jar Binks. Seriously.

Homo Sapiens – for the most part – are flat out insane. Thats why temporary insanity is a legal defense.

It just so happens that – though insane – most tend to still be able to function. Those who can’t are heavily medicated or nicely locked away in a padded White cell – and heavily medicated. Its like those dormant diseases that most carry and which just stay safe and firmly tucked away in your DNA strand. You still have it – and you probably don’t know that you do – but its there. There is that one food, drink, drug that you’re going to injest – or old age – thats going to trigger it. Then all hell breaks loose.

Then you wake up one morning and realize, “By golly! I’m certifiably insane!”. Or not.

So, once again I have a bunch of folks questioning why I made the design decisions that I did for my new games. My favorite ones? “…why is the world so flat? Where are the trees? Oh, can I have roads?”

This despite the fact that the game’s manual, promo materials etc all explain the premise of the game world.

The Terrans (thats us) have been at war with the Gammulans (the bad guys) since 1989 (hehe, thats when I came up with the universe). Send that to the year 3000 and go from there.

Anyway, a Terran battlegroup operating deep within Gammulan territory, discovered that those pesky Gammies had discovered a method of creating planet killer weapons. Much like the R.A.N.D.O.M* that the Terrans themselves had created.

So they sent in a deep strike team to that planet, LV-115 – located in the Gammulan quadrant – to find the site and destroy it. This planet is like our Mojave desert – it is used for military purposes only.

The Gammies saw them coming and put up quite a fight.

The Terrans – now on LV-115 – setup shop on the planet, while a space battle waged on above them.

When the All Aspect Warfare begins, the Terrans had only taken over Alpha starbase by taking out the Gammies.

After awhile – and making no further progress – the Terran brain trust (Galactic Command) back home said screw this; if we’re not going to find it, we’re just going to nuke the whole planet and call it a day.

So the remaining forces on the planet were evacuated. They did leave the base’s defense systems on-line in order to fool the Gammies into thinking that Terran forces were still on the planet. Though there are a few infantry marines on the planets – they are actually clones of Terran forces. Yes, clones – just like from all our previous games.

GCV-Excalibur is sent in to nuke the planet from orbit. They botch it.

As the Excalibur plummets to the planet’s surface, a team of marines beam off the ship and end up in the middle of nowhere.

The retail game’s campaign starts off where this team of four materializes on the planet.

* Random Nuclear Destruction of Obsolete Matter

Instead of typing it all up again, I’m just going to quote excerpts from an exchange I recently had in our Steam forums.

First, you say that it is a massive world. I believe you. It is indeed massive. But, most of the maps I’ve played had absolutely nothing! two or three bases dotted on a huge, empty world. I took a jet aircraft to fly straight in one direction, it was really, REALLY empty and boring. So I’m not quite sure how you can use the “massive” world argument here?

My response in its entirety

Just because it is massive, doesn’t mean that irrelevant stuff needs to be ON it. Would you rather that we did what other games do by littering the game world with blocky buildings and other inconsequential rubbish which serve NO purpose – and further impact the game’s performance?

The game is not based on “levels”. It is one massive seamless world. Most of the fps action focuses on the military bases. Thats where “stuff” is. LOTS of it. You end up out in the open world only when in aerial combat or when traversing from one place to the next. And if you’re aerial combat, the goal is to survive, not stare at the scenery and noticing that you’re out in open country – with nothing interesting. If you want that, try Microsoft Flight Simulator or one of the many study sims.

Have you played H.A.W.X? No? Please, go try the demo.

Point is, ALL games make compromises. e.g. our terrain technology is way more advanced that anything in H.A.W.X. (I only use this because it is the most recent air combat game). We don’t use blocks for buildings nor do we have blurry and messed up terrain at anything below 10,000 ft AGL.

Our game engine was designed to look good at ANY altitude – especially since ground zero fps gameplay is required. That sort of tech requires a LOT of processing.

The game takes place on a “near barren” planet used for military purposes by the Gammulans. Hence no cities. Think of it as the Mojave desert testing grounds. They have an entire planet for that. If the game was focused on a single base or city, we would have a smaller and much more detailed map focusing on that one area.

The game world is 400×400km. Do the math.

The entire terrain is loaded and rendered. In real-time. Why? because there are lots of bases where stuff needs to be happening – even if culling does render out-of-scene elements, the terrain itself needs to be processed, as does AI, dynamics etc.

Each of the bases is about 10×10km. They are spread apart because due to the AI and radar capabilities, any closer and bases taken over by the Terrans will automatically engage any nearby Gammulan base. And vice versa.

Here are three shots

1. The entire game world. Notice the waypoint marker on the left edge with the distance at the midpoint of the marker line.

The map area (ALT+M) is divided into different topologies with various climate and weather patterns as well as time of day (each Earth minute is three minutes on LV-115 planet).

2. The Alpha base. 10×10km

3. The distance from Alpha base (Terrans) to Bravo base (Gammulans). In a fighter going at Mach 2 (657.1 m/s) @ 10K feet ASL, you can traverse that distance in just about no time at all. That is just one example of why the world was designed the way it was. Gunships are slower but still a viable option. Vehicles and infantry are out of the question. For those, you can either jump from base to base using a DJP or you can airlift the vehicles using a gunship or shuttle and drop them at the destination.

Finally, in such a massive world – disregarding graphics for a second – a LOT of other processing takes place. Processing (e.g AI) that makes the GPU processing pale in comparison. A LOT of optimizations were done over several months. And when you get to the point where you can’t do more, you have no choice but to wait for the tech to catch up.

Comparing our game engines to the likes of Source, Unreal etc is laughably silly. For one thing, neither of those engines can power a game world of this size and scope – with our game’s features. And even if they could, they too would have performance issues. Take Crysis and FarCry for example. Both level based. Both totally detailed. Both in a relatively small world compared to ours. Yet with major performance issues as well.

And for every one of those responses, we get a bunch of these. All from the Steam forums btw

#1

What I like -

- It’s trying to do a lot and for the most part succeeds
- The vast amount of epically cool things to drive and play around with
- You need a brain!
- I like the mentality of the company, it’s refreshing to see someone who is not driven by corrupt stock holders. I would gladly give my cash to support someone smaller then the greedy folks at Betatest arts (EA)

Cons -

Xbox 360 controller doesn’t work as well as I’d like, it handles poorly.

I understand that a lot of processing is going on but I’d like to see small variations in the game terrain textures. I’d also like to see more things added to the sky box ( Like moons or planets or what not) If I read correctly this takes place on a alien planet, could we have like double moons or stars or something? (Even a static image would help) A fun game so far. I find small glitches here and there but nothing game braking. Most of these will probably be gone in the final release any way.

#2

The terrain and structures have a very Earth Siege/Star Siege feel to them. The canyon terrain is very nicely done.

I love the variety of vehicles in the game. The flight mechanic works fine for this game. I think they move like an aircraft without airfoils would. I can see where some people are coming from but you need to keep an open mind. This is the future we are talking about. It would be nice to have the ability to look around while driving. (I may have missed this in the manual though.)

I find the complexity of this game refreshing.

All in all a good game. I’m probably going to get the final game and I hope you keep updating it. Keep up the good work.

#3

i thought the demo was alot of fun. it took me a while to get the hang of the flying but once i finally got the hang of dodging thoes damn missiles everything just clicked. oh and to people worried about the desert landscape hop in a jet and fly over to Starbase Charlie. got some nice looking canyons and vistas over there.

can’t wait to play the full game

And so it goes acrosss the Internet.

All this despite the fact that we did release a demo well in advance of the game’s launch so that gamers can try it and make up their minds. Unlike other game companies, we don’t stick the best parts of the game into a demo, then give gamers shellshock when they go out and buy the game. No, over the years, all our demos have been done at the very last minute in order that they be indicative of the final game. We expose as much as we can without giving away too much of the game’s gameplay feature set.

If you don’t like the game based on the demo, move along because the final game isn’t going to change your mind. Ever. And I have no interest in helping you do that. Thats why there’s a demo.

And even so, over the years I have released my older games for free on the Internet. Those serve as promos for future games as well as introduce gamers who had otherwise never tried our games or who were too young to make the commitment. On any given day one or more of my free games is charting somewhere.

The rules for these new games don’t change just because they are in different genres and we’ve posted this everywhere that we have the games discussions, support etc. That being.

These games are very complex and huge, so sometimes we miss things or find things that we probably should do differently. As such, we welcome ANY and ALL reasonable and constructive feedback because our goal is to keep you playing and enjoying our games.

A LOT of work went into these games over a two year period and the budget is about x10 the size of any indie game. Ever. In short, by the time the games were finished, we were already a LOT of money and twenty-five months in the hole. So despite these games coming from an indie developer, we don’t sit around making excuses for why some things just don’t work. If we were going to do that, we’d have developed different games and called it a day.

And just because we are indies, does not mean that we shouldn’t aspire to attain high levels of quality as titles coming from publisher or better funded teams. I mention this because when some gamers hear the word “indie”, they think low quality bar. Fact is, I blame the media for that because they have tainted the terminology beyond recognition. To the extent that you might as well compare a car to an SUV and expect the same level of performance just because they are both vehicles. An indie simply means “independence” and the freedom to do what you envisioned and without outside interference. It does not mean anything else. So you can still be an indie and produce a $.99c app or an indie and produce a $10m app. Just because your app is $.99c does not mean you should not be held to a higher standard nor expect quality material.

A LOT is invested in these games and their engines (most of which are new or improved from our established IP). We as experienced developers don’t go around re-inventing the wheel just because we can. In much the same way that Source Engine licensees get updates over the years – while the core engine remains largely the same – we have the same principles towards our engines, as do all experienced developers.

For example: Our aerial flight dynamics works just fine and there was no reason or need to mess with them. It was and always will be on the lighter side since we’re not interested in developing study sims. Go to Tripwire, 1C etc for that. So our aerial dynamics engines have been that way for almost eight years, but have of course undergone tweaks and some revisions over the years.

So just because you happen to have played our previous space/planetary combat games, doesn’t mean that you should expect that we’d go and do a new aerial dynamics engine just because we have different (non-space combat) games. It just doesn’t work that way. If it ain’t broke, there is no reason to mess with it or change it. And that principle doesn’t just apply to game development. There is a reason why some people license engines and others build theirs from scratch. If you’re going to build it, there is no reason to re-build it if you don’t need to.

Most importantly our games have always catered to a more discerning gamer. They never were – and never will be – run of the mill games. Don’t play our games like you would COD4, Halo or whatever because the end result is that you’ll just end up being frustrated, discard the game – then blame us for something we have no control over. In short, you absolutely – postively – MUST read the game manual and run through the tutorials first. I mention this because a bunch of people were on servers yesterday asking about how to call up the in-game docs, enter/exit vehicles, find other people etc. Heck, one person asked me personally how to arm his weapon!! On a multiplayer server no less.

I never set out to conquer the world of gaming. I set out to make a difference and to do what I wanted to do on my own terms and with my own rules. Which is why to this day and since day one, I own my company and all my IP 100%. No partners. No investors. No VC. Nothing. And I don’t want any. Never did. Never will. The day I run out of money and with no games to sell, I’ll shut it all down and say a silent prayer to God for bringing me as far as he did.

Then I’ll retire and spend the rest of my days laughing at the poor saps I leave behind in the video game development rat race. You think I’m grumpy now? Just you wait. John Dvorak has nothing on me.

Until that day comes, I’m going to keep designing and developing games for myself and the discerning gamer. I’ll leave the cookie-cutter crap to those other guys who, despite doing that, are still going out of business, posting huge losses etc. I’m still here, making games for myself and those discerning gamers everywhere.

Why?

Because I make my own road. You either hop on or you don’t.

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5 Comments »

  1. BocoMarine says:

    MMM I like your games alot. Ive played AAW and its a huge improvement over the previous titles. Your company is steping in the right direction and now that you’ve explained it I see now. I didnt think of all that processing power that goes into the terrain and A.I which is more inteligent but they are unbelievely difficult to fight since they can snipe with machine guns. The MFWB is very cool but I dont see why anyone would need one its one big moving target but I like it nonthless. I would like to command A.I around like a RTS game that would be cool and I think simple to do and fixs some tacops command issues i was having in UC and BCM. Tacop is cool but slow so in a fight my squads would end up dead cause I was unable to issue orders fast enough

    Posted on August 7, 2009 @ 6:07 pm

  2. BocoMarine says:

    I love the game and I was wondering if your company has interships im going to school for game and simulation programming and I know C++ well I just started with it and now im learning classes and GUI

    Posted on August 7, 2009 @ 6:18 pm

  3. nicolas says:

    Hi there i am asking a few questions with hopes you have the time answering them

    I must clear that i understand your vision behind your games ,since the 3000ad days you gave your best trying to do something that nobody ever dared doing and that accounts for something.Sadly there always were some shortcomings that kept that vision from fully realising.And that is the reason i am here and i hope you take in consideration my questions…

    1) Why there are NO fully 3d animated cockpits for vechicles with full physics based camera viewpoints attached to the body of the character that drives the vechicle ? 2d like cockpits make the game look dated.I don’t think they are very difficult to implemend…

    Also why there are no fully animated characters while in 1st/3d person ? Nowdays almost every single game has more complex animations while in 1st or 3rs person view (For example try fear 1/2 or far cry 2,crysis,mirrors edge etc..I know its a lot of work but it can make in the end all the difference.

    2) Why the terrain is so flat ? ” I know it is supposed to be in desert ” but even in desert there are sanddunes and variances in elevation…In the game the terrain is completely flat….I can understand it may need a lot of reworking on the engine but i believe its something really important because in the end even if you render the whole planet if it looks so flat it will be very boring for the players…even the most hardcore ones…

    3) And my third question has to do with the emptyness of the world…You once said you have licensed
    speed tree.That was a great decision but why you don’t use it ?If you want to give players a lush and interesting environment to play you must fully incorporate speed tree and before releasing the game.I know it may hit the frame rates but i believe with a well incorporated Lod system it can be done with minimal sacrifice on the performance of the game….I mean look at Arma 2 for example..I know its just a fraction of AAW scale but still it manages to render huge details environments and running perfectly…

    My final thoughts are that you can always improve on a game but first impressions are what make or break a game…And for this is very important to add the features i am speaking about like the full 3d cockpits and characters animations/speed tree and elevation changes on the world…

    You keep telling that this is a hardcore game.I agree with you but that does not mean hardcore gamers do not like eye candy and detailed living breathing environments….

    I sincerely want this game to succeed to show people how complex and grand scaled games can be.That the reason i believe the above improvements are so important…

    Also in my opinion the mission scripting should have some work done(you know with some better voice over,some detailed character animations and cut scenes etc..

    i hope you have the time replying on this..

    Posted on August 8, 2009 @ 4:18 am

  4. BocoMarine says:

    I like to add a note I believe this game can destroy Halo if focus is taken away from Huge levels that are nice but the end result is that players lose interest quickly or if you have huge levels make it engaging in some way I was looking closely at AAW and with some small tweaks a RTS element can be added to the game and the core of the game can remain cause players would love to expand their territories and send forces to mine reasources and for military pride. If you want I can make a simple design doc to explain the RTS component that can be added to the core of the game and add a more rich and rewarding feeling to the game. That and animation should be added to players getting in and out of vehicles i know this would be a overhaul perhaps but would engage more of the players attention to whats happening. Think halo one simple get in and out animation i know I cannot compare this game to Halo cause they are played differently but why not take the best of FPS and RTS games and add them to one game and make a game so addictive and engaging to anyone. I believe aaw engine can support a desent amount of force I was thinking a 200 pop limit and vehicle limited to 20-50 I dont know how taxing that is on the computer but I would love to help 3000ad in anyway i can cause I see unlimited potential for Battle cruiser series.

    Posted on August 10, 2009 @ 10:03 pm

  5. SundarVicett says:

    Hello Mr.Smart
    I’d like to thank you for making my day. Two new proper games for me to get and a great big blog.
    Once again you hit the nail on the head… dead straight.

    I dont know how often you hear it, or whether it even maters to you, but Thank You.
    For all the hard work, time spent, stubborness and dedication. You are a genius and the games you create are without peer.
    I picked up on 3000ad with Universal Combat, a game that drew me in then spat me out, confused and fearful. Time after time I revisted this mind boggling masterpiece until it all finally clicked. (no small part due to brilliantly written, informative and entertaining tutorials)
    I have never played any other game that has matched or exceeded my experience in the original Universal Combat (bar it’s subsequent updates), indeed, it raised my own standards so significantly it has become very difficult to gain any satisfaction from modern, franchised, lowest common-denominator, based games.

    Since then, I grew older and games had less of a place in my life, but infrequently I would revisit your website and forums to catch up and sample your latest creations and their incarnations. Without the time to completely immerse myself in them, I could only enjoy them for small periods at a time, but I would smile, secure in the knowledge you were still doing what you do best.

    Never stop. Never pull any punches. Never compromise.
    Keep making games that you want to play, because I and many others want to play them too, they are the only games of their kind.

    Eagerly awaiting GCO since the days there was mearly one huge forum post about it on the old-style boards, and will continue to wait and try my best to support your releases on the journey towards it as this, if you push on with it (I am literally praying you do), will be THE game. I would literally retire and get some sort of intravienous drip style sustainance system to play GCO.

    Well, I’m off to try out two new games.
    Thanks again.

    p.s: Dont let them get you down ever. The ones who matter already know the answers are in the body of text they are purposedly replying to whilst asking their questions.

    Posted on August 15, 2009 @ 2:02 pm

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