Sure there are differences, but if a developer is already developing gambling games or other types of games that don't use real money for gameplay while including in-app purchases for other features, he basically already has the skills needed to make full feature gambling games. From a development point of view there is not much difference.
I think you're either forgetting or underestimating the impact of having to be able to pay out money to individual users, as well as the security and fraud concerns that come with that. A game getting hacked is generally not too big a deal, but a gambling application getting hacked is a serious issue.
From what I can tell through reading online (and I'm always open to getting better info), gambling applications spend a massive amount of time on their security backends and user authentication procedures. Then the next biggest time sink is ensuring maximum earnings within the legal stipulations around payouts and making sure the mathematical underpinnings of the game are unpredictable and exhaustively logged. Once a system has been completed, skinning it seems to form part of the maintenance loop (localisation follows legal compliance in different legislations) - this skinning seems to be the part that is most similar to the game development you're talking about, but without those other two preceding things, nothing works.
Again, talking about the design implications of building gambling applications is an interesting discussion that seems not to be happening.
Now should it be allowed on this forum to advertise positions in the "virtual gambling" industry is another matter, seems like you think that is not acceptable and you base this on the fact that gambling games need a license.
Nope. The rule I suggested is about recruiters and how they interact with the forum in negative ways. That points to any third party recruiter, not just ones offering gambling positions.
The questions around gambling jobs being acceptable have to do with how different the discussions around developing for both industries are. That's an open question... So far a lot of posts seem to have said "how can you tell the difference/it's fuzzy", hence talking about the legal distinction as an easy point of reference.
I kind of get a vibe that the issue is not really that you need a license for a gambling game, but rather that gambling is seen as a dirty sector and that it will pull the limited game-devs we have in this country away from making "proper games"?
I dunno. Historically, gambling jobs have hoovered up developers that might have made other things. There's nothing wrong with people making gambling games, there's no shutting out of that industry going on, that industry doesn't seem to interact with places like this outside of hiring recruiters ;) If the people in that industry are making games, radsauce. The gambling industry as a whole doesn't seem to have much need for the sorts of feedback and community organisation that MGSA strives for.
Well from reading some of the links in the search results, its apparent that unity does not seem to have problem with their tech being used for real money gambling games, although requiring a separate (and way more expensive) license. This makes the skill absolutely transferable.
However, someone experienced with unity enough to build a slot/poker/etc game, will probably know the vast amount more that unity (or any other engine) is capable of, and find it quite boring to work on gambling games alone.
But for a person in SA with no game dev experience, wanting to get into the game dev industry AND earn a decent salary, a gambling company might be a valid option. And form the looks of it, gambling games do implement game logic which can be used in "regular" games. Animation, sound, RNG, statistics, server side validation, object pooling, event system, etc.
Another interesting fact is that Game Maker was bought by Playtech at the start of this year. This is probably not a good thing for the software itself, as its development will now probably stagnate. But it shows that gambling companies can be serious about game dev, and whether "real" game developer like it or not, they will always be part of the game dev industry.
I want to put forward a simple perspective from myself:
1. Not allowing gambling game recruitment ads is not the same as "excluding gambling game makers". Gambling game creators are more than welcome to participate here, I don't see where it's being said that they won't be. Post. Talk. Discuss. All of that are participation. In fact, the worst form of participation is "drop ad and go".
That said, I'm not really aware of any gambling game devs on this forum. If there are and I don't know about them, sorry. Not that anyone should have to step out and shout that they're gambling game makers (or serious game makers or whatever game makers). So it's really not a big issue that I don't know that they're here or not. I'm just mentioning that I don't know about them, if they're here.
2. That said, I don't really want to include gambling game job postings here, because - speaking to the previous point - I haven't really engaged with anyone who's a gambling game dev. If they exist, why aren't they part of the community? If they don't care about the community, why should we help getting people into jobs that don't care about the community? Again, please tell me and correct me if I'm wrong.
Some fair points @Tuism. I think generally the nature of the gambling jobs means that what is produced there can't be talked about, so hence we don't hear about people working on those kinds of projects. (Correct me if I'm wrong here). So, you may see people who do that work, showing their personal work because that's what they can talk about. So you'd never know they made gambling apps.
I feel that an inclusive community is better than an exclusive one, unless of course that exclusion is based on abuse of the forum or its members. Now knowing what is abusive to a forum or its members is a bit more tricky, I suppose that if the majority of the members feel like that abuse is taking place its probably reason enough to exclude that content or member for the good of the community.
A very important distinction needs to be made between a job posting and an ad. These are not nearly the same things. Not sure about you peeps, but as far as I know most of the devs here does not have a day job in game dev. Any job reaching a candidate in our work climate is a good thing and to scoff at it would be quite snobbish imo.
That said, I'm not really aware of any gambling game devs on this forum.
I don't know exact numbers, and there are (or at least were) more, but it was pretty clearly said on this thread by both @mattbenic and @garethf that they develop gambling games for a living. As well, Matt has posted jobs here previously for openings at Luma for developers to work on their products.
A very important distinction needs to be made between a job posting and an ad. These are not nearly the same things. Not sure about you peeps, but as far as I know most of the devs here does not have a day job in game dev. Any job reaching a candidate in our work climate is a good thing and to scoff at it would be quite snobbish imo.
Cool. By that logic, this forum should be a general computer skills training board and we should welcome any and all job postings for anything from web design to bank DBA positions, movie sound effect design, illustration jobs and project management positions (to name only a fraction of the jobs that could potentially be somewhere someone works while trying to work on games in their spare time).
That's not what MGSA is for. This forum exists to support the discussion central to game development as both an industry and an activity. Finding jobs for everyone is an awesome goal, but that's definitely something that should be happening on a different forum - it's a different focus. If you start something like that, I'm sure you'd have everyone's support. Snobs or not.
P.S. What's the distinction between job postings and ad postings? Are ads just general "buy my game" posts by those random international studios spamming any forum they can find, or are you talking about something different?
I haven't really engaged with anyone who's a gambling game dev.
*Waves at Steven*
Myself, @mattbenic are devs building gambling games in Unity right now, @AngryMoose was before he moved on to start his own game dev company, @johnny_final_02 is a luma 3D artist/animator working on gambling games for Luma.
A couple of the others lurk occasionally, but are not big forum posters.
Both the Lighthouse Studios (Shark Attack Deathmatch) guys are ex-gambling, also left to form their own game dev company.
Cool :) I know of course posting that would either get this reaction or crickets :)
So that means there are gambling game builders here. Two are active.
I'm not talking ex-gambling game builders... By that logic we should encourage advertising job placements because plenty of us are ex-advertising employees.
So if two are active, and the rest (again, not talking about ex-gambling game builders, but current) are silent, what does that say about gambling game game devs and this community?
I don't think they should be excluded to participate, I don't see them being actively or formally excluded, so that there's minimal participation despite them seeming to be quite a contingent of them, doesn't inspire confidence.
I do however want to exclude gambling game ads because I think that those doesn't grow this community, based on above evidence.
I'm not talking ex-gambling game builders... By that logic we should encourage advertising job placements because plenty of us are ex-advertising employees.
I'm not using the fact that people used to work in gambling to justify allowing gambling job ads here.
If there is an argument for allowing those job ads, the argument is that gambling games are a sub-genre of games, and this is a game dev forum that allows game job posts.
Counter-arguments have attempted to imply that they aren't, in fact, games. But I suspect those arguments stem from a core moral objection, personally.
I understand that moral objection and am sympathetic to it, every person must make their own moral judgement, but it leads to some poor technical arguments, in some cases.
So if two are active, and the rest (again, not talking about ex-gambling game builders, but current) are silent, what does that say about gambling game game devs and this community?
Without also knowing what the proportion of non-gambling gamedevs on the forum that are also silent, nothing useful at all really :)
A very important distinction needs to be made between a job posting and an ad. These are not nearly the same things. Not sure about you peeps, but as far as I know most of the devs here does not have a day job in game dev. Any job reaching a candidate in our work climate is a good thing and to scoff at it would be quite snobbish imo.
Cool. By that logic, this forum should be a general computer skills training board and we should welcome any and all job postings for anything from web design to bank DBA positions, movie sound effect design, illustration jobs and project management positions (to name only a fraction of the jobs that could potentially be somewhere someone works while trying to work on games in their spare time).
That's not what MGSA is for. This forum exists to support the discussion central to game development as both an industry and an activity. Finding jobs for everyone is an awesome goal, but that's definitely something that should be happening on a different forum - it's a different focus. If you start something like that, I'm sure you'd have everyone's support. Snobs or not.
P.S. What's the distinction between job postings and ad postings? Are ads just general "buy my game" posts by those random international studios spamming any forum they can find, or are you talking about something different?
@dislekcia: Disregarding your blatant false equivalence, why not? Making games successfully surely requires gaining experience in several different aspects...? especially for indies? If a job is in any way game dev related (game project, game company, etc - regardless of skills biases, and regardless of personal biases), why would anyone want to limit the ability for people to further their careers? I really have to question the motives here.
I have some background in online gambling. From 2008 to 2011 I worked as an artist for a gaming/gambling developer. I was part of a team designing and illustrating elements for online slots.
So if two are active, and the rest (again, not talking about ex-gambling game builders, but current) are silent, what does that say about gambling game game devs and this community?
Without also knowing what the proportion of non-gambling gamedevs on the forum that are also silent, nothing useful at all really :)
I think you're misunderstanding the use of "silent" there. As I see it, @Tuism isn't talking about people lurking on the forum, but about the number of gambling devs that don't post OR lurk here at all.
@dislekcia: Disregarding your blatant false equivalence, why not? Making games successfully surely requires gaining experience in several different aspects...? especially for indies? If a job is in any way game dev related (game project, game company, etc - regardless of skills biases, and regardless of personal biases), why would anyone want to limit the ability for people to further their careers? I really have to question the motives here.
The distinction being... career.
Could you explain the false equivalence? I continued what I understood the logic of posting jobs for the sake of getting people hired to do things that are somewhat like game development was.
So far the biggest source of experience that helps people make games is making games unsuccessfully. If people aren't trying to make games, but are spending their time doing other things, then no matter how "related" those things are to game development at a superficial skill level, they're not actually gaining that experience. If anything, they're building up expectations that they should be able to make games without understanding the core of what making games entails: The player/developer feedback cycle.
I don't understand what "career" means in terms of the distinction between jobs and ads. Could you perhaps provide an example of a job posting and an ad posting? Which of those focuses on "career" and how? ... I was asking if an ad is related to a specific game, I guess I'm just not getting it...
If people aren't trying to make games, but are spending their time doing other things, then no matter how "related" those things are to game development at a superficial skill level, they're not actually gaining that experience.
There's an unfortunate dismissive elitism from some quarters in this forum that treats only designer-developers as real game developers. You can see it here in how you've put "related" in inverted commas and implied that gaining skills that you can take over into game dev is "superficial".
Learning how to create a 3D renderer for simulation applications isn't a "related" skillset, it's a related skillset.
So is marketing. I've used a lot of the skills I've picked up working at a digital marketing agency for my work at retroepic. Does that mean we should have marketing jobs posted on the forums? I personally don't think so.
I'm still for the option that people can post gambling jobs as long as it says gambling and that it's not from a recruiter but from a forum member.
I did two stints on the product that @mattbenic and @garethf worked on. The first one was quite early in my career, so I learned a lot of things that I later got to use in "proper" games: C#, XNA, curve interpolation, camera animation, animation blending, pipeline processing, how animation speed and movement speed of a walking character relate, and some others. It was also the first project where I saw a reasonably-sized game architecture built from scratch, or got exposed to the idea of a data-driven GUI, how to fake big crowds with limited rendering capabilities. I got to look over @angrymoose 's shoulder as he implemented a shadowing system. By my second stint (much shorter), the project was much more complex, and I got exposure to the biggest code-base I ever worked on; I got a hint of the complexities of network synchronization, I got to learn how to correctly render a skybox on a bunch of squares to appear seamlessly when arranged in a sphere. (I am sure the other guys can give more extensive examples).
These skills are obviously game development skills; they are not generic programming skills or web development skills. They are, of course, technical skills, and there are many other technical and non-technical skills that will go into your game developer tool-box. On the flip side, there are skills in gambling games that are not used in other games (such as some of the security requirements, including secure randomness). But any crisp division between categories of games will have certain skills that don't transfer.
I used to look at the forums for job opportunities, and would cast my vote for gambling games' inclusion. (Although I realize that the current proposed rule is to exclude recruiters, rather than gambling games as such... I am not sure this is good either, although with the typical nature of recruiter postings I can understand it.)
So is marketing. I've used a lot of the skills I've picked up working at a digital marketing agency for my work at retroepic. Does that mean we should have marketing jobs posted on the forums? I personally don't think so.
@dammit - that comment wasn't a justification for whether or not gambling job posts should be allowed or not, it was highlighting an unfortunate dismissive attitude on the forums.
As I've said before, if there is an argument for allowing those types of job ads, the argument is that gambling games are a sub-genre of games, hence gambling development is a form of game development, and this is a game dev forum that allows game job posts.
I don't feel strongly either way about allowing professional recruiter posts in general on these forums, I don't use them for that purpose, personally, but that would be the argument.
@garethf - I'm wondering where you're seeing this dismissive attitude? I have never seen anyone dismiss anyone else's job/employment as making them not a game developer. I personally have been actively encouraged while i explored marketing and psychology avenues and also now while I'm part of a team that may not fit the hipster identity of "indie".
I know a lot of people in game development struggle with the idea that they're not "good enough" for whatever reason (haven't made as much money, aren't as famous, didn't get on youtube, have a normal day job...I dunno the list is endless) but the truth is that is a thinking pattern coming from inside, not reflective of the actual attitude of the community members.
The definition of a game is a contentious issue. It is near as contentious as the definition of art. Zimmerman offers a fairly well accepted definition however:
A game is a system in which players engage in artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome.
In Zimmerman's framework, I'd argue that gambling would not be included because the conflict is no longer artificial; there is money involved and hence real consequence. That does not mean that the skills are orthogonal, nor that it is not design, just that it is gambling.
Edit: This point was meant to emphasise that any definition of a game could be cherry picked to support a particular perspective. Earlier someone was using 'the" definition of games to support their argument. I merely wanted to disabuse the earlier commentator's notion that games can be universally defined.
Gambling is a personal topic. I feel that those who actually have worked in the gambling industry cannot reasonably be considered objective about it.
Personally I feel that game design exists on a spectrum defined by a single question:
'How does your game improve players and/or their quality of life?'
In my view many aspects of the gambling industry exist on the far right of the spectrum, a dark place where every effort is made to exploit the human psyche so as to optimize profit making at the expense of quality of life.
Again, personally I'd like to see a movement towards the left side of the spectrum. The MGSA community is still small and hence our identity is fragile. There is no way of knowing how many of the more ideologically driven one might turn away were we to see job boards dominated by gambling games. I certainly would not have been as enthused by this community were I to have seen gambling or play to win dominating these forums two or so years ago.
There is a lot of exciting momentum picking up with educational games, games for change and more culturally representative games. Right or wrong, I do not feel that both gambling and the ideologically driven would be able to comfortably co-exist on these forums. That does not mean that developers of gambling games are not welcome, just that it'd be nice if concessions were made to the developing culture of the forums.
I think the philosophical "definition of a game" isn't really important for this discussion at all. Theory and philosophy can be argued till we're blue in the face, and have no real bearing on the day-to-day of this.
What's really being discussed here is "what's good for this community" and "what are the goals of this community".
Is it to create a safe space for creativity, diversity and possibly even an environment in which to foster change? Or is it primarily a professional development network?
Again, personally I feel that the former would be the greater asset, as @dislekcia and @dammit were saying, there are already numerous places where professionals are at liberty to pursue organisational and professional development goals.
I am not saying "burn the immoral witches". Participation in the community should come before cold call recruitment advertisements though.
Is it strictly necessary to be so secretive when designing gambling games? Why are we not seeing new and innovative gambling games following an open development model? Are they ashamed of something?
@NickCuthbert I daresay what you're bot claiming and asking there will be a completely new thread, and subject to plenty of flames that we don't need in this one :)
@Tuism : Sorry, I don't entirely understand what you're saying. Do you mean that we should move this discussion to a new thread?
I felt this:
Why are we not seeing new and innovative gambling games following an open development model? Are they ashamed of something?
May be a entire whole new topic on its own...
Then I realised that this thread is about the difference between game dev and gambling game dev. I *thought* it was about whether gambling game job posts should be allowed here, but then the heading is clearly not that.
If people aren't trying to make games, but are spending their time doing other things, then no matter how "related" those things are to game development at a superficial skill level, they're not actually gaining that experience.
There's an unfortunate dismissive elitism from some quarters in this forum that treats only designer-developers as real game developers. You can see it here in how you've put "related" in inverted commas and implied that gaining skills that you can take over into game dev is "superficial".
Learning how to create a 3D renderer for simulation applications isn't a "related" skillset, it's a related skillset.
I'm sad that this is considered dismissive, it wasn't intended to be. The inverted commas were trying to point out that the relatedness of the skillsets being pointed out as obtained through different types of work are potentially questionable. We know from experience that they're certainly not required in order to make games. The assumption that skills like knowing how to write a 3D renderer is the gateway to make games is a superficial one that is often harmful to people's starting efforts.
Yes, knowing how to write a 3D engine can indeed be useful when developing games, many things can. But if you're writing 3D renderers and not making games, then you're still not making games. The important part is building the experience of putting games in front of players, actually doing that, not doing something that might help you do that in the future at some point maybe.
Again, I wasn't trying to dismiss anyone. Sorry. At no point have I said that "designer developers" (I'm not actually sure what this means TBH) are the only true game developers, nor do I think that.
P.S. This feels like it's getting pretty off topic. Split to a different thread?
The important part is building the experience of putting games in front of players, actually doing that, not doing something that might help you do that in the future at some point maybe.
Sigh, this is reductive. You're narrowing the focus down to only this one thing, to make it easier to hand-wave away the value of working in a field that teaches you game dev skills. Learning game dev skills doing that thing? So what, not important, you might not need them. Etc.
No one is denying the value of putting a game in front of players.
@garethf: For those working in gambling, what are they (you?) hoping to gain from MGSA? Other than of course recruiting.
As I'm sure you're aware, there has been recent moves to disassociate the industry body from the community. I'm not sure why this thread has become such a bone of contention. As far as I can see, the moderators aren't actively targeting you. They just aren't actively encouraging gambling related activities.
If you want to tap into the community's technical or design resources, fair enough, there is no rule against that. I'm just not seeing exactly what you're objecting to. The definition of games is very fluid. If there is a clear overlap in skills, why are we not seeing more posts and more community engagement?
The important part is building the experience of putting games in front of players, actually doing that, not doing something that might help you do that in the future at some point maybe.
Sigh, this is reductive. You're narrowing the focus down to only this one thing, to make it easier to hand-wave away the value of working in a field that teaches you game dev skills. Learning game dev skills doing that thing? So what, not important, you might not need them. Etc.
No one is denying the value of putting a game in front of players.
Okay. So now I'm having a hard time understanding how and why you're broadening that definition of building 3D engines as exclusively game dev skills. They're not, seeing as you can use those skills in a whole host of other places... If they're not ESSENTIAL to building games, then why are they game dev skills? It seems to me that calling that stuff "game dev skills" completely removes any responsibility to ask if those are important - it's tautological: "These are game dev skills because they're called game dev skills because I say so". When I added a metric to those skills (ie: How often they seem to be needed by people making games here), that got dismissed as, uh, dismissive. Help me see how seeing skills not unique to game development as game dev skills (that seem to be required) is useful here - what does it allow this discussion to cover that it couldn't cover before?
Also, is being reductive the same as being dismissive? Is only replying to one sentence in an entire nuanced, explanatory reply reductive or not?
Edit: A bit late, mostly responding to an earlier post but still applicable.
Presently I'm finding it difficult to imagine "shared pro gambling sentiment" as some sort of marginalised voice being oppressed by people who don't care to see gambling being represented on mgsa.
Considering DOS (previously Forward Slash) is an international practically-a-corporation with over 1400 employees and counting, I think the gambling industry hardly stands to make a loss if mgsa decides not to host their recruitment activities, so I'm sorry but no they're not being oppressed. People who happen to work in the industry are welcome to join the forums and talk about the actual games they're making, but I don't believe recruiters for gambling dev are coming here with the intention of improving the game dev community in the true spirit of "South African culture", and to be honest it's pretty disrespectful to South African history to suggest that trying to keep gambling out of this forum is comparable to stifling diversity.
As for flooding, while I was job seeking earlier this year, I was offered a contract multiple times for a company that made graphics for virtual slots, as well as briefly conversed with about a potential position at another. I was also made aware of plenty of openings at several gambling dev companies, including DOS. I did not actively seek any of these, they found me. While this is anecdotal, I have to say, from my experience, those positions are not something I would find encouraging when I'm desperately trawling through mgsa forums for ALTERNATIVES.
And lastly, I think some of you might be blissfully unaware of how privileged you are that the only concern you have when talking about making gambling software is an abstract concept of "morality" and "idealism or something". From personal experience in my own family and from the experiences of friends, as well as loved ones who indeed work in the industry and know the numbers, I would like to offer the perspective that gambling is a real, dangerous problem that has spoiled lives, marriages and families, not as freak occurrence but as a business model. This isn't some misunderstood game dev family black sheep. As much as it provides jobs it's not at the same cost as entertaining people for a few hours on Saturday night and unless you're prepared to change laws, economic structures and society itself, as much as it might be a personal necessity, I don't think making gambling software is at all a valiant endeavour.
For all the uncertainty and discomfort that's been going around, I am indeed speaking loudly and clearly, I would not welcome the inclusion of gambling dev onto mgsa forums.
As much as there may or may not be skills overlapping or whether or not it's gaming or entertainment, encouraging and enabling gambling is immoral for actual psychological and societal reasons, not just because of some admins personal opinions.
Gambling isn't just the boring adult version of gaming. The success of gambling companies relies on the percentile of total players who are vulnerable people with addictive personalities, some who are fortunate enough to be able to afford it, and many others who unfortunately aren't. Perhaps you've all been lucky enough that your ideas of gambling are roadtrips to sun city for a jol or a game of Texas for the lols but the reality for most is addiction, dependency apathy and ultimately neglect. And enough people like this exist that it's an ENORMOUS, booming industry, entirely there because of precisely zero help from little online communities and local game jams and workshops.
This is an exaggeration but imagine if chemistry club debated about whether or not they should allow meth dealers to openly sell on the forums. No, it's ridiculous. That doesn't mean that meth dealers aren't allowed to join the forum and talk about general chemistry related stuff, but you want to keep the dealing off the page. Gambling isn't as bad as meth but it's still illegal in 28 different countries, and many people have suffered from addiction to it. I just really don't think it's valid to debate whether or not gambling is gaming while ignoring the fact that it's GAMBLING. As interdisciplinary some of the skills may be, the context kinda matters. A lot. Growing weed isn't really the same as gardening. Posting "Recruiting actresses for lgbt romance movie" is more dishonest than "Recruiting actresses for Lesbian + Ladyboys Wild Orgy VII" but both are inappropriate on an lgbt Filmmakers community forum.
And ya, even PMs can be kinda weird and not necessarily welcome. But that's your call to make. But sincerely, just don't be too surprised if you're reported as spam.
Okay. So now I'm having a hard time understanding how and why you're broadening that definition of building 3D engines as exclusively game dev skills.
Please stop being ridiculous.
Game dev skills are the skills required to build games, not skills exclusive to game development. Someone has to write the code (and updated it, extend it, maintain it etc), understand the math, create the art, the music, the 2D UI elements.
The fact that you can potentially buy someone else's skills (if they meet your requirements, if you have enough money) by buying engines, stock art, stock sounds doesn't change the fact that someone has to have the skills to build these things in order to make video games.
If you're using Unity, you've just outsourced the engine programming skills, not removed the need for someone to know them. When you purchase a 3D model, you're outsourcing that technical and artistic knowledge, not removing the need for someone to have that knowledge. Those skills ARE essential to building video games*, you just don't have to have every essential skill yourself, or even in your company.
But that doesn't change the fact that you can't build video games from wishful thinking. These are game dev skills, ie the skills which build video games, and your rhetorical dancing doesn't change that.
*Of course, which skills are essential to building a game will depend on that game's design. 3D modelling skills aren't essential to a 2D game, etc. Please don't try to counter this argument by pointing out that some chalk game doesn't need a 3D engine. -_-
@garethf: By that logic, isn't an understanding of semiconductors a skill for making games? We can obviously go further down the rabbit hole too. You'll probably say that's a bit ridiculous, so how about an OS? Probably also too extreme. Maybe graphics drivers? Sure, an engine is a requirement for making a game (just like semiconductors), but that doesn't make engine construction a game development skill.
I don't really understand why this is suddenly an engine debate, but I think the answer is clear: this is a forum for people that want to make games, not people that want to build all the hundreds of necessary pieces that can be put together to make games.
On the topic at hand, gambling, I defer to some of the recent comments above
I don't really understand why this is suddenly an engine debate, but I think the answer is clear: this is a forum for people that want to make games, not people that want to build all the hundreds of necessary pieces that can be put together to make games.
Those people are welcome too! As long as they're keen on putting those pieces together into a game and not any one of the hundreds of other things that could be constructed from those same pieces.
*Of course, which skills are essential to building a game will depend on that game's design. 3D modelling skills aren't essential to a 2D game, etc. Please don't try to counter this argument by pointing out that some chalk game doesn't need a 3D engine. -_-
This could easily be construed as elitism: You're saying that games that don't use 3D engines or even computers at all are not real games. We know this is false, so now it looks like you're saying horrible things... This is exactly the same rhetorical trick you pulled on me earlier and then you accuse me of rhetorical dancing. Please, let's elevate the discussion above this, okay?
this is a forum for people that want to make games, not people that want to build all the hundreds of necessary pieces that can be put together to make games.
Thanks for the clarification. Good luck with MGSA and see you all when I see you :)
This could easily be construed as elitism: You're saying that games that don't use 3D engines or even computers at all are not real games. We know this is false, so now it looks like you're saying horrible things... This is exactly the same rhetorical trick you pulled on me earlier and then you accuse me of rhetorical dancing. Please, let's elevate the discussion above this, okay?
That wasn't even close to elitism and construing it as such is absurd. It was a request to not raise an irrelevant argument about how a specific example wasn't general enough to cover all cases. Which was reacted to by raising a completely different irrelevant argument.
*Feel free to Ignore my posts, I just use tools originally intended to assemble divinely blessed non-gambling games to assemble evil gambling games instead, I don't really belong here. Any experience I may have gained is completely irrelevant.
*Of course, which skills are essential to building a game will depend on that game's design. 3D modelling skills aren't essential to a 2D game, etc. Please don't try to counter this argument by pointing out that some chalk game doesn't need a 3D engine. -_-
Am I supposed to - as a "chalk" or boardgame designer - feel dismissed by this statement? Am I meant to feel that there is a pervasive dismissive attitude towards anyone not making digital games?
Because I don't. I mean, I've seen nothing but support for the boardgame devs on this forum in general. Which brings me back to the point that perhaps these other people who feel dismissed about what they do isn't actually coming from the forum.
Am I supposed to - as a "chalk" or boardgame designer - feel dismissed by this statement? Am I meant to feel that there is a pervasive dismissive attitude towards anyone not making digital games?
No, he's clarifying that he understands he's using a specific example, and that example that wouldn't apply to all games. He's also asking that the irrelevant specificity of this example not be used to unreasonably derail the conversation. Instead his attempt to make this reasonable plee is being used to unreasonably derail the conversation. Winning.
We can obviously go further down the rabbit hole too. You'll probably say that's a bit ridiculous
Correct.
this is a forum for people that want to make games, not people that want to build all the hundreds of necessary pieces that can be put together to make games.
Only if you're prone to intentionally misinterpreting simple statements for the sake of winning online debates .
I'll prove it.
You're saying that games that don't use 3D engines or even computers at all are not real games.
Quote me saying anything like this.
You claim I've said X, my statements are all recorded for posterity in this thread, all you need to do is find a sentence I've said here that means what you're claiming I said, that isn't an example of you just wildly misrepresenting simple English statements.
Am I supposed to - as a "chalk" or boardgame designer - feel dismissed by this statement?
Because I pointed out that a chalk game wouldn't have, as a core requirement, a 3D engine? Because I said that chalk games don't disprove engine programming being a core skillset in video game development?
I don't know why you would, but that's your prerogative.
You guys on all sides of whatever argument this is are all crazy. Just talk about making games, that's all this forum wants.
Want to talk about gambling games? Cool, talk about them. Don't want to talk about gambling games? Cool, don't talk about them. (I don't recall anyone raise any gambling game-specific discussions here, if they come up, we can deal with them. If there are people who don't want to talk about them, then don't go into that thread to talk about them. Right?)
If we want to get some policy down regarding gambling game ads, then lets talk about that instead of rhetorics about big words about logical flaws.
@garethf: For those working in gambling, what are they (you?) hoping to gain from MGSA? Other than of course recruiting.
What do people working in game dev hope to gain from interacting with other people working in game dev? I'm sorry if this seems impolite, but the answer to that seems fairly obvious?
And to clarify, I don't interact with MGSA in any other capacity than as the director of Rogue Moon Studios, personally.
I'm just not seeing exactly what you're objecting to.
I object to poor arguments and disingenuous rhetoric, basically. Whether gambling recruiters get to post job ads here or not makes no difference to me at all, but base that decision on facts, not ideology. It's an emotive topic, I sympathize with that, but that leads people to making erroneous assertions to support their moral values-based stance.
If there is a clear overlap in skills, why are we not seeing more posts and more community engagement?
You do see engagement from people who work or have worked in gambling, like Steven you just don't realize it.
You'd also be surprised how few developers and interested parties actually know about MGSA, generally. Most that I talk to have never heard of it.
*headdesk* So, you're arguing for the sake of arguing?
So, okay, @garethf has no vested interest in the outcome and everyone else seems to be in favour of the option to not have gambling recruiters here - so, let's call this discussion done.
*headdesk* So, you're arguing for the sake of arguing?
No.
The topic of this thread is "The difference between games dev and product dev for online gambling", not "should gambling recruiters be allowed to post job ads in this forum". The OP said he will respect the Admin's request that he don't try to recruit in the forum in the first post, but people keep diverting into that topic anyway.
To remind you, this was the actual topic :
Now with that background I would like to understand the difference between games and gaming. Btw, I personally think that someone disingenuously removed the 'bl' in what was probably a marketing master stroke at the time. Are there any differences in skills, training and qualifications needed? Other than issues of morality and ideology, would a person who develops games be able to develop products for online gaming? And vice versa, would a person engaged in producing online gaming products be able to produce games? How do the two match up in terms of career prospects and making a living? Etc, etc......
I contributed my opinion on these questions based on my experience with both fields, and disagreed with some of the statements made on the same topic based on said experience.
I only respond to the comments made relating to those questions, really.
I brought up job posts when @Tuism seemed to think that me saying there were ex-gambling employees on this forum was an argument for allowing job ads.
Which, I made clear, it was not. I pointed out what the actual argument for that position was, for the sake of clarity. To repeat what I actually said:
I'm not using the fact that people used to work in gambling to justify allowing gambling job ads here.
If there is an argument for allowing those job ads, the argument is that gambling games are a sub-genre of games, and this is a game dev forum that allows game job posts.
Counter-arguments have attempted to imply that they aren't, in fact, games. But I suspect those arguments stem from a core moral objection, personally.
I understand that moral objection and am sympathetic to it, every person must make their own moral judgement, but it leads to some poor technical arguments, in some cases.
I similarly clarified when you made a similar comment in my direction:
@dammit - that comment wasn't a justification for whether or not gambling job posts should be allowed or not, it was highlighting an unfortunate dismissive attitude on the forums.
As I've said before, if there is an argument for allowing those types of job ads, the argument is that gambling games are a sub-genre of games, hence gambling development is a form of game development, and this is a game dev forum that allows game job posts.
I don't feel strongly either way about allowing professional recruiter posts in general on these forums, I don't use them for that purpose, personally, but that would be the argument.
In both cases, I was making it clear that the things I had been saying were not an argument for allowing gambling job postings on the forum, when people seemed unclear about that.
Comments
From what I can tell through reading online (and I'm always open to getting better info), gambling applications spend a massive amount of time on their security backends and user authentication procedures. Then the next biggest time sink is ensuring maximum earnings within the legal stipulations around payouts and making sure the mathematical underpinnings of the game are unpredictable and exhaustively logged. Once a system has been completed, skinning it seems to form part of the maintenance loop (localisation follows legal compliance in different legislations) - this skinning seems to be the part that is most similar to the game development you're talking about, but without those other two preceding things, nothing works.
Again, talking about the design implications of building gambling applications is an interesting discussion that seems not to be happening. Nope. The rule I suggested is about recruiters and how they interact with the forum in negative ways. That points to any third party recruiter, not just ones offering gambling positions.
The questions around gambling jobs being acceptable have to do with how different the discussions around developing for both industries are. That's an open question... So far a lot of posts seem to have said "how can you tell the difference/it's fuzzy", hence talking about the legal distinction as an easy point of reference. I dunno. Historically, gambling jobs have hoovered up developers that might have made other things. There's nothing wrong with people making gambling games, there's no shutting out of that industry going on, that industry doesn't seem to interact with places like this outside of hiring recruiters ;) If the people in that industry are making games, radsauce. The gambling industry as a whole doesn't seem to have much need for the sorts of feedback and community organisation that MGSA strives for.
However, someone experienced with unity enough to build a slot/poker/etc game, will probably know the vast amount more that unity (or any other engine) is capable of, and find it quite boring to work on gambling games alone.
But for a person in SA with no game dev experience, wanting to get into the game dev industry AND earn a decent salary, a gambling company might be a valid option. And form the looks of it, gambling games do implement game logic which can be used in "regular" games. Animation, sound, RNG, statistics, server side validation, object pooling, event system, etc.
Another interesting fact is that Game Maker was bought by Playtech at the start of this year. This is probably not a good thing for the software itself, as its development will now probably stagnate. But it shows that gambling companies can be serious about game dev, and whether "real" game developer like it or not, they will always be part of the game dev industry.
1. Not allowing gambling game recruitment ads is not the same as "excluding gambling game makers". Gambling game creators are more than welcome to participate here, I don't see where it's being said that they won't be. Post. Talk. Discuss. All of that are participation. In fact, the worst form of participation is "drop ad and go".
That said, I'm not really aware of any gambling game devs on this forum. If there are and I don't know about them, sorry. Not that anyone should have to step out and shout that they're gambling game makers (or serious game makers or whatever game makers). So it's really not a big issue that I don't know that they're here or not. I'm just mentioning that I don't know about them, if they're here.
2. That said, I don't really want to include gambling game job postings here, because - speaking to the previous point - I haven't really engaged with anyone who's a gambling game dev. If they exist, why aren't they part of the community? If they don't care about the community, why should we help getting people into jobs that don't care about the community? Again, please tell me and correct me if I'm wrong.
That's not what MGSA is for. This forum exists to support the discussion central to game development as both an industry and an activity. Finding jobs for everyone is an awesome goal, but that's definitely something that should be happening on a different forum - it's a different focus. If you start something like that, I'm sure you'd have everyone's support. Snobs or not.
P.S. What's the distinction between job postings and ad postings? Are ads just general "buy my game" posts by those random international studios spamming any forum they can find, or are you talking about something different?
Myself, @mattbenic are devs building gambling games in Unity right now, @AngryMoose was before he moved on to start his own game dev company, @johnny_final_02 is a luma 3D artist/animator working on gambling games for Luma.
A couple of the others lurk occasionally, but are not big forum posters.
Both the Lighthouse Studios (Shark Attack Deathmatch) guys are ex-gambling, also left to form their own game dev company.
There may be others around.
So that means there are gambling game builders here. Two are active.
I'm not talking ex-gambling game builders... By that logic we should encourage advertising job placements because plenty of us are ex-advertising employees.
So if two are active, and the rest (again, not talking about ex-gambling game builders, but current) are silent, what does that say about gambling game game devs and this community?
I don't think they should be excluded to participate, I don't see them being actively or formally excluded, so that there's minimal participation despite them seeming to be quite a contingent of them, doesn't inspire confidence.
I do however want to exclude gambling game ads because I think that those doesn't grow this community, based on above evidence.
If there is an argument for allowing those job ads, the argument is that gambling games are a sub-genre of games, and this is a game dev forum that allows game job posts.
Counter-arguments have attempted to imply that they aren't, in fact, games. But I suspect those arguments stem from a core moral objection, personally.
I understand that moral objection and am sympathetic to it, every person must make their own moral judgement, but it leads to some poor technical arguments, in some cases.
The distinction being... career.
So far the biggest source of experience that helps people make games is making games unsuccessfully. If people aren't trying to make games, but are spending their time doing other things, then no matter how "related" those things are to game development at a superficial skill level, they're not actually gaining that experience. If anything, they're building up expectations that they should be able to make games without understanding the core of what making games entails: The player/developer feedback cycle.
I don't understand what "career" means in terms of the distinction between jobs and ads. Could you perhaps provide an example of a job posting and an ad posting? Which of those focuses on "career" and how? ... I was asking if an ad is related to a specific game, I guess I'm just not getting it...
Learning how to create a 3D renderer for simulation applications isn't a "related" skillset, it's a related skillset.
I'm still for the option that people can post gambling jobs as long as it says gambling and that it's not from a recruiter but from a forum member.
These skills are obviously game development skills; they are not generic programming skills or web development skills. They are, of course, technical skills, and there are many other technical and non-technical skills that will go into your game developer tool-box. On the flip side, there are skills in gambling games that are not used in other games (such as some of the security requirements, including secure randomness). But any crisp division between categories of games will have certain skills that don't transfer.
I used to look at the forums for job opportunities, and would cast my vote for gambling games' inclusion. (Although I realize that the current proposed rule is to exclude recruiters, rather than gambling games as such... I am not sure this is good either, although with the typical nature of recruiter postings I can understand it.)
As I've said before, if there is an argument for allowing those types of job ads, the argument is that gambling games are a sub-genre of games, hence gambling development is a form of game development, and this is a game dev forum that allows game job posts.
I don't feel strongly either way about allowing professional recruiter posts in general on these forums, I don't use them for that purpose, personally, but that would be the argument.
I know a lot of people in game development struggle with the idea that they're not "good enough" for whatever reason (haven't made as much money, aren't as famous, didn't get on youtube, have a normal day job...I dunno the list is endless) but the truth is that is a thinking pattern coming from inside, not reflective of the actual attitude of the community members.
Edit: This point was meant to emphasise that any definition of a game could be cherry picked to support a particular perspective. Earlier someone was using 'the" definition of games to support their argument. I merely wanted to disabuse the earlier commentator's notion that games can be universally defined.
Gambling is a personal topic. I feel that those who actually have worked in the gambling industry cannot reasonably be considered objective about it.
Personally I feel that game design exists on a spectrum defined by a single question:
'How does your game improve players and/or their quality of life?'
In my view many aspects of the gambling industry exist on the far right of the spectrum, a dark place where every effort is made to exploit the human psyche so as to optimize profit making at the expense of quality of life.
Again, personally I'd like to see a movement towards the left side of the spectrum. The MGSA community is still small and hence our identity is fragile. There is no way of knowing how many of the more ideologically driven one might turn away were we to see job boards dominated by gambling games. I certainly would not have been as enthused by this community were I to have seen gambling or play to win dominating these forums two or so years ago.
There is a lot of exciting momentum picking up with educational games, games for change and more culturally representative games. Right or wrong, I do not feel that both gambling and the ideologically driven would be able to comfortably co-exist on these forums. That does not mean that developers of gambling games are not welcome, just that it'd be nice if concessions were made to the developing culture of the forums.
Edit: Minor corrections
What's really being discussed here is "what's good for this community" and "what are the goals of this community".
We need to remember that.
Again, personally I feel that the former would be the greater asset, as @dislekcia and @dammit were saying, there are already numerous places where professionals are at liberty to pursue organisational and professional development goals.
I am not saying "burn the immoral witches". Participation in the community should come before cold call recruitment advertisements though.
Is it strictly necessary to be so secretive when designing gambling games? Why are we not seeing new and innovative gambling games following an open development model? Are they ashamed of something?
Then I realised that this thread is about the difference between game dev and gambling game dev. I *thought* it was about whether gambling game job posts should be allowed here, but then the heading is clearly not that.
So erm, nevermind me :p
Yes, knowing how to write a 3D engine can indeed be useful when developing games, many things can. But if you're writing 3D renderers and not making games, then you're still not making games. The important part is building the experience of putting games in front of players, actually doing that, not doing something that might help you do that in the future at some point maybe.
Again, I wasn't trying to dismiss anyone. Sorry. At no point have I said that "designer developers" (I'm not actually sure what this means TBH) are the only true game developers, nor do I think that.
P.S. This feels like it's getting pretty off topic. Split to a different thread?
No one is denying the value of putting a game in front of players.
As I'm sure you're aware, there has been recent moves to disassociate the industry body from the community. I'm not sure why this thread has become such a bone of contention. As far as I can see, the moderators aren't actively targeting you. They just aren't actively encouraging gambling related activities.
If you want to tap into the community's technical or design resources, fair enough, there is no rule against that. I'm just not seeing exactly what you're objecting to. The definition of games is very fluid. If there is a clear overlap in skills, why are we not seeing more posts and more community engagement?
Also, is being reductive the same as being dismissive? Is only replying to one sentence in an entire nuanced, explanatory reply reductive or not?
Presently I'm finding it difficult to imagine "shared pro gambling sentiment" as some sort of marginalised voice being oppressed by people who don't care to see gambling being represented on mgsa.
Considering DOS (previously Forward Slash) is an international practically-a-corporation with over 1400 employees and counting, I think the gambling industry hardly stands to make a loss if mgsa decides not to host their recruitment activities, so I'm sorry but no they're not being oppressed. People who happen to work in the industry are welcome to join the forums and talk about the actual games they're making, but I don't believe recruiters for gambling dev are coming here with the intention of improving the game dev community in the true spirit of "South African culture", and to be honest it's pretty disrespectful to South African history to suggest that trying to keep gambling out of this forum is comparable to stifling diversity.
As for flooding, while I was job seeking earlier this year, I was offered a contract multiple times for a company that made graphics for virtual slots, as well as briefly conversed with about a potential position at another. I was also made aware of plenty of openings at several gambling dev companies, including DOS. I did not actively seek any of these, they found me.
While this is anecdotal, I have to say, from my experience, those positions are not something I would find encouraging when I'm desperately trawling through mgsa forums for ALTERNATIVES.
And lastly, I think some of you might be blissfully unaware of how privileged you are that the only concern you have when talking about making gambling software is an abstract concept of "morality" and "idealism or something".
From personal experience in my own family and from the experiences of friends, as well as loved ones who indeed work in the industry and know the numbers, I would like to offer the perspective that gambling is a real, dangerous problem that has spoiled lives, marriages and families, not as freak occurrence but as a business model. This isn't some misunderstood game dev family black sheep. As much as it provides jobs it's not at the same cost as entertaining people for a few hours on Saturday night and unless you're prepared to change laws, economic structures and society itself, as much as it might be a personal necessity, I don't think making gambling software is at all a valiant endeavour.
For all the uncertainty and discomfort that's been going around, I am indeed speaking loudly and clearly, I would not welcome the inclusion of gambling dev onto mgsa forums.
Gambling isn't just the boring adult version of gaming. The success of gambling companies relies on the percentile of total players who are vulnerable people with addictive personalities, some who are fortunate enough to be able to afford it, and many others who unfortunately aren't. Perhaps you've all been lucky enough that your ideas of gambling are roadtrips to sun city for a jol or a game of Texas for the lols but the reality for most is addiction, dependency apathy and ultimately neglect. And enough people like this exist that it's an ENORMOUS, booming industry, entirely there because of precisely zero help from little online communities and local game jams and workshops.
This is an exaggeration but imagine if chemistry club debated about whether or not they should allow meth dealers to openly sell on the forums. No, it's ridiculous. That doesn't mean that meth dealers aren't allowed to join the forum and talk about general chemistry related stuff, but you want to keep the dealing off the page. Gambling isn't as bad as meth but it's still illegal in 28 different countries, and many people have suffered from addiction to it. I just really don't think it's valid to debate whether or not gambling is gaming while ignoring the fact that it's GAMBLING. As interdisciplinary some of the skills may be, the context kinda matters. A lot. Growing weed isn't really the same as gardening. Posting "Recruiting actresses for lgbt romance movie" is more dishonest than "Recruiting actresses for Lesbian + Ladyboys Wild Orgy VII" but both are inappropriate on an lgbt Filmmakers community forum.
And ya, even PMs can be kinda weird and not necessarily welcome. But that's your call to make. But sincerely, just don't be too surprised if you're reported as spam.
Game dev skills are the skills required to build games, not skills exclusive to game development. Someone has to write the code (and updated it, extend it, maintain it etc), understand the math, create the art, the music, the 2D UI elements.
The fact that you can potentially buy someone else's skills (if they meet your requirements, if you have enough money) by buying engines, stock art, stock sounds doesn't change the fact that someone has to have the skills to build these things in order to make video games.
If you're using Unity, you've just outsourced the engine programming skills, not removed the need for someone to know them. When you purchase a 3D model, you're outsourcing that technical and artistic knowledge, not removing the need for someone to have that knowledge. Those skills ARE essential to building video games*, you just don't have to have every essential skill yourself, or even in your company.
But that doesn't change the fact that you can't build video games from wishful thinking. These are game dev skills, ie the skills which build video games, and your rhetorical dancing doesn't change that.
*Of course, which skills are essential to building a game will depend on that game's design. 3D modelling skills aren't essential to a 2D game, etc. Please don't try to counter this argument by pointing out that some chalk game doesn't need a 3D engine. -_-
I don't really understand why this is suddenly an engine debate, but I think the answer is clear: this is a forum for people that want to make games, not people that want to build all the hundreds of necessary pieces that can be put together to make games.
On the topic at hand, gambling, I defer to some of the recent comments above
*Feel free to Ignore my posts, I just use tools originally intended to assemble divinely blessed non-gambling games to assemble evil gambling games instead, I don't really belong here. Any experience I may have gained is completely irrelevant.
Because I don't. I mean, I've seen nothing but support for the boardgame devs on this forum in general. Which brings me back to the point that perhaps these other people who feel dismissed about what they do isn't actually coming from the forum.
@dislekcia: Only if you're prone to intentionally misinterpreting simple statements for the sake of winning online debates .
I'll prove it. Quote me saying anything like this.
You claim I've said X, my statements are all recorded for posterity in this thread, all you need to do is find a sentence I've said here that means what you're claiming I said, that isn't an example of you just wildly misrepresenting simple English statements.
I'll wait.
I don't know why you would, but that's your prerogative.
Want to talk about gambling games? Cool, talk about them. Don't want to talk about gambling games? Cool, don't talk about them. (I don't recall anyone raise any gambling game-specific discussions here, if they come up, we can deal with them. If there are people who don't want to talk about them, then don't go into that thread to talk about them. Right?)
If we want to get some policy down regarding gambling game ads, then lets talk about that instead of rhetorics about big words about logical flaws.
*rolls eyes*
And to clarify, I don't interact with MGSA in any other capacity than as the director of Rogue Moon Studios, personally. I object to poor arguments and disingenuous rhetoric, basically. Whether gambling recruiters get to post job ads here or not makes no difference to me at all, but base that decision on facts, not ideology. It's an emotive topic, I sympathize with that, but that leads people to making erroneous assertions to support their moral values-based stance. You do see engagement from people who work or have worked in gambling, like Steven you just don't realize it.
You'd also be surprised how few developers and interested parties actually know about MGSA, generally. Most that I talk to have never heard of it.
So, okay, @garethf has no vested interest in the outcome and everyone else seems to be in favour of the option to not have gambling recruiters here - so, let's call this discussion done.
The topic of this thread is "The difference between games dev and product dev for online gambling", not "should gambling recruiters be allowed to post job ads in this forum". The OP said he will respect the Admin's request that he don't try to recruit in the forum in the first post, but people keep diverting into that topic anyway.
To remind you, this was the actual topic : I contributed my opinion on these questions based on my experience with both fields, and disagreed with some of the statements made on the same topic based on said experience.
I only respond to the comments made relating to those questions, really.
I brought up job posts when @Tuism seemed to think that me saying there were ex-gambling employees on this forum was an argument for allowing job ads.
Which, I made clear, it was not. I pointed out what the actual argument for that position was, for the sake of clarity. To repeat what I actually said: I similarly clarified when you made a similar comment in my direction: In both cases, I was making it clear that the things I had been saying were not an argument for allowing gambling job postings on the forum, when people seemed unclear about that.
A review of flagged posts may prompt the issuing of warnings later. I don't have the energy for that now, given this morning's forum issues.