How to explain your game to an asshole. READ THIS IF YOU'RE TRYING TO MAKE PEOPLE LOOK AT YOUR GAMES

dislekcia

http://www.pentadact.com/2012-03-17-gdc-talk-how-to-explain-your-game-to-an-asshole

Tom Francis is awesome. He's just released GunPoint, which kicks all sorts of butthole:


I saw this talk live and I go back and read it often just to remind myself of what we should and shouldn't be doing when we talk about Desktop Dungeons and what the game is about. There are a lot of game projects here that I feel could benefit from some added attention to how they come across - I'm sure they're good games and that they're fun to play, they're just not communicating that right up front and I'd like to see that change so they can get more sales/attention/snacks :)

GMax

lol @ Title! haha thx dislekcia! Will definitely check it out!

Gazza_N

Speaking as an indie-oriented consumer, if not a journalist or full-on indie dev, I can only agree with his points. I know some folks are enamoured with the potential of games as artistic narrative medium, etc, blah, but ultimately it boils down to the reason people are playing, and that is mechanics. That's what you have to communicate. Few people care how masterful your story is, or how many gigafeels you've crammed in there, if your game is Generic Platformer x29846. Only way you're getting around that is with a huge marketing budget (Binfinite *cough*).

dislekcia

@Gazza_N: Hmm. I dunno, I don't really feel like these guidelines preclude making a game that's not mechanically focused. I think they're just asking you to be forthright about the actual experience of play, not the effort put into the exposition.

There's no reason that The Darksun Chronicles couldn't be described as "A thought-provoking adventure through lands ravaged by deep-sedimentary fracking" instead of what basically boils down to "The developer loves their own voice more than they care if you have fun, part XXVI".

Even Bioshock Infinite didn't really convey what it was about and stuck with "More of that Bioshock™ Plot Twistyness™ with Themes™" instead of what it was actually about: "Pastiche obscures your hunt for vox recorders inbetween frustrating combat", when it should have been "Racism and religious zealotry tear a floating city apart as you search for redemption"

Elyaradine

Great stuff! :) I especially like the idea of describing one (ideal) super awesome moment of gameplay. Maybe if you can't, you should work on the game until you can...

Gazza_N

@dislekcia: Well said, and agreed. My interpretation just reveals my horrible systems-driven game bias. I'm a mechanical, I'm a mechanical, I'm a mechanical man. :P

Thaumaturge

That's a rather interesting article -- thank you for sharing it! ^_^

... I do notice some such issues as described there in my own descriptions of my games... ^^;

(I have, however, taken note, in particular that I should place those brief descriptions -- genre/game-type, experience and gameplay description -- at the start of a presentation of my game.)

Fengol

Same as @Thaumaturge, I looked back on the descriptions of my old prototypes and games and I see how they could be improved for better conveyance.

Tuism

These principles are so sound that they should totally apply to every aspect of communication - talking about yourself, talking about your game, talking about that thing that you're doing, whatever it is.

And damn it's so hard! I'm trying like hell to come up with a description for my current project and I'm just not managing...

I think it'd be a great exercise for us to put down your own game descriptions and see how they can be improved :)

dislekcia

I think that when we post a game thread here, everyone should help out trying to come up with good ways to explain it to someone quickly. Just getting different viewpoints on wording and what possible ideal gameplay moments might be is incredibly useful.

Also, don't feel like you absolutely have to distill something down to a genre. When we talk about Desktop Dungeons, we start out by asking if people have heard of roguelikes, if everyone has we use one script. If someone hasn't, then we explain the game without mentioning roguelike at all. The interesting thing is that the key points are still the same: Quick, unique dungeon runs where the dungeon itself is the puzzle; Unique hook is exploration itself is how you heal, turning the dungeon into a resource and making every decision important; Ideal gameplay is just managing to finally take out that boss by the skin of your teeth.

It's only if they're still interested that we start talking about features like all the races, the metagame Kingdom, etc. All of these things can be swapped out depending on the crowd we're talking to though, we could describe the game as "Funding your own Kingdom by sending adventurers on puzzle missions in random dungeons" if that seems like what people are going to respond to better.

FanieG

@dislekcia - funny that you mention the "roguelike" definition of your game. When I first heard of DD, I went to check it out on wikipedia, and had to first follow the link to "roguelike" to better understand the concept. So it is really cool that you say that you have different ways of explaining your game to others :)

Kaiser_Gun

Tom explained what we call a Game Concept. It's a 1 or 2 pages document. It's divided into 3 parts.

1/ Description
Here, you describe the genre, the context, and the win/lose condition.

2/ Gameplay
Here, you describe your innovative game mechanics. It is useless to say that the player character can walk, run, jump.

3/ Unique Selling Point
Here, you say why we should buy your game. Actually, it's more complex than that for this part.

My third part is more about Level Mechanics. I explained there how I can create awesome situations by combining 2 or more game mechanics.

I can attach an example of a game concept if you want more details about that kind of document.

EDIT : Don't ever, ever, ever talk about an another game in your game concept.

dislekcia

@Kaiser_Gun: Who's "we", sounds like you're talking professionally? I really don't think that members of the press want a document - this is more about opening paragraphs and every sentence counts.

Why shouldn't you talk about another game? "It's like CoD, but with better guns, yo!"

Tuism

I can understand that you confuse people who haven't played the games you're pulling into your description, but at the same thing you could ask yourself what is more valuable: Having more people understand a more generic, non-emotive description, or having fewer people understand a description that really resonate with them because they feel like they identify with something in there (cos they've played it and enjoyed it).

I don't think there's a right and wrong answer, it depends on the game I think.

Kaiser_Gun

@dislekcia: The documents you send to publisher and press are the same thing when you need to pitch your game to sell it. Except the press needs some more stuff like video and images (+demo) and publishers need prototypes.

And the indie game consumers is more demanding about innovative gameplay mechanics, so if you just say that your game is like CoD but with better guns why would they buy your game ? CoD still technically more impressive than many (any?) indy games and it has a biggest community. Just see how EA struggles to sell the Battlefield series (which is actually a CoD with vehicles). We don't have the half of EA budget...

Look at Braid by Jonathan Blow, he never said that Braid is a Prince of Persia Sand of Time like without fighting and more time puzzle. Or Gunpoint wasn't marketed like a 2D Splinter Cell like games.

Let's take an example from its trailer :

1/ Description
A game of creative infiltration.

2/ Gameplay mechanics
- Rewire levels
- Plan
- Strike

3/ Unique Selling Point
- Invent your own solution

And every mechanics are illustrated through simple gameplay video in the trailer, which make this game very appealing.

Kaiser_Gun

Let's take another trailer (Braid)



1/ Description
What if you could learn from mistakes but undo the consequences ?

2/ Gameplay mechanics
- Reverse death
- Multiple realities
- Warp time
- etc.

3/ Unique Selling Point
- An innovative way to play a die and retry game.

Oh ! And :
Every mechanics are illustrated through simple gameplay video in the trailer, which make this game very appealing.

EvanGreenwood

In truth, Gunpoint is presented possibly even more to the point than what he suggests people do in that GDC talk:

http://www.gunpointgame.com/

Tom Francis said:

Gunpoint is a stealth puzzle game that lets you rewire its levels to trick people. This video will explain it.

The video gives a more in depth look of course... but that one sentence (along with a single screen shot) is all you see at first in terms of description, and it couldn't be more to the point.

Then if you like the sound of that, clicking on the link provided takes you to this page: http://www.pentadact.com/2013-04-22-gunpoint-gadget-trailer/ with a little more text and a video (if you really are intrigued).

@Kaiser_Gun What I took away from Tom Francis's article wasn't so much about the structure of a pitch (although he does suggest one), but that optimizing the amount of attention needed to grasp the appeal of the game being pitched is valuable.

Your "Game Concept" concept is a useful structure for describing a game, but it doesn't impose the same values that Tom was trying to convey. Tom was specifically talking about textual information where it is crucial to get to the point because text is relatively boring (though obviously the same rules are applicable elsewhere). @Kaiser_Gun You're now discussing trailers which might make it hard to have a discussion with you in relation to Tom's article. There's a chance we'll be talking round each other.

In any case I'm not sure if I can agree that "Tom explained what we call a game concept". You seem to be taking away from the article something quite different to what I did.

Here's what you laid out as a structure for pitching Tom's game:

Kaiser_Gun said:

1/ Description
A game of creative infiltration.

2/ Gameplay mechanics
- Rewire levels
- Plan
- Strike

3/ Unique Selling Point
- Invent your own solution

And here's Tom's actual pitch:

Tom Francis said:

Gunpoint is a stealth puzzle game that lets you rewire its levels to trick people.

Who do you play?
You’re a freelance spy, and your clients hire you to steal sensitive data or technology.

What do you do?
You break into high security buildings by rewiring the electronics. You can use a Crosslink gadget to see how all the lights, switches, cameras and doors are wired up, then drag a connection from one to another to make them work however you want.

Example?
You come to a security camera and a locked door.
Switch to Crosslink mode, and you can see the camera is wired to an alarm – if it sees you, the alarm will bring a guard running.
So you drag a connection from the camera to the door.
Now when you walk in front of it, the door swings open instead of the alarm going off, and you’re in.

So no, his structure is different to yours as well. Yours doesn't include the concept of "The Fantasy" as Tom terms it for instance. His pitch is focused on narrative, and on actions in the game that form a narrative that he feels might resonate with readers. Whereas your Game Concept is apparently focused on mechanics, the way the game functions. Yours appears to be closer to an abstract overview of the game, whereas his focuses on the player experience.

Not that one is objectively better than the other, it just isn't the same as what you are describing as a "Game Concept", except in the most reductionist sense. Tom's is a decidedly different format and emphasis for a pitch when compared to what you appear to be suggesting.

Although personally I prefer Tom's pitch method for my games. It seems to get to the heart of the appeal of the type of game I develop quicker. However I think for a game where the mechanics are the core appeal, the pitch you have described would be ideal.

In my personal experience, which is pretty limited I'll admit, I've found describing the fantasy to be very effective.

We released this trailer:



And it earned us an article in rockpapershogun, eurogamer, kotaku, pcgamer and joystiq (as well as many articles on smaller websites). It also got our choice of publishers interested, and we got a flattering call from one of the executives from Bad Robot (who produced the Star Trek movies) because of it. That trailer almost exclusively focuses on the fantasy of the game, and so did the articles that were written about it. (Of course many of the mechanics are displayed in the trailer, but that isn't what the trailer is selling).

Obviously this isn't the kind of success that Braid achieved. But frankly our game isn't as appealing as Braid. So I think the trailer was effective.

(As an aside, the concept for that trailer was pilfered from a rather brilliant idea @Dislekcia / @Aequitas floated for their game trailer)

Mostly I'm saying: There's lots of ways to sell a game. Our game is very much about the fantasy of the experience. Some games are more about the mechanics. What's important, as Tom described, is getting to the appeal quickly, and making sure your pitch can withstand the deficit of attention that comes with being an impatient-asshole (which many people, including myself, have the distinct displeasure of being).

Also, re: Don't mention another game in your pitch. Stonehearth http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1590639245/stonehearth is a really good example of a pitch that mentioned other games in order to draw on their appeal, benefit from nostalgia, and quickly convey complicated concepts. I suspect this is more in line with what @Dislekcia was suggesting. In my opinion the Stonehearth Kickstarter had a pitch-perfect video (pun intended).

dislekcia

@Kaiser_Gun: I'm not sure why you'd say that anyone would want to send the same information to both publishers and press. They're both very different entities that interact with your game in completely different ways: Publishers need to be convinced why your game is going to make money; Press need to be convinced that your game is a good story to tell people.

Yes, you could argue that those things are fundamentally grounded in the same thing, the game's mechanics, but that's a very limiting focus that removes several angles from the table in terms of communicating to both. A publisher cares a ton about who your team is and what your previous experience is - in fact, you can pretty much get a publisher onboard with a game by telling the story of how awesome your team has been in the past - anyone NOT throwing money at Vlambeer to make games for them is clearly daft ;) The press wants good stories about your game, or you, or anything really. If you can tell a neat story about something completely tangential to your game, you're still worth writing about from their perspective.

I think Tom's points are much more tailored on how to get people to pay attention quickly, like @BlackShipsFilltheSky said.

But yes, I can agree that publishers are usually assholes ;)

EvanGreenwood

@dislekcia Weirdly we've had mostly positive experiences with publishers... Although, now that I think about it, I tend to reject anything that smells like an asshole on smell alone (and our dealings don't get much further, for better or worse).

Also... I have this nasty habit of editing messages for a while after I post. There was a minor shout-out slash apology to Dislekcia in my previous post that he probably missed...

Kaiser_Gun

@BlackShipsFilltheSky and @dislekcia

I didnt say that my method is the best guys :D.

I'm just saying that a Game Concept might be a good way to summarize your ideas to the simplest thing possible. It helps you to define the most important part of your game and then you had the "fantasy". So the game concept is just a kind of draft to do it right.

dislekcia said:

I'm not sure why you'd say that anyone would want to send the same information to both publishers and press. They're both very different entities that interact with your game in completely different ways: Publishers need to be convinced why your game is going to make money; Press need to be convinced that your game is a good story to tell people.

I said :

The documents you send to publisher and press are the same thing when you need to pitch your game to sell it. Except the press needs some more stuff like video and images (+demo) and publishers need prototypes.

I just quoted the Gunpoint trailer text when I say :

"A game of creative infiltration."

This sentence is not mine at all :). It is Tom's one, it's in the trailer. And everything else I wrote are from the trailer. That means what you quote from me is Tom's actual trailer pitch :).

But what you quote from Tom's pitch is actually what we learn in any game design school, as least the one I did in France. And that is the way we do when we pitch a concept to Ubisoft or Activision-Blizzard (the two I deal with in the past). And the document you send to tell them that your game will sell is completely a different one.

This is the trailer we made for our final student project in 2008 :



So sorry it's in french. But it was the game who gave us an Imagina Awards (best student/university project) in 2009.

BlackShipsFilltheSky said:

Obviously this isn't the kind of success that Braid achieved. But frankly our game isn't as appealing as Braid. So I think the trailer was effective.

Come on, it was the game that brings me here mate! So yes, your trailer is definitely effective :). It is effective because you show us what we will do in the game and it seems fun.

dislekcia said:

in fact, you can pretty much get a publisher onboard with a game by telling the story of how awesome your team has been in the past

Deadly true. But im not in Europe anymore so that can't work from Madagascar :)

dislekcia said:

But yes, I can agree that publishers are usually assholes ;)

That's why i'm indie now lol

EvanGreenwood

Kaiser_Gun said:

Come on, it was the game that brings me here mate! So yes, your trailer is definitely effective :). It is effective because you show us what we will do in the game and it seems fun.

lol! That's pretty cool!

dislekcia

@BlackShipsFilltheSky said:

@dislekcia Weirdly we've had mostly positive experiences with publishers... Although, now that I think about it, I tend to reject anything that smells like an asshole on smell alone (and our dealings don't get much further, for better or worse).

I think that's because you've mostly been dealing with the new-wave of indie-centric publishers. They know that the exploitative bullshit publishers try to pull will simply push indies away, plus they're a lot more clued in on what the games they're looking for need. Just wait till you start reading Amazon contracts and the like, eventually it all just turns into people grabbing for more and more shares of your game and hoping you don't notice 1 clause hidden in a corner somewhere, erg :(

@Kaiser_Gun said:

I'm just saying that a Game Concept might be a good way to summarize your ideas to the simplest thing possible. It helps you to define the most important part of your game and then you had the "fantasy". So the game concept is just a kind of draft to do it right.
...
This sentence is not mine at all :). It is Tom's one, it's in the trailer. And everything else I wrote are from the trailer. That means what you quote from me is Tom's actual trailer pitch :).

But what you quote from Tom's pitch is actually what we learn in any game design school, as least the one I did in France. And that is the way we do when we pitch a concept to Ubisoft or Activision-Blizzard (the two I deal with in the past). And the document you send to tell them that your game will sell is completely a different one.

I don't think a game concept is a bad place to start, I'm just remembering back to this sales/marketing/startup course we did when DD was still young and one of the biggest things that we learned there was that you're always going to need to interpret your messages for an audience. So a game concept document is great, but because your audiences are different, you need to interpret what that concept document says for each of them. I think the same thing applies for a trailer - that's going to be really different to a text-based pitch because (hopefully) the visuals and sounds you've got going on are going to keep player interest. Text in trailers is usually something to be avoided, unless it creates emphasis points in the mini-story your trailer is telling.

I remember what it was like on that course to have someone tell us that our feature list for the game was boring. Eventually we figured out that each feature was actually something we could state in a different way to address a need or problem so that potential players could identify with the game even if they didn't read the back of game boxes all the time ;) Random-generation becomes "Bored? Desktop Dungeons never gives you the same thing twice" and quick play time becomes "Busy? Play a dungeon in 10 minutes, then play another with a completely new hero". I haven't given much thought to how we'd communicate DD to a publisher (we don't need one) but I'm pretty sure we'd talk about not being content limited and the difficulty arcs of quick play. Interestingly enough, entering competitions like the IGF and stuff is much closer to selling the game to individual players/press than it is to pitching to a publisher.

I'm looking forward to us putting up trailer ideas for DD and having you guys rip them apart and help us make them better :)

@BlackShipsFilltheSky said:

(As an aside, the concept for that trailer was pilfered from a rather brilliant idea @Dislekcia / @Aequitas floated for their game trailer)

Oh right! The "Hey, here's a hero they're totally aweso- *dies*" idea. I didn't notice that before, damn well executed. Really suits Broforce, still love that trailer :)