Category Archives: Editorials

The Creative Advantage of the Indie Game Developer

If Castlevania, Super Mario Bros., and Pokémon never existed, could they be invented from scratch today?

Game development is, for both better and worse, not what it used to be; the monetary costs and time costs to create Grand Theft Auto IV are lightyears apart from Street Fighter II. When games are Hollywood-level productions with Hollywood-level expenses, one misstep can sink a company—and so, to the best of each company’s abilities, with every statistic available to them, their number crunchers need to determine a priori whether their games will sell based on the history of their series and comparable series.

In the modern world, big game developers craft their games from market statistics. Some gamers love it (“give me bigger and better”) and others hate it (“give me something original”), but either way, developers do that because, in a real and literal way, they can’t afford otherwise. Market statistics can’t breed innovation, however; no one can create the future by replicating the past. When the game industry was still young, companies needed to pioneer new ideas because they had no comfort zone of existing trends and bandwagons to follow.

Konami could not have created Castlevania in this millennium. My pitch as the creator: Simon Belmont, a descendant of vampire hunters, battles Dracula and the undead with the Vampire Killer, a holy whip passed down over countless generations. My response as the publisher: a guy fights Dracula with a whip? Nobody buys into characters with whips unless they’re Indiana Jones. Give this Belmont guy knives like in Blade or guns like Resident Evil and House of the Dead. Make him more generic because then he’ll be a safer bet.

See, now Bomberman kind of looks like Master Chief or, like, Iron Man. So he'll sell better in the USA, right? Right?

The scary side of appeasing market trends. 6-3-2012 update: would you believe that I wrote all of the above without even remembering that Konami rebooted Castlevania? I only had their ill-fated Bomberman Act Zero in mind as a point of comparison.

What does all of this have to do with indie gaming, anyway? You'll have to click to find out!

Game Creation 001: Don’t Sweat the Similar Stuff

And it’s all similar stuff. I treated the Grand List of Role-Playing Game Clichés like an unchecklist when I spent my time paper-plotting my dream RPGs at the age of sixteen: anything I thought up that I found on the List needed to hit the cutting room floor. Years later, I discovered TVTropes—and if I had treated that like an unchecklist, no game on the planet would remain.

I’ve heard an academic theory that, from a satellite view of screenwriting and literature, they only offer two types of stories: a hero takes a journey or a stranger comes to town. “Hero” is shorthand for “main character”, but I won’t break that saying down further because I don’t devote my time to movies and novels. I devote my time to something far more interesting and this is my theory:

Video games only offer two types of gameplay: Mario and Pokémon. Either circumstances control the hero or the hero controls circumstances. Either a big bad dragon rolls into town and captures a princess, ruining the hero’s peaceful life, or the hero has had enough with peace and sets out to challenge the world and be the very best—like no one ever was. Dragon Quest vs. Etrian Odyssey. Mega Man vs. Street Fighter. Castlevania vs. Monster Hunter. Tetris vs. any sports game ever made.

I prefer the higher jumps and comedy coward stylings of Luigi myself, but objective credit goes where it's due to the icon of gaming. I can't in good conscience give Pikachu the nod over Eevee, though! Who can resist those eyes or its seven Eeveelutions?

The best-selling video game franchises epitomize the basic building blocks of any title in the industry: the two possible goals and roles of the player.

No clever text this time. Let's get inspired.

Martial Arts Are For Girls

Ryu and Ken may rule their street in the fighting game genre, but monks and martial artists have become a feminine archetype in RPGs. Since the 8-bit era, at least one heroine from a high-profile, genre-important, worldwide million-seller RPG in every generation of game systems doesn’t settle for standing on her own two feet. She kicks with her own two feet, punches with her own two hands, and furthers the idea that in the RPG universe, every lady with working arms and legs should do the same. Forget Beauty and the Beast. From medieval tomboy princesses to prehistoric hut dwellers to modern girls living in dystopias, Beauty is the Beast and her killer instincts are a tale as old as time.

Even a girl who dresses like a bright and colorful witch can be a fighter. By the way, she'll always be Princess Alena or even Princess Arena to me. That Tsarevna stuff... I think not! Ayla carries a club for show, style, and flavor, but the real threats are her fists, especially after they evolve into Iron Fist and Bronze Fist when she reaches level 70 and 90. Tifa looks much tougher in her Final Fantasy VII form, but I thought the style clashed with Akira Toriyama's art for Alena and Ayla. I also prefer this outfit, so raspberries to anyone who wanted FFVII Tifa here!

Above: fighter girls across the ages. Chronological by game release date, not her own in-universe era!
Alt/title text available to those who hover.

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