GameDev Breakdown

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Pontus “Zlapped” Mähler of Global Top Round Aug 11, 2021

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Original Air Date: Aug. 11, 2021 - Indie accelerator GTR's director of business development calls in to discuss his time as a pro eSports competitor, his transition into the business of making and publishing games, and what indies need to know about marketing themselves, attracting funding and business partners, and more.Show links • http://twitter.com/bzlapped • https://www.globaltopround.com/ • https://www.gameround.co/

Remembering Our Friend Abel Wang Jul 30, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jul. 30, 2021 - To celebrate the life of community rockstar Abel Wang, we revisit our 2018 discussion with him at GDC joined by Microsoft cloud advocate Jessica Deen.Show links • Support https://girlswhocode.com/ in memoriam

Buildbox Leadership Answers Your Questions Jul 21, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jul. 21, 2021 - Buildbox CEO, Jonathan Zweig, and Design SVP, Doug Manson, call in to address questions about the company, its game development products and services, and concerns raised in the development community about recent revenue changes for developers.Show links • CodeWritePlay coverage - https://codewriteplay.com/2021/05/18/buildbox-to-claim-up-to-70-of-user-revenue-soon/ • CodeWritePlay coverage - https://codewriteplay.com/2021/05/23/our-5-unanswered-questions-for-buildbox/* http://Buildbox.com

Games For Change President, Susanna Pollack Jul 12, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jul. 12, 2021 - Susanna Pollack calls in as Games For Change kicks off its 18th annual festival exploring the impact of games on education, healthcare, research, civics, and social issues.Festival highlights • Nsé Ufot (New Georgia Project) - https://2021gamesforchangevirtualfestiva.sched.com/event/jyWn/the-grassroots-game-new-media-for-voter-engagement • Josh Shen (State Dept) - https://2021gamesforchangevirtualfestiva.sched.com/event/jySO/can-governments-help-grow-the-gaming-community • Jenny Wu (Understood - festival’s support of accessibility and usability) - https://2021gamesforchangevirtualfestiva.sched.com/event/jyUf/raising-good-gamers-youth-safety-and-diversity • John Hanke (Niantic) - https://2021gamesforchangevirtualfestiva.sched.com/event/jySL/keynote-building-real-world-communities-with-niantic • Katie Salen (RGG) - https://2021gamesforchangevirtualfestiva.sched.com/event/jyVd/well-played-raising-good-gamers-a-behind-the-scenes-look-at-3-families-experience-in-minecraftShow links • http://GamesForChange.org • https://twitter.com/G4C?s=20 on Twitter • https://www.facebook.com/gamesforchange on Facebook • The https://us1.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=aa9b4edf4a633020c94db2c88&id=b441ca4b91

Retro Space Ball Developer Rik Oclon Jul 09, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jul. 9, 2021 - 3D Generalist Rik Oclon calls in to discuss his project Retro Space Ball, how he navigated a huge debacle with a major games publisher (and received no payment), and he gives us some great data about his player base as well as some insight into his marketing and community management research.Support our sponsorsThis show was sponsored by Appfigures! Appfigures is all about giving game makers the tools they need to reduce risk and get more downloads. To find out more, head to https://appfigures.com/on/GameDevBreakdown to try Appfigures for free. If you like it, use our special code GDB3030 to get 30% off for the next 3 months.Show links • https://rikoclon.itch.io/retro-space-ball on itch.io • https://knipsch.itch.io/dodgepeople-vr on itch.io • https://rikoclon.com/ • https://twitter.com/RikOclon on Twitter

Triple-A Veteran Luis Alonso Jul 01, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jul. 1, 2021 - Luis Alonso of Recombobulator Games calls in to walk us through his experiences contributing to series like Need For Speed and Mass Effect--or if you prefer, Hannah Montana and VeggieTales--before going indie with his wife (accomplished writer Michelle Franklin) to realize a creative vision that's stayed with him since childhood.Show links • https://store.steampowered.com/app/1534720/Space_Boat__Episode_1/ on Steam • https://recombobulator.ca/ • https://twitter.com/SpaceBoatGame on Twitter

The Virtual Book Tour Continues Jun 24, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jun. 24, 2021 - Todd promotes--and in one case, absolutely does not promote--his new book, Inside Video Game Creation, in three more chats with industry podcast hosts at Moonlight Game Devs, What Else Do You Do?, and GamerHeads.Show links • https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09151NFSQ/ on Amazon • The https://moonlightgamedevs.com/ podcast • The https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/what-else-do-you-do/id1550625254 podcast • The https://www.gamerheadspodcast.com/ podcast

Boss Fight Books Author Sebastian Deken Jun 17, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jun. 17, 2021 - Sebastian Deken calls in to discuss his book, Final Fantasy VI from Boss Fight Books, and how his musical background led to his unique approach in covering the game. We go over the Final Fantasy series' history in the US and how the games have progressed over time. There is almost no gotcha journalism.If you're already a fan of the Boss Fight Books series, you know that each author tends to bring a unique approach to their installment. Some books revolve around deeply personal stories while others are a result of incredibly thorough investigative journalism. In Final Fantasy VI, Deken introduces yet another approach: a music-first exploration of one of the most popular RPGs of all time.Deken brings the perspective of a well-studied professional musician to the challenge of capturing what makes Final Fantasy's metronome tick, and he's been reflecting on the magic of the third/sixth installment (we refresh this timeline in the episode) since the day fate placed a knowledgeable toy store sales associate in his father's path just after the game's North American release. His verdict? Final Fantasy VI's music is much more than background noise."I pitched it as sort of a look at the game through the music and how the music functions within the game to advance the drama and to hold the game together, because the script is a disaster," Deken joked during our discussion. "It's just--it's a trainwreck. There's so much going on that it's hanging by a thread, the story."During our chat, Deken explains how music helps move the game's narrative throughout its notorious twists and turns in gameplay. The book explores these choices, the soundtrack's later transition to live performances, and the composer's achievements in bringing video game music into its own as a legitimate genre.Final Fantasy VI is available in ebook format from Boss Fight Books with a paperback edition coming this summer.Show links: • https://bossfightbooks.com/products/final-fantasy-vi-by-sebastian-deken from Boss Fight Books • https://twitter.com/sebsational on Twitter

Adam Fligsten of Silen Audio Jun 10, 2021

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Original Air Date: Jun. 10, 2021 - Adam Fligsten of Silen Audio calls in to discuss his process, his projects, and his path into music and audio composition for TV, film, and games. His credits include Marvel vs. Capcom, Saturday Night Live, NBC Olympics, and much, much more.I think that people put these tools on a pedestal and they shouldn't. It should be accessible to everybody...- Adam FligstenAdam Fligsten has been composing music for decades. After working in the music industry in both New York and Los Angeles, he's leveraging his incredible resume including tons of highly visible work in TV and film to get more heavily involved in video game sound design and composition.While Adam is presently under a number of NDAs, his recent contribution to the Marvel vs. Capcom series suggests that, once again, he's making a beeline for the coolest projects around. When the pandemic kept most of us in isolation, he turned to Twitch where he streamed the entire process of composing https://adamfligsten.com/ceresstation/, a Super Metroid tribute album.Make no mistake: Silen Audio would love nothing more than to provide music and audio services for just about any game in development, but Adam maintains a refreshing philosophy about approachability and fun when it comes to making music."You shouldn't be afraid to mess up," he says. "That's what practicing an instrument is. You just keep doing it over and over again until it sounds good. If you're trying to record something, you usually have enough time to get it right. I think that people put these tools on a pedestal and they shouldn't. It should be accessible to everybody. Just pick it up, make some noise until it sounds the way you want it to sound, and that's it. That's making music."Silen Audio was founded in 2016 in Los Angeles, California, and provides both sound design and composition services for indie and AAA studios.Show Links • http://silen.audio • http://AdamFligsten.com • https://twitter.com/adamfligsten

Jesse Attard of Tactic Studios Jun 02, 2021

Show notes

Original Air Date: Jun. 2, 2021 - Tactic Studios developer and CEO, Jesse Attard (BioShock, BioShock 2, Street Fighter II: Champion Edition (2006)), calls in for a podcast chat about the studio's new Portal-style puzzle adventure game, Claire de Lune. We discuss his transition from major AAA teams to heading up an indie studio, parenting at publish time, best pandemic home office purchases, and more.A "Fantastic" Transition to Indie DevelopmentIt's difficult to imagine a triple-A veteran more optimistic than Jesse Attard. Since 2005, he's contributed to major projects at Ubisoft, Capcom, and Digital Extremes, putting him in the right places at the right times to work on everything from old flip phone games up to the BioShock series and even a late port of Street Fighter II. You'd be right to anticipate a story about burnout and the evisceration of hope in a notoriously brutal industry, yet Attard simply describes the move to indie development as a nice change of pace."Oh, it's fantastic. It's great. I love doing it," Attard says about the move from the major-budget studios. "I love having my own engine. I loved working on [Digital Extremes'] engine as well...because you have a lot of flexibility in terms of what you can do and add to it."Tactic's upcoming title, Claire de Lune, uses the studio's own proprietary engine that the team started building back when the major game engine terms weren't nearly as inviting as they are now. The graphics and gameplay seen in the game's trailers look right at home alongside just about any modern title.Attard has stories about why game engine freedom is important to him."BioShock was on [Unreal Engine]," he says. "And so we worked on BioShock, and you're terrified about touching any of the Epic code because if Epic decides to change that code, now you've got to merge them and it's just a big nightmare. Having your own engine, you have 100% flexibility. You can make it do exactly what you want. It's much easier to work with, from our standpoint. So that's been great."Beyond leveraging his technical experience, Attard is enjoying the additional creative influence he has as part of a small team. He wrote and took care of the full sound design for Claire de Lune.Tactic Studios is targeting a June 14th release date for Claire de Lune.Show Links • https://store.steampowered.com/app/717110/Claire_de_Lune/ • https://www.tacticstudios.com/

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