Hardcore Gaming's Salvation?

Quarter to Three talks to three developers about the profits and perils of bypassing the traditional retail market

Con't.

Qt3: Does being a small developer who's selling direct allow you to get away with not having state-of-the-art graphics and glitz?

Wardell: Yes and No. You still have to have good graphics. I know I won't play a game that has crummy graphics. But at the same time, it doesn't have to have an hour of cut-scenes. And not everything needs to be 3D rendered. I am still not in favor of strategy games using 3D unless there is a sound gameplay reason to use it.

Dunham: As I recall, we were slammed by the interviewer for just this, so obviously not :-)

Though let me add that I think our graphics are *better* than state of the art -- King of Dragon Pass has an infinite number of polygons, after all. Of course we trade off for frame rate. Luckily, the judges at the 2nd Independent Games Festival opted for polygon count and gave us the Best Visual Art award.

Moylan: To a extent, but only a small one. Gamers and reviewers will forgive up to a 20% "glitz gap" between an indie game and a big studio game. But that's all. It's unfortunate, but if you allow your game to look obsolete you're dead.

Qt3: Do you have trouble getting your game reviewed by the major publications?

Wardell: We'll find out soon enough. But we've found in the past that the game magazines tend to be generally fair overall. The main problem is how much time they'll put into a review. Small developers don't tend to get the benefit of the doubt. So if a smaller game takes time to get into, we tend to suffer for it in the review. Whereas in a big name game, the reviewer will tend to take the time to get into the game before passing judgement. I.e. a small game that fails to get the attention of the reviewer will tend to get a "This game sucks!" reaction. Many of the greatest games of all time took time to get into (Planetscape: Torment for one).

Dunham: Not really. (Though sadly of all the reviews, the two big print magazines seemed to take the most offense at KoDP's lack of frame rate.)

Moylan: To our surprise, no. Reviewers gave us their full attention and treated us well. Even better, they understood and enjoyed the intent and design of Combat Mission. They didn't treat it like just another generic 3D game. They "got it".

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