It's quite usual to see some trends coming and going along with each console generation. The technologic advances have allowed elements such as realistic physics and innovative interface methods, offering more room for the game designers' imagination and creativity... and while some ideas have been living in the developer collective subconscious - the DS stylus working as a pen, tilt sensitivity for racing, using the gamer's actual picture with the Playstation Eye and Live Vision camera, and so on - it's how each title's execution is done that makes it stand out from the crowd.
"Max and the Magic Marker" is one of these titles for WiiWare, and it's interesting how some of these aspects cross over - after all, the player uses the Remote as a magical pen to draw stuff on screen, and the outcome is based on realistic physics effects! But why did the gang from Danish studio Press Play chose Wii over the DS? The answer to this and many other questions were revealed by game designer Ole Teglbjærg, one of the company's founders. Check our exclusive interview, and the newest game trailer down the page as well!
About Press Play
FinalBoss: Thanks for your time! Please introduce yourself to our game fans!
Ole Teglbjærg: My name is Ole Teglbjærg, I'm 31 years old. I'm a co-founder and partner in Press Play, a small Danish game studio. My work consists partly of managing the studio along with the other partners, but I'm also involved in the actual development of the projects. I'm not a super coder, but I can program, and I can bring my ideas to life.
FB: How did you start your carreer in game development?
Teglbjærg: To be honest, my career in game development came partly by accident or luck or how you'll put it. When I was younger I didn't play a lot of computer games. My friends had Amigas and Commodore 64s, but I never had one myself.
Then in university I met Mikkel Thorsted and Rune Dittmer, and my interest in games and digital stuff grew. We made a lot of projects together - mainly artsy installations with some digital elements in them. After a while we started getting paying clients that wanted us to do installations for them.
When we graduated we had some long talks about what to do, and we ended up agreeing that it would very hard - if not impossible, to find a job that would be as good and fun as the one we believed we could create ourselves by making a business of our own and so we did. Our focus was "webstuff" in a broad sense, meaning we did websites, banner ads, and all sorts not so interesting projects, but also games. Of course we found out that games are a lot more fun to make than banner ads and websites, so our focus drifted more and more in that direction. Then our productions grew bigger and started financing our own games and that's where we are today.
FB: Do you enjoy playing games on your free time? If so, which titles and genres are your favorites?
Teglbjærg: Personally, I'm not a hardcore gamer. But I've always had a soft spot for platformers and more casual titles. Lately I've played LittleBigPlanet and World of Goo. I think they require just the right amount of commitment from me as a player. There's no boring dialog and it's instant fun, and I like that.
A part from the casual stuff I play around 30 minutes of Counter-Strike everyday with the rest of the company. It's our daily team building exercise.
Since I didn't play a lot of computer games when I was younger, people at the office sometimes laugh at me, when I admit not knowing some of the "classics" in gaming. But that's just how it is, and luckily we have people on the team who has played almost every game available, so they guide me.
FB: When was Press Play founded? How many people work there, and how is a day at the company?
Teglbjærg: Press Play is a Copenhagen based game studio currently employing 8 guys. It was founded by me (Ole Teglbjærg), Mikkel Thorsted and Rune Dittmer in 2006 when we graduated from university. In the beginning we made a lot of Flash games and websites just to stay afloat and pay the bills.
Now our focus has turned towards games for the download services for consoles such as WiiWare, PSN, XBLA. But we are still doing Flash stuff for clients. We like to consider the Flash projects as a testing ground for new concepts and mechanics. And the good thing is, that it is paid for but other people.
A typical in the Press Play office starts around 9-9:30, when people meet in. Usually we have a number of projects going on at the same time, with one to five people on it at the time. Currently we are doing Max and the Magic Marker, prototyping of "Octoracer", and two smaller projects for Danish National TV. Our flat structure and small teams on each projects gives everyone at the office has a lot of responsibility. Everyone must be able to make decisions and they do.
A round 11:30 we have lunch, and when we are done, the office is split into two teams and we play Counter-Strike for 20-30 minutes. We have tried a few different after-lunch-games, but Counter-Strike just seems to work really well. We find that shooting your colleagues in the head is good for the morale ;-)
When we are done shooting, it's back to work until around 17:00 when people go home.
FB: What are the pros and cons of running an indie development studio?
Teglbjærg: The biggest advantage of running an indie game studio, is that it's fun. We decide what's right for us, we make the decisions and that is extremely rewarding. The problem is that it's at our own risk. If we screw up, the consequences can be fatal for the company.
Another problem is money. We constantly have to be able to pay the bills and sometimes that makes it hard to make long term decisions. We have to focus on both getting an income on a monthly basis and invest in the future at the same time.
Another good thing is how the market is developing at the moment. The download services are shortening the gap between indie developers and consumers and that's a good thing.
About Max & the Magic Marker
FB: What was your inspiration for "Max & the Magic Marker"?
Teglbjærg: Concept-wise, the inspiration comes from the insane imagination of young boys. We all remember drawing what to others would just look like a few lines on the paper, but in our own minds would be an awesome airplane shooting rockets at aliens.
On the gaming side, the inspiration comes from two trends in gaming that were present when the concept was conceived - physics and drawing. The early videos of LittleBigPlanet had been released at that time and we thought it looked awesome. At the same time "Crayon Physics", "Line Rider" and a number of other games based on a drawing feature had come out. So we would be lying if we didn't name these games as inspiration gaming wise.
FB: Is it a WiiWare exclusive?
Teglbjærg: Right now we are focusing on WiiWare. We haven't quite decided about other platforms.
FB: We've noticed that this game has a lot going on regarding physics... what can gamers expect to do with the Magic Marker?
Teglbjærg: Max and the Magic Marker offers a unique drawing feature giving the player unlimited possibilities within a physical world. Everything the player draws gets physical properties and acts within the game world.
That means the player can pretty much do anything - and they do. What we have found when testing, is that people come up with all sorts of crazy solutions to puzzles we thought was pretty much straight forward. And that is the beauty of the game. We offer a framework - a physical world to interact with, and a drawing feature. The players do the rest and very rarely we know what that is.
That makes Max and the Magic Marker a game that you can not only play, but also play with.
FB: Given Nintendo DS' popularity, lots of studios presented ideas related to drawing, such as "Kirby: Canvas Curse" and "Line Rider". What led you to do develop it for Wii instead of DS?
Teglbjærg: There are a number of reasons to this. First of all there are performance issues. The Wii is not super powerful, but compared to the DS it's a monster. That gives us a lot more freedom in regards to physics and the number of things to interact with. Secondly there is also the fact, that our game engine Unity 3D supports Wii development. In terms our target audience I also think it is better suited for the Wii.
That said a DS version is still not out of the question, but that's going to take some time, and we might have to get somebody else to do it.
FB: The purple monster reminds us of another villain from a point-and-click adventure classic - not to mention a very intimidating Roman helm. How pesky will he be in this game?
Teglbjærg: There is some resemblance, but this guy is even more annoying. The monster will be present mainly in boss fights, but I can't say too much about that just yet - people will have to see it for themselves. Other than that he is the one screwing up Max's fantasy, turning Max's friends evil.
FB: Will there be multiplayer, or any other interactions from other people on this game?
Teglbjærg: In this version there won't be any multiplayer game modes. Unfortunately we had to cut that.
About the current market and future developments
FB: What's next for Press Play? What's the skinny on "Hard Plastic" and "Octoracer"?
Teglbjærg: Both titles are very far from Max both concept-wise and how far in the process we are. But here are the outlines:
"Hard Plastic" is a casual shooter for everyone. The player controls toy tanks in the battle for supremacy. The game is designed for 4 guys sitting in a couch looking for a fun, low commitment game that is easy and quick to access. The design objective is to take all the fun stuff from the classic shooter genre, and make it accessible for people who normally would avoid that kind of game.
"Octoracer" is a racing game for octopuses. The concept is still in a very early phase, but the idea is somewhat based on a mechanic we developed for Danish National TV (http://www.dr.dk/dr1/troldspejlet/hjernegnaskeren/x - the rules are easy - stay on screen and eat astronauts). This game is also based on multiplayer action, and is inspired by "Mario Kart" and Worms.
FB: What's your take on PC titles?
Teglbjærg: The classic retail PC-market is getting harder and harder to be profitable in. What we are seeing now is pretty much the same pattern as we saw with the music business a few years ago. The publishers/record companies are reluctant to accept that their classic business models with classic distribution no longer work as they should. The cost of development, distribution, and marketing is so high, very few games end up making profit.
That said it seems like the download services such as Steam is breathing new air into the PC-market. The download services remove the expensive middle man (classic publishers and the physical distribution), leaving a bigger chunk of the cake to the developers and lowering the cost for consumers. And also they are not nearly as troubled by piracy. So it is definitely an opportunity to develop in that direction.
One thing we as developers have to keep in mind though is the marketing. We can't expect people to buy our game, if they don't know about it. In other words we have to do marketing ourselves and most indie studios are not quite ready for that. I think in order to be successful the indie studios have to think a bit like big corporation and take marketing very serious. Having great support in the indie community is not going to fund your game. We have to get it out to "normal" consumers get them to buy it.
FB: What is your take on current consoles (360, PS3, Wii)?
Teglbjærg: I think each one has its own pros and cons.
The Wii is typically conceivede a "family console" engaging both young and old - a lot of the people who own a Wii, never play anything but tennis or bowling. That's not necessarily a bad thing, because it leaves an unexplored market, which seems like it is just opening up with WiiWare having some really good titles on the "shelves" already. Also there is the technical fact that Wii offers a different control scheme, but it seems like both Microsoft and Sony and going in that direction now as well.
The 360 has a large user base, successful titles do extremely well. But from an indie developer's point of view it seems like it can be quite hard to get a slot on XBLA and the competition is harsh. The PS3 user base is not as large as on the other two, and from what I've heard it's harder to develop for. But I really do not know much in depth these platforms.
FB: And what about portable systems (DS, PSP, iPhone)?
Teglbjærg: The DS has some really interesting titles on the list, and is in my opinion the most interesting. But what I hear from publishers, is it a very tough market to be successful in. New titles are competing with hundreds of happy-animal-pet-zoo-puppy-pony-kiddy-joy kind of games and besides that a shit load well established IP, so it's very hard break through the wall of that.
The iPhone could be interesting, but very few titles I've seen are actually that good and utilize the touch screen in a satisfying way. It has taken a long time for developers to actually understand how it should be used. Business-wise, the openness of the App Store is both the success and the problem about it. It is easy and cheap to develop for, but very hard to actually be successful. Even successful games sell only very shortly (a few days) and then the next "new thing comes around". That makes developers aim very low in terms of ambitions and development budgets, and that is not to the benefit of the platform in general.
The PSP has been lying still for a while, at least in Denmark (I've been told that we for some reason are behind the rest of the world on that specific platform). But Sony seems to have decided to give it another go with the new PSP. What the PSP titles (not counting LocoRoco, etc. ) are lacking in innovative design it is making up for in by the extra processing power it offers, making it easier to convert retail titles to PSP, without simplifying and dumbing it down too much.
FB: Digital distribution or retail?
Teglbjærg: I guess it goes without saying that we at Press Play believe very much in digital distribution. As I said earlier it really cuts out a very expensive part of the developer-distributor-consumer equation. Of course it will be some time before digital titles sell as much as the big hits on retail, but it is only a matter of time.
FinalBoss' Classic Round of Questions
FB: Which game made you think "I wish I had created that", and why? Other than "Asteroids", of course... [visit their official website and find out why!]
Teglbjærg: I'm sure not all here at the office agrees with me, but a personal favorite of mine is MicroMachines - the one with the small toy cars racing on a table top. It's simple and a whole lot of fun. In my opinion it proves that the quality of a game has nothing to do with what the graphics look like or advanced physics involved are - as long as the basic is fun.
FB: Which other game developers do you look up to, and for what reasons?
Teglbjærg: Generally I look up to all those indie developers who believe in their own concept and manage to realize it. I'm thinking of studios like 2D Boy and Ronimo Games (Swords and Soldiers). It takes a certain attitude to take the risk and overcome the challenges involved. Especially I like the work of Kyle Gabler (2D Boy). A lot of his early projects from www.experimentalgameplay.com are in my opinion fantastic.
FB: Have you ever been to Brazil? How well do you know the country?
Teglbjærg: No, unfortunately haven't been to Brazil yet. But I have a Brazilian friend (Renzo), who gave me Flamengo's football jersey I wear once in a while, and one day (when I get a decent pay check), I'll have to go and drink caipirinhas on Copacabana and dance at the carnival.
FB: What's your advice for aspiring game developers?
Teglbjærg: More specifically, I think the most important thing for indie developers is to knowing your limits. Of course it's good to be ambitious, but there is no point in trying to compete with the AAA titles. It is far better to be unique and innovative. For me a good game has nothing to do with how detailed the graphics are or how realistic the physics behave - it's all about game play and a good idea.
Don't be discouraged when publishers turn your project down. They tend to have a very narrow view on the games market. So if you talk a publisher who is used to make games for kids. They will always evaluate the projects within that frame. Just move on to the next and remember to get some feedback on what they liked and what they didn't like.
Be open and talk to other developers you think may have had the same experiences as you. A lot of small developers go through the exact same phases and challenges and we can learn a lot from each other (if anyone has a question, feel free to get in touch).
FB: Please leave a message to our readers and game fans!
Teglbjærg: Take it easy, it's just for fun...
FinalBoss would like to thank Ole Teglbjærg for sharing a bit of his experience on this interview, and we are eager to see what the gang from Press Play brings us on their debut title on WiiWare - and yes, we expect to see you enjoying the finer things in Brazil once you get here. Stay tuned for our next exclusive interviews!
