Making a video game company

Quilly

Seifer wrote: »

Are you serious?
Bullfrog started off in a time when it was still possible for a small group of people to make a commercial game; this is not possible any more.
And they were bought out because they made a string of really good games, not because they were "small". Starting small didn't pay off, working like a dog and producing high quality, fun games did.

well thats why i was saying you need a load of funding nowadays to even keep up ! and aiming toward a certain part of the game creation rather than a full game was probably the way to go. Bullfrog may have been a bad example for what i meant :P, but i liked what Bullfrog produced thus why i used them !

satchmo

Seifer wrote: »

Are you serious?
Bullfrog started off in a time when it was still possible for a small group of people to make a commercial game; this is not possible any more.

Rubbish - of course that's still possible, and Bullfrog was a very good example. You just have to pick a different market these days; iPhone/iPad games, Flash browser games, even small games on Steam can all be made by one or a few people without the barrier to entry that console games have. Hell, it's still even possible to make standalone PC game with a few dedicated people - Introversion have proved as much, and now they've moved on to making console games too.

Trevor451

Are there any game development studios in Ireland anyway?

Seifer

satchmo wrote: »

Rubbish - of course that's still possible, and Bullfrog was a very good example. You just have to pick a different market these days; iPhone/iPad games, Flash browser games, even small games on Steam can all be made by one or a few people without the barrier to entry that console games have. Hell, it's still even possible to make standalone PC game with a few dedicated people - Introversion have proved as much, and now they've moved on to making console games too.

Bullfrog are not a good example because when they started making games the industry was completely different. And they were developing for the state of the art technology at the time, none of which your offerings are.

dreamers75

Trevor451 wrote: »

Are there any game development studios in Ireland anyway?

Nope, last game development related studio was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havok_%28software%29


Which was sold recently.


to the OP unlikely you will start a video game company with no experience. if your serious make a game for Ipad/Iphone and work from there. There are a few courses in ireland that may help.

Seifer

dreamers75 wrote: »

Nope, last game development related studio was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havok_%28software%29

That's not true. I know Popcap have offices here as well as GOA. There are probably a few other obscure ones too. Blizzard have an operation here but I don't think there's any development. Activision used to do testing here too but not sure of the state of that either.

Kersmash

Blizzard have an office down here in Cork, but that's just customer support AFAIK.

satchmo

Seifer wrote: »

Bullfrog are not a good example because when they started making games the industry was completely different. And they were developing for the state of the art technology at the time, none of which your offerings are.

I'm sure there are many iPad developers out there who would disagree with you. They would probably argue that the iPad is much more state of the art than the five-year-old Xbox360.

But why does the platform make a difference? Regardless of what state the industry is compared to when Bullfrog started, the core process is still the same - start with a small group of talented people making a good product that people want to play, and build from there. Which they did, and very successfully so. Any startup game company today is most likely to succeed if they follow the same plan. Hence, they're a good example.

Trevor451 wrote:

Are there any game development studios in Ireland anyway?

There are some developers in Ireland - see here for a list, although it's definitely incomplete - missing Dark Water, Gala Networks, and probably others. However there is an absence of big-budget console developers in Ireland because the experienced talent isn't here. And the experienced talent isn't here because of a lack of big-budget developers.

Seifer

satchmo wrote: »

I'm sure there are many iPad developers out there who would disagree with you. They would probably argue that the iPad is much more state of the art than the five-year-old Xbox360.

They could argue that but they would be wrong. It may be a state of the art tablet but it is not a state of the art games platform.
It doesn't have the specs to play any proper games nor does it have a relevant input method.

satchmo

You're kind of missing the point here. Nobody said anything about making a full console game with a small team. You said it was impossible for a small group of people to make a commercial game. I'm saying many people all over the world are, right at this minute, proving you wrong.

Gizmo put it best, so I'm just going to quote him and leave it at that.

Gizmo wrote:

It completely depends on the type of games you want to work on. If it's a small studio targeting mobile/online platforms then you'll just need some funding and some good staff.

If you're thinking XBLA/PSN games then you'll need increased funding, more experienced staff and a publishing deal. Finding all of those in the right quantities in Ireland at the moment will be a challenge.

If you're thinking about AAA development then just forget about it for now.

Seifer

satchmo wrote: »

You're kind of missing the point here. Nobody said anything about making a full console game with a small team. You said it was impossible for a small group of people to make a commercial game. I'm saying many people all over the world are, right at this minute, proving you wrong.

Gizmo put it best, so I'm just going to quote him and leave it at that.

I'm not missing any point. I quoted a poster who said the OP should copy Bullfrog's model. I said that it was not possible to do that anymore as you cannot make games (proper games, not casual dross or flash time killers) with a small team like Bullfrog in this day and age.

BostonB

Seifer wrote: »

I'm not missing any point. I quoted a poster who said the OP should copy Bullfrog's model. I said that it was not possible to do that anymore as you cannot make games (proper games, not casual dross or flash time killers) with a small team like Bullfrog in this day and age.

I think that depends on how you define a "proper game".

Personally theres lot of big budget games I wouldn't consider a "proper game" either.

gizmo

Seifer wrote: »

I'm not missing any point. I quoted a poster who said the OP should copy Bullfrog's model. I said that it was not possible to do that anymore as you cannot make games (proper games, not casual dross or flash time killers) with a small team like Bullfrog in this day and age.

While they are certainly a minority, the creation of full commercial games is far from impossible with a small team. One need only look at the likes of Introversion, 2D Boy and Frozenbyte as proof of this.

The counter argument is, of course, that while the games released by these companies have been both critically and commerically well received, they are not technically speaking AAA games. That being said they are all far from being "casual dross".

RedXIV

Sorry for dragging up an old thread but was checking something

quarryman wrote: »

And how's it going now? Great to see people starting out from scratch.

We're still struggling. I'm not going to lie to you, it's far more difficult than we thought and we've totally rehashed our business plan but it's still there. We're making progress, albeit slow progress

jimi_t2 wrote: »

Bit OT, but is anyone familiar with the process of being a writer with a videogame company?

Just so you know, when peter molyneux was here for a talk a few months ago, he said how keen he was to get people in purely as writers, so send an email off to Lionhead and see what you can come up with

JayMul

How do you mean Peter Molyneux was here, did he call over to your house for tea? I'm feeling a bit jealous right now

Bulktohulk

JayMul wrote: »

How do you mean Peter Molyneux was here, did he call over to your house for tea? I'm feeling a bit jealous right now

He held some talks in a few different colleges as far I know.

JayMul

Aye I asked Red, he mentioned it was at the Jameson film festival I got to keep my ear to ground a little more. Would have been interesting I'd say.