Hollywood game development model
Here’s something I’ve been thinking about and researching a lot recently. It’s a description of an emerging game development model that uses a small development team to create a big game, and is the model we’re going to be using at Unknown Worlds. I recently wrote this up for our business plan, so please forgive me if it sounds a bit impersonal or corporate.
The “Hollywood” model
A new development model is needed to allow a company to retain experimentation and innovation, easier startup, and lower risks, while still allowing large production scale and high production values. This model is a hybrid between the current, generally accepted game studio model and the movie industry. It has been independently conceived of by Unknown Worlds and other experienced studios.
The Hollywood game development model dictates a small, permanent team that creates the game design, art style and concept, script, architectural constraints, tools pipeline, and everything else that constitutes the core of the game. Instead of creating the whole game, the team instead creates a ‘blueprint’ that ensures the game can be created quickly and unambiguously. Contractors and temporary employees are then hired to create everything from this blueprint.
Pre-production
The game world is created, complete with characters, places, technology and artistic visualizations. The design is then prototyped, evaluated and iterated until confidence in gameplay quality is achieved and production risks are thought to be minimized. Any needed technology is then completed, tested and deployed. This phase will take about a year (50% of the project time) and serves to minimize overall project risk and cost.
Production
Contractors who already know the technology work remotely on specific, bounded tasks from the schematics they are given. All the game’s assets are created, including models, textures, animations and levels. The core team will create the most important assets during this time and will guide the work of the external developers to ensure integrity. This phase is projected to last about six months (25% of the project), with the majority of the work being accomplished in the first three months.
Post-production
The team then performs game balancing, performance optimization, compatibility testing, tweaking and ‘polish’. Extensive beta testing is done, feedback is taken from players, and changes are made as necessary. Sound effects are recorded and the score written and recorded. This phase is projected to last about six months but won’t end until the company is completely satisfied with the game.
Development notes
1. Core technology choices must be popular and proven to ensure good contractors can be hired when needed.
2. If the company has consistency or efficiency problems during production, those tasks can be brought in-house (extending the schedule but at an equal cost). This may be needed to achieve total integrity.
3. The company won’t be able to reduce all risk in pre-production but it should reduce risks and rework, resulting in an estimated cost reduction of 50% of the industry average.
4. Foreign outsourcing of art and programming can probably be done at high quality and low expense. The team is experienced in working in a distributed fashion in different time zones, but if this doesn’t achieve the desired quality, local art or programming shops can be used.
5. It is the company’s belief that the sales potential of a game is determined largely by quality of the initial concept and the time spent in post-production tuning and refining the game. The company believes it can make hit games instead of average games by spending as much time as needed during these two phases. The Hollywood game development model minimizes team size to allow this extra time.
Appendix
1. Companies that have talked about or employed a similar model with various degress of success: Wideload Games, Revolution Software, Stormfront Studios, Mary Margaret Walker, Surreal Software.
2. Article on Hollywood Reporter
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As game requirements continue to grow, and as middleware gets better, I think that a model similar to this is a certainty, though I’m sure it will need tweaks and changes.
What are your thoughts on this? See any holes or potential problems?
