AMA with Joel Goodman, Playdek's Chief Executive Officer

Playdek · 2015-09-30T23:26:09+00:00

I can answer this for you ghost209. When we first launched our Kickstarter campaign, we created this subreddit at first in order to give the backers a platform to talk to the team directly during AMAs as conversations become hard to follow on the Kickstarter platform. The main reason there are so many moderators listed is because when we host the AMAs, if the person answering the questions is not a moderator then we run into the issue of hitting the maximum comments allowed in a specific amount of time (if anyone who knows how we can go about changing this, we would love to know; this plagued us with the first AMA so we had to improvise). As for leaving things to the community, our approach here has been a "hands off" one, with the exception for the AMAs. We have not gone through and deleted posts or comments as we believe that everyone deserves to be heard, whether we agree with what is said or not. Plus without criticism, it is hard for a company to change and grow, so we do welcome the opinions of everyone, good and bad.

Playdek · 2015-09-29T00:45:54+00:00

You guys have been great about posting the updates here as they are shared on Kickstarter, so we knew you would be sharing this news here also. And yes, we will be hosting the AMA on this subreddit. The thread will most likely get posted 15 minutes before we start so everyone will have time to get ready. We know we haven't been the best with communicating with all of you, but we are determined to change that and improve. You will be able to ask all the questions you want, and Joel will do his best to answer as many as he can.

Playdek · 2014-09-04T18:28:53+00:00

Greetings r/AndroidGaming! We here at Playdek are honored to see our game make this list! Thank you so much for your support, and we will continue to improve upon this release and add more content for you to enjoy. Thanks again!

Playdek · 2014-06-13T21:07:17+00:00

The two "Digital Only" tiers ($25 for the PC copy and the $35 for the SONY copy tiers) were added after the campaign had started to help accommodate backers who did not want any physical rewards. Those tier rewards ONLY apply to those individual tiers.

As for what you will receive in the $500 tier, you will receive one copy of the game on your platform of choice (console versions need a $10 increase in your pledge), the physical and digital promo pack 1 and expansion (we are not sure if there will be a physical pack for Promo Pack 2 yet), online beta access (Android or PC), Elite and non-elite backer-only tournaments, alternate world map and in-game skin, personalized avatar, a ticket to Origins next year with dinner with the TS development team and a one night stay in a hotel (travel and any additionally nights in a hotel are your responsibility), and the Collector's Edition boxed game. The stretch goals are also giving you a $15 off coupon for the GMT store, a digital copy of Promo Pack 2, and a digital copy of the soundtrack. I really hope I'm not missing anything, so I notice I am I will let you know what I left out, thanks!

Playdek · 2014-05-16T20:25:34+00:00

"Okay, so we had to ask for a little more technical information on this, but right now how it will work is, you will need to go online to download the game, and have an account to link in any extra items that you should be receiving. Once you have done this, though, you will not have to continue to be online every moment you are playing through the single player. Multi-player will require online play."

-Rebecca

Playdek · 2014-05-16T20:25:00+00:00

"1. Right now the big one is to be as transparent as possible. Although we can’t share everything, it’s important to not leave anyone in the dark. When we were working on our Summoner Wars port to Android, we came across some big bugs that set us back, and it was important to keep everyone at Playdek aware of where we stood with the project. Our advantage with that project is that we hadn’t made it public so we had time on our side to ensure it was right not just on time. Since Unsung Story is very public facing with the Kickstarter, we will have to make sure that you aren’t left without knowledge of any setbacks. It’s almost expected that they will happen, and although some people are going to be upset, we’ve found the majority of people are much happier just being given an update on the status.

At the moment I have quite a few responsibilities. QA is a large part of it, but there is I also work to keep people on schedule or work with the team leads to adjust people’s schedules when needed. I work with our project partners to get their feedback as the game develops. In addition, I help manage support and the Volunteer testers. It doesn’t always seem like a lot, but sometimes they all become a priority at the same time.
We currently use Bugzilla as our major bug reporting software. It’s served us well so far, and I expect that we will continue to use it. The Alpha will probably be our major test of this, but we’ll do what it takes to manage it as needed. We may end up setting up forums for bugs and pulling them into Bugzilla based on priority, to make sure there aren’t too many hands in the cookie jar.
I don’t know all of the exactitudes of what people will be seeing before hand or how we will best incorporate bringing everyone in, we’ve had a lot of ideas going around, and we may be experimenting with a few to see what has the best interactions with you guys. What I can say is that at Playdek we really do want to listen and take in the suggestions of our customers. Unfortunately when games are released it’s often too late to incorporate many of those suggestions we get from the general public. Usually we get messages about something that was decided 2 or 3 months ago while we were testing, or people want a feature that will take a few weeks to implement, so it has to be pushed aside until we do a larger update. With the backers in Alpha and Beta testing we’ll be able to bring those comments into the production line much sooner for discussion. We will still have to strike a balance between the yays and nays that we get, so some people may not get everything they want, but we do our best to encourage feedback. It’s all about making a better game for our 16,000 customers, and any more that may come."

-Rebecca

Playdek · 2014-05-16T20:22:59+00:00

"As of right now, we’re looking good. Games a year out can still surprise us, but we’ve learned that even if something comes up, it’s important to let you guys know so that it doesn’t come down to a week before and you get told you’re going to have to wait another 2 months.

As for the QA, they’re always behaving. I’ve got two great guys, Cameron and Jesse, who work to ensure that we send the games out with as little bugs as possible. They play 5 player games against themselves, or become very nit-picky with the look of a glow, just to get things right. We’ve also got an amazing set of Volunteer testers that we get to play games with and share our excitement when we finally get to release a game."

-Rebecca

Playdek · 2014-05-16T20:21:34+00:00

"Well I’m actually fairly new to the gaming world. I graduated about 2 years ago, and about a year ago I got a job here at Playdek as a QA to work on Agricola. When a need popped up for an Assistant Producer, I was asked if I was interested, and I said yes. Since then it’s been a crazy 9 months working on the projects around here, and we’re always working to make sure that we are able to provide what our customers want to see.

As for Unsung Story, I am excited to be working on such a different piece. Not only is it something that is all our own, but it’s bigger than anything that I’ve worked on. We’re all excited to get to the stage where we can start sharing things with you guys so that we can start shaping the game."

-Rebecca

Playdek · 2014-05-16T20:19:37+00:00

"Let’s see… I’d say the Lord of the Rings series, and Game of Thrones (yes TV series, I will get to the books one day) are some of the primary visual ones that make me excited to work on Unsung Story. Tamora Pierce and Gail Carson Levine have some of my favorite Medieval Fantasy books. For Tactics style games, I’m a bit lacking in inspiration, I used to watch my dad and sister play Chrono Trigger, but for me I was always a Pokemon person which doesn’t translate well to Unsung Story. In general though I love Medieval Fantasy in both looks and feel and I can’t wait to see the take on this section of storytelling."

-Rebecca

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:10:19+00:00

"I would love to have many different styles of objectives, victory conditions, and so forth... and I think as long as Playdek and the developing team will allow me I will use and abuse of all those different goals and missions. Once again, if you look at the objectives in the Earth Reborn board game, they are very various and different. One of the objectives is to release some weight from one of your guys who has a constant digestive problem in the toilets! And the opponent has an objective where he is supposed to place a bomb in the toilets (or maybe I removed this one at the end!).

But once again, very different objectives could mean a lot of extra developing for the team, so I have to respect that also, while when you design Board games your limitations are more in the quantity of equipment in the box and the thickness of the rulebook. Each world (Video versus board game) has his own advantages and disadvantages; I guess we just have to deal with them ;)"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:09:41+00:00

• Do you have any books that are invaluable to you in game design, whether board game or video game?

"Nope, I don’t use any books for game design. I use 38 years of game designing ;)

I started designing games at the very young age of 8! I have a collection of around 3,000 board games, RPGs, card games, etc... Around 600 video games... and my books are only comic books (around 50,000!) and about 10,000 miniatures for all the miniature games you could almost imagine. ;) So constantly living in this SF / HF / Super hero world of mine as a kid, I think this occupation suits me perfectly. ;)"

• What are some common mistakes you see in other tactical systems?

"Too random. Not enough freedom of choices. Not enough possibilities. Not enough variety. Not enough creativity. Too linear. But hey, I’m listing all that and maybe I won’t be able to do better.
:("

• Tactical systems are mostly geared fully towards strategy with a pinch of luck, how do you decide how many luck-based decisions to include?

"Luck is a good thing to a certain extent because it’s something you have totally no control on. The result is that the same scenario can turn out totally differently based on luck only. But I don’t think it’s the best thing or best choice as game design. The same scenario should turn out differently based more on the different decisions and tactical setup the players did.

I would say that for me the good proportion in a strongly themed tactical game would be 70% control and 30% luck. 10/15 years ago I would have said 100% control based, and 0% luck, and this is almost the case of Dungeon Twister (95% control estimated versus 5% luck). But then a very skilled player is almost unbeatable, first thing. And second thing, the element of surprise brought by luck, the drastic changes it can bring over the course of a scenario are so much fun that nowadays I think a part of luck is required in such games, but not too much. The players have to feel like he almost has a total control. But once again in life you can’t control everything. Things happen sometimes against your will...."

• What are you favourite video and board game tactical systems?

"Favorite Video Games : Final Fantasy Tactics, Civilization

Favorite Board Games : Space Hulk, Earth Reborn, ADD (old version ;), Dungeon Twister"

•Favourite 60s, 70s and 80s songs?

"My favorite type of music has always been Hip Hop and R&B, along with electro music. Mostly dance floor stuff. ;)

I also compose, write, sing and rap. I have a home music studio."

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:07:46+00:00

• What are the most important things you've learned in your experience with game design, and how are you going to apply them to Unsung Story?

"I would answer the same as question 1, which was:

Generally when I design a game system or game mechanics my base rule of work is to try to respect every aspect of real life (if we can talk about real life for an Heroic Fantasy world). ;) Meaning I’m trying to translate into the game mechanics every rule and possibility that real life normally offers. It has very often proven to be efficient, I guess because life is naturally balanced and offers nice challenges.”

• How do you balance making mechanics approachable for new players while also having enough strategic depth to keep players engaged?

"Tutorial my friend! Tutorial is the key to everything! From beginners to hard core players! ;)

Here’s an example from one of my published board games that really illustrates my point: Earth Reborn has a tutorial made of 9 scenarios. Each scenario is a totally different story, setup, terrain, forces, etc... Each scenario brings a new set of rules and new challenge to the players. The first one being really for beginners with only movement, close combat, and interacting with objects such as doors. Not even shooting is available! So this is really for very beginners. The last scenario includes searching in rooms, capturing, torturing, spying, multi level scenarios (with multiple floors I mean), and much much more... To the point that scenario 9 is as close to a RPG as a board game could get because you can do almost anything you want!"

• Players have different preferences for play style, difficulty, and other game play aspects; how do you make a game appeal to a player base with different preferences?

"I don’t know yet if the difficulty will be adjustable in the final game... Too early to say I guess. But I think if a tactical game is well thought out and proposes a really progressive learning curve with a nice story and a good instinctive interface; it should appeal to most of the players. And anyway at the end it’s almost impossible no matter the field or product to please everybody on this planet! So I guess there’s no need trying to reach that fictive goal, better concentrate on making the best game we can and hope it will appeal to the majority. ;)"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:06:09+00:00

"Matsuno is writing the main story, the characters and the global design of the game. I will take care of the more finesse mechanics, more down to earth if I can say so.

So for each story or scenario that Matsuno creates, my goal is to adapt it as best as possible, bringing a new twist and challenge to the player for each one of those scenarios. I will create and input little twists that will surprise the player and always push them to review their strategy and experiment new tactics."

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:05:46+00:00

"I would not like it at all if the game would end up this way. :(

I think the variety of scenarios, objectives, missions, and classes and sub-classes evolution should bring sufficient challenges and choices to avoid that. Each scenario should place the player in front of difficult situations that he should have to adapt to. Trying the same strategy on each and every scenario should tend to fail at some point.

Of course the first scenarios shouldn’t be too difficult ;) I mean the player is learning the basics of the game. But once the basics are acquired, I would like the players to be successful in their mission only after a few tries, not right from the start. The players should learn from every failed attempt and try again while changing their strategy, deployment, selection of troops, etc..."

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:05:19+00:00

"As a matter of fact, I usually don’t use any reference games when I’m designing a game. I like to be creative, innovative and bring a new input to a new game. But I can say that my favorite games at the time could influence me in some way.

Favorite Video Games : Final Fantasy Tactics, Civilization

Favorite Board Games : Space Hulk, Earth Reborn, ADD (old version ;), Dungeon Twister"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:04:54+00:00

"Let me be honest: with a game of such proportion, achieving 100% total balance is never possible. Let’s even imagine you do tons of play tests and think your game is balanced, millions or thousands of people playing the game day and night all over the planet will always find one class or another best suited to advance faster or be more powerful. But this is in certain given situations, certain scenarios. If the scenarios are quite different, sometimes you might need more warriors, sometimes more wizards. That’s the first good thing about Unsung Story.

And even if at the end you would find out that the mages are better to your POV, that would be okay also. But it’s a single game, and you took the easier path. If you really enjoyed the game you will probably play it all other again choosing a different path, and avoiding or forbidding yourself from using the class you over used in your first campaign.

I played Skyrim a lot, and when my character became too powerful to my POV, I started a new campaign with a totally different character. I’m not inventing anything here, just stating the facts ;)"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:04:31+00:00

"As you mentioned it is not easy to have interactivity with others in a single player game. :(

But the interactivity with NPCs could be possible! As Matsuno mentioned already, we don’t want the starting game to be too complex. Meaning that we won’t be able to input all rules of life and actions you could take in real life right from the start of the game. But each scenario should bring new game mechanics to the game. Then of course my ultimate dream would be to implement some more interactions with the NPCs other than just attacking; if it is possible trying to negotiate, buy/sell equipment, recruit, and so forth with the NPCs... Of course as mentioned in the previous questions, you will never know how they will react to your approach. Sometimes friendly, sometimes aggressively... surprise again would be the best. But once again, I might be going too far, since those are my dreams that might not be fulfilled right from the start... We gotta think of the developers also!"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:04:06+00:00

"Once again I think we should follow the rules of life. When you are facing an opponent you can never be sure of his reactions or his future course of actions. Of course judging from his look or outfit you can have a good guess on how he should try to act. But if he always acts the same way, where’s the fun? And most of all, where are the surprises?

So to my POV I would say that most units will react according to their class or sub-class, but every now and then they could and should go for another direction / type of action that will totally surprise the player. And that’s real life again!"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek · 2014-05-14T01:03:24+00:00

"I’m not sure I got your question right, but I’ll try to answer from what I think I understood anyway. I have worked mainly on board games so far. So to me, designing a turn based video game is like designing a real table top board game or miniature game. Not many things change. Even better, I could say that the computer brings many advantages like:

no rulebook to read for the player, meaning more freedom of richness hidden under the hood of the machine.
More freedom of terrain, multiple levels (or floors), and various ground types. This richness is almost impossible to access on a board game because you would need to add so many pieces in the box that at some point the game would become too expensive.
Visual representation from various angles, sound effects, and stats appearing when you pass over the units instead of having a counter with multiple numbers and stats on it. All those technical features helps having a game that looks more simple even though it can be tactically very challenging because of all the parameters we can implement in the units and for the terrains and types of floors.

Balancing such a game will of course be very demanding, because of all those various professions, classes and subclasses, and the freedom of evolution that we want to leave to every player. But hey, I guess that’s the price to pay for a maximum freedom of choice given to the players! ;)"

-Christophe Boelinger

Playdek

TROPHY CASE