Whilst there, Ma landed an entry position at 2K Shanghai, with the help of his father and brother. Eventually my girlfriend and I moved to Shanghai, to experience a bit more of the world." "After college I was working as a graphic designer, after not having any luck finding a games-related job in the US. "This probably influenced my eventual decision to get into the games industry," reflects Ma. The difficult lessons I learned from 2K were essential in our ability to release FTL. Eventually my interest became more nuanced as I learned to appreciate the complexities of game design."Īt the time, Ma’s father worked in the industry on the business side, so Ma sometimes got to peek behind the curtain, gathering insight on how games were made from a young age. "I probably don't have to explain how compelling exploring the bizarre and dangerous world of the Legend of Zelda was to a child - I was pretty much hooked from my first exposure. "Initially, I played videogames because of the pure enjoyment I received from the challenging new experiences they offered," remembers Ma. He’s always played videogames, starting on consoles until he discovered PC gaming nearer to adulthood. Justin Ma was born in Mountain View, California, but he grew up on Long Island, New York. Like FTL’s ship crew, sometimes it’s best to build up your experience levels before jumping to the next sector. It’s easy to look at a financial success like FTL and think it’s easily achievable to do the same, but this was far from Ma and Davis’ first foray in games development, between them they had the experience to succeed. With increased exposure comes increased expectation, all leading to extra pressure for Ma and Davis’ indie debut. However, studios looking into Kickstarter need to be prepared to deal with the unique challenges that running a campaign provides." Kickstarter may not be the ideal delivery system, but I don't think the model be going anywhere any time soon. "Crowdfunding is a great way for studios to actualise games that wouldn't traditionally appeal to publishers. "I wouldn't recommend to every developer, but it’s a great boon to many small teams," says Ma. Reading about success stories such as FTL can make Kickstarter seem like an appealing prospect for the independent developer, but Ma believes it isn’t always the best route to a successful launch. We were one of the few games on there at the time and it boosted our visibility considerably." The entire gaming community's eyes were turned towards Kickstarter. "That being said, I feel the majority of exposure our Kickstarter received was due entirely to luck - our campaign went live right after the Double Fine Adventure Game Kickstarter took off. "The simple answer is that FTL appears to just appeal to a lot of people - placing yourself into the shoes of Captain Picard seems to be a common fantasy," suggests Ma. The Kickstarter steamrolled every projection Ma and Davies had - something about the game seemed to appeal to the masses, but Ma, remaining modest as ever, believes there was more to it than that. I feel in the end we did a good job of balancing the two goals but the stress nearly derailed the whole project." "In the end, this meant we had a three-month long crunch period of trying to improve the game as much as possible without pushing the release date back too far. "The money helped us expand FTL considerably - we increased the scope, got an incredible soundtrack from Ben Prunty, and had Tom Jubert assist with the writing," recalls Ma. Because the Kickstarter had given a projected release date in the near future, it meant the pair couldn’t throw the extra funds at development without considerable delays, so instead they concentrated on expanding what was there. You see, the game raised twenty times more their Kickstarter goal, but the game was already close to completion when the Kickstarter launched. It was something Justin Ma and Matthew Davis were ready for when creating FTL: Faster Than Light, even though - had the Kickstarter been finished much earlier - they could have been less mindful of limitations. So when a game launches its player into space and asks them to manage their fuel reserves and the amount of missiles in their armoury, it immediately makes sense - replace missiles with bread and fuel with toilet paper and it’s a very real human dilemma. We can all relate to resource management - especially game designers.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |