The Last and Final Word: Gregory Weir
Gregory Weir was sick of his regular day job. He quit, knuckled down and launched himself into the world of independent game development (and sponsored browser games) with The Majesty of Colors.
Bonus link at the end of the interview.
Age?
26.
Location?
Charlotte, NC.
Development tool(s) of choice?
Most of my recent work has been in Flash using the FlashDevelop IDE and the Flixel library. I nearly always use the GIMP and Audacity. SFXR (and its derivatives) and the Deadly Alien Map Editor are very handy. I’ve dabbled a bit in Unity, and I’ve been learning Python and Django for an upcoming project.
What do you do?
I make games. Artsy games. I also do a lot of thinking about games, and sometimes I write down what I’m thinking. Most of my stuff has a pixelly aesthetic; a strong, dark mood; and an interactive narrative.
How did you get into game development and more specifically, independent videogame development?
I’ve always been interested in making games. I still have sketches from when I was in first grade designing levels. I’ve dabbled in games for years, but it wasn’t until I quit my job as a web developer and was struggling to make ends meet that I buckled down and started making money off of it. The Majesty of Colors was my first game that paid for itself. I’ve always been more interested in independent development than game development for a major company. I like the creative freedom.
How long have you been making a living off of browser games now?
Since I released Majesty at the end of 2008.
Define what an artsy game is to you?
When I say “artsy,” I’m trying to talk about the sort of game that gets called “art games.” All games are art, of course, so that’s not a very good term. Artsy games tend to be moody, or have an emotional weight that’s more than their aesthetics would suggest. They tend to ask for more reading-between-the-lines than other games. Passage, Limbo, Braid; these are artsy games.
There are those that think the pixelly aesthetic has been overused or just a fad in independent games. Agree or disagree?
I think I need to be wishy-washy on this. Pixelliness is probably more popular than it would be in a perfect world. It’s popular because it’s relatively easy to make look decent, it evokes retro games, and it provides a sort of minimalism that’s useful for the same reason as cartoons or cinéma vérité. It feels simple and abstract. I’d like to see a ton of other non-photorealistic aesthetic styles in games, but for now I think the popularity of pixel art is fine.
Why do you choose to use this aesthetic - nostalgia or limited artistic capabilities?
Part of it is certainly artistic limitations. I’m mostly artistically self-taught, and I’m an okay amateur cartoonist, but I don’t spend much time honing those skills. Pixel art lends a sort of pointillist precision to one’s work. There are also a lot of times when it evokes the right feel; How to Raise a Dragon was a storybook game, and pixel art is the storybook style of video games. My personal nostalgia rarely enters into it; I like evoking nostalgia in others, but I personally find pixel art fresh and beautiful, especially when done by a more skilled artist than myself.
You talked in this interview about Looming feeling like your most complete game and you spoke here about what you think defines a masterpiece. Is Looming your masterpiece or do you feel that you are still chasing it?
Looming’s definitely not my masterpiece. There’s very little I’d change about it in retrospect — I might add an automap, but that’s it — but it doesn’t do a good job of demonstrating my entire range of skills. Looming has an interesting setting and story, but the basic gameplay is frankly rather boring. The game does a great job (in my opinion) of making you feel like you’re wandering around a wasteland finding dusty bits of things. But that’s kind of a dull past-time, and it doesn’t demonstrate any kind of mastery over important things like challenge or fun or pacing.
Do you think you’ll know that your developing your masterpiece before you’ve released it or will you need to take a breath after release and look at the game objectively?
I’m not sure! I’ve got a concept that I’ve been calling my masterpiece, but it’s possible that I’ll actually release something else that demonstrates my mastery before that, or that the game I think will be my masterpiece will end up with a fatal flaw. I’m looking forward to finding out!
How smooth was the transition from working at a regular job to developing browser games and why did you make the decision?
I’m still adjusting. Having a regular job is frustrating. You have to deal with bizarre institutional issues that none of your co-workers like but everyone still participates in out of weird tribal consensus. You have to work on things that bear no importance to you personally. I commuted for 40 minutes each way to work in a cubicle as a contractor. That’s not very rewarding.
On the other hand, making games is incredibly rewarding and inspiring and fun. But it’s really hard to work for yourself and get stuff done. In the end, I only answer to myself, and it’s really easy for me to give myself a pass on procrastination. There have been times that it’s felt like I’ve looked up and two months have passed with nothing to show for them. I’m still learning the fundamental skills that will help me be as productive as I desperately want to be.
Are you making what you would call a comfortable living from sponsored browser games or are there times where things become tight, financially?
When I’m being productive, I can maintain a comfortable living. I tend to live relatively frugally anyway. After rent, my biggest expenses have always been student / car loans followed by food. But in times that I haven’t worked steadily, things can get quite tight. My wife is a web developer with a steady paycheck, which helps smooth over the cracks, but of course I want to be productive and personally solvent anyway. I’m definitely my own worst enemy when it comes to income.
Is there a constant pressure on keeping productivity levels up and come up with your next project? Do you have to run discipline yourself into a schedule that you follow on a daily basis?
Absolutely. Coming up with ideas is easy for me; I have more ideas than I could ever implement. But disciplining myself and getting to work on the next product is always a struggle. I tend to suffer from a sort of postpartum depression when I release a project, and I’ve learned that I have to have another one already started when I make a release or I’ll risk having a period of near-zero productivity.
What matters most to you, concerning your own projects - the popularity of a game, the critical acclaim or validation from others or how you feel about your own work on a personal level?
Intellectually, I care about how I feel about my work and whether I think I successfully executed my vision. Emotionally, though, I’m still strongly affected by others’ opinions. I’ve gotten pretty good at insulating myself from the comments of random players. Someone who plays my games for a minute and posts a rude comment probably isn’t my target audience anyway. But if a fellow developer or a reviewer I respect talks about my games, that opinion has a big effect on me.
Popularity doesn’t impact me much in part because of how weird the numbers are for Flash games. Just about any game a major portal sponsors and puts on their front page is going to get at least 100,000 views just from impulse clicks. Having a free browser game means you automatically multiply your number of players by 1,000 or more. It’s hard to mentally process the concept that some of my games have had over a million plays.
And who do you think your target audience is?
Someone who wants to look at a game and think about it for a bit, and is willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. Someone who likes stuff that’s a little creepy and maybe a little emotionally indulgent. Someone who likes story in games. I love to appeal to players that don’t fit those categories, but I think those are the people who will like my stuff the most.
How much freedom have you been afforded from working on browser games - are you able to experiment as much as you would like or do you always have to consider what the various portals (such as Newgrounds, Armor Games and Kongregate) may or may not like?
I think I self-edit a bit, but the portals are very open to experimentation and creativity. I’ve found that as long as a game is reasonably polished, sponsors don’t care how unconventional it is. I never hear mention of focus groups or industry trends from sponsors, and only rarely do I get a response of “our members don’t like this kind of game.” I think it’s more common that I hear “I personally don’t like this kind of game.”
How do you decide on a sponsor once your done with a project?
It’s usually a matter of who has the best offer. There’s actually a bidding process that goes on; sponsors make various offers, and I pick the one I like best. There are a few shady sites that I don’t do business with, but most of the big names are cool folks that I’m happy to deal with. Luckily, they’re all also on pretty good terms with one another, too. There’s a friendly rivalry, I think, but I’ve never detected that a sponsor held a grudge because I accepted another offer.
Care to ‘name and shame’ the shady websites that you refuse to deal with?
I won’t name any names in particular, but there are two kinds of shady sites I see and try to avoid. The first kind are those that mistreat their game creators by violating agreements, stealing work without proper credit and compensation, or taking advantage of folks who don’t know better. The second kind are those who mistreat other websites by deactivating sponsor links or playing games with misleading ads or URLs. I haven’t had any bad situations personally, but people should definitely do research on developer forums to decide if a sponsor is decent.
