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The Birth of a Game Studio Part Two: Goin' Places, Meetin' People What to Pack If you plan to attend an industry event to promote your indie studio, take some time before the event to make sure you can collect everything required to maximize your stay's potential. Here is a checklist extracted from our past experience, which has proven to be very handy: Demos - pack all you have been working on, to show it if the time comes. Pack both the final product and the sources, and also grab a copy of your compiler of choice. It is quite frequent to meet people and hear them say "looks good, but could you tweak it so that ….". Thus, having all the sources and tools with you can be provide additional flexibility. If you are showing to publishers, bring several copies of the demos on CD, along with other relevant material (screenshots of the game, concept art, modeling screenshots, in-game editors and tools, etc.). Publishers usually analyze the game at their headquarters after trade shows. Before signing anything, they will certainly want to take a close look at all the materials you can provide them. As for the machine to run the demos on, usually these are on the high-end, and sport the most powerful processors and graphics cards around. Future games will have futuristic hardware requirements, and hence the need for horsepower. If you are a new developer, you can either bring you own, or hire one on-site. Bringing your machine is, contrary as it may seem, quite frequent in trade shows such as ECTS (and also cost-effective). You can spot an ECTS attendee at London-Heathrow airport as they tow their CPU boxes around the terminals. Bringing your own equipment is, if you can arrange it, the best option, because you can be certain that the environment for the execution of the demo will be perfect. Keep in mind that different countries have different voltage standards, which can fry your blazing demo machine if you do not have the right converter.
You may want to consider renting the demo hardware on-site. This way the logistics of the trip become simpler. Renting may be a good choice if you are traveling far away (towing a desktop from our headquarters in Barcelona, Spain to the GDC in San Jose isn't exactly my definition of "fun"), or if you simply do not own such powerful hardware. Still, keep in mind that hardware rental companies do not think much about game developers, so expect the equipment you will rent to be quite mainstream. This does not really apply to the CPU, as you can get quite recent ones (for a high fee, that is), but graphics cards found in most rental equipment tend to be quite substandard, so play safe and carry at least your graphics unit of choice and a screwdriver with you. Renting a laptop may be a good alternative to desktop systems. The main benefit is that you can make presentations anywhere, without the mess of having to set up a desktop system. On the other hand, laptops are slower in general, and especially suffer strong disadvantages in terms of graphics power. This trend is really going to fade away in the near future, with the launch of "serious" units sporting chips such as the nvidia GeForce 2 Go and the ATI mobility chips, but expect performance to be a little slower than a high-end desktop. Still, you can change bad news into good news, which is the philosophy we followed at GDC. We rented a laptop and, because of our ability to execute our demo at decent speeds (16 fps) on it, we proved our ability as coders. Project Documentation - all written (or digital) information you can collect about your project should also make it to the show somehow. This includes (but is not limited to) the design bible, a shorter, treatment document (this can even be a powerpoint document), concept art, screenshots (handy if the demo suddenly freezes), scripts, music files, 3D models, etc. Additionally, if you are in a tech or playable demo stage, also bring a press pack. This should be a CD on which you put all the public information about the project. This should include such items as: a script description, the demo itself, screens for media publishing, a corporate overview file, and company logos. This way you can give the CD to any media representative and be sure they have all they need to ensure proper media coverage for your product. (We'll talk about the media in a second.)
The corporate overview document (many times in the form of a powerpoint presentation) should explain who you are and what you want to do. This document should be brief but thorough, and give details on:
Obviously, you can choose to be very open and give away lots of information, or play safe and give only parts of it. A good example is the financial structure: you can go all the way and depict the shareholder structure, capital rounds, etc. or decide to be brief and say "the company is privately funded and held." Remember that you can always throw in some details during a conversation if an investor requests them. Whatever you put in the presentation is, on the other hand, fixed, so many times it is better to say little (and add verbally whatever you think is useful) than to lament giving away too much on a printed copy. Another document you should bring is your business plan. This document must detail each cost and benefit derived from your project. On the costs side, it should clearly depict how much you have invested so far, and how much will be required to complete the product. Be detailed here, subdividing the costs into small pieces so the whole budget analysis is easy to understand. Additionally, you should predict sales from your title, and from this number calculate the expected return on investment. The best way to do this is by looking at similar games or genres, and making a tentative forecast of how much you game will sell. Obviously, it is only a rough estimate, but proper research can yield useful numbers. When doing the business plan, keep in mind that an investor does not expect to see optimistic projections here-stick to the naked truth and try to be as realistic as possible. Business plans should present the facts clearly, so using a spreadsheet file (annotated maybe to define each concept) is the best option. A good idea when making a believable business plans is to concentrate on the costs, which are predictable, and spend less time looking at how much you plan to make. A business plan which concentrates on "how rich you are going to be" without worrying about how much will it cost you to get there will appear unprofessional. Besides, publishers have their own methods to estimate game sales, so make sure costs are under strict control, and let them help you get the sales figures right. Last, but not least, you should carry your own NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement) so you can give information to potential partners without worrying. An NDA is a written contract which restricts the use of certain confidential information. It can be as short as a couple pages, and should clearly express:
Many times (especially with publishers) you will be offered a mutual NDA provided by their lawyers. Although these are usually very well written, they are often geared toward protecting the publisher's rights more so than the developer's. Therefore, it is a good idea to request them that they sign your own NDA, to make sure both parties are equally covered. You should find no problem in this respect, as the use of NDA's is a common practice in this industry. Finding a partner who rejects to sign an NDA is uncommon, and definitely not a good start. As you can see, a rule of thumb is to pack for disaster: think of everything that can go wrong while at the show, and pack it. Bring written copies of everything in case the computer collapses. Be sure to bring an extra copy of all written materials in case you lose something. This way no disgusting surprises will spoil your experience. As a corollary to the rule, it is a good idea to have someone at your headquarters checking for e-mails each hour or so during the conference: this way your company can e-mail you any additional resource you might need in an emergency situation. ________________________________________________________ |
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