Inside The Mind Of An Indie Developer

We’ve all done it, wondering what it would be like to have a career in the gaming industry.  For Ranyl Bantog, that dream is becoming a reality. I recently discovered his game Codex on the Xbox Live Indie Games service and after playing, decided to reach out to dig more into the mind of an indie developer.

Let’s start with your background, what drove you to want to create video games?

The short answer is that I’m a student currently enrolled in the Games Development option of the Bachelor of Technology program at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT). All the games I’ve built so far have been student projects in some form or another. I have also loved computer games all my life and I just wanted to pursue something I was passionate about.

Where did the idea for Codex come from?

I really liked puzzle games that made you think and my favorite was a board game called “Rush Hour” by ThinkFun. I wanted to make a puzzle game with the same spatial problem solving challenge but with a twist. Codex was my final project for the Advanced Game Programming course I took last semester. I needed to build a game within the 15 weeks the course ran and the only type of game I could think of building and completing within the time frame was a puzzle game. After completing the course I had about 12 puzzles finished which was enough to get me an A in the class. I spent the rest of the summer making more puzzles and tweaking the game play. Codex currently has 30 levels which increase in size and complexity.

For those not familiar, can you walk us through the process of having a game approved for sale on Xbox Live Arcade?

The process itself is fairly straight forward. The first step is to submit your game for playtest so that you can get some early feedback on game play and if there are any issues with the game that would get your game rejected for review. Once you are happy with the game and super confident that you’ve got all the problems resolved and its ready the marketplace, you submit for review. During the review process, the game is checked for crashes and any illegal content. If you’ve never done this before the process could be very unpredictable. I had submitted Codex 3 times for review. The first time I pulled my game out after 10 days when someone had found a crash. The 2nd time my game got rejected after 8 days. The problem with having the game pulled out or rejected during review is that you have to wait 7 days before you can resubmit. On my last submission for review, the game passed review in 4 days and I was completely unprepared. I had anticipated the game would spend about 10-21 days in review so I was planning press releases announcing the company and another announcing the game with a trailer. I got the email at 2am that Codex passed review which turned my whole strategy upside down… I just scrapped everything and essentially told the world that the game was out.

Your company, Good Guy Robots, seems to be off to a solid start, what other projects do you have in the pipeline?

We have Run Jump Slash which is a forced scrolling platformer targeted for kids aged 8-14. The “cartoon” look of the game was intended to appeal to kids but it looks like it’s managed to gain a following from a much older crowd as well. We are super excited about this title and plan to release the game before Christmas.

Where do you see GGR in 10 years?

Hopefully in 10 years GGR will still be around in some form still building games for kids. By then my kids will be a lot older and probably be into other types of games and who knows maybe the GGR games will grow with their tastes. Currently GGR has plans to build educational games in collaboration with a research group at the University of British Columbia that specializes in pedagogical studies (the science of learning). It would be great to release educational games that provide concrete educational value backed with some PhD’s in the credits.

You chose to name the company Good Guy Robots but in the logo the robot is actually destroying the city. Care to explain?

The name of the company was inspired by my 3 year old son who loves robots! When we would watch robots on the television, he would say they are all “good guy robots” irrespective of the good deeds or city wide destruction they would cause. He just loved robots and I wanted to do something he could relate too. We had other logos in mind but the first time he saw the logo his reaction was: “Daddy, is that a good guy robot? I want to play that game!”. So we chose that one.

What advice would you offer to other start-up developers who are thinking of jumping in the Xbox pool?

When you are starting off it would be best to keep your day job until you are actually making enough sales to take the risk. Keep your costs low and do your own art, sound and music if possible. Understand what it takes to be successful in the marketplace by seeing what others are doing right and avoid mistakes you see others are doing wrong. Fail early and often on smaller things so that you can learn from the experience. Don’t forget to take into consideration the cost of time spent on developing the game as this is your biggest expense. The moment you break even is when your sales surpass the money you could have made if you had spent the time working and getting paid to do something else. However if you are just in it for the love of developing games and the technology, then the effort and time spent on the game has already been worth it.

Finally, if you had to choose a favorite video game, what would it be and why?

My current favorite game would be the modern warfare series. I like how the game makes you feel like you are in a blockbuster movie with the way it gets you into the characters and story. Before then I kind of had been really into playing smaller ‘pick up and play’ games like geometry wars.

You can find more information on Good Guy Robots and Codex in these links.  Check the game out (240 MS points) and help support an indie developer.