Game Design, Programming and running a one-man games business…

Epic opinions

cliffski

I’ve mulled over whether to say anything at all, but if you can’t say what you think about the games industry when you own your own company, when can you?

I was part of a panel yesterday at Develop, the games conference for developers in Brighton UK. I was speaking about ‘microstudios’ with Robin Lacey(Beatnik), Sean Murray(Hello Games) and Mark Morris(Introversion), all of whom are good guys. As a one-man outfit, I’m the real baby studio there, but at 13 years of experience, also the grandfather, so I guess that makes me middle aged. Anyway… all was cool, and there was much joking and mutual silliness. Apparently I am the Barry Manilow of game development, and a mug to spend £75 on jeans. And the topic then came up of how indies can respond directly to gamers on stuff like messageboards. Basically I started making the point, and mark was also agreeing about how someone can email you as an indie dev, and you can reply personally back to that potential customer, and hopefully, that way you have converted that guy to buying the game.

At this point, there was this derisive snort from this guy in the front row, who said something to the effect of ‘one guy? who cares, that’s a waste of time’. He then started to lecture us on how that’s a silly way to do it.  I’m 95% sure that all four of us on the panel thought ‘what the fuck?’ as well as ‘who is this guy’? compounded by Robin asking him if he worked in marketing.

Anyway… it turned out this guy was Mark Rein from Epic, although he seemed to assume everyone within earshot knew exactly who he was, and why he must obviously be right. I got the impression he was there to laugh at the little guys, or to just inform us how we are all wrong. Interestingly, it seemed there was someone from sports interactive (one time indies, as I recall) there, who seemed more on the indie wavelength than Mark. It would have been cool to chat with him.

So… I’ve given this a lot of thought, and weighed up the pros and cons of just putting this down to misinterpreting someone, and so on, and I have reached this conclusion.

Mark Rein is a jerk.

Now I suspect this is not groundbreaking news, although it is to me, because I’ve never met him or even seen him before. However, this experience seems to confirm my opinions on Epic and companies like them in general. Now Mark may well look down on humble indies like me. He may well think I’m doing it wrong. he may laugh when me and Mark discuss the pitiful money our companies make, and giggle at the fact that we reply to gamers on a one-on-one basis… But fuck him. I would rather earn minimum wage making indie strategy games for the PC, as my own boss, with an original game, satisfying a hardcore niche of friendly customers (the one-thousand-true-fans-philosophy), without a publisher telling me what to do, and without having to leave my house to go to work, without having to do ‘crunch time’ (because, dude… its like so macho to work until 3AM and never see your family)… Than I would work at epic for megabucks. The sheer overwhelming stench of testosterone would probably give me a headcahe, combined with the dizzy excitement of exactly what shade of grey our next game’s space-marine would wear as he kicked alien butt. (I feel bad working on Gratuitous Space Battles for almost 2 years, but it seems like that old ‘wisecracking space marine with big muscles and chisel-jaw’ idea has been stretched out longer than the hundred years war).

I have absolutely no doubt mark would just naturally assume me feeling like that is jealousy, which, as anyone who knows me personally would testify, is just fucking funny. I really don’t care about Epic, and their games, as they are way way too macho and ‘dude’ for my liking, and don’t have demos, so I just assume they haven’t changed since Unreal Tournament. I try not to comment on games I don’t like, as each to their own tastes etc.  The only reason I’m moved to give a damn enough to state my opinion, is that I resent having some triple-a studio jerk come and tell someone whose run a microstudio for thirteen years that he is doing it all wrong. If Mark from introversion suggests I’m doing it wrong, thats cool, he does what I do, and has some serious experience, ditto anyone on that panel, or anyone with long indie experience. And I listen carefully, often over lunch.

But Triple-A studio bosses trying to lecture me on how to communicate better with gamers? Fuck off.

Cliff Harris (cliff@positech.co.uk)

192 thoughts on Epic opinions

  1. Pingback: Tweets that mention Cliffski’s Blog » Epic opinions -- Topsy.com

  2. LOL probably your best post ever :D
    In the end is all up to quality of life. Something that isn’t based on how much money you have on bank, but also on FREE TIME.

  3. Wow, that Mark Rein almost sounds like a walking stereotype. You know, the type of evil rich guy that gets his comeuppance at the end while the hero walks away with the girl at the end of a romantic comedy.

    Still, annoying to hear that guys like that prance around at cons with such comments.

  4. Its even sillier than that. He doesn’t know how any customer services work. Publishers have customer services departments that do actually reply to customers individually (although they often send an automatic reply if they catch a known support term issue in an email message).

    An advantage indies have is that the people making the games can talk directly to those that play it – rather than go through filters of reviews etc.

  5. Gabe Newell is sort of famous for replying to fan email in person and I believe that his company has a much better reputation with action game fans than Epic.

    Isn’t Mark Rein’s job also to sell the Unreal engine rather than make games? He was probably there to convince indie devs that they need to use whatever indie branded unreal engine they are hawking so that indie games can be just as over budget and blandly similar as 90% of xbox games.

  6. I just wonder what attracted him to the industry and I’m a bit baffled why when epic (it is epic isn’t it) are pushing their UDK engine into the indie sector but for a 25% cut of the indie profit (after $5000 USD) ?

  7. Hoorah, Marine! :-)

    Hey, maybe he was having a bad day, or got a nasty mail from a customer? I’m very much with you though. My iPhone Apps are non game so far, but caring about customers is a big deal for me, because I want to make the functionality that my App does implement absolutely perfect for its target audience. When I get one happy customer who knows they’ve got ten times the two bucks they’ve given me, they pass that on. Some day, one of them will pass in on to thousands, or hundreds of thousands.

    Going about thinking that one user doesn’t count is a dangerous dangerous game too. Look at how plenty of companies that could laugh at tiny Epic, have been kicked about by one unhappy customer. Apple, for instance, with the time capsule, who’ve finally given in and done a blanket swap out for customers with problem models.

    So maybe it’ll come back and bite him on his Epic arse :-)

  8. Weirdest thing to me – Epic started off as a few-man ‘indie’ band, waaaaay back in the day (Who recalls Epic MegaGames? ZZT? Jazz Jackrabbit and all that stuff?). Seems like they’ve forgotten their roots…

  9. Cliff I bought your games not because indie developers are the ‘in thing’ but because you make games that are fun. Turds like Mark Rein and the company he represents I have no time for.

  11. There is a freedom in designing for yourself the games that you love and for those 1000 fans that Mark Rein will never see again.

    It is perhaps he who should be jealous of the creativity and passion that an indie direction gives as well as the more humane hours.

    Hat’s off to you for your *rant*

    A game designer from warm Greece :)

  12. I wish game companies were more about games than companies. Companies like EA who care little about the quality or length of a game. They only care about how many people they can see it too for as much as possible.

  13. Bah, I wouldn’t worry about it, the guys at the top of the “industry food chain” aren’t in touch with reality any more anyway. Everyones so caught up with being an “industry celebrity” it makes me quite sick…

    This whole “kotick doesn’t play games” bullshit coming from Schafer winds the shit up out of me too, of course he doesn’t play games, he’s the top of a multi-billion dollar empire who make more money than god. Why the FUCK would he sit in his massive mansion playing video games? He can probably go out and spunk a few million crashing cars into trees and have a shit load more fun. Games are escapism for the have-nots. Not the billionares of the world.

    Mind you, Schafer has lost a lot of respect for me too, mainly for spouting off like a cock, Just shut the fuck up and make your game the best it can be, that’s the best way to send a clear fuck you. Otherwise you’ll turn into another Romero…

    I don’t know Mark Rein but I’d guess he’s just being an edgy cock to try and get mentioned on Kotaku for saying something interesting once…

    Cliff, Keep answering your 1-to-1 E-mails, Fuck what Epic megafail think…

  14. This is just mindblowing. How the hell does that Mark Rein think his own company got started???

    I’ve got it fresh since I happen to have read about it … just yesterday!

    Epic Mega-Games (as it was called back then) started as a 1-man shop; his founder was Tim Sweeney. This was on the early BSS days; the business model was more or less like this: you get the shareware for free, and if you want the full version send me a check to my (real) home address. Its first game, called ZZT, is still sold – around 2 sales per month or something – by Tim’s father, who is now retired but still leaves on that same address.

    Tim Sweeney is among other things the mind behind UnrealScript, and a language-hacker in general. By what I read on the interviews, he seems a very nice chap. And on top of that he doesn’t seem to do bad on managing or making a business grow.

    In contrast, Mark Rein is just a managerial guy. He got to the company when it was already 30 people or something. I wouldn’t expect him to be technically savy, but I would expect him to know when to keep it shut, being a vice president and all.

  16. As much as I appreciate a good Epic game now and then, one of the things I love about being an indie developer is getting to know the people who play my games. I will probably never be a millionaire, but that isn’t my measure of success.

    The same happens in almost every industry, though. The bigger you get the less contact you have with individuals, the less they mean to you.

    I have about 3 fans right now, so I still have a way to go before I even get to the 1000 true fans level, but I hope that I never get to the point where people don’t matter.

  17. I’m glad you realize that Mark Rein is nothing more than a Jerk. You are absolutely right, but I could actually go one step further and say that the higher-ups at Epic are all Jerks – nay, more along the lines of dickheads! Yes, even Cliff Bleszinski (the design director for Epic Games – some of you may know him as the man behind Gears of War) can be a dick. CliffyB as he liked being called, has grown up a little bit in the past few years, probably realizing – but more importantly – __being told__ – that he comes off as a tiny minded arrogant prick, has probably opened his eyes just a little. The top dogs at Epic are still just a bunch of arrogant PRs that nobody really likes, not even the working-class employees at Epic.

    However, to stay on topic to your point Cliffski, it’s no surprise that Mark Rein – one of the fools behind Epic, would see customer support, albeit from a single person or very small team, as a nonsensical solution to encouraging, promoting, and marketing all while helping the customers whom you get to know on slightly more intimate level. In other words, what you, and the other fine indie developers out there do, simply makes sense and you’re just cramping the style of the bigger guys – why? Because they can’t be bothered to interact with their fan base anyway, their is no real passion behind what they do, these big wigs are only there to make money, bottom line. Money might be all well and good and useful for surviving in a commercialized society, but it does not bring people closer in any way and if there is one thing gamers and game developers should share in common it is the love of the game itself. When a customer gets to interact with the creator of the entertainment they are so fond of it certainly does make a connection that Marketing PR’s simply cannot understand. To them, human connection gets in the way of what they deem most important and that is money. Guys like Mark Rein only wants to have any contact with his customers when there’s an exchange of money involved – from the customers pockets to his. After that it’s shut up and listen to him.

    I understand why you wrote this particular blog Cliffski, and to be honest, you came across quite level headed which is the professional thing to do, but at the same time I know that the situation must have also pissed you off. By extension, just reading about this (and some of the other bastards at the larger publishers and developing studios – mostly the CEO’s and hierarchy) pisses me off in a way that has made me want to respond. The reason for this is, I’ve always seen the indie game developer (or film maker, musician, etc. etc.) as the everyman. Someone who has gone out and done what they want to do, which can and in fact has inspired others to go out and do the things they want to do as well. With that said, I hope all indies (both the developers and audiences) realize what a unique relationship we have with one another and that being able to speak one-on-one (when time permits) is the best and most useful thing a developer and a customer can have because it benefits both sides equally in the form of customer service for the customer and important feedback for the developer. I sincerely hope these connections between real people never die off, and if they do, then I hope I don’t live long enough to ever be around when they’re gone. That probably sounds pretty heavy or that it leaves a lot on the indie developers shoulders, but it is I’m sure, something that can and has inspired many indie developers to keep doing what they do and continue creating those connections and relationships with their audience and customers.

    With that said – yes, Mark Rein is a JERK.

  18. That’s pretty bad. It reminds me of a talk Gary Vaynerchuk gave in which he referred to a Twitter user who asked for advice about following the “right” people. (Namely, people with 500+ followers or something.) Gary allegedly responded to this guy, telling him he was an asshole for caring about that sort of thing.

    For what it’s worth, I bought Gratuitous Space Battles a few months ago but I can’t remember the last time I bought an Epic game. I’m not much for the frat-boy market that has coopted the term “hardcore”.

    Anyway, nice to get another blog to follow.

  19. I have actually met Mark Rein, both at my former studio, and at AGDC, and I can actually confirm that he IS a jerk. Absolutely.

    What sealed it for me was watching him interact with those whom he considered unimportant or irrelevant. He does that thing where he looks over your shoulder and past you AS he’s talking to you, he can barely conceal his boredom.

    ‘Arrogant marketing fuck’ was my genuine impression.

  20. He sounds a bit defensive from the way you describe it – could he be feeling threatened / worried about micro-studios?

  21. Mark Rein is the same guy behind APB, if you played that game you would realize it’s just mass appeal gone wild to a shit lack luster game.

  22. @Thomas

    APB was made with the Unreal Engine, and Mark Rein did a little bit of promotion for APB, but he isn’t behind it in any way. It’s from a completely different company.

  23. As Stuart said, he sounds defensive. You have to question why, as part of a large company, he was there. He doesn’t exactly sound like the kind of guy who goes to give out sound advice or pick up tips. Maybe he’s doing it to make him feel better about himself.

  26. Awesome blog post. I get fed up by some of the so called industry elite looking down their noses at indies. Well said and you have a new blog follower.

  28. I never met Mark Rein and don’t know him at all, but I can only say that Tim Sweeney is a very cool and nice dude. I think Tim’s the main programmer at Epic too.

  29. Does anyone else think this juxtaposition of comments is ironic?

    “I’ve mulled over whether to say anything at all, but if you can’t say what you think about the games industry when you own your own company, when can you?”

    “[owner of small game company] has lost a lot of respect for me too, mainly for spouting off like a cock, Just shut the fuck up and make your game the best it can be, that’s the best way to send a clear fuck you.”

  30. Really?

    To try and avoid the potential dogpile:
    I really enjoy your blog. I also like the Introversion blog (although wish it was updated more frequently.) I don’t enjoy your games for a number of reasons (mostly design choices) but I still have a lot of respect for what you are doing and hope you continue to succeed.

    So I’m on your side, honestly, but why would you post this?

    This post reads follows the fairly predictable ‘smaller, indie guy’ vs ‘large evil company’ line. You go on to bash Mark for a single comment. Then you bash the whole company. You treat it like a personal attack and, perhaps more importantly, assume he’s wrong.

    If you were 10x as busy (in copies shipped, active products, whatever.) would you reply to every single person who emailed you?
    What about 100x? 1000x? 10,000x?
    What about if you were that much busier AND received the same increase in emails received?

    I’m guessing you might find it difficult and you would pick where you focused your time. Or maybe not? If you wanted to thats your choice, but it’s certainly possible it would be a waste of your time.

    You sound righteous and angry and this attack on Epic doesn’t gain you anything. I wish instead of reading this you had another interesting post about your development. Oh well.

  31. Here, here! Mark Rein sounds like a major douche now that I heard about what happened at the Develop conference. He should hang out with Bobby Kotick! I fully support you guys and how you guys roll.

    Personally, I’m with your attitude 110% – I would NEVER want to work on a mainstream-friendly title, because that means you’d have to target it at “lowest common denominator” gamers. AKA, the future college drop outs who’d rather grief people in another round of CoD or Madden than go to class (We’ve ALL seen those douches). This “one thousand true fans” philosophy is absolute aces.

    I sincerely hope that your studio can continue operating under such conditions and can prove this model is worthwhile for a long, looooooooooooooong time to come.

    And to think, they used to make Jazz Jackrabbit. Wasn’t that sh*t shareware back in the day? Man – the apple has fallen so far from the tree, it’s burrowed a hole to china by now :D

    Good luck on all your future endeavors! Seriously. I’m with you dudes 110%!

  32. This is the most compelling reason that I wish I’d made the effort to go to Develop – I’d’ve found it very hard not to just repeatedly shout “CUNT!” at him until he gave up talking.

  33. Mark Rein just loves trolling. He’s like a bratty kid showing off his AT-AT to the rest of the kids in the street who only have a stormtrooper and that han solo figure with the big head. I’m sure he loves his kids and is kind to puppies but behaving like a prick is behaving like a prick. the bottom line is that he was hijacking a panel discussion that really was nothing to do with him because he’s needy and craves attention even if the attention is people saying he’s a dick. Just ignore him and maybe he’ll go away :)

  34. It was a ridiculous interjection that he made. I was biting my tongue through it so as not to turn it into his panel discussion.
    Direct communication with people works, it is also part of the whole thing. It is not just the games biz that suffers from this megalithic organisation thinking it should just hand off to PR and marketing departments.
    Interesting though that Mark Rein should have to come along personally to interact on a one on one basis, his attitude seemed to be he should have sent some minions to heckle.
    I think he missed the point though, he was not taking on board that that all forms of communication and interaction with people work. Why just advertise when you can also engage and reach people who do not respond to advertising.
    I should add that last year, my first experience on Develop I was sat near Mark and he was very happy to make quite loud heckling comments during another talk that was about the sort of openness we now have on the web. Which I just half mentioned in passing in my last years blog post about it :)
    I guess its his role in the industry to stomp around like that, though wandering in late to your panel, which was really interesting, and being quite disruptive was out of order.

  35. Pingback: Epic Can “F**k Off” « PS3, Xbox 360, PSP / TheSixthAxis

  36. I was there as well (great panel discussion by the way, good amount of swearing), and watching Mark troll into the room halfway you could just see he was going to get on his usual bandwagon!

    I think, bless him, that beyond all the bluster and jerkery he probably did have a point of wanting to encourage indies to consider the more mainstream press interaction as well as the more direct dealings. Just unfortunate that he couldn’t be polite enough to wait till the question period and just had to shout it out :-/

    FWIW, Miles (from SI) can be just as blustery as well, but at least had the decency to wait to the end!

  37. Well said sir – I commend you on your efforts of creating games for the love of it, not just to make as much $$$$$$ as you can.

    Long live the indie developers.

  39. Pingback: Indie Dev Says Epic Can "F**k Off" | Xbox Centre
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  42. Its easy not to care about individual customers when you have the backing of a multi-million marketing campaign to sell a designed-by-numbers shooter. I’m completely ambivalent when it comes to Epic, but the bombastic arsehole double-act of Mark Rein and CliffyB just make me want to avoid their games.

  44. At the Nordic Game conference last year I saw how he interacted with a poor guy who was trying to sell his lighting algorithm to the unreal engine. Mark’s reply to the guy’s tech pitch: man, I’m jet lagged, bring me some water.

    During talks he would make random outbursts of 360 / gears marketing speils, which had little/nothing to do with the academic/gameplay discourse of the discussion/talk.

    If remember sitting there thinking: SHUT THE F**K UP, you are making yourself look like a complete idiot.

  45. I worked at Epic for 3 years, mixed with Mark quite a bit and found your comments quite offensive. I think you should offer up an apology to jerks everywhere for equating them to this pathethic excuse of a man.

  46. Pingback: Indie Dev Says Epic Can "F**k Off" | Kotaku Australia

  47. As an Indie Developper, I can only back you up on this. Sure Mark Rein may not feel the impact of a satisfied customer, but we know that it is the basis of a good company. As it has been pointed out, being big doen’t necessarily mean being a douchebag, look at Valve. Great post Cliffski.

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  50. Tsk. I was two seconds away from buying Gears of War, but I’ve suddenly lost interest. Oh well, I’m just one customer…what’s my initial $20 purchase going to mean? Or my following $30? Or the $60 one? Guess they won’t miss it.

    You, however…seem pretty chill, I shall be back. :)

    Also, that was the most maturely written “fuck off” blog I’ve seen yet.

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