Video Games! Anyone else?

[Dave Gomes]

Hey guys.

I'm curious how many of you out there are also in the field in any way shape or form. Currently I run a small blog where I review the topic of "game design" generally, but also cover a number of other facets of the industry. (www.randomplays.com)

Other than the shameless plug (which I hope is ok :)) there is a point! I have a new project I am heading up on the topic of gaming (it's my current muse) and I wanted to know if anyone has done anything similar. My goal is simple really. Get into the industry, but don't actually get a "real" job. I specialize in noticing trends, predicting successful future game ideas, and the critical startup phase (towards the purpose of selling off the licensing of said game idea).

I am eager to hear any suggestions or stories about other similar startups and steps taken to go from an idea in your head > to someone else buying the rights to make that idea a reality.

(I realize that's quite vague but at the worst this is a litmus for interest in video games in the forum)
Thanks for reading!
-Dave

[kamakiri]

Dave - I am very into the same market. I actually have been laying the foundation for a MMOG consulting company for a few months now. I have a team of experts in the field I put together who all work on a contingency basis out of their own location. It is nearly impossible to explain to the layman, but for people who play/know a lot about games, it isn't too difficult.

Basically it is a game economics consultancy. Game designers are concerned with playability, design, story lines, marketing, latency, technical issues... But they are very uninterested in the economy of the games themselves. Why is that a huge issue? Because of the gold farmers, and people making a living with RWT. (Play Money (http://www.amazon.com/Play-Money-Millions-Trading-Virtual/dp/0465015352), and gold farmers (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=res&cd=1&url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FFarmer_ (gaming)&ei=YqqzR7CJLKK6sQLT5ND-Bg&usg=AFQjCNHmj3Tv7Wk8NtGFENJZPjoJIysLpw&sig2=BZo8Mq6Ty2ZleUmVkQkngw))

Basically this established a very real exchange rate to the dollar, just like the Yen-$ rate. The tax authorities look at the industry more and more every year, and with the emergence of games like Second Life (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=res&cd=1&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsecondlife.com%2F&ei=0qqzR4ywMJm6sQLFteCDBw&usg=AFQjCNHSar0qoDrGjUSXC7VIuN37oulgTQ&sig2=L9rzPaiG1yYbFYR45hd3Bw), people are turning virtual money into real life fortunes (http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2006/11/second_lifes_fi.html). It is a very different thing to play a game and train something only to have your income from selling an in-game product reduced because you have a team of gold farmers mining the same resource 24 hours a day and flooding the market to get in-game gold to sell for hard cash.

With games becoming more mainstream, many more customers are playing. There is a huge market to 30 year olds, and they don't have 10 hours a day to grind out meaningless tasks for money, but they do have real world cash. This makes it much easier to decide. Pay a gold farmer $15 and buy the best amour, or grind for 10 hours for the same reward. The average wage at the last gold farm I worked with was $2.50 a day. Play for 10 hours, get $2.50, then the head of the farm sells that gold to an aggregator, who intern sells it to the dealers. It is very much like a drug cartel. The end dealers are the ones getting banned, and having pay pal transactions reversed. The aggregators are making cash, and the farms are just businesses.

I could go on and on all day on the subject, but I think you get the idea. I am working on a web site, but it is far down the list of things to get done. The game development is a very tight knit society though, and it is harder than hell to break into. If you look at the big games, most are developed by a small group of companies. Send me an email if you want to discuss more of this stuff. For me it never gets old.

[Dave Gomes]

So what server did you play on? :P

[badhank]

dont know if this helps: i work in the same building as a pretty large gaming company called silicon knights http://www.siliconknights.com/ and can probably get you some contact info with ppl if you are interested...