Backbone Entertainment - Developer Profile Feature
Chris Leyton
08/10/2005
TVG's continued focus switches to the creator of Death. Jr and the forthcoming Age of Empires DS adaptation...
Continuing our ongoing pursuit of talking to the worldās leading developers Derek dela Fuente spoke with Jeff Vavasour, VP Canadian Operations, and Studio Head at Backbone in Vancouver.
Please can you tell us about Backbone; when were you formed and how do the two offices of the company interact?
We started out as Digital Eclipse and hereās a timeline of how the company evolved:
1992 - Digital Eclipse formed as a "Mac productivity company" (Powerbook Upgrades and productivity/utility publisher), founded by Andrew Ayre, current co-president of Foundation 9 Entertainment
1993 - Digital Eclipse acquires the licence to Williams' classic arcade
games: Robotron, Joust, and Defender. Release "Digital Arcade Collector Series" on Mac, as the first foray into game development.
Self-published.
1994 - I joined the company. I handled the various aspects of production. (Sort of a Senior Engineer role that doubles as Producer at times.)Initial projects included a PC adaptation of Digital Arcade as well as the Commodore 64 15 Pack for Activision.
1995 - Digital Eclipse signs deal to develop emulation on other platforms for Williams Entertainment (now Midway Home Entertainment) to publish. We switch our focus to being a developer. Emulation business picks up, getting us involved in various console platforms, etc. We're operating as something of a '"virtual company" at that point, with HQ in Emeryville where business development happens, while I'm in Vancouver coordinating our contractors who are largely remote.
1997 - Andrew Ayre brought in Genetic Fantasia, and that's where Mike Mika comes in. They're a hardcore group doing Game Boy development. Through Mike's team's skills, we're able to anticipate the design of the Game Boy Color, giving us an edge on all other 3rd party developers. We have the first three 3rd party GBC games ready for launch. The Vancouver studio is also established in 1997, as projects are requiring the coordination of larger teams and people can't operate out of their apartments anymore.
So 1997 was the year both offices became development studios, really.
Beyond that, I'd say the skill for anticipating hardware design was something that came into play several times since, with the GBA and most recently with Emeryville's early entry into PSP development.
How we interact has evolved. There was a lot of co-dependency in the beginning. For example, we had projects coded in Vancouver, but with the production and art in Emeryville. But as we got bigger we started building up the infrastructure locally that has changed. These days we do tend to develop technology locally, and then share it to give the other studio an edge. For example, Emeryville had an excellent graphics tool we adopted in Vancouver. Vancouver had an engine infrastructure developed through from the GBA to the DS that Emeryville adopted for one of its DS projects. We're hoping to get more such efficiencies with the Collective and Pipeworks, now.
What would you say are the specialised qualities of the company and what would be your mission statement?
Good instincts with new platforms and our ability to adapt quickly have been some of our biggest strengths. We also have a very āGrassrootsā feel... we care about the games and employ a lot of people with an appreciation for the old school. We donāt have a formalized mission statement, but we always strive to make the best games possible.
"We've spent time adapting and expanding our emulation technology, ...and designed to be portable across everything from the GBA to the Xbox 360."
You have developed a vast range of differing genres of games on handheld as well as other formats. Do you believe that diversity is the road for many development houses and would do you see yourself as more a conversion house than pure developer?
Diversity has helped us remain a very stable developer. While other developers might put all their eggs in one basket, either gambling on a platform or a property, we don't live or die by the success of a single project. A number of developers didn't survive the transition a couple years ago as the technology shifted, but for us, business seemed to be pretty much as usual. Though, as technology escalates, single projects necessarily need a bigger investment, so in order to stay diversified, we've had to grow tremendously, which is part of the philosophy behind the formation of Foundation 9.
I wouldn't see us as a "conversion house" by any means. Even when we take known properties, such as Spyro, we're rebuilding the game from the ground up to make it something great to play on, say, the GBA. We developed Disney's Tarzan for the GBC as a million plus seller, as a game with solid accolades, in a time when movie tie-in games were almost universally scorned. I'd say we're an innovative house that thrives on the challenge of making fun games no matter what the target. Our love for this sort of challenge has made us a success on smaller platforms such as handheld, but it is our love of a design challenge that defines us, not our affinity for handhelds.
"We're also making some headway into the Xbox 360, via the announced Xbox Live Arcade. That's a foot in the door we're very eager to expand upon."
How important is the continued investment into R+D for Backbone; what are some of the tools and engines you have created and how technology focused are the teams?
There is no dedicated R&D department within the studio, but we do rotate teams in a manner that allows different people to contribute to R&D according to their strengths. Our primary tools and engines weāve built up in-house fall into two categories: emulation and Nintendo platforms. The Emeryville studio has largely been responsible for the PSP, and we have been making use of technology from other studios (such as Pipeworks) for console work, so that leaves us as the provider for the Nintendo DS and GBA.
In the case of the GBA, our technology has focussed on the isometric engine, OS-style āinfrastructureā code plus graphics (sprite, palette quantiser) and level editing tools. Of course, Emeryville also has some excellent GBA technology for platformers and tools for graphics, so thereās a lot of cross-usage there.
As to the Nintendo DS, we got on the kits as soon as they were available, and rapidly began adapting our GBA Dragon library to the DS. This gave us some common infrastructure for object management, camera code, etc. Emeryville extended this with some 3D features, gleaned from their experience with the PSP. We very much believe in having a solid foundation, and spend a lot of time shoring up our technology so that, when itās time to get going on a project, our people can concentrate on what it takes to make a game, rather than an engine. Together, I think weāve built a fairly robust library, with everyone having contributed their piece from the ground up. In this approach, the engine is more likely to suit multiple studio needs. Getting more out of our code, in that respect, is very satisfying.
On the emulation side, my first responsibility with the company was emulation, so itās always been something fairly close to my heart. Weāve spent time adapting and expanding our emulation technology, so itās very well-tested at this point and designed to be portable across everything from the GBA to the Xbox 360. Even with modern consoles, itās not as straightforward as you might believe to get the full frame rate out of these games when you canāt leverage the graphics acceleration of the console. For the low-end platforms, weāve created our proprietary āmeta-emulationā tool chain that allows us to do some pre-optimisation on the game ROMs to get extra speed out of a platform that might not otherwise be fast enough for traditional emulation. On the high end consoles, our need to create a robust standard within which we can run these diverse arcade games has led to some useful spin-off technology. A couple examples of code deriving from this would be our menu systems and interface code on the consoles that support all the controller and memory card issues, and our code to handle real-time head-to-head network play. Both of these have proven useful to us and other studios within the Foundation 9 umbrella, outside their original purpose.
What are your current thoughts on the next batch of machines such as the PSP? Also do you have thoughts for the next-gen of consoles?
Our people are in love with the PSP and really excited to be working on it. Weāre also making some headway into the Xbox 360, via the announced Xbox Live Arcade. Thatās a foot in the door weāre very eager to expand upon. The Xbox Live experience on the 360 is going to be something brand new for consoles, and we see all sorts of possibilities with this that our people are just clamouring to get into.
Beyond that, weāre definitely excited about the various platforms that are on the horizon, with some great game designs in mind for the Revolution as well. It will take us a while in Vancouver to get the capacity to develop for this next round, including the PS3, but weāre on our way, and I expect weāll grow into initially through collaboration with other studios, as we did years ago on the more modest consoles, when we were smaller.
Another area weāre excited to expand into, and the Gizmondo is perhaps representative of this too, is bringing the design experience we started to hone on the GBA to next-generation mobile devices like the N-Gage and its successors. Weāre looking to bring a true console experience to the casual mobile gamer.
Do you feel that specialising on handhelds is sometimes seen as less creative by publishers and maybe even the public? Do you feel you get the credit you deserve?
See previous answer. Handheld titles in the Game Boy era have often been follow-ons to console releases, so perhaps theyāre perceived as less creative in that respect, but only superficially, at first glance. I think the publishers respect our ability to reinvent a game for a new and very distinct platform. They recognize this is not a port, that weāre basically creating a whole new game thatās true to their licence, and thatās something they wouldnāt entrust to just anyone.
How hard a skill for would be programmers and artists is it to acquire the kind of skills to work on handheld games? What would be the qualifications to work at Backbone?
We have an old school attitude. You work with the constraints of your chosen platform to get the most out of it. Whereas a programmer on a PC title might see the handheld device as confining, our kind of programmer looks at the handheldās constraints as a challenge: āwhat can I do within these boundaries that no one has ever seen before?ā Itās the same kind of gaming mentality that was fostered in the 8-bit era and was even what made Doom so unique for its time.
So, our people have an appreciation for that kind of programming. We look at what people accomplished back then with awe, rather than considering it quaint. One of our bright new hires just turned 20 after we took him on, and he was still coding in assembly, building ROMs for the GBA, along with some custom hardware of his own. Itās good to see that attitude alive and well. Every technological constraint becomes a genre after all a while, so in embracing this old school attitude, I feel like weāre the modern Film Noir of gaming.
Beyond that, the kind of people weāre looking for are versatile. One of the charms, we think, of working for our studio is that you get to participate in all parts of the process. You will not be relegated to painting eyebrow textures for the next six product cycles. An artist might be doing very technical 2D work one game, creating 3D character animations wholesale the next, and then off to a licensed property after that. For an artist to work with us, being able to adapt, and being able to mimic different styles, is a very important skill.
The publisher/developer industry appears to be going through a tumultuous period, with several publishers aggressively acquiring development studios to work in-house and even publishers looking at rival publishers to strengthen their own control of the market. Is this a sign of the resource and sheer investment needed for the next-gen and does it mean the death-knoll for smaller, perhaps more creative projects and teams?
Well, I know why we banded together to form Foundation 9. It served two purposes: First, we wanted to pool our resources to face these next generation consoles head on. Iām sure publishers are experiencing some anxiety about facing that next round of development, too, and thatās probably driving the acquisitions. But beyond that, we also wanted to have the resources to finance our own dreams. Weāve got a lot of creative talent, and a lot of ideas. As it gets more challenging for a publisher to turn a profit in the next generation market, itās going to be harder for them to take chances. Itās hard to find a venue for your more offbeat ideas in that marketplace. We wanted to build the resources needed to support and finance games like Death Jr., where we could keep the process with the creative team, so that the game is inspiration-driven rather than marketing-driven.
Where that leaves smaller developers is something weāll have to see. Certainly, in trying to promote Death Jr., Foundation 9 created a campaign that went beyond jus the game. We got a comic book going, which drew interest from toy manufacturers, and drew interest from the movie industry. That got the attention of the publishers as something that might have some legs, marketing-wise, but left us with the creative freedom to mature the concept ourselves. This grassroots approach may be the future for smaller, more creative projects. It may be harder to get your idea financed by a publisher straight-up today, but with unprecedented opportunity to reach genre fans directly, anyone with a great idea and a website can stir up a buzz and get noticed. If youāre creative, you can find a way to stand out from the crowd.
What one other developer do you most admire?
Tricky question. There are many developers I admire for a variety of reasons, and there are new reasons they grab my attention all the time. Sometimes weāre impressed with the culture, sometimes with the business, sometimes itās just because they got a game weād love to be working on. I wouldnāt want to single out any one, but Iād say that we definitely pay attention, and aim to learn from the best everyone has to offer. And, then, sometimes we just merge with or acquire them. :)
Can you tell our readers whatās on the horizon for Backbone?
Weāve been amazingly busy. In the past few months in Vancouver, weāve just wrapped work on Rifts: The Promise of Power for N-Gage, Namco Museum 50th Anniversary for PS2, Xbox, GC, PC, and GBA, Midway Arcade Treasures 3 for the PS2, Xbox, GC, and PC, some work for EA that youāll see in an upcoming PS2 release, and are currently working on Age of Empires: The Age of Kings for Nintendo DS, Midway Arcade Treasures: Extended Play for the PSP, Atari Masterpieces for the N-Gage, and are just getting started on some more exciting stuff for the PSP, DS, and PC. Weāve got so much work, weāre looking to open another new studio on the East Coast of Canada just to help keep up.
TVG would like to thank Jeff Vavasour for this insight into Backbone Entertainment and the handheld genre; weāll have further Developer Profiles soonā¦
