TVG.SPEAKS...David Braben Feature
Derek dela Fuente
14/12/2005
TVG chats to Elite co-creator David Braben on the current shape of the industry, and his thoughts on its future...
Despite the acrimonious disintegration of their creative partnership, David Braben and Ian Bell will forever be associated with arguably the greatest space-sim title in the history of videogames, Elite.
A game so massive both in the literal and esteemed sense, Elite presented an almost unlimited universe for players to discover. With massive memory constraints imposed by the hardware, Elite made use of Fibbonachi number sequences to create, name, and co-ordinate countless thousands of galaxies, planets, and ecosystems, leading to the occasionally amusing names such as the 'Killer Edible Poets' race. The game managed to create a universe of real scale of epic proportions, which still continues to astound and influence games to this day.
Since then, Braben has continued to develop further titles based on the Elite brand with Frontier: Elite II in 1993 and First Encounter in 1995, both under his studio Frontier Developments. Neither sequel managed to replicate the success of the original however, leaving Frotnier and Braben to bide their time with a number of critical hits and an enjoyable collaboration with Aardman Animations on two Wallace & Gromit titles. Recently Frontier confirmed development on its most ambitious title in recent times, The Outsider is best described as a political/thriller set to define exactly what we expect from the next-generation - and there's always the talk of Elite 4.
TVG's nostalgic PC lover Derek dela Fuente spoke to David Braben about the 'good old days', and how he views the games industry in the 21st Century...
What exactly is your input nowadays as the head of Frontier Developments? Are you still heavily involved in the designing/concept stages and programming?
Yes - I am heavily involved in both design and concept stages, and of course in planning where we go in the future. I have done very little coding in the last few years, and in many ways I miss the head-down focus and satisfaction of coding.
Having enjoyed success in the 1980s on 8-bit as well as 16-bit machines, is success now a lot harder to achieve and do you ever harp back to the days where it did seem to be more innovative and exciting in terms of game ideas?
"Even in the 1980s, the majority of games were highly derivative - perhaps more so than now."
As with pop music, film - even books - much of what is produced is poor and forgettable. This was as true in the 80s and 90s as it is now; the memory of quality is the rose-tinted effect where we look back at just the best games of those years. Even in the 1980s, the majority of games were highly derivative - perhaps more so than now. A number of platform games based on film licenses (which I won't name) were almost identical to each other; literally so - it was little more than a change in sprite images, it was these that gave licenses a bad name - which I think is no longer deserved if you look at most more recent film-licensed games.
The PC market is steadily becoming smaller and smaller, with a perception that it has an 'unsexy' image; do you ever feel it could become a trend setter or market leader again, or do you feel that the simple fact is that consoles are more intrinsically pleasing, easier to use, is it part of an on going process?
Sales on the PC are decreasing, even though usage is perhaps not. Piracy is rife and perhaps the root cause of the decline in sales. This consequent lack of sales means publishers are reluctant to publish a 'risky' (ie innovative) game on PC as it is unlikely to sell very many units. We've seen the same thing happen on the Amiga, ST, Archimedes, and many earlier formats, but the PC may still survive. It is possible that online play will help keep it alive, as will online services like Valve's Steam.
"... but the PC may still survive."
The PC is still an interesting platform, but in addition the support costs are huge because of all the different graphics hardware, drivers and so on. This is ongoing as new hardware and drivers come along after release but don't work properly, triggering huge numbers of technical support queries so it is another problem to consider when doing PC games.
Incidentally, tech support queries are a good measure of commercial piracy too. We've seen this a few times, where in some countries sales are really poor - but where the number of support queries are still high - due to commercial piracy selling pirated versions at a lower price. A guy from Frontier went on holiday to Russia, and brought back a copy of one of our just-released games - and the pirates had even done their own packaging, based on art work taken from our website; and of course they got the technical support numbers right.
What do you hope that the more powerful machines will bring in terms of game designs and ideas? Better processing has brought faster, smoother, presented games but gameplay and design appears to have remained essentially the same. Do you feel there are many unexplored, unexploited areas and it's just a question of time?
Game-play has moved on continuously through the generations - it has been gradual, but there have been huge improvements all the same. Imagine a game that was just jumping around platforms, collecting objects, and avoiding baddies - if that was all there was to it, it would be rightly slated these days - but ten or more years ago such games were pretty common.
Nevertheless, I do feel there are many unexplored areas - and this is where the occasional breath of fresh air like Katamari Damacy comes from. Even now, graphics and presentation still seem to overshadow game-play in games, but I think this is where the fifth generation will shine.
With increasingly sophisticated architecture do developers have enough time to really explore the PS3 and Xbox 360 hardware ahead of their respective launches? It does seem that the first show case games on new machines never really use anything like the real potential of the machine.
"... I too want to do a new 'Elite' game"
The first 'batch' of games for fifth generation will be substantially fourth generation games, but with shiny new graphical effects, because as you imply, the development systems have not been around long enough to properly get to grips with the machines - one of the reasons Frontier is not doing a 360 launch title.
Do you feel there is a need for programmers to progress through certain machines and generations?
I don't think there is a need to have progressed through all the previous generations, though of course the skills you pick up on the way are always a huge help, but ironically in some respects it can also be a hindrance. There are many exciting new ways of doing things on the new platforms so a fresh look is required. For this reason I think it is best to have a healthy mix of experienced people and fresh blood on the team. Having said that, finding good programmers is very important - and 'good' does not always mean 'qualified'.
Has the success of Elite and the constant call for an update been a hindrance to you in any way?
No, because I too want to do a new 'Elite' game, but it has to be 'right'.
Looking ahead say 5 years what do you foresee as some of the next trends and direction for the videogame industry and is it an exciting time for you and your team?
The main change, I think, is the coming of age of gaming. Despite what we in the industry might say, in the wider world we are still in general looked upon as a curious niche that appeals to kids and teenagers. Some games tip-toe outside this and have a broader appeal, like FIFA, Roller Coaster Tycoon, The Sims, but these are very much the exception. I like to draw a comparison with film - film was similarly 'niche' in around 1930, with people tiring of car-on-a-train-track slapstick films - which were really vehicles for spectacular effects rather than personal involvement. Thereafter, film began to change for the better, and the emergence of Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock, and many others very much changed the perception of films. I think we are at this point with games.
"I'll avoid the predictable 'I'd try to dissuade Hitler/Stalin/Pot/Mao...' answer"
Why do you feel there are so few developers with a spokesperson, voice, or even industry icons? Do you feel people are afraid to voice their views in case they offend or go against the current trend?
On the contrary - I think many developers would be delighted to have more publicity, but the games business has largely been centred on publishers rather than developers - just look at the packaging. This is reinforced by some publishers moving to ever larger soulless internal development teams producing soulless games. Nevertheless some developers have managed to have their own identity despite this, and it is for the better.
What are you current thoughts on the price of games? Of course games cost a lot of money to develop but do you feel that some formats are excessive?
This is always a tricky one; at the root of the problem is that people tend to perceive value in price. Many years ago a game of mine, "Virus" was put out at a lower price point than some other games in some countries, essentially as an experiment to see if this helped increase sales and reduce piracy, which was rife at the time (an anonymous survey in Germany for Virus on the Amiga showed piracy running at 27 copies to each original), but it didn't help - the opposite in fact, as some suggested the lower price point implied lower quality.
If you could sit and talk to 4 people from the past or even alive who would they be and why?
I'll avoid the predictable 'I'd try to dissuade Hitler/Stalin/Pot/Mao...' answer - as I don't think they'd listen anyway.
The writer we know as William Shakespeare is a very interesting character - not for the obvious reasons, but because he was writing about controversial royal politics at a time you could get your head chopped off for saying the wrong thing. The guy buried in Stratford is almost certainly not the writer (a guy who had no books and had never gone abroad, let alone knew of royal court politics) - the actual writer was not stupid enough to use his own name, and was most probably the 17th Earl of Oxford, Edward DeVere. It would be fascinating to know the true story.
Sir Stanley Goodall was the British Navy's chief architect throughout the First and Second World Wars, and Admiral John 'Jacky' Fisher was the First Sea Lord in the First. Both were fascinating people (incidentally both detested Winston Churchill), and both were involved in some strange decisions. Again, I would love to know what went on at the time.
I would also like to speak to Douglas Adams again, he of 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' fame. I met him a few weeks before he died, and we got on very well indeed; he was a very interesting person, and we had agreed to have dinner when he returned from the US - which he never did. Very sad.
TVG would like to thank David Braben for sparing some time to talk with TVG. With the political/thriller, The Outfit, on the cards and the constant talk of Elite 4, Braben and Frontier Developments have certainly got a lot in the pipeline...