My interview with Ichiro Lambe of Dejobaan games.

I just conducted an interview with Dejobaan games' CEO, Ichiro Lambe about being a game developer. Here's the interview.


> 1. How much education is recommended for finding a job at a video game company?

If you're passionate about what you do, it doesn't really matter right now. I know people with PhDs (you know -- you have to call them "Doctor So-and-So") who work for game dev studios. And I know a fellow who dropped out of his first year of college, and made millions starting his own studio. And lots in between.

> 2. What is the creative process process you use to create games like 1...2...3 Kick it! or AAaaAAaahh!?

It's a 9-month process, but I can boil it down into these steps:
Oh look, an idea! (In this case, someone found a YouTube video of BASE jumping.)
Prototype (one weekend).
More prototyping (one week) to find out that the concept was fun.
Then plenty of iteration. Try things one way, then another. Which works the best?
Testing!
Polish!
> 3. How long does it usually take for a game to turn a profit?

It varies per game. But typically within a year.

> 4. Has Dejobaan ever worked on a project that failed?

Bazillions of them. Here's one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_8WoyEyzzM

I spent two years hacking away at that freakin' game, and it never turned into anything. But we learned lessons from it, and re-used design elements in future games.

> 5. When you're in the game's development process, are there ever any times when a task seems impossible to do?

Sure; for example, we still haven't gotten the look for 1... 2... 3... KICK IT! (Drop That Beat Like an Ugly Baby) down yet. It's still... plain. What am I going to do about it? I don't know, Josh. But our best thought is this approach:
Concept sketching (http://dejobaan.com/news/).
Breaking things down into tiny pieces (trying particle effects here; new models there).
Implementing those pieces and seeing what works.
> 6. How important to the company are Dejobaan's fans?

They make me happy. It's really a big part of why we do this. But one thing that surprises people is that we sometimes have to ignore our fans. What sounds like a good idea from a gamer's perspective might actually be a horrible design choice. And what sounds like a bad idea to gamers might sometimes be the right design choice. Go figure.

> 7. Is more work put into the game's actual visual design or programming?

Programming -- probably because I come from a programming background. Especially for Kick It, where we're trying to master Procedural Content Generation. Lots of math there; lots of trying different things, failing, retrying, and succeeding.

> 8. What has been the most fun project to work on so far?
> 9. Which project has been the hardest to produce?

Oh boy. They're all both simultaneously fun and brutal. Take the Portal 2 ARG. It was grueling work -- we had several hundred person-hours worth of tasks to do, and about half that time in which to do it. Lots of late nights. Entire days spent working. But we also got to stick GLaDOS into our games and fly out to visit Valve. Very awesome. I even got to be kidnapped.

> 10. On an average day, what are the responsibilities of you and your employees?

We're such a small team that it varies. I'm required to do any/all of the following:
-Accounting
-Negotiating a contract with lawyers
-Customer service
-Programming
-Running a meeting
-Talking to our concept artist
-Trying out a new tool
-Sitting in the corner, crying
-Design work
-Telling people about all this juicy stuff!



Hope that helps!

Cheers,
Ichiro

Dejobaan Games, LLC
www.dejobaan.com

Dude that's awesome that you got to interview a gaming company CEO!