Constructing narratives in game design with Sam Read-Graves

Sam Read-Graves is a BAFTA nominated video game developer and ex-teacher. He has made many games and is the creator of Trolley Problem, Inc., a darkly comedic narrative game based on real world philosophy.

In this episode, Sam discusses what brought him into the world of game design, his experience teaching young people and developing games, and why it's so important to him to lead an independent games company.

Website: https://www.readgraves.com/

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Transcript

Matt: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Teach, Inspire, Create podcast. I'm your host Matt Moseley, Chief Examiner for Art and Design at UAL Awarding Body. Each episode I speak to artists and [00:00:15] creative industry leaders about their experience of teaching and being taught, who or what inspires them, and we explore creativity in their work with the hope of showing you that there are infinite ways to be creative in the arts.

Matt: Today, my [00:00:30] guest is Sam Reed Graves. Sam is a BAFTA nominated video game developer and ex teacher. He's made many games and is the creator of Trolley Problem, Inc., a darkly comedic narrative game based on real world philosophy. In this [00:00:45] episode, I'm going to be talking to Sam about what brought him into the world of game design, his experience teaching young people and developing games, and why it's so important to him to lead an independent games company. There is a transcript available for this episode. [00:01:00] Please click the link in the episode description so you can read as you listen. Hello, Sam. 

Sam: How you doing? 

Matt: Very well, thank you. Thank you for joining us on the Teach, Inspire, Create podcast here at High Holborn. It's [00:01:15] wonderful to have you. For you, obviously, as your lens of games designer extraordinaire, is there a game or a particular kind of gaming experience that inspired you?

Matt: So, when I was younger, I had an older cousin, and we would always go to his to play Sega [00:01:30] Genesis and things that we didn't have in our house.

Sam: So, uh, from an early age I always loved playing games, but there was one moment when I was probably like five or six, and we were playing Mortal Kombat, which I never should have been playing at that age. So [00:01:45] Mortal Kombat is a beat ‘em up, so it's two people fighting each other, but I didn't have a clue what I was doing because the controls and combos and stuff were so hard, but somehow he was teleporting from one side of the screen to the other, and because he was physically [00:02:00] doing it on a controller, it felt like he was doing it in real life, like it really felt like a magic trick to me.

Sam: And then at that point I was just enamoured. Because obviously you don't get that with music and film. Those things are obviously made by people. But as an observer, if anything you [00:02:15] want to sort of fall away and just watch the movie. The fact that he was interacting with it was, yeah, just amazing to me.

Matt: Initially your first interest is from the perspective as a gamer?

Sam: Yeah, because I mean at that age, I had no idea technically how [00:02:30] any of this stuff was working. Every so often my cousin again would have something where you could edit something or add something and again that to me just seemed like magic because I had no understanding of how it worked.

Sam: So we would play [00:02:45] a game called Micro Machines where you know your little cars racing around the table and you could paint a car and then you would now be playing as that thing. And around the time was when Star Wars Episode 1 came out, and they had all the podracers, so then we were drawing [00:03:00] little podracers and putting them in, and yeah, that to me just felt so creative, that I was actually putting something into that world.

Matt: Yeah, so the design aspect, the interactive design aspect of gaming sort of became [00:03:15] a bit more on your radar. So, when was the first time that you made a game?

Sam: So the first time I wanted to make a game was probably when I was around eight or nine. Literally in paint on like my PC. So I'd do like a [00:03:30] running animation.

Sam: But that, this would have been probably like ‘98, ‘99. Like the internet was in its infancy. So, there was just no way for me to get that knowledge and libraries wouldn't stock books on game design, especially [00:03:45] then. So, it was always really hard to learn anything. So then, what I thought would probably be easier when I was a teenager, is I play bass guitar, and I thought, oh well, a life of working in music, or working in film, [00:04:00] would just be easier than games.

Sam: Which, looking back at it, is such a ridiculous statement. Like, probably two of the hardest industries to get into. 

Matt: Yeah, yeah. I'll just do those instead. 

Sam: Yeah. Yeah. Cause that's easy. But then when I was in sixth form, so 16, [00:04:15] 17, I just kept sort of finding like games would call back to me. And that was when I went to college to do IT.

Sam: And went to uni to study game design. And that was really when I've made my first game. So, [00:04:30] so now it's great to see there are so many free tools out there. It's so accessible. I would be expecting people who are interested who are like 14, 15 to be making stuff. 

Matt: And so what interested  you about game design initially? Was it like the sort of, uh, [00:04:45] I'm going to try and use the right terms here, but like the sort of the theme, concept or like the gameplay or the character design, kind of what was your first love for game design. 

Sam: It would have been games and mechanics. So like actually how the thing functions. At the time, [00:05:00] I wouldn't have known those terms. So it was just like the fact it's interactable. 

Sam: Right, yeah, yeah. 

Sam: But now, I can see how a mechanic, so something the player can actively do. When you put two or three of these things together so when you've got like a normal [00:05:15] jump and a double jump, and then something like a wall you can kick off of. But an enemy, what climbs walls, like these things start linking together.

Matt: Yeah. 

Sam: And that's where the gameplay comes from.

Matt: I know some game designers play a lot of board games and other kind of [00:05:30] games, and that kind of idea of achievement and process through a game. Do you do a lot of that as well?

Sam: Yeah, I think when it comes to game design and theory and how you actually interact, the easiest place to start for people is probably [00:05:45] board games.

Matt: Yeah. 

Sam: Because I see that as paired down game design. It's nothing but like the rules and then you like learn those, see how they interact with each other. Whether you've got a game design hat on or not, you're trying to work out how to play the [00:06:00] rules and work with them, tactics. If people are starting off with game design and really want to become game designers, then I think that board games is a great place to start.

Matt: Yeah, because I'm just thinking about sort of story and [00:06:15] narrative like . . . And we're going to talk a bit more specifically about game design, but like how important is it when you're coming up with a game about that idea of a compelling or interesting story that you play through the game?

Sam: So, in game design you have player [00:06:30] narrative and literal narrative.

Matt: Okay. 

Sam: So literal narrative is what is going on in the world. So say if I'm playing a space game, it's oh these aliens are invading our planet, I'm going to go in my spaceship [00:06:45] like da da da da da da. It's like the literal story to the game. And then the player narrative is what the players are doing, but those two things don't have to link up.

Sam: They obviously should but they don't have to link up. So, it could be oh I want to upgrade this weapon [00:07:00] before I go on the next mission. So now I need to do X, Y, Z. And then, how do you go about doing that as a game developer, you don't want that process of like upgrading things to be boring. But it might be just, oh you know, I've only got half an hour tonight so I'm going to go do a side [00:07:15] mission.

Sam: So now I sort of go off the beaten track and do this thing, or maybe I just want to explore and interact with characters. So, those two things, so like the actual story, like in universe. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Sam: And then the things that the player's doing, even if it's trying to get like [00:07:30] achievements and stuff, which is sort of almost out of the game.

Matt: Yeah. Yeah. 

Sam: I think linking those two things up is really important. You do get games fall down, sort of on either side of that, so, like for the space, sort of analogy, like Space Invaders, you don't really have [00:07:45] much literal story to go off. Okay, the aliens are moving down the screen, but all of it's about high scores, leaderboards, I'm gonna duck behind this bit of cover, and so on.

Sam: And then you'll have something like Mass Effect, where there's so many, actual [00:08:00] narrative beats. The game is built around talking to people and building up relationships. It is just very different. And, um, and Mass Effect is a game set in space where you have like these massive dialogue systems so you can feel really connected to [00:08:15] the characters in the world.

Matt: Interesting. I've never really thought about the story arc of Space Invaders or kind of why that's such a successful game. But yeah, there's so much around the community aspect of  gaming isn't there? In terms of [00:08:30] competing with other people or being part of a group of people that are really into a particular game.

Sam: Yeah and I mean those leaderboards in the 80’s and 90’s when you would have a physical arcade cabinet and you would want to be the person in [00:08:45] the town who's at the top of that leaderboard. It really had that sense of community. And then obviously the internet now picks that up with forums, online leaderboards, and everything.[00:09:00]

Matt: So, in terms of your training then, so you went to college to do training and qualification? 

Sam: Yes, so I went to West Suffolk College to do it. At the time, there were [00:09:15] no game design courses anywhere at a college like FE level. And then after that I went to Huddersfield University to study game design. I loved being there.

Matt: With your university course, do you specialize into a particular [00:09:30] area of game design or is it more of a general design experience?

Sam: So at the time - I couldn't talk about the course now. 

Matt: Yeah.

Sam: But at the time, it was one course for really all aspects and then you could pick pathways so you could sort of customize it when you were later on in the course.[00:09:45]

Sam: I feel like now, because those pathways are more distinct, universities would usually have two or three offers. So then you could just go on to the coding university course or the art university course. And then even in [00:10:00] there, there's room to break down. So the art course could be to do with concepting things and idea generation, could be to do with, you know 2D art and sprites.

Sam: It could be sort of 3D model making. I think one of the other big differences now actually with those courses [00:10:15] is when I went to uni, It was laid on quite thick - which I liked - that if you're on this course, it's to do games. But it doesn't really break out elsewhere and now I don't think that's the case . If you're going to be doing [00:10:30] 3D for games that also means you're going to have the skill set to do 3D for different types of apps, which may not be game related, but also adverts or film.

Sam: So much of film now is moving into real time rendering using game [00:10:45] technology. So, if anything, if you want to be a VFX artist for film, doing a game arts course might actually be for you.

Matt: That's really interesting, actually. That crossover between film and games is really interesting. Yeah, it's massive, isn't it?

Matt: How did the course connect you [00:11:00] with the wider games industry?

Sam: The course itself didn't really. And it's because games have always been really, really hard to get into. I don't know if it's the same case now, but a lot of people used to think it was because everything was really secretive. Everything took [00:11:15] so long to make, they didn't want to ruin their announcement.

Sam: So then they couldn't let anyone in the room. That wasn't really the case. It was more that you need such a high level to work in some of those bigger studios that [00:11:30] if you go there as like an internship, you sort of get in the way. Um, and again, I'm not saying that's the case now, but back then it definitely was.

Sam: So it was just really, really hard to have any conversation with any studio at university level. I [00:11:45] did two years on the games course, and then usually when you try and get your placement year, we went on a separate course, which was called enterprise placement year. And it was a different team which helped people start businesses.

Sam: So then [00:12:00] we being myself and two colleagues called Lewis Bibby and Ash Stansell, we started a studio called Hyper Sloth. And that course was really interesting because it was specifically business. So, we were on the course with people who would [00:12:15] be designing electronics. And then, after that, we got, uh, published.

Sam: So we got funded. So then we actually took just an actual year out. 

Matt: Right. 

Sam: To finish the game before going back to uni. A lot of the, like, us interacting with [00:12:30] industry wasn't through the uni. It was off our own backs. 

Matt: Okay. 

Sam: Um, which obviously, if you have a uni which can pull those strings, it's amazing. But equally I feel like everyone who's a college student, university student, wants to break into any [00:12:45] creative industry, I feel like you have to put in that effort out of hours.

Matt: Yeah, so you've got to find that sort of self-motivated approach to getting it done. How did the publishing come about then when you said, you mentioned that you got published as a company?

Sam: Yeah, so at the time [00:13:00] it was when Kickstarter, so like crowdfunding, had just started in America, and started getting quite big.

Sam: And then in the UK, it wasn't even a thing yet, but living online, we had seen what people had been able to rake in. So we thought that'd [00:13:15] be great for us to get started. So the second it came to the UK, we started a crowdfunding project. It didn't work, but as part of that, we went to the Euro game expo, which is more commonly called [00:13:30] EGX, and that we paid to go to, it was around one and a half grand, which for three uni students living off noodles was a lot of money. 

Sam: Yeah, yeah, that's a big investment. 

Sam: Yeah, but what that meant was that we just saw as we were now like [00:13:45] legit in industry. Like we were there with booth space talking to people we would look up to but then arguably were peers. And at that point we met the publisher who would be signed by called Mastertronic. [00:14:00]

Matt: It's so interesting that you made so early that mental shift between someone who's a student of games to an actual company. I guess there was a lot of preparation [that] goes into that as well in terms of like a brand, doing all these, the aspects that you [00:14:15] have to do when you set up a company.

Sam: At the time we didn't sort of see a lot of that stuff. Like we just wanted to make games and, and I actually, I feel like I have a lot of that with me now as well. It's, I just want to make games. If I didn't have to run a company, I wouldn't, [00:14:30] it's just a vehicle for me to be creative, and to work with freelancers or to get booth space or to sign a contract and not have it all come back on me as the company. So yeah at the time it was definitely a safety thing where we were [00:14:45] signing a publishing deal and if everything went south, we didn't want to be the ones responsible for it like personally, it was the company.

Matt: Okay, setting up a professional relationship that you know [00:15:00] between two industry bodies rather than you.

Sam: And it's something that I would recommend to, to, I was going to say young people, but I guess anyone is that you don't need to start a company really, really quickly, but when stuff starts to get serious that’s [00:15:15] when it gets more important. I wouldn't recommend running out and starting a company because it's just not, it's just not sensible. 

Matt: So what were you making? What was the, at that point, so obviously you've, you've set up this organization, you're at this big expo and you're sort of crowdfunding to, [00:15:30] to make what, what was the first sort of game that you put together?

Sam: So it was a game called Dream. We saw it as being a fairly small game. It's first person. So you're looking through the eyes of the character and you're exploring their dreams. We wanted to write what we knew. [00:15:45] So you play a character who's just left university and they don't know what they want to do with their life.

Sam: So then they introspect and go into their dreams and you sort of explore these like wastelands and offices and so on. And then at a certain point it starts to fall into like nightmares. [00:16:00] We didn't want to make a horror game. We wanted to try and bring in other stuff. So, uh, yeah, so that was our first thing and I'm really proud of it.

Sam: I think for our skillset and age and just everything at the time. It was [00:16:15] really like cutting edge.

Matt: And so it got released, you finished the game and it got published?

Sam: We had some good write ups. So we got a load of different like promotional things with Valve. So Valve runs Steam, which is really the marketplace for PC games.

Sam: It was really, really fun, [00:16:30] especially to do it with two mates over the course of like two years. It was just a great experience making it.

Matt: So you had some success as a team, didn't you, as well, with that initial game? You got some, some industry recognition. 

Sam: Yeah, yeah. We went to GDC twice, which is [00:16:45] the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Again, it's just one of those like badges of honor that we were able to do stuff like that. And then, after that game, because I left the team, and they signed their next project, I signed my next project. [00:17:00] So I feel like as  a platform for all of us, it was just a, like I say, a really great experience.

Matt: Brilliant. So if someone is thinking about designing a game, what is the kind of iterative stages of putting a game together from an idea to an outcome? [00:17:15]

Sam: So, speaking very generally, there are two variations. So, if you want to just make a, a quick game as a prototype or like to scratch that itch or to be part of a portfolio, you can turn around stuff [00:17:30] really quickly.

Sam: So we're talking maybe like two weeks a month, so that would just be coming up with an idea and probably within you know an hour just start making it and just seeing what you get. And then you might iterate it, you might say okay, [00:17:45] that's great for a portfolio piece and so on and game jams are really good for that. So what a game jam is a small amount of time is like a, really a fun competition to make something.

Sam: They can last anywhere between 24 hours [00:18:00] and, say, a week. But, they're really, really great for just those small ideas and just to get something out. 

Matt: Yeah.

Sam: When it comes to a bigger game, this changes quite a lot if you work with a publisher or not because [00:18:15] signing a game is a really big thing and it takes a long time.

Sam: So, for the last few games that I've made we have developed a prototype and come up with a game design document, so just some paperwork outlining what the thing is. [00:18:30] That might take three, four months. And then pitching to a publisher, the last two things I've signed have taken 10 months. So at that point, you're already over a year.

Sam: And then to actually make the thing and release [00:18:45] it on top of that, generally speaking, year and a half. So, like the life cycle of making something is probably around two to three years, roughly six months prototyping, six months developing, and then probably like a year of just [00:19:00] making the content. Because it's something I think that people forget a lot isthat say, if you want to make, let's say a customization system. So, you know, you, you have your character and you can put some hats on them and some shoes on [00:19:15] them. For you to code that might take, you know, as a prototype a day or two to make it like bug free so everyone can interact with it exactly how it should be maybelike two months. But then for the artists to come in, depending on the size of the [00:19:30] team, they could be working on hats and shoes and scarves for two, three years. It just, it completely is how long's a piece of string. 

Matt: Yeah.

Sam: So then you could sort of take that out to anything. Like, so if you're making a car and say GTA, you've [00:19:45] programmed the physics of the car, the wheels, how it goes at front wheel drives, at rear wheel drive, you might be doing that for a year. But then, time in the office, modelers could be working on cars for 20 years.

Matt: Yeah. Does your team deliver all [00:20:00] aspects of the game, or are you commissioned to do a certain section of it? And if it's a certain section of it, who has the oversight of the project? Is it the publisher is moving the different parts into position, or do you, as the company, kind of [00:20:15] commission externals to work for you?

Sam: Where we have worked with publishers, and I, at this point, I've worked with six different publishers, I feel like I've been quite lucky because I've always had complete creative control. You obviously [00:20:30] listen to them because I work with them for a reason. When it comes to things like marketing, they know what they're doing.

Sam: So it is always a conversation. I've never butted heads too much with someone, but we've always had creative control. When it comes to our [00:20:45] studio, we design everything ourselves, code everything, and I would say do the majority of the artwork. But the things we freelance out to other companies would usually be audio, especially [00:21:00] in-game audio.

Sam: So we can sometimes cover music, but just like foley sounds. So like walking around or shooting a gun. We also outsource localization, so as we sell the game digitally, it's very easy to sell all around the world, but the [00:21:15] game has to be localized into different languages. And when it comes to sort of who has the final say on, I guess, who does the work, again, really, it's me and the publisher talking. Have you worked with someone before that was really good? How much does this stuff cost? And it's [00:21:30] just a conversation, really.

Matt: You mentioned [00:21:45] that you initially were a musician. Music kind of was your other passion alongside games. Do you find that those interests still inform some of the work that you do today with your game design and your company?

Sam: Yeah, a hundred percent. So, [00:22:00] currently the game that I'm working on, I'm doing all the music for, which I love to do.

Sam: And the last project I put out, which was a game called Trolley Problem, Inc. I did all the music for that as well. The reason I think really I've made the music for both those project is [00:22:15] when I've made the prototype. I've come up with something that resonates with people. I could definitely say if I had made the music but it didn't fit, I would happily cut it.

Sam: But with both those projects, I feel like it's really worked. With [00:22:30] another project I worked on called Mainlining, which came out probably around 10 years ago, we brought in a musician called Gerard Emerson Johnson, and he's phenomenal. And I really loved working with him. He was [00:22:45] actually the only person who I sort of said, mentally, I want to work with them, sort of in the whole games industry, and it was because he's done music for a game called Sam and Max, which is a point and click detective game, which I [00:23:00] loved growing up, but also, he made music for The Walking Dead, Jurassic Park, Batman, just so much and had always done a really, really good job of taking that IP, but making [00:23:15] his own music.

Sam: So that's exactly what I wanted when I was working with someone that they could take what I wanted, but make it better.

Matt: So how did that creative collaboration work? Like how do you manage that process with someone?

Sam: For a musician, I actually [00:23:30] find it really awkward, because even though I do a lot of music, my theory isn't there.

Sam: So I never know how to talk to them. 

Matt: Right, okay. 

Sam: Usually it's, here I've made a playlist at three minutes twenty on track three, there's a bit I really like. 

Matt: Yeah, yeah. 

Sam: Or like [00:23:45] me trying to do some kind of horrendous, like, beatboxing over like teams. 

Matt: Yeah.

Sam: But yeah, I do always find that actually really hard to talk to, just because my Vocabulary with music isn't really there.

Matt: But there's this initial process of sharing [00:24:00] reference material, whether that's visual, sonic, so that you start the dialogue, do you as the game's designer, and then they respond, and it's a kind of back and forward, is it like that?

Sam: Yeah, yeah, when we're outsourcing artwork, I find it so much easier, [00:24:15] because I can actually just prototype it, I can say, do this, or if they send me over a rough version, I can just edit it and then send it back. So that I do find a lot easier. I think music is harder because it's so emotive. [00:24:30] People may not even know what instrument it is. Especially when you start going digital. If you're putting like, let's say, effect on brass, I just, I, I don't know what it is, so I can't even go look it up and research it.

Matt: It's so interesting about the scale of a games design project and about, [00:24:45] I think one of the things that people listening might be interested to is this idea of how much creative collaboration there is in that. You have the creative vision, you have the overall kind of, say on things, but then also you've got personalities and skill sets that you [00:25:00] have to manage to get something completed. 

Sam: Well, that's why I like being independent. I think I would find it very hard to work at a big studio. So those big studios, the term's AAA. So even though that comes [00:25:15] from Access All Areas, it has absolutely no meaning there. It's just, they're called AAA studios and it really means those multi million dollar games.

Sam: So you're talking like Grand Theft Auto, FIFA, Call of Duty. I've just never had an [00:25:30] interest working on them, because they're great games, I play them, I love them. But it's being a small cog in a big machine. And I know a lot of people, especially artists, who love that, because they can just have their little area, which they can [00:25:45] control, even if it's like a handful of assets for the whole game, they can just have that and control it.

Sam: But I much prefer to look at the thing as a holistic overall picture and that's why our team is seven people because we have [00:26:00] talented people for the skill sets but we can keep it compact. And I don't want to grow the team because you start to bring in like producer roles and I think it feels reductive to say that they don't necessarily, [00:26:15] like, get their hands dirty because they do, it's just, I prefer to work in a tight knit group. And not have to worry about sort of team X, Y, and Z. And then [00:26:30] things getting filtered through and you're playing this game of telephone of, oh, well, they said this, and they said this. I find working on a small team lets you be really nimble.

Matt: Yeah. I wanted to segue if we can into teaching, because I wondered if any of those [00:26:45] skills that you developed there have informed how you run your company or communicate with people. So, you did some teaching for a while, didn't you?

Sam: Yeah, so I had a game which I'm happy to talk about but I had a game which I couldn't get signed and I think it's quite important for [00:27:00] people to mention about those failures because I find whenever I go to talks or podcasts like this, they're always really informative but you're hearing from the people who say success.

Matt: Yeah, yeah. 

Sam: Yeah, so I I had released my first game called Dream. [00:27:15] I had released my second game called Mainlining, which was a hacking simulator. And then I was a producer on my third game, which I did not create or design. It was very much just I was, [I] came in to help out. [00:27:30] A game called Gang Beasts, which was really, really successful.

Sam: And I think from having run those two projects, and then worked and helped on a project which was so successful, I felt like I knew what I was doing. And I think in there there was a bit of an ego [00:27:45] and I thought okay well I'm just gonna now grow the team and make this third game which is gonna be excellent and we're gonna sign it and it's gonna be like multi million and this is how I grow my studio and grow just everything in general. And we worked [00:28:00] on it for a year and if you think about there's only three of us working on it but if you think of three people's salaries for a year it's a lot of money and when we couldn't get it signed I was gutted, I was absolutely devastated, mainly because when I said earlier about how [00:28:15] going to events like Eurogamer Expo and GDC, they like felt very validating, so now I'm in industry having a project fail suddenly was, now I'm not in industry. This isn't true, but what was running through my head [00:28:30] was all the uni, all this like late nights working on these projects. All of this has amounted to nothing because now I'm not in industry. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Sam: So then I had a mortgage. So very lucky timing wise, there was a job going at Suffolk new [00:28:45] college to be a games lecturer, got the job and then going in, I absolutely loved it. And the main reason I loved it so much was because everyone genuinely wanted to be there. So it wasn't behavioural issues or anything like that. The students wanted to listen and wanted to [00:29:00] play games. But then also these timelines that we're talking about of a game taking two to three years to make.

Sam: In a classroom, you've got 40 games going on, and they last about six weeks, and then you go on to the next 40 games. So just from a creative point of view as well, it was amazing.

Matt: I [00:29:15] mean, one of the things I love about visiting colleges and games design areas is the level of passion and embodiment from the students about gaming.

Matt: They love gaming. As much if not more as any other kind of creative student where the [00:29:30] artists, the art students love art. But I mean the game design students absolutely love it, don't they?

Sam: Yeah, and I think a lot of it is going back to how I got into games is it really feels like magic because you don't understand how it works until you're in the room learning how it works.  [00:29:45] As I'm not a traditional artist again I don't want this to sound reductive, but it's always a picture.

Sam: I've got a box of crayons. I can make a picture, um, that's obviously not how that works, but I feel like you can have an understanding but with [00:30:00] games I think people don't. And that's one thing when I was teaching was really fun is the Dunning Kruger effect. So when people start to learn something they learn like one thing and now they think they're amazing and [00:30:15] then when they start to learn more and more and more they realize how much they don't know.

Matt: Yeah.

Sam: And then there's this massive drop off and then they feel like they know nothing, even though they know more than they did last week.

Sam: Yeah, it's just that humbling moment. But again, that whole life cycle of learning [00:30:30] something is just really fun to watch.

Matt: So those students who are at college now might be listening to this. What skills should they be getting in their toolbox?

Sam: I think the main thing is that you should get people to play test your work. It's the same as if you're a musician, artist, [00:30:45] just showing people your work, sharing your work, getting feedback on it. You're always going to learn something whether someone says something and you realise that is the path you want to go down or someone says something and it just hammers home you don't want to do that for [00:31:00] whatever reason.

Matt: Yeah, yeah. We often say that it's as important to know what you don't like as it is to know what you do and helps you make those very conscious decisions about what direction you want to go in creatively. Do you have a particular software or set of softwares that [00:31:15] you kind of use a lot now in industry that they should experience?

Sam: Yeah, so a game engine is really the software used to make a game. So you're obviously, for artwork, you're going to be using things like Photoshop. For audio, there's a whole suite of things that you can use. I [00:31:30] personally use Reason, but I know a lot of people use different tools like Ableton and so on. But for games, the main game engines, nicely, are all free. 

Matt: Okay. 

Sam: There is usually some kind of clause that if [00:31:45] on a project you make one million dollars then you start to pay a share, but generally speaking, they're all free. So my engine of choice, especially for people starting out, is unreal engine.

Matt: Okay.

Sam: Which is used to make games like Fortnight, Gears of [00:32:00] war, the new Galo these big, big titles all completely free. The sort of the next one on the list would be unity, which I would say is more of a programmers engine. And then the third engine is called Godot, and Godot [00:32:15] is nice because it's completely open source which just means the community get behind actually building the engine as well.

Sam: And then there are more, so there's things like Game Maker and so on, but I feel like at the minute, Unreal, Unity, and Godot are the ones which have the most traction. [00:32:30] So a game engine is a piece of software that you actually build the game in. So, the easiest way to think of it is a 3D environment builder.

Sam: So, you actually build out the level that people are going to run around. But then also, as [00:32:45] part of that, is where all the code and where all the art all merges together. So obviously to build that world, you're going to need that 3D model of a door. And then you're going to need that code, which says when I press E on the door, it opens [00:33:00] and all of that is put into the game engine.

Sam: So, really it works as a space to bring all of your art, all of your audio, all of your code into one cohesive software.

Matt: And because you've been in the industry now for a fairly long [00:33:15] time, how has this sort of technology changed and evolved?

Sam: It's, it's absolutely mad. It's grown at such speed. Especially in the last, probably, [00:33:30] three years?

Sam: But yeah, if you look at the progression of, like, things like Space Invaders in the 80s, and then you're talking like Sonic and other 2D games in the 90s, going into 3D with [00:33:45] PlayStation and N64, online with Xbox. And now you're in this conversation of stuff looking realistic. Realistic enough that films like Avatar use Unreal Engine, which we're talking [00:34:00] about.

Matt: Yeah.

Sam: The Lion King, those newer Lion Kings use Unreal Engine, what we're talking about, but then also the technology of just online, like connecting people. So our new game has Twitch integration. So Twitch is a [00:34:15] streaming website where people can play games and stream out to their audience. Well, we build an integration so the audience can affect the game.

Sam: So now you could have thousands of people watching your stream and they're now all connected, in air quotes playing together. They're all interacting together [00:34:30] and they're just things that you wouldn't think possible at 20 years ago. And now with the verge of AI coming into everything as well it again, it just explodes again of what tools can AI make that empower us to create [00:34:45] things and by that I don't mean generative AI. I don't mean I'm gonna type a sentence and it's gonna make me a picture. I mean things like in Enter the Spider Verse, the Spider Man movie, I would have an [00:35:00] estimate of probably around 70 to 80 percent of the expression work in that is done with machine learning. And that's a tool where it's a tool created by an artist to create artwork sort of in its own place.

Matt: Yeah. [00:35:15] So it's unique, it's bespoke to that thing, it happens in real time sort of, or at a rapid speed I imagine.

Sam: Yeah, and the idea of just having machine learning so we can build tools and then those tools can help us build artwork I just think it's [00:35:30] gonna set everything off like a rocket.

Matt: Yeah, I remember when the, I think it was a recent Tomb Raider, they were saying about Unreal Engine it could create infinite landscapes and it was something about like the texture of rocks just hadn’t existed before. 

Sam: Yeah, so a [00:35:45] lot of what we do in games, maybe the last decade or so, is procedural generation.

Sam: And what procedural generation does is really, you give the game engine a rule set, and it will go away and make the thing. So that's how you get, say, randomly generated dungeons. [00:36:00] 

Matt: Yeah. 

Sam: So you can play the game for an infinite amount of time because it's just generating new content. Obviously that's built on rules.

Sam: That's effectively what Unreal Engine now does, but with photo realistic jungles and caves. [00:36:15] So yeah, the idea that you can just generate all of this stuff, even if it's not doing it for the user, say as me, a creator is generating it all. It lets you populate this massive, massive landscape. Which is cool because [00:36:30] we can make it all really, really quickly.

Sam: And then it's like, that's our draft. So then I can go in and I can customize everything until my heart's content, but it just gives you a base.

Matt: Yeah. And so with all this kind of new technology and all these new advancements, how has that changed or affected [00:36:45] your, your interest as a gamer?

Sam: I think just because of life, I prefer very short games. If a game is over four hours, I'm probably not going to play it. So Red Dead Redemption II is probably [00:37:00] technically, one of the most impressive games ever made, artistically, narratively, just everything, like it caps out every spectrum of quality. But to finish the game is around 90 hours. And to do all the side stuff and just see everything, we're [00:37:15] literally talking hundreds of hours.

Sam: And I've watched my wife play it. And it looks amazing, but I just don't have 90 hours to ride a horse around a desert.[00:37:30]

Matt: Games exist in so many different spaces now, don't they? What is the landscape of the [00:37:45] gaming industry?

Sam: So, when digital started to become a big thing, maybe 15 years ago, you got this clear divide, so you had indie games, which were usually done by one person teams, maybe up to like five or six, but they're [00:38:00] very, very small, very cheap, but also really innovative because there wasn't that risk factor because they were cheap and quick to make. So then you had this boom of creativity. And then you have AAA [00:38:15] games, which are games which cost hundreds of millions. With GTA VI,  I've forgotten what the cost of that game is now, but it's the most expensive, probably, piece of media ever made, like, dwarfing [00:38:30] any film.

Sam: Like, we're talking hundreds of millions. So I feel like those are either end of the spectrum. When it comes to what sits in the middle, you have a category called AA. Literally doesn't stand for anything. It's just the term used and you're [00:38:45] probably talking teams of maybe like 20 to 60 people making something which looks highly polished.

Sam: Generally speaking I'd say it's probably quite safe and it's just we know we're going to do the units we need to on these consoles. And then [00:39:00]  I think you start to enter into like cookie cutter land. So, it's creatively - I sort of stay away from that stuff. And then maybe actually even smaller than what you would consider like an indie game on say PC and console.

Sam: You would get like these micro [00:39:15] games where arguably it's just an experiment. And they might be anywhere from like a pound to like five pounds, maybe three. But that's where again you see like this real creativity with no focus on [00:39:30] market or expectation. 

Matt: So where do you go to play that type of game?

Sam: So itch.io is the website where you can check out a load of that stuff. There, on there are thousands of free games. That's also the best [00:39:45] place to interact with Game Jams. So if you wanted to actually start making games and just wanted to fiddle about and have a community to talk to, itch.io is great. You will also see some of that stuff on Steam, which is the, the big platform on PC.

Matt: And what, what role do sort of [00:40:00] app games, that sort of that world of things, play in?

Sam: To be honest, I don't know anything about the phone industry and like tablets and apps. It really seems to just be like a world of its own. 

Matt: Interesting.

Sam: And that stuff [00:40:15] is starting to cross over now because of streaming. So with Microsoft, Amazon, Netflix, all basically having their games to stream, that means that you can play these massive blockbusters on a phone, because it's not running on your [00:40:30] phone, it's just running through the internet. And now, I think that's going to make a really interesting overlap.

Matt: The difference between an app game and a PC game or whatever can be as big as sort of theatre versus cinema. It's like they're, they're effectively two different genres, really, even though they fall [00:40:45] under, the same umbrella of, like, theatre and cinema's performance these are, but they’re distinct beasts in their own right.

Sam: Yeah, and I feel a lot of that is because of the input method. So if I'm playing on a console, I'm using a controller. If I'm playing on a PC, I can use a [00:41:00] controller, but you're probably using a mouse and keyboards. And then that is completely different to if you're on a phone.

Sam: One, you're probably holding it vertically, so the screen's different. But then also you're doing a touchscreen, which just obviously offers up a lot of interesting stuff. [00:41:15] But is just very different. 

Matt: So if we fast forward to modern day, what does a working day look like for you at the moment?

Sam: So our studio is all remote, so everyone works from home. I [00:41:30] start really early. I feel like a lot of people in tech broadly always say they get all their work done at night. And I always think that's ridiculous because I'm tired at night. So I usually wake up probably around 5am and then really just roll out of bed and go straight onto my [00:41:45] PC. It's in a different room, but I pretty much start work straight away.

Sam: And the reason I do that is because my head isn't cluttered at that point. If I start looking at social media, watch a video on YouTube, then I sort of go down this big rabbit hole. Even if it's just mentally. So I really [00:42:00] try to start the second I wake up. And then we have a team meeting at 10, which is great.

Sam: That's really where most people start their day, go through what we're doing in that day, like we just probably last around 20 minutes. We go around each person for two, three minutes. They outline what they're doing in the day. [00:42:15] And then depending on what it is, then that's the day's work. So it could be dependent on where we are in the project.

Sam: Cause if you're early on, obviously you're making all these ideas and it's all really energetic. If you're sat at that midpoint, it's okay. I'm working [00:42:30] for a list of stuff. And then more towards the end, it's like, Oh no, I've still got that list of stuff. 

Matt: Some snags to do, yeah. 

Sam: Yeah, but it is nice because every day you do have different problems. I think that's the thing that I really like about game [00:42:45] design. I'm sure you get it in a lot of industries. Everything is creative problem solving. So every day, different problem. What’s our creative solution, because every game is going to have a different solution. And then I think probably my favourite part of the day, [00:43:00] this probably happens once a week actually, but I walk my dog twice a day, and I find it's a really good way to get away from the computer, but then when you're just walking around fields for say 45 minutes.

Matt: Oh yeah, it's the best, it's the most creative. [00:43:15] 

Sam: Yeah, you just have so many ideas come to you, and that's the reason I like working independently so much and having this sort of creative control, because then I can go back and maybe have a meeting with two people for 15 minutes and just say, oh, I've had this idea, let's just prototype and test [00:43:30] it, and either it'll be amazing, or we'll just drop it, and it'll just forget I mentioned it.  Where you just couldn't do that in a studio of thousands of people, because you'd have to go through so many layers of, oh, well, you need to talk to them, and then this, this, and this.

Sam: [00:43:45] So yeah, so my day really is talking to the team in the morning and then making stuff all day. And I love it.

Matt: And you built in, quite carefully it sounds like, that autonomy to be creative by not going down that road of [00:44:00] big organisation. You can have, do a lot of this creative problem solving and kind of work in a, in an iterative creative process in more of a traditional way.

Sam: One thing I always find interesting is as a business, I am part of a lot of schemes, whether they're run [00:44:15] by the BFI or creative UK and sort of these different organisations. And they're always about starting a business and building a business. But then the further you get into it, it's always about growth.

Sam: And people always talk about exit [00:44:30] strategies and how you're going to build this thing up to sell it on. And I very specifically named my company after me because I don't want to build a company. I just want to be the equivalent of someone who goes to their shed and does pottery. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Sam: Or like painter.[00:44:45] So for me, it really is just, I want to do my thing. That needs to be sustainable. So trying to work these things in so I can, like, just really just make stuff and just have fun and be [00:45:00] free. But working in that sustainability because obviously at the end of the day I do need to live. 

Matt: Yeah, so you sustain life to a comfortable level doing something in a way that you enjoy.  I know you probably aren't allowed to tell us too much but can you tell us a little bit about what you're working [00:45:15] on now as a company?

Sam: Yeah, so at the minute we're working on a multiplayer party game, which is really fun because when we play test it we just still get to play a game together. We're hoping to announce it soon.

Sam: But that multiplayer aspect [00:45:30] is really fun to test. What I will say actually is if anyone's looking into getting into games and starting off, make a single player game. I would say I've heard this a lot of times, making something multiplayer [00:45:45] probably, um, doubles the development time. I would say from this experience, it probably quadruples the development time.

Sam: It is unbelievably hard even now to make a game online. And I'm sure a lot of [00:46:00] people listening to this have sort of think, oh no, I followed that tutorial. Oh, I know I got that up from running in like two hours. Great. So did we. It's going to take you two, three times the amount of time it would to make a single player game.

Matt: Just [00:46:15] wondered if you could give us a sort of two or three of your all time favourite games and a little bit of why they're so brilliant.

Sam: So yeah, so without thinking into it too much, Portal. Portal is a puzzle [00:46:30] game made by Valve. I don't know the year it was out, probably talking like 20 years ago. I love Portal.

Sam: It's just so innovative in so many ways that I could talk about it for hours, but yeah, first person, if people are into puzzle games, [00:46:45] definitely check out Portal. Portal 2 is arguably bigger and better, but it feels like a full thing. It's probably like about 10 hours, where Portal 1 is just a really nice hour sit play through the whole thing.

Sam: I love it. A game [00:47:00] I've played most recently is called Fear the Spotlight, and it's a horror game. But it's made in the style of a PS1 game, so it feels retro but it is 3D. But the thing I like most about Fear the Spotlight is it's really [00:47:15] accessible. I find horror in games usually way too much. Because I love horror film, but when you're interacting with it, my heart can't take it.

Sam: But Fear the Spotlight has a really, really nice balance so it's [00:47:30] really welcoming and inviting and it never gets too much. I'm just trying to think of some more but to be honest, since making games I don't play tons. And it's one of those things where I don't know if other people feel like this because I've never really talked to people [00:47:45] about it but I find when I play stuff, I see what they're doing, it really excites me. And then I just want to get back on with making stuff. One last smaller game which I would like to sort of give a shout out to, it's not tiny but it's [00:48:00] smaller, is a game called Strange Horticulture. And I think it is more the type of games that I enjoy, ‘cause it’s just offbeat. So in Strange Horticulture, you play as a florist in a fictional world, where people [00:48:15] come to you with ailments, and you look through all your books and cross reference and see which plant they need. But because it's in a fictional world it could be something which makes the room [00:48:30] quieter and they might be using it to like stealth around. And then that ties into like witches so like there's a coven and you have like this map you fold out. But the whole game takes place on a desk. So again, it's just something that I don't feel like a mainstream [00:48:45] audience would have seen before but it's that kind of stuff that I really love.

Matt: Well, it's incredible, isn't it about how quite complex idea, but it's a simple interactive access point can lead to so much sort of adventure and I think that that is the best name [00:49:00] and the weirdest concept for a game that we've touched on today. So that seems like an ideal moment to move on to our creative provocation section. So we try to extract a provocation, which is something that our listeners can [00:49:15] do or think about or a call to action.

Matt: So do you have anything to you’d like them to do?

Sam: So for me, it would probably be to download Unreal Engine. And that might be [00:49:30] dependent on your PC. It's not like it's going to need the beefiest machine, but I would recommend Unreal Engine because it has a visual scripting language in it, which really means that instead of typing out code, you can do everything [00:49:45] visually.

Sam: And you can like pin nodes into other nodes and it's just all very clear. But you can do everything that you can do in code. So by no means is it like sort of baby time It's really technical but easy to get into. [00:50:00] Other engines as I said earlier, are excellent but if you wanted one start off with I would highly recommend the unreal engine. And then with that if you want to start building games, I would probably just go to things like YouTube and find some [00:50:15] tutorials, really just put in the work hours and just test stuff out.

Sam: Once you feel a bit more confident, things like game jams on itch.io, there's always probably about 20 to 30 game jams going on. I would start there. And if [00:50:30] for whatever reason, you don't have the time or the equipment to do those things, then I think making board games is something that is completely valid.

Sam: And I think a lot of, especially younger people write it off as, oh, it's not a video game, I want to make video [00:50:45] games. But there's so much knowledge to be had there,  not only from designing rule sets. But also thinking about what information does the player need to know? So in your rulebook or on your cards or whatever it is, what do you actually need to [00:51:00] put down to give them information?

Sam: And then also getting people to play it, just ripping that band aid off and getting some feedback. As a final thing, what I would recommend, a lot of people start off making the game they've always wanted to make. [00:51:15] And I think it's the worst thing you can do. 

Matt: Right, yeah, it's too much invested in it already.

Sam: Yeah, and you probably, there's so much over scope built in there because you haven't planned it to build it. You planned it because you think it's a cool idea. And [00:51:30] there's a game that I've always wanted to make. I don't have a story or anything like that, but I grew up on games like Mario 64, Crash Bandicoot.

Sam: These things where it was third person,  so the camera would be behind you and you'd run around and collect coins or jump around, break [00:51:45] boxes, whatever. I really want to make something in that style, but I don't think I'm ready yet. I probably will be soon. And then if everything aligns, I might make that, but I definitely wasn't ready 15 years ago when I started.

Matt: Right. [00:52:00] Saving that one. I mean, that's amazing. Thank you very much, Sam. You've been a wonderful guest.

Sam: Thanks for having me.

Matt: Thank you for listening to this [00:52:15] episode of Teach, Inspire, Create. Massive thank you to Sam! Really grateful to him for telling us all about his knowledge and experience. If you want to know more about Sam and his work, you can visit his website, readgraves.com and if you'd like to play some of [00:52:30] his games, they can be found on the Steam platform.

Matt: You can find links to these in our episode description. And if you're loving the podcast, please subscribe and share with a friend. And please rate us and review us wherever you get your podcasts. [00:52:45] It's so helpful to us to understand what you think of the show. Thanks again for listening and until next time, take care.