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You know what makes a lot of money? Music games. Even in 2009, a year in which music games saw a 46% drop in sales from 2008, DJ Hero became the highest-grossing new IP across all genres. It’s a game that was being called a failure in the weeks after its release, and some today even suggest that its sales have been modest. Yet for the companies that make music games, the cash continues to roll in.

The obvious question is “Where do music games go from here?”

To get an answer, I went to an expert on the subject: NYU professor Samuel Howard-Spink, who is heading up an initiative called the NYU Music Video Games Research Project. We had the opportunity to chat about nearly everything about music games, including the future of peripheral-based games, titles like Rez and PaRappa the Rapper, and a Guitar Hero/Rock Band battle to the death. 

So, what is the NYU Music Video Games Research Project? “The NYU-MVGRP,” Howard-Spink says, “was started as a way of getting the word out around the university and further afield that the convergence of music and gaming deserves closer attention. I began working in NYU’s Music Business Program in 2007, and came in excited about the opportunities gaming and mobile apps offer music creators and publishers. There are a handful of gaming related initiatives around NYU dealing with interactive design and esthetics, or gaming and learning, but nothing dedicated to the convergence of musical and gaming cultures and businesses.”

“Once I started, it I began to get attention from a variety of places, mainly professors whose students are asking for more classes dealing with these emerging opportunities. In the past semester a group of undergrads has formed the NYU Game Audio and Music Association (NGAMA) and they are now driving student activities. My own department, Music and Performance Arts Professions in the Steinhardt School, is developing game-related courses in its music business, music technology, and film composition programs. It’s very early days but my great hope is for our graduates to be leaders the field.”

I’m sure you’re all thinking about clicking that “new tab” button and sending in an application to NYU, but stick with me here. I asked Professor Howard-Spink what, exactly, these groups hope to find, both in terms of the oft-discussed monetary side, and also in terms of the cultural importance of these plastic-instrument games.

“It is rapidly becoming the case that there aren’t really pure music “consumers” anymore, in the way that we were at some point all consumers of pieces of plastic embedded with a recording, or as radio listeners where we consumed music in exchange for our attention to be sold to advertisers. People who value music in 2010 are “users” much more than they are consumers. In fact a recent survey shows that American kids spend 7.5 hours a day multitasking with media, most of which integrates music of some kind.”

“So I don’t see games as having the power to completely change music purchasing, rather they will expand economic opportunities for music creators and fans in ways we’re just beginning to understand. Games are already expanding the variety of music people are exposed to and are therefore likely to want to purchase and own, as well as the places and circumstances under which this mutual reinforcement takes place.”

When a JRPG leads me to purchase hours upon hours of Romantic piano, it’s hard to argue with Professor Howard-Spink on this point. Indeed, I know that I have personally expanded the types of music that I listen to based solely on games that have music in them: not only music games. But if consumers are being introduced to so much new music, why are CD sales still down?

“On the supply side, games and interactive media in general are definitely increasing the opportunities for music creators to make their livings licensing works to developers. Everyone knows CD sales are down from their historic peak around 2000, but what is often forgotten is that music publishing revenues and distributions to composers and songwriters are up everywhere because of all the new ways music is used and paid for in new media. Music is more important and enjoyed by more people than ever before, but the CD is not, and they’re not the same thing. The recording business will always stick around, it will just be less dominant vis-à-vis other music economies.”

I also wanted to know about this idea of the cultural importance of music games. Just how closely tied are games and culture, and how does music fit into all of this?

“Videogames and music have always had a close relationship, in much the same way cinema and music have. In both of these entertainment forms the visual elements tend to overwhelm the musical, but as a game like Guitar Hero shows, this is not always a given. Original scores and compositions for major games are decent sellers in their own right, and performances such as Video Games Live are driving teenage boys to sell out orchestral concerts. Games that base their play mechanics on music per se are more rare, but anyone who has played PaRappa the Rapper or Rez understands the attraction. I think Chime is a beautiful example of this, and at the same time it’s pioneering socially conscious gaming.”

“As for licensed soundtracks, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City broke the mold on integrating popular music into the gaming experience, along with the big sports and x-games sims. The “rhythm-action” genre represented by Guitar Hero and Rock Band has been as culturally significant as they have been commercial successes: Guitar Hero 3 was the first game to generate $1b in sales revenues, and in my humble opinion the genre itself has helped to save rock’n’roll from being fully Nickelbacked or Maroon 5-ed into a coma. The games have certainly increased the number of young people interested in pursuing musical activities in many ways; just ask any guitar instructor or owner of a musical instrument store. And when South Park bases an entire episode on Guitar Hero, it’s clear we are dealing with a genuine pop culture phenomenon.

When it comes to the cultural significance of music games, I was also interested in getting an educator’s opinion on the use of music games in education, both in terms of getting students interested in learning an instrument, and the possibility that music games can lead to a deeper understanding and appreciation of music history.

“While there are now many studies showing links between gaming and learning — for kids and adults — to date there have not been many rigorous examinations of their relationship to music education, although there is plenty of anecdotal evidence of their mutual reinforcement. Remember that musical training isn’t solely about scales and correct finger placement; rhythm, song structure, key changes, lyrics, genre styles, etc. are all elements of a musical education, and playing along with songs on Rock Band absolutely aids in the development of the awareness of these elements.”

“Of course, this just happens to be what we have at our disposal today. If you look at the YouRock Guitar, which has strings and is also designed for play with Guitar Hero and Rock Band, you can see the outline of a possible future for music gaming that places greater emphasis on musicianship.”

There was plenty to ask about DJ Hero, as well. Now that we’ve passed over into 2010, it’s hard to get a straight answer about just how well the game did. Activision says that it was the highest-grossing new IP in 2010, yet others suggest that it didn’t sell very well. So, what’s the deal?

“DJ Hero is a fascinating case study, and a genuinely innovative game. It was framed as a “failure” when it didn’t meet Guitar Hero-level sales in its first couple of months on the market, which just goes to show how narrowly success is defined by industry “analysts.” Consider this: in January Activision put out a press release saying that DJ Hero was “the highest grossing new IP (intellectual property) in 2009 in the US and Europe.” The release didn’t provide a hard number, so there are a couple of ways to look at this. Either DJ Hero has been much more successful than was suggested by its early sales figures, or so little new IP is produced these days (compared to the recycling of pre-existing IPs) that a relative low-seller like DJ Hero can claim that title.”

“Other factors to consider are that every kid in every part of America knows how to swing a guitar around rock-star style, but DJ-ing and turntablism are strictly speaking urban forms that have less universal appeal. Plus of course the game was released into a truly awful economic and consumer spending environment with a high price tag. I’m encouraged that Activision has already announced DJ Hero 2 for this year.”

I think we can all agree, at the very least, the DJ Hero is a breath of fresh air in a sector of the industry that is, at this point, largely doing the same thing over and over again. One could argue that consumers agree, as sales of The Beatles: Rock Band weren’t particularly amazing. Professor Howard-Spink had some thoughts about the potential stagnancy of music games.

“The genre has lost its early “wow” factor, but I see many reasons to be optimistic. The fact that $60 GH expansion packs are not selling as well as the original titles does not mean the music game is dead, it means the players of these games are making more careful decisions about what they buy.”

“And they are buying, especially DLC tracks, packs and albums, some 60m to Rock Band alone according to Harmonix. They don’t all need brand new plastic instruments to play now, so of course overall revenues from the games are going to be down. I think there may be some legs in band-specific releases depending on the acts. For example, if Jimmy Page ever comes around on this issue, I’m pretty sure a Led Zepellin Guitar Hero would blow away The Beatles: Rock Band in terms of sales.”

“The true innovation in the music game space is Harmonix’s Rock Band Network. In fact, Rock Band in general has pursued a much more sustainable “platform” model than Activision’s major releases every few months. Activision has acknowledged that it saturated the market in 2009 with six separate GH-branded releases, and in 2010 is restricting itself to Guitar Hero 6 and DJ Hero 2. Writing off music games at this point is not dissimilar to the “set-‘em-up and knock-‘em-down” mentality characteristic of the pop music world.”

Ah, yes, Rock Band Network. Professional song-creation tools for bands and artists, a new way to distribute for smaller acts, and the potential for limitless expansion of the Rock Band platform. As a concept, it sounds amazing. But will it work?

“The democratization of access to Rock Band’s distribution platform is highly significant, much more so than the lower sales of new Guitar Hero full-game releases. I’m not convinced that Rock Band Network will be a raging success out of the gate, but over time I expect it to become a very important sales and promotion outlet for indie musicians and bands.”

“At Midem in January, a Harmonix exec told label heads that it was a “no-brainer” to release a DLC version of any new album they’re putting out to capture that group of eager fans. Networked information economic models undermine the rationale for all-or-nothing hit-seeking and million-sellers, and expand opportunities for new entrants. This is a huge opportunity for indie labels and acts and will live or die according to their enthusiasm, whereas the major labels (with the notable exception of Warner Music Group) prefer the hit-based Activision model and hence we get Guitar Hero: Green Day.”

“It’s good for every stakeholder in this field that there is some healthy competition between the two formats that goes beyond dueling tracklists.”

Personally, my main concern with the growth of peripheral-based rhythm games is that we’ll begin to see fewer and fewer non-peripheral music games, such as Amplitude, PaRappa the Rapper, and even games like Audiosurf. Even the PSP release Rock Band: Unplugged arrived to little fanfare. Is there still room for such games in an industry so focused on high-profile, peripheral-based releases?

“Certainly,” Professor Howard-Spink says in response to this question. “With the ways that gaming is growing, especially in mobile applications, I’m pretty sure that we’ve only scratched the surface in terms of the ways that music and games are going to hybridize. Word is that it’s the gaming and music businesses [that are] most bullish on the iPad.”

“Besides, innovation without the addition of new peripherals within existing games is still possible. You can see this is the ways that Harmonix and Activision have added new functionalities to their existing hardware, for example the inclusion of extra notes during a long sustain, or the open E string on the bass. The Beatles game took one controller and managed to turn it into three-part harmonies – that’s an amazing innovation that doesn’t hugely expand the number or type of peripherals needed.”

Then there’s a whole separate sector of music that deserves attention: the fantastic compositions featured in games, both modern and retro. How many readers of this site, for instance, have game music loaded onto their iPods? How many videogame composers appear in the top ten of our Last.fm pages? Professor Howard-Spink discussed this with me as well.

“As a researcher and teacher in this area, I find it useful to break down music and gaming into four (sometimes overlapping) categories: the original soundtrack, the licensed soundtrack, rhythm-action, and emergent or generative (in which the actions of the player determine the music generated, as in Rez, Lumines or Chime). As far as orchestral OSTs go my recent favorites have included Dead Space, Batman: Arkham Asylum, Assassin’s Creed 2 and BioShock, which has what I consider to be the best sound design and musical integration of any game in the past five years.”

“Licensed soundtracks I’ve enjoyed include GTA4 – 18 radio stations and 200 hours of material is simply amazing – and the Rockabilly tracks from WET. BioShock 2’s licensed soundtrack does an amazing job of using songs from the 1930s and ‘40s to creep the hell out of me. And I bought a London Symphony Orchestra recording of Beethoven’s Ode To Joy after playing nothing but Peggle for two weeks straight last year.”

Then, just to throw some fuel on a fire that still rages, I had to ask: Rock Band or Guitar Hero?

“As a gamer, I prefer Guitar Hero because it’s geared more towards high-speed shredding and employs all the little reward mechanisms that keep a gamer coming back: incremental improvements in scores, note streaks and percentage breakdowns, for example. I prefer the hardware too, the smaller buttons allow for more speed than the fatter ones on Rock Band, plus I like the click in the strum bar. Rock Band is the better product from a musical and social gaming perspective.”

This seems to disagree with a lot of people recently, who have come to loathe both Activision and the Guitar Hero franchise, especially after the recent closure of Red Octane, the publisher of the original Guitar Hero.

“It’s a little too easy to frame Activision as the corporate baddie and Harmonix as the scrappy indie that could once you remember that it’s owned by Viacom. Last year I think I played Guitar Hero: Metallica more than any other game — I’d never even liked Metallica until I played it (Lars and Napster, long story), and the tracks from supporting acts are outstanding — and now I listen to and buy a lot more thrash and death metal than I did a couple of years ago.”

And will there be an eventual winner in this war?

“If I had to make a bet, I think that in the medium to long term the Rock Band platform will win out over Activision’s half-dozen disc releases a year.”

If all of this talk about games, music, and learnin’ has you interested, you can learn more about NYU’s games-related offerings at the NYU Game Center and the NYU Music Video Games Research Project blog.

_{As social games become more and more accepted, and the base continues to grow and grow, I decided it was time to start asking some Facebook developers about the platform. This is the first article in a weeklong series that examines multiple angles: the division between social and hardcore, big publisher invasion, the necessity of notifications, and social games’ future.}

A studio or a publisher, much like a writer, needs to ask an important question when starting work on an empty slate: who is the intended audience?

Another chin-scratcher to consider is platform. Does this pedestal, console, or blog seem like a good place to deliver to the intended audience?

Publishers are eager to jump into the Facebook pool, which might or might not have its fair share of turds floating around. But one thing is certain: its water is green with cash and it’s filled with users.

Earlier last year Electronic Arts made big waves by acquiring Playfish, a dedicated Facebook developer, for 300 million dollars. It signaled that the publisher was serious about the platform and perhaps not so concerned with shovelware of the Dante’s Inferno social Web game variety.

In 2009 we also saw Ubisoft release its first Facebook game, a traditional social Web game called TickTock. Hallow like the “o” in boring, it didn’t dazzle. But it showed that the publisher was serious about the platform in some regard.

Earlier this week I discussed the divide between social Web games and “core” games like Heavy Rain. There’s another, much smaller gap present. It’s between developers who are familiar with the social games versus those who aren’t — EA vs. Zynga, Ubisoft vs. 3G Studios.

Here’s a fundamental question I had when thinking about this topic: is big publisher targeting of the platform a good thing?

“Absolutely,” Zynga’s FarmVille VP and GM Bill Mooney tells me, “the more traditional publishers enter the market of social gaming, the more the segment will grow. More companies and games, means more choices there will be to suit the varied tastes of consumers worldwide. 

“That said, we feel very good about companies already in the social games space — our talent, some of which comes from traditional games, compares favorably.”

Nintendo must feel the same way about their position with the Wii. The publisher’s games are perfectly suited for the platform. It’s odd to consider that Nintendo competes against third-party studios on its platform, but it does. And it often wins.

“With a nascent market sector, participation of the industry’s biggest companies is generally a good thing in terms of legitimizing the space and pushing its boundaries,” PopCap duo, John Vechey and Jon ‘JD’ David, two co-creators of Facebook App Bejeweled Blitz tell me via e-mail.

“Look at casual games; the arrival of Nintendo’s Wii and the efforts by EA and other big publishers increased awareness of the casual sector tremendously, without wiping out the smaller firms that make up the majority of the casual games market.

“But just as with the casual sector, large traditional publishers need to understand the space and conform their offerings accordingly, rather than trying to make the space conform to their offerings. So while you’ll probably never play Madden directly on Facebook the way you might play a head-to-head match on PC or console, a ‘general manager’-level mode or Madden-based fantasy league might do very well on social networks and in fact introduce a large new audience to what has traditionally been a very ‘core’ sports sim.”

An understanding of the audience and platform is as critical as developing a good game. Bigger, traditional publishers just breaking in to Facebook might not get it all down pat immediately. Growing pains.

 ”Like I said,” 3G Studio’s CEO Costa says to me, “the general public gets it so all you should have to do it dumb down your franchises a bit and you’re good to go, right? Wrong!”

“The catch is that the general public is used to not paying for entertainment. If you’re a product person and don’t understand service-based business models you’re sunk in this market. There are Web and Media companies that will eat your lunch because, again, the game is the easy part.”

“EA made an interesting move buying Playfish and I’m eager to see if the box-product and service-oriented cultures can be merged. Most publishers will just integrate Facebook feeds into their products and move on while companies like Zynga and Playdom that can monetize ‘free’ services will thrive. Wal-mart gets a lot of foot traffic and they spend millions analyzing it and driving shoppers through the store like cattle. If you’re a developer ready to jump in and you don’t understand traffic monetization, then ‘Here be monsters.’ “

It’s a give and take mentality, coupled with a deep knowledge of the platform and its audience that has allowed some companies to thrive via Facebook.

One could argue that its games are simple because of the tech. Turns out it’s the people who are keeping the tech in line.

“The social web is still in its infancy and will continue to develop and evolve over the next several years. Zynga is and always will be focused on developing fun, engaging games,” Zynga’s Mooney told me.”

“While Zynga games offer a very social experience already, social gaming needs to be more about real user interaction and communication inside the game. One of the challenges in FarmVille is in-game communication — but people talk about it at bars, in dorms, on Facebook, and everywhere else.  We will be implementing new features that encourage more in-game communication this year.

“Ultimately, the most exciting and challenging thing that social games are a new kind of game – we know that the social experience fundamentally changes how gamers behave and everyone is still figuring out what provides the best experience for our audience.”

“Developing for the general public is just a different beast altogether,” 3G’s Costa said in our e-mail interview. “It takes a Web 2.0 mentality and your whole dev-team has to be onboard. Mark Pinkus, the founder of Zynga has said it best: Plan to one hundred percent, execute to forty percent. Deploy, measure, adjust, repeat. Zynga analyzes metrics, adjusts their games and redeploys in hours, not years.”

But some developers haven’t hit a wall. In fact, the platform has provided an outlet to do something new and unique for PopCap.

“The one thing that’s historically been lacking from our games is multiplayer, and Facebook gives us a fantastic environment in which to add multiplayer elements — some social, some competitive, some a combination of both — to games that we believe people have always wanted to play with others but just haven’t been able to in the past,” the PopCap duo told me.

Facebook isn’t going anywhere, and more users are playing FarmVille right now than there are members of Twitter. We’re not eager to see the stumbles, but we are excited to see the results of the successes.

_{As social games become more and more accepted, and the base continues to grow and grow, I decided it was time to start asking some Facebook developers about the platform. This is the first article in a weeklong series that examines multiple angles: the division between social and hardcore, big publisher invasion, the necessity of notifications, and social games’ future.}

This week we’re taking a look at the Facebook platform. One of the three developers I spoke with was Zynga Games, creators of the wildly successful FarmVille.

FarmVille a sim in the style of Harvest Moon — minus the fat. You won’t find yourself giving eggs to the librarian in hopes of scoring a child or tickling Pixies for golden tools. No, FarmVille is a real-time game that has you planting crops and immediately selling them in order to get access to more profitable crops and cute decorations. It’s never-ending, addictive, and a huge source of revenue for Zynga.

This revenue is not produced solely by ads, but real money from players in exchange for items. These range from the mundane to game breaking — in the sense that they don’t follow the base rule set — and are used to simply get ahead and defeat foes’ Leaderboard scores.

Think iron-clad Hoplite with a birdshot-loaded shotgun staring down a throbbing mass of axe- and stick-armed Persians and you’ll get the idea of the advantage of some of these items. If you still don’t picture it, then read up on the $40 “Wither Ring,” a promotional item that stops crop rot — the penalty for not being mindful of what’s growing.

Regardless of its “pay to get ahead” free-to-play model, FarmVille has over tens of millions of players. It’s an important game for Zynga in terms of the money it brings in, but it has also proved to be something of a petri dish.

“FarmVille is very important,” Bill Mooney, VP and GM, FarmVille at Zynga told me via e-mail. “It is not only the most popular social game, it’s also the #1 app on Facebook with over 70 million people playing the game around the world every month. FarmVille has also been key in the discovery of great game mechanics that we are incorporating into existing and future games.”

But it’s a petri dish with imitators — clones. Zynga Games is aware, almost flattered by the amount of developers attempting to cash in on their formula. They use it as initiative to keep building.

“We see [imitations] as validation of our game and our desire to provide best of breed. We continually add new, fun elements and surprises to FarmVille so players keep coming back.” 

Players do keep coming back, in fact. The loose tally as of this morning is 81 million or so active monthly users. I asked Mooney if he and Zynga Games created the ideal Facebook game. He agreed to some extent, hailing its simple theme and mechanics as reasons it has performed so well.
 
“Clearly, FarmVille is the ideal game for Facebook based on the sheer number of players. Farming is familiar to everyone and brings out the nurturer in all of us, which is part of the reason FarmVille is so popular. 

“In addition, FarmVille is user-friendly and easy to play.  Through a lot of hard work and strategic gameplay, players earn virtual money and experience in order to upgrade their farms with advanced crops, better buildings and fun decorations. We constantly add new elements and surprises that our players love to keep them coming back.”

If the numbers keep scaling the way they have been recently, FarmVille will have over 100 million active users by this summer. But Zynga isn’t sitting on the behemoth, sipping cocktails on that private continent they could have purchased last week: it’s churning out new games, and as I’ve been alerted, using the likeable mechanics from FarmVille to shape and mold them somewhat in its image.

“Additionally, we have a lot of other games on Facebook, including hits like Mafia Wars, Café World, FishVille, Zynga Poker, PetVille, YoVille, etc. — and with each game, we release new levels, new offerings and new features to keep players engaged and content fresh. “

And fresh is the word. At some point, perhaps within the next century, FarmVille numbers will begin to dwindle. As to what Zynga might consider next, well, you’ll have to tune in a bit later.

_{As social games become more and more accepted, and the base continues to grow and grow, I decided it was time to start asking some Facebook developers about the platform. This is the first article in a weeklong series that examines multiple angles: the division between social and hardcore, big publisher invasion, the necessity of notifications, and social games’ future.} 

Like it or not, social Web games are shaping the industry, making it possible for older and younger folks to get involved in a pastime that is often described as difficult or convoluted by those not intimately familiar with it.

It’s all in the Apps. Embeddable, simple, intuitive little pieces of software that have the power of capturing the imagination of those turned off by complicated HUDs and dramatic, battle-worn vistas or sludgy caverns full of monsters.

A monster in its own right is Facebook, a real-time LiveJournal that allows its users to connect and share on the fly, much like how Twitter allows us to talk about what our farts smell like the instant we catch a foul scent in the air.

Facebook is the bleeding edge of the social Web game revolution — one that many “core” gamers aren’t fond of. Chalk it up to the alien feel of Apps and their relative simplicity in comparison to the software being distributed on the Xbox 360 or PlayStation3.

In other words, the cons are the exact opposite of what others have found themselves enjoying about social games.

There is a divide between the two realms. On one end, there’s the social Web game. On the other, there’s the hardcore game. They’re both entertaining, and the beautiful thing is that they both offer unique experiences. The essence of social games for Zynga Games, developer of FarmVille and Mafia Wars, has something to do with the fact that it isn’t confined to the “core” approach.

“Social games are extremely different from hardcore games — so it’s like comparing apples and oranges — they both offer players different experiences and entertainment values,” FarmVille VP and GM Bill Mooney told me via e-mail. 

“Facebook game graphics can’t compare to those made for traditional consoles like PlayStation or Xbox, but they will continue to evolve and become more social and engaging. That said, we see users who were never gamers getting ’sucked’ into core gamer experiences — it’s very cool to hear about a 50-year-old person who clans up in Mafia Wars or min-maxes their crop production in FarmVille.”

PopCap Games, makers of Plants vs. Zombies, share the same idea as Zynga Games — with an added twist that represents how just how the studio has tackled the platform with Bejeweled Blitz.

“The Bejeweled Blitz experience is quite different from a ‘hardcore’ game obviously — it’s intended to be consumed in much smaller sessions (five minutes here, ten minutes there, when your schedule allows) … and for the Facebook audience as a whole, this seems very appropriate,” a PopCap Games duo, John Vechey and Jon ‘JD’ David, told me over e-mail. 

“Social games are a different breed from core games, and it’s doubtful that they’ll ever reach the levels of sophistication of core games, for a wide variety of reasons.”

This divide, which separates the gen pop from the hardcore like a prison’s wrought-iron gates and plastic shields, wasn’t made by the “core” crowd. It’s as simple as these two types of games offering their users two different experiences.

But I’ve learned from playing games like Bejeweled Blitz that fun is fun. And fun is universal. Just ask a Mt. Dew-infused teen how he feels about Halo, and then bother a 50-something woman about her thoughts on FarmVille. Beyond the curses from both parties, you’ll hear the same thing: “I like this because it’s fun.” This is the same concept espoused by James Costa, CEO of 3G Studios.

His studio’s upcoming Facebook game, Brave Arms, is set to toe the line of Facebook App and traditional console software. It’s an FPS, and one that may surprise you.

“For years game companies have been convincing us that bigger is better,” Costa told me via e-mail. “It’s like the movie industry ten years ago: everything had to be a blockbuster. In reality, we watch blockbusters a few times a month, TV shows almost daily and YouTube videos several times a day.

“Most of us at 3G are ‘core’ gamers and ‘core’ gamers see ourselves as connoisseurs of ‘great’ games, but that elitist mentality is what’s causing AAA-studios to close down and indie developers to flourish.

” ‘Core’ games are a niche market and at 30-million bucks a pop, studios only get one shot to develop an audience. Is Mass Effect 2 fun? Absolutely! Does a game have to be Mass Effect 2 in order to be fun? No way. The general public gets it.”

As any fan knows it’s been quite a while since any game in the Front Mission franchise landed on English-speaking shores. So long, in fact that a few dedicated gamers went and did it themselves.

Now, the series is set for a return, albeit in a decidedly different form, as Front Mission Evolved is more of 3rd-person action game than a turn-based strategy title. Old fans and new players alike simply must know more about this latest, current-generation installment.

To that end we sent Square Enix a bunch of questions, and got a bunch of answers. Read on for Destructoid’s exclusive Front Mission Evolved Q&A with Square Enix producer Shinji Hashimoto. You can also check the gallery for some hot new screens they sent just for you!

Destructoid: Front Mission Evolved is certainly a departure from the previous games, which were turn-based titles. What was the creative drive behind the change of style?

Shinji Hashimoto: The genre for previous numbered Front Mission titles that we’ve released was turn-based strategy games.  There were several spin-off titles, which were real-time simulations and side-scrollers, but I believe users have developed a strong recognition that Front Mission is a turn-based strategy game.

We feel that there are a lot of opportunities with the change of style because controlling the Wanzers seemed to have great compatibility with the shooter genre, making it a natural choice for this title.

Among its fans, the Front Mission series is known for having a very dense, involved backstory. Where does Front Mission Evolved stand in that canon? Will the game’s story be making any references to previous (or future) events?

This title is set farther in the future than any other game in the series. In 2171 AD, the human race, seeking supremacy on Earth, began to reach for the stars, racing to build orbital elevators.
Although it shares a common plot with the series, the story is not directly related to the previous renditions.  Anyone playing this series for the first time will be able to enjoy it.

The game apparently offers on-foot action alongside the Wanzer-piloting. Just how much can the player do when he’s outside his Wanzer? Will he be able to get in and out of it at will? Can he hijack other Wanzers?

During the single player mode, there are several missions in which the player character will exit the Wanzer to explore surrounding buildings and areas. Due to the map design and story, however, the player cannot get in and out of the Wanzer nor hijack other Wanzers at will. The third-person action as the pilot is exciting for any shooter fan, though.

One of the conflicts that came out of the original design concept was balancing the flow of the game and difficulty. It is difficult to keep consistency in the story when you can leave your Wanzer at a moment’s notice, while at the same time possibly creating impossible situations if, say, you were to lose your Wanzer in a boss fight because you decided to jump out. Additionally, retaining the graphical scale of both “worlds” – on-foot action and battles with huge mechs – would have been very difficult. We decided on a design that allowed both game types to be optimized graphically without sacrificing the fidelity of the game’s next-gen aesthetic.

Will there be a strategic or tactical element in Front Mission Evolved’s gameplay? Will the player be able to control a squad or be part of a larger operation?

The players will be able to enjoy tactical battles in the online multiplayer mode, where players can customize the allocation of roles such as snipers, assaults, and medics in each team. We’ll be sharing more information on multiplayer in the future.

Front Mission games have traditionally featured a fair amount of customization, with players able to choose from a variety of weapons and body parts to use in combat. Will Front Mission Evolved also have this sort of feature?

Yes, there’s an incredible amount of customization elements you can look forward to!  The title offers a variety of stages, as well as vast choices to customize your Wanzers for the online PtoP mode to fully express your unique designs.  I’m excited to see all of your Wanzers!

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That concludes our exclusive Q&A with Square Enix’s Shinji Hashimoto. We would like to thank him for his time. I for one am quite excited, and can’t wait until new gamers get to know just what a “Pile Bunker” is when related to robot weaponry. 

Front Mission Evolved is in development for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and is due for a Spring 2010 release.

Can’t get Mass Effect 2 out of your head? I can’t either. I have questions, all of which tickle me, compel me to prod. But they aren’t about what happened in the game. Instead, I wonder about its characters, its genre and possible DLC.

With tons and tons of swirling thoughts, I approached EA about doing an interview. I didn’t ask many connected questions. That wasn’t the point — I wanted to learn more about what was in my head at that second, those hungry beasties filling my skull.

Wish granted, the game’s project director Casey Hudson unwittingly satisfied my desire to just know more in the moment — to know more about those curious flashes when Shepard talks to Thane, how BioWare defines Mass Effect 2, and the exclusion of a same sex relationship. Spoilers abound.

In brief: Mass Effect 2 is an excellent, brutal game. The cinematics, oh-so-sweet, draw you in to an unmistakably fantastic sci-fi universe where all, oddly, doesn’t seem possible. Threat of invasion, a galactic collapse, hangs thick in the air. But here you are, as Commander Shepard, fighting against what seems to be inevitable defeat.

You will create meaningful relationships. You may then watch that person die. You will make decisions that don’t straddle strict moral lines. You will decide how Mass Effect 3 plays out.

A departure, Mass Effect 2 features stop-and-pop above all else. You’ll slide from cement column to bullet-chewed barrier, ducking laser fire, escaping death by, of all things, placing your back away from its red hot menace. The mechanics are tighter, much more focused on what the great third-person shooters like Gears of War have been refining, tuning, and evolving. You have less biotic attacks, less need to order squad mates, and a unique-feeling weapon you’ve become comfortable with.

It’s an action game. Or is it still an RPG? You’ll still be traveling the galaxy at will, collecting EXP, interacting with others, molding an experience for your own Shepard.

“There’s been a lot of discussion about what genre of game Mass Effect 2 is, what it was meant to be, and whether it satisfies expectations of different genres,” Hudson told me via e-mail. “To be honest, we don’t really design our games from the standpoint of what’s expected of a given genre.

“Our only goal is to create the very best games we can make, by learning from what we’ve done and evolving our approach. At BioWare we think of a great RPG (or in fact any game) not as a list of traditional features, but as design pillars that allow us to redefine our concept of an ideal game.

“These pillars are things like intense combat, the freedom of exploration, rich non-linear storytelling, and compelling character development and customization. Our most recent games, Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect 2, show how this flexible approach can capture very different experiences that each work on their own merits.”

Mass Effect 2 an RPG — but it doesn’t matter so much how it is defined, according to Hudson. Its building blocks are what really matter.

One of those blocks, a pillar, is the combat, which has seen a massive streamlining since the original. I think of Mass Effect 2’s combat as a rebuilding effort because of all the various tweaks, fixes, and stripped mechanics. Hudson disagrees.

“The 3rd person shooter style of combat in the original Mass Effect was quite well received,” he said, “so the combat wasn’t rebuilt so much as it was tuned and polished. For Mass Effect 2 we improved everything about how combat works, with an improved cover system, more precise aiming and weapons, smoother movement, and more active use of powers. “

But there’s no denying that Mass Effect 2 is a snappier affair. It’s easier to find missions now, and they’re quicker to end. The UI begs you to move in the right direction. The game now forces confrontation after key scenes.

“This was another area where we looked at places where people encountered roadblocks in the original game, and made sure there were features that made those things feel more natural. 

“An example is the general flow of information about what missions or activities are available for you to do next. By adding Yeoman Chambers and an email system, we had a few more ways to fluidly communicate things about where you can go and what you can do. This kind of small improvement was made in countless aspects of the game, making each detail feel like more smoothly integrated into the whole.”

Part of that whole are the characters. You’re on a suicide mission that requires the most talented people to see it to completion. One of those is Thane, a space frog with a mean history who offers some of the most spectacular dialogue.

When you start delving into the frog, the screen flashes. He moves his eyes rapidly, blinks with two sets of lenses with matching speed, recalling events, dredging up memories from a past he doesn’t seem comfortable with. Miranda doesn’t do this, nor does Jack or Grunt or anyone else.

Hudson disagreed that Thane does things differently because the goal was to make each character’s story and interaction unique.

“I’m not sure it’s that Thane in particular was different, but rather that each character offers something quite different from the others.

“For example, Samara has a unique point in her story arc that can offer new powers and a wild little story twist.  Subject Zero has an interesting hook in her romantic relationship that many people may not know about, and once you learn her backstory you’ll likely warm to her quite a bit versus your initial impression of her. We try to make each character offer very different aspects in both gameplay and story.”

One story that I didn’t see in the game was Legion’s, a Geth that can apparently do more than his brethren and operate outside of their typical parameters.

Because I missed him I assumed that he was something of a hidden character, a minor piece of the Mass Effect puzzle that wouldn’t do much for Mass Effect 3. He will, though, according to Hudson. But there’s a small catch embedded in his message about Legion’s importance — the team will keep tabs on which characters people are using the most in their playthroughs.

“We’re deep in spoiler territory, but yes, he’s a significant character even though he’s totally optional.  As with all characters, your decisions regarding Legion will carry forward into the next game. One thing we’re going to keep an eye on is how people make use of each of the characters in Mass Effect 2. That will influence our decisions on the importance of those characters in the ongoing story into Mass Effect 3.”

I’m pretty sure you can’t romance Legion, despite how terrible your face looks, and I’m certain you can’t romance a character of the same sex, unlike in the previous Mass Effect or even other BioWare RPGs of late.

Hudson didn’t tell me why the team opted to not include this option in Mass Effect 2, but he did say that the option will come back in Mass Effect 3 — if you laid the groundwork for it in the original game.

“In Mass Effect, as a female Commander Shepard you could have a romance with the female-looking yet asexual asari, Liara. That love story will continue into Mass Effect 2 (and Mass Effect 3) if you had started it in the first game, though things will be a bit rocky between you this time around because you’ve been away for two years.  You’ll be able to conclude that story with Liara in Mass Effect 3, though keep in mind that your romances in Mass Effect 3 will have an impact on how that plays out.”

Indeed. And while we’re waiting for Mass Effect 3, there’s always Mass Effect 2’s DLC.

“We actually have a pretty long campaign of various types of DLC currently being developed. It will cover the whole spectrum, from free items and content all the way up to several-hour adventures. We’ll be announcing some of the first bits soon, and one of the places you can find news about upcoming DLC is in the Cerberus Network panel on the start menu of the game.”

Bring it on, I say.

BioShock is a game about moral choices. Well, it actually isn’t, and that’s the problem. BioShock’s moral choice system was, to put it bluntly, about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the bollocks. Deciding between killing little girls or saving them didn’t really work as a moral dilemma, and we asked BioShock 2 creative director Jordan Thomas why these moral choices struggle to succeed in videogames. 

“Well, that’s a long conversation,” warns Thomas. “Part of it descends from the way humans regard simulacra vs. other live humans (who could affect their status and survivability). Empathy responses involve a number of sophisticated truth-checks against the subject thereof. Mirror neurons fire in response to smells, facial and vocal cues, all designed to ensure that you’re not actually wasting your cognitive energy on a socially irrelevant non-human. Or, for that matter, to help you avoid boinking a corpse. Moral reasoning all follows from that quick calculus we’re running against every social experience we undergo.

“Now enter a video game, where objectively you know without question that none of this is real — so at best, you’re a gentle solipsist, willing to suspend disbelief and play nice for the fun of it. At worst, you’re a freaking sociopath. You start thinking about gaming the system, not about how a live human might feel about your choices.

“There’s also a heavy interactive fidelity burden — many moral acts are subtle or deeply situational rather than general purpose slappin’ or gunfire, so you get a lot of quick time event abstraction, which lessens the physicality of the act and robs it of some power. Development constraints also tend to lead to broad good / evil choices, which some people find a bit flip.”

And what of BioShock 2? How did 2K Marin tackle the idea of morality in the new Rapture? Hit the jump for more.

“In BioShock 2, we’ve taken a tack that puts the burden on the content – meaning interactively, the choices are very simple, and in the case of the new adult choice-characters, entirely in the simulation,” he explains. “But the moral context of each is highly gray and arguable from many perspectives. And by the time you’re asked to make one, you have a lot of personal exposure to that character to help offset the ‘who cares’ effect. We feel they’re an interesting counter-balance to the Little Sisters and certainly help to seed the ethical terrain with more subtlety, but I wouldn’t claim that we’ve solved the problem now and forevermore. If anything, the interesting bit is how they affect the story later — but that’s spoiler country.”

Our BioShock 2 review will appear like magic on the frontpage this very morning! Keep reading Destructoid for the lowdown!

Earlier this week, I previewed a PC build of Max & the Magic Marker. It’s a creative platformer that puts construction in users’ hands. If little Max can’t reach a ledge or leap across a gap, players can create makeshift platforms to do so. It’s a frustrated Mario or Mega Man player’s dream.

During the writing process I spoke to game director and lead programmer Mikkel Thorsted via e-mail. His commentary proved priceless. He told me about the design process, how the team views the integral mechanics of the game, and revealed other little bits of insight about the game.

In the interest of your time and the article, I made decisions on what comments I should run with the preview. But I do so knowing that I would share the rest of what he had to say the following day. Venture below the fold to read the full interview.

Who is Max? Where did you get the idea for him?

“Max is a small boy but also a symbol of the inner child inside us all. Max is the incarnation of the childish and unspoiled imagination.

“The idea of him was conceived along with the game concept. We were very keen on creating a character that could fit our main vision for the game: to celebrate imagination and creativity.”

What about the magic marker?

“The magic marker is the one thing that makes Max & the Magic Marker a unique game. On one hand, the marker gives the player a very good idea about the creative nature of the game. On the other hand, I suspect some people may think that the game is only about drawing, which is really not true at all.

“The game is still very much a (platformer). Gameplay-wise the magic marker has turned out to be our tool to break the otherwise ‘deterministic’ nature of platformers and allow for open ended gameplay.”

When did you get the idea for the game? When did you start working on it and for what platform?

“The idea was conceived almost exactly two years ago. The concept was developed over a couple of months.

“First, it was just a sandbox – a drawing prototype made in flash, which proved that having a totally free “non-shape recognition based” drawing mechanic was a lot of fun. Later on, this mechanic was fused with a physics-based platformer, which was something we had been wanting to do for a long time at that point.

“As soon as this fusion was made Max sort of out fell from the sky. A couple of weeks later we had a prototype of the game in flash (I hope that I get an opportunity to show it at some point). We were very excited about our prototype and realized that this game had a bigger potential. So, armed with the prototype, we applied for funding from all over Europe and we ended getting enough money to develop a demo of the game.

“Regarding platforms it was clear to us already at the prototype state that this game would not only work on pc, but be perfect for Wii using the pointer and analog stick (Wii remote & Nunchuck). “

Why release on Wiiware?

“As startup game developer [sic] developing games for consoles services like Wiiware seems to be our only option really. I mean it does not take much research to find that publishers almost never go with untested developers.

“So, it is not because we did not believe in Max as a retail title but more that WiiWare seemed to be a realizable goal. I am also glad that WiiWare meanwhile has turned out to be the nesting ground for a lot of creative new titles and I hope that Max will land well amongst these.”  

I’m in love with the ambient art and color (in the imagination); both work together well to reinforce the idea that the game is based in a boy’s imagination and furthermore that he’s a creative child. Did you finding yourself studying children’s’ scribbles? What did you and your team have to do in order to nail the style?

“On a few occasions we had a class of second graders come to the office and sit around and make drawings for us based on very basic topics like “robots” and “pirates”. These sessions were fantastic for getting into the mind of the untamed imagination of children, and also served to help define the (style). 

“The art style has developed through countless iterations. We have tried more or less everything we thought possible and been down many dead ends before ending up with how it looks now. Lasse Outzen is the lead artist and has been leading this battle and I really feel he came up with a style that serves the gameplay perfectly and that is both childish but still appeals broadly. “

Outside of the imagination, the game is reduced to scribbles. Was this always a mechanic included in the game? For someone who doesn’t know, how important is stepping outside of the imagination?

 “Inside/outside imagination is very important for the game universe as it is meant to replicate what you actually do when you draw; i.e when a child draws a robot and then looks at it is not a drawing of a stale robot anymore, it is alive and shooting out lasers and what have you!

“So, inside/outside imagination has always been a part of the game.”

“In our initial prototype we played a lot with the feature and found that it allowed for cool things like jumping with Max, freezing and then building a box underneath him — done repeatedly and Max will end balancing on top a stack of boxes. It also gives the player the ability to build rather complex constructions in frozen time and then step back into the game/imagination and see how it affects the world.

“Another very important thing about the feature is (that) it gives the player time to think in otherwise hectic situations. An example of this is in one of the robot levels: There is a very fast moving piston that is trying to squeeze Max, here you have to freeze time / step out of imagination, then jam the piston with a drawing of a stick, unfreeze get Max next to the stick, freeze, delete the stick, draw another one on the other side of max and voila Max has passed an otherwise impossible puzzle. The stepping out imagination is both extremely important gameplay-wise but also artistically.”

Physics: Max & the Magic Marker uses them heavily. How important is it that players understand how the game’s objects can interact with each other?

“It is very important and we have put focus on slowly introducing the most important things the player has to understand. But actually the concept is simple; physics applies to everything and objects are designed to be accountable in the sense that a rock is heavy and a balloon is light.“

I find myself only drawing ladders and makeshift bridges. Will players be using anything else to traverse the game’s 15 levels?

“There is a lot of drawing ladders and bridges, but as the levels progress the player is challenged to draw more complex things, for example you need to make constructions that can hold down a button placed in the ceiling of a corridor or various shapes that can protect Max from falling rocks, rain etc.

“It has also been important for us that the game is not about drawing pretty things, but about creative puzzle-solving and fun platforming. It is not necessary at any point to draw something that looks like a house, a castle or a huge monster, but is both fun and possible.“

The first time Max grabbed a ledge, I was surprised: I assumed that Max would be in dire need of his magic marker. You could say that I didn’t expect Max to be as capable of traversal as he is. Two questions stem from this thought: (1) was the goal always to create a solid platformer where the marker was only a tool and (2) where did Max get his “ups?” I need to have what he is having.

“Yes, we have focused a lot on making the platforming part of the game solid enough to make the pure platforming parts as fun possible. Also Max is controlling his own super ego — it would be strange if he was incapable of hanging and jumping etc.

“More than anything we wanted to avoid making a game that was too static. We looked a lot at Crayon Physics and decided that even though it and Max shares the drawing feature we wanted to take the concept in a completely other direction. Max is the star of the game, the marker is “only” a sidekick. The real magic of Max & the Magic Marker is created when Max interacts with the drawings.”

What do you want people to get from this game? How do you want them to feel as they play?

“We want people to have a blast. We want people to not only play this game. We want them to play with it. We hope to give them a something familiar but with a fresh breeze of something original.

“We want the players to experiment, have fun and of course to be creative!”

I’ve been playing the game with a mouse and keyboard. How will the Wii remote controls work?

“Max is controlled with the Nunchuck while drawing is done with the Wii remote. A lot of development time has been spent fine-tuning the drawing feature.”

And finally, when should we expect to see the game on WiiWare? Any other systems?

“Hopefully in a month or two it will be in everywhere in western hemisphere but we do not have the precise release date yet. We cannot say anything certain about other platforms yet but it is very possible that we will look into other platforms.”

_{Destructoid would like to thank Mikkel Thorsted for his time yet again. If you’re interested in Press Play ApS, visit their official Web site here. If you’re curious about the game, check out our preview here and follow the game’s development blog over here.}

There has been a lot of talk lately about Japanese studios “going West” and “appealing to Western gamers” as the Japanese market allegedly sinks into decline. While chatting with Square Enix about The Crystal Bearers, we took the opportunity to ask game producer Akitoshi Kawazu what he made of the whole “go West” movement.

“The presence of Japanese games is not as strong within the international market these days, and as a business that creates and sells games, the reception in the Western market is naturally a point of interest to us,” he explains. “However, when developing a game we do not separate our target audience into categories like ‘Japanese’ or ‘Western.’

“We look more to player preferences, such as those who like higher difficulty levels, those who enjoy more of a collection element, those who look for more freedom in a game, those who like to have set objectives, and so forth. I do feel that one major difference in the Japanese and Western gamers’ preferences lies in the art style.”

Do you think that Japanese and Western gamers can be easily distinguished, or do you believe that it’s better to do as Square does and classify them by gameplay preferences? In any case, it’s an interesting discussion to have as more and more Japanese studios look to Europe and North America in order to make a profit.