2. Who am I? What is my purpose?
Europe @ Caffeine
Special Projects @ SUPERHOT
Scout @ Raw Fury
Speaker notes for online: These are my jobs!
4. What am I talking about?
Pitching your game to a publisher is a deeply
personal event
This doesn’t match up with people’s experience
How can you make it easier?
Speaker notes for online: I’m going to talk about why the process is weird and broken
5. The Meeting
Are you pitching to the right
person? Can they say yes or no?
Speaker notes for online: Pitching to someone who has no decision making power is a huge waste of time
6. The Cycle
“Not right now but show us the next build!”
== infinite cycle of improvements and delays
Speaker notes for online: I can give you feedback and ask for a build, and we could do this 100 times
7. Time
Publishers can take a LONG time to come to a
decision
Speaker notes for online: Sometimes we don’t know, sometimes more people need to play, sometimes we miss it, or sometimes we are just so busy
8. Ghosting
“They haven’t replied in weeks”
Speaker notes for online: I’m sometimes guilty of this, but I try my best not to because it’s so so frustrating
9. What does the publisher want?
You: “Publishers don’t know what they
are looking for”
Me, A Publisher: “that’s nice but not
what we are looking for”
Speaker notes for online: What do I mean when I say not what we are looking for?
Sometimes it means the game is F2p, sometimes it just…doesn’t feel right
10. What materials does the publisher want?
A build?
Market forecast?
Previous games?
Team?
Etc..
Speaker notes for online: Every publisher wants you to have different things. You should have these ready either way
14. Is everything in your pitch fixed?
Publishers hate: “We can scale the budget to
your needs!”
(sorry)
Speaker notes for online: We like to think every dev is an artist with unshakeable vision,
and they are letting us join them. Not that we are giving someone a job.
22. The Prototype
The build might have taken you months. It can
take publishers less than 1 minute to say no
(Sometimes we don’t even play it)
Speaker notes for online: I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
23. Chicken and Egg
No art pass All the art pass
Speaker notes for online: You need money for artists, but we want to see what your art looks like – it’s a paradox
24. What does a publisher look for in a build
Magic
Atomicrops looked terrible (sorry Danny). But it
had something special.
25. Gif Time - Then
Old Gameplay Gifs
Farm Marry Defend Recruit
26. Gif Time - Now Speaker notes for online: This is what it looked like
AFTER we signed it
27. Your Budget
Numbers? Budget? What?
Speaker notes for online: do you start with a budget, or end? For us it’s everything minus porting,
QA, loc etc, everything including that, a simple round number, your burn rate
28. Your Budget
Look at this
beautiful man
Speaker notes for online: Shams said that if he doesn’t see a budget on the last page of a pitch deck, he sends it back. This is smart.
30. How we view the budget
Burn
Rate
Launch Q1 2019
Art (PCM) $5250
Programming (PCM) $2210
Music (PCM - 6) $3000
Platforms Xbox, PS4, PC, Switch
Months 18
Total Development Budget $170,000k
Fake numbers lol
Speaker notes for online: This is specific to Raw Fury.
32. The scale problem
Raw Fury signed less than 1% of the games
reviewed in 2017
My inbox Wednesday this week
Speaker notes for online: The signed line barely changes, but the review line changes MASSIVELY
33. Why?
PAX booth
only has
room for 3
games
Xbox offers an
E3
announcement
CERT takes a
lot of time and
effort
Speaker notes for online: If you sign everything, you can’t give your devs love
34. Why do we not sign a game?
Genre
We already have a similar game
Doesn’t “feel” right
Doesn’t immediately cause a reaction
I’m just not in the mood for that type of game
I didn’t eat breakfast yet
35. QUICK VR SEGUE
Publishers won’t sign your VR game because:
• Fans aren’t asking for it
• QA is different
• PR is different
• Marketing is different
• Porting is different
• Barriers to entry @ office
• Platforms are different
• Storefronts are different
• Demoing is a pain in the ass
• (Notice I didn’t mention money?) sorry…
Speaker notes for online: VR can make money, of course, but it’s painful to pivot away
From “normal” games for a publisher
40. Reboot is the best conference <3
@DevRelCallum on twitter
callum@rawfury.com (Publishing!)
Or
callum@caffeine.tv (Streaming!)
Please ask any questions you like
Thanks to these folks for
providing anecdotes or
fixing my shit slides
@FelipeBudinich
@bobbylox
@simianlogic
@wombatstuff
@stuckbug
@steishere
@KristoferRose
Notas do Editor
Thank you for allowing me to talk at reboot
You are presenting something that is personal to you, I hope. It’s something you care about, and it’s something that you want other people to care about. I’m going to talk about why this process is weird and broken.
This can be the worst. Many horror stories of people having excellent meetings then finding out it was with someone who has no part of the signing process. Make sure you have the right person!!
The issue here is that I can give you feedback and say show us another build, and I could do this 100 times
Sometimes this is because we just don’t know
More people need to play
Haven’t figured out finances
I am sometimes guilty of this, but sometimes we just have nothing to say. I try and let people know if there are delays, but this is very frustrating
What do I mean when I say not what we are looking for?
Sometimes it means the game is F2p, sometimes it just…doesn’t feel right
Game design doc
Build
Prototype
Market projections
Family photos
Previous games
Team setup
Salary breakdown
Is there such thing as a Raw Fury game?
Is there such thing as a Devolver game?
Everyone knows devolver ship pixel games right? WRONGGGG
VR and multiplayer whattttttttt
“Teleglitch: Die More Edition is a roguelike top-down shooter with retro pixel graphics. ”
We like to think every dev is an artist with unshakeable vision and they are letting us join them. Not that we are giving someone a job.
We don’t like it when you suggest design changes for us
That’s the catch 22 of the games industry
I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
I play pretty much everything. Rarely do I not play something. It can take me 5, 10 seconds to play something
You need money for artists, but we want to see what your art looks like
everything minus porting, QA, loc etc, everything including that, a simple round number, your burn rate
Do you start with the budget, or end with it?
This is Shams from Paradox. He once said that if he doesn’t see a budget on the last page of a pitch deck, he sends it back
I don’t care, but it needs to be there
This is super rough. That’s OK, it’s how we work.
That’s hundreds of games reviewed, and less than 6 signed.