************************************************************************* PC Game Marketing Tips Newsletter January 1, 2000 Vol.1 Issue 1 Copyright 2000 Kandacom Publishing ************************************************************************* Happy New Year and welcome to the PC Game Marketing Tips Newsletter. Table of Contents Introduction Exclusive: A Digression of personal thoughts by John W. GCS Web Site of the month. Let's Get together and make a game! Free Gift from Kandacom Store Who am I and why am I doing this? INTRODUCTION This is the first edition of the PC Game Marketing Tips Newsletter. Just prior to publishing this edition we received a very good understanding of where the GCSW is headed. We revamped this edition to bring this to you immediately following this introduction. To fit in this exclusive I have taken three articles out of this issue and will include them in next months issue. In addition this issue will launch a monthly "web site of the month" Feature. This months selection is a well known member of the GCSW community. We will also discuss the possibility of a collaborative venture to develop a game. This is going to be a lively discussion over the next couple of issues I am sure. Finally, I will post the URL for my website where each of you can pick a free electronic version of any of the three manuals being sold there. I'll close this first issue with a little about me and why I am starting this newsletter now and what I hope with be achieved. Anyone wishing to place a free 30 word ad for any GCS or 3DRAD game related items, may submit their ad copy to pcgmtads@kandacom.net. There will be no charge for ads running in the Feb-June editions of the newsletter. This policy will be reviewed in July to see if continuing to run free ads is feasible. [Editors note - John W. (PieSkyJohn) was asked by me to give our readers an insight into the GCSW 2.08 situation. Below in it's entirety is John's reply. After reading it I am sure you will all agree that the year ahead will bring exciting opportunities to the GCSW development community. I am excited about having this much flexibility in a game development engine under $1000. See for yourself. Read this PCGMT exclusive below and see what is in store for the GCSW....ed-] Exclusive: a digression of personal thoughts by John W (PieSkyJohn). The past few months have been a struggle for me for a number of reasons. When developing this type of software you always have to keep one eye to the future and the other to the present, and if what you're doing now is going to be useless in 6 months then you have to make changes. Sometimes the changes are easy but usually they are painful. The problem is 3 parts: (1) the program must be useful to a broad range of users wishing to develop many different genres of games, so anything you do it must be functional for everyone or else it shouldn't be there. (2) the program must have staying-power and continue to be useful in the future, so anything you do now better be capable of being expanded upon rather than thrown out the window in 6 months. (3) any changes made to the program must be either compatible or easily adaptable for projects designed with previous versions. I've always held the belief that if you want to make a great "something", then focus on that "something" and make it great. In the beginning it was my goal to make the GCS a great FPS engine since that seemed the direction everyone wanted it to go. If it could be Unreal, or Half-Life, or Quake, then that would be good. But the truth is not everyone wants to make that sort of game and doing that would be undermining the driving strength of the GCS which was and has always been a multi-genre platform development tool. I knew what games I liked; I knew what games most of our customers liked, but that still isn't enough. I like fast action FPS games but I don't particularly want to make one of those. I want an engine that can do it all, do it easily, and do it well, and so do most of the customers. Its not possible to satisfy everybody, I've learned that, but its always possible to upset everyone. Theres always something that needs to be added or changed or just taken out entirely. Feedback is important. I always listen to both the suggestions and complaints from our users, then sit back and think of ways I could take all of what I hear as a whole and implement it in the design. Sometimes this produces success, other times failure. This isn't a business that rewards for effort, all that counts are results. So things finally reached a point where I needed to make some important decisions about which direction my work should take with the GCS. There has been an internal conflict to maintain past compatibility with the old GCS while working in new features and enhancements. This makes the work almost twice as difficult, and often times impossible. It would be a whole lot easier for me if we just rewrote this into a programmer's SDK, but then we would wind up with an entirely different product in an entirely different market, and I have no authority to make such a decision anyway. So that leaves the GCS as being a tool to provide game-making capabilities to non-programmers ages 12 - 99, which historically has been the appeal of this program. Therefore everything I do or want to do has to stem from that and grow from there. But for this engine to survive into the next millenium some changes have needed to be made, still need to be made, and this is involving a little more egg-breaking than I originally expected. The first thing I did since 2.05 was rip out the 2D display system and rebuilt a new one. Every GCS game I saw always looked like a GCS game, so a new system needed to be made to allow more screen customization. A lot of users contributed with suggestions for this and I don't think I ever got the chance to properly thank them for their input. Particles went through a total makeover, and now theres nothing you cant create with them that any other commercial game has. We needed model weapons, a definable 3D projectiles system, 3D sky effects, weather, improved water modes, increased vertical fov, a save/load feature, increased lighting, hi-res icons. We needed everything wrong with 2.05 fixed (which to my mind was nearly everything) - this included rebuilding elevators and solid door systems, rewriting the low-level rendering code, increased driver support, fixing a half-million bugs, and too much more I cant think of right now. For the first time since I came aboard (since 2.0) I'm very pleased with the performance of this engine. 2.0 was an experimental disaster, and in my opinion everything up to 2.05 should never have been released. 2.06 could have gone out as it was, but then suddenly it mutated into 2.07 and a whole slew of problems popped up from that transformation. Since then it seems like its been one thing after another until finally arriving safely at 2.08. I'm not speaking here on behalf of Pie or Kevin Stokes, this is just my personal take on things. Looking back theres a lot I would have done differently. I don't always agree with decisions Kevin makes or what a lot of other people think, but either way I continue to do the job I was brought on to do and let everything else take care of itself. Kevin and I have a mutual agreement on the direction the GCS needs to take and we have a pretty good idea of what to do to get it there. My only problem is there's not enough hours in the day, but thats usually the case for just about everybody. I do know that the supporters we have are the best in the world. Since coming over here I had never quite seen this kind of devotion to a particular product, and since then I've realized that most all of us are still kids deep-down. We love games and want to make them, otherwise neither you or I would be here right now. A lot of you I've helped through some tough situations with your games, others I've helped just by being a friend or hanging out for weekly chats, others by putting in that really cool feature you always wanted, others by keeping you posted on whats going on with inside development, and others just by listening to what you have to say. It makes my job here fun to be able to do that and I cant imagine wanting to do anything else. So if I haven't publicly thanked everyone for their support, I would like to do that now. Thank You. Please try to be patient, as hard as it is sometimes, and maybe a little understanding. 2.08 is coming, I promise. -John W. . GCS Web Site of the Month: This Website is one of the best available for the GCS. It was started by Steve Fury who ran it up until April of Last year when it was placed in the very capable hands of Dan Olsson. Since becoming web master Dan keeps everything up to date on this site. The site specializes in offering GCS related items that as offered royalty free for any GCS project. This site is a must visit if you haven't been here before. This is the top site for GCS related items. You have a dedicated web master and tons of information at your fingertips. Please visit soon and let Dan know how much we appreciate this great site and his effort to keep it "at the top of the heap". Visit http://www.gcsgames.com you'll be glad you did! Lets Get Together and make a game! That sounds strange when you think about it. After all aren't we all in competition with one another? The answer is yes and no. We are developing games independent of one another..yet...somehow we are trying to assist each other over some of the hurdles to success. Many of us are experienced in one or more areas of game development while others may not be. All of us can learn from the experiences of others. Should we cooperate with one another on a game? Will it be a commercial success? Who knows if it will even be a commercial effort. We have to start somewhere getting the creative juices flowing that exists in each of us. Some great game companies such as EPIC(tm) and id(tm) started this way. Is anyone interested in discussing this in the listbot? We have the talent within our community. With a bit of organization we can be off and running. Both experienced and inexperienced people are needed for this project. Do not shy away because you think you are new or not experienced enough. Free Gift from Kandacom URL Everyone who is a member of the PC Game Marketing Tips Listbot is entitled to select an electronic version of one of the three manuals currently being sold through the Kandacom web store. Please go to this URL: http://www.kandacom.net and click on our internet webstore. Once at the webstore review the selections and make your choice. After you have made your choice please send an email listing the title of the selection you want to pcgmtspecial@kandacom.net. I will attach your selection as a reply to your email. This offer has been expanded to include all members of the PCGMT listbot. In order to verify participation the email you send must match the email you have on the listbot. Who am I and why am I doing this? My name is Frank Keitz. My son and I share the same name and share the same career. That is a situation that has unique rewards and a few drawbacks at times. I have been working with the Pie in the Sky GCS game development engine since November 19, 1995 when I purchased the DOS version of the GCS with all the trimmings. I have used it since then to make games for my family, primarily my grandchildren. About a year or so ago I purchased the 3DRAD software. Recently, I have decided to get back into game development in a serious way since I have let that fall to the wayside as I pursued other activities. I have been a faithful read only participant in a GCS focused listbot for years until recently. My goal for this newsletter is to bring together as many of us loyal GCS and 3DRAD users and learn together how to develop and market our games. Can we do it? You betcha! Until next month...keep safe and have a very Happy New Year!! Frank This Newsletter is copyright 2000 by Kandacom Publishing. Any member of the PC Game Marketing Tips Listbot is hereby granted permission to duplicate this newsletter for personal use in email and listbots subject to the following conditions. The entire unedited newsletter must be used unless specific written permission is granted by Kandacom Publishing. To request permission to reprint a portion of or an edited version of this newsletter please write to PCGMTreprint@kandacom.net.