Gamer or developer?
Over the last few weeks I have constantly wondering one thing. Am I gamer or a developer? Today I have decided to find an answer.
My first encounter with games
Many years ago, when I was still a child I played a lot outside. I loved playing outside as I would climb trees, played hide & seek and got in to all kinds of petty fights. Your average kid. At a sunny day I went with a friend to her home and she showed something that would change my world. For the first time I played a game on a video console, I never remembered the name but for this entry I have looked it up. It was “Super Mario Bros. 2”. I looked at it and was stunned, she was not good at it and I refused to play as I was more interested in looking at it then actually playing. The only things I remember was the player select and the first level. I think I have only seen the game played once more after that until we got kicked out because it was such nice weather outside. I remember thinking it was such a stupid argument. But summer started and they went on vacation and just before they got back we left, then school started.
Becoming a gamer
But from that moment I was interested in computer games and I started nagging about it that some kids have a game console and we don’t. I threw the entire “it’s not fair” argument but my parents decided against it. Until 5 December and it was Saint Nicholas’ eve (he is something like Santa). To our surprise the good Saint had given me and my brother our very first game console. A Sega Mega Drive II and the game that was with it was a US version of Street Fighter 2. Now candy was competing with games for my allowance. Years later I was in a local shop and saw a game magazine, I didn’t know they existed (I dislike shopping, it takes so much time) and on the cover was an image of a young child holding a sword in front of a pedestal while blue energy was around him. It took me a few days, but then I decided to spend my money on that magazine. The kid on the cover was Link from the Zelda: The Ocarina of Time and it was about the Japanese preview. I remember that they showed a boss that was not in the actual release (although I think it was later modified and included in Majora’s Mask). We sold our Mega Drive and bought an Nintendo 64 with Lylat Wars (Star Fox 64).
Deciding my future
When I entered high school I told my parents I wanted to work in the video game industry and they shook their heads but later on changed that in “we shall see”.
So that is my history where I became a gamer. But now starts my history in becoming a developer. I sucked at a lot of high school subjects, but I had a lot of trouble fitting in and failed first year. I remember the huge contradiction on what level I should start. The previous school said I should started at the second lowest level, while an national independent organization said I should start at the second highest. As I struggled through high school there were a lot of strange events. In my first year I failed France but when I retook that year I was the only one as far as they can remember who had 10 on his pre-midterm report. Normally the range was between a 3 and an 8 but since I had done everything perfect they decided to give me a ten. I struggled through high school with a lot of help from my parents and teachers.Since there was no game education I decided to do IT. On the ICT course I made a lot of friends and had a lot of fun and me and a friend where “the best programmers”. I was surprised to see how little effort it took me to program.
Am I gamer or am I a developer?
Now I’m a student of the International Game Architecture and Design (IGAD) program. I’m having an internship at Codeglue, Rotterdam. And the internship has made some things really clear for me. I don’t think I’m a gamer in the same sense as others are at the IGAD course or at my internship. I like to play games from time to time and in my drawer I have two complete game design and an half dozen ideas that still need work.
But when I’m working I don’t think like a gamer especially when it’s programming that needs to be done. Oh yes, I know I’m working on a game, but a game is nothing more than an illusion. And because I know that I realize that I’m not a gamer but an illusionist. I let people thinkthat they are saving the world. I know that the a kid dressed in green is nothing more than a lot of different colored triangles. And it’s my job to uphold such illusions in new games. Because of the above conclusion, I should not be a gamer. A true illusionist is not bedazzled with his own illusions or those from others. And although as a programmer you don’t always design the tricks, you make certain that they work. You create parts of the machine, you help artists apply the paint and you listen and tell what is and what is not impossible to those who designed the illusion. Once the work is done and the illusion is complete you demonstrate it to the public and watch them enjoy (and pay) for something that is nothing more than a good illusion. So the only conclusion is that I’m a developer. I look in despair at near broken machines and I enjoy myself immensely when I see a proper created machine. I love to create superior machines that support the illusion and are often capable of much more than the one who designed it wants it to.
I’m not just a developer. I’m a developer who loves my job. I’m a developer who loves to see his creations being the cause of entertainment of thousands.
Final words
I know this has been a long rant but it has been something I want to get off my chest for a long time. Personally I find the game industry as it’s now young and naïve. It believes a little too much in its own illusion. But the cold hard truth is that in the end you are creating an illusion. Some people use poor quality machine parts, don’t give every detail or the painting thought or think that once a simple design is done you can work as it goes. Some companies require that the staff to go in crunch mode extended periods of consecutive overtime) with all it’s faults.
From a business perspective I think it should look and learn more from a young but more mature market, the IT sector. But at the ICT course I had one teacher who I understood after I started on the IGAD course. He said: “Always take in account the three P’s: Product, Project and process”. And many game developers are ignorant of the last one. The process is that what breaks or makes your illusion better than the rest.