Talking from perspective of both developer and publisher.

Overview

• Request for proposal
• Purpose of the DDP
• Preparation
• Conducting the Evaluation

Areas of investigation

Questions

what to look for

• Examine results and generate action

REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL RFP

• Listen to what the customer wants – udnerstand what is really being asked
• Focus on answering the really difficult questions
• Innovate and show off your creativity
• Do not spend more resources than necessary – have a timebox with 3 or 4 people and examine what things would make the biggest difference in getting that project

EG:  had couple of weeks to make a proposal for hardware manuf – producer made a sample game in Flash – mocked up 2 new controllers – rigged up electronics – and could demonstrate how the game could be controlled.   Showed extra effort and ingenuity.  This helped to show us in a better light.  Unfortunately we didn’t get that project but it showed us in the best possible light.

PURPOSE

*  Interview – Attempt to decide what it will be like working together; determine if they are capable of making the title; verify their flexibility and creativity

*  Risk Assessment – eg. what areas are ground breaking.  We all go throught the proces to assess potential risks:  – project management, schedule,

*  Proficiency of management and team:

- The management team is critical.  90% of the projects I have seen shut down were because of poor management.

- Management abddevelopent team’s – experience, proecess/methods, philosophy;

- Do the leaders have in-depth knowledge of the disciplines they manage?

* Partnership – looking for long term so that the process doesn’t have to be repeated.

- It is in both parties interest to have a beneficial relationship

- Trust is critical and earned – if you’re hitting milestones you’re probably get left alone by publishers

- Everyone wants a great product

- Be true to your values and capabilities – evaluate the title and be honest about your capabilities

*  Personality

- how do they react to requests? this will tell you a lot about how they will react to chage requests during production

- Do they act on coaching and suggestions?

- How responsive are they?

* How critical are they of fedback

- Are there any inconsistencies on the team?

* Passion

- how does the developer feel about the license or property?

- What types of games to they play?

- How much passion comes through when talking to the team?

- Passionate teams make better products.

*  Publisher Preparation

- Request and read bos for all team members – key man clauses in contract for key team members are common

- Request and read documentation from the developer (Engine API, art pipeline, software engineering, asset management, codings standards, schedules and design docs etc.)

*  What games has the company created?

What games has the team worked on? – Cross ref team members to the titles credits

- What games have the individual teams members produced?

- How long has the team been working together?

- How many games has the team produced?

DEVELOPER PREPARATION

- Prepare the team before the visit to help ensure things go smoothly

- Due diligence process meeting to discuss what to expect

- Inform team of the porject and discuss how you can leverage existing experience, tech etc

- Generate innovative game design ideas to discuss with publisher when they arrive

*  Know who you are interviewing with

* Determine how your staff tech and creative teams can best fill the brief

Conducting Interviews

- Talk to all key team and manageent members

- Talk to some of individual team members too

- the length of eval should be inline with the cost and scope of the project

- be professional, casual, friendly and informal – you are building a positive relationship

EVALUATION

*  Areas of investigation should include:

- Production/proj management:  previous project performance; scheduling practices and tools; what dev method; milestone deliverables; risk management (project risks, proposed solutions, contingencies, contingency trigger)

- Resources – company size and number of teams; team size; breakdown by discipline; outsourcing experience and process; time the core team has been together; experience on all target platforms.

- Risks – performance/FPS; memory; integration; localisation; networking; load times/streaming; TRC’s; load/Save game; Multi-processor support; memory latency; installation (PC); Compatability (PC)

- Design/Creative – Design process; docs and organisation; similar genre games analysis/experience; how do the tools support designers and artists workin on the same level at the same time; tuning tools and technique; game design ideas and innovations; differentiating factors from other developers.

Art

- Time to integrate assets using tools

- Art pipeline – how long does it take to iterate on assets?  how long does it take to create and integraTE NEW ASSETS?

-Use of standard tools – Maya, 3DS Max

- Style and Art Direction

- Quality – animations; models; environments; effects; in-game cinematics; movies; audio

TOOLS

- Version control (perforce, subversion, CVS, Sourcesafe

- Engineering tools – compile tools; build tools, editing, performance; documentation

TECHNOLOGY

- Animation; AI; AI; Audio; Character Rendering; Environment; Lighting & Shadows; Camera; Physics

Networking;

Asset Management

- How are builds gated so the asset creators are not disrupted by code changes?

- What is the/art check-in process?

- Version control of raw and game art and audio?

- Alpha, Beta, GMC changes

FInance – a sticky subject ..

- What is the burn rate?

- What is the average cost per man month?

- What is their general and admin ( G&A) overhead %?

- Cash reserves?

COMPLILING THE RESULTS

- Have a standard template that evolves as you conduct more DD evals

- Write up a report right after conducting the DD while it is fresh in your mind

- Score the developer on a standard scale in all areas (experience; art; technology; design , finance, resource etc) this will help you compare them with other developers.

FOLLOW UP

Follow up with the other side to determine next steps the week after the visit

Send any additionally requested docs and/or materials

OTHER THOUGHTS

- Take it seriously – millions of dollars are at stake

- Get lots of sleep the night before

- Ask other partners about working with them but try to get both sides oft he story

- show off your capabilities and sell your team

- work with existing partners to make them better rather than searching for another – better the devil you know

- be honest about your capabilities and needs

- if you are a developers try to work with multiple publishers if you have the teams for it

- Scale the proecess to match the scope of the project

- Your mileage may vary, each publisher is different

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