Xbox co-creator turned developers' agent says industry needs to keep looking for stars of tomorrow
The man who co-created Microsoft's games console and now brokers big talent deals between headline development personalities and publishers like EA has warned of a generation gap facing the industry talent base.
Speaking at the VentureBeat-hosted GamesBeat event running alongside last months' GDC, Seamus Blackley - the former Xbox man and former Develop columnist, now head of Hollywood agency CAA's games division - urged the industry to 'reclaim' the lost generation of game designers.
"There's a whole generation of games designer that is is absent - it's like the World War One 19 year-olds ,they've vanished. The Will Wrights, the Warren Spectors, the Sid [Meiers], the Tim Schaffers - we can give those guys what they want, and do large deals for them. But there is no generation after them," he said.
He dismissed the games industry's current ways of finding new talent amongst graduates, suggesting that approaches like 'taking three great graduates and putting them to work on the next Godfather game' squanders their potential.
"That [approach is] a fine business decision, but the perspective for us is that it is a much better idea to take these three guys who perhaps have a beautiful idea and a different way of working, protect them a little bit as they build up a new idea and a new way of looking at things and a new way of design - and a few years from now they will be a much better business," Blackley explained.
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"In the '90s there was no mechanism to do that - and we lost a generation of designers. I think its important we look to reclaim that new generation. And for a variety of reasons; there aren't that many Will Wrights in the world so at CAA I have to grow my business somehow!"
But the comments came not just as a pitch to explain why CAA was carving a place for developers to have the kind of agents usually boasted by thesps - it was part of a wider message in which he said the industry must continually look to improve itself, and keep shaking off the preconceptions put on it by those outside the games industry - something that seems relevant given his new role in Hollywood.
"Just as a lot of people in games view the movie business as this unstoppable cloud of money people in the movie business think the same thing about the games business," he said of his experiences at CAA.
Likewise, he said this thinking had informed his previous venture, the games funding outfit CEG which was founded to 'make game funding painless'.
"At Xbox I realised, along with Kevin Bachus, that there was no way the industry was going to step up and keep making the interesting ideas that grew the industry to the weight it was at," he said, again referencing how the industry's expansion has also led to an oppression of new talent.
In all, he said the games industry must make sure it doesn't fall into bad habits: "Great projects happen when a lot of people put a lot of effort into making them happen. Previously these happened organically but as the model matures and the industry around that matures people become set in their ways."
Fascinating. Reminds me of the problem I see with the current outsourcing abroad fad. The industry isn't training up enough junior artists. In a few years, when outsourcing's no longer so cheap, the industry here isn't going to have the skills base to bring stuff back inhouse. there seems to be a very short termist approach at the minute.
I don't think it's anything like he reckons it is. It's just capitalism. These established guys command capital, thereby they command the airtime. The talent is there just sitting in the wings until some bandwidth frees up when one of the established guard retires. There is plenty happening in indie games and the gaps will be filled don't you worry. The outsourcing comment by Fran is probably more accurate.
He may be on to something. There's a strange thing in the games industry where creators are rarely seen as talent, and more often as replaceable cogs in a production machine. In most creative industries that approach went out with the dinosaurs - outmoded by a more modern marketing "blend", take for example the Harry Potter films, which persist as a mix of 'brand', director's name and reputation, acting talent, and so on.
But in games, everything seems to get centralised in brand (or perhaps studio), and then observers are surprised when products vary wildly in tone and quality as the creating team changes. There are a variety of factors that contribute here - not least that the games industry doesn't have the same fluidity of talent across teams that the movie industry does - but I'd suspect that it ultimately works to the disadvantage of both publishers and individual developers.
It's an interesting discussion on something that's not often openly aired: the number of individual games developers who have any kind of public profile is curiously low.
Thanks for the comments, J.
It's certainly an interesting one - the games industry seems to not only neglect to address issues around the lower end of the age scale, but the upper end too.
We are planning a more detailed investigation into this - in the meantime, readers are free to mail in comments to me via Michael.French@intentmedia.co.uk or post them here.
Here's a question Michael.
The very people who are responsible for managing the outsourcing today - I mean, the outsourcing producers, lead artists, who have that role in their studios etc...
Given the relative lack of junior art & animation roles around right now, how many of THEM would manage to get into the industry today? I suspect a significant number wouldn't.
Food for thought.
Tomorrow's generation is being forgotten in the hurry to just "get things done" today- and it's going to hurt the industry down the line.
I have to agree, the last few studios I have worked at outsource 50-80% of the artwork, most which would be ideal for juniors to learn from. Much as I did back in the PS2 days. A very short-termist approach for hitting deadlines in what have become development factory houses. Furthermore, as Fran says, the art leads/managers I have worked with cannot do this work anymore either. The clever ones in senior roles therefore never step up anymore and although this curtails career development, itmeans that we are always in demand for our skills.
Yes, the next 5-10 years will show just what studios have long term plans to help the juniors into the industry as the old boys move on and out.
I have to add that the decisions studios are making are hurting us "old boys" as well.
I've spent 23 years as a developer but through the nature of the companies I worked at, I have ended up as a failry niche 2D artist. The problem is, you walk into any place with that skill set and the 3D guys suddenly have all their prayers answered, as they now have someone to take on the undesirable (to them) 2D work. What that ultimately does is tie you to the restricted role, whilst leaving the rest to progress and develop.
After the latest redundancy, I now find myself with considerable experience in all the places nobody else wanted to earn it in. But you show me a place that will take someone on and offer them the chance to develop into a desired role.
In the last 23 years, I haven't received a single iota of training, because training someone costs money and doesn't get the job done... and hey, that's what your spare time is for isn't it? Why train someone when you can send the work abroad to people who work for less, and have expended their own money getting the training for you.
It really is about time the studios started giving back to the employees as much as they get, and helping those employees to grow. If they don't, then there are more people like myself who are going to end up wasting away, leaving the industry full of fragmented development and shattered ideas.
So, Michael, when can we expect this "investigation"? And will it be dumbed down to avoid pissing off your advertisers? This is a subject of vital importance - you should commission someone independent to write it and publish their report no matter how damning it is.
It'll be in the June issue, Fran.
Nothing will be dumbed down in the way you suggest.
its a-lot to think about and some very good points. i wish we could hire alot of interns and train them while we put out our current game. to do that though we need more equipment and time to manage them and more budget to support them. thats hard to find when budgets are already ballooned out. outsourcing solves that and acts as a force multiplier for small studios. we still hire new people from school but just fewer of them. if out sourcing does become impractical then maybe we will be the outsourcing destination too. our rates will be competetive with china and india as theirs hopefully come up. that could mean more opportunity not less. the real threat is funder risk aversion which is well discussed in the article. this is a problem with maturing industries. the movie bizz may provide some good solutions. i hope seamus finds them for us in time.
