Link to video:
Table of contents:
0;00;00;00
Mike was Studio Art Manager of Supcom & FA
Mike was Snr Producer for Supcom 2
Mike worked at EA, LucasArts, GPG, Relic, Nvidia, Sony
0;04;39;25
At GPG, Mike was working on multiple titles, running art, helping with hiring, helping with outsourced art
Some of FA art was made by Chinese outsourced artists
Cinematics were hard and are extremely expensive, had to achieve the goal without blowing the budget
0;07;32;05
On Supcom 2 was a Producer, working with the publisher
Perhaps Supcom 2 didnt go so well because tried to appeal to too many people
With Supcom 1 they had huge loyalty which worked against them when Supcom 2 diluted
0;09;33;11
Mike didn't make art, they had a Lead Artist
Mike was more about Change Management
Protecting staff
0;11;05;18
They had to consider memory and used LOD
It took ages to achieve strategic zoom working on older hardware
They had to manually model 5ish LOD models, these days decimation tools do it for you
They didn't quite have fancy tools. Trees didnt auto snap to terrain adjustments.
Mikes job was to make sure people had time to achieve all of this well.
0;14;28;13
Today's engines are good because they automatically do things for you.
They decided not to use an off the shelf engine.
At the time Unreal couldn't do Supcom.
Great Engineers like to roll things from scratch.
Studios have to decide if they want to be a "tech company" or not.
0;16;54;29
Mike didn't do much art
Although he did make the talking-heads on Supcom 2, made a system to generate a video of a talking head based off text
As a producer you have to keep your distance
Did a bit on the cinematic side
0;19;01;17
Mike played the game a bit (sounds like for fun) but also for work
Mike likes finding bugs in games
0;20;35;22
There were many art projects on Supcom. Trailer, UI, Units, Map textures, Maps
Some people could do just one part of the process
Some people could do many parts of the process
They would make concepts, get sign off, start modelling
The game was fun without final art (whiteboxing)
0;22;54;13
Before the concept art they get given a brief of how many of each type of unit they want
Artists make a jillion concepts
The team would pick out the better ones
There would have a brief like if it was meant to be a Strong tank or a Fast tank
Chris conjured up lots of big ideas
Sometimes they built things that didnt turn out that well
It's fun to see your art come to life in the game world
0;26;04;07
E3 demos were always huge
Supcom got a huge reception - you could tell it was a hit
When supcom finally released the reception was great
Some strangers found out who Mike was and were impressed - Mike was a Celebrity
In Supcom 2 they hired a unit modder from Supcom 1
A lot of people in games are former modders
Companies like hiring modders because they already have the skills
0;28;58;17
There were another art project - Animation
Units get rigged
Some of the same people would make unit animations in the game as well as the cinematics
Other games are harder with organic shapes to animate
Riggs are a speciality beyond just modelling
0;30;41;23
There was another art project - Effects
You create an effect by layering images with different additive/subtractive modes
They used a tool to create effects
The nukes were big important effects
Effects need to be performant because there are so many of them
Its easier these days with modern tools - they had to cheat
Really good effects artists are very rare
0;33;44;01
In Supcom 2 they had a Lighting project as well
They can add lights and bounce lights
Baked GI provided rich textures
Easier now, you could have self-shadowing and reflective units
Grey Goo had some nice lighting
0;35;43;07
The PA team made it to zoom out even further
The PA art style was more memory efficient
0;36;54;02
In a new RTS Mike would add raytracing
Raytracing adds great reflections
Explosions can light other explosions
If you don't have a card with Raytracing then it just turns that off
Raytracing could be used for more than reflections one day
Tech moves too fast
Tech can do great things but you don't have the budget to use the latest features
You need it to be procedural for it to be cheap
Bigger games companies can spend more on latest features because they use the work in multiple titles
Game Engines also make it easier because you get a lot for free
All of the big studios are using outsourcing companies to create content quicker
0;42;13;29
They were making map heightmaps in photoshop
Chris liked making the content editable so it would last a long time (and look at where we are)
Publishers don't like mods as much because they want to Sell you more content
0;43;56;20
To make repeating textures they would use software tools that could help convert a picture to repeat
They would normally start with a hand drawn image
These days you use a drone to scan something in 3d
Nowadays people use Substance Painter which can also make tiles
Substance bakes out to standard textures and normal maps - it doesnt calc at runtime
You can get lost in Substance (aka substance abuse?)
Houdini is a very hard tool to learn but is great, they use it for movies and some games
As an artist you need to keep in touch with all of the tools constantly - or move into art management
Decals were all handdrawn
The artists were speed painters, when they make concept art they create the impression of the thing
Normal maps were a new concept at the time
They work well on hard surfaces
0;50;56;05
The themes were not really tied to the storyline, they just wanted nice themes
The art team just came up with ideas
They didnt need much concept art
In SC2 they needed much bigger map concepts
0;52;27;11
The seraphim concept was built around the new chrome shader
Mike came a few months into Supcom so the original faction choices were done
Sometimes the art comes late into game concept
0;54;16;17
Shaders were made between engineers + art teams
Usually engineer makes the shader then art team tweaks it
These days Tech Art department would take care of it
Back then everyone just go into it, everyone knew everything
Although effects were seperate
These days its all seperate art departments
0;56;19;11
Ideas come from other games, reading tech books, conventions
Sometimes they see ideas years before they get released
Artists bug engineers to put new stuff in
Sometimes they HAVE to put in trendy ideas for marketing purposes "fully rendered with normal maps"
0;58;47;05
Process of making a unit - brief, concept, signoff by Lead Designer & Art Designer, high res model, playtest, textures, LODs, rigging, effects, audio, markup for audio/effects like footprints, go back for revisions
Signoff includes does it have the right feel, fit the unit, look the right Toughness
Initial LODS were boxes
LODS come after high res because you need the silhouette
Revisions if they dont look good or look to similar, not right for gameplay
Everything needs to be rebalanced around new unit
1;03;32;24
Funny stories
They made a movie from another GPG game, Dungeon Seige, starring Jason Statham
It had a line "I'm going to gouge evil from its shell" http://www.inthenameoftheking.com/
As a joke they put the line into other GPG games, Space Seige and Supcom2
In Supcom 2, Commander Lynch may or may not look like Sarah Palin
https://deck16.net/post/11435558943/goo ... ommander-2
They put in some goofy lines into Supcom2
Mike wanted a Supcom movie
1;06;20;06
Chris is a character, lots of energy, crazy jokes, caring, fun
GPG is remembered fondly
Supcom - the team was excited
Mike did 6 years of supcom - three titles in a row
1;07;35;16
Supcom 2 was a bit of a downer
Reviewers were a bit hostile
Original games were so well received - people loved talking about it
1;09;15;02
Steam still has 500-1000 daily players
FAF has more players, new campaigns, performance fixes, etc
Steam people should move to FAF because we have been improving things for 9 more years
In FAF you can download for free but need to own the game on Steam and link
Mike is going to play but will get crushed
1;10;59;18
Mike was good at Supcom2 until 1 week after launch, then players started com-bombing
Some players complained
Mike always wanted to make a Nuke
Perhaps he needed to react to the game and not have a premade plan
1;12;58;29
In Supcom2 the AI reacts to you much better - Hard AI was hard
It would watch your units and build a counter
It was useful to block AI scouting you
1;14;24;05
Critical Decisions - Mike doesn't think Supcom2 was watered down because of the console.
However it was trying to appeal to a broader audience because that's what the publisher wanted.
Perhaps the franchise could still be alive today without that decision.
Some games tick over like Warhammer.
Supcom style RTS almost needs to be an indie game because the income is low.
RTS audience is small.
Non-indie devs go for big audiences.
A smaller studio is easier to keep alive. GPG grew quite big.
Around 2008 the USA economy tanked but GPG kept going for a few years.
1;18;13;24
Mike thinks a publisher these days could sponsor an RTS
They still make little RTS games, they publish them under different brands, they dont know what will be the next big thing, it's like fishing for Fortnite
There's a big market for mobile strategy games
Mike is interested in seeing new Age of Empires title - latest major RTS
Sponsors walk around hundreds of GDC indie games looking for projects to sponsor.
1;22;24;09
How can a one man dev get funding for an RTS?
They want a demo. It's hard to pitch an idea without one. Example of a game that doesnt get funded until the demo is there.
Your demo could be a pretty movie about your game.
Publishers want to know if you have Engineers - they are the hardest to get.
A lot of the people on GDC floor have polished demos.
You can find publishers on LinkedIn - if you present well, show your engineers, what you can do. You can cold call.
Don't assume they are getting 1000 calls a day - they will listen to you.
We have some cred as we have a community.
Modders are highly respected in the industry.
Project plan & milestones are good.
Publishers will look at your plan to see if you have the team, the proper people. Do you have a plan to get the people?
Publisher might not look nicely upon your plan if you leave things out to look lean.
Publishers want to know what you are missing so they can help. They dont just give money but skills.
If your going for a smaller budget you don't need a full-on upfront project plan etc.
Kickstarter is an option. Especially for smaller, diehard fan bases.
1;31;32;28
RTS isnt dead, it has turned casual
Lets see what happens with Age of Empires, maybe a Total War game
Will they go for the same audience and get sales? Will the audience increase or decrease?
Would there be another TA successor? Maybe if you could find someone at Square to champion the game. Sometimes they revive an oldschool game. Perhaps RTS wave will return.
1;34;58;27
With more modern tech Mike would explore if can increase player count, which FAF has already done (8 players to 16) plus a very handsome member of the community has recently asked if we could upgrade that to 32
Maybe a new RTS could be on distribution platforms like Stadia, or other devices
1;38;33;19
At the moment Mike is playing Death Stranding, The Last of Us Part II, Doom, Firewatch
For RTS, Godus, XCOM
1;40;37;23
Mike isn't super attached to his own ideas, just tries to help idea generate
It's not just art but everyone has opinions about balance, design, etc.
QA gives designers a hard time with bugs like "game is not fun", "unit is not fun"
Funness is an iterative process - you need to allocate time to refine
1;43;41;09
Mike has a work in progress Supcom 2 video that he will try and send us
Square got Supcom team in trouble for stealing spaceship model from Terminator movie
However the Supcom model was made years before
We need a picture of the terminator/supcom dropship
1;46;27;27
Mike would like an Eternal War added to a new RTS where you drop in to a persistent game
The landscape is affected/shattered by this fight
Would get reset every month
Could you have 100 players in there?
When you leave the game all your stuff dies.
New entrants to the game could unlock a new safe map zone to build for a while before the game starts.
Maybe older players get a constricting field.
1;50;31;20
Nomads is the 5th faction under development by the community
They have old models and are upgrading to new models
Mike thinks Nomads looks UEF inspired
Perhaps Nomads' visual theme could be to use asymmetricalspare parts from other factions
Could look patched together from parts of other factions - would make it easy to make models
Its ok to "look Cybran" so long as you "look like you stole them from Cybran"
Nomads team are making models, shaders, custom tools
1;55;42;28
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