1 Overview of the Casual Games Space with a focus on the needs of developers. Ivan Tkachenko Vice President of Production Nikitova Games / Kenjitsu

2 Nikitova: Outsourcing 6 years of experience 5 offices Chicago, LA, Kiev, St Petersburg, Dnepropetrovsk 3 dev teams Kiev, Ukraine; St Petersburg, Russia; Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine 250+ employees

3 Nikitova: Casual Games Projects Wild Tangent Fire Fly Polar Golfer Polar Bowler Shrek 2 Ogre Bowler Big Fish Mystery Case Files Anarchy Enterprises NDA Project …

4 Nikitova: Casual Games Development Service Full game development Development of Game Design Document Art creation Characters Levels Special Effects Programming C++ Java Flash, Director Porting to alternate platforms

5 Developer's Goals Make hits (top 10) Own popular IP Increase revenue No excess in value chain

6 Scope of work: What developer needs to reach his goals Management Sales & Marketing Production Infrastructure and artefacts Postproduction

7 Management Project management QA Manager Lawyer

8 Project management Budget Typically produced for approximately $50,000 to $200,000 USD Small Team Roles overlapping 1 person plays a number of roles Number of projects go simultaneously Planning / Tracking Meetings Coordination Communications Reporting to stakeholders Conventions

9 QA Manager Test Plan Looking for bugs Compatibility testing User Surveys Usability testing Focus Groups Play balancing Linguistic and Functionality Testing

10 Sales & Marketing Research Pitch Negotiations

11 Research What is your Target Audience? Who are your publishers? Game mechanics Setting Art Style

12 Pitch Look and feel Prototype? More pictures Key Selling features Short description instead of GDD

13 Negotiations IP holder Type of contract Publisher Self-publishing Work-for-Hire Funding Share Risks Give up rights

14 Production Stages Team involvement Technologies Processes

15 Stages Concept Prototype Alpha Test Beta Test Gold

16 Team involvement Art Programming Game design Management & QA Sound

17 Art 20-45% of budget Art Director Style Light Color FX Outsource Sketches

18 Programming 20-25% of budget Lead programmer Architecture Flexibility Handles Tools Outsource Prototype - No re-using GDD TDD

19 Game design 20-25% game design / narrative / script Idea Producer Game Designer Game mechanics Key Design elements Outsource

20 Idea Reference analysis Thinking Organization Number of people Brain storm MindMaps More Ideas - wider choice Test you choice

21 Producer Is it fun enough? Creative opposition to PM Marketing support

22 Game Designer GDD Levels Balancing Explaining features on production stage

23 Game mechanics Matching Games Chain Popper Find Subsets Shape Manipulation System Management Breakout Variants Casual Sports Games Card & Parlor Games Other Arcade Variants

24 Key Design elements Simple and Meaningful Play with Transparent Rules User Interaction Depth & Complexity Rewarding Players Showing Progress Forgiving Game Play No stress Visuals and Themes Narrative and Characters Using Sound and Interactive Audio to Enhance Gameplay

25 Outsource GDD First phase of outsourcing full title

26 Management & QA 15-20% of budget Project Manager QA team

27 Sound 1-10% of budget Outsource Sounds list Music list References list Playable demo with Handles

28 Technologies Engines an Framework Director Flash Torque HGE Popcap Framework Web + PC + Mac Network Community based and multiplayer casual games.

29 Processes Small Team Small Budget Agile method

30 Infrastructure and artifacts CVS Feature & defect tracker Art asset management Project Plan

31 CVS Documentation GDD TDD WIKI Code Graphics Variants CVS AlienBrain Perforce

32 Feature & defect tracker Test Track Bugzilla OnTime

33 Art asset management AlienBrain Perforce Art Tracking Tools

34 Project Plan Microsoft Project Tracker

35 Postproduction Porting to alternate platforms Localization Support

36 Porting to alternate platforms Open own division Outsource to porting house

37 Open own division Long term Experience Risky

38 Outsource to porting house Short term Nikitova Mobile

39 Nikitova Mobile Nikitova Mobowise Service Product

40 Localization Plan at preproduction phase German, Japanise