![]() The self-serious tone is really set against games' own nature. We were constantly making excuses, for example, for the fact our protagonists couldn't talk. I felt like game development had the same elephant in every room this is a video game and nothing we’re making here makes sense once you compare it to anyone's real experience. ![]() "I remember feeling intensely frustrated, both with that 'self-serious' style of games and the various corporate strata that had been bearing down on us. Commercial risk or not, the game had to look a certain way. On the contrary, sloppiness and roughness were at The Magic Circle’s center. It was possible the game's "sloppy" appearance could put potential buyers off. ![]() However, given The Magic Circle had to look like an unfinished game with very little colour, basic graphics, and even some missing textures, Alexander started to worry if its pre-release screenshots would be understood as intentional or misinterpreted as genuine. The studio had two priorities: cultivate the game's art style and plan its narrative. In summer 2013, after finalising the original concept for The Magic Circle, Alexander and Thomas moved into Question's new headquarters, a house in San Francisco owned by Alexander's parents. "What we didn't realise was that the indie wave was about to break." "We thought we were striking while the iron was hot," Thomas says. It was smart, personal, and unflinching, but contrary to indie game myth, The Magic Circle would not become a hit. Directed by an old software bug that had become sentient and gone rogue, players were led to excavate, edit, and ultimately destroy The Magic Circle from within, indicting its creators and their volatile fanbase in the process. But in 2013, they left mainstream game development to found their creative partnership, Question like the series that had introduced them to one another, their first independent game was set to examine and test gaming's boundaries.Ĭalled The Magic Circle, the game took place inside an unfinished, eponymous fantasy RPG. From sea-water cascading through Rapture’s corridors to neon lighting effects and scary set-pieces, like the appearance of the first ever Splicer, Alexander’s art and visual work had helped set BioShock’s tone. Before taking on directorial duties for BioShock 2, Thomas co-designed the original's epochal Fort Frolic level. For over six years-first at 2K Boston, later at Irrational Games-they helped redefine what big-budget games could do, invigorating the famously crude shooter genre with horror, tragedy, and political intrigue. We all agree the independent video game scene is destined to succeed.Īs former BioShock developers, Jordan Thomas and Stephen Alexander are familiar with unconventional video game stories. Reassured that low-budget, personal, and idiosyncratic titles can be successful, an entire culture also gets to feel like video games, at last, are getting better by the power of their sheer creative worth. The developers make their money back and then some, win awards for “narrative,” and start to plan a second game-a game that’s going to be even more honest this time. Idealistic and humble, the group are finally able to make the game they've always wanted to make, a game that just so happens to resonate with an increasingly sophisticated and artistically aware video game audience. ![]() The conventional indie game developer success story goes something like this.Īfter growing disillusioned in the overly-corporate mainstream, a group of designers and artists take a risk and set up their own studio.
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