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The Future of Gaming is User-Generated: A Conversation with Look North World's Alex Seropian
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Episode Summary:
In this episode, we're joined by Alex Seropian, a true legend in the gaming industry and the co-founder of Bungie, the studio behind Halo. Alex is now the founder of Look North World, a company focused on creating experiences within the Fortnite ecosystem using Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN). Alex discusses the evolution of the gaming industry, from the era of physical game distribution to today's platform-driven economy. He shares his insights on where innovation in gaming is headed, the challenges of discoverability, and the paramount importance of building a strong community. This conversation is a must-listen for anyone interested in the future of game development, user-generated content, and the ever-changing landscape of interactive entertainment.
About Our Guest:
Alex Seropian is the founder of Look North World and has an extensive history in the gaming industry. He co-founded Bungie, was part of Industrial Toys, and worked at Disney. He is now focused on building user-generated content and experiences within Fortnite.
- Look North World: https://www.looknorth.world/
- The Fourth Curtain Podcast: https://www.thefourthcurtain.com/
Key Topics Discussed:
- [02:11] The Future of Innovation in Gaming: Alex shares his thoughts on where new and innovative ideas in the gaming industry will come from, highlighting platforms that support experimentation and risk-taking.
- [05:10] Discoverability in a Crowded Market: A discussion on the challenges of getting your game noticed on platforms like Steam versus UEFN and Roblox.
- [10:05] What Defines a "Good" Game?: The conversation explores how the definition of a quality game has evolved and how generational differences impact what players find engaging.
- [12:41] Creating Games for Younger Generations: Alex talks about his approach to creating content that appeals to him while also building a diverse team to create games for various audiences.
- [14:42] The Player Feedback Loop: How Look North World launches numerous games and uses player feedback to iterate and improve their experiences in a live service environment.
- [18:15] Company Pillars and Adapting to New Platforms: Alex discusses Look North World's founding principle of exceeding player expectations and how they've adapted that philosophy to the realities of the UEFN platform.
- [20:54] The Importance of Community: Alex emphasizes that building a direct relationship with players is a top priority for Look North World, as important as the IP they create.
- [25:08] The Early Days of Halo and Multiplayer: Alex reflects on the explosion of the Halo community and the surprising ways players connected to play online before the widespread availability of Xbox Live.
- [35:34] What Excites Alex Most About the Gaming Industry: From the advent of 3D graphics and the internet to the current "platform economy" where creativity is happening within larger game ecosystems.
- [47:16] Alex's Podcast, The Fourth Curtain: Alex plugs his own podcast where he interviews other luminaries in the game industry.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Alex Saropian
00:00:01
Speaker
Welcome to PlayerDriven. Here's what you're about to listen to on today's episode. Today we are talking to Alex Saropian. Alex is the co-founder of Bungie, and more recently he is the founder of the studio Look North World.
00:00:14
Speaker
They are building UGC, which is user-generated content in Fortnite, using the tool called UEFN, which is Unreal Editor for Fortnite. It's really cool to see how different types of creators from AAA to Indie are taking these projects live on UEFN.
00:00:29
Speaker
across the massive player base that Epic has built up. It's a really cool story and a great fanboy moment to be able to talk to the founder of Bungie, who's created amazing hits such as Halo. It's a really fun conversation. If you haven't liked or followed PlayerDriven yet, please check us out on Spotify or Apple or YouTube and all the platforms where you could find your
Alex's Background and Parenting Insights
00:00:49
Speaker
YouTube stuff. we had I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did.
00:00:57
Speaker
Good morning, good evening, good afternoon. Welcome to the player driven podcast. Greg here. week Today we have an episode I'm very excited about. We are joined by Alex Seropian.
00:01:09
Speaker
He is the founder of Look North World and he has also started studios that you may have heard of such as Bungie. He's been a part of industrial toys. He worked at Disney. He's done so much in the gaming industry.
00:01:20
Speaker
He's done so much with community and just building games we all know. And I'm super excited to talk more about what he's doing now at Look Northworld and how he's building UGC with UEFN and all this cool stuff.
00:01:32
Speaker
Before we dive too much into it, Alex, like thank you so much for joining me today. Is there anything you'd like to say about yourself? Well, thanks for having me, Greg, um and thrilled to be here. um Gee, you know, I think you you hit a lot of that the the highlights there. i'm also um a ah ah father of three. It was Father's Day this weekend.
00:01:55
Speaker
um And you know, there's just a lot of odd parallels between raising kids and starting companies. um But excited to get into it with you today. Thanks
Opportunities and Challenges in Fortnite's Ecosystem
00:02:06
Speaker
for having me.
00:02:06
Speaker
Yeah, I hope you had a great Father's Day. You have created some amazing things in your life. I don't want to harp too much on it because you talk a lot about your your past and there's little bits of the past I want to talk that connects to what you're building now.
00:02:21
Speaker
You are building Look North World, which is focused on building experiences within the Fortnite ecosystem. And I think it's a fascinating time to be a game creator when you can take a look at a platform that's not just Windows or Mac.
00:02:36
Speaker
You're looking at a place where people live already. And what you're trying to do is create a unique experience from within there. So now we're in this world where you've created aaa games, you've created ugc Where do you think yourself that the future of innovation is going to continue to happen in gaming?
00:02:54
Speaker
ah Well, that that's ah that's a big question. um And it's one that I've thought about a lot. i don't know a lot of people have been thinking about it over the last few years as the industry. you know Our industry is amazing because it's constantly evolving.
00:03:09
Speaker
um And it's part of what makes opportunities. So like there's so many opportunities in the game industry because it evolves so quickly, it evolves so often in in these sort of like cycles.
00:03:21
Speaker
um And you know innovation just in general, innovation is like this word that... can mean a lot of things or it can mean nothing. um But where new ideas tend to come from are places that support um experimenting, support ah not having to kind of like manage these big investments with low risk, which is, ah you know, what the big companies do. You know, the big companies invest hundreds of millions of dollars to make games if you're Microsoft or if you're EA or Take-Two, they're going to get Grand Theft Auto 6 right, you know and they're putting a lot of money into it. um
00:03:59
Speaker
But what that means is um the the new stuff, which is not doesn't fit an existing model, the innovation you know it tends to come from places ah where it's okay to take risk.
00:04:14
Speaker
um And what does that
Content Discoverability Issues Across Platforms
00:04:16
Speaker
mean? Okay, to take risk? Well, it that means maybe you don't put all your eggs in one basket, you know, or ah you know you're you're not sort of accountable to some big, huge corporate machine.
00:04:29
Speaker
And these platforms, UEFN is one, um I would say Roblox is another. um These platforms really support that kind of experimentation.
00:04:41
Speaker
And they're also coupled with a user base and a ah creative base, which is pretty young, which is also a place where you tend to get new ideas, you know, places where people aren't sort of immersed in pattern fatigue. pattern fatigue So um where will innovation come in the game industry coming forward going forward? Well, probably a lot of places, but I definitely think, and this is something that really attracted me to to ah building in this space, I definitely think platforms like UEFM, platforms like Roblox, these platforms where you can move really quickly, you can try a lot of things. We made 20 games last year. That's insane.
00:05:20
Speaker
um We're going to definitely see a lot of innovation coming out of those platforms. Innovation one important aspect of it. The other one is discoverability. And in this time where we are, right a lot of new indie games are coming out, and it's super exciting. But One, they're all competing for time, which most of our time probably in Fortnite or Roblox. Anyway, the second thing they're competing with is Steam, which Steam has lot of great stuff going for it. The problem is it has a lot of stuff going for it.
00:05:47
Speaker
So you got to be found. So now you're building these experiences on Steam. UEFN or Roblox, and it's a different type of discovery discoverability issue, right? Because most people, maybe not most people, maybe I'm just getting older now and it's a different lens for me, but most people know the game Fortnite for Battle Royale, right?
00:06:06
Speaker
How is discoverability different from an indie game or Steam, sorry, versus UEFN, or do you not see much of a difference there? Well, um Another big question. ah A couple of ways to look at that.
00:06:22
Speaker
ah I would say the the specific question about UEFN, you're right. Players go to Fortnite to play Battle Royale. So there's a certain kind of player there already. So if you're making stuff and you want to be discoverable to that audience, well, that's a factor and you need to put that into consideration.
00:06:40
Speaker
um But i would I would say there are parallels on any sort of content-driven platform, and and you could, in a broad sense, that that's anything. you know that's That's Netflix as a content-driven platform, right?
00:06:57
Speaker
Any of those platforms, they're... There's only more and more content coming every day. It's getting easier and easier to make things. That's a good thing. That's a plus, right?
00:07:10
Speaker
So, and there's more and more of these channels and platforms that are competing for people's time. So just discoverability um of good content has gotten more and more challenging, both for the consumer and the creator every year, because there's just more and more and more stuff.
00:07:31
Speaker
So is that good? Well, I mean, I think it's think it's good. think it's good because we have more choice you know as game players or you know you know TV watchers or whatever.
00:07:44
Speaker
And this's if I'm a creator, there's more opportunity. But it does mean that, ah you know, that that power curve, you know, the power that power curve, that's that's sort of like, you know, on a platform, like the top 1% makes all the money and the bottom 99% makes nothing.
Changes in Market Dynamics and Game Creation Philosophy
00:08:05
Speaker
ah That curve gets really challenging from a commercial perspective. You know, back when I started in this industry in the ninety s ah there were a lot of gates you had to go through to get a product into market.
00:08:22
Speaker
you know you You had to be able to make a game, which was difficult. ah You had to manufacture it, which was expensive. You had to put it in a store.
00:08:33
Speaker
So that's not digital sales space. That's actual physical real estate. So there's only certain number of slots you know that you have to compete for. Once you were there... there was traffic and you know you you're going to sell some product. you know And if it was good, you're going to sell more. And that was that was a predictable and uh could be really good uh business model commercial business model to today ah it's it's different you know it's like it's way less expensive and easier to get to a point of sale but you're competing like you know like you say discoverability is the big thing competing gets so much other content that yeah that 99 percent
00:09:15
Speaker
is uh it's it's challenging so the topic of discoverability like where does it go from here i think that's the real question is as it gets easier and easier to make content and and out let me tell you it is getting we're going to see some really like i mean you've been watching like the videos from from vo it's like that is mind-blowing and that's just like version one of that thing you know it's like So, yeah, I don't know. I don't know the answer to that question. It's definitely a question that we think about a lot because we are are operating in this space. i my My hope is that quality wins the day.
00:09:57
Speaker
You know, like like the best, I think Ed Catmull phrase, or maybe it was Lasseter, the best business model is quality, you know? And I think maybe that gets more and more important as ah accessibility to creativity gets easier and easier.
00:10:15
Speaker
I think, you know, as you say that, I think about streaming and you have Netflix and Amazon and Hulu and all this stuff where there's more and more content and our brains are filling up and we can't consume that much because there's only 24 hours in a day. know,
00:10:30
Speaker
It's the first thing that you said there when you were talking about was was good. And I'm trying to think that I think the definition of a good game has also changed, right? you used to look at kind of a nice polished game. It was released, right? And it was done. And and now when you go into Roblox, you see...
00:10:48
Speaker
for lack of better words, some crap games that are just spiking to the top. And we're in this world of content creators and influencers and people trying to push their own whatever, right? And it's like, this isn't even a good game, yet it's on the top. Like, why is this staying here? And it's just this frustration. And i could i maybe I'm wrong, but am I making this up where you're like good doesn't necessarily mean good. Sometimes there is lucky. Sometimes there's timing. Sometimes there's just the right people are seeing it at the right time.
00:11:19
Speaker
ah you know Yeah, all of that stuff is a factor, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. you know If people are attracted to something, they're playing it, they're enjoying it, they're liking it, they're sharing it, then does that not make the definition of good?
00:11:38
Speaker
That's a fair and valid point, right? I guess... and Different strokes for different folks. Well, I mean, it's generational as well. and like You know, these these Roblox in particular is a younger audience.
00:11:53
Speaker
And, you know every generation, what's cool to that generation is confusing to the older generation. And what's good to the older generation is crap to the new generation, right? You know, that's that's a societal thing. that's ah that's a That's a truth of human evolution.
00:12:11
Speaker
um what my kids think is hilarious is like, Hmm. And what I think is awesome is like, you know, dad rock or whatever, you know, it's like, and that's good. That's good. That's, that's ah evolution.
00:12:25
Speaker
You know, how, do how do you Alex deal with something? And maybe it's, i'm going to take a step back. My wife and I were having a conversation about music this weekend and how music these days is kind of crap compared to the music of our time. And I was just like, you know what? It's all a symptom of when you grew up, your experiences. Right. ah And well, I don't disagree. I'm in that age bracket where I like what I, that dad rock, right.
00:12:50
Speaker
This new stuff. And do you find it tougher to make games for kids or younger generations? Cause maybe it's hard to see through their lenses. ah Perhaps. And you know and my my my approach, i have I have a couple of um ways of thinking about at least the kind of content that I want to make, the kind of games I want to make, the kind of games my studio is going make.
00:13:14
Speaker
One is um I'm going to make what appeals to me. That's just my way. ah And I am a so forever student.
00:13:26
Speaker
So I'm going to work on things where I'm going to learn something. um um I'm going to get better at a particular element of the craft. And that's what I personally will invest my time ah creating.
00:13:41
Speaker
ah That said, I am part of a studio, and the role that I play in the studio is ah I play many roles, but one of them is a manager, you know and I don't make all of our games, ah which is a good thing.
00:13:55
Speaker
um And we ah are building our team in our studio with folks who are passionate about creating on these platforms, and ah we have ah pretty diverse group of
Building Community and Feedback in Game Development
00:14:09
Speaker
creators. um different ages, ah genders, points of view, walks of life.
00:14:15
Speaker
And we can you know we can operate at kind of like at a publisher scale because these games are so small. Like I said, we should we shipped, I think, over 20 games last year. So we can try a lot of things and support a lot of folks ah being creative in the studio along the way, um whether they work directly for us or whether they're another studio we partner with or whether they're a creator from the community that that we're supporting. And that's, I think, also, I think super cool about these platforms is that you can you can try a lot of stuff, experiment, and learn really quickly.
00:14:49
Speaker
When you're launching that many games, what is it? I mean, you work with Hasbro, you work with Bandai Namco, you have these great partnerships, great games that people recognize, and then you have to ship these games, you build them.
00:15:03
Speaker
What's it like getting feedback from players? you know Is it the same life cycle of a game as you would have seen 20 years ago? Is the life cycle shortened based on the the feedback? and I mean, it runs the gamut. it it behaves These platforms behave you know behave more like... um you know they They are a live service platform. yeah Fortnite, Roblox are free to play.
00:15:24
Speaker
um Fortnite in particular is, at least from a commercial perspective, is entirely um supported by engagement. So you know we're trying to build games that players will you know come back to every day and play forever.
00:15:41
Speaker
um So ah sometimes that works, which means you're kind of listening to the feedback constantly and supporting a game week over week, month over month. And sometimes it doesn't.
00:15:52
Speaker
And you have to decide, okay, what did we learn here? All right, let's roll that into something new. Or what did we learn? Is there something we can apply to what we built to ah make it easier?
00:16:05
Speaker
you know more interesting. And I think you know you mentioned Bandai. It's a great example. We made a a game with a Gundam game with them that released around the same time as they did a Netflix movie.
00:16:16
Speaker
And ah we we built what we thought players would like. And and it did pretty good for ah you know a short amount of time. um And we kind of listened to that audience and refactored it as ah in in a native Fortnite genre, like a red versus blue game.
00:16:34
Speaker
um And when we re-released it based on that feedback, it did did even better and it was pretty sticky. So so yeah, it it is a lot. These platforms are c certain like they're, you know, it's not like a paid download one and done. It's it's a relationship constantly listening.
00:16:53
Speaker
You know, how do we actually talk to our and listen to our players? um But, ah you know, there are channels on these platforms for us to get direct feedback. We also operate you know, we operate a ah community discord where we're streaming, we're doing game, you know, game events and just trying to build a relationship with our players.
Look North World's Evolution and Priorities
00:17:11
Speaker
That's, that's the thing that's really important to what we're doing as well as is having a place for our audience to, um to come and and and connect with each other connect with us.
00:17:23
Speaker
um As as we build the company, you know, so So something I've learned through this podcast is the concept of pillars and how different studios have these pillars that they kind of build upon. And I'm curious if you have that concept of pillars at Northworld, and does that start to change as the platform and how you learn that platform works, right? are Like maybe you go into that first UEFN game thinking X is going to happen, but Y happens and you got to shift your whole thinking like,
00:17:54
Speaker
are there any major learnings you have that are kind of become company pillars because of how these platforms differentiate um definitely i mean like we started off with a pretty simple premise of um let's build games that are better than expected um and uh ah I think that's a great you know like ah goal is you know you can set an expectation of what you're going to deliver, get people excited about, and then you over-deliver on that. And that's a great recipe for delaying your players, you know being successful. And i it it does um take a a very subjective viewpoint of
00:18:39
Speaker
ah assuming that you ah know what players at least expect. if you want to if If you want to exceed expectations, you have to define what that expectation is.
00:18:51
Speaker
And when we started, it was you know we started right when UEFN came out. Our assumption of a player expectation on the platform was wrong by, i don't know, two or two or three viewpoints. you know you know The thing that you identified just as just as an observer right off the bat, genius, everybody on here is playing Battle Royale. Okay, well, that's an expectation right there. you know um Do players want to come and play something entirely different?
00:19:20
Speaker
Maybe over time, but you know in the beginning, you know maybe you want to like not take too many steps away from the core experience. um And another is like you know what what is the value of production value?
00:19:34
Speaker
Us coming from ah you know more of a AAA background, we have our own ideas of what quality means. And you know back to our little conversation about um yeah what does define good, ah there's a certain level of production value that you would expect, say, in a console game that um is is sort of like diminished returns on a platform like a UEF and a Roblox, where it's really about quick, fast social gameplay um and a little less about, you know,
00:20:09
Speaker
you know the most amazing you know vist inviting vista of you know ah of of uh of a scene that you can imagine so so yeah we still operate with that mindset of you know we always endeavor to deliver something better than expectations but uh where we've evolved and learned along the way is okay where do we ground that flag of what the expectations really are to help us point ah you know what to focus on as as ah as we're building.
00:20:41
Speaker
Was community always top of the list? Like you knew from the beginning, community has to be aspect did it start like- Pretty much number one. Pretty much number one. Like the whole, the the whole well, whatever. there's a lot There's a lot of things that we've learned about um what's happening in the game industry relative to these platforms that are forming our long-term strategy. But ah we don't own the platform. you know we We own the IP of the games that we make.
00:21:08
Speaker
And if we're smart, we have a relationship with our players ah where we can grow that audience over time and ah you know really do something special for ah for a group of people. So that community um is as important to us as the IP, as the games that we're making. number you know The top top two things that we consider as our you know our goals as a company.
00:21:42
Speaker
Cool. Usually about halfway through, I like to do a fireball around where I'm just going to throw question to you ah don't put any thought into it ah good to go hot take all right well you'll see uh favorite question people don't like it what did you have for breakfast uh ate no breakfast today i did not have i usually do eat breakfast but today i'm recovering from kind of being over served yesterday so yeah what was your father great question what was father's day dinner Oh, we had a shish kebab feast yesterday with everything. You know, lula kebab, chicken kebab, you know, pilaf, grilled vegetables, hummus, tzatziki.
00:22:27
Speaker
Life good. It was ah off the charts. Yeah. All right. If you were a kid in college today, you were just talking about how easy games are becoming. What would you choose to study?
00:22:39
Speaker
Art. Can't go wrong with art. We'll always need artists in the world. What is the last show or movie you binged watched? Succession. Alex, let me know before the podcast that I am here wearing my Jets shirt and we are not a good football team, but he is a Bears fan.
00:22:58
Speaker
Who will have the better record this year? Oh, 100% Bears. Like I'm really excited about ah this season. You know, it's like, we got We got a couple years under the the our our new star players and a new coach. And ah yeah, yeah, it's good. This is going to be a good year.
00:23:19
Speaker
Mind you, that sentence has been said every year ah ah since ah I got out of college. But, um you know, but this year.
Gaming Industry Reflections and Personal Hobbies
00:23:29
Speaker
You know, as a Jets fan, I've seen all my number one QBs go to other teams over the years, and they've all come back and kicked my butt. You know, we went to, i actually went to London. I saw Sam Darnold beat beat us and, you know, what happened to Smith.
00:23:41
Speaker
Now we have your ex QB and this is our opportunity to to rise.
00:23:48
Speaker
um All right, back to our normal schedule program. So I promised really not to talk about Bungie, but I wanted to bring it up for two little-ish ones. The first one is comm community ah and how Bungie...
00:24:01
Speaker
is community and how it was specifically for me, right? I was alive in the world of Xbox One and Halo One came in. It was just mind boggling. We'd sit in our house. We'd have the hub set up in the central part of the house. We'd have things go everywhere.
00:24:16
Speaker
what What was so cool is that, you know, this was local Multiplayer, you could play with anyone. Then GameSpy came out and created this whole tunneling feature where people go hook their Xbox up to their computer, launch GameSpy, and connect with people across the world to play Halo. And and know Dreamcast was online, but Halo was that first online experience for a console that I think everyone started to play.
00:24:42
Speaker
And the truth was, this was the start of multiplayer and community to me. And it was so cool to be able to play people on with my big bulky Duke controller across the world, talking to people with baby voices on their filter. And it was just magic that someone was able to figure out how you can do this without the existence of Xbox Live. And and did you have any concept of the community or any of this stuff that was going to be when this was all happening? Or was this like a...
00:25:11
Speaker
holy shit type of moment. ah You know, ah a little of each. check we We had been um doing multiplayer games for for a long time. It definitely was ah DNA the studio, back to, um you know, we had this game Minotaur, which is like the second game we ever made, which you had to have a modem ah to play.
00:25:34
Speaker
um But that kind of... um
00:25:38
Speaker
co-op, competitive, ah you know, multiplayer part of our games was but it's always part of um the culture of ah even a development process. Like that's how we would really test the games is by standing up multiplayer first. and um and and frustrating each other you know you'd you'd have those pain points where something wasn't working right and you know you'd have to get out of your chair and go have a really you know serious conversation with a programmer because something this was not working right um and uh so multiplayer super important um for uh for the first halo there was
00:26:23
Speaker
you know we wanted to do more than we were able to do we made a bunch of compromises and the fact that the the community and the internet in general sort of like kind of patched over the the limitations of what we were able to achieve that was surprising um uh but the fact that people you know got excited about it um i mean the the scale of how everything worked out was way beyond any expectations but the fact that ah Some of that stuff was ah was appealing to a certain audience.
00:26:55
Speaker
um ah that was That was sort of the ah hope. you know ah Again, I thank you because countless hours of my childhood and college, we would all just still set it up. I think it was one of those moments that you'll never forget in gaming. you know There's a few few things. I always think of Mario 64, but connecting Halo and being able to play 16 people, everyone on TV. That's that's awesome.
00:27:19
Speaker
It was wild. never It never gets old to hear, you know, when I meet somebody who who's had a formative experience with a game that I've worked on, it's the most flattering.
00:27:29
Speaker
ah It's, you know, it's it's the the best feel-good moment of better than any, you know, review, chart position, anything like that. It's like having an impact is why we do this.
00:27:42
Speaker
And then on not the flip side, but the other point was that you worked on the soundtrack for Marathon. I think you did all the music like maybe for Marathon. The first one, yeah.
00:27:54
Speaker
I've noticed a trend where a lot of these really successful studio game directors started and did the music and soundtracks for games. Is this like ah
00:28:04
Speaker
It's funny that you've mentioned art as the thing that you went to school for. you're go like like Is music still a passion or is it the passion? And like, don't know, is there just some some weird thing going on where musicians are the ones that are creating the best games out there?
00:28:18
Speaker
I haven't heard that before. i i What I'll say is um i I love to make things. you know i I love craft and the creative process and you know conjuring something up out of nothing.
00:28:34
Speaker
And for me, music ah was super appealing for that reason. um i I grew up taking piano lessons. I played a lot of guitar. I'm not a fantastic musician, but the craft of creating music ah is is is really i really enjoy it. And it's not all that different for me than programming or You know, woodworking, which is my other hobby, or cooking, which is another hobby of mine, where you you assemble things and up but you know with with a particular idea in mind, and you get get an enjoyable outcome that you can share with others. is ah
00:29:11
Speaker
I mean, that I didn't and didn't have to do the music. I wanted to do the music. I guess nobody else was going to do it.
00:29:20
Speaker
so you can yeah when you When you have the chance to retire and be done, there one of those specific hobbies that you're still going to want to do? Is there still a passion for any of them? um you know If you asked me that question a few months ago, i i probably would have said ah ah woodworking, which is which I will always do. I love woodworking.
00:29:41
Speaker
I love the physicality of building things that are physical um over the last six months. So I've really kind of gotten back into um ah more coding.
00:29:53
Speaker
um I would say a lot because of um what modern coding is like today with ah like AI kind of co-piloting it makes the the learning process of like picking up a new language or you know implementing some API or system that you're not familiar with really accessible um so I feel like there's a lot more for me to explore on the on the programming side so You know, both of those things. I'll have an indoor and, well, I guess woodworking is sort of outdoor, but I have my garage open when I do it. So let's just say I'll have an indoor and an outdoor activity to be working on. I love the woodworking answer. Actually, I was never hands-on, but I wanted to build my own desk. So I built my desk. I kind of, you stain it, you sand it, you kind of, it's a very good process. And I feel like it's one of those tools that once you learn how to do it, like you want to keep going because you want just keep buying more tools and doing more things.
00:30:52
Speaker
And with the ah language, I've heard the same thing in Duolingo, actually. Duolingo on the stock perspective is doing really well right now because they realize that language is really great to learn via AI with an assistant there. And coding is just another language in another form. So I yeah like i think there's a huge opportunity for people who are in school or any age right to say, hey, I can start learning this and going to super quick and super easy to really get started here. And I think kids these days have a really...
00:31:20
Speaker
cool opportunity here to really take advantage of learnings and being able to do something with it. Yeah. Yeah.
Advice on Learning and Experimentation
00:31:28
Speaker
I mean, a you know, when YouTube came on the scene, it ah like early days, it was a little hard to see ah what kind of impact it would have um um on the world, you know, and and also me.
00:31:47
Speaker
particularly today, you know, if you look at what YouTube is as a platform, in some ways, it it has been one of the ah most impactful educational tools um ever, you know, people pick up new skills, ah learn from each other, share, and teach each other through video on a platform like YouTube. And I think we're going to see something even more powerful with ah with AI.
00:32:15
Speaker
ah where that ah learning can become even more self-directed and accelerated. So it's pretty exciting. Yeah, I've been experimenting with with my podcast on what's the best information way to share information with people. Some people like to read, some people like to listen, some people like shorts, some people like infographics. And You know, it's always an ah interesting thing on how are people going to continuously learn? Because even myself right now that I'm ah older than I was when I first started working, like I used to spend hours just researching forums, trying to see how things work. And then you get more responsibilities and you have kids or a family. And then like you can, you become time poor and you have less time to learn. So if I were to ask you, Alice, what's the best way you learn?
00:32:56
Speaker
What would be your answer? Yeah. um Well, i I guess I would say a couple things. One one is don't be fit afraid to try. So there's a lot of things that I sometimes, sometimes I'm like, oh i i have an idea, oh but it seems hard.
00:33:15
Speaker
And and Those are usually the things where there's a lot of learning on the other side for you. If you can kind of just power through the initial um learning curve or whatever and kind of get into something, you come out with a much deeper understanding of that sort of area, you know.
00:33:33
Speaker
So that's one. Don't be afraid. um and then the the other is uh you know go gowood in go um go in manageable steps you know it's it's a it's a lot easier to hit a goal if uh if you take small steps towards it um and uh yeah so i don't know i think that ladders feedback people need to hear more often is that They try and conquer Rome in a day. They try and do as much as they can, or they start with the hardest thing thinking, Hey, I'll reverse engineer this. Right. And I've learned that and I'm trying to learn how to create stuff as well. Like if you set manageable milestones and tasks, like at the end of the day, you can say I completed this. And when you can check that thing off your day, it's like, what did you do today? Well, I completed phase one of this project, right?
00:34:20
Speaker
It gets much more exciting knowing that you completed it rather than having to climb a mountain in an entire day. For sure. What changes have you seen in the gaming industry that excite you the most?
00:34:33
Speaker
Let me give you two answers to that question. you know There's there's the sort of the historical kind of obvious things which are very exciting, like 3D graphics and the internet. If you just think about like how games work today, i think we take a lot for granted um and that all the connectivity is on the you know is on this side of the year 2000, pretty much.
00:34:56
Speaker
um And it's opened up a whole new, like, just a ton of different kind of genres, ton of different kinds of ways for people to play with each other, a globalization of of games, and ah and and the elevation of...
Platform Economy and Future of Gaming
00:35:11
Speaker
of gaming from the basement hobby to a mainstream uh you know force for um uh for fun for you know meeting people and just uh culture in general um if if uh so that's my obvious sort of historical answer that What's happening today, um I'll tell you, I am pretty excited about, and this is the self-serving answer to it, I'm pretty excited about what where we're working.
00:35:40
Speaker
um Because you know games, when I got started, games, like you know but we were talking about this before, you'd have to like put them on a disc. You'd make a CD-ROM, or even diskettes if you're as old as me.
00:35:52
Speaker
um And you know you'd have to... put it in a store. And that was like this real retail sort of like economy of games. And then, you know, that sort of the internet and the the apps era um has really dominated.
00:36:07
Speaker
ah you know, i think mobile is something like 60% of the game industry. um is really kind of dominated how ah people discover and consume. And today we're starting to see, and I really think this is a thing, another evolution, and and this is what we call it, like the platform economy where a lot of creativity is happening inside these other games, inside on these platforms and the creativity is coming from everywhere.
00:36:34
Speaker
um And I think it's gonna result in a lot of new play modalities that we haven't even discovered yet. um and and if you look at what's happening mean i'm gonna i'll i'll talk about fortnight because we're in that ecosystem a lot if you look at what's happening there with disney coming in with star wars and all the other ip and content that's all entirely interoperable could you even have imagined as a kid that oh there'll be this place online that we can hang out and spider-man's gonna be there it's looks like batman yeah and luke
00:37:09
Speaker
and they And you can you can fly an X-Wing. You could do all this stuff, right? and And you know that would be like the plot of Lawnmower Man or or Ready Player One.
00:37:20
Speaker
And you'd yeah, you would laugh just like you're laughing. It's like, yeah, yeah, that'd be cool. It's never going happen. And and it's you know now the metaverse. you know We don't call it the metaverse because I don't know why that word's got so much stink on it.
00:37:32
Speaker
But that's kind of where what's happening, you know? Is that exciting? yeah Heck yeah. That's kind of exciting. I agree with you. You know, the truth is Fortnite is the metaverse that people spoke about. You have different skins from different games coming in. They're enabling you to bring it into the the UEFN Creators games or Rocket League or Legos, right? The beauty of these technologies is when you stop using the term that people are coining for it, like metaverse, right? It's just the next evolution of a game, right? Like, Hey, it's a ability to use different things or different characters within a game, right? Like it's super cool to see that happening. And Epic is just crushing it. I feel like, I mean, my best father's gift I got was Bob's burgers in Fortnite. Cause I wanted to buy Bob's burger. And like, it's just so cool to be able to see that
Team Dynamics in Game Development
00:38:22
Speaker
happen. Right. yeah,
00:38:24
Speaker
I don't know if that becomes a problem further down the line when maybe Epic becomes too big for its own good. I don't think so, but who knows? But I think it's a super cool time for gaming and I think it's cool for creators, creators right? I think what was better in gaming pre Xbox 360 timeframe when things were pretty much consistently online?
00:38:49
Speaker
um What was better? ah Okay, well, I can think of maybe a couple of things. um One, um team sizes were smaller.
00:39:01
Speaker
And is that is that better? Well, I mean, if you want to do like big ambitious rich like super high production value stuff well maybe it's not better because you kind of need uh you know you need a big team to be able to produce some of these amazing things but there is something really attractive about um going through a product cycle and a creative endeavor with a small tight group of of ah like-minded folks in a development team so um that's one thing is that this the scale of the business has just changed a lot and
00:39:33
Speaker
I really enjoy um having that ah camaraderie with, you know, like in a manageable size team. So that's that's one thing. um You know, and and while the the the opportunities and accessibility and stuff is kind of like really off the charts today, it it is pretty competitive. You know, there's, there's um you know, the...
00:39:55
Speaker
in many different ways, it's competitive for finding um ah talent you know to work with. It's competitive for getting discovered in the in the sea of of entertainment options, let alone just other games that are out there. And back pre-whatever, 2000, there were less choices for people. So if you were good at making something, maybe you had a better chance of um connecting the customer.
00:40:20
Speaker
So maybe those are a couple things. I'll give you two answers there. Those two right there. Perfect. what um What's the average team size for a team that's working on one of these games? um We have shipped games from a team of one ah up to and had team of eight or nine.
00:40:39
Speaker
um And we have done some projects. in we We don't have one like sort of like formula for how we make a game. like The team of one projects, that's usually we're working with the creator. When we work with the creator, they're driving the project. But you know they're kind of doing it in...
00:40:54
Speaker
you we're on discord, they're doing it in our discord and and our team is sort of there to help. So that's kind of on the smaller side, a larger production would have like one of our teams, which is typically five people.
00:41:07
Speaker
um And they may be working with a codev partner, which may add another, like you know, three to 10 people. So we we have done projects that are larger in scope, ah but they don't get that much bigger than that currently today.
00:41:20
Speaker
It's not bad, right? Like you said, you could be agile and you have multiple projects going on a single time. Yeah, that's it that is part of the the model for us is the ability to kind of scale up, scale down when needed, pretty agile and flexible.
Final Thoughts and Personal Gaming Experiences
00:41:36
Speaker
Okay. I think that's most of the questions I have for you today, Alex. I do have one more since you didn't want to answer the yeah hardest game to get to market. Which was the hardest platform to work on?
00:41:48
Speaker
Oh, well, ah that would be the early PlayStation 3 working on the Unreal Engine 3. think it was Unreal Engine 3. um PlayStation 3, where I think we're the first game to ship that platform on that engine.
00:42:03
Speaker
um And lots of technical challenges. That that special, was it an IBM processor? It had some weird processor, right? That would have to sell. Wasn't that the cell processor? I think so. I know that i don't know. mike I'm so old now. you know I can only, I can only remember, my memory's only in black and white. you know I get it. You got the Master Chief helmet behind you though. So you're still a kid at heart there. I love that. oh yeah Oh yeah. You have three kids you mentioned. Do you play games with them at all? or Well, I mean,
00:42:33
Speaker
We do play lots of games. um Many of them are sort of like IRL physical games. Like ah we've got a long running euchre game going. Also, we play this card game called Wizard. i don't know if you ever heard of it, but it's one of the best card games.
00:42:45
Speaker
it's um It's kind of a non-standard It's like a deck of real playing cards with a few extra cards in it, which is a lot of fun. We've done a couple of D&D campaigns. um my ah My son, who's in the middle, is Valorant player, um though he doesn't let me hang with him in Valorant.
00:43:08
Speaker
I get it, man. You've got to keep up. ah Kids are tough. My kid's seven now, and he's we just started playing. re I probably shouldn't let him play Fortnite, but we started playing it, and like He's doing better than me now. I'm like, uh-oh, I'm in for trouble here.
00:43:22
Speaker
um But it's fun to be able to sit down and play with him. like It's so cool to see his evolution of how he didn't know how to even walk in 3D in the beginning. And like within minutes, he's just running it. I know. Isn't that amazing?
00:43:33
Speaker
It's amazing. I love the use of games for education. And maybe, again, Fortnite's not that prime example of games and education. But it's a great way for kids to want to keep going and continuously learn.
00:43:45
Speaker
Right on. um Well, Alex, again, that's all I have for you. This has honestly been a dream come true. I appreciate learning what you're doing at Look North World. I think you know building community, building on the UEFN network, I think it's so cool to see someone who built huge AAA games over time say, hey, this is a platform that's going to be something and we're going to invest our time into this. I think it's important for creators to know that there's a lot of people out there both AAA as well as indies that are building on these platforms. that and they are for real, which people know this by now. So I appreciate that.
00:44:19
Speaker
Before we go, do you have anything else you'd like to say or talk about? ah Oh, hey, I totally freak forgot, Greg. um Is it okay if I plug my podcast on your podcast?
00:44:29
Speaker
Please, you yeah. The Fourth the fourth Curtain. is firsttain that's ah Yeah, that's a podcast that I host with my art director, Aaron Marquin, and we talk to industry luminaries about their journey through the through the game industry.
00:44:44
Speaker
um So yeah, this season we had we've had Bing Gordon and Mike Morhaime, the founder Blizzard, on. Next week we'll have, you mentioned educational.
00:44:54
Speaker
Did you ever play the Oregon Trail? Who hasn't? I know. we tracked down ah the dude who made the or the Oregon Trail, and Phillip's going to be on this next week. So so you can find it anywhere. You know you listen to podcasts, um The Fourth Curtain.
00:45:11
Speaker
How do you like the experience of hosting a podcast? I love it. ah as As you noted, i am an audio guy at heart. I love the format. And if you've been listening to this episode of ah this podcast, you know i like to talk, too. And I love meeting people, um even if they're Jets fans. No, just kidding.
00:45:34
Speaker
um Good luck this year. Rude. Yeah. No, it's ah the podcast is a great format. I love it. Awesome. Well, again, Alex, I truly appreciate it. On the player-driven blog, we'll have links to both the fourth curtain to look north world. We'll have information about Alex and everything we spoke about. So again, I'll say it for a 15th time.
00:45:56
Speaker
Alex, thank you again for not everything not just everything you've created, but your time today. And i wish you the best of luck and have a great day. Right on. You too. Thank you so much.