LordOfLore
Banned
Developing video games—hero's journey or fool's errand? The creative and technical logistics that go into building today's hottest games can be more harrowing and complex than the games themselves, often seeming like an endless maze or a bottomless abyss. In Blood, Sweat, and Pixels, Jason Schreier takes readers on a fascinating odyssey behind the scenes of video game development, where the creator may be a team of 600 overworked underdogs or a solitary geek genius. Exploring the artistic challenges, technical impossibilities, marketplace demands, and Donkey Kong-sized monkey wrenches thrown into the works by corporate, Blood, Sweat, and Pixels reveals how bringing any game to completion is more than Sisyphean—it's nothing short of miraculous.
Taking some of the most popular, bestselling recent games, Schreier immerses readers in the hellfire of the development process, whether it's RPG studio Bioware's challenge to beat an impossible schedule and overcome countless technical nightmares to build Dragon Age: Inquisition; indie developer Eric Barone's single-handed efforts to grow country-life RPG Stardew Valley from one man's vision into a multi-million-dollar franchise; or Bungie spinning out from their corporate overlords at Microsoft to create Destiny, a brand new universe that they hoped would become as iconic as Star Wars and Lord of the Rings—even as it nearly ripped their studio apart.
Documenting the round-the-clock crunches, buggy-eyed burnout, and last-minute saves, Blood, Sweat, and Pixels is a journey through development hell—and ultimately a tribute to the dedicated diehards and unsung heroes who scale mountains of obstacles in their quests to create the best games imaginable.
Facts:
Release Date: September 5th
Pages: 304
Physical Price: 15.99 USD 19.99 CAD
Digital Price: 10.99 USD
Audio Book: 8 hours and 1 minute and voiced by Ray Chase of Final Fantasy XV fame
Games covered:
- Stardew Valley
- Diablo III(Excerpt: How Blizzard Saved Diablo III From Disaster)
- Destiny
- The Witcher 3(Free "DLC": How A Designer Accidentally Opened Every Door In The Witcher 3)
- Halo Wars
- Pillars of Eternity
- Dragon Age: Inquisition
- Shovel Knight
- Uncharted 4
- Star Wars 1313
Quotes about the book:
—Tom Bissell, author of Extra Lives and Apostle, and writer on the Gears of War, Uncharted, and Battlefield franchises”Making video games is one of the most transformative, exciting things I've done in my two decades as a freelance writer. Making video games is also an excruciating journey into Hellmouth itself. Jason Schreier's wonderful book captures both the excitement and the hell. Here, at long last, is a gripping, intelligent glimpse behind a thick (and needlessly secretive) creative curtain."
—Leigh Alexander, author and tech journalist”So many of the cultural problems both within the game industry and among fans come down to a lack of realistic public understanding of the tribulations of development. Jason opens a crucial door into an abnormally secretive industry, in the brave hope of teaching us a little more about its flammable alchemy."
—Cliff Bleszinski, creator of Gears of War and founder of Boss Key Productions”A meticulously researched, well-written, and painful at times account of many developers' and studios' highs and lows. May need to make it required reading for the developers at my studio."
—Rami Ismail, cofounder of Vlambeer and developer of Nuclear Throne”The stories in this book make for a fascinating and remarkably complete pantheon of just about every common despair and every joy related to game development."
—Adam Conover, executive producer and host of truTV's Adam Ruins Everything”Jason Schreier brilliantly exposes the truth about how video games are made. Brutal, honest, yet ultimately uplifting; I've been gaming for thirty years, yet I was surprised by every page. Turns out what I didn't know about my favorite hobby could fill a book. This book! Can't recommend it enough to any serious fan of this generation's greatest new art form."
Forbes review: The Brutality And Beauty Of Building Video Games
Exclusively for NeoGAF, the first paragraphs from the book:
Say you want to make a video game. You've got this killer idea—it's about a mustachioed plumber who has to rescue his princess girlfriend from a giant fire-breathing turtle—and you've convinced an investor to give you a few million dollars to make it happen. Now what?
Well, first you need to figure out the exact number of people you can afford to hire. Then you need to call up some artists, some designers, some programmers. You'll need a producer to keep things running smoothly, and a sound department to make sure the game has, you know, sounds. Can't forget to hire some quality-assurance testers to check for bugs. And a marketing savant—how else will everyone know about your future best seller? Once you're all staffed up, you'll need to make a strict schedule that determines how much time your team will spend on each part of the game. If all goes well, you'll develop a demo for E3 in six months, then be ”feature complete" by the end of the year.
After a few months, things seem to be going well. Your artists are drawing all sorts of cool enemies for your plumber to fight: ghosts, mushrooms, that sort of thing. The designers have sketched out some clever levels that will guide the player through raging volcanoes and fetid swamps. The programmers just figured out a fancy rendering trick that will make the dungeons look more realistic than anything you've seen before. Everyone is motivated, the game is making progress, and you're handing out stock options like they're free newspapers in the subway.
One morning, you get a call from your producer. Turns out that rendering trick is useless, because it knocks your game's frame rate down to ten frames per second. The playtesters keep getting stuck on the volcano level, and your marketing guy is grumbling about how that might affect your Metacritic score. Your art director insists on micromanaging the animators, which is driving them crazy. Your E3 demo is due in two weeks, and you know there's no way you can get it done in less than four. And suddenly the investors are asking if maybe you can slash that $10 million budget down to $8 million, even if you have to let go of a few people to make it happen.
A week ago, you were fantasizing about the speech you'd make at The Game Awards after taking home Game of the Year. Now you're wondering if you'll ever even finish.
Amazon US link.
Now I just have to wait till after work to read it.
