Pitches, Pitches and more Pitches

During these last days I was busy with a bunch of pitches… Man, it sucks! I know that as a game designer we have to be able to design the game from the basic concept to the high implementation and we should love to work on each phase of the project. Actually I like to design the basic concept, however it is more exciting to work on the high implementation, when you face the real challenges and should follow up the team in order to achieve the project’s goals.

In the perfect world the game designer wakes up early, takes a shower, eats something healthy and goes to his work singing “I feel good”. Once the game designer is in the office, he or she will receive a detailed briefing requiring a game pitch. Usually it is a short presentation document describing the overall idea of the game. The designer makes a research and discusses some ideas with another designers or colleagues… After a couple of days, a very creative and original game will be described in a great pitch to the publisher. Furthermore, the project will enter in the pre-production phase, the publisher will pay for the project, and the producer will gather the people to work on that amazing project during the next months.

Unfortunately, in the real life it is a little bit different! First of all, don’t think that you will always receive detailed briefings, sometimes they are so poor that it is hard to figure out what the client is asking for! In some cases it is difficult to understand if they want a point and click adventure or a social simulation, for instance!!! Trust me, sometimes it happens. Someday I will start a blog to post all those briefings: stupidbriefings dot com… =P

On the other hand, the opposite situation also happens!!! Some Request for Proposals (RFP) will contain loads of details about the game the company wants, that you will have trouble to write a good pitch, because the RFP practically contains the main idea defined at al. Sincerely I’m not sure which one is the worst!

However, the good part of all this is that we are always learning! We can pass a week studying about dog’s behavior to design a pitch and in the next week we will have to research about surf. At least we are studying interesting subjects… Well… Ok…Some of them aren’t that interesting, but it is also cool to learn new things.

Well, but as I was saying, the real life can be very cruel! A game designer normally writes tons of pitches, but most of them will never pass this phase. After that, it is also possible to have a game canceled during the pre-production phase or even during the production phase!!! Oh yeah, sad but true!

The Zombies are coming...

Maintaining this blog up to dated is harder than I thought it would be. But after a couple of weeks working on some game pitches to the company where I work, I decided to write a new post about a game that took my attention during these last weeks. It is PopCap’s Plants VS. Zombies released on May, 5. The game was designed by George Fan, the same guy behind the unique Insaniquarium.

Before the release, some teasers of the game were published on Youtube. Those videos are really cool, mainly one of them starring a charismatic sunflower performing in a very cute song about zombies, plants, nutritional information about brains and so on. The lyrics are quite silly and addictive at the same time. I was anxious to put my hands on that interesting new title. Not because I like Tower Defence alikes, not because I like zombies (actually they make me laugh). But I was curious to see Plants fighting zombies, it should be funny and unusual. And I can’t deny that the song was echoing in my mind!

Finally when the game was released, I could try it out! I must confess that when I started to play, I wasn’t expecting a great experience, I don’t even like Tower Defence alike games. I thought: “It’s just a simple game that I should try for around 15 minutes to understand its mechanics and that is all!” However, I was completely wrong.

Every aspect of the game has a perfect harmony and balance! The goal is quite simple, you just have to avoid that the zombies get in your house and eat your brain (oh! It hurts!!!). To do that, you will use wide artillery of vegetables to protect your house, every plant has its own characteristics and particularities.

Your main resource in this game is the Solar Power, you use it to put your plants in the battlefield. During the day you can get the Sun item that falls from the sky time by time, but you certainly can’t just count with that. So, the Sunflower is a key plant to have with you, since it will generate more Solar Power to you. You’ll realize that the basic strategy is planting a considerable amount of Sunflowers to guarantee all the Solar Power that you’ll need to create your line defense and beat the levels.

There are also different types of zombies to annoy you (and believe me, some of them can really provoke you a headache). They are the real stars of the game. Sometimes it is difficult to maintain the concentration, because those guys are really funny and you will laugh a lot (especially when you see the “Michael Jackson” Zombie)! Most of them moves slowly, but it is necessary a lot of hits to destroy them, so isn’t that easy to beat them all, mainly because there are the moments of a massive attack, and you’ll have a lot of zombies advancing at the same time.

The first level quickly introduces the basic mechanic of the game with few tips. It is simply ridiculous how easy everyone learns to play it. The second level introduces a new degree of difficulty by adding two new lines to protect. After Each level you will find new plants cards (the game use a deck system, before playing the advanced levels you should choose which of your cards you’ll use in that match), items and hilarious zombies to fight.

As you advance, the degree of difficult increases in a moderate pace. But the game has a smooth curve of challenge, the levels are very well balanced, and you will want to keep playing to discover new things, new plants, items, zombies, scenarios and so on. It is simply impressive how this game can attract casual players and hard core players as well. George Fan designed a perfect experience to both audiences!

If you are a casual player you won’t find any problem to start to play and shoot the hilarious zombies for around 10-15 minutes to accomplish one level and then leave the game and return to your daily activities. If you’re a hard core player you will have a lot of fun by trying different combinations and strategies to master the skills and unlock all the extras as the mini games, puzzles and so on.

Definitely Plants VS. Zombies is one game that every wannabe game designers (just like me) should try and explore its nuances. We have a lot to learn with this unique reinvention of the Tower Defence style. It worth every cent you pay to buy it!