Opinion: Surprise! Your Game Is Canned

[In this opinion piece originally published in Game Developer Magazine's March 2011 issue, EIC Brandon Sheffield discusses what it is like to experience a sudden and unexpected game cancellation.] Until last month, I was contract narrative director for a mid-tier budget, big publisher-backed original IP for retail Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, as well as my work as EIC for Game Developer magazine. Then, suddenly, one executive shuffle later, projects were getting canned left and right, mine among them. It’s happened to nearly everyone in the industry, but it’s the first time for me, so I’ll delve into this a little bit. Well, That Sucks! Nobody saw it coming—the game’s alpha was approved and paid for, response from the publisher was positive, and all our ideas were really coming together. The story made sense and had a flow to it. All gameplay elements existed in the alpha, and our unique look was showing through. Five days after that, word came down that it was over. Ultimately, it came down to publisher finances, there was nothing anyone could do about it, and frankly I don’t even blame the publisher. Still, one can’t help but think—what if we’d put a little more effort in? What if we’d worked longer hours, or made our ideas more obvious in the alpha build? Would it have helped? Doubts and misgivings are difficult to avoid. The game took a lot of calculated risks, which for NDA reasons I obviously can’t divulge—did those risks keep us afloat longer, or did they kill us prematurely? Will I get to see these risks taken eventually in some other game, and burn at my missed opportunity? These questions are unanswerable, but always lurking in the back of my mind. Luckily, nobody’s losing their job over this—the team absorbed all its core members into other projects, and life goes on. As an external contractor though, my journey with this team has ended. It was a good group we had, with solid ideas, crazy work ethic, and a willingness to take a stab at something new. I suppose everyone feels that way about their teams, don’t they? What Now? When you’ve put months of your life and much of your brainpower into one project, it’s difficult to derail. I keep thinking of things I could do to make the story better, the characters more believable, the subtext more subversive. Since this does no particular good for anybody, I’ve got to redirect my thoughts to something else. And that’s one of the silver linings to a project cancellation—if you do have other ideas, a canceled game is obviously a huge disappointment, but it’s also a weight lifted. To make this magazine run and also be narrative director on a decent-sized game, I made myself work some crazy hours. Essentially, I never stopped. That may be a bad example to set in an industry plagued by crunch, but I wasn’t actually crunching in either job per se—I was crunching in life, by doing two full-time jobs simultaneously. Suddenly, I find myself with reams of free time. No weekly meetings, no deliverables, no misunderstandings to clear up, and no critical issues to think through. But the energy remains. I still need to “do,” and to “create.” I’ve talked a lot about the merits of smaller-scale teams and development, so I’m going to put my money where my mouth is, and work on a few iPhone and XBLIG projects I’ve been considering for some time, alongside some art and coding friends. There’s something to be said for working at your own pace, on a project that’s very much your own, even if the financial rewards are uncertain. Talent Bleed? I outlined all this so explicitly because I think my experience is not unique. When a project you’re passionate about slips away from you, the passion doesn’t go away. The need to create remains, and must be channeled somewhere, or be lost. I think this experience is what turns a lot of modern-day developers away from the traditional publisher-backed game industry. This is good for players, because they get more varied experiences across more platforms—but it’s bad for traditional game developers and publishers, because they may lose some of the people that will fight for risk and new experiences in traditional games. I’m certainly not saying I won’t work in a traditional game development setting again—I most likely will, when the opportunity presents itself. There are certain kinds of narrative experiences that are difficult to put forward with a small team, and those ideas still intrigue me. But there are persons for whom rest and repose hold only limited appeal—I think many game developers feel this way, and it’s what pushes us to keep creating and make the games we make. For all of you out there who may have recently lost your job, had your game canceled, been scaled to half-time, or anything of that nature, I urge you to find out what you really want to express, and find a way to make it happen for yourself, even if that’s not within games. Rather than looking at this as a time to mope and feel sorry for oneself, the best thing to do is to work on those smaller or weirder games you’ve had floating around in your head, write that screenplay, code that application, or finish that novel. That’s my challenge to myself, and to those of you in similar situations, I pose the same challenge. Let’s see what we can come up with before we get back to the big grind, if indeed we ever do.