The Chris Cobb Interview

[HalStep 855]

we have another great interview from Ross Sillifant a.k.a Chryssalid,so please enjoy:

 

  GOG Presents The Chris Cobb Interview

 

 

My latest in an on-going series of 'Unsung Heroes', is none other than
Mr Chris Cobb,

Chris, you have the floor Sir, please introduce yourself to our readers.

Hello! I’m Chris Cobb. At the time of this writing I’ve been in the games
industry for 16 years. The majority of that time was spent working on larger
projects at larger companies, but 4 years ago I left my job at Disney to start
Ragtag Studio, a very small 3 person studio.

Q)Am i right in thinking you were involved at High Voltage on N64
Paperboy?, if so, what can you tell us with your exp.on the game and
the N64 itself?.Game seemed an odd choice for myself to appear updated
on N64, being a 2D classic that i felt only really 'worked' in the
arcades (i know i'll be shot for saying that), turning it into 3D and
putting it on a powerful system, throttled back by it's choice of
storage format-carts at a time everyone was using CD's.

You are exactly right. In fact, Paperboy 64 was the first game I ever worked on,
so it has a special place in my heart. As you can imagine, working on games
back then was totally different from how things work now. The thing that
sticks out to me the most was just how far game engines and tools have come
since then!

I was hired as an environment artist, which means I would build the
environment related visuals in a 3D program, then export that out to
the engine on which the game runs. I didn’t hate on it too much back then,
because I didn’t know how good things would be in the future, but in
retrospect, the process I touched on above was unbelievably complicated and
time consuming, especially when you consider how simple the geometry we were
working with was back then! I’m sure my memory on the specifics is off,
but I would say it would take somewhere around 2 hours before I could see
my geometry in game, whereas today it's nearly instant no matter what engine
you use. Things really have improved for the better!

But anyway, I can certainly understand why you had a hard time seeing a
classic game given a totally different treatment in 3D. That’s pretty much
human nature. While I did like the original Paperboy, I also enjoyed the
new version we made, and was happy with the end result. The game wasn’t
without its problems, and yes, those problems were largely due to the fact
that the game was now in 3D, but I enjoyed the art style and thought it was
a fairly successful modern take on the classic.

I’m really grateful that I got into the industry just before cartridges
had gone away. Somehow my involvement in that game feels a lot more permanent,
just because it's stored on a cart, instead of digitally. Though in reality,
the opposite is more likely true!

Q)you were also involved in the stunning Thief:Deadly Shadows and the
not bad....Deus Ex:Inv War (I personally found it a little dumbed down
compared to the original) on Xbox etc, would you mind talking us
through your roles on both and thoughts on the Xbox (which MS killed
off way too early i found :-( ).

I was hired at Ion Storm Austin as a hybrid environment artist / designer.
The designer addition was new to me and something I was very excited about.
I was specifically hired to work on the Thief Deadly Shadows team, but at
a certain point a good chunk of the team was moved over to help get
Deus EX: IW out the door.

If you know both of these games, you’ll understand why the need for
hybrids like me were necessary. In Thief, the art and the gameplay
are so tightly intertwined, it's nearly impossible to separate the two.
Just to give an example: In Thief, you control a character who spends
the majority of his time hiding in the shadows from enemies.
The lights in the environment very literally dictate how visible you are.
So the placement of the lights is critically important for gameplay.
Well, as any artist would tell you, the placement of lights is also a
critically important aspect of making environments look good! So naturally,
in a game like Thief there would be a lot of push and pull between designer
and artist if they were two totally separate positions.

Enter the hybrid artist designer, a role meant to marry the two.
Basically, artists who had the ability to approach the creation of
the environment with the eye of a designer. This was useful for
Deus Ex as well, though a bit less so.

As far as Xbox development was concerned, I don’t have too much to say
about that really. For the majority of the team, we work on PC’s in the
engine the game is built on (in the case of Thief, it was a modified
version of the Unreal 2 engine), and we don’t have much direct interaction
with the target platform. Close to the end there are concessions made for
frame rate and whatnot. But I didn’t even look at an Xbox during most of
development. And you could say the same for most games I’ve worked on since that time.

Q)I'm going to cover Stubbs The Zombie:Rebel Without A Pulse now, as
it was 1 of my personal favorites from the 'Twilight' era of the the
Classic Xbox, the game was something of a very brave 'experiment' was
it not?.Your lead character was in fact something of a looser, game
didn't take itself seriously at all (thank god), before i get onto
the more serious questions about the game, i have to compliment (what
was a small team) it on it's fantastic use of art, it seemed to draw
inspiration from every aspect of 1950's culture i could wish
for-Popular Science magazines combined with horror comics, mixed in
with you name it, it was fantastic, even more so when i consider by
then the Halo Engine was no spring chicken..

So, in your own words could you talk us through your role on the game,
how 'easy' it was in bringing to life what you yourself had thought up
(perhaps starting from paper+pencil concept sketches etc?) and
basically anything with regards to the 'risks' the team knew they were
taking with the game-Video Game Humour is often a very narrow path to
walk and media hype seemed very much focused on 'The Next Big Thing',
as it sadly always is, in this case the Xbox 360, was there a real
sense of concern the game would be overlooked?

Thanks very much for your kind words regarding Stubbs the Zombie! To this day
it has a very small, but dedicated fanbase. It never gets old when I meet
someone that knows about, and enjoys the game.

It was indeed ahead of its time for a variety of reasons. First and foremost,
it was out in front of the whole zombie craze. Not only that, but it remains
a very different take on what has become a very crowded and overdone genre.
In most ‘zombie games’, you are simply dudes with guns laying waste to waves
and waves of zombies. Stubbs was a very different take on that, since you play
as the zombie.

The other reason I felt Wideload (the developer) was ahead of its time,
it felt like one of the first true indie studios. A small (I was the 8th
employee, and we only got as large as 20) self funded studio dedicated to
making its own ideas into games and owning its own IP. This was before the
iPhone even existed, and right around when Steam launched, and the first
version of the Unity engine had released. So there wasn’t much of an indie
game movement just yet.

Anyway, Ion Storm was going downhill and I wanted to move back to Chicago
where I had started my game career. I heard about this oddity of a company
named Wideload and emailed Alex Seropian, the founder.
(he was also one of the co-founders of Bungie) We traded a few emails,
did a few interviews, and I was hired on with the title ‘Art Commando’.

At small companies like these, most of the employees need to have a very
broad skillset and wear a lot of hats. So while I hadn’t done much outside
of environment art and design at this time, I had demonstrable experience
with broadening my comfort zone and taking on a variety of tasks, so we felt
I was a good fit for this position. Art Commando meant that I would be doing
a little bit of everything on the art side. That is exactly what it turned out
to be.

I was actually hired when Stubbs was already halfway through production.
And while the gameplay and character art were solid when I was hired, the
environments were a mess, and all other aspects of art needed a lot of help.
So mostly came in to do a lot of heavy lifting to get the environments under
control, and just help out with a lot of misc tasks related to characters,
animations, cinemas, and just about everything else art related.

Unfortunately, because I wasn’t there from the start, I can’t speak too much
about how the idea came about, or how decisions were made in face of a variety
of risks. I did hear stories though. One that everyone liked to tell was about
the process of finding a publisher for the game. The game was brought to nearly
every big publisher, and the responses ranged from confusion to comical. One in
particular responded with something along the lines of, ‘Oh wow, this is really
great! You are really onto something here! But I do have one small suggestions.
What if, instead of you being the zombie, you could be a guy with a gun and shoot
the zombies!’ This publisher obviously didn’t get it.

Releasing so close to the end of the Xbox’s life cycle was definitely a concern.
But one that you can’t do too much about. We never know in advance how long a
game will take, or when the platform holders will decide to launch the latest
version of their product. It's impossible to know how this ultimately affected sales.

Q)Sticking with the use of the Halo engine, what sort of techniques
were used to make stubbs really capture that 1950's comic book vibe
and stand out the way it did? and was the engine used for convience?
ie you were a small team, did'nt have the time or resources to code an
engine from scratch, clear Xbox in twilight time of it's commercial
era etc?.

Everything that went into Stubbs presentation, all of the art, the music,
the dialogue, all did so with a 50’s twist applied to it. I think the most
prominent 50’s nod was the soundtrack. All of the songs in the game were
songs that were actually popular in the 50’s, so you can’t get much more
blatant than that.

The art style was something I would describe as ‘retro future 50’s’ That
may sound contradictory. All of the characters, architecture, and the
vehicles were designed with a style popular in the 50’s, but everything
was given ingredients from the future as well. For example, many of the
cars were actually hovercars. It all fit really well. Back in the 50’s
robots were quite popular even though they weren’t real. Well, in Stubb’s
those robots that everyone fantasized over in the 50s actually were real.

One great example of the past meeting the present: A robot would roll up
and put gas in your car for example. The younger generation may not even
realize there used to be gas station attendants to pump gas in your car.
Heck, it was even before my time. But there certainly never were robots
that did it for you! Super cool.

As for the choice of engine. I wasn’t around for that, but the reasons
are very clear to me. Much of the team that made Stubbs the Zombie were
ex Bungie employees. As your rightfully pointed out, Stubbs was made with
the Halo engine, which was a product of Bungie. So naturally, most of the
employees were familiar with the engine. And while I’m only speculating,
I’d imagine that the owner of Wideload worked out some sort of agreement
where he could continue to use this engine, or at the very least licence
it very cheaply.

Q)Difficult question and i fully understand if you'd prefer not to
answer it, but how would you describe Wideloads relationship with THE
PRESS regarding Stubbs, both in USA and Europe?.From what i recall
certain areas of the US Press took an utterly bizarre angle and
attacked the game over Stubbs being a Cannibal-like a serious WTF
moment if ever i did, whilst here in UK, likes of Eurogamer took a
somewhat sulky attitude (and a sense of humour by-pass) moaning game
wasn't funny, was too short yadda yadda.

Were there inward groans (no pun intended) when Wideload, a fledgling
studio, had to devote time and resources countering the bizarre-Wahhh
he's a Cannibal, ban this sick filth etc and the stoney cold reviewers
from likes of Eurogamer (It's ratings like the 4/10 Eurogamer gave
Stubbs and Edge gave AVP on Jaguar that put me off trusting reviews
for life, the 'experts' were so far off the mark it was unreal).

I will pass on this one. The press wasn’t something I was terribly concerned with,
and as a result I don’t have much knowledge of it and therefore not much of an opinion.
Sorry!

 

Q) Were there ever plans for a Stubbs 2? maybe on 360?.I ask as i kinda
had my fingers crossed MS would bring out new installments of things
like Stubbs, Quantum Redshift, Kung Fu-Chaos etc on the 360, as i
loved them on Xbox, instead MS seemed to kill off every god damn thing
of promise (Freelancer 2), so i wondered if you/the team were ever
approached for a sequel or put proposals forward and how far they
got?

Everyone at the studio wanted to make a Stubbs 2, but as the first one didn’t
exactly light up the sales charts, and publishers weren’t throwing money at
us to make a sequel, it never happened. I know for sure that there are at least
a couple of different story treatments for what would have happened if we had
the opportunity to make a sequel. But alas, that will never happen now since the
team is scattered to the four winds and the IP is owned by Disney.

I hesitate to call the game I’m working on now, Ray’s the Dead, a spiritual
successor to Stubbs, but it was heavily inspired by it, and will likely be
the closest thing that Stubbs fans will ever get to a sequel. So do with
that info what you will.

Q)If you don't mind me asking, how do you find the working environment
of a small studio, compared to being under the Umbrella as it were of
working for a large, multi-tiered company? are you in essence
balancing creative freedom, with a degree of job security? or..given
the nature of big publishers laying off staff seemingly at a whim if
latest hyper game falls below sales projections, do you find yourself
better off?

Could you tell us the processes behind forming your own studio's? how
you guys all came together?

This is a tricky question, as my answer to this has changed so drastically
over the years. About 10 years ago I would have told you that large,
AAA studios were my life's goal. About 6 years ago I would have told
you large AAA studios were the devil, and having your own small studio
is where it’s at. Today, I would say that having your own small studio
is insanely difficult, and boy there really are a lot of advantages to
working at a larger studio! The grass is always greener on the other
side and all that.

The truth is I haven’t yet found the proper balance between the two.
Working at bigger studios, the pay was great, work hours were reasonable,
live outside of work … was a real thing. Having my own studio, we have
creative freedom, we don’t have to answer to anyone, we make our own
schedule. If only I could take ALL of the best of both and combine them
into a single work place! That’s the trick isn’t it?

Currently, all of the luxuries associated with having our own studio
come at a great price. We haven’t drawn a paycheck in 4 years.
Because of that, there is never a point in life where I feel ok about
NOT working, so enjoyment of life is at a bit of a low. It’s really tough.
And what makes it harder is there is no guarantee that things will improve
when Ray’s the Dead is released. The market is really competitive right now.

I don’t have any pretty bow to tie this story off with. I’ll just say
that no job, no scenario, is perfect.

As for how the studio formed, I imagine it’s a fairly common story
these days. A couple of long time developers (in this case, myself and Matt)
had been working at larger studios for quite a while. After years of
disillusionment, we decided the time was finally right to take the plunge
and form our own studio. For a few months, it was just Matt and myself.
We were hot on the lookout for a programmer that we could trick into
giving up a six figure paycheck to work with us for nothing. We eventually
were really fortunate to find Shawn, who was in the same mindset as us,
and enthusiastic about what we were working on. He took the plunge with us,
became an equal partner, and off the three of us went.

Q) Rays The Dead (fantastic title) has been described as the
'Spirtual' Successor to Stubbs, why 'Spirtual' i wonder?.Licensce
issues perhaps or did it allow you the 'freedom' to retain elements
from Stubbs, but take the 'sequel' in a fresh new direction for todays
gamers?.Also game was annouced for:PS4, Vita, PC, Mac+Linx, that's a
lot of platforms for a small team to handle (and any plans for XB1 in
future?).

Given the cut-throat nature of the industry today, do you find you
have to launch on as many platforms as possible, to get noticed/reduce
marketing costs, i wonder?.

I touched on this a bit earlier, but Ray’s the Dead is definitely
not a sequel to Stubbs, since it has nothing to do with that story.
Its also not something I’m comfortable calling a spiritual successor,
if only because I wasn’t one of the core team that came up with the
Stubbs idea, and none of those people are involved in the development
of Ray’s the Dead. But what I am comfortable saying is that if you
were a fan of Stubbs, you will find a lot to like here, along with
a fairly direct reference or two. And besides, it’s likely the closest
thing you’ll ever get to a sequel. Disney owns the rights to Stubbs,
and people far more influential than I have tried to pry it out of their
hands with no luck. So I wouldn’t get my hopes up!

As far as our choice of platforms, you are right that we have
committed to a lot and perhaps over extended ourselves being such a
small team. There are reasons each platform was chosen. Some I can
go into specifics on and some I can’t.

PC was an obvious choice. We are developing on PC, and the barrier
to entry there is the lowest so really it would be foolish not to.
The Mac and Linux versions were added primarily because we are
developing in the Unity Engine, which makes the process of porting
to different platforms fairly straightforward. So the hope is the
MAC and Linux versions are fairly straightforward. We may eat those
words however.

As for the PS4. That happened for a variety of reasons. First and
foremost was because Sony took a great interest in Ray’s the Dead
from the very first time we showed it to them. They have been
extremely supportive of us. We actually showed them the game before
the PS4 was even announced. Once it was announced, it became the
obvious choice of platform. It may have been a better idea to
concentrate on the PC version first, but Sony’s enthusiasm and
support went a long way toward making us want to support their platforms.

The Vita version is something Sony approached us with, and it's
something we were excited to do as fans of the system. We also
hoped it would add some value to the PS4 version as it will be a
cross buy title. The Vita version is definitely going to be the
biggest challenge for us, but it’s something we really want to
make happen for the fans, and for our friends at Sony.

Q)Sticking with Ray, could you talk us through some of the design
processes involved in the game? From concept art, preliminary sketches
etc, just how much from concept makes it to final game and what's the
trade-off in terms of things that sound or indeed, look 'cool' on
paper, but simply don't work in game?

I hate to disappoint, but for Ray’s the Dead i’ve largely
shifted from art over to design. Matt Carter is responsible
for the look of the game, and is the one that deserves all
the praise that you’ve heaped on the look of the game.

He puts all of his heart and soul into the characters of
Ray’s the Dead. I’ve seen piles of sketches on his desk and
computer monitor. It's hard to say how many iterations he
goes through before finalizing one, but his process works
because they all look great.

I can say as a tiny team with very limited resources,
we certainly don’t have the luxury to experiment and discard
too much work. Iteration, while still necessary, just isn’t
something we can allow too much time for. Fortunately Matt
nailed his artstyle down early on and has been able to crank
out characters at a steady clip.

There hasn’t been too much that flat out didn’t work in game.
But there are many things that need to be changed or improved
once we see them in game. One thing in particular is the color
palette of the different zombie types Ray can control.
There has been a fair amount of back and forth regarding which
color would best represent each zombie type, what colors are
easily identifiable from each other, etc. As you select different
zombie types to control, Ray’s bulb and aiming beam will change
color to match the zombie type you have selected. So we had to
choose colors that are clearly different from each other,
and also translate well to being a part of Ray’s look.

Q)The Art (concept and in-game) in Rays The Dead, is bloody marvelous,
character designs are superb, vibrant use of colours, packed with
humour and detail, really makes for some stand out 'eye candy', which
do you, personally prefer, the concept stages, ie drawing up
characters, foes, locations etc or designing the environments they'll
feature in?.

Also, is it a rewarding job? being an artist in today's industry?.I
mean you must be doing something right, i'm very cynical by nature,
but you've made me sit up and take notice with Stubbs and now Rays The
Dead.

Well, the answer is easy for me since I work on designing environments,
and I don’t work on characters. I have always focused on environments
and level design. I very much enjoy all the challenges associated with
level design. And as I always say, I feel the environments are often
the most important characters in any game.

It can be rewarding. It just depends on what you are willing to accept
as compensation. If it's money, then yes it can certainly be rewarding.
If you enjoy making people happy when playing your game, it is rewarding
in that way too. If you are looking for fame or recognition, well that’s
pretty hard to achieve in game development. I can’t name terribly many
artists in game development aside from people I know personally, can you?

Q) Sony, on paper, seem very keen to push the likes of PS4 and Vita
(Vita espically now 'Triple-A Game development' seems to have fallen
off, as the 'ideal home' for Indie developers, hell even Jeff Minter
is on-board with TxK...

But in reality are they doing everything they can to support Indie
developers, once they are signed (?) in terms of support and perhaps
most importantly, marketing...i ask because even now the PSN store is
a bloody nightmare to navigate (PS3/PSP owner myself) even when you
know what your looking for, let alone trying to discover new gems.Is
there ever a feeling your new titles might get over-looked?.

This is an interesting topic that I can only speak to from our perspective.
The level of support they provide can vary greatly depending on a number of
factors. Those range from concrete factors like ‘are they funding your game’
to the more vague ‘how much does someone there like your game’.

We have the good fortune of having a very favorable relationship with them,
and I can say that their level of support has been FAR above and beyond what
we ever expected. I mean, they had us playing the game on stage during their
E3 press conference. Really, it doesn’t get any better than that,
and I still can’t really believe that happened.

I can’t yet speak to the support we will receive regarding the PSN store
as the game is not yet released. I am equal parts concerned about how
crowded the store is, and optimistic that we will get some kind of prominent
visibility when the game first launches. No promises have been made,
this is purely based on the level of support they have given thus far.

Now, while we have had an exceptionally positive experience with Sony,
I have heard from other developers that can’t get Sony to give them the
time of day. This is the unfortunate downside of having human beings
champion your game, rather than pushing it through an automated platform
like Steam. A lot is left to circumstance. Does there happen to be anyone
that will like your game? Is your game the kind of thing that the platform
is focusing on right now? Any number of factors could mean you aren’t going
to make any inroads into the company, and certainly that can feel very
frustrating. But for now, a platform with a curation process in place,
and interaction with humans is working well for us.

Q)What about what i call the 'mainstream media'? we all know
physical/print magazines are in decline, printing costs through the
roof, internet etc providing digital media 24/7, so is there a
tendency for them to focus perhaps a bit too much on big name games,
from big name publishers whose advertising keeps the physical mags
alive?.Basically how difficult is it to get a new title like Ray, the
notice it deserves, with so much out there fighting for consumers
attention?Or have likes of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube become the new
marketing battlegrounds and word of mouth replacing multi-page press
Ads?

So as you may have heard, we have partnered with Adult Swim to act as
publisher for Ray’s the Dead. The primary reason is, as you mentioned
in your question, that there are a lot of games fighting for the
consumers attention. We felt we needed to do what was necessary to
ensure we had a chance of getting the word out in today's crowded market.
No chance we could do that on our own, so we turned it over to someone who can.

To be honest it wasn’t an easy decision. We had actually been talking
with Adult Swim for more than two years before signing the deal.
We were really hesitant to partner with a publisher, as early on we
had hoped it wouldn’t be necessary. But during that time, the market
became more and more crowded, and the choice became easier.
They have some great marketing plans that we are excited about.

As far as what the effective methods of marketing are, I can only tell
you what I’ve been told by our publisher and various conversations with
others. Streamers and social media seem to be the way to go.
A good combination of an effective message, coupled with positive
word of mouth and a few prominent streamers playing your game is
what we are hoping for. We will also have a pretty snazzy TV commercial
that will run on Adult Swim from what I understand!

Paying for print or web ads has never been a part of any conversation
I’ve had with any publisher. I don’t think that is considered a cost
effective way of getting the word out. I have even been told that attention
from the press isn’t a terribly effective way to move the needle.
But of course I’d love to see a lot of that.

Q)Final couple of questions, cliched one 1st....

Can you tell us of any Lost games (any formats) you've worked on over
the years and what became of them? (this for Unseen64/GTW).

One of my favorites was an expansion pack for a game called Ground Control.
The expansion was called Ground Control: Dark Conspiracy.
This was very exciting for me as it represented a few firsts for me.
One, it was my first PC game. Second, it was an expansion for a game
I was already a fan of, which was exciting. And third, it was the first
time I was able to work on a game in a genre I was a really big fan of.

Anyway, I certainly consider that a lost game. Though I did just check and
see that you can get the base game, the expansion that I worked on, and the
sequel on GOG.com. I may have to check it out again soon!

Where can we find your latest (and indeed future games)a link so we
can promote the site would be fantastic.

Our website is in need of an overhaul, but currently it's the best place to keep up with us:
http://ragtagstudio.com/

And...any messages for your fans who are reading?

I always encourage anyone that has an interest in any form of entertainment to dig
a bit deeper into your hobby of choice to see what you might discover.
In any medium, it's always easy to hear about the latest AAA blockbuster game,
the hottest band, or the highest grossing movie. But all of these forms of
entertainment offer so much more that you won’t know about unless you put some
time and energy into digging a little deeper. It's worth the extra effort.

 

[YODA 331]

Thanks for sharing this! =)

 

[Alcoholic1978 540]

That was a good read . thanks for posting .