Erin: Welcome to T2A chat. We’re with creative director Sid Meier at the home of Firaxis Games video game development studio near Baltimore, Maryland. Named after an orchestral work composed by the company founder, 'Firaxis' is a fusion of 'fiery' and 'axis.' This communicates the company’s vision. Firaxis has released twelve 'triple-A' products in ten years and is recognized as a global industry leader. Let’s get started with a question from Ethiopia…
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Wondwossen, Ethiopia (email): What’s the secret behind a great video game?
Sid: Great video games are made by people who love to play video games and have the technology and creativity to make new ones.
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Erin: Tell us all about your Civilization and the decision to put it on console now…
Sid: With the great new next gen console technology we felt we could finally really bring Civilization to life for the console audience. Great graphics, great sound, multi player play, super special effects and tons of fun!!!
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Katie: Can you describe your education and career path? How did you become a computer game developer and where did you get your inspiration?
Sid: I've always loved games even before video games. I play board games and family games. When I went to the University of Michigan, I studied computer programming and game design was a way to combine two things that I really enjoyed. I started very early in the game industry and made a couple of games all by myself. I've been really lucky to be making games for over 25 years. Many of the games I've created were based on things that I enjoyed when I was a kid. Whether pirates or airplanes or history, they're all things that I kind of was fascinated by when I was young.
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Katie: What advice would you give to a young person interested in a career like yours?
Sid: If you want to get into the game business, we first recommended a well-rounded education, because the game needs to be about something and the more you know about the world, the more interesting your games will be. It also helps to have a skill like programming, art, sound, design that we need to make games. But some game designers have even started as play testers or level designers.
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Xman Spiderman (email): Do you have any projects or advice for computer engineering students?
Sid: Our best advice is to make a game. It doesn't have to have great graphics or animation but it's helpful if you can show that you've actually made a game as opposed to just playing a lot of games.
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Erin: Describe if you can the typical user of one of your games…do you try to reach outside your biggest customer base and if yes, where?
Sid: We try to make games that are fairly general interest games...civilization players come in all ages, genders and nationalities. We try to make games that are easy to start playing but increase in depth and variety the more you play them.
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Erin: Many of your games, such as Colonization and Gettysburg, have historical bases. Would you describe yourself as particularly interested in history? What about the past makes it such a good setting for your games?
Sid: I am interested in history. It is a common experience that allows people to jump right into games and start playing with what they already know. If you know a little about the history of the world, you can play civilization and if you know about pirates you can play Pirates.
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Erin: Can you name some of your favorite computer games?
Sid: Starcraft, Age of Empires, Gran Tourismo,Guitar Hero.
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Erin: What computer game are you most proud of?
Sid: There's something special about all my games but Civilization is probably the one that has turned out the most like I wanted it to.
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Erin: Tell us about some of your flops…
Sid: Not every game idea that we try works out. A dinosaur game comes to mind....we tried a number of different approaches but none of the games were as fun as the idea that dinosaurs really deserves but we hope someday to make a great dinosaur game.
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Ryan: What part of programming is your favorite and where at Firaxis are you most hands-on in terms of involvement?
Sid: I'm most hands on at the early stages where we're exploring all sorts of possible ways of creating the game. And that's also my favorite part of the project, seeing the blank screen start to turn into a game is very satisfying.
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Ryan: What sets your games apart from others that are similar?
Sid: I think each designer brings their own style, approach to gaming. My games tend to be about real world ideas. They allow the player to drive the story and be the star of the game and they offer a lot of "replay ability" and variety and interesting decisions for the player.
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Erin: Talk about the trends you see in video gaming in terms of development, here in the United States and elsewhere around the world…
Sid: I think we're seeing a number of new genres of gaming which keep the industry vital and always exciting. We're seeing massively multi-player games become very popular, the quality of games on new consoles is really amazing and we're seeing innovation in casual gaming with the Nintendo Wii and lots of creative games on the Nintendo DS System.
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Erin: What about video game competition – how big is it and do you believe it’s good for the industry?
Sid: It's great that there are many good games out there. Our feeling is that if someone plays a good game from another company, they'll be back to play more games and maybe one of ours...competition is good because it forces us all to make better games.
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Erin: How difficult is it to protect your material – even your ideas?
Sid: That's really not something we worry too much about, even two designers might approach the same topic but make very different games so we're not trying to protect our idea because we have lots of other ideas, so that's not something we're too concerned.
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Erin: What future intellectual properties is Firaxis planning?
Sid: That's a question we can't say too much about right now. We can say really cool ones, though. We're working on some great new games and hopefully we can talk about them before too long.
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Erin: Civilization Revolution is hitting U.S. store shelves today but it's already been out in Europe. Talk about the release and how widespread is it...will it also be released in other regions of the world?
Sid: It hit North American shelves today...it's been out in Europe and will be hitting the rest of the world over the next month or so...learn more about it at www.civilizationrevolution.com or www.firaxis.com
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Dave: Do you forsee a time when open source games might really take off, or is that almost impossible given the typical skill set of volunteers? Also, if open source games were to take off, would that scare you?
Sid: We're seeing more and more independently developed games, especially on the pc and with the huge budgets of Triple A games, there's also an opportunity for independent developers, open source desktop games, to kind of fill in the more casual gaming segment.
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Erin: What about the video game culture most troubles you, most inspires you?
Sid: Video gaming, it's great it's a worldwide form of entertainment, an experience we can share with other countries, cultures. We learn about other places by playing video games created there and I think it often has a learning component to it that teaches young people about things they might not otherwise learn about.
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Erin: What role would you take if you could be in a video game and what title would you give the game?
Sid: We've actually talked about making a video about making video games but it's not as exciting as you might think (laughs). So we'll stick to making games about famous people and not designers.
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Erin: That’s wraps T2A webchat with video game developer Sid Meier of Firaxis Games. Our thanks to Sid and to you for joining us. We hope you can come back on Wednesday, July 16th at 1800 utc when we learn about the history behind the Olympic Movement and Olympic Games. We’ll talk with historian David Wallechinsky as competitors around the world prepare for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing. That’s Wednesday, July 16th at 1800 utc right here on voanews.com See you then! |
