Ep01: Interview with Senior Game Designer Douglas Burton at Polyarc — Transcript & Show Notes

Transcript:

Episode Overview (00:00) :

(John) On this Out of Play Area episode, you’ll listen to a fellow Full Sail University game development alumni and dear friend Douglas Burton. Doug’s worn many hats in game development where he’s danced the full spectrum between game design and coding to refine his specialty as a puzzle designer. I got to work with Doug at Midway, Austin back on our first shipped title, Blacksite Area 51. Since then, he’s gone on to work for studios all throughout the United States and across the pond in Scotland.

Listen in as Doug opens up about finding the right college to achieve his goals onto developing console games, working in mobile, meeting Steven Spielberg himself, and hear his perspective on the importance of studio culture and equitable hiring practices. Welcome game designer at Polyarc in Seattle, Detroit’s own, Doug Burton. Let’s start the show.

Show Introduction (00:59)

(Catherine) Bienvenido! Bienvenue! Welcome to the Out of Play Area podcast, a show by video game devs for gamedevs, where the guests open up one on one about their journey, their experiences, their views, and their ideas. No ads, no bullshit. Join us as we venture far out of the play area with your host, seasoned game designer John Diaz.

1: Game Devs in Movies (01:21)

(John) I think you and I have had this conversation before where they’re like, get someone to play a game developer and then they’re like, “All right, guys, do your job!” And then they’re like mashing the controller furiously or something. Like that’s what we actually do at work.

(Doug) I always see that’s always one of those things where like if you see something in a movie that is like your job, then you can tell how fake they make it look. And you always see that in movies when someone is playing a video game and you know they are pressing every button. I’m like You don’t You can’t press that many buttons at once like I don’t know what game they're playing that’s gonna even register all those button presses. That’s not how it works.

(John) That’s a great point, man, that an amazing input pipeline right there, too.

(Doug) And I got to mention one thing that always bugged me in Charlie’s Angels years ago with like, Lucy Liu and Cameron Diaz and Drew Barrymore. There’s a scene where they fall in this room with these two kids playing with an N64 controller and they’re playing a Final Fantasy game and they’re both playing at the same time. I’m like, First off, there’s no final fantasy on N64 none of them were multiplayer. So I was just like for so many reasons this whole scene is fake. But of course in the theater no one wants to hear that. But, like this is so fake!

(John) You’re the only one standing up.

(Doug) Exactly! They’re like that’s not what this scene is about. It’s about Charlie’s Angels, not the games.

(John) Accuracy, man. I’ve always valued the opportunity, or I’ve dreamt of the opportunity to be some type of Game Dev Consultant on some project. We need a professional. Come in here and tell us how it should be done.

(Doug) See that sounds like the real dream job like just come in and give someone all your ideas about what game development should look like.

2: A Toast (03:07)

(John) So what are you sipping on?

(Doug) Ooh Yeah, I was I mentioned I was going to try and find a stout for today and I was looking around. I found this one that was on limited release at the store. So I decided to I had to get me one. It was limit one per person and I was like, I gotta get it. It is Evil Twin Brewing and it’s called “Some people are immune to good advice” Maple Bourbon barrel aged stout.

(John) Yo. Yes, man. Yes. When? When you told me you were going to get a stout. I try to match my guest. I want to be on the same wavelength with them. So I went ahead and got me Dragon’s Milk Bourbon Barrel Aged Stout. This one’s got vanilla. Anytime I see kind of vanilla or coffee and bourbon. Bourbon barrel. I like to check it out. Well, to that, sir. Cheers. Salud.

(Doug) Cheers to you sir!

(John) Santé! Yeah, Yeah.

(Doug) Mm hmm. That was good. That Maple that barrel. That bourbon barrel. Oh, it all comes through great.

(John) Oh Yeah. Okay. This is gonna be a great show. Gonna be a great show.

3: Working in a Pandemic (04:20)

(John) How? How has the pandemic been treating you?

(Doug) Yeah, I’ve always felt like my dream has been to work from home this easy, and I think that people too. But no one wanted it to happen like this sort of situation. But the introvert in me is very happy to be able to be at home so much and I can roll out of bed a half-hour before our morning meetings and doesn’t matter if I’m still in my pajamas. So I love that part about it. But, you know, I just moved to Seattle this year. So the downside is I still have really seen the city or gotten to do much. So professionally work from home has been right up my alley, but socially, I’m like, Oh, man, I need to get out. I need to do more stuff to get my mind off games off work sometimes. So I miss that aspect.

(John) Because you moved not too shortly before all this hit. When did you get to Seattle?

(Doug) Yeah, I got to Seattle. Uh, at this point, about a year ago, a year and a couple of months ago.

(John) So it was like you were in Winter, you were in Winter 2019? Yeah.

(Doug) Winter was just getting started.

(John) That’s a great place to start. Let’s start from when you got to Seattle.

4: Working in Mobile Development for Scientific Games (05:33)

(John) What brought you to Seattle? Because I really thought that there was no way you were ever gonna leave Austin, Texas.

(Doug) It kind of surprised me, too, but yeah, because I’ve been in Austin for, like, 12 years at that point, or at this point, and I was working at Scientific Games doing mobile gaming and mobileslot machine games. I was basically taking their Vegas slot machine games and taking the mobile version and doing the User Interace and the Gamification and all the mobile based text messaging, notifications, push messages, all that kind of extra mobile stuff, making all their games work with that. And that was like almost in my mind. I was like I could retire doing this because that was like easy game development, like the slot games were already done. The math for it all was already done by mathematicians who check it with the IRS. I think, and like it’s all it’s all federally checked out and all that. So the games are like super tight and well done, very non buggy. And I just had to do the UI wrapper on top of it and kind of make it fun and monetized. I was like, “This is doable.” You know, after making action console games and worry about performance. And, uh, you know, we gotta get out on time and some tight deadlines and just trying to make things bigger and bigger and bigger. It was nice to work on games that were kind of like already kind of set in their ways, and the audience for the game was super forgiving. So most of our our target demographic was women above 50. And yeah, they just like and gambling people just like colors and lights and sounds. And so it was. It was like a joy to make the game, but also kind of very easy game making. I would say.

(John) You hit on a lot of amazing things right there, Doug. I just want to take a step back, right, Because a lot of people may not realize that the primary market for mobile games are women above 50 right? Like my mom, the one time I put a tablet in her hand, right? Like, Hey, Mom, I bought you this for Christmas. This isfor us to face time and keep in touch. She said, Oh, can you put in like this Slot game and I was like Yeah sure. Here you go. Download it, installed it. And that was all I would see her do.

(Doug) They picked one game and yeah they are going to stick to it.

(John) She would get tight as well whenever the pay walls came up, right? Like, hey, you ran out of your daily allotment, right? Hey, but you can pay for more

(Doug) Yeah, that was that was the market. Like, you get those one or two whales who are spending a grand every week at least, and because, like, that’s when again they played. So that was their version of going out. That was their version of, you know, whatever their vice was, you know, they might not spend money on alcohol or partying or food or whatever. This game was that for them, for some people, you know. And some people are just really rich and just really like slot machine gaming on the go I guess. I can say I never totally understood it. I appreciate the games that they’re pretty games, but you don’t really you could never get the money back out like you could in Vegas. So in Vegas, you get the whole light sounds, But if you win, you could get actual money back. With mobile games you could win and you wouldn’t get any money back. You just got a higher bankroll to play the game more. So that part I always surprised me.

(John) I love it too, because, like to your point that we have always worked on cutting edge, state of the art graphics and you ux and UI and tight kind of rendering the console or the computer to its knees, right? Where as here, you kind of got to work on something solid and push it in whatever direction, knowing that it could take it right, because the processing wasn’t that that intense. Yeah. And what was funny? I remember at one point, one of our big big customers. She complained that her old tablet, the game was running slow on it. And she spent so much money, like every week in this game that it was much more cost effective to just buy her a new tablet. So we literally just bought her a new tablet, put her game, put her her information on it, copied over the stuff for her and then just mailed it to her. It was like, Here you go. Thank you for being a great customer. Here’s a new tablet. Just because, you know, she wasn’t techie. Like she just needed a screen that could play the game. But those old tablets just get older over time and, you know, and so that was the thing too. We have to make the game work for some kind of a low bar quality of cell phones. So that kind of kept the game simple art wise and just made it so I didn’t get too complex. So we got to worry about the game. Cool and fun and interesting without having to chase that, like graphical fidelity, that sort of thing. So that was one nice, nice break about it.

(John) Yeah, I can imagine. Right. Like typically, we worry about a few different skews, right? Like Xbox, PlayStation, PC, maybe some Nintendo console of some sort. Even when you’re PC, right? You gotta worry about a few different graphics cards. Or you could just be like, Hey, this is the minimum one. You know, you need a 1080ti, but for mobile, that’s a broad spectrum.

(Doug) Yeah so many phones. You got a different screen. Sizes and resolutions. Exactly. All that stuff. You do all kind of stuff, like and then if they want to rotate the phone, what happens if they put your app in the background? What happens and then worry about issues with, like, push notifications? And then, as the stores add new rules like you know, the Google store Apple store? They changed their rules about stuff like Keep up with that. So that was always tough, too, because then things changed. At one point, you used to be able toe have, like, a demo of your game. And then the demo was free and they have a paid version that had, like, no ads or something like that on and at a certain point decided they didn’t want they had too many games doing that. People get confused. So they made us that every game only gonna have one version. But they didn’t really stop anyone from keeping two versions. They were just occasionally be like, Oh, you have two versions. Your denied updating your game, and it’s like we weren’t denied just two days ago, and they’re like, Oh, sorry, never mind. We take it back. Yeah, it was like that all the time, like they would deny you or something. You call them like I get making about this and they’re like, Oh, never mind. It’s what we will ignore it. It was just such case by case, person by person approval stuff that mobile gaming was kind of a wild Wild West in that sense, in a few ways, too.

(John) Google and Apple gotta earn their 30% pay cut, right? They gotta They got to certify, make sure everything is running smoothly. I imagine that Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo don’t have to deal with the same volume that Google and Apple have to deal with.

(Doug) Yeah, that’s definitely true.

5. Working in Console Development (12:18)

(John) That’s so interesting. But like, mobile was not where you started right?

(Doug) Yeah, I think. Yeah, like I started off really doing console. Yeah, well, Midway Games where me and you met, you know, that was console. Wasn’t it a PC game. I think that the PC version came out later after, like, after consoles. Yeah. Did the console thing for a while lot of big action shoot em up type games. Clearly moved to I guess what I felt more and more casual type gaming. So even like more casual consoles and made a few Wii games and then I never did any, like, mobile console games. I think never gonna never hit that market. Like the 3DS. I never made a 3DS game or a PSP game.

(John) For sure. I would say the PSP. 3DS. Game Boy games were would be a different class from Mobile. Just touch controls versus tactile button controls they’re two different beasts.

(Doug) Yeah. Yeah. And then you people just people just playing them different ways. Different times. Uh, yeah, because I think when people the person who bought a PSP or the 3DS they were gonna play on the go and like that, they were gonna focus on. But then when Cell phones came out. People are gonna like player game for, like, 10, 30 10 seconds, 30 seconds and then go back to their email or phone call. And so games had to get, like, way faster way punchier. Your audience wasn’t gonna stick around for a half hour to finish a level. They were gonna be in for 30 seconds, and they if they can’t pause your game or get in and out. They’re probably not gonna keep playing. And so, yeah you have tothink about all that stuff and change how youre game works. Just if you’re going from, you know, console to mobile. The same game just won’t work.

(John) Yeah, it’s a different. It’s a different world, man. It’s a whole. It’s a lot of different skill sets, and I don’t think enough people out there appreciate the breadth of skills and challenges and problems to solve when you talk about developing the game right.

(Doug) Absolutely, absolutely that’s the hardest part of making a game is telling people who don’t make them how difficult it is. Sp when you start talking to people who want to make games or you started getting other companies involved who wanna like I wanna hire you to make game for me or I wanna port some other game to Mobile. And explaining how difficult it is is always hard because you’re like it’s a whole process. Like even though the games already done, you’re still making it from scratch. If you’re trying to port it or something like that, you will never. People are always surprised how much things cost in games, how long they take.

(John) I’ve never sat down and done a budget like I’ve never been in those conversations or if they’ve kind of asked me, I’m very bad with estimates, I rely on other people for that.

15:03 (Doug) I mean, yeah, that’s that’s one thing is definitely comes just with, like getting it wrong. Enough times like you get it wrong enough times that you figure out where you go wrong and try to estimate some stuff, and then you finally get good at it.

6. Making Video Games Was In Your Genes (15:28)

(John) When did you know that this was the world you wanted to get in? How did you end up in this?

(Doug) In like, games and general everything. Hmm? It was, like, for me. It was pretty early. It was like high school. I started. I started developing making games in high school. I found what was called a M.U.D. multi user domain. Um, and that’s when, like, games were just text based. So, like, you log on and then you read, you know, you’re in a inn, you know, press w to go West Press s to go South type thing.

(John) Yeah those text based RPGs

(Doug) exactly that is like that. And I found one. I was in the Dragonball Z and so I found one about Dragon Ball Z Dragonball Z World. And so I was playing that like, every day, and I played it enough that people with a lot of people would join the game. Be like, Hey, how do I do this? And so I had a macro for just, like, giving, like, tutorial stuff like press control one and be like, Oh, hey, to change your clothes. Do this blah, blah, blah. People were like, Oh, thanks. After a few weeks of doing that, the people who were running it we’re like, Hey, you’re always here. You’re really helpful Do you want to join the team? And I was like, Oh, I don’t know what I’ll do, but yeah, I’m in. And then I saw it. So that was the first time finding out like, Oh, you know, games are made by people like someone has to go in and think up everything you’re gonna do, describe it, get it made by artists, prototype by just by a programmer and make every part of that. And so I started doing that. I used to. I used to, like, Skip Lunch to go to the library and work on this game during lunch breaks. And at that point, I was like, Oh, I could like, make games. I’m gonna keep doing this. So that was very my plan after that.

(John) Is that because you had like your computer lab, you guys had a computer lab in the library and that was your access to the Internet?

(Doug) Exactly. We had a computer lab in the library. We had like one PC at home. I will work on that at home. Like my mom, she worked to computers. And so when she got home, she don’t really use our computer much like business purposes. And so I was using it for gaming all the freaking time.

(John) So you could say that it was in your blood. Oh, definitely. In the family genes.

(Doug) My mom, she’s a bit of a gamer, So really What? She What does she play? Oh, man.

(John) What does she play? She played any of your games. See, that’s that’s That’s the real question right there.

(Doug) She she’ll buy them, but I think they’re playing any of them. The close she came. Was she She had a Wii not a Wii U she had a regular Wii.

(John) Nobody had Wii U.

(Doug) Yes. Very confusing. Is it a Wii? Is it a Wii U? Is it the same? Is it different? Yeah. So she brought my game Boom Blocks Bash Party on the on the Wii. Yes. Yeah, she played that. And then she was just like I don’t get it. She’s like, I don’t get why it’s fun. I’m going back to Rock Band.

(John) A shout out to EA for publishing one of the I think, one of the few handful handful of games that well published under Steven Spielberg. Right,

(Doug) That was a cool. So I got to meet Steven Spielberg, so that was the highlight of my career.

(John) I feel like that’s gotta be like top 10.

(Doug) Oh, definitely, definitely. I was just like nice to meet you, Stephen. I was like, Oh my God, I called Steven Spielberg. Steven.

(John) I’m on a first name basis with Steven Spielberg.

(Doug) That’s how it felt. That’s how it felt. He had just came back from being on the set of Transformers. So we had a transformer hat on transformers T shirt on. So we got the bond or that, like, one second.

(John) Okay, I think he was like, producer on there. Probably.

(Doug) I think so. Yeah.

(John) I love that I love. See, there’s something to be said for all the craziness and the madness of the games industry. But it does rub. You do rub elbows with a lot of entertainment and and they don’t know how it goes on over here, right? Like we kind of have some idea. We think we have some understanding of how how it goes on in Hollywood and movies and things like this. But they definitely have no clue what goes into the game development.

(Doug) Definitely not. That’s what was so it was cool about when I met Steven Spielberg. I guess Boom Blocks was like his second game at that point. So he definitely seemed to have an idea. So he could, like, actually look at a level and he could give a nice little Oh, I like this part about it. And it makes sense. It was just like, Oh, pretty colors like No, he understand? What? What went into making the game? Kind of how hard, how long it takes. So it was a quick little introduction. We were like doing some levels for the game. So he was like, Oh, yeah, I want to meet the guys who were doing the levels and he would happen to be there the day we went to go visit EA. Um, that was super cool. Oh, I want to give a quick shoutout EA for doing one of the coolest things that also happened to me and video games. When I went out there the same trip to LA, where I’m about to meet Spielberg. They have a little ea shop where you can buy e A games for a cheaper.

(John) Which studio was this?

(Doug) It was in California, I think. Like so Cal. Nor cow like, uh s. Okay. Okay.

(John) Okay. So probably a l A. Probably the main campus over there. Yeah.

(Doug) Yeah, that’s right. It wasn’t l A. Yeah, yeah. So we were there for, like, a week just to get, you know, kind of like brain dump what the game is and what everybody wants to be in that sort of thing. Your contract do some levels for them. And then before, before I left, I was like, Oh, hey, can I buy some Sims upgrade or Sims DLC from you guys store? Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know, your contractor, you work for us, your story open to you. And so right where we were going to fly back, I go to the store. I’m like, Hey, I want to buy all these games, and they’re like, they’re like, Oh, you need an employees ID number. And I’m like, I’m just a contractor. Like I’m sorry. You can’t do. And I’m like, No, this is I was so excited about this. I have, like, 20 DLC fax was. gonna buy a super discount. Yeah, and then so then that didn’t happen. So I got back to Austin and one of producers. Their email, me. She’s like, Hey, I heard what happened. You know what? I’m sorry to help you out. Let me know which which packs you want, and I’ll give us into you. And I was like, Oh, thanks. You know, actually, I want these for my mom so you could just see them to her. And here’s which packs they want. And then they’re like, Oh, your mom, all that’s so sweet. And they just send her all the DLC packs they had on. I was like, That was super bad ass, you guys. And then they didn’t charge me. They were just like, Hey, thanks for helping us out. We have to help you out. So that was super cool. Oh, I love that for so many reasons, Doug one. You would think that as a game developer, we have our full of games, but no, like, there’s a vicious cycle of we work on games so we can make money to throw it right back in and buy more games. It makes it. I don’t feel as bad now when I buy expensive, like packs or whatever. I’m like. I’m supporting industry, so it’s worth it. Good man. Good man. You know, it’s crazy, bro, because the Sims community is strong and it is going. It never ends. It never ends, right, And it’s full of wonderful people, like it’s not. It’s not an average community, and it’s not like a hardcore. I don’t want to say toxic community, you know. But it is definitely on the on the on one of those showcases for like, yo, this is what a great gaming community can be kind of thing. It is like, Yeah, I just I just occasionally popped in and out of like, seeing what the Sims community is doing, and I know just recently that a big thing where they can with the melon unpack, Have you heard about the whole melon unpack issue? Let’s walk through it. Yeah, so then there was a big people were kind of ah, a little upset that some of the sims darker skin tones didn’t look really good in the game. And so one of the models, she made it her her whole deal to improve the skin tones in the Sims. She did a great job Everyone loved it became like a must have pack. And I guess they eventually got back to, you know, the Sims team about the issues with their skin color issues and all that. And so they were like, We’re gonna fix it. We see what you’ve done to make it work. We want to take that and put it in an actual official legit upgrade or expansion against. I’m not sure what to call it. But then that just recently came out. A couple months ago, they released their kind of update, and it had all those new skin tones in it and all that. And so that’s just super cool that, you know, that came out of the community. And then, you know, developers were ableto look at that and say we believe in this and we’re going to support it and actually make it part of the game. So that’s super shout out to x Mita Mita for that shot her out. Google her check out her twitch. She is. Ah, She’s a prominent member of the Sims community. We’re lucky to have her. And I’ve seen you. Your avatar, Doug. It looks it looks uncannily like you. I mean, yeah, that’s ah, that that’s that’s all. Clears work. My girlfriend. She got into the Sims a couple months ago. Really? And yes. So she is very detail oriented with our sims. How much time does she take? Hours? Hours? Yeah. So? So there’s something to be said.

7. Character Customization & Player Representation (24:11)

(John) Have you ever worked on a character, customization, feature or system? Because I’ve never worked on one. Actually, you know, I’ve I’ve dabbled with it, but I’m always keen to learn or hear about people that mess with those because they’re huge for some for some people, that’s like, 50% of the game.

(Doug) Oh, yeah, Oh, yeah. Like one game I worked on All Points Bulletin (APB) . That was probably our best feature we had. We had a super in depth character customization feature. You customize your character, customize characters, tattoos, every mole on one person’s body, basically, and then you do the same with like your vehicle. And so people got so different personal personalization that was really the best part of the whole game, and people spent hours and hours and there were whole communities around, just personalization features. And so I love any game that lets you get into that in detail because you can really do your own stories. Storyteller wants you to make your own characters like that. In depth wise, I’m always a fan of it when the games take that. Take that personally personalization system. Really seriously.

(John) Was that something that you were involved in? So that’s that was Real Time Worlds, right? Those were like the original Crackdown developers.

(Doug) Crackdown, and then the owner of Real Time World. I think he was the guy that originally made the first when they were the group that made the first GTA like the old school top down. Eight. Bit looking GTA.

(John) Yes, yes, it definitely there was. There’s there’s a lot of there’s a lot of talent. In what part of the UK was it?

(25:50)(Doug) That was a Scotland. Scotland’s up a Dundee Dundee, Scotland, Scotland It’s the sunniest place in Scotland apparently gets the most sunny days in Scotland.

(John) I always found that, like London and the Pacific Northwest and Seattle have similar weather.

(Doug) Definitely, Dio definitely do agree. That’s why I feel like I haven’t haven’t changed my weather situation too bad. Like they’re very different in Austin. But they’re not too different than you. Like Scotland. Even Detroit else. That’s what I’m from Detroit.

(John) Well, I’d love to dive a little bit in on your background, right, because, ah, big part of this show that I want to put out there is for people to understand that there’s no one cookie cutter mold of game developer, right? Like we come from everywhere, all shapes, sizes, colors, sexes, belief, systems and all that. So that’s really what I want to feature. So, yeah, Please take some time and tell us where you’re from.

(Doug) You so I’m from Detriot. Originally grew up there. Um

(John) can people say like the d when they say the D Is it Detroit? Or is it like…

(Doug) You could I mean, people. I don’t know if people really called Detroit, like we don’t really do like d town, that sort of thing too often. Uh, but I was like, If you’re in the Midwest, then yeah, if you say the d d Town. Then it’s gonna be Detroit about your South. That’s gonna be Dallas.

(John) Okay, there’s a fine line there. Be careful

(Doug) The thing was I group in Detroit it was, wasn’t about Detroit was more about which block you grew up on. Like remember, Eminem came with six miles. The movie?

(John) Yes, it was 8 Mile.

(Doug) Yeah, that’s right. I grew up on six miles, so it is really useful as a marker where you’re where you’re from in Detroit.

(John) I’ve known you for over a decade, and I didn’t know you grew up on six miles.

(Doug) There you go try to talk about Eminem or eight mile often enough (John) damn. And Eminem is one of my top. He’s one of my top three. so I got so that’s That’s so I love it. See, that’s one of the big catalysts for me putting this show together right? Half of it is to like, exposed the people behind the games that were not just machines that were not just kind of what you see out there. And the other half, really, it’s selfishly for me to get to know my friends and people that I’ve worked with on a deeper level right and have an excuse to kind of ask you these probing questions, right? Without it feeling to kind of like, Yo, why are you grilling me? John, what you grilling?

(28:24)(Doug) No I think it’s awesome. I mean, like, we see people in video games like in interviews, so that about their games. But we don’t always get to, like, get to know individual people behind the games because a lot of times about studios or studio heads or what the studio has done previously, that sort of thing on. But I would love for games tohave more times to feature individual people coming in movies, you know, movies. We will happily hype up the sound guy from this movie, the producer of this movie or something like that. And I thought, We don’t see that enough in games like if you like. If you knew who did the gun fighting in one game and then like, Oh, that guy moved over here, did the gun fighting in that game. Then it’s like, Oh, that’s why they’re both so so great. It was the same guy and a whole different situation. Well, I was thinking about, um, Hamrick, Josh Hamrick shout out to Josh Hamrick, We another fellow full sail alumni that we got to work together at Midway and is in Seattle. Oh, yeah, Yeah. I was thinking about Josh because, like, our first game 51 he did a great job on getting those couple weapons. He had feeling really good aan den. He left to go work on Halo and the weapons there, of course, feel great. E think he left a lot of the work on Fallout three and then follow three weapons. Feel great. And so I’m just like Josh, That guy for me. I’m like, What’s he working on? Oh, cool. They’re gonna have a great weapons. Yo, shout out to Josh Hamrick. I’m gonna put him on my short list of people that I relentlessly hit up on. Invited to come participate. Put him on the list. Done. Done. Okay. So I I love your background because you started this early in high school and you saw kind of the direct correlation. A lot of people don’t make that connection. I wasn’t I certainly wasn’t eso you were doing it early from high school. So then did you continue that when it came time for college, so I know exactly what I want to do. I got to find the curriculum. I tried that. I think I think one of the college was 2002 is when I graduated high school and I was looking around for, like, a game development game design type program. There weren’t a lot of them yet. There was probably Ringling, but they still were mostly art Focus. Uh, that was only really big name I knew about at the time. So I ended up going to art school in San Francisco at the Academy of Art because they had a program called New Media and they listed, like, Oh, go into new media if you want to do things like art director and then one of them was like game developer and I was like, That’s what I wanna do All right, count me in and I got there. But it was mostly teaching about It was a lot of this traditional art teaching, and I’m like, this is great, but I kind of want to get in making games. Like, right now, I don’t wanna wait four years and pay so much money to do it. So I bailed on that and then end up going a full sail and full sale was just like they were. They had it perfectly done. We’re gonna teach you the current tech on the current computers using all the current information that we have. And that was awesome. It was fast. It was efficient. It was expensive, though. But it was It was a great school and definitely helped me get my foot in the door s o. That was super cool. Yes. Yeah. I mean, I’m shout out fellow full sail alumni, We both kind of graduated in. Oh, six. Do you feel that your investment paid off like the return on investment? Was it worth it? That’s tough to say. I think like it was like today I would say no today. You could learn so much for free on YouTube and a couple of 100 bucks. You get, like, a masterclass type website to, like, learn from an expert eso I would not tell people to go pay 50,000 plus dollars on college toe development if you don’t have to. You’re not even factoring inflation. That e Yeah, that’s interesting. That’s that’s the point I make to a question to ask everyone because everyone’s mileage varies. It had had its benefits. I mean, I got to, like, connect people like you. We we didn’t We didn’t meet in school. But after school, we both kind of got a job in the same place through the same similar school context. And so that helped us both end up in the same position with a really great job, great people. And then I got that job, I think mainly because one of my co workers got hired before me and he talked me up. And that’s what got me into Midway like a rusty. Uh, he’s going to come on this show. I make sure he comes on this show. Oh, yeah, That was awesome. Yeah, he got in and he was like, It was like I worked with Doug. He was great. And then, like, we met Doug, let’s bring it back for another job. And so I got that one. So, were you guys in the same class or you guys one same projects? Yeah, we were in the same class and we have the same same final project team on. Then we interviewed like that. Same job. I think it was a It was like it was a programmer job at the time. And he was a better program than I was. And then they brought me back for design. Job s I got Got the design job, uh, work together again. So that’s interesting. Did you see yourself as Maura, game designer or a programmer when you were kind of looking to break in and looking for work after college? Yeah, I think I saw myself originally. Maura’s a programmer. Um, just cause that was the one that kind of made the most sense, like you knew what? The job Waas. You knew what you’re kind of got asked to do, but game designer was and still is a little nebulous. And you’re never really sure what that exactly means. Like what? My design am I doing levels? Um, I doing, uh, systems, uh, other kind of content. You should never be sure what you’re gonna be doing with game designer. Which is why nowadays I might in my stuff, I would say game developer, because, you know, you could do a little bit everything and some some of it’s a little program Aries. So this little art heavy? Um, some of its more just produce ary or management, but, uh, it’s all in the effort of designing the game, and so I kind of roll it all together. Now it is. I sympathize with you 100% doug, like, game design definitely does tend to wear a lot of hats or gives you the opportunity to where the hats that you want really right. Usually like, Hey, the game needs to get done. How do you want to contribute to it? Right? If you have the soft skills, you may tend to be mawr producer facing in your design habits from day to day, right? Or you may be more technically inclined, right? So then you arm or kind of in the systems in the tech design, maybe even gameplay scripting and coding things like this or you’re more art incline, Right. So then you kind of have more of a level design approach or asset pipeline work. I love it, man. I love it because I’m right there with you. That Yeah, when you go in as a programmer, you kind of know what you’re going to be doing right, even though there’s a lot of avenues to to run with. And when you go as game design, nebulous is the perfect word, man, like every week it takes a little bit like, even when you get some new tools and okay, I gotta be the one to learn it first and find out how best to use it and then estimate that knowledge everybody else and, you know, and just hope that I was I was mostly right About what? I think that’s why they use it. And, uh, but everything e like that. I like that. So whenever I talk to speak about you dug gonna be like, Yo, Doug Burton, the good homie slash game developer. I don’t say game design. I don’t say gay programmer. I don’t say game artist game developer, because you do it all I try and things you like. And that was when things when I got into games and went to full sail, I wanted to go somewhere that I thought would teach me enough that if theoretically I was locked in a in a room by myself, with infinite resource is I could make a great game like I would know enough on everything to, like, pull, pull the audio together, pull the art together, pull the program in together and still gonna make a great game with just what I know. So that’s why I kind of like to be able to do a little everything to your good with that man. You’re good with that. I I talked. I speak with people often, and I share the same sentiment that you have where it’s like today’s day and age. I don’t know why people go to college, right? Like you can teach yourself anything. It’s like the matrix, right? You just plug yourself in and you can get all the skills right away. And and the one thing that kind of made me turn and and change kind of my view a little bit, right? Kind of. Give them, give them a little bit. Waas the network, right? Like you pay for the people that are around you working in and solving the problems and building that report. Uh, and so when they hit me with that one, I’d be like, I you know that that may have tip the scales to make it worth it Like the fact that I got to know you, Danny, but Ross and Rusty Josh, like a bunch of people and even rob Kabul shout out to rob global. Uh, that was like, all right, you got me. Like, e couldn’t sit at home and have connected with all of you guys. And like you said, like all those names just mentioned, we all probably got just that that first step in thanks to Rob COBOL, which is like he was Was he exactly at full sail? E always butcher his job. Alright, I’ll be like your advisor career development. Uh, I’m gonna you know, I’m gonna definitely invite him on this show, and I probably want to even do, like, panel style where we would just be, like, all sit there. But like I rob, we’re gonna interview you, man. We’re gonna hit you with, like, all the questions we’ve ever had. Be funny. I would love thio. He hear about how things were from his side of the things. And then I’m most interested. You. How many other full sell to voters out there, you know, kind of have him to thank for setting up that first meeting. Their first job us, so we jumped around a bit. Doug and I love it. I love the free flowing form of just chatting with my buddies and getting to know and getting to share your story with the public when you broke in at Midway and you So you broke in as a game designer. What would you say were those kind of essential skills that you’re like? Oh, I’m so grateful that I have these and then what were the ones that you didn’t know you needed to know? But you picked up kind of thing. If that makes sense, yeah, I think so. Games are you definitely want to be able to, like, put yourself and other people shoes. So you kind of want to look at a level, and I’m not always say what not just what do I think will be cool, but like what would be cool as someone who has no idea what I’m trying to get them to Dio And so that’s why I really love making puzzles because for me, that’s that’s what most games development is. It’s like puzzle solving, and then and then and then setting up a puzzle so that someone behind you can have a good time solving it. So I was loved. You’re making a room and, you know, you know the goal. But then you need to make the goal interesting to find an interesting to figure out and interesting to get to. And so for me, I’ve always been a fan of puzzle. So that came kind of naturally for me. Have been like, Okay, I need to kind of make a little puzzle that’s been fun for someone else to solve. But then after that, once you get into games, you realize how much communication is needed to get anything done. How to get anything, really get anything done, you know, high quality and like, very fast. So you’re gonna need to talkto artists when you talk. Thio programmers, when you talk about audio people and they’re gonna be the one that they all come to, Thio connect it all together. So I go to the programmer and say, Hey, I need the a button to jump, and then I go to the animator and say, Okay, I need to jump animation and then I go toe audio guy. Okay, I need the audio for this to play at a certain time, The animation. So the programmer says, Okay, here’s your hooking to do the jump, okay? And I need to make that jump. Call the right animation. I mean, the animation call the right sound. And I need to make all those connect together because the audio people don’t wanna learn the animation tools. Animation doesn’t wanna learn the programming nodes to call the jump animation. So I cannot be the middle bet the middleman has to know a little bit of each piece to make it all come together. And so you know enough to be able to talk to different people about you use like they’re kind of keywords and then be able know enough, technically, Thio, hook it all up. And so I think for me, that was the surprising part about how much talking there is, how much back and forth and how much meetings and that sort of thing. But once you get that sort of thing and it kind of becomes second nature, then you just have, like, a few templates of Okay, here’s how we’re gonna start this. Here’s how we’re gonna finish it off and you kind of let rely on those toe help. Make sure getting stuff done efficiently. 1 billion%. I love that you call that out because I find that soft skills in communication. They don’t get taught enough. You know, it kind of ends up on it kind of ends up something that you kind of evolve into or grow as you are fortunate enough to work in a in a game studio with awesome people that are super passionate about every little facet or detail of their own discipline or expertise, I I will have to call out that there’s a certain there’s a certain breed of individual that you fall under on. And this is just your super approachable right? Like I I can say that because I work with you that you’re extremely approachable, and it’s easy to come over to you and ask you for help, for your opinion, for your insight, for debugging, right? And I’ve always welcomed whenever I had the opportunity. When you come over and wanna find out something, So how does this work or, you know, Hey, I gotta figure, you know, Hey, come check this out right? Like it’s just like, Oh, sweet, hell, yeah, And you know, everybody’s mileage varies, but for a game designer, I do believe, and I’m biased. I do believe that we are kind of the glue, right? Like there’s some. There’s a responsibility on the shoulders of a designer, too. Convey the vision that comes from the creative director, the design director, or what have you right? Or the narrative with writers write to share that vision and convey it whether it be verbal, whether it be through documentation, whether it be through a prototype or a system or something like that? Well, like here, like somewhere Matt Right now, Polly Arc, we kinda I think we can describe that as you know, someone has to the person, the champion, an idea. So let’s go after the one to like, Okay, I’m working on this really cool boss fight, and so I got to be the one to be like, Okay, here’s the story. The boss fight. Here’s how it should feel. Here’s how it’s just sound. And then, actually, the one that people can come to to be like Is this sounding the way we wanted Thio could be like, you know, it’s not. You kind of want to go more this direction, arm or that direction, and then you can just rely on the person making it to, like, interpret that to still make something super cool, like I want to be a little scary or want to be a little more whimsical. And then they take that. Okay, I see what you’re saying, and they could make that and then you can put it all together. But then someone has to the person kind of. They’re just always playing it, making sure it is. It’s still fun. Are we hitting our goals? And is everything kind of coming together the way we expect? And when people are making content, they don’t always have time to be playing the game and really am lives in the game and then also play testing it and getting up people’s opinion on it. And so that’s a big part designed to is being the person who is shepherding the each idea and making sure it’s being completed, its not buggy. It’s actually fun. So there’s a lot, a lot of stuff that goes in design. MM, lots of those involvement involvement in general, which is just like those soft skills E love that I love the year. So shout out to Polly Ark. I’m glad that they got you to come out to Seattle. Me too. And so Polly arcs interesting, right? Because, as I understand it, you guys are like solely VR Development and V are falling to the purposes I mean right now with 2021. But it’s I consider it still cutting edge, right? Like there’s nothing else like it. A RVR are kind of their own bag and require kind of a whole new set of thinking and approaches. And I’m curious, you know, from from your background, right, you’ve kind of seen and done it all. You’ve worked on all the different councils Mobile Xbox, PlayStation, PC. And so what drew you to the are what? How’s that going? Yes, Like I was started. I was getting the VR early on, like, you know, soon as Oculus got picked up by Facebook and that all made it look like Okay, this is really happening now, like there’s actual money behind it and that actually lot of buzz around it. So at that point, I was like, Okay, it’s happening VR is gonna start becoming a real platform. And so then it was. Then the quick question was Okay, well, what do we wanna make nvr like? You know, you don’t want just make the same old games And now you’re just seeing them in the headset and playing them like normal, like, you know, PR opportunity to actually really put you in the game. Even better put in the game. So somebody just put you in a different world or even the current world, which is all kind of different rules. Now, you can do that, and you don’t have to rely so much on the visuals and audio to carry that, because just just the hardware helps you carry that. So with console and with mobile gaming’s you are you so that huge barrier of the person playing is on the couch or they’re on their cell phone listening through little little earbuds or or they’re playing on a controller that just has to remap what they wanna do onto a button. So I was like, Oh, I wanna jump over this wall. I just press the button. But then once you’ve er you wanna jump over that wall or look over that wall, Then you actually look over the wall. So it’s not just no longer you playing the game. It’s just you in the environment and things were happening. And so when you think about that way, you could do a lot more cool stuff. Br so you could make a horror game that is scary, like all by itself. What this new gannet came out fantasma phobia. I play that VR. I couldn’t get past the tutorial because tutorials like go into this dark garage trough the light and and called to the ghost. And I was like, I don’t want to do that. It’s super cool. It’s super fun, and it’s so easily, easily like scary and and And you just you’re in the game so much easier And then just so that you can. I’m with you, though, like a lot of people that I speak to VR development about, it’s almost unfair to go into the horror genre, right? Like there’s so much you can do. And in a movie experience, for example, it’s easy for you to like close your eyes, but nvr you got that thing in your face. You know, and it’s expensive and you can’t just, like, rip it off and chuck it right like you’re like, Ah, you know, it’s It’s just not It’s just not muscle. It’s just not instinctual, right? So you that you’re still facing that thing and it’s It’s almost unfair s so that’s definitely a design thing that I consider cheating. But I see so much promise there for sure, exactly that. Like you just get toe you get. You get the players by in so much easier so you could do a lot more cool stuff. I feel like and put them a lot more cool places and it’s just, yeah, just the whole new way of making games. I feel like everything I used to work. It doesn’t work the same any more. Like a lot of older games, you know you want explosions to be like big and super realistic, and things were flying in the play at the player and there’s explosions. There’s fire and there’s debris everywhere. You that now NPR that’s super tiring and stressful. And if things were flying at your face, you’re like, Oh God, that feels horrible. I don’t want any of that that happen? And so now it’s like change the way you make games because games that were exciting are now overstimulating, I guess. In a way, yeah. Yeah, that’s that’s interesting. I wanted to touch on that a bit, right? Your background, your extensive resume and experience, Right? You worked at midway on Black Siren One Virgil on dark siders to read Fly a PB at real time world. Ah, lot of action oriented combat, You know, high intensity games. I empathize 100% those type of games I love to play, so I love to develop them, but it seems like you’ve migrated revolved in a different direction Now, in the types of games you’re developing. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I mean, I definitely had a lot of action games because I think I think I did a p B. That was like cops vs robbers and I realized the personalization that was on that game. And so, like the concerts, robbers, things, because a lot of players put their own story behind. It s so it was super action. It was really more about the story of, like, your cop character or your criminal character. And it was big on personalization. So I love that. And then after doing dark siders and you know, you do the apocalypse and you’re playing as death and you know, you’re all these bladed weapons that was super cool. But that point I was okay. I think I’ve had my fill of this whole death. Despair, kill, kill, kill type games. I kind of want to do some more stuff. That’s like joyous and fun and interesting things. They’re gonna, like, sit with you after you’re done with the game, play a couple games like one of the reasons To me, it was the Stanley parable that was super meta like, Yeah, you’re like, It’s like a game that notes It’s a game and you could play how you want And it will kind of comment about how you’re playing it and like, talk back to you because it was a conversation almost between you and the game. So that was super cool. And that was the next idea like that. This is what games can be like. They want to be exciting and fun. They could be really cool story experiences and things that really stick with you. There was a lot more games like a lot more games like that kind of get bubbled up and stand out to people games like the last of us and all the naughty dog games. People love those for the action, but we always come back to like how great the story are. The characters are and that sort of thing. So I think that type of gaming is becoming more and more popular. And people are praising ITM or s e kind of move towards that. I’m like, yeah, I really wanna do more games that people play And I’m like, Man, was that a game or was that just like a really enjoyable story experience? So I’m trying to move to more in that direction. Amen, Brother, Amen. Like you got to evolve with the times and the trends, and I love that you’re staying at the forefront of that. You see, kind of the patterns of what people are gravitating towards. And to be fair, the industry is maturing. Yeah, definitely. It definitely is on that. That was a big thing to I can’t apologize because they had also been through making a lot of, like, actually games a lot of them worked on bungee is a lot of them came from, you know, doing what was destiny was like a lot of their last big action game. And so they were also very excited about making kind of more joyous games and games that had a wider audience and that weren’t tiring. And this will really enjoyable to make. And they were also very smart about saying, Hey, you know, VR is kind of in its infancy, so we can start this early making some really quality story games that were available for anybody to play any age, any skill level. And we do that this early Then, you know, as people adopt PR, they’re also gonna be like, Hey, let’s get that really great VR game that at this point, a lot of people have, like, vetted and said, Yeah, this is a great intro to be er and so Polly Arc has been really smart, but been like, Hey, VR is coming so we can just kind of position ourselves through the advantage of it. And so we’ve been kind of try to that last couple of years. I love it, man. I love it and you get to put your talent of puzzle design to work, right? Love making puzzles, lovemaking, puzzles, love. A lot of people solve puzzles every time you see someone half of their puzzle and they’re like what? And then you see them figure it out and it clicks and they get that like, Oh, I love that feel like every time I’m gonna ask you a favor, as as somebody who has no clue understanding of how to approach designing puzzles, let us send a little bit on kind of your motivations, your inspirations or your approach. Mhm. You know, you don’t got to give us all the Doug burden to, you know, But I think the first part of the tool bag is okay. First, I would say it’s they’re probably the hardest of the like level types to make puzzles because, you know, they got a pretty gonna be interesting, like most levels, little bit challenging. But they also really gotta have that. We kind of call the ah ha moment s. So it’s gotta be history that Yeah, that, like that. That mode of like, oh, right from my face, this whole time type thing, I was like a good riddle Once you what? You solve it. You’re like, Oh, of course, that the only way it could have ever been Why did I give you this long? But the biggest thing for me was like level design in general is I just get ideas from you gotta get ideas from everywhere, every every little thing you’re doing, you know, whatever cool design you see, like Oh, you see a cool You eat a strawberry that day and in the shape of the strawberry makes you think about a level idea. You’re like you could make a level that’s like strawberry shaped and then instead of seeds, that’s where there’s little holes that air is blowing out off. And you’re like time, the way you move to, like, get around those holes, whatever. Something like super weird generic like that. And you just get it down on paper or until the prototype state and you start feeling it out. Okay, what about this idea is actually interesting and I want to keep and you just keep piece by piece and then you say, OK, this little section works. Let me, like, figure out what works for the other another part of the level and you can’t just do it section by section so you can get that kind of beginning feeling good, get the middle feeling good, and then make sure that it has that Ah ha or that hook moment of like, Oh, that’s the piece that I’m missing toe make this all work and, yeah, there’s no riel like 123 like step process. It’s really just get into it and you start just feeling it out. And then usually the puzzles kind of make themselves once you have the goal, have the obstacles. Then you just got to see how can I move these things around to make it interesting to get around the schools into the goal? Okay, okay. I dig it, I dig it. I love I love because, you know, I got I got design homies on the whole spectrum And you you strike me as, ah feel I feel it out. I absolutely, absolutely. And that person was like, I just start making a lot of people do the paper design or even do like Legos to, like, picture in three D. And and I would close my eyes feel it out. Picture what? I’m what I would kind of want to dio and then visualize it. Yeah, and I just open the editor and just start putting in blocks and playing through the game. I’m like, I’m like in the game immediately. Awesome. Awesome. So? So there’s a There’s an element there of, like knowing the blocks that you’re working with, knowing what you have, what the player knows, that you have to kind of teach them or work with. And there’s, Ah, there’s the base set up. There’s the end goal and there’s the middle hook, right? So I’m curious if I can. If I can dig in a little bit deeper on the hook, how do you identify the hook? That’s what I’m trying to think about a couple puzzle I’ve done and the hook is really tough to, because that’d be great if you if you cite an example from a game you’ve worked on. Yeah, I’m trying to the last puzzle. I just make made one recently that I like the hook, but people who did it the first time we’re like, Oh yeah, that feels good. But people who did a second time or like, man. I don’t think it. I don’t think it works on. I can’t. I can’t decide if the puzzle is like too difficult or too easy, because once you figure it out, they think some people think that it’s not. It doesn’t work. It takes iteration. What’s very interesting? What you just said there was like, it’s dope. The first run through on then on the second run through it kind of. It kind of has a different Yeah, because, like, a puzzle is a riddle. Once someone knows the answer, they’re no longer solving it. They just know it. And so you only get one chance to find out if it works or not like, Okay, here’s the puzzle. I can’t tell you how it works because since you know that’s it, you’re gonna know how it works. S e tow, watch you solve it and to see if at the right point you make the right kind of realizations. So usually with the puzzle the end of the room and you make the goal clear and you make it clear what they can manipulate. And so they say, Okay, that’s why I’m trying to get to I can turn this thing, and I can press this button. So then then, some people, Those are the elements, right? Like, Hey, you’re gonna work with these two or three commands or buttons or elements? Yeah, You got your goal. Get your elements. Eso People work through a different direction. Some people start at their character and okay, how can I get my character just further into the level? Some people, some people, actually look at the goal and say, How can I get from that goal kind of back to my character? It’s like a maze to start to start to start the endpoint working way back, You know, people come out in the other direction, but then what you want is that watch them piece together so they make sure they figure out what pieces they could manipulate. Make sure that’s obvious and clear. They figure that out and then you want a breadcrumb a couple steps of it. So maybe when they come into the room the button that they compress, sort of like blinks or unprecedented to, like show that Oh, it’s moveable. So now first thing I do they’re gonna go the button and press it. Okay, What does this do? Okay, moves this wall piece. Okay. How can I use that wall piece? Because now it’s a new element. I know I have. So now they have learned something new about the puzzle, and they already feel like they’re making progress, Which which feels so good. Eso eventually people figure. Okay, I have all the pieces. Now, how do I use these pieces? Okay, so I press this button, a wall comes out like, got the button, that wall goes away. I need that wall to get somewhere else. So now the question is, how can I keep this button pressed to get to that wall? So then so then they they’re stepping through. Okay, what can press this button off this thing? I can I can pull or drag. Okay, put the thing on the button. Now I get to the wall, I’m on the wall. What do I do with this? And then then there on the wall. And then they go. That’s the kind of the next stage of the puzzle. So Stage one is kind of like figuring out all the elements to string. Okay. When I used elements, what new thing changes. And then how do I use that new thing that has changed? And does that get me closer to my goal? And so it’s just that briefings over and over and over with the elements. How do I use them? What, has it gotten me? Okay, what are my new elements? How do I use those? I was supposed to get me. Yes, yes, it makes sense to me now. It makes sense to me now. It’s like give them a chance to fig, to explore and play, to figure out. Oh, these are my elements that I can play with and then see how they can apply those elements in different interesting combinations, right for the agency. And I think that’s the hook that you’re referring to is to be like, Oh, I know that when I attach this on the wall, then it kind of makes a bridge or whatever. And then, Aiken spin it a little bit, right? And so that’s a oh, I want you and I could see where else I can apply that. Let me see if it works, right. And then you kind of throw that other twist at them. next level was the word you just used that you said, Oh, a twist. So the next level of a puzzle is you put a little twist on it where assume they think they figured it out and their brain kind of goes into execution mode, just like okay, before that hot. So they go into, like, Okay. Oh, I got to figure it out. Let me just do the puzzle Jump here, go here, do this, get here. And then they get to a certain point, they realized that they made the assumption that was wrong. And they’re like, Oh, that’s me, That’s what they’re Ugo like that. Like, Oh, I thought that I could make this. Oh, I need that button to get unprecedented. At this point. It’s not like, Oh, that’s that’s that. That’s the ah ha! Moment of like, Oh, I haven’t solved. Let me do it. Wait a minute. I missed something. Oh, and then there. Then they have that last piece of like, you know, all the elements. You know how it them all. You know, whether I’ll get you. But there’s one more piece you’re missing off. You need to somehow maybe either undo or do an extra step toe get to the final solution. And that’s that’s kind of the last stage of the puzzle, right? It’s like, Okay, you’ve got it all figured out. Let’s throw a little twist in there. Yeah, you understand it, But have you mastered it? You know, all the ins and outs and then one last twist to be like once you know, all the pieces. Uh, did you check this though, Like one little. But then that cemented II feel you, because then then as you progress the player, or you paste them through it those same elements that you forced them to master before progressing, then kind of keep building on them right As the game progresses, keep challenging. Them said that that ebbs and flows. Yeah, Yeah, you do the same puzzle, but then you’ll change the twist on it. And they’re like, Oh, you got may, uh, I think it was from that moment to feel fun and should ever feel frustrating. Or like, you lied to them. Should just be like you figured it out. You just figured out slightly Wrong way or you or you just got presumptuous in your solution. You kind of want that moment. Yeah. You want the rules that they just kind of figured out that you walk them through thio persist. And to be consistent for sure. E love that. I love that Doug, man, it’s It’s been really cool, I think Last thing I want to touch on is, you know, you’ve been at you’ve worked at a lot of different studios with a lot of different people. You have a vast network that you’ve built up that have all had their version of Duggal mites embedded in their memory. Um, I’m curious, you know, compared to where you started, where you are. Now what? What have you seen in terms of, like, culture? Building a good team like you said, back to the point of like, having a team that can challenge each other Iterated call out the things that like, Hey, this feels good on the first try. Not so good. On the second try. How do we make it better, right? Yeah, that za tough one. I feel like I’ve I’ve been at, like, two studios that, like I really was like, wow. And that was a really great like culture. like everyone was. It was the communication was really open. I think that’s a big one. I think people need to be, uh, happy and willing to talk to each other about things they do and don’t like about the game. Midway had a fantastic culture man like, I think we were spoiled for that to be our first break in the industry like a diverse team, although a mix of like motivated, hungry, passionate junior talent with like savvy, super intelligent and experienced veterans and we were just all kind of like fueling each other. It was It was a wonderful time. It was a great group. I think that’s that. That’s a big thing. Is like, Yeah, I think with Midway A lot of us were a little bit younger, and so we were more open toe like talking about all of my ideas. It was like this does this work that does not work? People aren’t really afraid to like, say they didn’t like anything because it was really more like I know I’m no expert, but I didn’t like that, and it’s like so people can take it and not like a order or anything. It’s more just like Lehman’s feed. I feel like yeah, feedback. Yeah, yeah, That’s a big thing of like being able to give feedback openly and honestly, and no one feels attacked. No one feels like it feels like they’re big. They’re doing the attacking, uh, and that I don’t know how you really build that, like that is, just there’s certain personalities, types and and certain soft skills that you want to look for. In fact, I’ll link you one of our audio audio leads just did, like a block post or interview about our interview process about how you know, we definitely try to do a good job of looking not just at someone’s technical skills like, Can I do the job but really like, Can they grow in the job? Can they work with the team Well, And yeah, she she flagged like a couple like things to look for, and it was like, Yeah, people who are people who give feedback and take feedback and who and who are like, eager to like, collaborate when ideas and that sort of thing. I think so. I think any I feel like I hope that good games come from happy teams is trying to steal the whole milk thing. Like when good milk come from happy cows. E Remember that E is Polly Arc hiring? Is there anything you can talk about? What? What you’re working on? Yeah. So probably we are hiring right now. We’re hiring some. We knew we need some or going to a team. Really? And we’re also hiring some audio under the terms audio creators. Uh, and that’s that’s why that hiring, thinking on mine because you have one of our auto team had just mentioned then the whole interview about how to hire and how equitable ity and hiring and how to reduce bias and hiring. And so we do all sorts of we use all sort of tools to make sure reducing bias as much as we can. We want to make sure we’re getting that diverse, um, pool of applicants and what we want we want to remove. Okay, You can’t remove all bias. That’s one of things you know, and you accept. So you do often you can to reduce the biases. Well, I mean, you, you touch on a good point. There, right is we all have our own individual biases and definitely are unconscious bias, right, That that at least all the interviews I’ve ever been on happen. You’re dealing a full day across a wave of different people. And so I think that helps the process, right. Like you guys are all their different times, different points in the day. And you’re you’re seeing different sides of the person, so you get multiple people weighing in. Yeah, that’s a big thing. You want what people weighing and from all different, uh, all different parts of development and different experience levels. So that way you can you can get Sometimes you might have someone who interviews great when they’re talking with a higher up. But they might interview poorly, talk to someone they think is like below them. And you kind of get a little bit of that personality in there, and that could come. That could be trouble. Someone teams where you need everyone to kind of be ableto equally, give ideas, and no one feels pressured or intimidated or anything like that. Eso that sort of thing you just look out for and also you want to sort of make sure that interviewers don’t taint each other. So you don’t wanna go on? You wanna be the first interviewer? And then on the way out the comment the interviewers like, Hey, wasn’t great or some like that That’s gonna take them because we’ve been interviews where people come in and they have done strong in the beginning of the day. But then once they kind of calm down or they had their coffee or had their lunch, then they’re just like, nailing questions. And everyone’s like, Oh, they’re perfect. Meanwhile, people giving the day were like, I think they were great and you never know what the reason could be. It could be it could have been a bad day. It could be a bad Internet connection. Uh, they had another coffee yet sort of thing. And I’m gonna make sure that one, like bad interview won’t take someone’s entire interview process. And I just thought that you could do to prevent that. Absolutely, absolutely. Even even now, in the age of virtual zoom interviews where you’re behind a webcam and maybe maybe your best traits either are magnet like, magnified or not. You know that’s something to be accountable to be mindful of, right? So I really appreciate those words of wisdom there. How do people reach out to you or connect with you or follow you and see? See what you’re up to, man. I will say that Twitter is probably the best best place I got. Double might Dev on Twitter. That’s where you could find me occasion. Talking about talking about Deb stuff Besides that, you can follow just the Poly Arc Twitter account. That’s gonna worry. Try and keep up to date about what we’re doing. We’re thinking what we’re talking about. Okay, Fantastic. I’ll make sure the link your Twitter Duggal, might Dev and Polly arcs Twitter in the show notes. Click on those follow. See what these guys up to doing. Amazing things Before you go, I’d like to ask you if there’s anybody a friend or colleague that you’d like to nominate to come onto the podcast. Yeah, I’m gonna nominate one of our artists. Her name’s Karen. She’s a super awesome. Artists always want to talk Thio. I love hearing her and she she I love hearing her feedback on anything I worked on because she’s like, so nice. But she’s also so correct, like she’ll be like she like, Uh, yeah, I don’t want to say, but I think this level is totally not working. And I’m like, she’s right, but he said it so nicely. Tell it to you like that. Okay, Fair, fair. Okay. Cem, Cem, Cem. Last lightning round questions for you. Is there someone you would credit as having been, like a good mentor for you throughout this career? Or somebody that has inspired you in this industry to keep doing what you’re doing, even or outside the industry? I mean, that’s that’s a huge list. I can’t pick this one person like Jon already. You’re definitely on the list. Yes. Yes, I’m saying it. You have been doing awesome stuff everywhere. Like what you did with Red Dead, right? G t a. You were working at the Amazon doing some awesome like tutorials and stuff. It’s always like John’s out here killing the game. You already on the show? You don’t e to start there. OK, now, next on the list E uh, one of our early, uh, one of our early leads. Harvey Smith, Harvey Smith, everyone. I talked to him. He always drops. He’s that guy who every time I talk to him, he’ll drop one little nugget of knowledge on you. And you’re like, Dang, that was a great point. Yes, I I can’t I can’t corroborate that. 100%. We first worked at Midway. He used to say you could teach anybody the tools sort of thing. And so he was like, Yeah, finally, what you like to work with because you could teach anybody how to work the tools. So it’s more about the person. And so I think I’ve I’ve carried that through ever worked on. Yeah, I’m gonna end on that one because that one is powerful and strong for a lot of people that are listening to this that are all about, like, You know what I need to learn, read? Do I want to break into games? I’m like, the best programmer, or I’ve played everything. And I’ve written all the walk throughs. Look at my sweet demo, Riel. You know, why am I not getting hired? Right? And so Yeah, Thio, emphasize what you just said. There. The person you are, right? Like your nature, your temper. When things get rough, as they will do when we’re working on the game for years. Uh, is about yo, can we ride together through the thick and thin to get this thing out there? Absolutely. There will be a lot of conversations, a lot of tough conversations, love disagreements and hopefully, many more agreements. But between all that, you know, people you gotta talk to for, you know, eight hours a day of your life So it doesn’t make sure the people that you feel you can talk to you and you can you can enjoy working with and creating ideas with. So I think that’s always a huge part of, ah development in general. Hell, yeah. I mean, it’s It’s a clear sign of why you stuck through it. So long, my friend, for sure. Absolutely. Or duck. It’s been an absolute pleasure having you on the show. You too. I hope to bring you back in the future. When you got anything else you want to share with the world. The next person to fall out of the play area. Corrine, artist at Poly Ark. I’m gonna hit her up. I’m excited. I’m excited. Take care, brother. Thank you. Shout out to Doug for walking us through his journey in this wild industry toe, where he currently resides at Poly Arc in Seattle as game designer on their VR projects and his conscious evolution as an intuitive creator working on action titles and then moving on to the comfort of tightly designed casino games on Mobile and ultimately seeking to make a more resounding and memorable narrative and immersive experience on the next out of play area. Episode will sit down with the creative force known Onley as Mr Benjamin, and we’ll talk about how he discovered games, getting his graduate degree at Michigan State University and breaking into the games industry, ultimately working alongside one of the O. G S Howard Scott Warshaw at the three d o Company. How to play area releases new episodes every other Monday on all the major players, including Apple, Google Spotify, Amazon audible. I think you can even ask Alexa to play us. Thank you for listening. I’m your host, John Diaz. Please make sure to subscribe to see what developer pushes out of play area. Next time, stay safe. Stay true. Stay creative