Mythos - Gamespy Dev Diary
Mythos is one of those quirky titles that we're proud to be able to shine a spotlight on. It began as a tech project for Flagship's Hellgate: London, and has rapidly evolved into something much more. Over the next few months, we'll be showcasing Mythos
with exclusive insights from the team as well as screenshots and video
you won't find anywhere else. Our first guest is Brock Jones, the
game's producer. We'll let him tell you the rest!
I'm Brock Jones, the producer of Mythos, based at the Flagship Studios Seattle office working on Mythos,
our massively multiplayer action-RPG/dungeon crawl. By pretty much any
measure, we're a small development team. As I glance around the office
right now I count 11 people, including myself. Making a game like Mythos
with such a small team has a host of perks as well as a few potential
pitfalls, but in the end, at least for us, the pros clearly outweigh
the cons.
Mythos? What is Mythos?
Mythos was conceived in the mind of its lead engineer, Travis Baldree (creator of the semi-casual dungeon crawl, Fate).
The notion of a visually updated, multiplayer dungeon crawl with
classic gameplay was appealing to Flagshippers at the corporate
headquarters in San Francisco. This isn't a particularly surprising
fact given that the Flagship company roster and the credits from Diablo and Diablo II are nearly indistinguishable.
Flagship knew that Travis was a very valuable guy to have around and they recognized that Mythos could be a very useful project to help prove out much of the new technology that Hellgate: London would be developing. Mythos could exist "under the radar" and let Flagship iron the inevitable kinks out of things to help ensure that Hellgate: London went off without a hitch.
In the beginning, there was only Travis. As a team of one, Travis
worked from his home in Seattle and quickly built up the core gameplay
of Mythos. The project was certainly helping to identify and fix issues with Hellgate: London, but beyond just being a test platform it was also starting to be... fun! Gradually, the notion grew that Mythos could stand alone as its own game.
In order to really have a shot, though, Mythos would need more than just Travis, so the hiring began and Flagship Studios Seattle was born. Mythos
got its own artists, another engineer, some game testers, and when
Travis got so mired down trying to keep the whole team running that he
could hardly focus on actually making the game, they got a producer.
When you're working on a small team in a small office, it's hard not to
know what your coworkers are up to, and this team awareness is one of
the most advantageous elements of working on a small team. Anyone who
has ever worked on a very large team as a bit player in a large
production is likely familiar with the potential for disillusionment
and the occasional urge to just "phone-in" work. When people don't feel
like their work has real significant impact on the product or the
people around them, motivation can become a scarce resource. This is a
problem we rarely see.
In a small group, you know that everybody else is depending on you to
get your work done so that they can keep doing their work. Frequent
verbal updates travel back and forth across the office, so everybody
knows what everybody else is up to. Furthermore, everybody knows that
their work is important and that if it doesn't get done, there isn't
anyone that they could pass the buck to. Ultimately, nobody wants to
let anyone else down, and that can only benefit the team and the game.
"We Hunt and Kill Bad Ideas for Sport..."
That's not to say that working on a small team is all roses. Simply
stated, there are more than eleven jobs that need to get done when
you're making a game, and sometimes the bulk of the work to be done
will all seem to fall on the shoulders of one person. To really
maximize the efficiency of a small team, it helps to have people that
can easily transition to other roles to help spread the workload more
evenly. Visit Mythos
HQ on any given day and you might find one engineer writing quest
content or designing particle systems, another engineer polishing up
some art assets, an artist giving tech support, and the producer
cleaning the bathroom or balancing item drop rates.
Versatile people represent the key to making a small team work. Without
people that can perform multiple roles, it becomes difficult to realize
the "low overhead" benefits of having a small team. We've got a great
team of people and when they see that something needs to get done,
they're willing to jump in and help out regardless of what's in their
job description.
While this kind of flexibility really helps us get the job done, it
also requires a certain type of personality to make it work. We all
want to make the best game possible, and we all voice our opinions
pretty freely to our coworkers. Our engineers frequently have input on
the art that goes into our game. On the flip side, our artists often
voice strong feelings about specific game features as they are
implemented. We all tend to be bluntly honest with our assessments,
whether positive or negative.
To actually benefit from this type of situation, you need people that
have a thick skin and an open mind. We hunt and kill bad ideas for
sport, so if team members have a difficult time handling criticism or
defend ideas based on pride alone there is a real potential for bruised
egos and hurt feelings. However, if the team is able to handle
criticism and keeps it constructive, there is a huge benefit to be
reaped.
We all get to contribute to the entire process of making Mythos
in a very real way. That feeling of participation is strong motivation
and is the fire that keeps our team going. It's a dynamic that can only
work with a small team of the right kind of people. If the team grows
too large or the people don't mesh just right, the communication and
interactions that fuel the process sputter and the project falters. But
when it clicks, it makes the job incredibly satisfying and rewarding
for everyone involved.
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