4 ms·

How we sold a couple hundred million dollars of software in Japan

74 points by agavin 15y ago

Uhhrrr 15y ago
>More problematic was the seemingly simple fact that when a big block of text comes up on the screen the game effectively needs to pause so the player can read it. You can’t just “hit pause” but need a separate state. This simple feature caused a lot of bugs. A lot. But we stomped them out eventually. I would love to hear more of the gory details here.
- Oxryly 15y ago
  I doubt it's too gory... its probably just that "hitting pause" would pause whatever is deciding to put the block of text up so it would never go away...
- agavin 15y ago
  Well pause in video games is actually kinda complicated. By the jak period I had a pause mask (64 bits) that could pause all sorts of independant parts of the game separately. Particles, Camera movement, texture cycling, light changes, enemies, etc. Sometimes you just want to free the characters in place (and usually enemies and the like) but don't want the whole screen going motionless. For example in Crash, when Aku came out, I wouldn't want to pause the fruit from flying to the score. That would look odd. The Aku pause is to give the player a breather, not just to pause. Also, the real pause brings up the pause menu, which you certainly don't want with Aku.
gcb 15y ago
calling a title heavily produced by Sony an oddball in Japan is weird. But takes little away from the feat anyway
- agavin 15y ago
  This was the first American title that was heavily produced by Japan. Before us, Tetris was the only external game that had sold really well. Across all consoles/machines!
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
patio11 15y ago
It roughly translated into ‘the sound of the guitar mixed with the tree imagery is too nostalgic-sounding’. I’m still scratching my head on that one. A really good translator might have written that as "Your artistic choices are dated", which is probably what the original author meant to convey. The word invariably translated as "nostalgic" is natuskashii (懐かしい) and it conveys an impression of times-gone-by, which is sometimes not a good thing. (I once read a delightfully poisonous review of UI decisions by our senior engineer, beginning with "The new interface to the web app reminds me of my childhood experience working with mainframe terminals, except without the complex functionality.")
- agavin 15y ago
  Haha. Ken Kutaragi complained of Crash in the very early days that the "trees should wave their branches at you, giving the nostalgia of childhood." Or something like that. At the time we found it merely puzzling.
  - Natsu 15y ago
    Natsukashii is one of those Japanese concepts that you just have to learn along with the language, a lot like itadakimasu or the various forms of yoroshiku onegai shimasu. It's not so hard to understand once you understand the feeling they're supposed to convey. I usually end up mentally un-translating them because the translations end up sounding unnatural in English. Unusual uses of words like "nostalgia" and certain other bits of "translationese" make it easy to spot translations and identify the source language and not just for Japanese. For example, unnatural sounding uses of the word "illiberal" usually indicate statements translated from Chinese.
- mukyu 15y ago
  natsukashii I normally would not feel the need to correct a typo, but in an instance like this it is different as most people on hn do not automatically know what was intended.
  - Natsu 15y ago
pheon 15y ago
wow andy gavin on HN would never have expected that. whats your current thoughts on the "gaming market" these days, so much has changed since the console under the TV ruled the earth. e.g. if you were to start all over what/where/how would you spend your time?
- agavin 15y ago
  I've been on HN for over a year :-) Starting out is hard now in console gaming, except "maybe" x-box live or something. You'd have to start on iPhone, Android or the like where the costs are lower.
  - pheon 15y ago
    over a year cool and thanks for the response! Mr Cerney on here too? aint spoken to him in ages :) Yup yet I remember when ppl were complaining how PS2/Xbox games x10 game budgets and all hell was breaking loose with the industry doomed. These days iphone/android have technical constraints on par if not more so xbox/ps2 thus making a highly polished game on a phone hell of alot cheaper than AAA console title but still not something you can do in your basement. Guess my question is what type of game would you start out with? AAA level phone game with 80H+ of gameplay and 10 levels will cost a lot to develop and no one will play past the first level, or pay more than $5 for - IMHO ofcourse :)
    - agavin 15y ago
      Probably focus on something simple with very addictive gameplay.

74 points by agavin 15y ago

>More problematic was the seemingly simple fact that when a big block of text comes up on the screen the game effectively needs to pause so the player can read it. You can’t just “hit pause” but need a separate state. This simple feature caused a lot of bugs. A lot. But we stomped them out eventually. I would love to hear more of the gory details here.

Oxryly 15y ago
I doubt it's too gory... its probably just that "hitting pause" would pause whatever is deciding to put the block of text up so it would never go away...
agavin 15y ago
Well pause in video games is actually kinda complicated. By the jak period I had a pause mask (64 bits) that could pause all sorts of independant parts of the game separately. Particles, Camera movement, texture cycling, light changes, enemies, etc. Sometimes you just want to free the characters in place (and usually enemies and the like) but don't want the whole screen going motionless. For example in Crash, when Aku came out, I wouldn't want to pause the fruit from flying to the score. That would look odd. The Aku pause is to give the player a breather, not just to pause. Also, the real pause brings up the pause menu, which you certainly don't want with Aku.

gcb 15y ago

calling a title heavily produced by Sony an oddball in Japan is weird. But takes little away from the feat anyway

agavin 15y ago
This was the first American title that was heavily produced by Japan. Before us, Tetris was the only external game that had sold really well. Across all consoles/machines!
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]

patio11 15y ago

It roughly translated into ‘the sound of the guitar mixed with the tree imagery is too nostalgic-sounding’. I’m still scratching my head on that one. A really good translator might have written that as "Your artistic choices are dated", which is probably what the original author meant to convey. The word invariably translated as "nostalgic" is natuskashii (懐かしい) and it conveys an impression of times-gone-by, which is sometimes not a good thing. (I once read a delightfully poisonous review of UI decisions by our senior engineer, beginning with "The new interface to the web app reminds me of my childhood experience working with mainframe terminals, except without the complex functionality.")

agavin 15y ago
Haha. Ken Kutaragi complained of Crash in the very early days that the "trees should wave their branches at you, giving the nostalgia of childhood." Or something like that. At the time we found it merely puzzling.
- Natsu 15y ago
  Natsukashii is one of those Japanese concepts that you just have to learn along with the language, a lot like itadakimasu or the various forms of yoroshiku onegai shimasu. It's not so hard to understand once you understand the feeling they're supposed to convey. I usually end up mentally un-translating them because the translations end up sounding unnatural in English. Unusual uses of words like "nostalgia" and certain other bits of "translationese" make it easy to spot translations and identify the source language and not just for Japanese. For example, unnatural sounding uses of the word "illiberal" usually indicate statements translated from Chinese.
mukyu 15y ago
natsukashii I normally would not feel the need to correct a typo, but in an instance like this it is different as most people on hn do not automatically know what was intended.
- Natsu 15y ago

pheon 15y ago

wow andy gavin on HN would never have expected that. whats your current thoughts on the "gaming market" these days, so much has changed since the console under the TV ruled the earth. e.g. if you were to start all over what/where/how would you spend your time?

agavin 15y ago
I've been on HN for over a year :-) Starting out is hard now in console gaming, except "maybe" x-box live or something. You'd have to start on iPhone, Android or the like where the costs are lower.
- pheon 15y ago
  over a year cool and thanks for the response! Mr Cerney on here too? aint spoken to him in ages :) Yup yet I remember when ppl were complaining how PS2/Xbox games x10 game budgets and all hell was breaking loose with the industry doomed. These days iphone/android have technical constraints on par if not more so xbox/ps2 thus making a highly polished game on a phone hell of alot cheaper than AAA console title but still not something you can do in your basement. Guess my question is what type of game would you start out with? AAA level phone game with 80H+ of gameplay and 10 levels will cost a lot to develop and no one will play past the first level, or pay more than $5 for - IMHO ofcourse :)
  - agavin 15y ago
    Probably focus on something simple with very addictive gameplay.