IGDA Game Cafe

So a few weeks ago I was contacted by Jason Della Rocca from IGDA to be a host to the artists iteration of the Montreal Chapter GameGafe. And, being a sucker for punishment, I accepted. I have to admit that it did make me nervous.

So I showed up around 18h30, managed to order a burger and we got started around 19h45. We were split in 3 tables, one for each topic: Pure Art, Tech Art and Business Art. I ended up with the Business side. I’ll try to summarize what was talked about at my table and at the group chat we had at the end. Keep in mind that it was really more food for thought than definite answers.

First, we pondered about outsourcing. Some of which is done to save money and some of it because some companies just don’t have all the staff they need to complete their game. We wondered if in the case outsourcing is done to save money, it doesn’t just move the cost to a different cost center. Like for example, flights and travel costs to go and visit the contractor teams.

We also considered the “Ubisoft way” which is to create an entire studio in a different country and try to export the corporate culture there by sending existing employees to work there.

We discussed the difference between outsourcing a whole project or just chunks of it, what factors make it easy to export something to a different work pipeline. The level of interaction between the asset and other assets similar or different plays a very important role in that aspect. Increasingly geometry is affected by physics (trees in the wind, etc) and that makes their outsourcing more tricky. Also, if installing your pipeline over at your contractor’s location is resource intensive and converting the assets from their pipeline is buggy, isn’t the future just to standardise pipelines? The game industry is almost reinventing the wheel for each new game with new tools, new engines. More standard tools would make it easier to find competent contractors, would make artists more mobile and would reduce training time. It was also debated whether or not a standard engine would make all games be the same, then the engine was compared to a movie camera.

In the case where your contractor is in another country, one has to be careful of cultural issues, the references provided have to be way more precise or else the items in the game will end up looking like your contractor’s locale. Which brings about the topic of art direction. You need to have a very available art director to handle having a constant look to the game, especially if it’s a very stylised game, that person also has to convey the style to the contractors and make sure everyone is on the same line of thought. Parallels between the movie and the game industries were drawn.

Another topic that was discussed was licensing and it’s pitfalls, how to deal with the license owner, how some licence owners consider games to be just another merchandise and how it affects the artists work.

That’s about it, all in all, a pretty sweet evening.

Your website, Build it or outsource it part 5: How to register your domain name

The organisation in charge of accrediting registrars is called ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers)

Here is a list all accredited registrars, if you search the web for a registrar, you will come upon companies that are not listed here, it doesn’t mean they are fraudulous and shouldn’t be trusted. Many registrars have reseller programs where they sell bulk domain registrations and their resellers set up business selling domains and looking legit. These resellers can in turn have resellers who set up business, you get the point. However, when choosing a registrar, my advice is to try and cut as many middlemen as possible. And it’s not even a question of costs, since it might not be more expensive to buy from an accredited registrar than from a 3rd level reseller. The problem is if one of these middlemen goes out of business. It has happened to me and while I was able to recover my domain from the accredited registrar (by sending all kinds of info about the company proving the domain is really mine,) I had to pay my fees twice that year because the first guy went out of business with my money and without paying his provider. It was also a lot of stress and hassle. While accredited registrars can go out of business as well, the fewer links between your and the ICANN, the less chances of a weak link.

Also, don’t let yourself be fooled by e-mails or snail mails from official sounding companies that are NOT your registrar telling you that you are about to lose your domain. I have received such letters and the name of the company suggested a government link when it was really just spam to try and get me to change registrar. This is barely ethical and I recommend against using such companies.

How was the registrar able to find my mailing address? Because when you register your name and address are added to the registry and other users can “whois” you and find your info. Just put “whois domain” in a search engine and you will have dozens if not hundreds of whois tools (here is the one for Google.ca for example.) There are anonymous registry services as well that let you register a domain and the registrar pus own info in the registry. The problem then is, how will you recover your domain if the registrar goes belly up? Effectively the domain is registered to them, not to you! I’d rather have a little less privacy and knowing that I own what I bought.

Another point to be aware of, is that some registrars have hidden fees, that is, they advertise a price but once you have registered your domain with them, they want more money for basic stuff such as pointing your domain somewhere. They often have a hosting service they are try to push but you should be aware of such fees before signing in. Other registrars also put up a fight if you decide to switch to another registrar so it’s worth checking a registrar’s reputation.

For all it’s worth, I currently use 1&1 Internet amongst others and have used ExpertSRS and EZhosting in the past and have been satisfied as well.

Dr Sketchy!

Ever been to a life drawing session? How exciting was it? About as much as having your winter tires installed? Actually I’m exagerating, because I quite enjoy life drawing, it’s just that the atmosphere is often a bit stiff and I don’t usually feel like I fit in the crowd.

Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School is the remedy to that! Started by a lady called Molly Crabapple, it’s a mix of life drawing and party. Basically, you head in a pub or other public venue, pay your fee and then draw away cabaret girls, drag queens, and many other colorful characters while drinking beer and participating in draws and contests. It’s not very serious and no one looks at you funny if you can’t draw worth crap.

The first and oroginal chapter is in NYC but there are now many other independant locations of Dr Sketchy, we are now lucky enough to have our very own Dr.Sketchy Montreal, be sure to visit!