How long will the Seven have to prepare their games for release, and other questions.

[JeffCrook]

How long will the Seven have to prepare their games for release? I suppose this should be divided up into the three levels of game complexity.

How will testing of each of the Seven's games be handled before the 'official' release of each game?

The advance against royalties states that an advance of between $1K - $7K will be made. How will it be decided who gets how much?

Using the example of Castle Marrach, how long did it take to create this setting and its stages, how many people were working on it, and how much of their time did they dedicate to it?

Will other games be supported with printed game manuals, like Castle Marrach?

Your booth at GenCon was definitely the best of all the exhibitors!

[ChristopherA]

Originally posted by JeffCrook:
How long will the Seven have to prepare their games for release? I suppose this should be divided up into the three levels of game complexity.

We hope that late this fall and early winter of next year that each of the Skotos Seven will put up a Stage based on some facet of their proposal. This way they can try out our development system and have real player feedback on their ideas.

This will also give them some idea of the scope of their ambitions, and adjust either their schedule or their ambition http://www.skotos.net/ubb/wink.gif

We would like each of the Skotos Seven to have their games available sometime in 2001.

How will testing of each of the Seven's games be handled before the 'official' release of each game?

We consider any Skotos Seven game automatically a 'Flagship' game, and as such, we will be helping the StoryBuilders more with developing their work. Once a game passes our internal review criteria and is no longer in alpha and is ready for beta, then we'll seek beta testers from our own gaming community.

As we start giving StoryBuilding capabilities to more people next year, we'll be unable to give more then basic assistance in testing non-Flagship games. This is part of the reason why we are adding only the seven this year. Hopefully by next year a community of StoryBuilders will exist that can help each other with testing and quality assurance, and we will be supporting that community.

I also want to make it clear that we have many internal tools to make quality assurance and testing of games easier, from bug tracking, to revision control and QA fields in objects.

The advance against royalties states that an advance of between $1K - $7K will be made. How will it be decided who gets how much?

This is largely based on looking at three criteria:


Most important is the experience of the StoryBuilder -- someone with extensive prior experience with game design or muds/mushes will get a larger advance.

Secondly, how much has already been written. If we are licensing something with quite a bit of existing material to draw from, then we will pay more.

Lastly, how much draw will the game have? Based on who the authors is, what the genre is, etc. how many players can we expect compared to other games?



Using the example of Castle Marrach, how long did it take to create this setting and its stages, how many people were working on it, and how much of their time did they dedicate to it?

Although Castle Marrach was conceived about a year ago, the detail work began in June when our tools became available internally. Currently a team of people are working on it--none of them full time. An individual experienced with our tools can probably do a game of the sophistication of Castle Marrach in a year of part-time work, or a team in four to six months.

Will other games be supported with printed game manuals, like Castle Marrach?

Yes, all the flagship games we wish to be supported by additional materials, such as manuals. We'll commission artwork, do the layout, etc. if the authors have not been able to do so themselves.

Your booth at GenCon was definitely the best of all the exhibitors!


Thanks! We wanted to let people know that we are serious about this, and the booth was the best way to show it.

-- Christopher Allen

[mobydick]

Further questions regarding expectations
for Story Builders:

1) The previous reply talks about the
possibility of building in teams. If
I'm interested in working with a team,
but don't have anyone in mind to work
with, can Skotos provide people to
work with me?

2) I realize this may be difficult
to answer, but roughly, about how
many hours does Skotos expect a
Story Builder to put in? Are we
talking on the order of 2-3, or on
the order of 15-20 or more?

Mobydick

[ChristopherA]

1) The previous reply talks about the possibility of building in teams. If I'm interested in working with a team, but don't have anyone in mind to work with, can Skotos provide people to work with me?

I'm not sure the best way to handle this today. We hope that over time that these Forums will become the heart of a StoryBuilding community where people can find like-minded partners to build games.

How to find partners in the few short weeks before the Skotos Seven deadline? That is more difficult. Certainly, if you are interesting in offering your help to one of the Skotos Seven once it they are announced, that is possible. Or you can put your name out here in the StoryBuilders area with what you are interested in, and ask people to join you to make a joint proposal before August 31st.

In fact, as I give feedback this week on the proposals sent so far, I suspect that I will suggest that some of the authors should consider joining forces.

2) I realize this may be difficult
to answer, but roughly, about how many hours does Skotos expect a Story Builder to put in? Are we talking on the order of 2-3, or on
the order of 15-20 or more?

To be a member of the Skotos Seven we expect you to be professional -- that is why why we pay an advance on royalties. Yet we know that it is not an occupation -- it is something that you do in your spare time.

Any experienced fiction writer, author of a RPG scenario, etc. has to take it seriously enough to get the work done. How they do it varies, whether they devote a day a week to it or a few hours each evening.

This is part of the reason why we look at prior works when evaluating the qualifications for the Skotos Seven. We want to see that you have the skill to juggle your spare time and get things done.

As to the total number of hours? I'm sure that a Stage is comparable in hours to a short story or a novelette, but a Grand Theatre is probably more like a novel or a screenplay. A World is much more difficult, probably as difficult as a series. However, unlike any of these art forms, it easier to split the work of building games between multiple people.

-- Christopher Allen