English text of Tom Sloper interview with Gamedesignerz.net, conducted in April 2001. Korean-language version can be seen at Gamedesignerz' Club OnGoing site: http://www.gamedesignerz.net/features/interview-tomsloper.htm (copy and paste into the URL box of your browser). <><><><><> Part I. For background information 1) What is your year of birth? TS - Oh, my gosh! In America this is an illegal question for potential employers to ask! (^_^) Heh. Well, my experience obviously indicates that I am older than most people in the game industry. Since you ask, I am 52 years old. I try not to mention my age to potential employers, because they may not want to hire someone so old, to design or produce games targeted for a younger audience. 2) What is your gender? TS -- Male. Potential employers are allowed to ask this question. (^_^) 3) What is your academic background? TS -- I have a Bachelor's degree in Speech and Drama from the State University of New York at Fredonia. I also took a year of graduate school in Theater at the University of Cincinnati. 4) How long have you been working in the game developing industry? TS -- Twenty-one years. I started by making games for handhelds (watches and calculators), the Vectrex, and the Atari 2600. 5) How many game titles have you participated in developing? TS -- 78 unique titles, plus many ports and localizations. 6) What is the company that you are currently working for? TS -- I left Activision in 2000, after 12 years there. Currently I am offering my services as a freelance game designer, producer, and consultant. I call my business "Sloperama Productions." 7) What is the position that you are responsible for? TS -- I am a designer/producer/director/creative director. With all the experience I have in the industry, I am now offering my services as a business consultant as well, to publishers and developers alike. 8) How many new games do you play per month? TS -- Not very many. One or two. 9) What is your favorite game genre? TS -- These days my favorite is mah-jongg. I am always interested in new mah-jongg software to try out. 10) What software do you often use in designing games, and for what purposes? TS -- For design purposes, I use Word 2000 and Microsoft's Paint program that comes included with Windows. Sometimes I use other graphic utilities too, depending on the capabilities of that utility over Paint. I also use Excel 2000, usually for the business aspects of producing games, but also to create tables for my game design documents. 11) What was your job before you became a game designer? TS -- I was a modelmaker. I used to work in engineering companies in Cincinnati, and when I moved to California, I made models of new toy concepts. 12) What is the average annual salary of a game designer? (If it is okay, please state yours too.) TS -- I'm not sure what the average salary is. I guess game designers' salaries range from a low of about $30,000/year to a high of $120,000/year. Average salary is probably in the $50- 60,000 range (I'm guessing). I get a high salary, but then I am not only a designer but also a producer and director. II. Main Interview 1) Why did you become a game designer? TS -- I became a game designer by accident. I was making models of toys one day when a game programmer complained to me that he was supposed to program some games but didn't know where to begin. We went to lunch and I outlined some ideas. We went back and presented the ideas to management, and they liked them. From that day I had two jobs: modelmaker, and game designer. Over time the company didn't need modelmakers anymore as the focus shifted from toys to electronic games, but it was obvious that I still had a place at the company. 2) How did you prepare yourself to become a game designer? TS -- I always was interested in writing, graphics, and playing games. I prepared for the job by just doing the stuff I enjoyed! I played board games with my friends. I drew and wrote original (and unpublished) comics. I learned about airbrushing and painting with oils and acrylics. All those pursuits prepared me for game design. 3) What do you think about the current trend of the game industry? TS -- The business is in a downtrend at the moment, but there is no way we will ever go back to the days when all you could do with a TV set is watch it. There will always be a demand for games, not only on the TV but also on the computer. The business will get strong again. Maybe someday we will have one standard technology, rather than competing console systems (all using different hardware and operating systems) and competing computer systems (same comment). 4) What do you think about the game industry and the market of Korea? TS -- I attended a speech given by Byung-Ho Park at the Game Developers Conference in San Jose, California in March 2001. His words opened my eyes to the depth of the development community in Korea. Then I went to the Tokyo Game Show a week later, and met with several Korean game developers there. Obviously this is a community that is growing and strengthening. Rest of the world, watch out! (^_^) 5) What kind of game are you developing at this moment? (If there isn't any, then what is the most recent game that you have developed?) TS -- I recently delivered a treatment for a PS2 game to a prospective client. It's an action/adventure game, and I can't talk about it right now. I've also created some dice games, which I am hoping to license to a Japanese toy company. (These are actual dice, not an idea for electronic entertainment.) 6) What is the part that you are responsible for in the game that you are currently developing? TS -- My most recent computer game for Activision was "Shanghai: Second Dynasty." I designed it and produced it. I just discovered last week that the game received an award from Computer Games Magazine, they called it "Year's Best Classic Game," which made me pretty happy. 7) What games do you think are the best in that part (of question 6)? TS -- You mean, what other designer/producers are out there? I guess I am a fan of Sid Meier, Steve Meretzky, and of course Shigeru Miyamoto. Some day I hope to be half as good as any of them! 8) What kind of methods do you use to get ideas and inspirations? I prefer to have some guidelines from the client, to begin with. What kind of game do they want? If the need is for an educational game, then I go to the Discovery Channel store and see what grabs my interest there. If the need is for a PS2 game, then I think about appropriate genres to begin, and I think about the target audience. 9) In your opinion, what is the most important role of a game designer? TS -- Communication. A game designer must communicate the vision to the rest of the team. So the game designer has to be able to write and speak well. And it helps a LOT if the designer can draw well enough to illustrate his or her ideas. Of course, it is also necessary that the designer be creative, that he or she have fun exciting ideas that will interest and engage others. 10) What are the main qualities that you consider a designer must have? TS -- A designer must have a broad base of knowledge (must be well educated), because designing a game is essentially creating an imaginary world for other people to inhabit and interact. So a designer must have an understanding of how worlds, and people, work. A designer must be a good writer as I said before. And a designer must be resourceful. It is often necessary when designing an imaginary world to do real-world research. So the designer needs to be able to find information (in the library, on the internet, in the phone book, or wherever it can be found), in order to fill in the interesting details that make a world interesting and realistic. Of course, a designer must also have a creative imagination, so that the world he or she creates will not be boring or derivative. 11) In the game designer's view, what is the best game in the history? TS -- That is a toughie! I loved the old Infocom text adventures. The pictures and feelings the text created in my mind have hardly ever been matched in graphic games. But at the Tokyo Game Show I saw some footage of the story sequences in the upcoming Final Fantasy X, and that looks like it will be a gorgeous game. I also liked Myst, the first Game Boy Mario game, and Mario 64. 12) And why (for question 12)? TS -- Sorry, I guess I jumped the gun when I explained my reason for liking the old Infocom text games! (^_^) I liked the beautiful world in Myst, and all the intricate puzzles. The Mario games hooked me with the cute characters and fanciful situations, but especially the well-polished and totally addictive gameplay. 13) What advices would you give to those who just started off as a game designer? TS -- This is one of my favorite topics! People who want to become game designers should get a college degree. In college, the aspiring designer should study all kinds of topics, from physics to writing, as well as psychology, acting, and art. The aspiring game designer should pursue his or her topics of interest, as well. For instance, when I was in college, I used to be fascinated by astronomy. The aspiring designer should learn as much as he or she can about topics that s/he is interested in. Learn, explore! If the designer isn't interested in the world, how can s/he create a better one? I write more about career preparation on my website, at http://www.sloperama.com/advice.html. And once the aspiring designer has gotten a job at a game company, my advice is to work hard! It's the lightbulb that shines the brightest that gets noticed, and promoted to the best jobs. It is extremely important to have a good, cooperative attitude. Games are not made by one person, they're made by teams. It's not a job for lone wolves. 14) Last of all, what do you think game design is? TS -- I think game design is the process of creating an interesting world for others to inhabit. The world doesn't have to be a large one -- it can be as small as a deck of cards or a handful of dice, or it can be as large as a nation or a galaxy. The rules of that world are what are important. What capabilities do you give the inhabitants, what physical laws or limitations? And what is the goal of the game? It must be fun, and the way to make it be fun is to have an understanding of how the world works, and (hopefully) to find it all FASCINATING!