One European studio fulfills orders of the Belgian mafia and makes excellent RPG for money earned on resale by smuggled Russian black caviar. Sergei Klimov met with the director of this studio and found out that torrents are good that normal developers do not come to the office for dinner and that to make a good PC-game without a console version-utopia.
Twelve years ago I began to show at international exhibitions " Vseslav "And for three years I got acquainted with most European publishers and developers, who in those years took place in the category" Beginners ". We were united by three things: none of us had money, no one had ties in the industry and we very, very, very much loved the games – which were not business for us, but a vocation. Of course, we wanted to be successful and rich, to drink wine and fly on the Concord, like Peter Molino, but first of all we just wanted to “engage in games”.
Since then, a lot of water has flowed. Each of us survived the times of adventure and periods of dull stagnation, but one thing has been preserved: everyone I met at those very first exhibitions have not been changed and are still engaged exclusively in games. It really turns out that the professional development of games has grabbed you for life. If you are a good sculptor, this is a long time. If you are a talented designer of role -playing games – this is almost forever.
I used to think that the reason for such conservatism is purely practical: the industry is full of employees without higher education, “peppers with oddities”, which, outside the game industry, in fact, are not needed. Now I am sure that the whole thing is called. If you like games, you will never exchange the creation of an interface for a new strategy to draw up a balance of landscaping default city.
At the exhibition in Cologne, our Swedish partner decided to introduce me, a Russian publisher, with one British guy who launches a new portal of digital distribution in Europe. It was not possible to introduce. Seeing me, the gray -haired (already) guy yelled: “Gorbachof!" – and rushed to hug, because for the first time we met each other ten years ago at the annual French exhibition Milia. He was then the director of the Canadian publishing house (since then bankrupt), and I am a developer of a promising role -playing project (since then frozen). Both minus for old failures and plus for constancy – games, games, games.
If you look from the side, the history of the Belgian studio Larian It looks simple: the young team has developed The L.E.D. Wars , Then she did Divine Divinity And Beyond Divinity , I went into the shadow for several years – and now I returned to the market with Divinity 2: Ego Draconis. However, not everything is so simple: for several years to the abyss, and then return with the game, which the entire profile press has already given 8-9 points once, only units managed.
The triumphal return of Larian is a miracle that became possible exclusively thanks to the persistence of the founders of the studio. Larian Director Sven Vink himself finances his projects, develops them himself and shows them to the press. Sven does not build a business empire, does not dream to overcome Blizzard and does not plan to disrupt a million on applications for social networks. It’s just that he is a talented designer who makes good (and sometimes even very good) games for fifteen years in a row, the high estimates of which many California gatefuls would envy.
We make games – this is our task
Hi, Sven, how many years, how many winters! It seemed to me that last year you were more actively at the exhibition.
Yes, we handed over the version yesterday Divinity 2 for Xbox 360.
Passed?
Passed. They didn’t sleep only for a couple of nights, so all the guys went early today – to sleep on the weekend. With these console versions there is always a problem in terms of terms. You can’t move in any way, everything is painted in advance. Therefore, in recent days I had to go to a feat, live at work. You can imagine what our wives think about it.
What to do, sacrifices for the sake of art. For RS, it is more convenient to develop?
In terms of flexibility – yes, but with finances on RS is now bad. It looks rudely like this: you have a team of 20 people and you have been making the game for two years. This is twenty -four months, we multiply by 20 – we get 480 months of work. If your expenses for one employee are equal to a thousand dollars per month, then this is half a million. In our Belgium, human expenses are several thousand a month. And euro, not dollars. That is, to make a good game, I need a budget of several million – and then it needs to be recouped. Therefore, if you want to make a big role -playing game like Divinity 2, for example, then without console versions of such a budget you can’t repay.
In Russia, we have a magazine with the motto "PC Only and Forever". How do you feel about such statements by developers? Well, you know, “prefixes must die, all this will soon be covered, and RS will survive the third world”.
Such a rhetoric does not hurt me very much. I developed my first project for Amiga, then I worked for RS, now for RS and Xbox, soon for Sony I will do something, probably … We make games-this is our task. The plot, mechanics, characters. And the formats in which we release these games is a purely technical issue, market issue and demand. If you have good programmers, you can handle any platform. If there are no good programmers, then it is not clear how you are going to finish for at least one platform.
I'm not a capitalist, I'm an idealist
Listen, what kind of project was for Amiga – your first game?
I wrote it at school, in the last grades. The game was called War. Some of my friends graduated a year earlier, went to our Belgian University to study and grabbed the game with him. And then after school I go to the same university. I come to the first lesson, ask the locals that they have interesting here. And they say: we cut into one game in the laboratory – just a plague! Strategy, WAR is called. I was just happy. For the sake of such moments I make games.
That is, for the sake of glory, not for the sake of money? But Brad Wardell from the "village" says that For him, game development is a business. And he makes good games not because “it is necessary”, but because this is the most true way to make good money. The better the game, the easier it is to sell, the more money you collect from the market ..
Money is good, but they have never been the main thing for me. I'm not a capitalist, I'm an idealist. Many years ago, the director of the largest German publishing house at that time told me that our industry was lucky: idealists move forward. And he was right. I could earn significantly more in another industry, but I chose games. I love games.
What does your family think? The wife is satisfied? Parents? Who would they like to see you?
Mom would better send me to the bank. The wife is also unhappy with games. For the past seven months of deadline for the deadline, we have not slept for two nights last week. Neither parents nor wife love our industry for this. We are like police officers – when we follow the trail, everything else for us ceases to exist. Only if you work in the police, then you suffer for the sake of society, and society understands this. And if you work on games, then you just do your favorite to the detriment of the family, and society tells you that you are an idiot. Although in fact we are the same in terms of motivation. Unraveling crimes is pure idealism. The same with the development of games.
Your employees agree?
Very even. We have one programmer under the pressure of his wife changed his job. She sawed it-that he makes little money, that his career prospects are not as beautiful as they could be in a large office … So he went to work in a system integrator (_fire, a contractor who provides advisory services, sets up software and equipment. – Approx. "Gambling")._ A month later I escaped, returned to our project. Because I could not stand it. His two things were finished off: the fact that instead of creating a new world in the game he was engaged in breeding customers for money, and that instead of artists and screenwriters he had to consult with the clerks who discussed at work how much the parking lot is in the center of Brussels.
And how – he is satisfied that he returned?
Yes. We are special – not Larian specifically, but the game industry in general, the development area. We are binded by the general cultural field. In my studio, people speak five languages. If you walk along the corridors, you will hear English, French, German, Dutch and Russian. At the same time, we perfectly understand each other, because when we make the game, we all know what a good game is, even if one of us is from Berlin, the other from Moscow, and the third of Amsterdam. And we have freedom, which is important.
Freedom like what? As an opportunity to come to the office for dinner and there is pizza right at the desktop?
No, this is no longer freedom, this is chaos. After all, we are not a club in interests, we have a company that makes games, but for this we need discipline, we need planning. Especially if you develop a game for consoles, where the terms are very strictly fixed. You asked me how we differ from other companies – so, we are not different how we work, we differ in what and with whom we work. You just come to work as if you worked at the bank, but only instead of reading news reports from oil regions, you read the script of the new game chapter. The freedom that I am talking about is creative freedom. In every game we create a new world. And what are you creating in the bank? (smiles)
Is there really no industry in which it would be as interesting as in games, and so that they pay more? Suppose that if a game programmer goes into the support service of the mobile operator, it means that he is not a game programmer, but hired power without creative ambitions. But here artists, for example, can go to work in a movie … shoot serious tapes. Be part of art.
This is a common opinion. Until you yourself try to find an interesting job, you won’t understand how unique the games are as a professional area. Our author of dialogues in Divinity 2 is a professor of history with a doctoral degree in Anglo -Saxon culture. He was very glad to work on the game, because his usual area, scientific, it is very boring, there is almost nothing new there.
Who has the widest selection – this is the programmers. They will always be able to find a good job. Not with games, yes, but if you try, you can get into an interesting scientific project or where else. They will not pay a lot to you there, as in games, but the work will be creative, it will be pleasure.
It is more difficult for artists. You can work with advertising, but this is not a very cheerful area, a lot of strange customers who need to constantly draw bottles with shampoo. It is even more difficult to find adequate work outside the industry designers. Only games give them such freedom of creativity to which they are used to.
It is important for me that my games love
Let's get back to the topic of capitalism and idealism. Wardell from the Stardok is listening to only those players who paid for the game. He ignores everyone else. Logic is understandable: instead of focusing on freeloers, it is better to work for those who have reinforced their opinion paid by a copy. You agree?
It is important for me that my games love. Regardless of whether they bought them or downloaded them. I am happy when I open the game forum, and there are a thousand new Divinity 2 messages. If you tell me that eight hundred messages from this thousand – from the downloads of the pirate, then I will not have happiness, because they play the project, and this is the main thing.
But piracy is a problem?
Problem who would argue. We will collect the Russian version for almost a month (the conversation took place in early September. – Approx. "Gambling") , And my producer has already sent a pirate copy purchased in the Moscow market. There is a “student of the word of diminution, for one who has been starting from the age of ten courtship to become the elite of a person’s warriors”, “peasants-passengers who they” and “very cheap technique that is”, and the chestnut color of hair is called “short brown ". And the virus in addition. It is difficult not to consider this a problem.
But if someone writes to me: “Sven! I went through your game and almost cried in the finale. It was the best week in my life! P.S. I downloaded the game from torrents, ”I will not write in response:“ So that you die, arrogant goat ”. I will write: “Cool! Very glad!"Because people play my games and enjoy them, for this I create them. And you know, if this guy liked my game so much, then it is possible that he will then go and buy a collection edition (smiles).
Tell me, you are listening to players at all – in terms of how to do the next project?
I like to read what they write about my project. Especially about how exactly people went through the game and what their impressions of the gameplay were left over. The audience is important to me. But if we talk about the future, then I already know how to do the next project.
In August, Divinity 2 came out in Germany, and some German players did not like the finals. So much so that very evil letters began to come to my address, as they say, Hate Mail. Demand a happy end, demand to release a patch that would give them the opportunity to get another ending in the game … I will not go to that. The story of Divinity should be what it is written.
How would you determine the criterion for the success of the project? Which is more important – high ratings? Good sales?
You know, sales are a derivative function. Today the market feels good, tomorrow – not very. There is no direct connection between the training camp and its quality, you yourself know, you are a publisher. Ratings are more indicative in terms of quality, but they also depend on the context. Someone appreciates the plot above the graphics, and someone is above the plot, the assessments are subjective. Especially if we are talking about average marks. It is important to be proud of what you are doing, for me this is the most important indicator of success. If I have something to be proud of, the project was a success. We handed over Divinity 2, and I can say that this is a good game. I am satisfied. My team is happy. So the project is successful. And ratings and sales will be later.
Free breakfasts will not save from a stroke
Let's talk a little about you and about your colleagues. Larian – Belgian studio. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the development of games in your country?
Yes, as elsewhere. I would not say that our country is somehow especially predisposed to games, games can be developed everywhere. For example, I really like King’s Bounty. Also, the project has not been done in California, and it is unlikely that the developers will tell you that the Russian land somehow helped or interfered with it. To organize a studio and then this studio can make good games, you need several like -minded people. That's all. If there is a bone of the team, the rest of the issues are resolved.
You could establish Larian if you were born not in Flanders, but in the Moscow region?
I think I could. Remember, we talked about new teams – where to go to young enthusiasts to make it easier to make games? My answer: the place does not matter, the main thing is to be together. If you are five and you all move to New Zealand – there are no problems, you can make a game. Where will the office be, it does not matter. It is important that the team be together. Now, if you are separated in several cities, if you have a designer in St. Petersburg, and the artist in London, then yes, then there will be problems, and I'm not sure that the project can be finished at all.
What's good in Belgium?
Everyone speaks different languages. Diversity helps. We have a very small state, and at the same time we are located at a very popular intersection of Europe – at school, history lessons consist mainly of listing which country in which year we were captured.
We can take an artist from Germany, a screenwriter from Belgium, a programmer from Holland, and they all fit normally into the team, because we do not have any main Belgian composition, we are all different, we are used to talking in English. It is easy to connect to such a team of any specialist.
And what?
The size of the country. You saw that we have a road from the studio? Fermat, stables … We rent an office in the village, but at the same time go to Brussels forty minutes. And to Genta, the capital of the province of East Flanders, in general twenty. And here I pay five times less for renting a studio than you are in Moscow. It helps. If I had to maintain an office in a large city, it would be harder for me to finance development. On the other hand, you know what we pay taxes? Sixty -five percent. I understand that this is necessary, it goes to social funds, for unemployment benefits, and so on, so I do not complain, no. Just state. Development in Belgium is very expensive. That is why we entrusted many tasks for Divinity 2 to third -party teams. Containing a team of 100 people here would be madness.
And what about your shots? In Moscow, before the crisis, there was some kind of arms race for The topic of salary funds. A small number of experts with experience were in time, everyone moved from the company to the company in search of the best share ..
Grass is always greener on the other side of the road. I have already stopped worrying on this topic. Young experts always want to try to work in California. It makes no sense to hold them, this is a normal desire. One of our artist left for work in Bio Ware , Two years later he returned.
Why? There, they say, in the morning they cover free breakfasts.
Free breakfasts will not save from a stroke. They had permanent crane there. Such a schedule of work that he stuck out in the office for 12 hours a day, until some vessel burst in his head and a micro. After that, he returned: he says, I want to make games, but I do not want to work on such a hard conveyor.
Since then he has been happy again?
He was happy. Now I left again. To the Canadian branch Ubisoft. We will now wait for what will happen to him there (smiles).
I want to improve the quality of life of developers
How much does a person work in your studio now?
Thirty.
More happened?
Yes, it reached fifty. And less also happened when only three people remained in the team.
And on Divinity 2, how many people worked? All thirty?
Closer to a hundred, many external employees participated. In general, the development process has changed a lot over the past five years, Larian now – this is no longer a set of professionals for all occasions. We have become a coordination center that distributes work on various teams of narrow specialization.
And how do you like this format?
Quite. We will now complete the work on Divinity 2, and I will continue to reform the structure of the studio. I want to improve the quality of life of developers in our team. One guy works for us, he used to live in Frankfurt and spent four hours on the road every day: he traveled at six in the morning, we had ten, worked up to six and went back. There was ten at home, fell to sleep right away. But he didn’t want to move to Belgium – he had his parents, wife, friends in Frankfurt.
How it ended?
I moved all the same when the work increased. And what to do? When I talk about the quality of life, I mean this: I want him to work on the continuation of Divinity 2, returning back to his city. It is necessary to change the process of joint creativity.
To develop the game, there is no need to meet all 30 members of the team every day to meet each other. If you live in Frankfurt, you can work on the game for four days at home, and on Fridays appear in the studio to discuss the current state of affairs with the producer and other colleagues. Only 6-7 people in the entire project have a real need for everyday communication-these are producers and designers. All. The rest can work most of the time from home, and such work will be much more productive than work in the office.
But what about the stories that when working from home, people sleep before dinner, all week They watch “Doctors House”, and then try to make up for a plan for the last two days before delivery?
Our experience shows that the more comfortable a person works, the more productive his week passes. The problem of working in the office is in abundance of unnecessary processes. I judge by myself: when no one distracts me for two hours, I am able to do as much as I usually do in the whole day of the usual workflow. Sometimes I close the door of my cabinet and do not go out until I end the task, I adopted this habit from our programmers.
Usually after all, how does it happen: someone is not sitting, and he begins to wander around the studio, ask questions, look for advice. And instead of thinking and inventing on his own, he eats the brain to others, violates their concentration. In reality, only daily interaction is necessary only for the coordinators of the game, producers who work with external teams and should synchronize their efforts. We are like a spider that weaves a web. Our web becomes larger, and the spider is less. I want 6-7 people in the office to coordinate one hundred and fifty external employees, so that the small size of the internal team is not an obstacle to create a big game.
Which of the external teams did you work on Divinity 2 – with which countries?
With Argentina, with Romania. With India. With Hungary. We thought with Estonia, but we did not like their team – before the start of work, we came to see the office. These were some kind of muddy, it is not clear how they were going to work with us.
They worked with the Bulgarians, but it didn’t end with anything good, everything flowed sluggishly, opaque. There, such a story was ridiculous with their producer – he will no longer come to us, he praises his whole country. Literally through the word. During lunch, he takes a salad, eats, says: "Eh, your tomatoes are good, but they are tastier in Bulgaria". We return to the office from the restaurant, he immediately: “You have a highway in two stripes? And in Bulgaria usually in three, or even four ". I told him: “Listen, let's close the topic, I was in Bulgaria, there is blue sky, green grass, no surprises”. He was silent, but then in the office he continued to whine again: “Who are we waiting for? In Bulgaria, usually everyone for a meeting five minutes before the start comes ". In general, we decided that we could not work with such a team.
We had a familiar smugglers
I myself wanted to ask you about your adventures in Sofia, but since you mentioned Bulgaria, tell me how you earned money on black caviar there?
Black caviar … (laughs) This is true: the first money for the development of the game we earned on the resale of black caviar from the USSR. So Larian definitely has Russian roots! Remember such round blue jars? In the early nineties, they were not very expensive for you, and I had a familiar smuggler from Russia – I still walked at the university with many Russians, they periodically took me to the bathhouse.
There was one guy among them, the most common. And somewhere a month after our acquaintance, this guy appears at my house with a sports bag full of banks with black caviar, which he somehow drove in the bus through Estonia. And says that he urgently needs to attach these banks. Yes, no question! My friends and I have helped, in two weeks we sold everything for friends, and as a result, we had some kind of incredible amount that we decided to spend on the development of our first game at that time.
The L.E.D. Wars?
No, l.E.D. – This is our second project. The first was the game for Atari – for that old Atari, which released game consoles.
Something I don't remember anything about your game for Atari ..
And she did not take place. In 1996, we signed up to develop a project with a budget of $ 50,000, and three months after that, Atari decided that she would no longer engage in games, so our contract was canceled.
And then the turn of The L came.E.D. Wars?
Yes. Also with a budget of $ 50,000.
What can you say about this project?
This was my first commercial game. I learned to make games. Invalious experience. And then there was LMK – The Lady, The Mage & The Knight, role -playing game. It all started very well – we subscribed to the German publisher to the budget of a million dollars ..
But what ended?
Unfortunately, a few months after the start of work on the project is our publisher, Attic , went bankrupt, leaving a lot of debts. Including us. We worked on the game, passed the stages. First began delays with payments. Then the publisher stopped answering calls. And finally closed, and we stayed with debts of $ 500,000.
However…
Yes. It was very difficult. In order to repay debts, we started working with the casino then. With the Belgian mafia.
In the schedule "Game of a week" you cease to be afraid
You had a mafia then?
Was, and what else. And now there is, I think so.
You didn't drown anyone there by chance?
No, what are you. When I say that it was a mafia, I mean only customers. These were serious guys on expensive cars with Swiss numbers. They had a casino throughout Europe, and they needed games for slot machines. As well as slot machines themselves.
A lot of projects for them have done?
Hundreds!
Oh well!
We handed over the game a week. And in two years they paid off all the debts. In general, you know, it may sound dramatic – young developers exchanged a role project for games for a casino, but we learned a lot then, useful and not very.
For example?
We have lost fear before the end of the project. You know how the developers happen: it seems to you that just now you can’t give the game, because the story is not allowed, and you ask for another month … more … and then six more more. So, in the graph “Game of a week”, you cease to be afraid of the moment when the code is closed for changes. You just say: "It was the last version". And if some ideas remain, you start with them already on the next project.
And the mafia did not show itself?
Yeah, of course! Once my friend and I went to Sofia on Affairs, as we worked at that time with local artists. And then one day such a tight guy came up to our hotel lobby, two meters by two meters, in a leather jacket and says: “Fallou Mi, May Kar Na”. I almost went.
Author!
Sergey Klimov – General Producer of the Moscow Studio Snowball Studios And the permanent author of the magazine " Gambling ". He has been engaged in games for 14 years, during this time he managed to publish more than 150 projects in Russia for all platforms – PC, PS2, PSP, PS3, Xbox 360, WII and DS, although it refers to PC with special trepidation. From his own games he managed to develop and publish ( Pike ), another – to develop and freeze (" Vseslav ").
At the moment, Sergei and his team are fighting a crisis, buying the rights to new games for reasonable money. Most of all, Sergei loves to read reports on sales that he receives every week, and look at the new prototypes of Russian projects without the publisher, which he receives every day.
Local Chekists, or something?
Local bandits, as it turned out later. This guy leads us to his “Lada”, in which the same square man sits (besides his brother), and they are taking us somewhere. I ask: “What is the problem?"He says:" Know problems, just my boss wants to talk to you. But first we will go to the night club ". And so they bring us to the night club, and the club is closed. They call somewhere, people come, take off the lock from the door, call girls from somewhere, turn on music, and we have such a surreal night disco.
Gradually, the people are being pulled up, they constantly pour us … Finally, the guy shows us that the time to leave, and we go down to some kind of basement, in which there is a security post at the end of a long corridor, and behind him-an office. As I understand it, the local boss sits in the office. Who probably loved the “godfather” very much, because he talked to us as in the film – with pauses, with meaningful views. “You,” he says, “are doing casino in Europe?"We:" Yeah ". “Here,” says, “look,“ and holds out a plan for a building. – This, – says, – my new casino. Interested?"
I think: "The main thing is not to panic". And I say that in our organization (I said so – “in the organization”) the decision is made by the chief manager, to whom I will transfer everything immediately upon returning to Brussels. “Good,” says the boss, “thanks. You are free ". The very polite type turned out to be. And so we go back to the hotel with two of his bandits, or guards, this is how, and we say to each other in Flamandy: “That's it, we are now ordered the way to Bulgaria-if we appear here again without news from“ The main manager ", No one will nurse with us".
This is not role -playing games for you.
Yes. I also remember, for me, the first trip to Las Vegas was a cultural shock. Our clients say to me: “Guys, you need to make games for machine guns differently. Something is wrong with you. You were the last time in the casino for a long time?"I say:" I have never been in my life … "-and they send me to Las Vegas on an airplane.
And there?
And there I realized that the theory and practice of design are very far from each other. For example, in all games there is a sound background, a melody, some musical interruptions that are played when winning or defeat. So, all slot machines – regardless of the manufacturer – these melodies in one vein. Otherwise, it will be impossible to be in the hall due to cacophony.
I went to the bank and took $ 400,000 on credit
Tell me, when you helped out $ 500,000 for two years of work for the casino, there was no temptation to score for role -playing games and continue to work for Vegas? It seems to me that you would make more money than on the development of Divinity.
I would definitely earn more money, but I already said that money is not the main thing for our studio. We gathered to make games, so we gave debts and returned to role projects.
Started Divine Divinity?
Yes. Signed the project again with the German publisher, with CDV Software.
Big budget?
- 000 000. Only you then cross out the figure from the text, okay? I don't want to give out any secrets inadvertently.
Divinity was a success, she now has an average rating of 81%.
Yes, the game was a success. But, unfortunately, she also lingered, and we spent more on the development than we received from the publisher. So it was a creative success and a financial catastrophe at the same time.
After the completion of Divinity, I had a very difficult period in my life. We have only three people left in the company, in general zero. It was the end of the year. I went to my father to South Africa, I thought the whole trip was how to get out, how to not close the studio, what would we do … and when I returned to Belgium in January, I decided to do it Beyond Divinity. I went to the bank and took $ 400,000 on credit.
At your own risk?
Yes, it was difficult. And it was very sad. We had a full office, thirty people, we gave the game, it received excellent ratings, and still we were in debt again. Moreover, by the end of the development of Beond Divinity, copyright from sales of the first part began to come – and it turned out that we could not take the loan, not to do Beyond. We would have had enough money to develop a new large project ..
Then we started making games for children. For local television. My wife and I were just born children, and I got involved in this topic. You know, I always tried to do only what I was understanding: I develop role -playing games because I love them, and children's – because I look at my children and understand how their head works.
And you got children's games?
Another how! There was even a situation when the local parliament initiated an investigation why 9 out of 10 children in the Flemish region of Belgium play our games; They thought that we somehow unscrupulously use the power of television to make children buy our games.
But I remember that during this period you also began to participate in television exhibitions – in Cannes, in London – that is, then you went beyond your territory with children's projects?
Yes, and it helped us a lot: firstly, working on games for children, we built a technological base, finalized the engine. Secondly, we have forced money to start working on Divinity 2. Our games for children were licensed by the Air Force channel and several more large European television channels. This gave us the opportunity to return to role -playing games.
The best ideas come in the direction of movement
When you started to think about Divinity 2?
About three years ago. Remember, you came to me and I showed budget calculations? We then built a development model with the participation of external teams, presented how many millions we will take, and began preliminary production, description of the world, gameplay. In parallel with this, we continued to save money for the development and selection of external teams for working on models and textures.
As a result, somewhere for eight to nine months we went to preliminary work and two more years directly to develop. Divinity 2 design-document is about two thousand pages. I have the only printed copy in my office, no one else dared to translate the paper like that (smiles). If you read this document and then look at Divinity 2, it turns out that these are two completely different projects. The plot has changed, the design of game mechanics has changed. Only the vision remains. And the map on which we implemented about a quarter of the planned.
The best ideas come on the go of movement – this is the specifics of the games. There is a huge difference between "see" and "represent". You launch the version, look at you in an invented scene and understand that it must be completely rewritten. So we work.
How much the experience of previous projects helped you?
You know, we can repeat some mistakes endlessly if a sufficient amount of time has passed between similar situations. After Beta Divinity 2, I began to write conclusions for myself and tried to find on the Internet whether any of the developers already wrote something similar-and found his own article written after the passage of Beond Divinity. Some conclusions were repeated one in one. I forgot Beyond Divinity, in both projects I had similar problems with the volume of the game and the first game scenes.
And the development was easier compared to the first Divinity?
No. We have added experience, the team increased, but in parallel with this, the expectations of the players grew up. Previously, to make a house in the game, I went one day. And now it takes three weeks, because the level of detail is higher, the functionality of the game engine, the players will want to go to this house, consider all the rooms.
You will ever finish your "all up"? Here are counting the year for three developments – and this is if on finished technology. We see a line in the design document: "A lonely warrior wanders through a gloomy forest". You used to launch a sprite on the path – and you're done. And now you will order a mokap for a warrior, test the effect of swaying trees, bring to mind the refraction of light in the foliage.
The last of the Mogican
Sven, you just finished a large project. And he was already well accepted-in the German game press now all ratings are about 80%.
Well, yes.
So what is the secret?
To enjoy the process. No person can withstand two or three years of constant stress and self -flagellation. We collected a version, played, commented and noticed what we liked in the game ourselves. It was such an internal stream of positive mood.
The reaction of players to our project also helped. You know what we did a week after the release of the German version? Several times a day we looked through all the game forums, where they wrote at least something about the game, and sent outstands around the studio.
The wife is satisfied that the seven -month -old Abrall was over?
She would be more pleased if I sold the studio and found a calmer job. Additional money would not hurt either. After each game, she asks if it will be such a bestseller that we can buy my own house – and so far I answer in the spirit of “not this time, dear” (smiles). And so – yes, of course, glad. We are sitting with you in the garden now, we drink wine, the weather is good, tomorrow Saturday and I will not have to go to work. This is happiness.
You, except for games, have been doing something lately?
Studied. My wife is a biochemist. I have long wanted to understand what she was doing at work. And in general, the brains dry a little, if only the games are engaged all day, so last year I entered the university at the Faculty of Chemistry. The first course finished in June.
And how?
All exams are excellent. What did you expect? Our team is very capable. And we make games not because they don’t take anywhere else, but because we just love this business very much.
What will you do in the near future?
Now we are finishing collecting various language versions of Divinity 2, including Russian, and we work on other games in the Divinity universe. We will announce them in a few months.
But there are no plans to unite with some major publisher or change the genre?
No. Larian is an independent studio, we have a Divinity series, and we are quite good to work on it. We do not make "games for everyone". We make role -playing games for those who love and appreciate role -playing games. And all. We are the last of the Mogican.
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