Interview: Bill Tiller (2oo7-Apr)
Mix'n'Mojo.com hat ein Interview mit Bill Tiller veroeffentlicht. Bill Tiller arbeitete wohl mit an The Curse Of Monkey Island, auch bekannt als Monkey Island 3, und arbeitet derzeit an A Vampyre Story, einem (hoffentlich) netten Click'n'Point-Adventure. Sieht schon mal recht vielversprechend aus.
Der Interviewer nervt mich nur ein bisschen [...]
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Bill Tiller
Artist, designer, Master of the Universe.
“Excuse me... I don’t suppose you know if—“
“Don’t ask me anything about this place,” said the gangly blonde women with a limp cigarette in one hand and a cell phone in the other. “I’m just here for a facial.”
“Ah. Thank you. So kind.”
I turned around and began to walk back to the front of the cottage where Autumn Moon had established themselves. It was a lovely building and a lovely day. Small, old fashioned... wooden. Just the sort of place you’d imagine a gothic adventure game to be made. The only problem was finding a way in; they did, after all, share the building (small as it was) with four other businesses. Luckily I bumped into Bill Tiller outside, who was all smiles and glasses and beard.
“Hi,” I said. “We e-mailed? I do hope I’m at the right time. I am at the right time, aren’t I? It’s just that the busses...”
“Yeah, the time’s brilliant,” he replied, opening the front door and walking through a porch room, then through another door into the main office. I followed. There were, if I recall correctly, three people sitting in front of computers, and I shook hands with them all. One was working on a 3D model of a top hat. We went through into another room, which had a desk in it, a card-board cut-out of Guybrush and a shelf o’ games.
“Half of our team work at home,” explained Bill. “We might fill this room up a bit more, though. Maybe get a screenwriter in here.” He motioned vaguely at a corner of the room.
I looked at the games. They were a lot of LucasArts titles there, including some repeated in different languages. And as for Guybrush: “Yeah, I just took him when I left LucasArts. I don’t think anybody wanted him, so… yoink. I win again.”
Having been given the tour, it was time to move into the porch room for the interview. It’s a lovely room – very white, very homely. There were some Nightmare Before Christmas memorabilia, and a few art magazines on a small table.
“Please, have a seat.”
---
Thanks. Well. First of all... you’re making a demo for your publisher?
Yeah, I’m not used to doing all that; it’s a new way. I’m used to making a demo for the public. The whole process is a lot different from LucasArts, but then we had a lot more money and financial support. If LucasArts announces a game then it’s no doubt that it’ll get published – but here we’ve got 10-12 different markets, and we don’t want to loose the publisher’s money, so we have to make a demo to prove that the game will sell. We’ve already got the big markets, Germany, Britain... North America is still in negotiation, but it’s the smaller markets that are the most difficult.
What about downloadable games? Did you ever consider doing that?
In 2000 I had that idea, but the market wasn’t ready for it back then. I think it’s a good idea, but... I have a feeling that people like boxes… and of course you don’t get the casual gamer, if you don’t have a shelf presence. I guess you can get around that if you release the game later in the stores, though… um… also, the graphics might be constricted because of the need for low file sizes. I wonder if Telltale have that problem...
I think they repeat objects, or something.
Ah, yeah. That might do it. But yeah… being able to publish yourself is definitely an advantage. You get more money that way, too, though you also have to handle a lot of extra stuff.
Right, like PR, which you don’t do, right?
Yeah, right. Sometimes I have to be careful with what I put in the blog, which is why I don’t update it much. I try to limit the amount of information I give out, anyway. I’m also not a great writer – it can take me hours to edit something.
Funny about those publishers...
I did work at an independent games company, once, working on a game that later became Guild Wars. We were originally going to release it online, so the graphics had to be more basic so that the download wasn’t too big. When I played World of Warcraft, I thought it looked a bit familiar, because the engine was based on the engine that was in the original Guild Wars.
About the editing... are you dyslexic?
Yeah, a bit. It can be tough. I’m not so bad with reading – it’s the writing that’s the main difficulty. A lot of creative people have dyslexia, though... I guess it’s because you see things in a different way. I write a lot, anyway.
I wrote a lot of fantasy novels when I was a kid. Not wanting to get them published or anything: it was just for fun. Nothing major – just fifty or so pages. I took a lot of inspiration from Tolkien, to the point that I was copying his voice and tone. Then I’ve written quite a few game design documents and story ideas. I’m not the greatest at gags – more at funny situations. Dave Harris does most of the actual jokes.
---
About Tolkien... I believe you worked on a Lord of the Rings game. That must have been fantastic – to work on such great property, I mean.
Well it was a lot more fun in the beginning. The game design changed rapidly over the 16 months. Originally I was designing locations not in the movie, but then that changed. Electronic Arts saw some footage from the films and immediately became more interested in our project, since it was obvious that the movies were going to sell. They changed things to make the games much more like the movies. Before, I could be creative. After that, I had to look through thousands of stills from the films, because I had to get the look accurate. I had to phone up Weta and 3”6 to get them to send me stuff...
What did you think of the films?
I thought they were very good. I have a different picture in my mind, though. It generally lacked a bit of colour. The shire was a wee bit dark, and too wild. I imagined it more like, uh… where you live, I guess [referencing England]. I liked the way the Hildebrandt brothers did it.
And the film used John Howe and Alan Lee.
Right, and they’re a wee bit darker. Lothlorien was very monochromatic, in particular. In the book it’s described as green and gold, but in the film it was just... blue.
Is there a danger that A Vampyre Story will be like that?
I think it’s a mistake to go too monochromatic. I don’t like it, so no, A Vampyre Story won’t be. If you look at World of Warcraft, it’s very bright and colourful. They have a colour to match every setting and mood. I think that’s one reason it’s so successful. There are good monochromatic games, though… like Resident Evil, and... what was that one with the giants?
Oh. Ico. No... Shadow of the Colossus?
Yeah, that’s it. I don’t like working on games like that, anyway. I did once, on something called The Suffering, but I kept on trying to sneak more colour into it when nobody was looking.
You mentioned World of Warcraft?
Oh yeah. MMO’s can really suck up your time, so you’ve got to be careful. I really have to limit myself. I’ve been playing World of Warcraft for two years, and it’s taken me that long to get to level 42. I was playing it recently, and I grouped up with some other people and they said: “Oh my God! You’re level 42 and you don’t need to group! Such a noob!” I had to work out all the party etiquette. I said: “I’m sorry, I solo a lot, that’s all.”
It lacks story, though. That’s the worst thing. It has the environment, but not the story. Dungeons and Dragons - that can have great story. MMOs miss this human element. Wouldn’t it be great to have innkeepers played by real people in WOW? It hasn’t achieved the level of tabletop RPGing, anyway. I think that’ll be the next step – artificial intelligence to replicate that.
Have you got your steed yet?
Oh, yeah! I got my skeletal horse.
Oh, you play Undead!
Heh, yeah. Obvious, I know – since I’m working on a vampire game, I figured I *had* to play the undead side.
I think the undead could have been cooler...
Oh, yeah, they could have made them much better, but I like the wraiths. I think it would be really cool to play as one of those. There’s some guys, though, who are level 70 already, and the expansions been out for only – what - [he pretends to check his watch] two months? They must be playing twenty hours a day. I can’t do that anymore – I have a wife and kids now, and they take up most of my time between five and midnight, when I go to bed. But I still manage to play a wee bit.
What do you think of the new races?
The Blood Elves are kinda neat, though it’s weird to see so many running around Ogrimmar. I’m thinking: you shouldn’t be here! Also, they all look like girls, which is strange to see. I mean, it’s not like you see many female Tauren. [He smiles and nods his head slowly]. But the Blood Elves are pretty, and popular. There’s a lot of them around.
I guess back-story’s very important for character. Do you have a lot in A Vampyre Story?
Sure, yeah, I know all the back-story for all the characters, and sometimes I might dip into that. The characters are mostly flawed, which is important for people to relate to them. It also causes conflicts – so you gotta have flaws, as well as past and motivation. Once you have that, the story writes itself.
Has the story changed much?
Not really... just how long it is: the details have been altered, but the main story is the same as ever. The precise details will probably keep changing until the very last minute. You generally overwrite and then cut back with these things.
That’s what my professors tell me to do. They also tell me to have ‘character development.’ I wrote a story that had no development, and they didn’t like it.
I’d probably disagree with your teacher, there. It’s not always important. Mona does have a character-arc, but it won’t be really developed until the sequel, and not resolved until the third game – if we make them.
Basically, Mona doesn’t care to wit about magic or monsters. She’s in denial about being a vampire. She just wants to ignore the problem and move forward – she wants to be an opera singer and wear pretty clothes instead, but that’s hard for a vampire, and then she finds that she needs to suck blood to stay alive… that’s a little hard for her to come to terms with.
It’s good to have unresolved character issues... Guybrush’s story seemed too resolved when he married Elaine.
I think they didn’t expand on the problems and difficulties of marriage – and there are many of those. I had a plot idea for Monkey Island 4. It had Elaine as the breadwinner, doing all the great piratey stuff, getting all the money, whilst Guybrush is left at home looking after the kids. He wants to recapture the old days... it was actually, basically, the plot for The Incredibles. It would have ended in a similar way, too: saying that you can have the old glories, but you need to rework them into your new life.
That sounds a bit like the poem Ulysses, by Tennyson. It’s about Odysseus coming back from the Trojan wars and pining for the old days again.
But he really wanted to get home! That’s what the Iliad's all about!
Yes, but once he gets home it’s pretty disappointing. His wife has grown old and his son has turned into an accountant.
Haha. That’s funny. I like that.
What will be the ‘look’ for A Vampyre Story?
Oh, pretty similar to CMI, though we won’t be using an outline. Since the characters had outlines in CMI, the backgrounds had to as well, but that isn’t the case in Vampyre Story as it’ll be 3D. The trick is to get the characters and the background to match.
At the moment you can pan left and right. We’re investigating moving in and out with the camera, though we’d have to re-res the backgrounds. Maybe for the next game. Usually the first game takes a wee bit longer – a lot longer, actually.
How long will the game be?
That’s changed – it had to be cut back a wee bit. As it is now, it’ll be around 15 hours, which is roughly half of CMI. About the length of Full Throttle.
When will it be out?
The plan is Fall this year, depending on the country. It might change, if the publishers want us to spend more time on it, but no-one here wants to still be working on the game in 2008...
Why Vampires?
Because I love them. I’m a big fan of traditional gothic horror, and have read lots of vampire books. I’m also a big fan of Halloween.
What’s better: vampires of pirates?
I dunno, they’re both pretty neat. Vampires, probably. I would still love to make a pirate game in the future. Something bright and swashbuckling – I don’t care about LucasArts. It’s not like they control all pirate games.
What do you think about LucasArts?
It’s a bit of a bummer that they aren’t doing some creative, non action games – but I was mostly disappointed with Full Throttle, both that it was cancelled, and that it wasn’t looking very good...
Yeah, some of the later screenshots looked good, but the early ones were shocking. I wonder why that was.
I believe the art directing wasn’t organised – the guy who did it had his strengths in animation, not in the visuals. We had our Full Throttle: Payback, and Simon Jeffery got Larry to do that. There was six months of creative differences, then Larry got lured away to Microsoft and Sean Clark got on it. I got tired of all the politics, in the end.
Hey, I wonder if... [He got up and walked back into the office. I heard muffled laughter behind the door.]
Hah, no, she doesn’t want to talk about it – too much pressure. LucasArts won’t let her; she signed something. [I forget who “she” was because my memory sucks, but this nice woman who works at Autumn Moon also worked on Hell on Wheels]. But I didn’t sign anything, so I can talk about Payback...
Did you hear about LucasArts suing Digg.com?
Haha yeah... I’m thinking: why do they even care about this old game? I can only imagine that they’re setting a precedent for other cases. They don’t mind fan-games, though...
They did cancel two, back in the day. Fate of Monkey Island and Legends of LeChuck.
Oh, but they haven’t said anything about the Indiana Jones one, right?
Fountain of Youth? No, they missed that one.
Good, because I really loved that. I’d like to help out more with those games, except I don’t have much time, what with the kids and work. I would like to do something like this... [he shows me an art book with step-by-step guides for drawing]
That picture looks very Monkey Island [I said, pointing to a drawing]
Yeah, that’s Peter De Seve. He was another one of our inspirations for Monkey Island. It’s good to copy artists, as you can learn the fundamentals that way. You’ll then develop your own technique naturally.
But you were also over the top with Monkey Island, and then toned the style down, right?
Yeah, I was very O.T.T at the start. The danger is that people think you’re only capable of doing that, and you can’t be more realistic. Larry Ahren wanted something a bit more over the top, whilst John Ackley wanted something a wee bit more realistic, like Disney, so in the end we compromised.
I never have the patience with art.
I know what you mean – some of it can be a little tedious. Usually, for the mundane stuff, I listen to audio books. The funny thing is, I can tell what I was listening to at the time just by looking at a part of the picture… so this bit would be Harry Potter, this bit Sherlock Holmes, and so on. Sometimes, I’ll listen to something depressing, it will make my art sad.
Why do you think adventure games are more popular in Europe?
I dunno... they’re much more popular, though. Even at LucasArts, Europe was more than half of our revenue. Hmm. Why do you think it is?
Perhaps the society is less violent... but that’s a huge generalisation.
It might be that, it might be. People around seem to be worried about getting attacked, whilst I’m just worried about paying the bills, and global warming. Politicians have created a climate of fear. I don’t think games make you violent, however. I mean, I’m very non-violent; I haven’t been in a fight since, um, high-school...
Oh? What happened?
Hmm... I think... someone was reading a love letter I’d set to a girlfriend, and I got mad in class. I was 17. You know what teenagers are like.
Well, I’m nineteen, so...
There you go then. You know exactly what it’s like.
Do your kids play games?
Yeah. My daughter likes fashion/creative stuff. She likes to make characters in MMOs without actually playing the game. My son likes Harry Potter on the Xbox, and shooters. It’s hard to find one not too violent. That’s one of my life-goals, actually: to make an FPS that wasn’t violent. We got him a robot game in the end.
Around this time we decided to go get lunch. It was a beautiful day, and a beautiful town. Whilst we’re walking, Bill says how he keeps nagging LucasArts to bring the old classics out on the Nintendo DS. “I really wish they’d do that,” he said. I also learnt that he’d been to Europe twice; once to Britain and once to Germany. He’s going back to Germany this summer, for some business related event – I forget what. The trees were blossoming. Birds were singing. “I usually eat here,” said Bill, opening the door to an old fashioned diner. “Looks lovely,” I said.
We sat down and studied our menus. “I’m always tempted to get eggs, in a place like this,” I said. “Good food for students, eggs – very cheap and easy to make.”
“I had a meal-plan,” replies Bill.
In the end I had fried egg and toast, and Bill had a tuna melt on sourdough bread (“It’s gotta be sourdough if it’s tuna”)
---
Did you like college?
Sure, I loved it. I went to the California Institute of Arts, which was founded by Walt Disney, and they let me in on my art-work, which was good, because my grades weren’t too hot. I aced tests – it was homework that was always the problem with me.
It must be lovely to live here.
Yeah, it’s very nice, very quiet---
All of a sudden, a man burst through the door and started shouting at the waitresses. Bill looked alarmed, muttered, “time to phone the police!” and readied his cell phone. Luckily, everything blew over, and the man left without the need for law enforcement. I attempted to avoid an awkward silence by talking about my love for baked beans. “And crisps,” says Bill. “You have salt and vinegar crisps, in the UK. They’re my favourite flavour.”
Random question, but here we go: why the games industry?
Ooh, that’s a good one... I actually ask myself that, sometimes. I have contemplated leaving, but it’s difficult to switch careers at this point– I’m 39 – and I have all my contacts in the games industry. I could go into book illustration, or animation; it’s possible.
I wish Tim Schafer would direct a film. He’d make a great director.
Mm, or an actor. I saw him at an awards evening.
I wanted to go to that, but I had to get the kids to bed...
Tim was very funny.
Yeah, he’s very good with the jokes... he’s always been like that. I’m only like that when I’m drunk. I remember one time when he was taking a CD and the guy who’s CD it was came in, and Tim froze in position with the CD in his hand, and said: “if we’re really still then maybe he won’t see us!”
Another time I burst into his office to take some art for something, and I saw him there, so I said: “is it okay if I come in?” and he said: “sure.” Then when I was getting the art, he was saying: “so it turns out I have colon cancer… of the spleen.” I got the message to get out right then.
The thing is, Tim can use that humour against you, so I wouldn’t want to be on his bad side. He’s like... a nice little dog; good to pet, but I wouldn’t want him to bite me.
He could do clay animation. I like clay animation.
Me too... Burton, Wallace & Grommit... I didn’t like the latest one, though… Flushed Away...
I didn’t see it.
You didn’t miss anything.
The food arrives, and is delicious. Bill drinks an ice-tea. Good choice.
Are you voicing the game yet?
Yep. Most of our budget is being spent on the German version, because that’s our biggest market, but I believe that there are more good actors out there than there are roles, so it should be no problem to find good people for the English version as well. My wife's an actress; we have contacts.
Frederick will be like Robin Williams, but less annoying. Mona will be French, but not too French. We were actually advised to tone down her Frenchiness. People might have had trouble with the accent.
Will there be lots of reference humour? I guess you can’t do Star Wars jokes...
Oh, I think we can. I don’t care about that – they can’t stop me. We’ve generally kept away from humour that would date the game, though. Like, uh... an example joke would be: Mona seeing some hay, and saying “it’s a stack of hay,” and then Frederick comes in and says, “no, it’s scarecrow entrails.” Wait, that wasn’t very good...
Generally, we’re aiming for universal humour, stuff that will go for different cultures, and won’t date. That’s not something we did so much in Monkey Island, but we did do it a little – like we wanted to make fun of American football, but we changed that to just make fun of every sport instead.
The office is nice. It’s a nice little group.
Right, yeah, it’s good. I’m happy with the team size and budget – though I would like a wee bit more money. Ron Gilbert’s the same with group size – he probably won’t have a big team for his new game, as it can very sprawling and political. I was helping him out with his game a little, advice and so on. He’s trying to meld RPGs and adventure games together – but I really am sworn to secrecy about that. All I will say is that the concept is very very funny.
Would you like to make an RPG?
Of course, though it would obviously have to be an entirely different engine. We’d have to learn how to make a different kind of game, as well. I had to partly teach programmers how to work on an adventure game; one guy had Mona always carrying the objects she picked up, but you know, in an adventure game, when you pick something up, it disappears in your inventory. Someone else spent a while animating a running horse, even though it’ll mostly be still.
A horse? Will we be able to ride it?
Hmm... probably not. You will have vampire powers, though. The interface will be similar to Curse of Monkey Island, with the verb coin, except in this it’ll be a cross, and there’ll be four options... hands, eye, mouth and vampire power. We haven’t quite settled on how that’s going to work. Either you’ll have more options to chose the power, or it’ll change depending on the context. So using it with a window will turn you into a bat; using it on a person will make you suck their blood, and so on.
Powers can be a design problem, so we have to limit them. They can be a bit like giving a character a gun. It would be no fun if you could just use hypnotise people to get out of every situation. More powers may be given in sequels, if we make them.
Will there be mini-games or arcade elements?
There are some planned, but they won’t necessarily be in the final game. Some ideas and puzzles have been left over for a sequel.
We were going to have a few more mini-games in Monkey Island. At one point we wanted to have Guybrush make his own custom pirate flag, and that was going to be a puzzle.
But in Vampyre Story, we won’t be doing anything too radical. We aren’t reinventing the wheel here. Hopefully, adventure games will get a bigger market, and our game will add to that a wee bit – but that’s all we’re hoping for in the grand scheme of things.
One thing, though... I’d love to get Max in there, somewhere. But they probably wouldn’t let me...
Telltale would! They’ve very nice.
Yeah. Maybe.
People are really looking forward to the game, anyway.
That’s good. I hope we can deliver. I get a little nervous...
Well the art-style is one reason by it’s so anticipated—
--yeah, I’m not too worried about the art. That should be good. Oh, did you hear about the Steve Purcell art being sold?
Yes. It went for a lot.
I don’t think so. It’s a piece of gaming history. I bid up nearly to 4,000 on it... I was just beaten by this other guy. It was probably a good thing, because Amy – my wife – would have killed me. I planned to put it on the plastic and pay it off over the next ten years...
---
At this point we went back to the office, and Bill showed me some concept art he did for the cancelled Full Throttle sequel: Payback.
“The basic plot was... a corporation was getting rid of the roads, and instead people had to drive hover vehicles, which they would buy off the corporation. The story was about reclaiming the wheel. Ben was framed for the murder of Maureen, and was hounded by paparazzi, though one of the paparazzi was going to be friendly, and would help out a wee bit. There were also different gangs fighting. One called The Dragons, and they had flames coming out of the front of their bikes.”
Bill then turned around and said to one of his co-workers: “was that the same plot as in your version?”
The woman’s face clouded over, as she tried to recall her own work on the other cancelled sequel. “I honestly can’t remember,” she said at last. “I must have blocked that whole episode from my life.”
Bill turned back to the computer screen and brought up a picture of a huge bike, with little bikes attached to its side. “These were called leeches,” he said “The side-cars could break off and do their own thing.”
Then he showed me some black and white maps of small areas. “Here, you would have to jump across these barrels in the toxic waste, and scale that wall to get to the door there... so some basic puzzle-solving, along with the action.”
---
Here ends my notes. I think I got everything down more or less accurately. I changed the order of a few things, and let one or two details out because I couldn’t remember them exactly, but generally, everything from my visit is here. Bill told me that Autumn Moon were very busy, so it would unfortunately have to be a short visit, but in the end I stayed for about three hours, and he didn’t act like he wanted me to leave. “I wish I could have showed you the game,” he sighed. There was some reason behind why he couldn’t – something about Crimson Cow handling all the press – but it didn’t matter anyway; I had a fantastic time talking to Bill, and meeting the dedicated team behind A Vampyre Story.
Bill reminded me a lot of Bill Bryson. Perhaps it was just the first name – or the beard. I think they both share a similar sense of humour, though, and they’re both clever and funny, without being intimidating. Like a kindly professor, who takes your hand one day, and says: “this is how to draw curly clouds.”
A big thanks to Bill Tiller and Autumn Moon Entertainment for allowing me to disrupt their office for far too long! Also, Bill paid for my lunch (after I embarrassed myself: I made too much of a show of saying “No no, I *insist!* I *have* to!” to the point of causing a scene in the restaurant. “You *have* to? What, for a religious reason?” asked Bill. “Well, no,” I said – and that was that.
So thanks Bill for paying as well as giving me so much of his time – and the best of luck to Autumn Moon in making A Vampyre Story.
>> # top # | Q: Mix'n'Mojo.com
Der Interviewer nervt mich nur ein bisschen [...]
(show me)(don't show me)
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Bill Tiller
Artist, designer, Master of the Universe.
“Excuse me... I don’t suppose you know if—“
“Don’t ask me anything about this place,” said the gangly blonde women with a limp cigarette in one hand and a cell phone in the other. “I’m just here for a facial.”
“Ah. Thank you. So kind.”
I turned around and began to walk back to the front of the cottage where Autumn Moon had established themselves. It was a lovely building and a lovely day. Small, old fashioned... wooden. Just the sort of place you’d imagine a gothic adventure game to be made. The only problem was finding a way in; they did, after all, share the building (small as it was) with four other businesses. Luckily I bumped into Bill Tiller outside, who was all smiles and glasses and beard.
“Hi,” I said. “We e-mailed? I do hope I’m at the right time. I am at the right time, aren’t I? It’s just that the busses...”
“Yeah, the time’s brilliant,” he replied, opening the front door and walking through a porch room, then through another door into the main office. I followed. There were, if I recall correctly, three people sitting in front of computers, and I shook hands with them all. One was working on a 3D model of a top hat. We went through into another room, which had a desk in it, a card-board cut-out of Guybrush and a shelf o’ games.
“Half of our team work at home,” explained Bill. “We might fill this room up a bit more, though. Maybe get a screenwriter in here.” He motioned vaguely at a corner of the room.
I looked at the games. They were a lot of LucasArts titles there, including some repeated in different languages. And as for Guybrush: “Yeah, I just took him when I left LucasArts. I don’t think anybody wanted him, so… yoink. I win again.”
Having been given the tour, it was time to move into the porch room for the interview. It’s a lovely room – very white, very homely. There were some Nightmare Before Christmas memorabilia, and a few art magazines on a small table.
“Please, have a seat.”
---
Thanks. Well. First of all... you’re making a demo for your publisher?
Yeah, I’m not used to doing all that; it’s a new way. I’m used to making a demo for the public. The whole process is a lot different from LucasArts, but then we had a lot more money and financial support. If LucasArts announces a game then it’s no doubt that it’ll get published – but here we’ve got 10-12 different markets, and we don’t want to loose the publisher’s money, so we have to make a demo to prove that the game will sell. We’ve already got the big markets, Germany, Britain... North America is still in negotiation, but it’s the smaller markets that are the most difficult.
What about downloadable games? Did you ever consider doing that?
In 2000 I had that idea, but the market wasn’t ready for it back then. I think it’s a good idea, but... I have a feeling that people like boxes… and of course you don’t get the casual gamer, if you don’t have a shelf presence. I guess you can get around that if you release the game later in the stores, though… um… also, the graphics might be constricted because of the need for low file sizes. I wonder if Telltale have that problem...
I think they repeat objects, or something.
Ah, yeah. That might do it. But yeah… being able to publish yourself is definitely an advantage. You get more money that way, too, though you also have to handle a lot of extra stuff.
Right, like PR, which you don’t do, right?
Yeah, right. Sometimes I have to be careful with what I put in the blog, which is why I don’t update it much. I try to limit the amount of information I give out, anyway. I’m also not a great writer – it can take me hours to edit something.
Funny about those publishers...
I did work at an independent games company, once, working on a game that later became Guild Wars. We were originally going to release it online, so the graphics had to be more basic so that the download wasn’t too big. When I played World of Warcraft, I thought it looked a bit familiar, because the engine was based on the engine that was in the original Guild Wars.
About the editing... are you dyslexic?
Yeah, a bit. It can be tough. I’m not so bad with reading – it’s the writing that’s the main difficulty. A lot of creative people have dyslexia, though... I guess it’s because you see things in a different way. I write a lot, anyway.
I wrote a lot of fantasy novels when I was a kid. Not wanting to get them published or anything: it was just for fun. Nothing major – just fifty or so pages. I took a lot of inspiration from Tolkien, to the point that I was copying his voice and tone. Then I’ve written quite a few game design documents and story ideas. I’m not the greatest at gags – more at funny situations. Dave Harris does most of the actual jokes.
---
About Tolkien... I believe you worked on a Lord of the Rings game. That must have been fantastic – to work on such great property, I mean.
Well it was a lot more fun in the beginning. The game design changed rapidly over the 16 months. Originally I was designing locations not in the movie, but then that changed. Electronic Arts saw some footage from the films and immediately became more interested in our project, since it was obvious that the movies were going to sell. They changed things to make the games much more like the movies. Before, I could be creative. After that, I had to look through thousands of stills from the films, because I had to get the look accurate. I had to phone up Weta and 3”6 to get them to send me stuff...
What did you think of the films?
I thought they were very good. I have a different picture in my mind, though. It generally lacked a bit of colour. The shire was a wee bit dark, and too wild. I imagined it more like, uh… where you live, I guess [referencing England]. I liked the way the Hildebrandt brothers did it.
And the film used John Howe and Alan Lee.
Right, and they’re a wee bit darker. Lothlorien was very monochromatic, in particular. In the book it’s described as green and gold, but in the film it was just... blue.
Is there a danger that A Vampyre Story will be like that?
I think it’s a mistake to go too monochromatic. I don’t like it, so no, A Vampyre Story won’t be. If you look at World of Warcraft, it’s very bright and colourful. They have a colour to match every setting and mood. I think that’s one reason it’s so successful. There are good monochromatic games, though… like Resident Evil, and... what was that one with the giants?
Oh. Ico. No... Shadow of the Colossus?
Yeah, that’s it. I don’t like working on games like that, anyway. I did once, on something called The Suffering, but I kept on trying to sneak more colour into it when nobody was looking.
You mentioned World of Warcraft?
Oh yeah. MMO’s can really suck up your time, so you’ve got to be careful. I really have to limit myself. I’ve been playing World of Warcraft for two years, and it’s taken me that long to get to level 42. I was playing it recently, and I grouped up with some other people and they said: “Oh my God! You’re level 42 and you don’t need to group! Such a noob!” I had to work out all the party etiquette. I said: “I’m sorry, I solo a lot, that’s all.”
It lacks story, though. That’s the worst thing. It has the environment, but not the story. Dungeons and Dragons - that can have great story. MMOs miss this human element. Wouldn’t it be great to have innkeepers played by real people in WOW? It hasn’t achieved the level of tabletop RPGing, anyway. I think that’ll be the next step – artificial intelligence to replicate that.
Have you got your steed yet?
Oh, yeah! I got my skeletal horse.
Oh, you play Undead!
Heh, yeah. Obvious, I know – since I’m working on a vampire game, I figured I *had* to play the undead side.
I think the undead could have been cooler...
Oh, yeah, they could have made them much better, but I like the wraiths. I think it would be really cool to play as one of those. There’s some guys, though, who are level 70 already, and the expansions been out for only – what - [he pretends to check his watch] two months? They must be playing twenty hours a day. I can’t do that anymore – I have a wife and kids now, and they take up most of my time between five and midnight, when I go to bed. But I still manage to play a wee bit.
What do you think of the new races?
The Blood Elves are kinda neat, though it’s weird to see so many running around Ogrimmar. I’m thinking: you shouldn’t be here! Also, they all look like girls, which is strange to see. I mean, it’s not like you see many female Tauren. [He smiles and nods his head slowly]. But the Blood Elves are pretty, and popular. There’s a lot of them around.
I guess back-story’s very important for character. Do you have a lot in A Vampyre Story?
Sure, yeah, I know all the back-story for all the characters, and sometimes I might dip into that. The characters are mostly flawed, which is important for people to relate to them. It also causes conflicts – so you gotta have flaws, as well as past and motivation. Once you have that, the story writes itself.
Has the story changed much?
Not really... just how long it is: the details have been altered, but the main story is the same as ever. The precise details will probably keep changing until the very last minute. You generally overwrite and then cut back with these things.
That’s what my professors tell me to do. They also tell me to have ‘character development.’ I wrote a story that had no development, and they didn’t like it.
I’d probably disagree with your teacher, there. It’s not always important. Mona does have a character-arc, but it won’t be really developed until the sequel, and not resolved until the third game – if we make them.
Basically, Mona doesn’t care to wit about magic or monsters. She’s in denial about being a vampire. She just wants to ignore the problem and move forward – she wants to be an opera singer and wear pretty clothes instead, but that’s hard for a vampire, and then she finds that she needs to suck blood to stay alive… that’s a little hard for her to come to terms with.
It’s good to have unresolved character issues... Guybrush’s story seemed too resolved when he married Elaine.
I think they didn’t expand on the problems and difficulties of marriage – and there are many of those. I had a plot idea for Monkey Island 4. It had Elaine as the breadwinner, doing all the great piratey stuff, getting all the money, whilst Guybrush is left at home looking after the kids. He wants to recapture the old days... it was actually, basically, the plot for The Incredibles. It would have ended in a similar way, too: saying that you can have the old glories, but you need to rework them into your new life.
That sounds a bit like the poem Ulysses, by Tennyson. It’s about Odysseus coming back from the Trojan wars and pining for the old days again.
But he really wanted to get home! That’s what the Iliad's all about!
Yes, but once he gets home it’s pretty disappointing. His wife has grown old and his son has turned into an accountant.
Haha. That’s funny. I like that.
What will be the ‘look’ for A Vampyre Story?
Oh, pretty similar to CMI, though we won’t be using an outline. Since the characters had outlines in CMI, the backgrounds had to as well, but that isn’t the case in Vampyre Story as it’ll be 3D. The trick is to get the characters and the background to match.
At the moment you can pan left and right. We’re investigating moving in and out with the camera, though we’d have to re-res the backgrounds. Maybe for the next game. Usually the first game takes a wee bit longer – a lot longer, actually.
How long will the game be?
That’s changed – it had to be cut back a wee bit. As it is now, it’ll be around 15 hours, which is roughly half of CMI. About the length of Full Throttle.
When will it be out?
The plan is Fall this year, depending on the country. It might change, if the publishers want us to spend more time on it, but no-one here wants to still be working on the game in 2008...
Why Vampires?
Because I love them. I’m a big fan of traditional gothic horror, and have read lots of vampire books. I’m also a big fan of Halloween.
What’s better: vampires of pirates?
I dunno, they’re both pretty neat. Vampires, probably. I would still love to make a pirate game in the future. Something bright and swashbuckling – I don’t care about LucasArts. It’s not like they control all pirate games.
What do you think about LucasArts?
It’s a bit of a bummer that they aren’t doing some creative, non action games – but I was mostly disappointed with Full Throttle, both that it was cancelled, and that it wasn’t looking very good...
Yeah, some of the later screenshots looked good, but the early ones were shocking. I wonder why that was.
I believe the art directing wasn’t organised – the guy who did it had his strengths in animation, not in the visuals. We had our Full Throttle: Payback, and Simon Jeffery got Larry to do that. There was six months of creative differences, then Larry got lured away to Microsoft and Sean Clark got on it. I got tired of all the politics, in the end.
Hey, I wonder if... [He got up and walked back into the office. I heard muffled laughter behind the door.]
Hah, no, she doesn’t want to talk about it – too much pressure. LucasArts won’t let her; she signed something. [I forget who “she” was because my memory sucks, but this nice woman who works at Autumn Moon also worked on Hell on Wheels]. But I didn’t sign anything, so I can talk about Payback...
Did you hear about LucasArts suing Digg.com?
Haha yeah... I’m thinking: why do they even care about this old game? I can only imagine that they’re setting a precedent for other cases. They don’t mind fan-games, though...
They did cancel two, back in the day. Fate of Monkey Island and Legends of LeChuck.
Oh, but they haven’t said anything about the Indiana Jones one, right?
Fountain of Youth? No, they missed that one.
Good, because I really loved that. I’d like to help out more with those games, except I don’t have much time, what with the kids and work. I would like to do something like this... [he shows me an art book with step-by-step guides for drawing]
That picture looks very Monkey Island [I said, pointing to a drawing]Yeah, that’s Peter De Seve. He was another one of our inspirations for Monkey Island. It’s good to copy artists, as you can learn the fundamentals that way. You’ll then develop your own technique naturally.
But you were also over the top with Monkey Island, and then toned the style down, right?
Yeah, I was very O.T.T at the start. The danger is that people think you’re only capable of doing that, and you can’t be more realistic. Larry Ahren wanted something a bit more over the top, whilst John Ackley wanted something a wee bit more realistic, like Disney, so in the end we compromised.
I never have the patience with art.
I know what you mean – some of it can be a little tedious. Usually, for the mundane stuff, I listen to audio books. The funny thing is, I can tell what I was listening to at the time just by looking at a part of the picture… so this bit would be Harry Potter, this bit Sherlock Holmes, and so on. Sometimes, I’ll listen to something depressing, it will make my art sad.
Why do you think adventure games are more popular in Europe?
I dunno... they’re much more popular, though. Even at LucasArts, Europe was more than half of our revenue. Hmm. Why do you think it is?
Perhaps the society is less violent... but that’s a huge generalisation.
It might be that, it might be. People around seem to be worried about getting attacked, whilst I’m just worried about paying the bills, and global warming. Politicians have created a climate of fear. I don’t think games make you violent, however. I mean, I’m very non-violent; I haven’t been in a fight since, um, high-school...
Oh? What happened?
Hmm... I think... someone was reading a love letter I’d set to a girlfriend, and I got mad in class. I was 17. You know what teenagers are like.
Well, I’m nineteen, so...
There you go then. You know exactly what it’s like.
Do your kids play games?
Yeah. My daughter likes fashion/creative stuff. She likes to make characters in MMOs without actually playing the game. My son likes Harry Potter on the Xbox, and shooters. It’s hard to find one not too violent. That’s one of my life-goals, actually: to make an FPS that wasn’t violent. We got him a robot game in the end.
Around this time we decided to go get lunch. It was a beautiful day, and a beautiful town. Whilst we’re walking, Bill says how he keeps nagging LucasArts to bring the old classics out on the Nintendo DS. “I really wish they’d do that,” he said. I also learnt that he’d been to Europe twice; once to Britain and once to Germany. He’s going back to Germany this summer, for some business related event – I forget what. The trees were blossoming. Birds were singing. “I usually eat here,” said Bill, opening the door to an old fashioned diner. “Looks lovely,” I said.
We sat down and studied our menus. “I’m always tempted to get eggs, in a place like this,” I said. “Good food for students, eggs – very cheap and easy to make.”
“I had a meal-plan,” replies Bill.
In the end I had fried egg and toast, and Bill had a tuna melt on sourdough bread (“It’s gotta be sourdough if it’s tuna”)
---
Did you like college?
Sure, I loved it. I went to the California Institute of Arts, which was founded by Walt Disney, and they let me in on my art-work, which was good, because my grades weren’t too hot. I aced tests – it was homework that was always the problem with me.
It must be lovely to live here.
Yeah, it’s very nice, very quiet---
All of a sudden, a man burst through the door and started shouting at the waitresses. Bill looked alarmed, muttered, “time to phone the police!” and readied his cell phone. Luckily, everything blew over, and the man left without the need for law enforcement. I attempted to avoid an awkward silence by talking about my love for baked beans. “And crisps,” says Bill. “You have salt and vinegar crisps, in the UK. They’re my favourite flavour.”
Random question, but here we go: why the games industry?
Ooh, that’s a good one... I actually ask myself that, sometimes. I have contemplated leaving, but it’s difficult to switch careers at this point– I’m 39 – and I have all my contacts in the games industry. I could go into book illustration, or animation; it’s possible.
I wish Tim Schafer would direct a film. He’d make a great director.
Mm, or an actor. I saw him at an awards evening.
I wanted to go to that, but I had to get the kids to bed...
Tim was very funny.
Yeah, he’s very good with the jokes... he’s always been like that. I’m only like that when I’m drunk. I remember one time when he was taking a CD and the guy who’s CD it was came in, and Tim froze in position with the CD in his hand, and said: “if we’re really still then maybe he won’t see us!”
Another time I burst into his office to take some art for something, and I saw him there, so I said: “is it okay if I come in?” and he said: “sure.” Then when I was getting the art, he was saying: “so it turns out I have colon cancer… of the spleen.” I got the message to get out right then.
The thing is, Tim can use that humour against you, so I wouldn’t want to be on his bad side. He’s like... a nice little dog; good to pet, but I wouldn’t want him to bite me.
He could do clay animation. I like clay animation.
Me too... Burton, Wallace & Grommit... I didn’t like the latest one, though… Flushed Away...
I didn’t see it.
You didn’t miss anything.
The food arrives, and is delicious. Bill drinks an ice-tea. Good choice.
Are you voicing the game yet?
Yep. Most of our budget is being spent on the German version, because that’s our biggest market, but I believe that there are more good actors out there than there are roles, so it should be no problem to find good people for the English version as well. My wife's an actress; we have contacts.
Frederick will be like Robin Williams, but less annoying. Mona will be French, but not too French. We were actually advised to tone down her Frenchiness. People might have had trouble with the accent.
Will there be lots of reference humour? I guess you can’t do Star Wars jokes...
Oh, I think we can. I don’t care about that – they can’t stop me. We’ve generally kept away from humour that would date the game, though. Like, uh... an example joke would be: Mona seeing some hay, and saying “it’s a stack of hay,” and then Frederick comes in and says, “no, it’s scarecrow entrails.” Wait, that wasn’t very good...
Generally, we’re aiming for universal humour, stuff that will go for different cultures, and won’t date. That’s not something we did so much in Monkey Island, but we did do it a little – like we wanted to make fun of American football, but we changed that to just make fun of every sport instead.
The office is nice. It’s a nice little group.
Right, yeah, it’s good. I’m happy with the team size and budget – though I would like a wee bit more money. Ron Gilbert’s the same with group size – he probably won’t have a big team for his new game, as it can very sprawling and political. I was helping him out with his game a little, advice and so on. He’s trying to meld RPGs and adventure games together – but I really am sworn to secrecy about that. All I will say is that the concept is very very funny.
Would you like to make an RPG?
Of course, though it would obviously have to be an entirely different engine. We’d have to learn how to make a different kind of game, as well. I had to partly teach programmers how to work on an adventure game; one guy had Mona always carrying the objects she picked up, but you know, in an adventure game, when you pick something up, it disappears in your inventory. Someone else spent a while animating a running horse, even though it’ll mostly be still.
A horse? Will we be able to ride it?
Hmm... probably not. You will have vampire powers, though. The interface will be similar to Curse of Monkey Island, with the verb coin, except in this it’ll be a cross, and there’ll be four options... hands, eye, mouth and vampire power. We haven’t quite settled on how that’s going to work. Either you’ll have more options to chose the power, or it’ll change depending on the context. So using it with a window will turn you into a bat; using it on a person will make you suck their blood, and so on.
Powers can be a design problem, so we have to limit them. They can be a bit like giving a character a gun. It would be no fun if you could just use hypnotise people to get out of every situation. More powers may be given in sequels, if we make them.
Will there be mini-games or arcade elements?
There are some planned, but they won’t necessarily be in the final game. Some ideas and puzzles have been left over for a sequel.
We were going to have a few more mini-games in Monkey Island. At one point we wanted to have Guybrush make his own custom pirate flag, and that was going to be a puzzle.
But in Vampyre Story, we won’t be doing anything too radical. We aren’t reinventing the wheel here. Hopefully, adventure games will get a bigger market, and our game will add to that a wee bit – but that’s all we’re hoping for in the grand scheme of things.
One thing, though... I’d love to get Max in there, somewhere. But they probably wouldn’t let me...
Telltale would! They’ve very nice.
Yeah. Maybe.
People are really looking forward to the game, anyway.
That’s good. I hope we can deliver. I get a little nervous...
Well the art-style is one reason by it’s so anticipated—
--yeah, I’m not too worried about the art. That should be good. Oh, did you hear about the Steve Purcell art being sold?
Yes. It went for a lot.
I don’t think so. It’s a piece of gaming history. I bid up nearly to 4,000 on it... I was just beaten by this other guy. It was probably a good thing, because Amy – my wife – would have killed me. I planned to put it on the plastic and pay it off over the next ten years...
---
At this point we went back to the office, and Bill showed me some concept art he did for the cancelled Full Throttle sequel: Payback.
“The basic plot was... a corporation was getting rid of the roads, and instead people had to drive hover vehicles, which they would buy off the corporation. The story was about reclaiming the wheel. Ben was framed for the murder of Maureen, and was hounded by paparazzi, though one of the paparazzi was going to be friendly, and would help out a wee bit. There were also different gangs fighting. One called The Dragons, and they had flames coming out of the front of their bikes.”
Bill then turned around and said to one of his co-workers: “was that the same plot as in your version?”
The woman’s face clouded over, as she tried to recall her own work on the other cancelled sequel. “I honestly can’t remember,” she said at last. “I must have blocked that whole episode from my life.”
Bill turned back to the computer screen and brought up a picture of a huge bike, with little bikes attached to its side. “These were called leeches,” he said “The side-cars could break off and do their own thing.”
Then he showed me some black and white maps of small areas. “Here, you would have to jump across these barrels in the toxic waste, and scale that wall to get to the door there... so some basic puzzle-solving, along with the action.”
Here ends my notes. I think I got everything down more or less accurately. I changed the order of a few things, and let one or two details out because I couldn’t remember them exactly, but generally, everything from my visit is here. Bill told me that Autumn Moon were very busy, so it would unfortunately have to be a short visit, but in the end I stayed for about three hours, and he didn’t act like he wanted me to leave. “I wish I could have showed you the game,” he sighed. There was some reason behind why he couldn’t – something about Crimson Cow handling all the press – but it didn’t matter anyway; I had a fantastic time talking to Bill, and meeting the dedicated team behind A Vampyre Story.
Bill reminded me a lot of Bill Bryson. Perhaps it was just the first name – or the beard. I think they both share a similar sense of humour, though, and they’re both clever and funny, without being intimidating. Like a kindly professor, who takes your hand one day, and says: “this is how to draw curly clouds.”
A big thanks to Bill Tiller and Autumn Moon Entertainment for allowing me to disrupt their office for far too long! Also, Bill paid for my lunch (after I embarrassed myself: I made too much of a show of saying “No no, I *insist!* I *have* to!” to the point of causing a scene in the restaurant. “You *have* to? What, for a religious reason?” asked Bill. “Well, no,” I said – and that was that.
So thanks Bill for paying as well as giving me so much of his time – and the best of luck to Autumn Moon in making A Vampyre Story.
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Labels: videogame news
posted by Woodrow at 4/23/2007 10:37:00 PM
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