Hey Rami, did JW talk to you about me sending the ballguy mod to Tom(sleepcycle)? It would be a really fun thing make a series of ballguy runs : ) but it's all up to you, I get it if you don't want me to. people might get confused. Anyways, If JW haven't asked I'll ask now; Is it okay If I send it?

February 22, 2014

It's definitely OK to send it, but it might indeed be confusing. It's extra confusing because we don't know whether we'll have mod support after we switch from decompilable Game Maker files, so I'm not sure if I think this is a particularly good idea. It is absolutely your call though, in the end!

Liked by: Capsized Moose

Rami, Y U No Release NT Update? Now I have no excuse but to study.

February 22, 2014

I'm visiting the inaugural Vermont Green Mountain Games Festival, but I'm uploading it now from Burlington International Airport.

Rami, you are single-handeldy responsible for half of my Twitter-feed. You must know your way around. May I ask what tools and personal policy you use for your Tweeting?

February 22, 2014

I use Tweetdeck, and my personal policy is to only tweet things I'd be comfortable saying in real life. That's about all.

You mention in your answer to the previous question that you signed a deal with adult swim to make Dinosaur Zookeeper to help pay the bills. Can you elaborate a bit on how you went about finding that deal or did adult swim approach you about making the game? Is this still a viable option for Indies?

February 22, 2014

They reached out to us after Super Crate Box. That's the advantage of having a 'digital business card' in the shape of a freeware game.

We don't know what the current state of the Flash market is like, but we fear it's not as great as it used to be. Sites like FlashGameLicense are a good indicator of prices nowadays, and you can decide whether you want to business through them independently.

Update on LUFTRAUSERS? If I'm not mistaken, by today you guys should've received some news from Sony about the flight of LUFTRAUSERS through the certification process. Hopefully not rejected otherwise another 4 weeks of wait time.

February 21, 2014

We did get news, and essentially we need to get a certain minor issue negotiated away. We're working on that, and if that works out we're moving forward to getting ready for announcements!

Half Rami, Half VlamBeer or Half Beer, Half VlamRami or Half Vlam, Half RamiBeer? or Half Rami, Half Vlam, Half Beer ?

February 21, 2014

Half VlamRami.

When it comes to your own self funded titles, how do you validate your project ideas, is it heavily reflective of the more successful content that you develop for others

February 20, 2014

We don't believe in 'make games you want to play', because we're always worried that we'll end up being the only people that can't enjoy them beyond seeing them as a broken piece of software. We make games we want to make, the games we have fun with while creating them. The ones we feel challenge something we know or thing, or those that we have fun toying around with.

We actually never really base any of our business decisions on things we've done before (beyond when we take a prototype to a full project). We like to rid ourselves of as much 'history' as we can before we make any decision. Since everything changes so fast, information that is a year old is already severely outdated.

Basically: we trust that if we like it, the people that like us will like it too.

Liked by: Bernard Larkin

I'd also love to know, Do you take social media as a serious form of marketing? ( Facebook, Twitter, ect. )

February 20, 2014

Anything you do in public is 'PR'. Yes, Facebook and Twitter are marketing. However, don't forget that a large force behind early is the ability to be honest. Vlambeer is a lot like me, and a lot like Jan Willem - even though we're polar opposite in terms of personality. So while everything I say on Twitter or Facebook affects Vlambeer, Vlambeer is enough like me that there is no conflict there.

Be honest, approachable and care about people reaching out to you. They're the ones that'll keep you afloat and sane when things get rough.

What are the most important things you did that you got you to sustainability?

Bernard Larkin

February 20, 2014

Incremental revenue. Make small games / small deals, sell them and earn increasingly more as the income piles up until you reach sustainability. Not only does that lead to more experience (as you're making more games), but it also leads to a relatively stable financial situation. Of course, this worked for us, but won't work for everybody. We just happened to find a model that fit our particular method of making games.

Liked by: Fabio Basile

Did you have a clear vision from the beginning of where you wanted to head with the company? and have you reached any of your goals that you have set yourself?

Bernard Larkin

February 20, 2014

Yes, we absolutely did. Let me copy-paste some text from that original three page document that the two of us agreed upon:

We established the following short term targets:
• Create Super Crate Box as a business card of sorts. (Reached)
• Earn funding through smaller games. (Reached)
• Make better games, not more games. (Ongoing)

We established the following long term targets:
• Create an efficient workflow towards digital distribution releases. (Reached)
• Make Vlambeer a known presence in the (Dutch) independent game scene. (Reached)
• Support and expand the (Dutch) independent scene. (Ongoing)

"When setting up a company, it is usual to only think about what the products should mean for the users. In our belief, it is even more important to think about what the studio itself should mean for people."

Have a direction, as a direction allows you to make decisions more easily. Don't have too much of a set destination though, that just locks you in. Adaptation is one of the most powerful tools at your disposal.

Liked by: Alex Camilleri Joshua McGrath

I'm really wondering how you and Jan started Vlambeer. What were your starting conditions? Such as the financial situation, If you had any funds to play around with or you started from scratch and worked your way up.

February 20, 2014

We founded Vlambeer in September 2010, after we decided we wanted to do our own thing. We had been in university for a while, but we didn't like the curriculum there. As former students, we received €250 from the government each month. On top of that, we had some money set aside for the first few months of Vlambeer, while we worked on Radical Fishing. I had a side job at Mediamarkt (an electronics retailer) as a computersalesman to pay for my rent.

Radical Fishing netted us $10,001, which was just enough for us to survive until we made Super Crate Box. We then signed with [adult swim] to make thrice that amount minus three dollars with Dinosaur Zookeeper. From there, we kept growing with the idea of 'incremental revenue'. The idea was making small games that added a little bit of money to our monthly income.

We're still doing that.

Liked by: Ghada elkallawy Bernard Larkin Edwin

Why did you guys decide to make getting to Venus require a certain weapon? I clearly remember you can JW arguing about not hiding a secret door in the wall because then players would always carry a Grenade Launcher incase they found the door. But the current method requires exactly that, I don't qui

February 20, 2014

Wonderful question. So, getting to Venus requires one specific action for the player, but it doesn't force them to a weapon type. Effectively, it's asking players to use one weapon and the item required for a while, which I feel is quite different.

Are there things you decided not to show on your livestreams? Are there things you've shown that you thought in hindsight was a bad idea? What advice would you give to a PR person used to the secrecy of traditional AAA development who wants to try development streaming, to help them transition?

February 19, 2014

We believe in being honest. We've shown pretty much all of development on stream, but we've been hiding things in the game off-stream to make sure there are secrets in the game. We're not hiding anything that isn't hidden in itself in the game.

Are Vlambeer's livestreams archived? I haven't the time usually to watch the streams (in eastern US your streams are at 7 AM I believe, when I'm at work), but I am very interested in watching how you two operate.

February 19, 2014

Twitch is a bit particular about the whole saving thing, and with how hectic everything is over at my end I've sometimes missed archiving a livestream. You can find most of them on our Twitch page in the 48 hours directly after the stream.

Liked by: Shaine Kruel

Do you use some kind of entity component system?

February 18, 2014

Game Maker has a system that acts as such, yes.

What was the story with the shopkeeper from Ridiculous Fishing being too stereotypical?

February 17, 2014

We responded to a tweet that said something along the lines of 'any reason for the hat on the shopkeeper, keep in mind that I won't accept any answer?' and - since we made so many jokes about fishing with hats during the creation of Ridiculous Fishing, assumed it was a joke. As such, we forwarded them a Twitter account we also own for Ridiculous Fishing to juggle the joke a bit there.

Of course, it turned out it wasn't a joke, it was a serious inquiry into the hat of the shopkeeper, and we quickly explained the reasoning behind the character design and apologised for the misunderstanding of forwarding someone to a fake Twitter account when responding to a inquiry. We've since taken any confusing or ambiguous tweet to be serious, to err on the side of giving an appropriate answer.

The whole episode (minus our apology, which is on Twitter and might be lost in the currents of Twitter) can be read on Daphny's blog (Warning: BRIGHT FLASHING BACKGROUNDS) over at http://www.poopdoggyballs.com/?p=4164, and the comments have the full explanation in there.

GIven your egyptian inheritance, I think you could give us a thought about game developing in countries where the freedom of speech and other rights are critical, seriously threteaned or at least compromised. Sorry for not being more specific, but what could you tell about that to us. Thanks.

February 17, 2014

I wish I had a good answer here, I really do, but I'm afraid I don't. In terms of privacy, Tails seems to be a pretty great Linux distro to deal with internet needs (https://tails.boum.org/). I'm really, really sorry - I've been privileged enough that Egypt is a country where, even though the freedom of speech was and still is threatened, it is still acceptable to make most types of games.

I have no idea who you are. If you had to introduce yourself in an informative way, here's your chance to do it. // I know it's not a question so please bear with it.

i3flames

February 17, 2014

I'm Rami Ismail, one half of Dutch independent games studio Vlambeer. My job is business, marketing and development. Outside of that I try and facilitates independent development in all shapes and sizes whenever I can. Life takes me all over the world, and occasionally it even takes me back home to the Netherlands.

Liked by: Ghada elkallawy

What keeps your motivation up?

February 17, 2014

The hope that I'm having a positive impact on the industry, on developers and on the scene, and the faith that I'm making something people like to play.

Liked by: Capsized Moose Ghada elkallawy

I'm nearing the end of my degree and I want to be a game dev, but big studios don't attract me. Your (and everyone's) advice is just to "make games", and I want to do this, but how would I fund such a thing? I assume the simple answer is 'get a job on the side', but I worry that'll leave me drained.

February 17, 2014

It might. Sometimes the answer is not simple, and in this case it sounds like the answer is either 'get a side job that pays just enough to fund yourself and bite through being drained' or get some experience and money at a game studio before going indie. Either way, spend your spare time making games, going to events and taking in culture and life for inspiration.

Liked by: Ghada elkallawy

Rami, what suggestions would you give to a person stuck with many low pay jobs, little time, but willing to make games for a living? I found out about this passion too late, and I am stuck in a poverty/work cycle where I really have not even 1 hour of free time during work days.

February 17, 2014

Use the 20 minutes you have and the weekends to make games. Please read Greg Wohlwend's blog post (see http://aeiowu.tumblr.com/post/53234753408/dont-quit-your-day-job-a-letter-to-the-hobbyist-on) on 'going indie' from that cycle.

Liked by: Ghada elkallawy i3flames

What is your opinion on academic game education such as the "Game Architecture & Design" course in NHTV, Breda?

February 17, 2014

It's OK. Like most schools in the Netherlands, it takes a lot of effort to be ambitious at the NHTV. I guess it's more of a cultural problem than a problem with the school itself, though. If you're looking to be a AAA programmer or a AAA 3D artist, the NHTV is the best choice in the Netherlands at the moment.

Have you ever thought about using Kickstarter to fund one of your games?

February 17, 2014

We've thought about it, but we decided not to use crowdfunding. We like the idea of immediately being able to give something back for money. That doesn't say we're objecting to Kickstarter, we're actually quite fond of it, but it's just not something we feel Vlambeer should fund a project on at the moment.

"they're allowing it more often than not." Why do you assume that? In what way are people allowing it? It is not ignored in the professional community. You can't paint inaction as systemic sexism when there is action. Also, there is no proof that women salaries are different from men for same work.

February 17, 2014

The inaction is systemic. And yes, the wage gap is well documented (see http://reports.weforum.org/global-gender-gap-report-2013/). In the lands with the best gender equality, women still earn ~9% less than men for the same job and hours on average.

I feel like it's fair in some way that you get random checked more often. This is not due to racism, but rather due to what countries/people are often seen as "enemies" currently. I'm sure that if the situation between these countries and ours changed, you'd get checked less often.

February 17, 2014

What you're describing is actually racism, and I'm pretty sure that if I held against you everything that your country did wrong in the history of mankind and discriminate against you on that basis, you'd probably agree that it is.

I'm a Dutch game developer, but I have an Arabic name and a slightly different skin color. Profiling is not just costing tax money, it's also not making the country safer: it makes it unsafer, because now there's actually a profile you can avoid to have less chances to get caught if you're up to no good.

Liked by: Alex Camilleri Ghada elkallawy Shaine Kruel

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