Mad Rantz

What if a game was marketed by exclusion? This nutty idea is inspired by services like Gmail, where they open up a thousand slots, let’s say, and then after those initial thousand slots have been filled you can only get access if one of those thousand invites you. I thought something crazy that might be interesting is to do this, but to also build in a reward system in the game that ties directly to the depth and breadth of the people you directly or indirectly have invited into the game. Maybe a social networking game of some sort.

Skype allows you and up to four other people to conference together online in crystal-clear conversation. We’ve been using it lately when playing our weekly dose of World of Warcraft and it is truly astounding how good it works. It is clear, relatively easy to use (similar to any decent instant messaging client), and best of all it is free.

I haven’t had an opportunity to use it as a remote team management tool, yet, but it looks promising. In addition to its audio capabilities, it has some P2P functions for file transfers and such, the ability to call mobile/land phones (for a price - 2 cents per minute for U.S., Canada, and Europe), it’s cross-platform (Mac, Windows, and Linux), and it’s all encrypted, which is a nice addition.

The game would be a paintball game that is a parody of gangster life. One direction would be to make it with a cartoony look, make the characters either little kids or animals (more likely the latter), and family-friendly. So, picture it more like the spunkiness you found in old Worms titles in terms of visuals and audio cues, along with “turf wars” such as fighting over a schoolyard, or a playground, or a backyard.

Another direction would be to ditch family-friendly and aim for a South Parth-like set of characters, with similar bleeping of foul language. Or truly go for a more adult experience and mix in hip-hop tunes, “drive-bys” with paintball guns, and block-to-block turf wars.

Pros: Lots of options in terms of game design, easy to make memorable play and characters, and opportunities to stand out from the rush of WW2-inspired first-person shooters.

Cons: Multiplayer-focused game which have proven hard to sell without a box on the shelves. Last couple of options might simply piss people off.

As one of the owners of 21-6 Productions, I was very proud of the strides we had made in the indie game community. However, for a while now I have been feeling that it was time to move on. And that’s exactly what I am doing. The plan right now is to create a new studio over the next few months - Lumpy Games. I still have many of the same goals as when I helped start 21-6, but now with a few more years of experience I feel I have enough knowledge to start fresh and build a truly successful game studio on my terms. I wish the guys at 21-6 continued success and I’m looking forward to what they have in store this year.

And no, I don’t know what “Get yer lump on” means really either, so leave me alone.