Retro Studios (Austin, TX)
- Started back in 2004 when Tanaka visited Retro Studios to talk about localization
o Michael (CEO, I think?), who has been involved with DK Country when he worked at NoA told Tanaka he’d like to work on a DK game
o At the time it wouldn’t make sense for them as a studio
- 4 years later in 2008 - Meeting between Tanaka and Miyamoto
o Miyamoto mentioned making DK and asked if Tanaka knew of a studio
o At that time, Retro had been doing a bunch of experiments so they wouldn’t be able to make Donkey Kong
o But coincidentally, a bunch of key members of the studio left. This allowed for them to do DK Retuns (silver lining to people leaving J)
- Overall, it was a HUGE change for them as a studio
o They had been doing Metroid for 10 years prior
o Art lead used to completely different style (art wise)
§ Had all artists do experiments and go in different directions
§ Had them all try different things, see what was working
§ “Fun” and “whimsical” were the primary drivers
§ There was a lot of “Man, that looks like it belongs in Metroid,” the team really had to work together
o 3D first person to 2D sidescroller also a big shift for how textures were made: texture size was relative to screen, as opposed to something you could approach in game
o Didn’t have camera system that was equipped to do 3rd person camera
o Had to problem solve handling characters passing through each other, needed a system for making them sort correctly
- At start, had intensive meetings with Miyamoto
o Animation totally critical for him (big change in style for them!)
§ More art changes
· Tools & rigging system not appropriate
· Did a lot of R&D for rigging – stretchy IK, broken hierarchies, experiment with style
o Certain features were dear to Miyamoto
§ Example: ground pound – they spoke for hours on this feature
· For first pass at it, made motion 1 to 1 with controller movement
· Miyamoto thought it felt off. Suggested off-setting it (ba-boom, ba-boom), making it rhythmic made it FUN
§ Blow mechanic
· Came from Miyamoto watching the change in direction animation (for like, 10 min straight)
· Thought it looked like blowing: “it might be fun to make DK blow on things”
· When they took this idea to the team, “the lights didn’t initially come on”
- First thing to do when approaching a franchise which has been done before become engrossed in all of the other games in the franchise
o They played a TON of DK games
o Got inspiration from lots of other side-scrolling games
- Major shifts in thought process
o Didn’t need to over think this game
o It’s simple: make it fun. Really it’s just a game about an ape with a tie who is trying to get his bananas back
§ Animation lead: We wanted moving around to be FUN.
§ Just traversal = fun
- Multiplayer
o Tanaka’s priority
§ In the original DKC – you tagged out with a friend. Wanted to see simultaneous multiplayer
o But Miyamoto said to focus on a single multiplayer
o This caused some headaches for the team. J
§ Tripled number of player animations (# was in the thousands)
§ Now had to figure out a better camera system (2 target camera) completely different challenge
§ Had to model more, since the camera could pull out farther than single player
§ Level designs had to permit characters getting stranded
o A goal was to have a very experienced player able to play with someone inexperienced and have fun!
- Challenges in working with Nintendo
o Distance, time delay
o Had to overcome with communication
o Constant video conferences, tons of visiting, lots of bilingual staff for translating docs
§ Needed people who could clear up cultural confusion (in addition to language confusion)
o An ounce of prototype is worth a pound of documents
§ Particularly since the documents had to be translated – this created a lot of time gaps
§ Rapid fire prototyping made it work
o During meetings with Nintendo typed and sent real time notes to the team
§ Were often able to get a build with changes in it back before the meeting was over (could see changes in action)
§ This was vital in a game that is ABOUT small details
- Tidal wave level
o There were open spots in the level where the waves would move from the background to the foreground. You had to hide DK behind things to keep him safe
o 2-3 months before lot check, Tanaka didn’t like it – tech artist himself was called into the meeting for direct feedback
o In general, had to try to make all functionality flexible because it was a game where details mattered so much
- Incredibly high standard of quality
- Debugging feature
o QA could easily take in-game video captures and send them to the engineers
- Importance of E3 demo
o E3 was highly motivating for the team
o There was a high bump in productivity because of the public reaction
o Had 4 levels complete for E3 – 70 more to finish!
o Took away great data points from watching people play at E3
o After E3 focused intensity on polish
- Miyamoto “I’m looking forward to playing this product with my family and enjoying it” (high pressure J )
Q & A
- Eastern vs. Western development styles?
o Nintendo doesn’t focus on GDDs or spec sheets
o Idea is that they find a core idea and make a prototype and iterate over and over until it feels right
§ Once it feels fun and appeals to a wide range, that’s when they hit the ground running (they don’t go into production proper until then)
o At the start, retro didn’t do this – would send HUGE spec docs to Nintendo
o Next Level Games in Vancouver & Monster Games in Minneapolis – these companies have come to understand Nintendo’s design philosophy & come on board with it
- Some devs (including Retro studios) tend to think side scrolling action games are easy – this was a real shock
o Miyamoto’s quest for perfection was a rude awakening
o Much, much more content for artists in this game than Metroid
o The point was to have fun in just one screen – so shot composition had to be good in every screen
o Had to add big moments to each level to give them their own feel
§ Needed to give players specific things to talk about
o 3 days before lot check – Nintendo asked for a fundamental change in the way that platforms moved (fundamental part of whole game)
- Change in difficultly not straight ramp, more like waves: up and plateau a little, then more up. Let you relax for a second before making it harder
- Idea of ‘speed runs’ came from youtube – people did that with old DKC
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