>> PROFESSIONAL CAREER ADVANCEMENT ISSUE MAY 2007 THE LEADING GAME INDUSTRY MAGAZINE >>A WHOLE LOTTA COLLADA >>MOVING ON UP >>PRODUCT REVIEW STANDARD FILE FORMAT GAME DEVELOPER’S ADVICE THE FINE ART OF FOR THE INDUSTRY’S SAKE? FOR THE GREAT JOB HUNT COREL PAINTER X POSTMORTEM: ELEBITSKONAMI’S ¼ËÉ9gÉÛпÉP¿g9ËÃÉ Ù9ËÉËÉGgPgÉ¿g9ËÛÉ Larger data sets and escalating build times are the harsh realities that face anyone trying to achieve a greater sense of realism in 3D simulations and games. That’s why SGI and PipelineFX have teamed to deliver a scalable, easy-to-deploy render management solution—including SGI® Altix® XE integrated server systems built on Quad-Core Intel® Xeon® 5300 processors and Qube!™ software from PipelineFX—that can move projects from rendering to reality in no time. Read how you can accelerate your rendering workflow with our new White Paper, “Managing Rich-Media Workflows,” at www.sgi.com/go/create ©ÏßßÆÉ,­ÉÉ¿zËÃÉ¿gÃg¿Øg^­É,ÉÃÉ9ÉË¿9^g9¿ÉsÉ,PÉ¿9§PÃ[ÉP­[ÉÉËgÉ.Ëg^É,Ë9ËgÃÉ9^È¿ÉËg¿ÉPÐË¿gÃÉÙ¿^Ù^g­É Ëg[ÉËgÉz[É5g[É9^É5gÉÃ^gÉ9¿gÉË¿9^g9¿ÃÉ¿É¿gzÃËg¿g^ÉË¿9^g9¿ÃÉsÉËgÉ ¿§¿9ËÉ¿ÉËÃÉÃÐGÃ^9¿gÃÉÉËgÉ.Ëg^É,Ë9ËgÃÉ9^ÉËg¿ÉPÐË¿gí -gÉ)§gg5É9^É*ÐGgqÉzÃÉ9¿gÉË¿9^g9¿ÃÉsÉ)§gg5[É [ÉÐÐ[É9Ù9­ []CONTENTS MAY 2007 VOLUME 14, NUMBER 5 PROFESSIONAL CAREER GUIDE 7 FEATURE Moving On Up A career move doesn’t always involve leaving a company. Developers have a bounty of choices within reach, from changing job titles to moving to a different studio within the same company. But the decision isn’t always entirely in one’s own hands. By Paul Hyman 15 GAME SHUI Going Freelance Working full-time can be a drag for some, but it also means security, benefits, and camaraderie. What does it take to make it as a freelancer in the game industry? By Noah Falstein 19 PIXEL PUSHER Pay Pushers In this corner, we have the introverted artist; in the other corner, weighing in at several billion dollars, The Man. Learn how to beef up your uppercut before jumping into the salary negotiation ring. By Steve Theodore FEATURES 28 POSTMORTEM: KONAMI’S ELEBITS 23 COLLADA: CONTENT DEVELOPMENT With an almost reverse-KATAMARI DAMACY aesthetic, in which USING AN OPEN STANDARD 28 the player throws objects in various environments while Collada is a free to use standard that allows developers to searching for creatures, ELEBITS is Konami’s latest original IP share files across multiple applications in order to improve for Wii. Producer Shingo Mukaitoge gives an uncommonly workflow. In this technical article, Rémi Arnaud and Kathleen straightforward assessment of the ups and downs of Maher reveal Collada’s roots and practical application. working with a constrained hardware—and more By Rémi Arnaud and Kathleen Maher importantly, in a short development cycle. By Shingo Mukaitoge 23 DEPARTMENTS COLUMNS 2 GAME PLAN By Simon Carless 36 THE INNER PRODUCT By Mick West [PROGRAMMING] One-Third Running in Circles 4 HEADS UP DISPLAY 33 AURAL FIXATION By Jesse Harlin [SOUND] What’s hot for developers, 360 gets Live chat, Double Fusion meets THQ. An Inside Job 34 SKUNK WORKS By Tom Carroll 56 BUSINESS LEVEL By Steve Augustino [BUSINESS] SHIGEYA SUZUKI AND SAORI YASUHIKO SUZUKI AND SAORI SHIGEYA Corel Painter X and product news Regulating VoIP COVER ART: COVER Game Developer (ISSN 1073-922X) is published monthly by CMP Media LLC, 600 Harrison St., 6th Fl., San Francisco, CA 94107, (415) 947-6000. Please direct advertising and editorial inquiries to this address. 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WWW.GDMAG.COM 1 []GAME PLAN www.gdmag.com CMP Media, 600 Harrison St., 6th Fl., San Francisco, CA 94107 t: 415.947.6000 f: 415.947.6090 EDITORIAL EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Simon Carless [email protected] MANAGING EDITOR Jill Duffy [email protected] FEATURES EDITOR Brandon Sheffield [email protected] ART DIRECTOR ONE-THIRD Cliff Scorso [email protected] CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Jesse Harlin [email protected] Noah Falstein [email protected] Steve Theodore [email protected] Mick West [email protected] IMAGINE THE FOLLOWING UNLIKELY SCENARIO: NEUTRAL IS AS NEUTRAL DOES ADVISORY BOARD Dave Pottinger Ensemble Studios the movie theaters of America are divided into three It seems that Sony’s PlayStation 3 E-Distribution Hal Barwood Designer-at-Large George Sanger Big Fat Inc. Ellen Guon Beeman Microsoft Harvey Smith Midway groups, each of which requires a different aspect Initiative is keenly focused on first-party or Andy Gavin Naughty Dog Paul Steed Microsoft ratio and delivery format for any movie showing in second-party exclusives, such as SUPER RUB-A- Joby Otero Luxoflux it. Perhaps the three different formats don’t actually DUB, FL0W, and BLAST FACTOR, which take ADVERTISING SALES DIRECTOR OF SALES encourage easy conversion between them. advantage of the PlayStation 3 hardware in some Steve McGill e: [email protected] t: 415.947.6217 Just think what a chilling effect that would have way. These are all fine titles, but they’re GLOBAL SALES MANAGER, RECRUITMENT & EDUCATION on some filmmakers who wanted a shot at emblematic of a Sony-centric portfolio. Aaron Murawski e: [email protected] t: 415.947.6227 MEDIA ACCOUNT MANAGER showing their independent movies nationwide. I want to see a mass of compelling indie titles, John Watson e: [email protected] t: 415.947.6224 Sure, independent filmmakers might be able to like WORMS or ALIEN HOMINID, making its way from SR. EVENTS ACCOUNT MANAGER, SOUTHWEST Jasmin Davé e: [email protected] t: 415.947.6226 do fairly well with only one-third of the American PC or Xbox 360 to PlayStation 3. I’d even want to SR. EVENTS ACCOUNT MANAGER, NO. CALIF., NORTHWEST, ASIA & market at their disposal, but what if a certain see completely independent titles emerging from WESTERN CANADA target market just wasn’t able to get to a theater scratch from non-Sony funded developers who are Nick Geist e: [email protected] t: 415.947.6223 EVENTS ACCOUNT MANAGER, EAST COAST, U.K. & EASTERN CANADA that played the right movie format for the film free to publish their games on multiple consoles. Cecily Herbst e: [email protected] t: 415.947.6215 they wanted to see? Let’s say only a third of all Why isn’t that happening? I can only presume it’s ADVERTISING PRODUCTION art house movie chains were actually equipped to because Sony has not set up a good mechanism for ADVERTISING PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Kevin Chanel show that film. more loosely tied indies to easily and swiftly REPRINTS Cindy Zauss e: [email protected] t: 516-562-5000 This scenario would force independent convert their games. Things are even worse in Julie A. Douglas e: [email protected] t: 516.562.5092 filmmakers to have much smaller budgets for Nintendo’s corner, where retro titles are spouting CMP GAME GROUP their films since their chances of success are out by the gallon, but new downloadable games VP, GROUP PUBLISHER APPLIED TECHNOLOGIES Philip Chapnick VP, STRATEGIC MARKETING Michele Maguire drastically reduced by 66 percent. Wouldn’t it are completely absent as of press time. DIRECTOR OF MARKETING Tara C. Gibb make more sense to have the movie available My fingers are crossed that some developers CONFERENCE DIRECTOR, GDC Jamil Moledina everywhere? are secretly working on downloadable Wii games, SENIOR CONFERENCE MANAGER, GDC Meggan Scavio but as far as I know, there first needs to be an EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, GAMASUTRA.COM Simon Carless FATAL FLAW announcement and decision from the senior level CIRCULATION The ham-fisted point I’m trying to make is that the within Nintendo before the company will commit to CIRCULATION COORDINATOR Miguel Mendiolaza e: [email protected] same chilling effect is currently happening with such titles; to which I say, come on, Nintendo. You’re CIRCULATION ASSISTANT Michael Campbell e: [email protected] CIRCULATION ASSISTANT Andrea Abidor e: [email protected] downloadable games for consoles. While Microsoft missing a great opportunity for a mass of awesome has a clear outreach channel for independent content from innovative people! I wouldn’t even SUBSCRIPTION SERVICES FOR INFORMATION, ORDER QUESTIONS, AND ADDRESS CHANGES games with Xbox Live Arcade, the company hasn’t care if an indie game on Wii didn’t use the motion- t: 800.250.2429 f: 847.763.9606 e: [email protected] been working with Sony or Nintendo to create sensor remote in a unique way, as long as it worked INTERNATIONAL LICENSING INFORMATION standards so that those games are available to well with a normal controller and cost $10 or less.