Ron Gilbert
Interview by Mark Lovegrove, Boris Danilovich, Shawn Guzzo [2003]
It's not often you get to have a chat with someone who is considered to be one of the biggest influences of point and click adventures, what with creating The Secret Of Monkey Island, Monkey Island 2: Lechuck's Revenge and working on numerous other graphic adventures by LucasArts. But we at the AGDzine wanted to know more about Ron's feelings on independant developers...
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normal = Ron Gilbert
Are you aware of the many independent point and click adventures out there?
I know of several projects that are going on via the internet to build independent point and click adventure games. I have not paid too much attention to them other than following a link when I hear about them.
Have you played any independent point and click adventure games?
I have not played any of them.
What is your opinion of people who make point and click adventures as a hobby?
I think it's great. Before I got into the game biz, I did nothing else
except make games as a hobby. It taught me a lot about game design and
programming. It also taught me that I can never be an artist. But back in
the early 80's, the graphics were so crude that you could get away with just
about anything. I kind of feel sorry for kids today because of the hurdle
that they have to meet when doing games on their own.
I would encourage anyone that is making *any* type of game as a hobby to
keep doing it. The key to being a great game designer is to design lots of
games. Most will never be made, but you always learn a lot in the process.
One of the great things about working at LucasArts when I did was that all
of us constantly cranked out game designs. Most were just silly, or
concentrated on a single concept that we found interesting. In the 8 years
I worked there, only 4 games of mine were made, yet I did close to 100
designs. None of them were wasted time. OK, maybe "I Was A Teenage Lobot"
was kind of a waste.
What do you think about fan-games, and what is your reaction to a
fan-game based on one of your creations? You may remember that "Fate of
Monkey Island" got shut down by LucasArts - there was an article in PC Gamer
about it.
Now that's an interesting and complex question. A couple of weeks ago, I
was having a conversation (i.e. argument) with a friend about intellectual
property, file-sharing and copyrights. She brought up the issue of fan
fiction and I was a little torn on the subject. On one hand, I have no
objection to it and it can be quite flattering. My only concern comes when
it is completely counter to my vision for the world and/or characters. The
danger (as the creative creator) is that the public no longer sees the line
between the fan fiction and what I've done. I know this might seem selfish,
but as the creator of something, it is very close to me.
From a publisher point-of-view, it's not really possible for them to just
ignore fan-fiction. By law, they have to defend their copyrights and
(especially) trademarks. If they don't they can loose them. So, even if a
company doesn't mind fan-fiction, they have to send out nasty letters. This
can easily be in a lose-lose situation for them. There is also a line
between fan-fiction and parody. At least in the US, you have the right to
do limited parody of a subject and not run a fowl of copyright laws.
So, to answer you question. I like fan-fiction, to a point. And if it was
up to me, I'd try to allow it as much as I could while still protecting my
trademarks and copyrights.
Have you seen the "Monkey Island Out-takes" flash animation?
Yes, I had seen that. Very funny. That is a good example of the kind of
work that would be protected in the parody clause in the copyright law (in
the US at least).
What do you think makes a good point and click adventure?
Story, Puzzles and Characters. The whole point of an adventure game is
Story. Puzzles are just a mechanism to hold that up, which is why you have
to pay very careful attention to puzzles. Every one of them needs to
relate to and support the story. One of the places you see adventure games
failing is that they put in puzzles that are simply there to hold up the
player. In a good adventure game design, there are *no* wasted puzzles.
Expanding on that point, is that one of the problems, that developers and
publishers think of adventure games as a type of glorified (and more
expensive) "Tetris", meaning, "fit slot A into slot B and make it really
pretty"? Do you think they're ignoring the story telling and interactivity
possibilities of the genre, and that maybe these types of games would be
better marketed to a completely different audience?
Without question some do. It is very frustrating for me to play an
adventure game that is full of puzzles that are simply busy work, or just
puzzles because they are clever puzzles. Puzzles are the pillar that
supports the interactive story. They are a mechanism for advancing the
story and should be designed as such. Classical narration, such as Movies
and Books are full of puzzles, these are just the decisions and obstacles
that the characters make and overcome in the course of the story.
Because they are interactive and suffer from the limitations of technology,
adventure game story "obstacles" need to be a little more blunt, so we turn
them into puzzles. But it should never be lost on the designer that they
are there to advance or explain the story and characters. One of the most
important phases of a Movie or Book is the editing. Cut out everything that
is not absolutely necessary and make it tight. The same process needs to be
done with an adventure game. Pull out all the crap that does not drive
towards the end.
What do you think is the most important trait in a project leader?
There are two:
a) Vision. A good project leader needs to have a strong vision for what
they are making. There is nothing worse (baring nuclear war) than a project
that flounders around due to a lack of vision.
b) Collaboration. A good project lead/designer should act as a filter for
ideas from the team. I always ran my projects where everyone was free to
contribute ideas. There was a lot of group design and input. It was my job
to make sense of all the ideas and absorbed the good ones and reject the bad
ones, or the ones that just don't fit. I often come across project
leaders/designers that feel that if other peoples ideas get into the game,
they have lost the authorship of the work. This is so wrong. Besides
getting a lot of great ideas, it also helps foster a sense of ownership with
the rest of team. Huge chunks of Monkey Island came from Tim and Dave.
That game would not have been as great as it was without them feeding it
ideas.
Do you think there are things that a commercial adventure game can't do
which a non-commercial adventure can, and if so, what?
Yes! This is something I have been toying with for years. The big problem
with the game industry today is that there is no outlet for "independent"
games, much like there is for movies. Every game that is commercially done
today has to be a block buster. Thanks to 3D, so much money has to be
poured into games that they have to be hits. No publisher will touch a
game that will sell a hundred thousand units, even if it cost much less to
make. The problem that this fosters is wildly new things can't be tried
because it's too risky, or good old staples like the point & click adventure game die.
There is no reason for it. I could make a great MI style/scope adventure
game for a fraction of the cost of what is being spent today, but no
publisher is willing to touch it. It just makes no sense for them to. Part
of this blame has to go to the retail stores as well (at least in the US).
They put a lot of pressure on publishers to only do huge hits. They don't
want to waste the shelf space on "art games".
If you think about it, the video rental market saved independent films
because they don't need a profitable theatrical release for the studio to
make money. There is nothing like that in the game biz. Maybe the
internet, but online distribution is plagued with it's own problems that
will one-day be solved.
So basically greed is holding back the industry. Is there any reason to
believe that a smaller publisher whose goal wasn't necessarily world
domination couldn't still turn a decent profit on a smaller production like
you mentioned? Assuming of course you could get it into some kind of market,
maybe not the retail chains but some other, untested market (which would
bring me back to the question about trying to get these games to a new
audience).
Not greed. Companies need to make money. It's more like short-sightedness.
A lot of the problems that publishers have is driven by the retail stores.
They turn out products so quickly that a "sleeper hit" has a very low likely hood
of being able to catch on. It does happen, but not a lot. I don't think a
small company could survive that just did low-budget (but good games). What
we need is a large company that is not afraid to have an "independent" label
for games that are just good and further the art form. Some of these might
catch on. The movie business works like this. Many of the independent
labels are just owned by the large ones. Their charter is just different.
As much as everyone loves to hate the block-buster summer movies, it's needed
because it pays for all the other more interesting stuff.
How do you feel to know that so many people have been inspired by you to
make their very own point and click adventure?
I think it's great. It's just too bad there is no thriving market for
them anymore.
Do you think creating games independently can set a good basis for a
career in the industry?
Absolutely. There is a lot to be learnt, and a good independent game (even
unfinished and unpolished) can show a lot of what you can do. Just don't be
afraid to start at the bottom. If you have what it takes, you'll move up.
Write plenty of designs and pass them around for feedback. Most will be
crap, but that's OK.
If there was one tip you could give a point and click adventure game
developer, what would it be?
Don't quit your day job.
Have you seen 'Pirates of the Caribbean' (The movie, obviously), and how
much did you love it? A lot of fans think this is a close to a Monkey Island
movie as we'll ever see. What would you think if Lucasarts/Film/ decided the
time was right? We could only pray for no giant robotic monkeys... although
typing that out here makes it sound like a much better idea than it should.
Duh. Of course. Opening day.
It was a great movie, most "fun" I've had a at a movie in quite a while.
Much of MI was inspired by my addiction to the Pirates of the Caribbean
ride, so it's not surprising that that they felt similar. If you want to
read the other things that inspired MI, pick up a copy of "On Stranger Tides"
by Tim Powers.
Ron, thanks very much for taking the time to answer our questions!
Glad you liked the interview, I think your questions are very interesting and not like most of the other interviews I've done. I like that they were about amateur and independent game designers.
Don't worry, we won't ask you the big question about a certain ending, unless you feel so inclined...
What the hell, I've sat on this secret for long enough. OK, the secret to
Monkey Island is this. Guybrush is really
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