{"id":1848,"date":"2021-05-13T07:19:11","date_gmt":"2021-05-13T07:19:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/?p=1848"},"modified":"2023-04-18T16:10:45","modified_gmt":"2023-04-18T16:10:45","slug":"post-mortem-mark-lara-partners-in-justice-eng","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/2021\/05\/13\/post-mortem-mark-lara-partners-in-justice-eng\/","title":{"rendered":"Post Mortem – Mark & Lara: Partners In Justice"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Creating a video game is a long and complicated process that requires the collaboration of many people with different backgrounds and talents who find themselves building together something much greater than themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We at Deep Monolith recently faced, on April 16, 2021 to be exact, the biggest challenge of an indie game developer: to finish something<\/strong> .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this article, I will retrace our 1.5-year-long Odyssey<\/strong> for the production and release of the cooperative Detective video game Mark & \u200b\u200bLara: Partners In Justice<\/a> exposing all our mistakes and inaccuracies but also the positive things we have done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A screenshot of the homemade trailer from the team founders!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The development process<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Below is the flow chart kindly granted by Italian Party of Indie Developers<\/a> , which illustrates all the development phases of a video game. We think it’s a good starting point for setting up your project!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The flowchart used by IPID<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Below you will find our considerations for the 4 phases of the project: Concept, Pre-production, Production, Release (Post-production)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Project conception<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In my humble opinion, this is the most important phase of the project and must be done in a particularly meticulous way. Remember: a well done design phase can save you years of developing an unprofitable project or make you rich!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ERROR:<\/strong> At this stage we should have been more pragmatic: doing market research<\/strong> , drafting a business document<\/strong> (containing expected costs, expected revenues, financing methods) and validating the idea. <\/strong>The key word in this phase is DATA! <\/strong>You probably won’t come up with a lot of data. Well few data are better than 0 data!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BONUS:<\/strong> We have set some limits not to be exceeded: project length, money to invest in it, etc… If you are just starting out, create a project with duration of a few months<\/strong>. Our project was released after 1 and a half year from its conception, but we actually did 6 months of net development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BONUS:<\/strong> We focused on a simple mechanic that makes the game different from all the others<\/strong> , the so-called “elevator pitch<\/em>“.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Pre-production phase<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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In the pre-production phase we prepare for the party: team members are chosen, prototypes are made, internal agreements are established and many documents are prepared. This phase is important although it is easy to mix \/ skip<\/strong> in favor of the next phase, in fact it is the phase in which we have made the most mistakes!<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

If the video games were a car<\/strong>, the team members would be its wheels! <\/strong>Choose your team members carefully.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ERROR:<\/strong> This phase was practically skipped by us, as we already had the full team and we didn’t ask ourselves the question: Is this person perfect for this role? <\/strong>Choosing team members incorrectly can cause many problems including: lack of technical skills, waste of time ‘chasing’ people, headaches and muscle aches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ERROR<\/strong> : This phase is done to make arrangements with team members. Will you pay employees every month? Will you give him a slice of the game’s revenue? Well, whatever, write it down<\/strong>. Not like we did!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MISTAKE: Set up hierarchies and divide tasks<\/strong>, avoid “bottlenecks”. A big problem we had was on staff management: who has the last word? Who decides deadlines?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the example of the car above, the roles and hierarchies determine the engine, the body, etc!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ERROR:<\/strong> We haven’t solved many unknowns in due course. Translations? Release platforms? Create the necessary documents to better plan the project<\/strong> .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ERROR:<\/strong> Choose your working methodology and stick to it! We used the Scrum agile<\/strong><\/a> methodology<\/a> , but failed to stick to it due to a lack of hierarchies<\/strong> . Technically successful operation, but the patient died.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ERROR:<\/strong> Select the right software<\/strong> . Starting from the engine you use, up to the communication methods. For example, we had communication problems<\/strong> because there were those who used Whatsapp, who Slack and who Telegram.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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BONUS:<\/strong> One thing we have done particularly well is the playtest. As in the conception phase, even here the data<\/strong> will help you not to go off the rails<\/strong> and stay on the right path. We’ve had more than 100 people<\/strong> test the game and have gotten great data for both gaming and marketing!<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Production Phase<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The production phase is generally the longest of the game creation process and requires strict rules<\/strong> that each team member must follow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  • \"\"<\/figure><\/li>
  • \"\"<\/figure><\/li><\/ul>
    The transformation from Pre-Production to Production of the Contradiction Screen!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    ERROR:<\/strong> We only created the Steam page 2 weeks before release<\/strong>, this was a mistake as we lost potential customers who could have wishlisted. It is never too early to start advertising the game. Stick to the Marketing Plan<\/strong> you made in the pre-production phase and design a funnel that brings together your potential customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    ERROR:<\/strong> We do not have contact with press and influencers<\/strong> in time. It’s always a good time to connect with others, they can help by sharing your posts, giving you game advice and further exposure to your audience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    BONUS:<\/strong> We have built authentic relationships<\/strong>! Don’t just copy a pre-made post to each influencer: spend time and try to create a long-term relationship with them. Take part in their initiatives, share and like their posts. It may be the best time spent on the whole project!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Release Phase<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

    If you have planned the project well, this will be a fairly quiet phase. But it can quickly become a nightmare if you have made mistakes!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    ERROR:<\/strong> We spent \u20ac 1400 on Facebook ads. It is possible to make a good campaign even if you do not contact an expert, however you have to study well how the algorithm works. In particular, we have staked everything on a few ads, instead of doing small tests<\/strong> and seeing which part of the market was more profitable!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    ERROR \/ BONUS:<\/strong> We have respected the deadline we set ourselves, studying the best time to release the game. However, having little time, we ended up with absurd working hours<\/strong> to meet the deadline, sacrificing some things that could be done better, such as ads campaign, quality assurance, press & influencer marketing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    BONUS:<\/strong> Choose the right price<\/strong> for your game. When choosing the price, take into account the discounts<\/strong> you will have to apply and what your game offers. Usually indie games tend to keep the price too low, which negatively affects the total revenue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    I hope this article will be helpful for anyone who wants to seriously start being an indie game developer!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Thanks for reading and we would be happy to hear your feedback to see if it was useful to you and how we can improve!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    What did we do well and what did we do wrong in the production of Mark & Lara: Partners In Justice<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1477,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[102],"tags":[100,105,104,96,97,103],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1848"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1848"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1850,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1848\/revisions\/1850"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deepmonolith.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}