Hydro Thunder Postmortem on Gamasutra

Our in-depth look at "what went right" and "what went wrong" during the development of Hydro Thunder Hurricane is now up on Gamasutra.  

We love reading developer Postmortems, at least the ones that don't BS around too much and actually fess up.  We tried to be as candid as possible in this one, and at the same time give a little perspective on what it's like making the switch from working for a big company to running your own studio.

Here's an excerpt:

When we started Vector Unit, we figured the experience we had as leads managing large teams at established game development studios would scale smoothly to the development of a smaller game project. If anything, we thought, it would be easier -- fewer moving parts. To some extent that ended up being true. What we didn't count on were the countless small surprises that small game development had in store for us.

You can read the full article here: Postmortem: Vector Unit's Hydro Thunder Hurricane

Keep 'em coming!

I have to admit:  I love getting fan mail.  

When you work at a big company like EA you don't really get much correspondence from the people who play your game.  I'm sure Spore and Madden fans send plenty of emails, but most of them end up in some PR inbox and rarely trickle out to the team that made the game.

Ever since HTH came out this summer, Vector Unit's received a pretty steady stream of emails.  Here's a particularly great one we got today, from Will Smith (I'm assuming not the Fresh Prince):

Just a very short note to say thanks. I have been playing games for so many years and this year have played all the "BIG" hits like Splinter Cell: C and Alan Wake; solid properties for sure.. But I have not enjoyed any game more than Hydro Thunder Hurricane. You guys and that SMALL team you have there have brought gaming back for me to what it once was.. I simply cannot believe how awesome this game looks, plays, and feels.. Ring Master is beyond addictive! Cannot wait to play Tempest Pack tomorrow!!

Thanks again of this great game -- please have more DLC for HTH! You've done wonders with this property!!

Ahh...that feels good.  Sometimes a bad review or a negative comment can get you down, and then an email like this makes it feel like all the hard work was worth it.

Most of the emails we get are people like Will who just write to say that they like (or love!) the game.  Some suggest ideas for DLC or future updates or games.  A few complain about this or that feature.

But we love reading all of them, even the occasional snark.  It just feels really good to know that there are people actually playing your game, and that they cared enough about it one way or another to take the time to write an email to us.

So thanks, Will, and the rest of you emailers!  You are the wind beneath our wings.  Sniff.  I'm getting all verklempt.

XBLA Fans Interview

There's a pretty in-depth interview with HTH's creative director Matt Small at XBLA Fans today.

Thanks to interviewer Miguel Coelho for asking more "out of the box" questions that your typical interview. The conversation ranges from descriptions of the new Tempest Pack tracks to the design process for new levels, to just why are those Expert Ring Master courses so damn hard?!?

Read the full interview here:  Tempest Incoming -- An Interview with Vector Unit's Matt Small.

PSN, DLC and Blood Wake XBLA

Ask a Developer!

Steve asked us three (three!) questions.  Which I would say is greedy but I like his questions and in this place I AM GOD so there are no rules except the ones I make.

Are there plans for a PlayStation Network version [of Hydro Thunder Hurricane]?

People ask us this all the time, and unfortunately the answer is no.  Microsoft Game Studios licensed the game from Warner, and as you can imagine Microsoft is not generally all that gung-ho about making games for the PlayStation.  

I say "unfortunately" because some of our best friends are PlayStation owners and we'd love nothing more than to trounce them soundly in HTH multiplayer on PSN, until they cry like scared children.  But it ain't going to happen this time around.

If sales are good, do you plan on doing any future DLC?  In regards to licensing and Warner Bros owning the IP, is it possible to do more DLC?

I don't know the particulars of the licensing deal between MGS and Warner, but I would guess it probably allows for multiple DLC packs.  

We'd love to do more; we have all kinds of ideas for new boats, new tracks, the whole shebang.  But the first part of your question hits the nail on the head:  it's all about the sales.   If you want to see more DLC for HTH, the best thing you can do is go out there and make everybody you know buy a copy of HTH and the Tempest Pack.  

Given the chance, would you ever want to re-release Blood Wake as a XBLA title?

Just a side note here:  Everybody who asks us a question about Blood Wake gets a free hug.

We would totally work on a Blood Wake XBLA port.  And it's not entirely out of the question, since last I checked Microsoft owns the rights to the game.  Of course, there are a lot of things that we would want to change or do differently, so it would probably be more of a sequel than a straight port.

Tempest Pack releases October 27

The Tempest Pack DLC will be released on October 27 for the low, low price of 400 MS points. 

"But what does the Tempest Pack have in it, Vector Unit? Is it really worth four one hundreds of my hard-earned and oh-so-precious points?" 

Why yes, sir, it is. With the Tempest Pack you get three (THREE!) brand new original race tracks, including the Bermuda Triangle, Atlantis, and Castle Von BOOOOOM! And of course you also get all the Ring Master and Gauntlet variations for these tracks. You get two all new original boats - the super-agile Whiplash and the slip-slidery Psyclone. 

But wait, there's more! The Tempest Pack also includes new skins for all the original game's boats, including the two contest-winning skins for Rad Hazard and Banshee. 

NOW how much would you pay? 

But wait! Don't answer yet! As a bonus we've also included six "X boats": Expert level variations of all the original boats, so you can compete online and on the Leaderboards with any boat you want! That's 11 Expert class boats to chose from! 

And then there's the little matter of 3 new Achievements worth an extra 50 sweet, sweet Gamerscore.  

The Hydro Thunder Hurricane Tempest Pack. October 27. 400 points. Nuff said.

Multiplayer balancing

Ask a Developer!

Ed Drake from Pensacola, Florida asks:

Why are the boost powerups in Hydro Thunder different in multiplayer than they are in single player?  What made you decide to go with the handicap silver powerups?

The "loser helper" powerup system in HTH's multiplayer mode was something that we added later in development, after months of playing online with each other and the team at Microsoft.

Originally the powerups were identical in SP and MP races.  Not surprisingly, the best players (cough *RALF* cough) consistently won most of the multiplayer matches, while noobs and, shall we say, the more joystick-challenged players, almost never climbed up out of the bottom half of the pack.

You might say, well that's how it goes.  Skillz winz.  

The problem we noticed was that the less skilled players quickly grew frustrated with their inability to compete and dropped out.  Again, not entirely surprising.  The surprising thing was that it was actually less fun for the best players as well -- there's no sense of challenge when you're 10 seconds ahead of everyone else and you know you can just cruise to an easy victory.

To maintain a rich online experience, you need as many people playing as possible.  If players -- especially new players -- are too easily frustrated, they just say screw this and drop out, which reduces the number of players and the number of available online games.

Originally we were skeptical when our producer at MS proposed the loser-helper boost system.  We feared it would take all the challenge out of the game, and frustrate skilled players.  Once we implemented and tuned it a little, however, we realized the opposite was true.  Giving players at the back of the pack more boost kept the races close and exciting.  Even if you're really good, you have to watch your back all the way to the finish line.  

There's still plenty of strategy and skill; you have to drive well, but you also have to carefully manage your boost for that final sprint to the finish line.  When you play online, you'll notice that the best players still win almost all the time, but they don't win by 10 seconds or 5 seconds, they win by half a second, or sometimes less.  And the new players feel like they at least have a chance at the top three.

I think the decision to include the loser helper boost system has worked out well.  There are lots of multiplayer games on XBLA, but good luck finding anybody to play with in most of them.  Hydro Thunder Hurricane has been out for 3 months, and you can still regularly find online games to join.

Loser helper FTW!

Shhhhhh...PlayStation Move is out

I heard this same conversation twice yesterday:

LAUREL:  Speaking of which, when is the PlayStation Move coming out?

HARDY:  Um, I think it's out already.  Isn't it?

Apparently Sony launched its PlayStation Move bundle three weeks ago, and....did anybody notice?  Not anybody in the press as far as I can tell.  No New York Times Technology feature.  No launch title lineups on the game websites.  Well, OK, IGN posted a review.  But that's about it.  That and a couple of blog posts.

Not exactly the full-court-press media blitz I was expecting.  And not really the kind of coverage a new system needs to pull in those coveted casual gamers.

Microsoft has said several times that they plan to treat the Kinect launch with as much fanfare as they would any new console system launch.  They certainly have an opportunity to capture mindshare in the media.  Here's hoping they don't fail to take it.

Tempest Pack on the horizon

The Tempest Pack has entered Microsoft Certification.  That means they're testing it to make sure it doesn't violate any international treaties, and also uses words like "Gamerscore" (Yay!) instead of "Gamer Points" (FAIL!)

Still no hard date yet but we're targeting 10/27.  If there's a chance of releasing it sooner we will.

Hatin' on haters

An article on Ars Tecnicha today describes how Hydrophobia developer Dark Energy Digital is getting all Fatal Attraction on reviewers who panned their game:

The company's strategy for fighting back is to attack the credibility of the sites that didn't like the game, and borderline harass writers who speak out against it. At what point does damage control go too far?

Man, all I can say is there but for the grace of whatever God you believe in go I.   Reviews for Hydro Thunder Hurricane were generally quite good, but there are always one or two that really make you crazy.   Like, rabbit-boiling crazy.  In our case one review in particular, from a certain prominent website, really smarted.  

Whenever you ship a game, no matter how good, there's always a (hopefully short) list of stuff you know could've been better.  Polish you didn't have time for, tuning you could have done more of.   If you're honest with yourself you know the game's weaknesses as well as its strengths.  And I don't really mind when a reviewer notices those things and knocks your for them.  Fair is fair.  

The reviews that drive you crazy, the ones that make you want to buy a crate of eggs, let them rot in the sun for a couple of weeks, and head over to the reviewer's office park, are the ones where feel like the writer just had a bug up his ass for whatever reason and decided to take it out on you.  

The particular reviewer I'm thinking of listed out a bunch of criticisms that to me just didn't make sense. Among other things, he griped that our races were too long, over 5 minutes -- when in fact all the races can be finished in less than half that.  He also complained about the load times.  WTF?  Our load times are like 10 seconds per level, tops.  Those kinds of comments make you wonder:  Did he even play the game?  

The review was so lopsided, and so off-base compared to the other reviews we were getting, that we considered bitching about it publicly.  But we decided -- and I think the Dark Energy story proves -- that kind of noise hurts you more than it helps.  

Ultimately I think it's best to, as the guy sings, "ac-cen-tuate the positive, and e-lim-inate the negative."

So thanks to Edge, and Gamespot, and Joystiq and GamePro and OXM, and the many others who actually played our game to the fullest and appreciated its strengths.  And thanks to the fans who have taken the time to write in, or post on the forums or Facebook, to tell us how much they enjoyed it.  You all give us the fire in our bellies to keep on keepin' on!

And to You Who Shall Remain Nameless -- that crate of eggs is still out back.  Gettin' reallllly ripe....