He Knew Nothing.... But Got His Indie Game Published — Full Time Game Dev Podcast Ep. 017

Mr Devon Mr Devon welcome welcome welcome I'm super excited to talk to you I've been wanting to talk to you for the last week once I found out exactly who you were and I saw what you've accomplished it it well I'll be honest with you when I saw your Kickstarter campaign and when I saw your game I thought I don't really know if I want a AAA Studio on my podcast oh and I'm and I'm being serious CU I messaged my producer I was like are you sure this isn't AAA it has that AAA feel and that Vibe um your game is called elements and it's it's well frankly I I'll just say this and I'll let you introduce yourself elements is the game that I would tell this might offend you it's the game I would tell my audience not to make and the reason why is because it is the scope is is kind of scary it's an open world Zelda inspired game and so that's

my introduction for you it's a huge compliment I hope you realize that's a compliment because you're pulling it off anyway Devon give me an introduction here did I do a good job you did you did and thank you I I that really baffles me when you say like you thought it was AAA and that's super flattering and I appreciate that especially coming from yourself I've watched your stuff for a long time and your uh the quality of your stuff is I would say AAA so that means a lot appreciate it um so I'm Devin Parsons I'm making a game called elements um and I started on this journey about three years ago and now we're here still working on it gotcha is this your first game by the way elements it is it is I've done animation and video production for the past 10 years but game wise um yeah this is my first jump in I have have a

suspicion that you have a prominent career prior to Game Dev and the reason I say that and maybe you can tell me if I'm wrong or right but the reason I say that is because Game Dev is a culmination of a ton of different skill sets uh management time management um working with a team communication Asset Management knowing how to plan things like actually realize that there's a set order of things so for example you don't put a roof on a house before you lay the foundation that kind of stuff there's a process and so my question to you is did you have a prominent career before Game Dev by the way if you're like me and you always dreamt of making an indie game as a full-time job I have a free webinar below that goes into exactly how to make six figures with just a demo I was just like you for years I thought I had to make a game in its entirety before getting a paycheck but there's actually three ways to make six figures before even finishing your game I've done this m multiple times so check it out below

if you do want to go full-time Indie and thanks for watching career no but I did my own I guess I've been an entrepreneur my whole life and so I used that 10 plus years of working on my own businesses which was video production animation and doing all those things that you say um yeah so I would have to tell stories making videos or animations for businesses um tell stories for short films um I had to worry about audio and composition and color grading and everything that actually translates into games um so I I did that for a long time and I just never did it in an interactive form um right yeah is is making games

more complicated or less complicated well the way I I was thinking about it the other day was it's when you make a film it's you're building something and the viewer is watching it and then what exactly what you made is how they receive it when you're making a game you have this input from the player and they can decide to do whatever they want to do and you have to account for that so I think it's enormously more difficult to make a game not not that it's easy to make a film at all but it's there's just so much more that you have to think about I'm going to toot my own horn here in a little bit because and sort of just piggy back off of what you said there um I uh I got into [Music]

making short horror films in the last four years so like making games I've been doing it for you know over a decade um but making short horror films I got into as well and I thought it was I I kind of thought about it backwards where I was like this is the next step up the ladder yeah and I'm not going to pretend that I'm the a genius director or whatever but in terms of complexity it's it's much more simpler especially in the story storytelling Department with film because you can control in a linear way you can control the story and what's being told you know what I mean and so I found myself on set you know doing these films where like some people would say man I do sound like I'm bragging here but some people would say like on the onset they'd be like like it's crazy how

you know how to do this and I'm like well this is nothing compared to trying to tell a story when the player has control over the story do you know what I mean oh I totally know what you mean yeah we we have to think about every possibility that the player might do and like for so one of the difficulties like I'm facing having an open world game is how and where do I place those story beats to tell a story because elements is a very narrative driven game but if I want to give the player freedom to go start in the nature biome or and then if they want to go to the ice biome like how do I ensure that there the players are still getting a similar story in in doing that so those are one of the difficult things you don't have to think about if you're doing a film it would just be like okay you're going here first then here first and then that's it

right but now we have all these options outline you outline it in your in your screenplay yeah and then you storyboard it and then you get your shot list and then your schedule together you get your team together and you follow the shot list and the schedule you know what I mean whereas with game development it's like how exactly do you if you're if if your game is story driven which my next game Twisted Tower is very story driven it's different than yours because it's it's very linear looks awesome by the way I appreciate appreciate that thank you it's probably not the best kind of game to make in this day and age uh because linear Shooters that's like early 2000s that's like my life though I love that that's that's what I was raised with yeah but long story short you know putting together putting together a story for for Twisted Tower to me it made complete sense like I had a team of my my team we're making a game together we're sort of building this game in a bubble and so

we play the demo and we're like that's great the story's flowing everything's working the Rhythm Is there and we're just really really proud of this demo and then we start sending it off to people who don't know anything about the game and we say Hey you know play the demo and devastating [Laughter] devastating I I I have a feeling you know what I'm talking about like the play testing just gives you a kidney stone like that yeah yeah oh yeah well I had the exact experience so like after um like when we the first packs we did we did PS East um after um partnered with apigy and um having players play the game was that was the first time that ever happened and especially the game being kind of open like I always thought okay the players are going to

see that and they're going to go to the towards the village but some players just want to go the other way and go over to the clim try to climb the mountain that you didn't have time to finish yet and you're just the whole time you're just like oh my goodness gracious what why you're doing that like and you want to say it but you also want to get the knowledge of what the other player might do yeah it scares me because it's like when I'm in these situations and I'm I'm it's kind of like when I'm with a friend and they're driving poorly and I'm in the passenger seat I don't want to be rude but I'm like hey hey hey hey hey hey put the brakes on I just want to shout it out yeah yeah drive better and the same is true with Game Dev but you can't do it you can't do that no you can't tell the player to do X Y andz um from at over their shoulder you have to do it in a What in what's even more

difficult is you have to do it in the game you have to do it with some kind of prompt or sign posting or UI or something and then this is the kicker you have to do it in a way that's not insulting or makes them feel like you're holding their hand you have to hold their hand without them knowing you're holding their hand yes you have to know what they're go you have to try to anticipate what they're going to think and and sneak it in and make it feel like they discovered that on their own yeah that's right that's one of the hardest things to do I think so let's get I want to get a a stress level um metric I want to figure out what your stress levels are and then I'm going to ask you once I get your stress levels I'm going to ask you to tell me your story okay so let's start let's start at the end here you're you're you're sprinting this race right now you're in the middle of a Sprint right you're trying to get this game done Y

how are your stress levels one being this is a breeze 10 being I really could smoke a cigarette right now um I would say right now I'm at a five and the reason I'm not at a 10 is because I decided that I wasn't going to let myself get to a 10 anymore so five is probably my Peak now because okay I I I've been at a 10 a few times um it seems like anytime you want to show your game like I've been to PAX East and Pa West a few times yeah and every time without fail I am finishing the build and packaging it it almost to the minute before I have to get into vehicle to go to the airport so it's it's like that saying of the time that you like your workload will

expand to the time you have um and so I don't want to have that feeling anymore it's just I mean it's not good to have that so I'm trying to like keep that low um but I'm how do you how do you do that um take walks no like literally like literally like so funny yeah you you just have to like for I I mean I haven't figured it out that's for sure but I think you have to look at it as a marathon and not a Sprint um yeah because when first started this game I thought it would maybe take two years and now we're like three and a half years in I mean till the game is finally finished it might end up being five and

like that's a long time so if you want to be on stress level 10 for 5 years like that's that's detrimental to your health so um what I try to do is just look at it as a marathon and just clock in in the mornings and then take some breaks and then when everyone goes to sleep I work again and get it up and do it all all over again but as long as I know you're working after you're working after your wife goes to bed or well that's the best time everybody's everybody yeah my wife and kids I mean that's the best time because no one's bothering you right so um You probably I guess for me for me it's for me it's 8 to 5 and and the rule in my house is pretend I'm not at the house working yeah yeah that's a good rule it makes me sound like an a-hole it's just that's that's how I grew up my dad you didn't you didn't mess with him while he worked

yeah and so in my case it's like 8 to5 I I'm out I'm out of commission and then after that let's let's play and wrestle and have fun you know yeah yeah I I try to do that but if and you know most times the kids are at school so it's not a yeah it's not like they're bugging me um my kids bugging me like really um but um but yeah it's um it's something that like I this game is like the thing I want to do it's like whenever we're home and like we're not doing something as a family and everyone's doing their own things like my wife's reading a book and the kids are playing video games they're playing outside or whatever like this is the thing I want to do so yeah that means that I do want to do it like when everyone else is in bed and and I have some time not saying that you should sacrifice sleep because I still

have to set an alarm to put myself to bed but um that's hilarious you need an alarm go to bed I know you've you've had to have been there at the like of course you're you're getting you've to got to a point now where you've figured it out quote unquote but like at the be at the be no at the beginning you're probably the same like I mean if you're if you're down and you're you're into something that you want to do all the time it's like a it's like a time portal and you just unless you tell yourself to go to sleep or tell yourself that it's time to stop then I mean you could just well you know I'll you know I'll be candid here me and my wife have been working through this ever since we got married you know over 10 years ago she knows that you and you sound very similar Devon my brain

operates on a okay I'm addicted to creativity and it is a problem I'll say that it's sure it certainly sounds pretentious believe me um but I need it no it doesn't I I I need it if I if I'm not building something I go crazy I I get stir crazy so vacation for me I've told my wife this and she doesn't like it and no wife should but I don't like going on vacation I can't it's so hard I just want to make something and build something and create and create no matter what it is I want to write music or so like I was I was born with this tick this this need to get a constant hit of I guess it's dopamine or something where I'm if I make something and I see it created I get this Rush yeah now the problem with that and and and maybe tell me if this is how you are

the problem with that is that when it's 2: a.m. and I know my kids are going to wake me up at 6:00 in the morning MH I I can't stop I cannot stop it's like it's like um it's like a drug and and so you're just you just keep going so I totally understand that feeling of you need an alarm to stop and I don't know what it is about Game Dev what do you think it is something about Game Dev where you cannot stop doing it what is that well I mean it's a lot of people are like that playing video games and I mean I've been at that point where I was the person playing games and I want to play all night um destiny um so oh wow and um but now I think it's once you figure out that you can play a part in creating that for

someone it's like you have that addiction because you know that like you you start to see video games in a different light and and now when I play video games I'm I'm I look and like I was playing the other day and my buddy's like all right stop looking at the textures like he just knew I was because I'm like trying to like figure recreate how that how they did what they did and why they did it sure um so if we can play a part in that and then have someone play that it's like I think it's it's personally more addicting I guess quote unquote but um what what do you think Devin what do you think drives let's just speak for you personally what drives you what's the Deep if we could just drill down and drill down and drill down and to until we're at your like subconscious level

like your ID yeah I don't know if that's the right psychological term if we could drill down what is it that makes you want to create a game and like you said have someone play it yeah what who cares what is this is it about the money no so it's I think it's two things it's I want to build something that can can impact or change someone's life for the better I I think I'm inherently a people pleaser like I want everyone to like me um so I want everyone which I know is impossible to like the game I create but also I want to build something that will stand the test of time I mean I won't be here forever but you know potentially if I build something great enough like maybe

it can be around for a thousand years and I don't know why I care about that mhm um but I I feel like if I build something that's positively impactful for someone and then I and that is something that can like last longer than I can last then I can give that much more I guess maybe yeah I think that's a really really wonderfully poetic answer sadly mine is not that what is yours mine is like I don't know that I I'm so interested in this question I like to ask this because for me it's almost that's why I bring up drugs it's like for me it's not about changing the world I wish I was as good a person as you please and also and also it's not about Legacy for me because frankly I actually personally

my belief is that our games will die probably in 10 15 years I mean if we're lucky our games will surpass our own life but I think most game developers no one's going to remember their game at their funeral um they'll remember their children yeah but um I I hope I hope my kids are at my funeral and they want they want to speak and and say say good things about about me so it's not about Legacy building for me necessarily I'm not arguing with you I just know for me it's that's not something I think about for me it's this weird I hearken it to Playing God so like and then we I want to hear your whole story but but I talked about this with a previous guest it's on my previous podcast I think his name who was it who did I talk to Josh Chambers he's awesome Josh Chambers is super philosophical and and has a lot of he thoughts and I love the guy and

something that I've been thinking about is how making games is kind of like playing God so the way that I live my life the way that I think about things is I think everything feels like it should be Eternal so like the idea of death like the idea of things ending it creates or you mourn that your body Mourns that you're like wow I don't want to die that's sad or uh when I moved out of that apartment or that house it was sad seeing it empty because that's a part of my life that died so seeing things die and change is painful because there's something Eternal in our subconscious so this is definitely getting more esoteric and spiritual but all I'm saying is that when you create something and build something it feels like you're participating in something that's almost Godlike it's almost outside of you and

there's this sensation of I am I have power and I have control over this little thing have you ever felt like you're playing God when you make a game that you're building this little mini world and and you feel a sense of you feel a sense of control that maybe you don't have outside of that yeah well 100% especially building a world that literally has mountains and rivers and lakes and oceans like I feel like I'm building a place that I would want to be in and when I'm doing that and then I I get to play it and I get to try to anticipate what other players will do in that World um I think that is pretty much yeah

exactly the same thing that you're saying but but also if you are quote unquote playing God then you are affecting these players in when they play and and what they do so yeah so so do you think about that when you're building do I think about my the the NPCs I'm affecting like how no how how these people that play their game The Players how they will feel like when they when they play you know and that's I think that's such a good point Devon because that's I think that's ultimately what I love MH I think it's almost like I'm allowed to mess with the player if I want to mess with the player yeah and it it gives you it I'll just I'll put it out there it's this it's perhaps a power play it just it's this one thing that you can do

where you're in control yeah and so here an example of this is that we have these we have these treasure chests in our game Twisted Tower and you have to pay to open them and most of them you can see through they're glass so you can look inside and say oh I want to buy that and you open it up and then you get some goodies or some snacks or health or ammo or something but there's some that are opaque and they have a big question mark on them and there's something really really fun F about making one that's worth you have to pay $1,000 to open it and inside there's only a dollar like that's fun to me as a game not as a gamer but as a developer it's like let's mess let's mess with the player it's like the mystery box yeah yeah oh yeah and there's something fun about there's something fun about controlling the emotional state of your players and I'm not going to sit here and say that's a good thing I just know that that's really fun that's that's it's it's like you're a magician you

know and you're in control of of how you you you know what's happening behind the scenes but what's presented is impressive and so you feel almost like a master charlatan and it's really fun yes I I totally agree um yeah and every time that I place an enemy uh a banded Camp a treasure chest I'm thinking about how will the player find this and what am I going to give them and and will they feel this way will they feel that way I mean and and like that multiplies throughout the entire game you're building so by the end of it it's like you just have no idea but you hope you made the right decisions um that's right but it's going to be up to the player to to make them in the end to Piggy back off of that it

really comes down to I think as a game designer and as a game developer you kind of have to have a good I don't know like a good self-awareness and awareness of human psychology um it's so funny because whenever I'm talking to game developers on this podcast they're always so socially aware like they're they're good at having a conversation and I think what that is is they're able to predict how Thomas feels and they're able to predict how people feel during a conversation some of my best friends I was telling my wife this yesterday I was like I I find myself gravitating towards game developers as friends and I'll I'll tell you you know be completely blunt there's some game developers out there who are some weird weird kids there are some weird kids in the game development community and and I love it I love it though because they're so socially there's this strange in tuness with themselves yeah because if you're going to be a successful game developer you have to be able to predict

human psychology do you feel like that's true of you um yeah and like I went to school and I minored in I majored in Psychology um um sorry I majored in criminology and minored in Psychology and wow um wow so that was my whole thing before I mean my my life plan was to become you know you know police officer or detective or whatever um and I think that is a lot of you know trying to figure what people are doing um or what they're going to do um and whenever I find myself having conversations with friends or people that I just meet I always I always want to know their story and I want to know if I can do anything to like Aid in that and like help bring something to the surface or like give them a

different perspective um so I think that translates into games because I'm always trying to anticipate what the player's going to do and um absolutely it's it's not easy and I I'm hoping I make some good decisions for the game but um it's something that i' I've always I've always done and I've right yeah I just wanted I mean I'm the type of person that's I'll go to a hotel and I'll be like all right so this is what they should have done because you know there's this is not this way this should be that way so I'm I'm trying to like design that in my game and it's like when someone walks inar you know they I see this and they're like oh that should have been that way I want to like have that done before someone else can point it out well I I love that we're

we're sort of hopping back to your initial your initial career because I want I want a good chunk of this podcast starting now I would love to hear your story starting from you know was this ever a dream so starting back when you were a kid and college and and even through your film uh career I want hear about that but I also want to mainly mainly I want to hear and I know my audience wants to hear this because look they're looking at you Devon and they're going I can never do what Devon's doing you can there's no way there's no way the indie game Dream is dead it's over it's not 2012 anymore whatever right so my question to you is you were in you went to you you were at law school or criminal University yeah just University so just uh did you graduate yeah yeah so I have a degree in

criminology which that's crazy literally means nothing no I think it's really exensive that's so cool though I I'm super into like we've been watching um me and my wife have been watching um oh come on innocent uh Presumed Innocent so good Presumed Innocent yeah did it wasn't good until the last episode the last episode was stupid but we can't talk about it but we have to talk about that side we cannot talk about it but yeah you could tell it was manufactured by by Apple they come in there and they say we want to do this and it's like no don't do that don't change it but anyway anyway no spoilers great show though loved it yeah and now we're watching the original with Harrison Ford to sort of compare oh nice nice that that said though Devin so we we've got you getting this degree in in criminology which is I think that's

awesome so audiences listening right now they want to be you you're living the dream okay by the way people listening right now in the comments is Devon living your dream let us know not I'm not living the dream but only I would say I would I would say Devin the reason you're living the dream is because you're published by ape and apogee is this OG game brand that is amazing so you are living the dream so that's a preface for me to say you're living the dream now tell my audience how you did it and how they can do it too start from the beginning and ramble let's go first I would say I'm not living the dream because I'm published I'm living the dream I guess because I get to do what I want to do every day and I feel like a lot of people I'd say the majority don't get to Thomas I think you get to do what

you want to do every day um but I think the number of percentile is probably pretty low and I I wish that it was higher and one of the things I do when I meet someone for the first time I say what would you do if you won $100 million what would you do every day with your day and if you can come up with an answer on what you would do every day like maybe that should be something that you're pointing yourself towards and if I won the lottery tomorrow not much would change I would still be making this game um yep so my story um I how far back do you want me to go um well let's not let's not go back to conception I think that would be a little weird so I was but I I I think after you got your degree after you got your degree okay like a lot of people I

think where where we want to start is we want to start at the place where you kind of got it a hint of like I'm kind of unhappy and I kind of want to make a game yeah how do I do that so I was I grew up a gamer I've i' from I think four years old is when I first had an Atari I might have been three and I got my Nintendo when I was four I can't remember exactly so I've my whole life um I've played games um but I never really thought like this is something that I could do so I went about my life I joined the military at 17 I was in for 12 years went to University got a degree um and I was full branch of the military uh Communications so Army um okay Army cool and um and while I was in there I did kind of a desk job within the arm Army which was an image Tech

which is someone who goes around I don't know how I got this awesome gig but you go around and you take pictures of like the cool um exercises that everyone's doing and like the the fun stuff for the Army and they use those images and videos like for the public uh to kind of get more people interested um so I also at that time um started video production there was a contest for Dorito's chips um and I decided that I would put a contest video out and it was terrible it was so bad um but I just got hooked and I got hooked on making things for people and hooked on making things that people would see so I started uh business I mean started small charging people a little bit um um and then slowly raising that over time

and eventually got into animation and then when um the pandemic hit I lost a big contract and I had a little bit extra time so I'm not sure what spurred it but probably some YouTube's videos possibly uh some of your videos um showing that like anyone can do this um I searched up a so I downloaded Onre engine I searched up how to make an RPG and the first playlist that came up I just played it and I followed it uh in Unreal Engine and after I was done that tutorial like it was quite basic but I was kind of hooked um and after and after that I just decided that I would spend a little bit of money on some

assets excuse me onreal engine gives you a lot of free stuff but I had in my mind uh this game I wanted to make it kind of coincided with playing Zelda breath of the wild with my kids and like it's a single player game so you have to kind of when someone dies you know if you're playing with someone you hand them the controller and then it's their turn and I was like it'd be pretty cool it'd be pretty cool if like this was Split Screen Co-op you know like I grew up playing all the split screen co-op games like I would go to Blockbuster and rent a game like every weekend me and my buddy would like beat it and whenever we found one that was Split Screen Co-op like it was that much more exciting because you don't have to do that like past the controller back um so that coincided the same time I down loaded on real engine and I came up with an idea for a game and I just started

make making it so I started I got someone I got like a Basse mesh actually from I think one of the other might have been art station um and kind of tweaked it a little bit and then I started putting enemies in there and environments and within like 6 months I had a prototype so I posted on Twitter I think actually the first post I was did was on imager and like the first post went viral which was ridiculous um yep because like I just I I didn't even know what imager was I just was goog I literally Googled like how do you Market a game and like that came up um yep so had a viral post and then I was like okay what do I do so I threw up a website I opened up a Discord and then I

mean I the community started growing right there um and then within that six months time after I was posting on Twitter for a bit getting some wish list and getting some followers um uh Scott Miller from apy reached out to me and over Discord and like it's kind of a big deal in the gaming sphere so like I can why sorry to interrupt you but can you let our audience know why Scott well he's had his hands and and helped create a lot of games like Duke Nukem max pay like some games even like games like Raptor Commander Kean like games that I grew up playing like I have floppy discs still Somewhere In My House of like Raptor like three I think it was three for I can't remember now but um so like literally played games that this person has

created and they were like reaching out to me so I didn't really believe it and I told my buddy he's like and his podcast is uh by the I sorry to interrupt you I just want people to know his podcast is below in the link in the description I did one with him yeah really good actually good he he's he's a brilliant brilliant guy and has a lot of fun tweets so follow him on Twitter um as well so go ahead sorry about that yeah no problem yeah so like he reached out to me I told my buddy and he was like that's that's a scammer Bud like that's not that's not him that's not the real guy so I did some re I did some research and eventually like I figured out that it was actually him and he said I saw your game he's like would you like to talk and we talked and and he said that he wanted to publish a game and I was like what is happening right now like I I didn't really oh man like I didn't I wasn't looking for that

but like it seemed like the stars had kind of aligned or whatever and um so I thought it might be a good fit and we made a deal and then within the next like month or so um I was full-time um part of the deal was I mean funding for like a year or a year and a half or whatever it was and um um yeah so that's how it happened man that is I I want everyone listen how about this let me ask you a question did do you feel this is a let's get an honest answer out of you as best as you can do you feel that you are were born with um I sound like Liam niss here a unique set of skills what a good movie um that's a

great movie were you born with this it I I'm just going to it seems like you were born not with a Golden Horseshoe up your butt but you were but close you were born with this ability to just identify like what the next move is yeah and failure failure doesn't really happen to you very much oh I wouldn't say that um uh yeah maybe I would say that I but I think it's because but I think it's because no that's wrong that's wrong I wrote a book and it was a flop okay um I have like hundreds of copies still um so there are there are fa there are failures and it's just like mitigating that failure and learning from it so the reason that that didn't work was because I had zero marketing so the learning from that is

not to have zero marketing so Market the heck out of it um so it's funny though you say that because like my wife I have you I'm not sure if you're a fan of Seinfeld but there's that episode of um oh I love where the like he's like even Stephen he always finds the he finds a 20 in his pocket it's like everything happens it's like I feel sometimes like that is like what happens for me um but yeah um and then so things after that just kind of um kept rolling like my originally my daughter I planned her to voice the main character she was at the time nine I think but she wasn't old enough the character is supposed to be 12 in the game so she wasn't old enough and I did a test like giving her some lines for the voice over and she within like the first like you know 10 minutes she's like Dad are we done yet and I'm like well if

you're going to voice all these lines in the game I don't think we're even close so so a So apigy at around the same time um they had someone who worked works at apigy jiren he happened to know Patricia Somerset who just happens to be the voice of Zelda in Zelda breath of the wild so oh yeah so they said would you like um Patricia to voice your main character and I was like what what really um so we like met digitally and talked and so yeah so she so Zelda literally is the voice of Her main character um that is amazing and you know a lot of people listening right now they might think of man I don't want to work with a publisher that's scary you know that and I don't need their money the truth is though as a publisher they they have these connections I first

publisher deal well the second deal I signed the first one I signed I was 18 and it was a bad deal and we ended up buying the game back but the second publisher agreement that I signed the CEO reached out to me and he said hey you know just FYI Shan Aston is interested in voicing one of your characters Sean asked him being Sam wise gamg nice from Lord of the Rings and I was like and I'm like I'm like a 25y old in a cubicle at a marketing agency it makes zero sense and funnily enough I'm that picky that I actually didn't even do it because I was like it's just not it's not the right voice for my character yeah I need like I need like a emo grungy kind of edgy guy point being though Publishers have connections so it's more than just money right Publishers also might ha have a set of devil horns they might have that too so

you've got to be careful about what the publisher has some things are good some things are bad yeah so you've got to really vet your publisher apy I've had conversations with them and we've actually negotiated before great um great guy Scott great great guy Scott so they they seem to be legit super happy about apy but anyway go ahead sorry to interrupt you there yeah no I I don't think you interrupted that yeah and I think if for anyone who's like thinking about getting a publisher or has been approached like you have to look at it as like a long-term relationship like you know you you want to you want this person to be your friend someone you're going to like be your family like you you're going to be spending time with them and you're going to be doing things with them and with the game and if you're not I thought about this a while back

and it's like if you're not going to have dinner at Christmas time with these people like if you wouldn't like then you probably shouldn't be working with them like that's right so that's right and it it just happened to be like abig fit well with me and then we went to PS and like it was instantly like just a connection like all the other publisher or all the other developers like just like instant bond and like no one had any big heads and like we all just cool and chill and like it just felt like a right fit and it still does and I mean you have to kind of parse that out when you're talking to someone and like just picking up the phone and talking to someone you'll be able to tell you know it's hard to tell though because some people listening right now when the word or the phrase

$100,000 is thrown in front of them or they hear that on a Discord call or a zoom call with a publisher suddenly it's very difficult to interpret whether the person they're talking to could be someone they get a beer with or could be somebody you hang out with and get dinner with money tends to skew and blur our perceptive or our perception of whether a publisher is actually legitimate I've been there I worked with a publisher I worked with a publisher signed a deal got some money and again this was when I was younger and I shouldn't have but the money was so enticing I mean can you imagine being 18 years old and yeah a publisher is talking about $20,000 yeah you know so you've got to be very very very very very very uh you got to be willing to say no to money and careful 100% you got to be willing to say no to the money because

like you said totally agree with you it's a longterm relationship right and and that is just like one of the hardest things I think in Game Dev is like sustaining yourself while you're building this thing because it's a longterm it's a it's a marathon on Sprint and like there are multiple ways you could do that like some people you know save a bunch of money from a job and have a nest egg and they live off of that while they're making the game some people you know um work on their game part-time while they're working at another job and that's a thing that can be done as well like not every game has to be so ambitious that it takes five years of your life fulltime um so there's ideas good ideas out there and games that can be built on a smaller scale and maybe maybe it's just building a smaller game in your parttime and then putting that out there you know so you have some experience and like that might be the thing that like

connects you to somebody else and there's other there's also uh there's like government grants there's like other type of funding so like there's there's multiple ways and publisher is just happens to be one and it works for some people but not everyone well let's talk about I I can I can count on my hands I'm going to guess your funding sources I've seen a couple of them publisher publisher Kickstarter Kickstarter which by the way why did you or how much did the kickstarter raise 256,000 I think Canadian woo Canadian so our dollars not I mean it's still it's still some money it's still some money money yeah yeah uh I'm going to assume you make some money with social media somehow no is there a way that I can do that yes I'm actually doing it right now I am doing right now with this podcast thank you so much Devon I'm going to make some money from you we'll have to

talk because I I was that would be lovely um and great it's actually the best kind because it's recurring yeah yeah and I mean that would be nice um and maybe someday that in in the cards um we also got an epic Mega Grant um which any if anybody is unfamiliar with epic Mega grants it is a fund that Epic games who makes Onre engine put together it's they set aside $100 million um this was probably five years ago don't quote me on that and they're taking applications on their website um you all you have to do is go to Just Google epic Mega grants and you can apply um you don't need a prototype I mean everything helps you can you can add whatever you want into this application um they want to know how

much you want and they want to know how you're going to use onreal engine to kind of help um bring onreal engine to more people and yeah they're they're some of the grants are essentially free money because they don't check in they just want developers to succeed so I I'm really like excuse me I'm really um big on that program I mean it's I don't think it's easy to get in like I applied and it took them probably six or eight months to get back to me um and but I did get a grant and that was really helpful um where where I'm from we have a tax a digital media tax credit so that means that um some of the marketing spend and some of the spend from employees and hiring um is offset so they'll give you

a tax credit back so for example the kickstarter we did we made I mean 250,000 or whatever but we did run some ads and Those ads cost money but one of the things that these digital tax credits covers is marketing so that was part of that so we got a lot of that ad spend back um so that depends on totally like where people are in the world and what's available but you have to look because you never know okay so we just heard your story and I guarantee you and this is this is definitely not a negative thing but the people listening now are going to go man you know I wish I was as lucky as Devon and it just seemed like things it just seemed like the stars constantly align for people like Devon and they align for people like Thomas and my I I have one question for you and hopefully that'll answer those

feelings that people might have my one question for you is how would you rate your ego 10 being you're an egomaniac and you don't take criticism one being you feel like you're incredibly humble and anytime you get criticism you take it seriously I think by saying that I'm humble doesn't that mean I'm not humble but yes so this is what's called a 22 Yeah but I but I personally I when I say to my wife that I'm humble I think she says I'm not but I think if you were to ask one of my friends they would say that I am I don't know I think I am I think that's hilarious a wife is never going to say that their husband's humble because you're like in the same house all day long yeah but but I I definitely try to take

criticisms um and I think you have to if you're going to be marketing your game and putting it out there you're going to get negative feedback doesn't matter how good your game is your game could be the best game in the world and you'll still have people not like it um but if you start to hear things multiple times and sometimes there is a truth to that so yes so I try to I try to put things out there and and if I see someone commenting like I will look and if there's multiple people saying the same thing then may oh maybe I have to change that or maybe I should do this and like you know um there's often get some really good ideas well I think a Golden Horseshoe a giant Golden Horseshoe you up my butt cuz I've been told that by some of my family

members and if if I get that if I'm if I'm told hey you have a golden hole shoe up your butt I don't the way I take it is I don't say well I was born with that instead I the way I think of it is it magically starts appearing this is such a strange visual but this Golden Horseshoe up your butt magically starts appearing the more feedback you take and the more willingness you have to listen to advice of people who are just a little bit higher up the ladder than you they don't have to be at the top just a little bit higher you know what I mean and not only that in proportion to how hard you work I think that's I think I heard this somewhere and I wish I could quote where it was but it was like luck is a train that rides through quite often but we don't always have the ticket so that

ticket is like the hard work and preparation so if you're working if you're working hard on something I mean it just happens it just usually happens that you have that luck so I mean yep yeah but the the humility the humility is is really a directional variable in that metaphor meaning I would hate to be on a train leading like straight into a mountain or like straight to hell and humility is where you go hey am I on the right train yeah or like do I need to get off and get on a different one mhm because I can't tell you how many times like i' I've had people call me or they'll reach out to me or they get on Discord or whatever we'll go get lunch blah blah blah and they'll say Thomas tell me how to do what you're doing like when it comes to games or YouTube or whatever and I'll give them the exact freaking framework that I've that I've been using

and I'll say this is what you do XYZ and they'll it'll like just completely go over their head because they're like no but but I want to do it this way or no I want to do it that way and they just don't listen I'm not saying I'm the end all be all I'm just saying if somebody's doing something you want to do maybe you should just like listen and try it I got oh my goodness like we're we're in this beta testing phase and it's brutal like so much feedback from game developers who are better than me and they're just like this sucks this sucks this sucks this sucks this sucks and my initial my initial response is like screw you I you're wrong in your head smart right oh 100% 100% not not in real life yeah yeah and then I'll sit there then I'll sit there I'll take a sip of my coffee and I'll I'll I'll think okay

this person made $5 million on their game and they have overwhelmingly positive reviews on Steam maybe I should listen to them and so I'll begrudgingly open up Unity grp my teeth make the freaking change of the stupid flashlight this or oh my goodness you seriously feel like the player speed needs to be this whatever I'll do it and lo and behold it's way better so you just got to listen to people and you can't listen to people unless you're willing to ask people like Devon and say hey Devin what do you think about X Y and Z and it's GNA make you feel sick and it's going to make you feel nervous and your hands are going to shake and you're not going to want to hear the advice because it means you're going to have to work harder but but that is how you build the Golden Horseshoe yeah and you work hard and you listen would you

agree I would agree and and not only listen but like understand that just because one person did it that one way doesn't mean that you have to replicate exactly but there's always tidbits of information that you can take um yep and and use that so if you have 10 mentors or people that you follow I mean there might be just one small thing you get from each of them and they combined into something that makes your path because everyone's path's going to be a little bit different um that's right that's right okay well well well Devin that was a killer podcast you're one of my I shouldn't say this because they make other guests feel bad but you're one of my favorite guests you are very um very very easy to talk to appreciate that um yeah so dude we need to have you on again and we need to talk about like your actual game but I will say this

people listening go ahead click the link below wishlist Elements which is an open world Co-op RPG inspired by Zelda breath of the wild that's a big undertaking you're insane it but I [Laughter] am cool man all right anything else you want to leave the audience with before we wrap up here um just if you're gonna if you want to do something just do it just do it that's good and will they fail you will fail probably but that's fine and just learn from it I try to tell my kids that all the time it's like you're not going to be great at everything I mean you can be good at anything but you can't be good at everything so if you work hard enough at one thing eventually you'll be great that is a beautiful note to end on sweet dude thank you so much thanks for hanging out that was appreciate you man I've been following you for a long time

I really appreciate it yeah no problem Deon take it easy man Cheers Cheers by the way if you're like me and you always dreamt of making an indie game as a full-time job I have a free webinar below that goes into exactly how to make six figures with just a demo I was just like you for years I thought I had to make a game in its entirety before getting a pay check but there's actually three ways to make six figures before even finishing your game I've done this multiple times so check it out below if you do want to go fulltime Indie and thanks for watching