How To Make Indie Games Full Time (Greg Lobanov) — Full Time Game Dev Podcast Ep. 037

believe it or not you don't have to have a viral indie game to go full-time that was true for me and also for my guest Greg labov Greg has a ton of games under his belt coin Crypt wander song chakori and beasty ball none of these games were explosive or viral yet they continue to bring in a full-time income for Greg and even his team in this conversation we talk about that we talk about solo Dev versus well working with a team and making games which one he prefers and also maybe which one he recommends for you we also talk about Unity versus unreal versus gdau versus his tool of choice game maker we talk about Publishers and pitfalls of self-publishing versus working with Publishers and getting funding for just your demo and we also talk about the future of Indie Game Dev how AI is going to affect game devs is it something you should be scared of or something you should embrace I think Greg's answer is actually going to surprise you but before we get into the interview I want to thank this video sponsor milanote milanote is a tool for organizing all of your creative projects into free form

visual boards which makes the creative process Dynamic and customizable and it meets your needs I find it especially great for the early and messy stages of a project as the tool is great for planning brainstorming and collaborating on ideas while keeping everything nice and structured it lets you add text video images sketches code Snippets full task boards and so much more so you can easily keep track of your game's progress for example here's a project where I've structured several boards that cover different aspects of the development process such as a brainstorming board and a mood board so I can quickly start getting into the creative process all while staying organized and not really losing notes or ideas along the way on top of that milanote has over 100 pre-made templates to make it even easier to get started or simply get inspiration on how to best structure your workflow once you're ready to share your work you can invite teammates and get feedback or

collaborate with them in real time this kind of collaboration is so important I use it for my game Twisted Tower I know plenty of other My Game Dev buddies do the same thing on top of that they also have a great mobile app which ensures you never lose an idea even on the go the best thing is that Milano is available for free with no time limit so I definitely encourage you to sign up for free and check it out below by simply using the link in the description I I I was studying your portfolio and it's like number one you worked with Publishers and sometimes you didn't Y and number two is it true that some of your games were solo projects uh I don't think yeah like like M I've always had at least music that I didn't make in the games and I well I mean that's that's pretty standard for solo devs though so I feel like you can still be classified as solo even though you hire out the music so if you if you if you're saying music is separate then yes I've done I've done some games that were that were solo minus that um I've kind of worked at

every scale so I did games that were like just me plus like public domain music and me like plus a musician me plus a sound designer and a musician me plus an artist and a sound designer me plus a programmer and you whatever all I've done a whole bunch of stuff so yeah I've worked at a lot of scales and I like I did web games I did mobile games I did RPGs I did freeware games like freear RPGs uh and now I do commercial games on Steam and console games and yeah so I've been all over the place so was coin [ __ ] solo solo uh I coin so coin Crypt was it was solo for a lot of it and then um I brought on an artist for the last like year of the project who like redid a lot of the art that was in the game um and made it made it cleaned up so the game that people know today uses um that artist art his name was Tyler okay and wanders song is that solo wanders song was me plus a sound designer and a musician [Music]

um and and their contributions were significant like I really cannot I don't think you could say wandersong like is wanders song unless you like because it's it's a music game right so it's like and that's why they were on it too you when I start when I started making that game um I I had the intention of doing all of the sound effects and music by myself uh and they it was like not good like and I was like this I'm like I'm like gonna fail like I'm I'm going to fail the idea of this game if I don't if the Music and Sound doesn't land on it and that's why we had the kickstarter for it and that's why we hired people to do that stuff you know because it was like yeah this game is only going to work if this stuff is high quality and we worked closely you know they contributed like meaningfully to like the story and stuff too you know yeah chory and so chory was was like a five person you know like me sound designer musician Artist Artist and like a sound designer helping sometimes as well so um and like the two artists were like my roommates at the time and then and then yeah the same sound deser from from

chory and then Lon rain doing music um was the first time we had worked together yeah was the developer of Celeste involved in that game uh not directly like I'm I was probably more involved in Celeste than they've ever been into the games that I've worked on but wow we like we we're very close so like we we talk a lot uh we like if there's like like if there's any like if there's I mean so a lot of the developers in Vancouver like we all do hang out and and talk but of of all the studios in Vancouver like me and the Celeste like EXO team like are about as they're about the closest studio to me in terms of just like how often we we meet up and how closely linked like our careers are and and stuff like that yeah beasty ball was that Solo or or team team like capital T team that's this is definitely a team game okay big old Team game okay great so first question I have about this this I I want to ask this um because I know people listening they want to know most people listening right now are thinking I want to be a solo de developer I want to go solo and it's

because it seems simpler right how's it how does let's say the very simplistic almost solo coin Crypt and Water song Life how does that compare to this bigger team life um it it is different I mean so I still feel on on beasty ball like I I'm calling a lot of the shots so I say team because um like the production quality for the art and the audio uh and and programming like all this stuff is and design so like every aspect of the game has someone helping with it and they're erasing the bar on it but at the end of the day all those people are still answering to me you know like like I'm getting kind of getting the fin it doesn't really feel like um it doesn't like uh how do I say like I'm still directing everybody so like there's not like an art director who's separate from me who's deciding what the game looks like like I decide what the game looks like or at least at least have like a huge huge hand in it um so I don't I I've never worked on like a like AAA

scale right like really really big team or and I have like beastball is like you could say about 10 10 people working on it um which is not the you know so I so I guess I I can't speak to like bigger than that I guess is what I'm saying just to context it does feel different it does feel different um I like it because uh at least I I consider myself a social person and I actually really like that I get to talk to people all the time and they inject like the people who work with me on be inject so much creativity and energy into it and that part's really exciting to me um because I I can actually start to really feel like a fan of of the game because not every part of it was done by me right like when someone does a really good animation on the game uh or like adds like you know like like designs like a really cool encounter like I can be like no I love that you know and and I can really feel that like in a way where when I do it all myself I don't get to appreciate so that energy I appreciate a lot I do and I but on the other hand yeah I I do sometimes Miss like the flexibility it's not really even the um it's it's

not like it's like we have like creative battles because actually everyone on the team is like smarter than me at the stuff they do like they're they're making the game better like it's like and I don't I don't like there's no friction when it comes to that the only friction is is just that it's it's at the game is so big we couldn't make this game without all the people working on it um so like I I don't regret having them or anything like that and what game is this by the way Greg oh be beasty ball okay beasty ball okay because I Know You released that was it November last year yes so are you still working on it yeah it's an early access so we're still actively yes still actively developing it yeah wait so you're willing to say that beasty ball was a mistake while it's not even done yet I I a game like a game whose development was in the genre of mistake genre it's like it's a game that should well I mean look I'm very proud of it I think we landed and like I'm I think it's amazing yeah totally I I say this but it's just that it's it's the kind of De velopment style

that usually doesn't go well I AG or I agree in the sense that my game I'll sh I interrupted you but my game I I know what you're saying because I feel that way about my game right now it's like yeah this probably shouldn't have been made in this economical context it's a it's it's a linear first person game first person shooter it's like a Bioshock Style game and it's like wow in 2025 you really want to do this Thomas you know you want to spend three years doing that so sorry Sor interrupt but I know know feeling yeah cuz cuz I mean yeah a lot of games are in that yeah you know and I I feel like I I was I only went allowed myself to make a swing like this because I've had I've made so many games um because I've made so many games that did okay and we had enough kind of funding around that we could afford a little bit of a risk yeah and that's the only reason why I took you know and this and this like beastall this is like this is like lifetime dream game like this is what I'm it's like a game I have always wanted to make that I never felt ready to do that I I couldn't do myself so and this is like and this is when I was like

you know Now's the Time I have I have the resources I have the team you know I could finally make this game and like and again I'm I'm saying that it's it was hard and and there were a lot of things about it that like you know it wasn't like the smartest choice I don't regret it I'm really happy we did it and like I but also I would never do this again I think I don't know I will talk to me again in like three years but like it's I feel like this this effort right now is worth it for this game and like but it's not like a smart like I wouldn't recommend it you know right well I mean as it pertains to a team you know do you do you feel like if they heard you say that right now because they'll probably listen to the podcast would they be would they be disappointed in you or or are you guys honest about this with each other like man you know yeah I hope they'd understand yeah I mean because we we all come from like well we we're all well we're we're friends you know and we all come from the the the like we're all people who are multi-talented or have worked on smaller projects before and we all enjoy the creative process that's

why we're it's even now like it's why our team is probably smaller than it should be because a lot of us just love wearing lots of hats and love being really involved with stuff yeah so I feel like everyone really understands the the desire to like um you know like make just just just like the raw creative ability just make stuff and produce things and and have fun making things and and and then release it and move on to something else like that's all part of the process and I feel like everyone can on the team could appreciate like wow this is a big project you know everything that everyone works on is tied to everyone else's thing and things go really slow and it can be frustrating for anybody in the team because like yeah like when it's when it's big right every everybody can feel that that friction right so I feel like we all we all can yeah do you do you ever feel I'll speak for me you know when I had a team of five and not everybody was full-time and they were all contract work um yeah but there was several full-tim and then there were several part- timers all contract mhm there was a lot of pressure

as a leader to I don't know communicate in such a clearcut way and be decisive about things when deep down I knew I was probably G to cut stuff and I knew I was probably G to change stuff right okay how how about you you know do you ever feel like in a way you have to fake confidence as a leader uh I well okay so my I'm I'm terrified I'm terrified of that of that experience um and that and that's a big reason why our teams have grown so slowly um so like the games like wandersong and chory like they could have been made with bigger teams I think but they weren't because and and the reason why is because I'm terrified to bring anybody on and make them do anything that I have to cut later like this like that's like so Dreadful to me um and I know and yeah so I what we usually do is like I Ram people on so

slowly and conservatively and the entire try and bring them on I'm like just so you you know it's like it's going to be an hour a week cuz that's all I can you know like it's like it's like that's that's how that's how we often work because because I never want to tell someone to do something like that's that thing that you're saying I haven't actually done or at least like I've only done like I i' like when I basically when I tell people to do something it's because I'm confident and if I there's like very rarely do I cut stuff and when I do it's like it's a talk between us and usually I feel like we agree at the end of it you know I'm like right I'm really you know we worked really hard on this but like here's why it's not working and they're like you're totally right you know and it looked like a good idea at the time but it wasn't you know like yeah yeah well I like to think that for my team um we did agree on decisions right but you know you never really know because true the money is coming from me to you you know and me to my team they're getting paid by me so you never fully know what their true opinion is at least

that I mean I've we've been very open and honest about this um me and my my 3D artist at the time his name was Felipe and we're really good friends MH but he was like he was like there he's like there's there's no way for me to be completely completely brutally honest about what I think Thomas because you're my you're my boss or you're the project leader you know so at the end of the day I can't fully tell you that I think you're dead wrong now he was very very honest and we we made a ton of decisions based off of his feedback mhm but at the end of the day it really the buck really did stop with me and dude I'll be completely honest there were so many decisions I made that were wrong okay you know I look back on this this project it's taken three years to make we redid tell me if you've ever done this m we redid every single level three times completely from scratch from

scratch have you ever done that I have never done I don't think I've ever done a rework that comprehensive like on on a game but it's only because we we we work in it a different way basically um another thing we that I I do differently I guess because I because I have done enough solo stuff so yeah almost always if I'm not confident in something if if if I'm trying a level that I don't think might like may or may not be final oh I can do the art on it I'll do a bad job but like rather than hire someone to do it like I'll I'll it'll go a bit slower but I'll do the drawings and then so that when I have someone to do the AAL art like coin cry being a good example right like when that artist came on of the team like we had a whole game that had art already with every character and stuff and and I was like you know and I know this stuff's going to be in the game there were characters that are cut you're never going to have to see or Draw there's levels that were cut that you're never going to have to see or do you know but this stuff is in the game this is all good right so go like that's that's that's more that's like that's more my style than than the the total

rework thing yeah but it's it's it yeah it's also because like like you know like um like I was saying like the games that we like wanders song Cher like there that we had that Focus right that helped us kind of know also where what direction to build in beasty ball was the closest to to having um some like scary stuff but even then like we it was it was organized in a way that like a lot of the team was kind of safe from the destructive parts right right yeah do you think let me ask your opinion on this I've been trying to get a framework for my audience about like how to build a team if they want to and the framework goes something like this um only higher when you're like 100% sure that that is going to generate profitability to some degree what I mean is you shouldn't hire someone when you don't have your Loop figured out or when you don't have your gimmick figured out or when you don't know really what the game is like you should you should you

should figure out what the game is in this sort of as an indie as an indie not in double A or triaa but as an indie when you're strapped for cash and you you've got you're barely able to even maybe you're not even able to pay yourself yeah my theory is figure out your gimmick and your Loop figure it out alone as a Hermit when you can sacrifice time in your own ego by constantly you know changing stuff and changing stuff changing stuff only once you've figured out what your game is and what the loop is that's when you hire on people to then extend what you've already created 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 multiple times so check it out below if you do want to go for fulltime Indie and thanks for

watching that's totally totally true I mean no I I think that's I think that's the healthy at any scale even AAA cuz like you know it's it's not they they don't have the option because what happens at in big studios is that they have a huge team that makes a game then they have to start another project and then like it's always that's always the hardest part for all those big teams because they're like well there's no game figured out but we have 100 artists like so what do we do now like no one enjoys that part of the process right so like if they could I think they would be happy like that's why they all have like multi project they can just shift someone onto something that needs something right now right or they reskin a game and they make Call of Duty 30 and it's like skinned with like Carnival skins you know um yes yeah so like that's why that happens right but like in a vacuum if you're look at a one project Focus that's totally that's how it should be because no one there's no reason for anyone to do art if you don't know what the game is yet because yeah it's true like if your idea like changes then all the stuff that's there gets destroyed every time every time you change the idea like CH we went I went through a whole bunch of prototypes like

different genres and stuff but um like just by myself right and then I only brought on all those artists musician when I had like I had a dog walking around that could draw on on all the screens and I was like this is going to be the game do you want to do this music do you to do this art do you want to draw this dog like and you know what I mean like yeah were you tempted to extend that Loop and and to create it more complex I I was watching a live stream of it today M and one of the streamers said she was like I really want it to be watercolor I wish that I could blend the colors together and I was thinking I bet you Greg felt like maybe he needed to do that but you stopped yourself because you're a smart developer is that uh it was it's it it it's totally the other direction again so for CH because it it it all came back to it it was like game design for me is like the the the most important like Center of all the stuff that I do and in chory for the game design to work like one of the

core tenants of that game is like it has to be super obvious if something is colored in or not and that has to be like a binary state for all things right like this thing is yellow or it's red or whatever and like that's a click and you know it's like and that that determined the art style and determined like how all the painting works and something like watercolor it's like that's a different game and there there are there are other indie games that do this right that are like oh like watercolor like oh it's like a beautiful cand you can make any kind of art you want but they're not puzzle games or if they try to do puzzles the puzzles suck no offense you know but it's like they're not they're not designed for puzzles right because like yep and whereas what I was doing was like no I'm I'm making a Zelda game you know like it has to work on on a Zelda level like like very crunchy clear states of everything and that's why the art the paint looks this way and I'm not changing it you know yeah I if I was doing a SE maybe I would think about you know reapo some of that stuff but that was the vision for that game so I never consider considered a lot of stuff that like you know it's a great example of a

thing we didn't think about because we knew what the game was supposed to be uh I I love that I I I just thought about something um it's sort of the layers of of game development um what informs something else so like you just mentioned like the game design will inform the art style and it will inform um the story mhm uh is that true for everybody because I'll speak for me story is actually what for me for my games and my studio like my brand MH story informs everything else right which doesn't necessarily make a profitable project I'll be completely honest sure because you're you're you're treating it like it's a film MH and I would say that maybe Bioshock which is again I'm making a Bioshock kind of game right now yeah Bioshock has that Vibe it's like the story is

integral to everything else yeah that's why it's an immersive Sim it's like it's not just a classic first person shooter it's it's not like Doom 2016 it's like no the you you go on a path and you experience a story and it's super linear like hardcore so for me story informs everything else and my question to you is is do you feel like that's a mistake or should game design inform everything else I I don't think okay so I don't think there's a wrong way to make game games um and I've done and I've done stuff a lot of different ways I would say even like like wander song was much more a story first game where the design was informed by story um and then I I kind of flipped on that um and from having tried to and also just like like Bioshock I think I think you're right that it's story first because I think kevine he's like a a writer first right he's a writer he's a writer so I think usually whatever and like I know like like God of War for example like those games are directed by um a person who was an animator and those are and you can you can feel right it's like the director like whatever their their

discipline is like that tends to be what informs a lot of the other stuff in the game from and from but from having tried a bunch of different like iterations of this I would make a case that doing design first is the most stable way to do it and that's why we do it this way and my my case for it is just that like so whatever whatever your leading thing is um like that's going to be like you know so if it's story you're like okay this is the story I want to tell these beats are going to happen this order they have to feel this way the characters to go through these arcs and it has to end like this right and that's and that and that becomes fixed and then what Happ so when you have a fixed element then everything else in the project has to become a problem solve to kind of like fill in the gaps right so it's like okay well if this happens in the middle of the story then what's the level going to be or like what's the player going to do you know or how do they get from point A to point B or how do we whatever right um and so and what then what then happens is that everything that isn't so everything isn't that fixed element because it's a

problem solution it's going to be variable in quality and and that's like it's like you can like you can have a really like once in a while you'll have a really smart you'll have a Brain Blast like oh my gosh this like this design is so good and it solves this narrative problem but a lot of the time it's going to be well this has to happen this order and like there's no good level that can happen so they're just going to walk down the hallway for two minutes while we talk to them or you know or like there's going to have to be a boss fight and we don't have you know this guy doesn't have any cool powers so maybe it's a gimmick boss fight I don't know like you know whatever like it'll land because the story's good but like the design isn't going to be amazing and that's fine and like wander song was full of stuff like this like if I look back at the game there's a lot of things that game they're like I want the player to feel this way and the design that like executes that is not it's like everyone's least favorite level in the game it's the part everyone just you know but it works on a narrative level everyone's like oh well I you know it was frustrating and I really felt like when with the character or when the surprise happened there was all this it was paced perfectly right so the narrative stuff lands but the design

doesn't always right right but so big big big picture when so that like that's that's what the game ends up feeling like but when a game isn't fun to play people will tend to look down on everything else or they won't see everything else because if the game isn't fun to play and they don't finish the game then as far as they're concerned there was no story or often they'll feel like the story sucks because they didn't like playing the game that much so and that's not 100% true like because I mean I'm proud of wandersong I think it's a great game and like our audience loves that game and there a lot of like Bioshock is famous and people love that right like it's not like it's impossible um but like when you when you choose like you know if you choose like design is the one thing where like when you compromise it you compromize like I think people's experience more generally I guess is what I'm saying yeah oh yeah it's like the it's like the oxygen of a game um you know it's I I'm I love putting things into Frameworks it's one of my favorite things to do sure something I just heard from you is design first and

then Forte second mhm so game design should probably always be the priority at the impetus of any project get a good gimmick and a good design and a good mechanic and then after that then you go Okay now what's my forte as a developer is it music is it art is it story that and then that is what your focus is I yes I mean if I was GNA if I was going to build a plan for someone to succeed at making something like make like whatever the difficult game is they want to make I think that's like I think that's a very stable plan I don't want to say it's the only way to make games though because a game like Bioshock wouldn't happen ever if that was the only way games were made right and the games that you make would never happen if you didn't make you know the way you make them yeah um and a lot you know there's lots of games out there that are done you know art first music first you know and they're great there's lots of great games that come from places like that so like I don't want to be I don't

want to say there's only one way to make it it's just that it's it's really [ __ ] hard right and these these games are like these games are kind of like the elephant man it's like like you are an icon you're beautiful and you're fascinating but you're the elephant man it's like pinstripe was that way it was like this game was built on a rickety strange scaffold of M odd mechanics that made no sense M all to support a story right and it was that's why it took me 5 years to make that game because there was not a singular this is the scaffolding and boom boom boom boom boom build the game on this simple yeah Loop or mechanic it was like random and so feat feature creep feature creep feature creep the opposite of that is kind of what you're saying like the witness right where it's like you explore you do a puzzle and the puzzle is is just expanding slowly right M mhm and but

it's the same core gimmick and then the story is built on top of it the art style is built on top of it yeah so I I totally agree with you that there's no right way to do it it's just if you want your if you want your game to have the same sort of flare as like a David Lynch film where it's like what what is this [Music] mhm then sure just go for it and follow your heart but if you want to be sane and get it done yeah in six months to a year start with the design first would you agree with that I would agree with that sure yeah okay okay did you hey did you learn a lot of this from Publishers I I'd love to shift gears and talk about Publishers because sure yeah you uh you've you've self-published right yep and you've also worked with Fini yep um and then who else the guys who did starve we yeah we're working with Clay

the Don't Starve team right now on on Beast ball and we worked with we worked with humble so humble published wanders song on consoles not on Steam but on consoles yeah so we we've worked with yeah a few different Publishers and talked to more of them okay so we just talked about Solo versus Team now let's talk about self-publishing versus publishing what are your thoughts there um okay so well my experience with publishing I think is really weird straight up um because we I'm scared of money like I'm scared of taking people's money in in the same way that I've always been scared to hire people uh unless I knew 100% what the game was I've always been scared to take publisher money unless I knew exactly like like so basically I've never done a big budget like even though I've worked with these Publishers Fini and Clay who worked with me on chory and wandersong gave zero financial support directly wow so they did not invest in the game in any way and humble did but their investment was like $50,000

literally like which which in in game publishing is really small for anyone who doesn't who doesn't knows you know it is it's very small um and and that was it was literally like this covers like my rent and the rent of my two friends for the last year of the game and and then some extra because I just want to like I want to make sure I've rent for like a year after the game comes out no matter what even if it bombs because I was scared of it bombing and that's why I took money um but so like so I haven't done so and and because my relationship with them is is like that I've always had very hands-off experiences so Publishers don't usually invol like that's why my games also end up this way so janky but it's CU yeah Publishers haven't really ever gotten involved or haven't really W to muck with what we do um because they're so it's like we have a very like like they're like okay you make the game and we'll just like put it on the consoles basically okay and that's that's it right so I haven't had this kind of like like I've never had like a milestone wow that's amazing last year what Milestones were were

really introduced to me is my third it was my third publishing agreement I signed a deal with 3D Realms okay and uh Milestones are scary yeah yeah I can imagine because they can reject them if they don't like it yeah you know yes totally so like I so I I have a lot of friends who worked with Publishers like I have a lot of secondhand information about it and like I know about the industry in general I'm just saying that from my experience like I have not my publisher experience is like is is pretty barely a publisher experience just an investor um yeah barely if that right I mean with in the case of Fini and um and Clay like Mo most of Val that we get from them um is that they gave us connections to platforms so like to get on like a Nintendo switch or to get like a Sony deal or a Microsoft whatever that was their value was that they had connections with those people also they just are happy to answer emails every day and to be on Zoom calls with those people and to negotiate so like when they gave you an offer they would have they have contact knowledge be like well I think you should be more for that or

you should give give me more and we'll give you these things or whatever right so that I didn't I didn't think about most of that stuff the publisher would do all that stuff and then come back to me and be like hey so we got you this much money to do these three things and I'm like oh that's great cool you know and and just shows up like a gift from the heavens right and that's that's what I want exactly exactly so it's primarily about money it's like yeah you're not looking for a marketing arm or someone to help with localization well that that too yeah so they they they they contributed so when I say they didn't put money in like like localization and porting are would be they they would actually contribute but in the sense that they would like also like hire the people to do that I know yeah all the money go ahead go ahead sorry just they like all the money would change hands on on their kind of layer so for my part I'm just thinking about like my my artists my musicians my sound designers making the game and then like paying and organizing and structuring localization and breaking down the profit share and sending and doing the wire transfers everybody like that's

like publisher just this all that gotcha gotcha you know I I think that what do you think about this rule um as game developers release more and more games they should eventually part ways with Publishers altogether do you agree with that uh I like a lot of my friends would agree with you a lot of my friends who have done a lot of games for a long time would agree with you I don't feel I don't I I I don't know like I I like I kind of like the relationship that I've had with my Publishers so and I I don't feel like if I was doing this again if I was doing a beasty ball again or chickery again like I wouldn't like in like for my next game I even though like there's a lot of reasons why I could self-publish I don't know that I necessarily would um I think that it's important for people to question what they want out of their publisher relationships and not just take for granted that they should get a publisher because that that is kind of um that's the way a lot of people talk these days is like well you have to get a publisher and you have to get this much funding and you have to make a game that's this

big that stuff isn't necessarily true right so that's an assumption that I would challenge but I I wouldn't say that when you get experience you should not have a publisher like that's not what that means in some sense like I think like having a publisher is a really Savvy decision that an experienced person like me could make um because you because like I get things from them that I you know they just do things I don't want to do and they take care of things I don't want to take care of yeah so yeah okay uh what are some things that that well I I'll say what I think really quick like um some things that I always warn people about when getting a publisher um I'd love to hear your thoughts on big red flags right sure sure some of some red flags for me are um abstract Milestones that aren't clear like um what is the deliverable for q1 for Q2 for Q3 for Q4 if the deliverable isn't clear and if it's not concise in the

contract the payment is abstract it's like they can really pay you whenever they want and then suddenly team they turn down for reason y another one is not a clear defined definition of what a royalty share is because if it can include if it if it can include expenses like let's say they throw a party in their local office in Denmark mhm and they throw a party and the party costs 10 grand they can count it as an expense and deduct it from your royalty yeah so you need a clear royalty definition and then the third one for me is is uh intellectual property there's no reason why a publisher should be able to buy your intellectual property for 50k for God's sake you know yeah yeah yeah yeah um they should get a license right and it even in perpetuity seems a little crazy to me I'm thinking maybe 10 years yeah um max so those are my red flags do you have any that you could think of red red red flags um those are all great examples honestly um I think it speaks

to a a deeper like like I think all like it's like trust it's trust in the because the first thing the Milestone definition it's it's like yeah it's partly like a money skimming thing there is also like that's also I think speaking to like a does this publisher understand my game and do I trust them to direct you know to give me direction on the game and and to have vision for the game cuz it also speaks to like how are they going to Market and how do they understand what our audience is going to like about it because if they don't understand what a milestone of my game is they also don't understand like what my game is and then they don't understand who's G to like my game so and and like you want to be able to trust them on that level right where they're like oh they get it you know um and like like part of it and that also comes from a fact that like as a like indie game developer uh you know like the games that we work on are really personally important to us they're like our babies so and that's partly that's part of what makes it so scary to enter these relationships is that like you want the publisher to care about the same way that you do they obviously can't and they never will but it's it's

really hard to give control of your gameway to somebody when you don't TR believe that they they feel the same way about it yep y um you know I like I'm I'm so spoiled again this is like like my experience is so unique but like with all the Publishers we worked with like I only signed with them because I felt I felt that's stuff like I talked to them in person a bunch we and and like they they really conveyed that they understood the game and they cared about the game and they cared about me and and like we you know I felt we were friends you know and I felt like and I felt like if they wronged me like if they did something [ __ ] up then like you know okay cool you win you stole 50 $50,000 for me my game but you are [ __ ] going to be like everyone's going to know that you [ __ ] up you know like like that like you're not you can't you're not going to get away with this and and like and I'm never going to work with you again and like it's not gonna like they're not they're not I don't know like I I I felt that there was some security there too right yep yeah like well I found Greg I found that like uh

it's not necessarily the contract or the terms that make a solid relationship I've found in I've I've signed four deals um okay and I found I think you've signed more than me but I've done four since I was 18 all the way until I was 35 MH the the deals that were ended up being bad mhm were the ones where the money the money was it came from investors and hedge funds and it was changing hands and it was all over the world yeah you know it wasn't localized and clean mhm and that relates to number two which is uh leadership changes like uh mergers and buying the studio and then selling the studio and yeah that stuff because you you're talking about like I was friends with the leadership well what about the studios what about the Studios that reach out to people listening right now and those Studios that leadership is

temporary it's to it's true that happened I mean yeah they they ceased to exist in the last year right they did and even while we were working with them like yeah the PE the person who I signed my deal with like left like two years later and then someone else came in and they left and yeah by the time they that humble had ceased to exist I think the person like my person in charge of my games had changed like three or four times and so I definitely didn't know them anymore so it's true like you can sign a deal with somebody that you trust and then that doesn't necessarily mean that in the future that that's who you're working with that's totally true um so yeah maybe I'm just lucky that they didn't [ __ ] me over when maybe you're maybe you're a good judge of character you know um you know I don't know like I all in all my recommendation is don't sign big deals I I don't want to sign I don't want to sign a $500,000 deal with a or a million dollar deal with a big time publisher I don't think I would ever touch that because I would sign a deal with someone like armor games and the reason why and

I and I did and even though armor games restructured like they they got hit hard last year in 2024 just like everybody did we we had talked to them too at a couple points so I know yeah yeah the reason and the reason why I would sign with them again is because they're tiny it's and you know that the CEO or the president or the owner of the company is the owner of the company and if you know him and you can have a call with him MH you know pretty much what the co company is about right sure and as long as he doesn't sell it to somebody else um you should be good whereas if you sign this massive deal with these massive Publishers it's terrifying because you have no idea who these people are and who the real boss is and who the real boss of the real boss of the real boss is totally you know well yeah I mean like I think this kind of gets back to that like that that hiring practice you're talking about too I mean it's just yeah like small deals hiring as is possible when you have a Clear Vision like those those go hand in hand because

it's just like it's it's a very conservative choice to make as in like safe for you right it's very low risk and and I think being low that's how I've that's how I've lived like you know how I've made it through the industry for so long is like operating as low risk as I possibly can like only taking the minimum amount of money because that that's the other thing it's like you know we could have asked for more but the more you take it's like the more you're in debt and the more like you know the more they can ask from you there's there's downsides too though because when a publisher is less invested in your game like like financially they are less invested in other ways too like it's not if your game bombs it doesn't matter right because they don't they don't take they don't lose for that either when they make a big investment they're also kind of in the you know they're in the trenches with you right they have to make that money back so C it's certainly relative though because like okay let's say let's say uh embracer group invests a million dollars in a game it's pennies that's pennies to them sure sure yeah yeah whereas if Armor Games invests 200 Grand that's like their biggest project and so

you know so it's I think it's relative right yeah there's there's relative there I guess I I think there is just sort of a spectrum of like um because like if you want to make a lot of money in games yeah like sign a million dollar publishing deal I mean don't even finish your game you have a million it does happen doesn't it like yeah sure and and and and if your game comes out like they want to make a million dollars back or you had you know you you've done that right you've made a million dollar size game but that is a totally different that's a a hyper stressful experience a totally different experience and to me a not fun experience compared to the signing a $50,000 game that's made by you and two friends like those feel really different that's and the result is really different and I'm not going to say one's better than the other like as far as the result or you know it really depends just what do you want out of life which is a hard question for everybody but it's like you know if you want to you know like like the things that I enjoy yeah I I get to do I get to appreciate my life better when I'm making small games with small teams with small budgets like that's fun for me yeah yeah I think you're right I um I there were

two realities the first reality is the first game I signed first big game I signed was pinstripe and I signed it with armor games and I can remember dude distinctly I signed that deal and I was making that game super chill in my upstairs office tiny little office I would go outside I'd skateboard in the warm summer air and and just chill it was the most chill life mhm versus signing a big massive deal I won't say with who and laying awake at 3:00 a.m. sweating thinking about the stress of the of the schedule and who's getting paid and where's the money and so for me I will only probably ever sign tiny little deals if any at all sure because when when a lot of money comes into your bank account from one of these

Publishers mhm they're probably going to be watching you like the I of saon totally yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah it's nothing nothing comes for free right yeah um but a $50,000 deal with a small publisher you're basically free you're nobody's puppet you know yeah sure yeah yeah they're they're they yeah yeah we we had very little oversight on that kind of stuff and and it paid off for them too just the record you know like I think I'm very trustworthy I finished my games that's another part of it that's good that's good you're not just taking the money and running yeah yeah yeah so that's good well what what I've heard here in in the last like 20 minutes is you've actually been saying what a lot of the other developers who come on the podcast have been saying lately which is just staying really lean is smart and starting small and scaling slowly is really really smart but what's different what's different about you than all the other Developers ERS is you don't use

Unity um can you give me can we shift gears shift gears here and talk about why are we using Game maker and not Unity or gdau or unreal uh I learned how to use Game Maker when I was 12 uh and I just don't I just don't like being bad at things so every time I try to learn I have actually I I used I made some games like not not commercial games but I've made games in unity um I know I know the gist of it I just really don't like it and I'm I'm used to the way game maker like I'm just I have a game maker shaped brain now because I just grew up with it um and I get I'm also fortunate that the engine has sort of grown up with me because they they been they now they you know it's available on Console ports when I wanted to make mobile games they did mobile ports um and so it's just always kind of been like yeah it's just always been it's whatever I wanted to do it always kind of worked and I think it's actually been I think it's been useful to my career in the long term because it has its limitations like it's

not good at making 3D games and stuff but honestly making 3D games sucks no one should do it and like the fact that I I never I never like was you know because like I just I just only make 2D games only had 2D IDs because I'm use a 2d game engine and I think that is a big reason why we were able to finish the games that we started yeah uh it helps it definitely helps right and keeps things small budget and stuff so yeah well why why is it that 2D games and 3D games have a different budget in your from your perspective it's just so exponentially harder like like um there are so many angles like so as as like let's say as speaking as an art director um if you want to put something on the screen uh in a 2d game the the pipeline is so simple it's like if I I want something to look like this I draw it looking like that I put it on the screen that's what it looks like what it looks like y you know 3D is like okay well like just to make a 3D asset like that's timec consuming like that's almost like to do a really good drawing and make a good 3D asset 3D asset takes longer then

you have to skin it then you have to put in the game engine and then there's like uh questions about like lighting and shading and making sure that like just just on a basic technical level that everything's hooked up in the correct way and then you have camera work to deal with as well so like like you know just making something look a certain way is like so not trivial in 3D like for every single asset every single asset as to go through so many and then and then it doesn't look right right sence iteration it's like well why it doesn't look great oh well from this angle oh like this thing looks too small or oh because the camera is this far away or this close so we have to make this higher resolution or whatever it is right so like it's just yeah and then that so that for every single asset for years and years and years forever correct that's why and that's just the art that's just the art that's not even talking about like collision and physics and optimization optimization is huge so like we when we were working on Twisted Tower uh I'm still working on it but like we as a team yeah it looked amazing it looked so good and then we we we sent it off to the QA team mhm and they were

like hey you know it's running at 20 FPS on Playstation just FYI it's 20 frames per second and so we're like crap okay well we got to we got to learn how to bake lights and so the team figured out how to bake lights and the game looks completely different in all the worst ways it looks flat and boring there's it's not Dynamic there's not those cool shadows being cast obviously you could figure out how to do better light mapping but we're a small Indie team yeah and point being you know the whole optimization process not only is it incredibly timec consuming to figure out with 3D games but yeah if you don't do it perfectly your game doesn't like you said it's not like 2D where it just looks like how it looks yeah it changes based on the optimization principles you decide to use 100% 100% yeah and it's like it's very specialized technical knowledge to do a good job at any like light mapping is one thing and then yeah the 3D like 3D calling and 3D geometry reducing and and just like getting your

shaders to run faster like like every little effect in every Shader suddenly yeah I mean like 2D like has like you it's like we optimize stuff in 2D and sometimes you compromise to look a little bit 2D but still I feel like I have so much more control over the you know from start to finish what it looks like yeah you know when I think about game maker versus let's say unreal sure um game maker is like it's like walking into a pantry and there's like you have your you canned chicken you have some bread some and some black beans and that's your choice and then with with unreal it's like uh Cheetos Doritos uh cupcakes you got truffles you got your canned chicken though you got it up there in the corner there collecting cobwebs MH the what what what I'm really describing there is developers who jump into unreal and they're like look at all this amazing stuff we've got uh you know

real time uh Global illumination we've got unlimited you don't have to do an LOD it's just unlimited uh draw distance uhhuh and we've got all these Mega scans and they're all free MH and what happens is you get these massive bloated games that all look the same with unreal right yeah actually this is um this is something that I've um so I judge um art for the igf I do like category yeah so um like on the jury this is something we talk about a lot um and like this I don't remember who who said this to me but it was really interesting cuz they they talked about how when the engines get really big because yeah like you say like unreal games kind have a look to them and you even Unity games can have a look to them and that comes from like Mastery so if someone has a Mastery of the game engine then the game start to look like that person and then then you can't tell what they made it in when they have total control over it but with these really big game engines because they they are so like huge and honorous and like and like like you know all every aspect of

everything that's lit in an unreal game is not done by you and to make have Master over that is like so such a technical skill so it's like especially when someone's working and they're making their first game for example it's going to end up looking like the engine because you don't know like it's like you're you don't know how to change half of the stuff in it because you don't even know what half the stuff it's doing right um yeah and this is like like with with 2D again like this kind of I think this gives you a shorter path to that that kind of like that that Mastery thing where your vision like your unique idea what the game should look like tends to map out you know like a lot of games that are made in game maker don't look like game maker yeah I think when when you like if you yeah look at popular game maker games yeah no one no one even knows our my games are made in game maker anymore people are already shocked by it BC ball has 3D stuff in it for the record like we put a 3D rendering yeah we we made 3D rendering and like 3D model loading and stuff for it so like no one knows that it's still on Game Maker but yeah like it doesn't look like game maker right and it doesn't look like unity and it sure doesn't look like unreal like it's it's a weird janky ugly middle between all

that stuff thing and it's fun like it looks different I think it hasn't appealed to it absolutely that makes me think about AI um I I'm I'm man you know all new technology is brutal when it comes out it kills people like cars right sure vac enes um just prescription medication every new technology is deadly until it's until the until the roads are properly made like for example like when when cars came out mhm they had to drive on what was made for horses sure right yeah so I'm thinking about Ai and I'm like we don't have a framework or a system in

place or or even Unity unreal and gdau and Game Maker are they really set up for AI development like you could maybe try and retrofit it on there so I'm just saying all this to say everyone's really confused as to how AI is going to fit into game development sure um and it's very very very scary to me um because all I see all I can see right now is a bunch of crappy shovelware games kind of like we were talking about with unreal where it's like they're all going to look fake they're going to look like Marvel movies no offense Marvel don't do it this was fun no yeah but they're all going to look like these cheap games and so my question is to you do you have that worry with AI like is it going to create create just Dil I mean I yeah well well I don't know

I gu I don't if I'm worried about it like I think any like anybody with talent and vision is g to make a game that you know like like no like no one's going to like if some like I would never release a game that I wasn't proud of right so like my vision is gonna like if I if I'm not happy with something then you're not going to see it until I'm happy with it and that's true for like anyone who with Talent Vision in the industry like no one's going to start no one who's like good at games and and has like Clear Vision with this stuff is going to suddenly start making bad games because AI exists it's not going to like destroy quality stuff um I think it's it's a it's it is a tool um and it has some use like it has uses and I actually I've heard um from my friends who do like programming more so than I do like AI actually has a lot of applications in programming that are kind of exciting for some people that I that I work with which is neat um but yeah on the art side I I don't know yeah I think it's hard to make a case for it um really for art yeah I think so I think I

yes yeah I think it's very hard to make a case for ai's usefulness in art right now I think because because it looks so awful well or cheap it looks like it's like the equivalent of fast food that's how I see I I don't I don't so I don't just I don't just disagree with that assessment I mean you can make you can generate different art styles too but it's it's it's really hard to do any like AI is sort of like counter to intention which is a huge part of what I think like when you specificity like when we're trying to do something for a game it's like you need something specific you're like I need a guy you know who like fits in this world and and and has like it fits these criteria and has these themes and these colors and stuff and like you can give all that information to an AI thing and it'll still give you like it's like not right it just doesn't get it because it doesn't it's not a person and and it also doesn't have its own Vision like it can't like you know like what's fun about working with artists for me is like I can give them all that stuff and they'll give me a drawing that's like hits all those notes and then adds like 10 other flavors that I didn't think

about and adds like a new a new energy to the game and like it's like that's that's momentum and energy that like fuel that like pushes the vision forward right that gives us like oh like it's not just he's in a top hat it's like he's a walus too and like oh if he's a walrus then maybe like this you know it's like what whatever it is right it's just like working with people is exciting and and and energizing whereas AI is like it it's just so hard for it to hit like just just to hit a spec is really hard for an AI like that's just the Baseline thing that's never going to be perfect at and to hit a spec in the way that a person can and then add extra energy is another thing so yeah yeah I don't like and I want to say like just like like Tech on a technical level I don't even think AI art looks like bad because like I think it's like based on art that looks good so in a certain sense it's like it like it passes Merit like if like a casual person who doesn't like look at Art all the time or care could look at AR and be like oh it looks cool looks fine looks good but it definitely doesn't look unique and unique is something that I am attracted to like just as a consumer like something that I get excited about is when I see something I haven't seen before which is something I are like by

definition just like can't really do um and like I I I'm more excited by um like you know like yeah like small teams doing creative stuff that feels really expressive and personal you know like if anything like when something like like like bad to me like there's like there's a good bad right someone who draws something like very like sketchy doodly personal comicy like only that person would draw this thing this way like that's exciting to me like that's like why I get excited about games today still or new art directions right like AI doesn't do that um exactly okay I'm going to ask you I'm going to ask you here would you rather and um and this is related to what you're saying MH would you rather be never understood again for the rest of your life nobody understands you at all but you're a billionaire and you're living this dream life in this dream location or would you live one more year

and people fully understand your art and and who you are in your craft okay and okay so when you say understanding me like like people like really like Vibe with the game get you yeah with the game or your paintings or your music and this is related to what we're talking about with AI sure it's a sincere question I want to try and start asking this to every developer yeah okay essentially would you rather be understood for your craft and people like they're like I understand Greg I play his game and I get it I understand him yeah or you're never understood but you're incredibly wealthy yeah you know that is a tough for me you know like uh I'm I've been in a weird spot with my career where I because I feel like I've actually achieved the um the the ladder on some on some of a little bit like so we make games that are really really Niche and resonate with people really really really strongly um and I'm so grateful for that like it's it's really special

so like I uh like when you give me this would you rather it's like uh yeah I guess there's this part of me that like thinks has thought about like you know well could I could I succeed in the other way could I make a game that no one likes but everyone buys you know um because I honestly it's just it's for me it's like a new challenge so like right now I'm I'm almost more curious about that but because you never experienced it CU I haven't experienced it yeah what's what's a ton of money feel like you know maybe it's actually an incredible feeling I'm sure I'm sure it is on some level well the reason go ahead go ahead well just you hit me out a because we like uh you know making games that are larger scale I think it's also shown me how um I I think I think my my real answer is still the lad like because the no matter what I do like even when I try to make stuff that's commercial I think my Tendencies just take me right back to like staying small as small scale as possible and enjoying the process as much as possible possible so it's like yeah I think that's just who I am you know like I've challenged

it a little bit and I'm like n it's I just don't think I work in that other exactly the other level well that's the reason I ask is because I think that I think the coldness I think the coldness that people sense when they see AI art is it's it's like this doesn't reflect me right it's this sense of I'm not I'm not being understood here mhm like when I watch I love Wicked by the way I watched Wicked sure and the new movie yeah the oh yeah the new movie I watched it and like I live in South Carolina so like all of my friends are like you know scruffy scruffy dudes who do not like Wicked and I'm like guys you've got to watch this movie it is so freaking good yeah yeah yeah and it the reason I like that movie is because when I when when I see when I see Defying Gravity and she's flying around screaming her head off and singing that song m there's a part of me that's like I I feel like you know me

and I think I think that's why people love that movie and that story it's like everybody identifies with what the writer the composer the cinematographer the director what they're saying and they go I'm reflected I'm reflected in this you're like it's like looking in a mirror but the mirror is like uh this psychedelic colorful green and purple or green and pink experience you know sure sure so the reason I say all this is that I don't think no matter how good AI art looks in games or film I just don't think it it can truly reflect people there's something inhuman about it and so to be heard and to be reflected and to feel understood both as a Creator and a consumer that's like literally what drives all entertainment is this sense of I'm understood by my fellow humans yeah I think that I mean so I yeah I I'm up two minds about this I agree with you so like I mean I relate to stuff in just the same way and the

things that I get excited about I get excited about for the same reasons I also like TW it a lot I didn't I didn't think I was going to um because I yeah it was surprisingly good um the uh what was I gonna say oh okay because I think it's we it's it's it's a challenging time to as as an artist I think one of the things that's challenging because you you you talked about marble movies earlier I think that's a great example of like cuz okay if you look at like what movies are making the most money or have been like historically like for the last like decade it's been very like Vibes based movies that are like immaculately constructed that feel like like they're like they're basically the the fuel for AI stuff right AI is kind of feeding on on this like cool guy doing cool things on a cool screen and and like Marvel movies like they're not like meaningless like they have like cool characters and stuff but I think like it it it definitely can feel like in in the popular opinion appeal doesn't necessarily come from like for everybody doesn't necessarily come from like like

really deep relating to stuff right um which is challenging it's challenging like it's like I like I'm not happy to say that you know like I kind of want to be wrong about that but I think it's actually it might be true that a lot of people aren't looking for that when they come to watch movies maybe they get it by accident and then we kind of tricks them and they're like oh I I came to watch a cool guy in a robot suit but then he made me he I caught feelings like that's that's definitely true sometimes but some like a lot of times like like they don't know they're going to catch feelings when they go to watch Iron Man right they don't go to Iron Man expecting that deep experience they go there because there's a guy in a cool robot suit he's really handsome and funny like yeah you know what I mean and that shows really well in trailer and that's not like yeah so and and the games I think games are um it's the same way I mean and like I think this with my work too right because I'm totally making these like heartfelt games that are for like the smallest audience that are going to care about it in the biggest way um but they're not top of the team charts or anything right so yeah like I I I like this like so I agree with you and like the things that I do AI art is never going to achieve

like I would never use AI art because it would never it would never be satisfying or do what I wanted to do yeah but like yeah I don't yeah I think I think the reason why there's all this friction and like kind of handing around is because like it actually is really effective at doing some types of things that some people like a lot and that's why we're like we can't like that's like why it hasn't been discarded out right I'm not excited about it it doesn't make things I'm interested in but it's like you know like I'm so I'm still kind of like looking to see how people end up I wonder if it's as simple as yeah I I think you're right like you've challenged my thought process here a little bit because it's like well we we live in an era where this might be too esoteric but we live in an era where everything is everything so like 1980 Was 1980 and then 10 years later 1990 was 1990 and there was a clear distinction between the two you look at the styles of 60s 7s ' 80s '90s all the way to 2000s it was a very distinct clothing style music style

film style everything was very precise okay but now everything is everything like I what what what defines the 2020s and the 2010s when it comes to style and music I mean it I feel like it there's some stuff but I feel like it's kind of blurry sure the reason I say this I'll get to my point but the reason I say this is because because of the internet Everything is Everything like there's there's a place there's a there's a there's a genre and a style of clothing or films or games or whatever there's a style and genre for everybody because if I want to make a game about a guy who goes around and sings and it's a story game uhuh there's a place for that there because you could find your audience on the internet whereas in 1990 you couldn't find your audience right it it would probably be a

lot more difficult to find that audience but you found it yeah it was it was hard to access yes yes so there's an audience for everything now right and so maybe maybe this whole AI thing it's as simple as there will be an audience for AI crap right but there will also be an audience for organic by organic I don't mean food even though that was a trend and it's it's stuck it's landing and it's here to stay cuz I love organic food but like there's going to be a place where the organic stamp is going to be put on certain games it's like this is human made and it's for those people who love those kinds of games that yes that that I I can totally agree with that well because yeah I mean like people yearn for that stuff no matter what and that's not going to change right like it's just it's another tool that can manufacture certain kinds of things and that doesn't replace like you know if if any thing like I I feel like we already see this a little bit where because access to tools has become more

ubiquitous like more people can make music and more people can make art and more people can make games and I what I feel like that means is that people actually have been in general more excited for things that are are uglier or feel more kind of like Fringe or counterculture like a game like patro I think actually is epitomizes this at some level because it's like it's not a beautiful game but everyone loves it and people like how it looks looks um I'm using as an example cuz it's really popular right but I feel like like part of the success of games like this is like like it's a little bit it's a little bit ugly it's a little bit like solo Dev e and that's a characteristic that's like becomes more Charming the more everything else becomes beautiful and big budget right so like and that's exciting to me because it's like that means people will be excited about like uglier weirder things right like and and that's what I do so you know maybe they'll like me well I'm just going to let you know Greg when I get the balatro developer on I'm telling you said his game was ugly well okay sure I'm just kidding sure

yeah well that's so interesting I I I I was saying in a live stream last or I think it was three weeks ago I was saying make your game stinky like make it smell bad yeah sure why not you know every game's trying to smell good they're trying to be like polished and beautiful and everything's perfect and precise why not be the David Lynch of making games and make it just strange you know totally to stand out yeah I mean know a lot of like like like undertale or like pizza Tower like these are games that are like you know and like they're not even like they're done really well it's not like they're done without craftsmanship but it's just like that's an art style that is really appealing to people in a totally different way that AI wouldn't produce right and until Pizza Tower existed and AI could like now iterate on the ex you know before it was there AI couldn't do that right yeah so exciting what would the prompt be before Toby Fox right what would the prompt be to say make me a game that looks like that like undertale

you know yeah yeah what is that even CU like Toby Fox for all of his talent he made a really ugly looking game but it's beautiful but it's it's like it's like it's using awful colors on purpose you know and it creates that charm that you just it only can come from a singular mind yeah yeah it's very it's very personal like that's what that's what sings about it yeah so yeah I think that stuff will always be there and if anything I'm excited I'm excited for people to like get more of a taste for that if if if AI ends up diluting you know showing up everywhere yeah oh that's a really good way to put it man I think you're totally right it's like um suddenly it makes smaller more personal games more valuable because they're more scarce yeah yeah that's that's exciting to me yeah it is I mean you've done a really good job in your career like with with your games because they they have a very very distinct Greg style I think you I think you've nailed it and you still and you

do it with a team which is incredible sure yeah yeah yeah I was um this is something I've been talking to people lot about this CU BC ball came out and we were sort of looking at it and it was like it was funny to me because it um the response the audience response is so similar to the other games I've done like you know it's like like a similar size of audience with the same like level of enthusiasm which is which is awesome and it was interesting to me because before the game came out I was thinking like oh this is going to be one that like it's it's a it's in a popular genre and like and like it's more Desy like the story is is a bit more compromised and we're doing something that's a bit more like systems Z and stuff and so like people are gonna it's gonna hit people in a really different way and that wasn't the case but it's interesting because yeah the art style was so different between the games too like I thought that's how I was I kept bringing up I was like isn't it weird because like my games look so different they're all different genres and my friends at tell they're like no they all look like your yeah yeah so yeah we can't we can't get your stink off of your games I can't I can't to use that metaphor of smell like I I

would always talk about my and we'll wrap up here but I would always talk with my team about I want my games to smell the same it's it's an aroma it's it's this sense of this subconscious sense of like oh that you could just spot that from a mile away and I was just like you I was super duper worried when we were making Twisted Tower but if you look at Twisted Tower in its final form it's almost in its final form if you look at that game versus like pinstriper never song it's like yeah that's that's Thomas's game even though it was a team based game um and I think you're right I think that it's hard to get AI to do that um it just it just takes human hands even if it's a team someone at the helm to create that that Greg or that Thomas style you know yeah y yep well cool man thanks so much for hanging out this was a blast is there anything you wanted to to leave the the audience with obviously we'll have the link in the description for beasty ball yeah and would you like your website or

your Twitter or beasty ball which one would you want to put in there if I was going to put one thing in there I think people should check out beasty ball because that's what we're working on right now but uh yeah okay anything anything you want to leave the audience with uh I hope that people make games I hope that people like like I I I think it's really fun uh and it's uh yeah you know you should try it if you're thinking about it you should try it it's it's good stuff it's great it's great it's a it's the one art form that is every art form um you know what I mean it's it's I would say that film making was every art form but now it's no game development is giving control to the audience in a film and it's just a it is a Monumental task but that's what's so fun about it you know if you like to make stuff there is the most stuff to make in games and and you can do it all your which is not true in film but games you get you get to sit down and and have your hand on every part right and that's fun for a certain type of person if

you're if you're like me yep exactly well cool Greg thanks for taking the time dude this was really really fun yeah hey and don't forget to check out today's sponsor milanote you can start organizing all your projects completely for free by creating a Millan note account using the link in the description