In the game industry we have a kind of essay that we call a ‘postmortem’. This is usually an article that is written after a game is shipped where the developers examine the project with the benefit of hind-sight. This typically includes what went right, what went wrong, and the lessons learned. This way, developers can learn from each other. After all, a wise man learns from his own mistakes, but a wiser man learns from the mistakes of others.

Of course, we haven’t finished Hegemony, so we can’t write a postmortem yet. However, this is the most ambitious project any of us have ever worked on, and we’ve already learned tonnes, so today I’m starting a two- or three-part series that I’m calling a ‘premortem’. This is the sort of stuff we discuss in the office whenever we’re daydreaming about how we’ll manage our next project. Nothing I’m about to talk about has been proven yet – we won’t know that until the game is released – but these are our lessons learned so far, as we see them today. Continued →

I’m a fan of indies. Whether it’s independent games (like us!), independent music, or independent film (warning: contains Rick’s poor acting; may be unsuitable for connoisseurs of good films) I like the kind of freedom that’s enjoyed by a team working on a low budget with nobody to answer to. Of course, it’s not all rainbows and lollipops; indie development certainly has its flaws, and there’s a number of strengths to the traditional model which are easy to envy, so this week I thought I’d talk about the strengths and weaknesses of indie development.

Before I go on, I want to be clear about what I mean when I talk about “traditional” model. In this model, you approach a publisher (or a producer, or a record label, in the case of film and music) and convince them to buy your idea. In reality, they’re not really “buying” your idea; yes, they usually take ownership of your idea, but they’re not actually giving you any money for it. What they're really giving you is just the loan that you need to bring your idea to fruition (and usually with a rather high interest rate to boot). Luckily if your idea fails, the publisher takes the fall, and you don’t have to pay back your loan. They’ll also typically handle most of the business stuff like marketing and distribution; the sort of stuff most creative types aren’t interested in. Continued →

“Digital Distribution” is the technical term to describe the process of selling a digital file to somebody over the Internet, rather than bundling it in a box and shipping it to a brick-and-mortar store. Now, it’s no secret that I love digital distribution in ways that most people would consider unnatural. Sometimes it can be a sordid affair, when people don't do it right, but for the most part I’m a big fan. Let me tell you why... Continued →

Last week I wrote an article denouncing DRM – which at this point in history is about as controversial as denouncing asbestos – so this week I thought I’d talk about something which, to date, has received very little attention, but which I think is almost as important as the DRM debate. I’m talking about download limits.

This is obviously something which only applies to digital distribution. When you go to a store and buy a physical copy of a game, that disc should last you a lifetime. But when you buy a game digitally, you have to worry about what happens if your hard drive dies. If digital distribution is going to succeed, then customers need to be able to rest assured that their investment will not be lost a few years down the road.

We think that’s important, so when you buy a game from us, you can rest assured that we will never force you to buy a game when you’ve already purchased it before. Continued →

This post is about Digital Rights Management, or DRM; that annoying technology that some companies like to use to control how you're allowed to access your games, music, or movies. With video games, this usually takes one of the following forms:

* Requiring that the game disc is in your computer while you play.
* Requiring that the computer is connected to the Internet to play.
* Limiting the number of times that you are allowed to install your game on a computer.

Here at Longbow, we're all avid gamers, and we don't like DRM. If you've been following the various DRM scandals and names like StarForce or the Sony rootkit are familiar to you, then what I'm saying isn't very controversial. There have been many people – gamers and developers alike – who have already spoken out against DRM, but it remains an important issue. The market is still flush with games that are laden with DRM, so it's nice to know where a developer stands on DRM. Continued →

We're ramping up to start beta testing Hegemony. If you're interested in helping us with this process, please email Jim with the following information:

* Name
* Forum display name
* System specs
* Approximately how many hours you spend gaming each week
* Your favourite genre
* Your favourite game (recent favourite and all-time favourite)
* Any games you've beta-tested before

We're looking for a wide range of participants who are willing to earnestly and readily share their opinions with us. We're planning to start off with a very small number of testers, so don't worry if you don't hear from us right away because we'll be opening up the beta testing pool as we progress.

We still love you! And we've written some new forum software to prove it! Head on over to our forums and celebrate!

Oh, and if you're interested in Hegemony, watch this space. We'll have some news very soon.

Welcome to our new site! We've been working on this for a while, and it's finally come to fruition.

A number of things have changed, aside from the nice facelift. For instance, when you purchase any product that's available for Mac and PC, you'll get both versions. We also got rid of download keys; now you just need to go to our Download Centre and log in with the email address you originally used to place your order. Oh, and if you've never created an account with us (i.e. at our old forums) no worries, we still have your order information. You just need to use our password reset system.

And one more big change: all of our games are now only $4.99! So if you've been waiting to buy something, now is the time!

Of course, things are still under development. You'll notice we don't have any forums or high scores at the moment — those are all still to come. (The forums should come back soon, but the scores may take a while longer; I have a whole new design I want to implement for that.) So stay tuned!

So take a look around and let me know what you think. Be sure to let me know if you find any bugs, browser incompatibilities, or if you just have a comment that you'd like to share.

Okay, the system isn't down, but our store is. But don't worry! We're working on an entirely new site which we'll be launching in a few weeks, so if you'd like to order something from us, hold on to your cash and come back later this month and we'll be happy to oblige.

Stay tuned!

Come on everybody, say it in your best Monty Python accent: We're not dead yet!

Work is still progressing on Hegemony, and things are coming together. We've been focus testing the game to find our weak spots, and we've been shopping the game around to publishers to see if anybody is interested in putting Hegemony on store shelves. (To all the digital-distribution fans, don't worry, we'll still be selling the game online, regardless of any deals we may make with publishers.)

Meanwhile, we've also been developing a new website which we'll be launching in about a month. However, we'll be taking down our online store at the end of this month, which means it won't be possible to order anything from us during the few weeks between when our old store is taken offline and our new website is brought online!

So if you're interested in buying anything from us, be sure to do it during the next 11 days!