Tarver Games, LLC

Ghosts Attack: Developing the Story.

Today’s post is the first in a 3-part series about the story behind Ghosts Attack, written by the game’s Associate Producer and lead writer, Alexander Norris.

A lot of people have expressed interest in the story behind Ghosts Attack, and now that it’s close to being released, we thought it was a good time to share some of the thinking behind the creation of the story and how we built it up.

In the beginning, the story was limited by our capabilities as a very small, indie game developer. Having built an arena in which we could drive or fly around, we knew the game would be a first person shooter. But killing bad guys in a world of walls meant the baddies would need to know the walls existed. This would have required programming their characters to have significant AI and collision detection. And let’s face it — that just wasn’t going to happen with our budget. Which led to a short brainstorming session:

Hmm, what kind of bad guys don’t care about walls?
Ghosts?
Ah, yes! Ghosts could “care less” about a silly wall.

So, at this point in the game’s development, we had a world and enemies to interact with (In the earliest stages, the ghosts were non-animated, little black sprites with scary red eyes that moved toward the player in an intimidating straight line) but we needed something to spice it up…

How about red Boss ghosts?
Sure. How many?
Thirteen sounds good, and not the least bit cliché!

In order to tie the ghosts, the artificial world and the player’s in-game experience together, we created the back-story of a scientific experiment gone awry at Torgan Science. The disgruntled victims of that accident were now our source of exposition and conflict.

Finally, our tale needed someone to not tell it, but, more importantly, to show it. From our antipathy of handholding narrators and our respect for the player’s intelligence, came Karl, the Torgan Science Technician. We felt a snarky IT guy – who actually voiced doubt in the players abilities and was originally cold to any friendship that might develop – could propel the story selfishly, yet allow the player to feel like every new event was experienced “with” Karl – who willfully bucks the rules of Torgan Science, but still absolves himself from any consequences of the players actions.

So this gives you a bit of insight into how the story of Ghosts Attack came to be. We had a lot of fun coming up with the storyline and integrating it into the game to give a true ARG (Alternate Reality Gaming) experience. We hope you enjoy the game as much as we enjoyed making it. We have a lot more surprises and twists planned in the coming months as we release additional episodic content for the continuing story of Ghosts Attack and the mysteries of the Torgan 13.

Stay tuned for part 2 in this series: How the Story Affects the Design and Vice Versa.

Its ROCKTOBER here at Tarver Games!

What a month! October was the “official launch” of Tarver Games and it was jam-packed with events, meetings, speaking engagements – and of course – development!

We made our official company debut in sunny San Diego at the semi-annual CTIA conference. Why were we at a wireless show you may ask? The company’s first IP is being developed for the iPhone —so what better place than a show dedicated to all things gadgety and mobile to get some valuable feedback on our first product. We met with a number of press, influencers and innovators and the CTIA crowd loved what we are doing with Ghosts Attack – especially the game’s location-based gameplay feature, which was a big hit.

Android was the talk of CTIA and we are keeping a close eye on this segment to see how the it plays out as a gaming platform. Who knows, maybe we’ll build a Ghosts Attack app for the Android

We also attended the Digital Hollywood Conference in Santa Monica where our own Chris Cross participated on a panel about extending brands and IPs across multiple platforms. Sitting alongside other executives in entertainment – from games to film, TV, toys and comic books – discussions raised some very important topics including game budgets and franchise development. Chris, reflecting on the very first Medal of Honor game he developed while at Dreamworks, revealed that it was never intended to be a franchise, rather a one-off title. But its storyline resonated with a massive global audience and proved that it could sustain relevance over a long period of time with major cultural footprints. That, Chris pointed out, is the formula for a successful IP.

Unfortunately, $20M budgets and 400-person dev teams are few and far between, but by focusing on today’s more nimble platforms – like the iPhone – game developers can test the waters without taking huge amounts of financial risk. That’s what we are doing here at Tarver Games – with a small team of game development specialists, we plan on delivering a bunch of small output games and from there, we will see what resonates. This is the foundation of our business and will help us expand our IPs and remain fiscally responsible.

Our final stop this month was the Social Media Club of LA’s “Games Go Social” event, held at Rubicon’s swanky offices in Santa Monica. Quinn spoke on a panel alongside other talented game makers from EA, GirlGamer and GoSub60 Games, and talked to an engaging crowd of Twitter happy social media and gaming enthusiasts. The live stream, provided by TechZulu, generated more than 6,000 online viewers and 500 chat participants – a record high for #SMCLA! The takeaway from this discussion – aside from the fact that a man who poses as a woman in an online environment is called a “mangina” – is that game communities and fans are using social networking sites Twitter, MySpace and Facebook to stay connected and informed. You can view the event on TechZulu here: http://bit.ly/2vWgTe.

Thanks to everyone who rocked it out with Tarver Games this month. We hit many milestones, including the launch of this very fine web site and the development of our Facebook and Twitter pages (thanks Sean and James!) and receiving positive media coverage of our company and product (thanks Karen & Andrea!). We are so appreciative of all your support and are psyched to continue sharing this journey with all of you!