The Serious Art of Designing Fun

I recently discovered that Konami has its own developer blog. To be more precise - Hideo Kojima (of MGS fame) has his own blog. Interestingly enough, the blog isn't just from him, but also from his team members. If you have the time, do check out Christine Kogure's blog... or rather her blog within Kojima's blog. It's an interesting look at the Japanese culture and the japanese game development environment. I've never met her personally but I've heard only good things about her work.

If you have the inclination, please post a positive comment on her entries. My understanding is that japanese game development is a rather thankless task let alone being a female developer.

I'm baack! At least I hope I'm back... Things have been busy of late at work.

So, you're probably wondering - how'd my startup business go? Well, the answer is it didn't.. or rather, it did but not in the form I anticipated.

I was given the opportunity to head up Kung Fu Factory's Vancouver office branch and it was too good an opportunity to pass up. It gave me the opportunity to run a studio while minimizing the financial and business logistics I'd have to deal with.

So yeah, I sold out.

Does this mean all the work I had put into setting up an indie development company been for naught?

Far from it. The research and effort I put into the indie endeavour helped prepare mentally prepare me for the travails of running a studio. Even now, I'm boggled by the amount of personal growth I've experienced.

Well, that's the end of the blog for today. Expect more entries in the near future.

This morning, I had an epiphany.

Spending 8 days trying to condense a wide swath of research material and execution plans into a 4-page business plan tends to do that.. or at least, I think it was 8 days.

The point is that I finally have what I feel is a good first pass summary regarding the company goals and objectives. Of course, that just leaves me with the task of writing the sections which expand on the items I had worked so tirelessly to summarize.

You could almost call it the 'circle of life'.

Oh... and the epiphany? Blogging is a fantastic way of getting rid of pent up negative energy.

Thanks for reading.

Day 3 and counting.

I never thought setting up a business plan would be so much work! To make matters worse, I find my attention constantly wandering back to my game design and implementation details.

I guess I'm more of a game builder than a business man.

However, I have to say that putting together a business plan is probably the best decision I've made. Putting a plan down on paper really helped sharpen my vision. As a result, there's strong cohesion between my short term goals and my long term ones. In addition, I'm currently re-evaluating my project timeline and budget.

Time to head back to my business planning session...

A very important part of a business proposal is the proposal budget. No financial investor is going to touch a business proposal that doesn't have one. I've resorted to keeping track of my business finances (of what little there is) in order to lend gravitas to my budget.

In keeping up with my small budget approach, I've decided to go with the free accounting software, GnuCash. It's perfectly suited for tracking an indie development. It lets me keep track of my assets, liabilities, and expenses using plain English. It also lets me enter amounts using different currencies (a real big plus given that I'm Canadian and most software sold online are in US dollars). It even has the option to retrieve the currency exchange rate from the web on a daily basis.

Most importantly, GnuCash helps me quickly plan out a several budget scenario within the program. It tracks my cash flow and let me compare it to the budget scenarios.

Oh, did I happen to mention that it's free?

If you're planning to ask how it stacks up to commercial accounting software like Quicken, I have never used any other accounting software so I have no clue... nor does it matter. It lets me get the job done and get it done fast.

If you intend to use the software, I highly recommend that you go through its Tutorial. Not only does it teach you how to use the software, it also teaches you how to practice proper accounting. My head's just bursting at the seams with information about tracking loans, mortgages, and taxes. A definite plus.

For all the wannabe Canadian entrepreneurs out there, there's a great article on managing the finances of a small company using GnuCash by Aerospace Software. Look for the 'GNU Cash for Business Users' series found at this link. It's a real eye opener - or it was for me.

There's a great article on how to pay yourself if you're the only shareholder at the site. Click here to read it.

Finally, if you're looking to put together a proposal budget, I found the R.I.T. (Rochester Institute of Technology) website to be an excellent tutorial on drafting out the budget. You can find the tutorial at this link.