Written by Michelle Buss
The Amazing World of Goo Beats The Big Guys
A quick look into how two average guys beat the big companies and came out on top.A truly remarkable thing happened on Amazon’s list of top ten selling PC games just before Christmas. At first glance it did not seem like anything was out of place. There was World of Warcraft by Blizzard sitting on top as usual. It is after all the most popular PC game of all time with something like a starting budget of $100 million. Then World of Goo by 2D boy in second place. This was where things got a bit wacky, what was World of Goo and who the heck was 2D boy?
They are actually Kyle Gabler and Ron Carmel, both former Electronic Arts employees who decided to strike out on their own. They wanted the creative freedom that comes from not answering to a big multi - million dollar company, unfortunately that came with a very small, self funded budget. As Gabler says “we never sat down and made a budget, but if we had it would have included rent for our apartments, meals, coffee and kitty food.” Coffee would obviously have been the biggest expense as according to the boys , in a way reminiscent of J.K. Rowling, the game was designed in any Wi-Fi enabled coffee shop that did not kick them out. Keeping their chairs probably required a lot of coffee to be consumed one would imagine.
According to Carmel the most scary thing about making the game was living totally from their savings “it is kind of frightening watching your account balance going full steam ahead for zero” as he so eloquently puts it. They were both sustained by a vision of putting a quality product on the shelves totally independent of big companies. Luckily they achieved their goal before the money ran out and with the huge success of the game they are unlikely to have money problems in the near future.
So what is so great about this game? One of the big reviewers in the industry put it like this “World of Goo is so stunningly designed, so beautifully illustrated so completely adorable that any of the greatest development companies in the world would be proud to release it.” All that on $10 000, bet the big players are green with envy. In fact they are green with envy, we know this because some of them have had a high profile go at these little guys. The 2D boys don’t seem too bothered, in fact they say “ we derive a sick sense of pleasure from industry big-wig’s indignant, self righteous incredulity”. Well there is no harm in that and it really is refreshing to see talent and hard work win over money for once. Let’s hope it happens more often.
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