1. The Past, Present & Future of Computer Game Development
Nick Burton
RARE

2. Worked in the games industry for nearly 10 years as a software engineer, currently a Software Director at Rare
During which time I’ve worked on StarFox Adventure, Kameo: Elements of Power and Jetpac: Refuelled mainly as a Game Graphics Specialist lead role. But before that I worked in academia as a researcher in the medical imaging and volume visualisation field.
Rare has been around for over 23 years and have sold more than 100 million games
We have developed for many different platforms (22+) from the Sinclair Spectrum to the Xbox 360
Situated near the village of Twycross in Warwickshire and are part of Microsoft Game Studios

3. In the beginning.
So this evening I want to look at where the computer game industry came from
Where it is now..
And..
Where its heading..
So lets start at the beginning…
There were no computer games!
Sticks and hoops maybe?

4. Tennis for Two
Brookhaven National Laboratory 1958, exhibit only created to give visitors something to interact with as all other displays were static
Willy Higinbothem

5. 1961 - Spacewar Steve “Slug” Russell, Martin "Shag" Graetz
Wayne Wiitanen
MIT 1961 DEC PDP-1
Just played by students for around 8 years.

6. 1971 – Computer Space
Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney – the worlds first commercial video game.
Nolan saw Space War at the university of Utah and was inspired in the late 60’s.
Nolan and Ted released computer space through Nutting Associates a mechanical arcade game developer. It flopped.
They were not deterred, they had another idea for a game called Pong so they set up a new company to produce it – the company was called ATARI – and this is where it gets complicated….

7. 1972 – Magnavox Odyssey
So Magnavox release the first home console the Odyssey in 1972 containing several games – one of which is called Tennis but is essentially pong.
Now the inventor Ralf Baer had completed the prototype in 1968 AND filed the original patent describing how a video game could work in 1957 so Ralf is REALLY the father of the video game but he got his product to market late, yes his work even predates Higinbotham’s work. To make matters worse Nolan comes out with Pong in the arcades shortly after the Magnavox release and claims he never saw Ralf’s invention even though Pong is the same as Tennis, many years later it all got a bit messy and ended up in court. But Nolan HAD seen pong.
Ralf receiving his National Medal of Technology, in 2006
So William Higinbotham showed of the first working game in 1958
Steve Russell etc. created spacewar the first working DIGITAL computer ‘game’
Nolan Bushnell bought the first arcade game to life
Ralf Baer invented and bought the first console to market AND first filed the patent detailing how a videogame as we now know it would work.

8. Late 1972 – Pong
So I mentioned pong and the problems i caused but what I didn’t say was it was the first truly successful VIDEO game.
History of Pong……..
Design
Testing in Andy Caps
Regeneration of Arcades, golden age of gaming, other players enter Taito (Japan), Space invaders 1978, Universal etc.
Interestingly during the period ATARI had two employees who have since been very successful, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak Apple’s founders – both worked on ATARI’s Pong follow-up Breakout.
So Arcades on the up propelled by cutting edge hardware, home gaming born but held back by limited hardware.

9. The rise and fall of arcades. The rise of home gaming.
The rise of mobile gaming.
Arcades grew out of early work in the 70’s and entered a ‘golden’ age in the late 70’s and early 80’s
Driven by technology consumer hardware could not match.
The bubble burst in the early 80’s, but arcades regained the strength and rose again in the mid-to-late 80’s
Home gaming was on the up and nipping at the arcades toes, eventually it over took.
Tipping point when home games got better than arcade games, once it was the other way round.
As consumer technology got more powerful, home gaming ruled.
As it got ever more powerful mobile gaming started to grow as well.

10. Today, right now, this minute?
Web 2.0 and gaming
Gaming has grown up into a real entertainment business
Over 120 Million PS2s in the world
Over 25 Million Xbox 360’s
Games now an accepted art form

11. Shift from arcade gaming.
Halo = Big, GTA = Bigger!
The big boys.
30+ Years of growth!
19% year on year growth.
$3.2 million from $500, 1973
$4.7 billion in 1997
$20+ billion in 2005
Pong generated an estimated $3.2 million income in 1973 for $500 initial investment
In 1997 US games industry was worth $4.7 billion
11 Years later in 2008 US games industry was worth $22+ billion, UK £4+ billon.
Average year on year growth is 19%
Shift from arcades to home gaming over that last 15+ years
In 2004 Halo 2 generated more than $125 million in its first day on sale
In 2007 Halo 3 generated more than $170+ million in its first day on sale
To date Halo 3 has sold more than 8.3 million units, revenue was up to $300 million in about a week.
Halo3 was the biggest grossing entertainment launch EVER it beat spiderman3 and pirates of the carabean3
But Grand Theft Auto 4 beat Halo, selling 3.6 mullion units on day 1 - and generated $500m in one week.
Highest grossing game of all time is currently Guitar Hero 3 which has grossed over $1bn
Biggest names in the business Microsoft, Sony, EA, Nintendo

12. Trends & Consolidation.
Games ≠ TV, Music or Film
The Industry Model.
Trends & Consolidation.
Investment & Banks.
The Customer
The Retailer
The Distributor
The Publisher
The Platform Holder
The Developer
Investment (venture capital etc.) banks don’t like developers
Current Trends (consolidation etc.), recession & industry reaction.
Nothing like the movie, music or TV industries

13. The Industry is cyclical.
Every 5 to 7 years a new generation of consoles arrives
A particular console’s popularity follows a curve during its life hitting a high point around 2/3 though its life cycle
As popularity of a specific console format is dwindling a successor is waiting in the wings
Computing power is ever increasing
In 1996 when Nintendo’s N64 launched some 26 years after the moon landings it was widely reported as being more powerful than the computer that put man on the moon. When I started here at Rare in 1998 the fastest computer in the world was the Cray T3E-1200 clocking in at 1 trillion floating point operations per second, just 7 years after that Microsoft launched the XBOX360 which has comparable performance to the Cray – yes you have a super-computer under your TV. Goes on to explain what all that power is used for, paper rendering, water, lighting, physics, grass blah, blah, blah.
Oh and the XBOX360 launched on the 10th anniversary of Toy Story, the first major all CG motion picture success. In those 10 years we have gone from Toy Story taking Pixar many months to render with large networks of computers to the XBOX360 rendering similar quality visuals (look at Piñata) in real time in high definition.

14. Getting a game to market.
30 to 100 people 1.5+ years work, that’s at least 45 man years
$4 to $15 million in production costs on average across the industry, but can be more
Product Testing
Focus Group Testing
Marketing
External Market forces
Censorship and TCR issues
Hitting a moving target – the bar is continually rising

15. Misconceptions.
Not all games are a financial success, for every hit 20 titles fail
Game developers don’t all drive Ferraris
It’s not the boom or bust industry of 20 years ago
Game developers are not out to corrupt your children
Game developers are responsible, well organised software developers
Games are not written by one person in a bedroom anymore
The most popular console is not always the most profitable for a developer to work on

16. The Future? The Challenges; Empowering the Player/User
Richer experience
Lower Development Costs
Longer Product Shelf Life
Growing Talent
Empowering the Player/User
YouTube, Flickr, Wikipedia et al, can Web 2.0 be applied to games?
Make better Developers and expand the industry
MS-XNA, the start of a vision
Next Generation of Consoles, 2011?
Will consoles converge with PCs or other devices

17. Questions?