In his Casual Connect Europe lecture, Dave Padilla shared some ways indie developers can cut down on stress. “Things are going to go wrong,” he says. “You can’t let it worry you. You can’t let it stop you.” For Dave’s advice, see the video below.
Dave Padilla is CEO and executive producer of Hyperkinetic Studios, a company he co-founded with his business partners, Richard Bisso and Tomo Moriwaki. This was the way they chose to leverage their 20 years of experience: maintaining a development studio with an environment both sustainable and fun, able to create the games they would love to play.
The Skill to Move Things Forward
Dave’s overall responsibilities sound simple: to ensure that everyone has a constant amount of work and all that is necessary to keep developing. But when you break this down, it becomes much more complex. He creates relationships with new clients. He develops the partnerships that allow the studio to keep growing. He makes sure the teams understand the overall vision of the current projects. Equally important in an ever-evolving industry, he ensures the company keeps changing with the times.
He came to this position with a background as a producer and experience in keeping projects and teams moving forward — experience which allowed him to learn how to find the right answers to challenges. “The most important attribute I developed was the ability to take my ego out of the equation and see every failure or success as a stepping stone to becoming a better CEO,” he says. “One of my key strengths has been to look at past circumstances, figure out what worked and what didn’t, and apply those lessons effectively.”
Dave got involved in the games industry when a friend told him it was possible to test games for a living. His interest was piqued enough to try it out, and as time passed he realized the industry offered things he loved: working with teams, technology, and, of course, games. As a result, he began pursuing a career in the industry much more aggressively.
Everything About the Games Industry is Fun
He claims everything about his work in the games industry is fun. Working with developers who are exceptional at what they do and constantly bouncing ideas off them to make everything the company does become better brings him the greatest satisfaction.
He looks for team members with an abundance of talent, but also those who are honest, able to express their needs and willing to take chances and receive input from others. He emphasizes, “Development studios are places where the ‘No man is an island’ saying is completely true.” He believes the team realizes he is their greatest cheerleader and recognizes he is trying to build the best possible environment in which they can be creative.
Complications within the team are handled by maintaining an environment where people can say what they need to say without fear of being attacked. Dave has discovered that complications tend to arise most often from misunderstandings and differences in work styles. But he believes that “figuring out those differences in an open and honest fashion helps everyone create a map for working past issues.”
While he didn’t begin his career with the intention of becoming a CEO, when it appeared that Hyperkinetic Studios would become a reality, Dave surmounted a steep learning curve. He did this by talking to as many of his mentors as possible, not being afraid to ask questions and learning to ask the right ones.
Dave admits to a deep-rooted need to push things forward and see things built that didn’t exist before. As a child he hoped to become either GI Joe or a Beatle, suggesting a strong interest in entertainment and competition. These needs and dreams were all met in his work as a game producer. As he says, “I think I found a great alternative!”
The proudest moment he remembers from his career occurred when he actually saw someone talking with enthusiasm about a game he had worked on. At the time he was an associate producer for Ultimate Spider-Man. When he heard it was released, he saw the display in a Game Stop in Berkeley, California. A few kids standing nearby picked up some copies and sounded extremely excited about playing it. It was his first experience in discovering how much happiness his work could bring to someone else.
One of the most difficult times for him was during 2007 when the games industry was taking a hit; it was not an encouraging time to be unemployed, with studios closing faster than they were starting up. But Dave recognized that networking and learning had to continue, so he went back to school to stay mentally active and to learn new skills. Eventually, though things seemed to be at their worst, he had a few interviews, and those who interviewed him appreciated that he had continued learning in an industry where learning is crucial.
The Indie Projects: How and Why
The inspiration to start indie projects at Hyperkinetic Studios came through talking to the right people at the right time. As Dave and his co-founders analyzed the current state of the games industry, the experience they could draw on, and the condition of their studio, they realized starting their own indie project would be best for the future of Hyperkinetic. They are still in the phase of exploring whether the premium or the F2P model will best meet their needs and the clients’ needs.
Dave asserts that it is important to begin testing a game early in the development process, just as soon as there is something to test. In addition to making the game as bug-free as possible, it is important to be sure the game feels as natural as possible from UI, user experience and fun angles. The early testing allows developers to discover when something doesn’t make sense or isn’t fun before having making a lengthy time commitment in the game.
A good time to begin play testing is when hands-on feedback is needed to validate features and to make sure people other than the developer or publisher understand the gameplay. He insists, “It is often difficult to separate ourselves from our work, so we tend to forget that things that make sense to us don’t necessarily make sense to other people.”
Dave is very excited about the impact VR will have on the games industry in the future. He also believes there is still a lot of potential in F2P because it creates viable opportunities for teams without capital to develop an original title that investors will want to fund. His personal litmus test for new products is to try them out himself and try to put himself in the user’s shoes to see if any new trend will make sense.
Much of his free time is devoted to music. He has been playing since the age of 10 and has no intention of stopping. He also enjoys seeing live music, reading and traveling. Recently, he’s taken up running half-marathons.
And he frequently can be found playing Starcraft 2. He is convinced it is still the best RTS game and hopes someday to make it to the Diamond Leagues.
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