Simon Mack, CTO of NaturalMotion, knew at an early age that he wanted a career in software development but, although he grew up playing games, he never considered the possibility of working in the games industry. While he was studying at his university, a friend introduced him to a company called MathEngine and the physics simulation middleware they were making. He says, “I was blown away—this was unlike anything I had seen before and more advanced than I had thought possible. I got an internship there and was hooked.”
Inspired by Technology
During Mack’s work on physics engines, he met Torsten Reil, CEO of NaturalMotion, and was inspired by the breakthrough technology his team was creating. He has now worked for the company for almost 11 years.
Today, NaturalMotion focuses on advancing its middleware technology with state-of-the-art character animation that scales across consoles and PC, as well as for their own mobile games. They also focus on growing and sustaining their mobile games such as Clumsy Ninja and their CSR franchise, while developing new breakthrough mobile games in new content categories. Emphasizing product value and customer experience is what allows NaturalMotion to build experiences thought to be impossible on mobile. And, they are always interested in hiring the best people to help take the company to the next level.
No two days at NaturalMotion are the same; Mack claims it’s hard to imagine a “normal” day. Because they use agile, collaborative processes across all projects, usually they begin the day with scrums with various teams. The rest of the day includes such things as product reviews, tech planning, and helping teams resolve technical issues efficiently. Mack especially enjoys the sprint reviews where he sees the progress on each project. He points out, “With so many teams working across technology and games sections, there’s always something we’re working on together to raise the bar for incredible consumer experiences.”
When not hard at work, Mack does manage to fit in a bit of mobile gaming. These days, Mack’s mobile gaming includes Threes! and Boom Beach. He also admits to playing a lot of Zynga’s recent launch, Farmville 2 Country Escape; he enjoys the game’s visually rich design and depth of gameplay.
Succeeding on Your Own Merits
In the games industry, Mack finds “a fantastic blend of genuinely cutting edge technology and artistic creativity, something that is found in very few places.” He enjoys the constant change and the inspiring talent the industry attracts, as well as the fact that it generally allows people to succeed on their own merits.
Mack has had considerable involvement with recruiting talent and offers this advice to people starting out in the games industry: “Build a portfolio that showcases your art or what kind of code you can write. I always enjoy interviews where the candidate shows off a personal project.”
Great Growth and Consumer Experience Opportunities
During the time Mack has been in the games industry, he has seen amazing technical progress in the console space as well as a change in the scale of games, development teams and budget growth. The results have been richer visuals and deeper AAA games with great content, causing a great deal of consolidation in the industry.
And, he notes that the past few years have seen amazing growth in mobile gaming. “Mobile games have enabled smaller teams to create high quality games more quickly, revitalizing the industry with massive opportunities for growth,” Mack says. “Millions of people who have never played traditional video games now play social games on mobile devices every day. Casual consumers benefit from far greater accessibility, social experiences, and lower costs, whilst hardcore consumers have better console-quality experiences than ever before and an increasing number of category options on mobile.”
But Mack sees possible mis-steps made by developers new to the industry, including determining the right level of innovation in technology. Some resist using middleware, preferring to develop their own solutions. So, as they re-invent the wheel, they have less efficient development time and miss the opportunity to use best-in-class technology.
He also sees the opposite scenario: it is becoming more common for development teams to pick an off-the-shelf engine solution and simply add content. He believes this lack of technical innovation can lead to games that lack the ‘wow’ factor they need to stand out. At NaturalMotion, they emphasize constant innovation in technology while remaining as efficient as possible by using best practices and reusing existing systems when it makes sense.
Mack is excited to see how mobile technology will evolve over the next few years. He says, “We’re nearing the possibility of real console-quality on mobile devices, and it will be interesting to see how that is best leveraged in making games that appeal to both the mainstream market and the more hardcore player.”
Simon Mack will be talking about Clumsy Ninja and the character animation system used to create their game during Casual Connect Asia 2014. Find out more about his session here.
