Or, Vagabond Dog for Valentine's Day!
Hello. We are
talking today with Justin Amirkhani, of
Vagabond
Dog. The
trailer for their upcoming release,
Sometimes Always Monsters, can be
seen
here. For full
disclosure, Justin is a regular in my biweekly
Dungeon Crawl Classics
game, and was a player with my 3
rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons
game when I co-owned
Golden City Comics.
RCK: Hi Justin. How are
you?
JA: Today, I'm a
little frantic because we're in the final stages before release. We've been
working on this thing for about 6 years, and despite all that time, I find
there's always more to do!
RCK: Hopefully youll
still have time to make the game on Wenesday. We’ll be seeing if the dead can
return to life....
JA: Joining the DCC
game over this last year has actually been great for my schedule, sanity, and
socialization. Like I said, we've been working on this for a long time and over
that period there's been some points where those elements of my life have
definitely suffered. Having a group that depends on my ability to stab monsters
to death with my character's pitchfork (long story) is the sort of reliable
break I need from the intense and isolating game development work I get steeped
in.
RCK: I am not very well
versed in video games or computer games, myself. Most of what I do is pure
tabletop. Can you tell us a little bit about what drew you into the computer
side of gaming?
JA: I grew up playing
with polygons before polyhedrons, so it's moreso tabletop that drew me in over
time than video games. My earliest roleplaying experiences were with the likes
of Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights on PC. Ironically, at
the time I had no idea all of their systems were based on D&D.
Eventually, I met people who explained their
pen-and-paper counterparts, and I grew a fascination with the freedom and wider
play space that traditional games offered.
RCK: I understand that
started with the Golden City Comics
game?
JA: Pretty much, yeah.
There were attempts to play one-offs even before I knew the rules, but Golden
was the first real campaign that I ever took part in. It was a rather
revelatory experience that's informed a big part of how I view games and
design.
You're a great DM, and I'm glad to have played under you; both then and now!
RCK: Flattery will get you nowhere!
How about Sometimes
Always Monsters? What’s the elevator pitch for that?
JA: It's a game where
you play as a recently married author. You're a best-seller, and life is going
really well. Then you join a cross-country bus tour to try and promote your
next novel, but start hearing some nasty rumors that claim you're a plagiarist.
There's a lot of choices to make within the game, and it's a cross between a
narrative experience and a sort-of life simulator. We tried to make as many
options as possible within the confines, and it's got a lot of variability
depending on your decisions.
RCK: A long time ago,
before computer graphics became good, there used to be quite a few text-based
games. When you mean narrative, does that mean text?
JA: Yeah. Reading. Lots
and lots of reading.
Between this game and its predecessor, there's
easily over a million words of dialogue baked in its code. The only thing that
separates it from a classic text-based adventure is that you can actually see
your character walking around and doing stuff.
RCK: How do you keep
players engaged with these non-action scenes?
JA: The quality of the
setup, their investment in the characters, and a consistent feeling of agency
is what keeps most people interested. Usually, when things are getting their
wordiest, there's a heavy choice right around the corner.
RCK: I guess what I’m
asking is for your theory of game design.
JA: Although I tend to
follow my instinct more than anything, I do believe that giving players the right of refusal is incredibly powerful.
Especially in a confined medium like video games, the power to simply decline a
piece of content can feel very freeing in contrast to games that try to keep
players on a railroad of good content.
Of course, this requires a ton of extra work to
provide. Players can also sabotage their own experiences when given this power.
For example, you can skip the entirety of SAM's
main narrative if you simply don't go on the bus tour and make your character
stay home watching TV. It's not exciting, but it's totally possible.
This philosophy leaves players somewhat
responsible for their own entertainment, and forces designers to accept that
large swathes of content may never be seen. However, there's no substitute for
the feeling of agency this sort of design provides.
RCK: The trailer definitely
promises something unusual. Most games try to get you to the point where this
game begins.
JA: Well, it being the
a sort of follow-up definitely helps. We managed to chew through most of the
things first-time designers try to do in our previous game and took a lot of
feedback to heart when starting this one. A lot of people complained about the
chore-like grind and somewhat depressing tone of its predecessor, so Sometimes Always Monsters tries to be
different by offering the desserts first.
RCK: I understand you
have something of a dedicated fan base. Can you give them any insight into the
team behind your games?
JA: Our team's really
small. I handle all of the writing, design, and development. Jake makes sure
everything still works, and solves trickier technical problems. Meanwhile, all
of the art for the maps, characters, and everything else is handled by Emilio.
We all work from home, and collaborate online through Discord.
We're nothing fancy, but our fans know we're
dedicated. It takes a lot of patience to build the kind of games we've made,
especially when you don't have a big studio.
RCK: There you have it.
Sometimes
Always Monsters is set to release on the 2
nd of April. People can preorder it on your website
here. And there's another interesting interview based on your previous release
here.
Good
luck! And thank you for talking with us!
Those who know me know that I am a big fan of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, a story which I have read countless times.
