Gadgetory

show title yeah it's in there right um and the trailers all set because we'll run with that mostly at the top you wanted you want to test it out make sure it's a plan okay yes right now so make sure we got good audio a new ways to communicate okay you cognize okay if you make full screen yep do that great oh that looks great cool all right in three two it's Wednesday May 16 2012 you tune in to the 404 show on Sina TV I'm Jeff Bakalar and I am Justin you this is the show where we go indie for a day just for a day in our hearts we're very lucky to have on the program today please Anne Heche oh and James swear ski filmmakers from the new film indie game the movie this is really cool because obviously everyone who listens to our show knows how passionate I am about gaming and have two artists here who share that same passion and actually did something cool with it is a treat for us so welcome to the program thank you so much for being here today well thanks for having us our pleasure um I want to show the trailer to the to the to the film because I just think it's shot so beautifully and it's just really a really good piece of art so before we actually get right to the trailer real quick tell us exactly what this film is what it is about we'll run the trailer and we'll get into some business here cool yeah movie is a future doc that james and i made about independent game developers so we follow game developers as they make and release their games and we followed super meat boy Fez and a little bit of braids and so it's all about that creative journey of making that thing and putting it out there very cool so um you know it's it gets pretty intense at times I want to run the trailer real quick and we can get into more about what these developers with these independent developers faced on a day to day basis which sort of blew my mind let's check out the trailer right now for indie game the movie I'm determined to make video games and I make video games because I can I mean it's the sum total of every expressive medium of all times made interactive like how is that not it's awesome my whole career has been me trying to find new ways to communicate with people because I desperately want to communicate with people but I don't want the messy interaction of having to make friends and talk to people because I probably don't like them and it's not just a game like it's I'm so closely attached to it this is my identity it's fence I'm guy making fast you know that's that's about it you're making it was about let me take my deepest flaws and vulnerabilities and put them in the game I'm on the line me like my name my career if this if this fails like I don't think homeworking games again I like in a concentration camp if you can't get it just if you can't get the work done then the past two years are basically worth nothing no pressure all you've been doing for four years is look at this like this closely you can't see anything else you don't even see the mistakes in alright very cool what an engaging trailer it really makes you feel like these guys are not just making games they're sort of headed into battle it's intense it's pretty intense um so how did this get off the ground now I know there's a lot of backstory this film was funded primarily through Kickstarter how does that press because we talked about Kickstarter all the time we're sort of fascinated by the whole idea of sort of crowdsourcing funding for stuff how did you guys get from hey we have this idea to hey all right it's at Sundance now in five words go yeah um it kind of we ended up doing like a long time ago this short little five minute documentary on this one independent game designer Alec Aloka and it was actually a documentary for hire this little five minute commercial piece and we thought it was going to be like this little puff piece you know just the guy made a game that's cool sure and it had end up being kind of the process of talking to him ended up being just a lot more than that it ended up being like about this guy who the more and more he worked on this project the more it kind of became like this extension of them and this reflection of them and it reflected completely what he was going through when making the game and it was just in that was kind of like a new idea to us the fact that games could be personal and an expression of something and it's not a new idea because that's been around for a long time but a new idea to us and then after that we kind of at the same time we were going down to the independent game summit at the game developers conference San Francisco and hearing all these stories just like Alex from all these other guys about you know basically just point everything you have into your game sure and then putting it out there see how people react to it and just if we were always taken aback at how crazy dramatic and stressful these stories were and we're like well you know if we can get that on film that would be that would be compelling I would love to see that documentary and then we looked around and there were no game design documentaries really they were there like a couple on the internet but nothing nothing really really big which blew us away because you know games are huge they're bigger than movies they're bigger than music and their tongue documentaries on all those so we thought you know this is a story that probably should you know be told right now we're start to be told as soon so we kind of did like this short little test piece with Edmund McMillen and Tommy roughness of Super Meat Boy Fame and we went down to santa cruz and kind of filmed a five-minute peace with them for two purposes one was to kind of like prove to ourselves that you know there is a movie like a proof of concept like hey yeah yeah right exactly ND w two years but yeah so we shot that that piece and then that was the piece that we put on kickstarter in may 2010 and we done like a couple months of research and you know had made this little like vertical slice of what we thought the film could be and it like exploded and we should mention a kick start at this point was like it wasn't like Kickstarter today all right oh this is when Kickstarter was underground this is over like before like Tim Schafer and like the million-dollar right objects no absolutely because that really sort of blue Kickstarter into the lime really sort of completely lifted the veil on on Kickstarter this was something that was getting that sort of uh you know that sort of ground swelling from the start would you guys were able to do that way before all that other you know popularized ground swell in that like we were asking for 15,000 which isn't a lot of money to write documentary but we ended up with 23 and he was just we got funded in two days and it was this life changing moment for us sure like we're two people from Winnipeg making videos and all of a sudden they're people all around the world that like this idea enough to give us money in advance like that's crazy pretty crazy yeah yeah yeah yeah and that kind of like set in motion the next two years of our lives like we actually thought we literally thought it would take a year now which is just silly and naive and it in we not only that we thought we could even like knock off a corporate gig or commercial gig to help fund the thing like in this year and now it was like it's been twenty-four seven Indiana movie since that day in May 2010 and yeah and then the Kickstarter just kind of took off and we thought it would take about 30 days to get our goal it took 48 hours and then it kind of just kept on going and it was like this overwhelming kind of surge of validation and people saying like yes please make make this thing like please tell this story absolutely and yeah it's been great yeah I mean that the three again the three games that are profile their Fez which just came out braid which really sort of brought you know I I feel like there's certain games that sort of become milestones for a certain genre or movement you look at something like braid that just took everybody by storm so the developer of that game Jonathan Blow you guys sort of feature him as maybe like the grandfather of this movement throughout the film and yeah I mean in it obviously he he i was 10 haina yeah for sure and and that's the thing like he's still a young dude and at the same time he's regarded as this like overseeing you know authority figure on the entire in dijon row are sort of giving inside throughout the film that's peppered through the stories of love of edmund and and tommy and um and what Phil of who I just lost my mind over and we'll get to him in a second sort of gives John sort of gives insight as to what these guys are going through and I found that the film really you know there's a big debate whether or not games are art right that's always that always comes up because Newsweek or the wall street journal or the New York Times will do a piece on that and you know some authority figure who reviews movies will say oh they're not they're not art how could that be and I feel like this is the film that basically is like look if you don't think games are already after watching this what is wrong with you is was that sort of like an underlying theme that you guys were happy that was was told yeah kind of like is but we don't really say games aren't ever in the phone cheering address right oh it's definitely not even mentioned directly but yeah we just we thought let's just show the process yeah and to ask you know they're like any other creator like like what they go through in the thumbs very similar to what we went through to make this movie exactly um yeah like I think it was kind of like our goal to make something that you know when people like leave the theater and if someone happened to say hey by the way do you think gave her art they would kind of think back to the movie and say well you know they went through all this and I poured so much of their heart and soul into this game then there's all the technicals yeah and they are in the artistry that actually goes into making it that you can't draw any other conclusion but like yeah these guys were making art yeah that's yeah but we never wanted to like make a games our art film sure we wanted to make a well I guess games art film because look at it thank you that that and no I mean it's an it's only a logical sort of thing to draw from it you watch these guys put their heart and soul and literally their lives into these games and you're sort of like oh my god why are they doing this to themselves you know these dudes are in there in it I mean they go through some really intense stuff at some point it seems painful you know they they haven't slept they seem almost malnourished they just really are putting every last ounce of their life force into into what they're creating and to see them you know maybe not straightforwardly admit that yes these games are representations of who they are themselves you can just tell that you know the amount of effort that they're putting in what other conclusion can you draw from something like that so i think that the film does a really good job at sort of examining that and portraying that arm what's something that I that blew me away specific and almost all of the developers echo this sort of sentiment at some point in the film was that they would die if they didn't get this game done I know I know Tommy says it out right he's like look I will kill myself if I don't get this film it if I don't get this a game made what like what is that you know you guys are sort of watching this developed before your eyes and you're sort of piecing together this story that's unfolding what did that mean to you guys when I mean obviously I think you guys can relate maybe not about the suicide aspect of it but what did you think of that as it was unfolding in front here there is just this intensity about it you know and I think a lot of people go through this when they're working on a project that's like 20 to 25 years long and they've invested everything they have sure and if they don't if it doesn't pull through their screwed right so but it's bizarre to be on the other side of the camera and here somebody so focused and so you know so stressed that they get to a point where they're like it would just be easier to die than just to finish this yeah just cuz yeah like you make this game and it's your one year to year three and every day and making this game you get up you get up like 10 a.m. or 11am or whenever you get up and then you shuffle over to the computer and you spend like 14 hours if it's sure i was there and then you go back to bed and then you do the same thing over and over and over again and if you've been doing that for like 18 months or two years or three years like that game that defines you that process defines you and everything about that defines you and then once that game gets threatened or the process looks like it might not work out you're left with nothing you're left with nothing but the or like in your mind at that time in that crazy man in the crate yep in the craziness you're left with the idea that like if this doesn't happen I've I'm just wasted three years of my life right and and so much effort so much energy and I've could have devoted it something else and it's scary you know for sure they scary and that definitely comes through I mean there's a lot on the line um we'll talk more about the the passion that some of these i call them characters in your film but they're real life people will get to that specifically phil fish the the guy behind fez which is I think the most one of the most entertaining people that I think unintentionally entertaining as a better way to put it we'll talk more about that right after this break stick around there's a lot more for for after this this is the 404 mr effers the show where we all sing song you welcome back to the 404 we've got two fantastic guests on the program the filmmakers behind the movie indie game the movie lizanne and James are here with us so happy you guys are here we're having a lot of fun with you finding about what the what people go through in developing independent games and you know I think when you mirror the game industry to the film industry you guys sort of walk a fine line it feels like with with the subject matter that you're dealing with you know a lot of people say oh you know indie movies really aren't in d it's just a you know the biggest example I always give people's Warner Brothers independent like is that not a big oxymoron in itself yeah you look at these independent games I mean these are two dudes in someone's bedroom you know these are two dudes who really are you know scraping for whatever they can would what do you do you think there's a big misconception in terms of what indie gamers are defined as or indie developers are defined us from film to two games Oh probably I think you could probably get a lot more done like a like independently like as as a video game artist you know but you know there seems to be you need to depend on so many of the people in the crew needs to be so much bigger right distribution is just much more you know has made more gatekeepers in film and it does in video games although that does seem to be changing sure but like I think you have probably more power more latitude to be independent as a video game designer I think like completely independent because all you really need is you know your ideas your computer in your software and you can you know put it up that's it that's it yeah it's like look at minecraft minecraft is just two guys or one guy one guy yeah and it's growing 10 yeah and just in Sweden and like a hundred million it's amazing it's a it's absolutely amazing um let's talk a little about phil fish who is behind the game fez you guys told me an interesting story about him and what he went through with his ex partner at their sort of a development company there was a lot of legality issues there was a lot the stuff that was going to prevent um Phil from showing the game at PAX East I mean there are some scenes where he looks like he's just gonna freak out I mean how much of that what were you guys thinking during that whole process because when I was watching it I was like oh wow there might be a murder dhaka documented in this film as well well what was that like I think like we we showed up in Boston for pax there's our first time at pax yeah and phil was staying at like this fancy boston hotel the langham and we got a room there too because he was staying there and so we got this expensive room and we walked over and we're like okay so you're gonna get ready to you know get ready and get the game ready for pax he's like oh no you may not show it and our reaction was yeah we have this exception hotel you have to show it we're making a film here you this is part of the movie no no and we yeah we just we didn't know everything that was happening with him yeah and when we showed up there was a potential that he wouldn't have his business stuff figured out mm-hmm and yeah and it was just so stressful for him because this is the first time he's showing the game after four years of development not showing anybody and you know there was such a big disappointment in a lot of waiting on his end yeah for sure yeah and it just speaks at that moment word like you're you're in the moment and you are completely defined by the game and and the game is threatened at that point and you know you feel threatened and it you you go you go a little crazy yeah like knowledge is that yeah he was in really stretch that's like the most stressful time of his life you can tell I mean it looked like he was just ready to pull his hair out yet he had his little like graduate moment to you know and it was just sort of it was very uh it was it was very telling of what exactly he was going through yeah yeah that's really his beard told the story you know the wackier his beard guy that directly related to hat what he was going through in his mind yeah but it's a really crazy story it's kind of amazing that like he shared all that yeah cuz he could have just told us to screw off and be like you know what I'm having a hard day here leave me alone but he sees value in sharing the ups and downs of what he went through which is it's really amazing those a whole thesis of the film kind of like in one of the reasons why the developers wanted to be in it because people don't know they'd like they really have no idea sure what goes into development and how like crazy stressful that that can be and you know like you can explain it over and over again but you know it still doesn't stick right like it's just you know but seeing it hopefully can kind of you know make it a little more easy to understand and you know like for the people that put thought into it like I think a lot of people don't post on until like how games made and that's okay because it's a game just try it yeah but but yeah yeah when you do not many people know exactly how much of these guys are in their games sure yeah um if there was one thing you guys really as filmmakers learned from this whole process what do you think was the big takeaway for you guys personally above they'll make you know the or just about the whole process what you you know about you know the similarities filmmaking and game development was there like a big takeaway for you guys personally that maybe is not so clear in in the film itself there like a big takeaway that you guys were like you know what I don't know like like going into it we knew that we were you know aiming to capture like dramatic hard stories sure and I think we were still surprised at how dramatic and tough and hard the stories were right um yeah but think one thing like I I wasn't a big gamer before we got into this I and I'm not very familiar with coding or any other process but what was particularly interesting to me was like how personal code could be we don't get into a lot of that in the film but that we have you know programmers talking on and on about how the thought process of them you know making the game is something personal and his artistic to them which was surprising to me because I just thought it was just a bunch of like letters and numbers and slashes I didn't realize it was this whole like poetic thing for that person like they could look at their code and like know where they were when they coded that and right you know kind of like what phase in their life they're going through they could look at someone else's code and you know kind of get an idea of their mentality amazing what type be like Co matrix you know and I love those ethically see what's going on something that I just can't wrap my head around for sure um chat room is asking uh what games are you guys really into I know and you just said you're not a huge gamer but are you James are you a gamer yourself yeah you're playing right now that you're yeah of is weird we're making this movie and I haven't touched a game in so long because I'm like one of those guys we're like I like to play one game right and I like to play a lot of it and i'll lose my life to that game for like a week or two weeks until like I reach that kind of saturation point where I just feel bad for playing it as much as I do right but at last less game that did that to me with binding of isaac which is like related to the movie cuz the Sharon melons latest game and that that game had my number for a long long time and it was uh yeah yeah it was kind of like a roguelike and it's kind of like this wonderful way to kind of dip your toe into the water of roguelikes sure and kind of get used to it and in yeah yeah I loved it again awesome very cool uh the gate the film is indie game the movie it will be out in theatres may 18th in New York LA San Francisco and Phoenix and then the 25th which is a week from tomorrow Miami and Toronto yeah if you want to find out more about the film and also I believe you can also pre-order the digital release on the website right now that's at indie game the movie com make sure you go and do that we can also follow these n and James on Twitter will link to that in our show notes today and that's going to do it for us we really appreciate you guys coming on the show it was really great hearing all about the film like I said it's shot beautifully it's done really well and if anyone is somewhat interested at all hardcore casual in the process that goes into filmmaking the good the bad and the ugly this is definitely something to check out so thank you so much for being here really appreciate it guys and us and our pleasure and all the best of luck with the film it's great anything alright that's going to do it for us today 866 40 for CNN is the number to call or you can email us the 404 at cnet com let us know what you think about all things indie game the movie you can also follow the game has its own I'm sorry the film has its own Twitter account as well right that's indie game indie game indie game movie there it is up on the screen there alright that's going to do it for us we will be back tomorrow with a brand new show until then I'm Jeff Bakalar I'm Justin you it's the 404 high-tech lowbrow have a great wednesday we'll see you guys tomorrow you