Create Your Own Video Game With Game Salad

January 08, 2009

We've all played video games, but what if you could make a video game?  What if you could make a game where you were flying a plane that you designed through space?  Now imagine you can send this game to your buddy in Iraq, because you added flying midgets to it and he'd think it's funny?

Game Salad isn't a video game.  Game Salad will allow you to create video games yourself.  Gendai Games, its creators, is taking art to another level by giving us a tool to make it interactive.  I am excited to see the official launch from this smart group.

I caught up with Josh a.k.a."Yoshi" Seaver, a developer at Gendai, to see what the latest was on the project.  Incidentally, it's his birthday today, so Happy Birthday, Yoshi!

MICHELLE:

There are now adults who have never known a time without mainstream video game consoles.  How do you feel the prevalence of video games among that generation has affected its culture?

YOSHI:

We definitely now have a world culture--especially in the US, Europe and East Asia--that is completely immersed in playing a variety of games across consoles, personal computers, the web and mobile phones. I was just at an amusement park midway and instead of popping balloons with darts for a stuffed animal, now you can play in a Guitar Hero competition to win a real guitar. Now there's practically never a time or place during the day you can not encounter and play a game. While in the past, media consumption was more passive, now it is highly interactive. With game literacy increasing and game tools getting easier and easier, it's only natural that we'll see a large cultural shift from game consumers to game creators. GameSalad plans to be there to help people have fun (and make profit) making that transition. GameSalad is more than an easy way for non-programmers to get games on the web and iPhone. Ultimately, GameSalad will be a lifestyle portal for people who choose game development as a their primary pass time.

MICHELLE:

GameSalad allows users to create video games with each other.  How did Gendai Games come up with this model?

YOSHI:

To be clear, GameSalad technology does not allow creators to create a game at the same time (unless they are in the same room). But we wanted to create GameSalad so that it's possible for game making to be an family activity. I would love to see parents and their children making games together as easily as they would bake a cake, or put together Legos. Our goal is to make GameSalad simple to use whether you're 8 or 80, the same way iMovie has made it so easy to create videos for YouTube.

Secondarily, GameSalad allows creators to "remix" others' games, a second way to create games together. We came up with this model because we want to encourage people to learn from each other to come up with more innovative game design and play.

MICHELLE:

You've been very upfront that Game Salad is not violent.  What made you guys make this decision?

YOSHI:

Well, selfishly as gamers ourselves, we certainly would like to see more variety in the kinds of games being offered. But it's important to make a distinction between conflict and violence. Most games are fun because there is some sort of conflict. But it would be great if we could encourage creative design in games to not have every conflict resolved by violence. Being an open tool, we can't  stop games created that have violence in them, but we can foster a development community that challenges people to do something that hasn't been done before, and certainly violence has been done and done and done.

MICHELLE:

Game Salad users will be able to share their games with others in multiple networks.  How will the licensing work for this?  Can users choose?

YOSHI:

GameSalad will work on the web, on social networks, and on a variety of mobile devices. We plan to support a variety of licensing models for game developers to choose from, from Creative Commons to DRM and micro-transactions to allow artists to monetize on their efforts.

MICHELLE:

You are currently in alpha mode.  What has it been like working with your testers?  How are things going?

YOSHI:

Things are going well with our closed alpha. When we announced our alpha we had applicants from every continent and over 50 different countries. It was mind-blowing to really realize the power the internet has to make your product known without any promotion. Originally we were thinking we wanted feedback from a lot of testers, but some interesting research has shown that after about 5 testers (for any given phase or feature you are testing) you get diminishing returns, so we've decided to keep our alpha small. We have been trying to test with developers from a variety of backgrounds, interests and ambitions so that we can create a really versatile tool that has something for everyone.

MICHELLE:

Insert not-so-shameless plug here.

YOSHI:

GameSalad provides the only tool with a graphical user interface enabling non-programmers to build the logic to create sophisticated games. Oh, and just one more thing. GameSalad is the easiest solution for casual creators to make, publish and monetize games for the web and iPhone.

To learn more about GameSalad, visit www.gamesalad.com.

Here are some preliminary screenshots of GameSalad.

 

Comments

[playing guitar]

Games such as Rock Band and Guitar Hero are setting the video game world on fire.With games like Guitar Hero becoming so popular, more and more people are choosing to learn the guitar for real.This really amazing.

[Thai]

No, the people at gamesalad are not getting new people anymore.