Unepic Developper Interview - Francisco Téllez de Meneses - English Version

Tripy73 : Hello, Firstly I would like you to introduce yourself, just to learn more about yourself and how you became an independent developer.

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : Hello everyone, I'm fran, a Spanish indie developer. Creating videogames has been my hobby since I was 14. I started working in videogames in UbiSoft (a French company) and later in other companies. But working within companies do not let always allow you do what you want, so I finally decided to restart my hobby again work with games from home, with the games that I myself would prefer to work with. Thanks to the success of this game I created as a hobby, I was able to leave my previous company and start working as an individual developer.

Tripy73 : Unepic is your first video game. Could you tell us more about it including its development. How long did development take? What steps were taken to create it? What difficulties have you been encountered?

Francisco Téllez de Meneses :  The first step took around 1 year. I did it in my free time and the goal was to show it to my friends. After which, they reported to me the aspects in need of change and I needed another whole year to change everything.

After 2 years, I had a demo available so I created a site and published the demo. To my surprise it was welcomed by players, and this encouraged me to finish the game.

4 monts later I was able to complete the game and launch the first full version. Furthermore, thanks to the feedback from players I was able to improve it even further adding new functions.

The goal then became to publish it in Steam. However, after submiting the game, Steam rejected it without feedback or an explanation. This was very upsetting and before submitting it again, I started to work hard on improvements such as HD, remake of sound, music, etc.

... This finally led to a great outcome. I inculded Unepic in GreenLight and after a few months it was chosen by the community.

Tripy73 : Is this GreenLight system a good opportunity in your opinion?

Yes it is. The alternative was to search for a publisher that was already in Steam. And a publisher would mean losing my freedom to do what you want, and I may also lose a part of my income, etc.

Tripy73 : The PC version of the title has been available since September 2011 and for the last month on Wii U, what was the reception from the public on these two platforms? Are you satisfied with sales of the Wii U version?

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : Steam players are very exigent but grateful at the same time. WiiU players, and especially Miiverse community have been very satisfied. Everyone is very happy. In fact, there will soon be new updates with things they have been requesting, such as playing with D-PAD and having Zoom in TV.

I'm happy with the sales from the WiiU version. I expected much less due to the low sales that WiiU is currently experiencing.

Tripy73 : Concerning the Wii U version, when did the adaptation of the game begin? Have you met difficulties with the port and integrate Gamepad functions? Has your relationship with Nintendo been good in the past?

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : The porting started on january 2013, after we recieved the agreement by Nintendo. Unlike Steam, Nintendo liked the game and they agreed to it straight away with no special request for change.

In addition to this, while porting was being done, I was invited by Nintendo Spain to several acts, so I must say that I was treated very well by them.

During the porting of the game, there was an opportunity to ask Nintendo our problems and doubts. We received answers within 24 hours.

My only concern about Nintendo WiiU is maybe they are not 100% compatible in the way of programming and documentation. I too accommodate Microsoft's software.

Tripy73 : It is true that it is the point which often reoccurs, that they seem not very efficient in explaining how to make best use their hardware.

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : Yes. Well, I do the same with my games: I want to see results fast and I don't tend to document a lot of it. IN fact, in the new editor for architects, the way of working is not 100%  usuer friendly, so I created a user guide for them.

The porting was specially complicated because I used a custom engine which I created, so I had to port not only the game but also the whole engine. For this part I had the help of a friend I know who did the porting of the engine while I ported the game itself (interface, use of gamePad, etc).

Nowadays, using Unity, you just need to click a button and voilà, porting done. Months of effort avoided.

 

Tripy73 : Why are the contents of this version is so different than the PC  version (No craftingt, no coop mode, etc…)? What changes you have brought to the game? 

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : The 2 big differences between the PC version and WiiU version are :

1.- In WiiU, the age rating is for Teens. So any swear and references to drugs and sex have been removed.

This was a personal choice to avoid problems and to have parents allow their children to play the game (as WiiU is a familiar console). Nintendo did not ask for it.

2.- There is no multiplayer with WiiU because this feature is not finished yet. Also multuplayer needs a strong update system and this is not possible with consoles. IN Steam I can make a change in 2 minutes while in consoles I need weeks to do it.

Tripy73 : The dialogues contain a lot of humor and the geek’s easter eggs from the title, are clearly good points, could you tell us more of this?

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : Of course. Dialogs and humor has been one of the most criticized parts. Humor is something very subjective and it can be liked or disliked. Some reviewers complained about the "teen humor". Polite magazines said "I personally don't like the humor" while more harsh magazines said "the humor is horrible".

The first idea when creating Unepic was to do a game for friends, so I did not think about the global public and I used the jokes we used to do when we were younger.

So all humor and dialogues are very personal. In fact, the first story for the game was an epic one, but when my friends saw the game after the first year they told me the story was the same than Zelda... so I had to change everything from scratch, which led me to make it the way it is now.

The funny thing is that, while magazines criticizes the humor, all coments in Miiverse are the contrary: they love it, specially the references.

Tripy73 : In any case, I myself like dialogues and objectives of quests. For example - where it is necessary to place leeches on a very specific part of the body of an ogre, during its sleep.



Tripy73 : Finally I would like to know your future projects. Any ideas for new games? If yes, on which platforms do you think they will be? Is the Wii U one that you may be considering?

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : At present I am finishing the multiplayer of Unepic and also making a special version of this one.

Blizzard did Warcraft and then created Starcraft... well I want to do the same: create a futuristic version more oriented to shooting rather than hitting with melee. This time graphics will be better.

The futuristic version of Unepic, as it will share the same engine, will be available for the same platforms as Unepic, including PC, WiiU, Linux, Mac and, if Unepic is ported to other platforms, then they will also be included.

I also have a completely different project - very experimental, where I will do a crowdfunding with kickstarter (to see if people like it and have the money to do it).

I still can't tell anyting about the subject because I'm still documenting and interviewing with people of the sector, but France is one of the top countries in the subject of the game-experiment.

I expect to create the crowdfunding January 2015, in a year.

Tripy73 : Concerning the experimental game, in which genre would you classify it? For example... action, adventure etc. or a mixture of different genres?

Francisco Téllez de Meneses : The game that is more similar is GTA, so a mixture between action and driving, with a deep background.

Maybe after finishing the documentation part I could find out that it can't be done, so it's still too soon.

There are no ideas for platforms yet. It all depends on the engine used to create the game and the interface used.

Tripy73 : Thank you infinitely to have taken time to answer out questios. We hope to have more informations soon, concerning your future projects.