CODING BACK THE YEARS

FORMER CODEMASTERS’ BOSS DAVID DARLING REFLECTS ON COMPANY’S BUDGET BEGINNINGS

When you set up Codemasters in 1986 why did you aim for the budget-games market?

The intent behind Codemasters was to build fun, accessible games that could be bought by players on a budget. As much as the games on the market were interesting and fun, we felt that we could do far more with our games in a shorter development period. We wanted to concentrate on fewer games with have more emphasis on creative risk and experimentation.

Did you ever feel there was any stigma attached to budget games?

Regardless of any stigma around budget games, we wanted to focus on making enjoyable games. Magazines were a primary marketing tool for videogames, and full-price titles occupied the majority of the space in their pages. This made it more challenging for budget games to get a spot – we had to think differently about our strategy. We wanted to earn a player’s trust. We drew people in through appealing screenshots, and strived to make the gameplay as fun as possible. This way, once we distributed the game to the right retailers, it would jump off the shelves at players and spread through word of mouth.

Which Codies’ budget games stood out for you as being the most pioneering?

There were two things we focused on when we led Codemasters. We used popular themes at the time and innovated in ways that benefitted the player. Professional BMX Simulator was the first game to have four players simultaneously play together, as far as I’m aware, with two players playing on joysticks, and two sharing the keyboard.

What did budget games allow you to do that perhaps wouldn’t have been possible with full-price releases?

Full-price games often had licensing tie-ins. So when you’re responsible for the production of their game content, you often have to minimise risk to make games that sold really well and following standard guidelines was key. So you couldn’t use licences to make something like Rockstar Ate My Hamster or other similarly out-of-the-box games back then. Exploring and making different, but attractive, experiences for players was a bonus of making budget games.

Codemasters did try full-price games on the home computers. How did it go?

When we wanted to explore higher prices, we largely sold compilations, collections, and packs of games. Over time, we increased our game prices from £1.99 to £2.99. Once we moved on to the 16-bit era we published videogames on Atari and Commodore Amiga systems and on CDS, we sold them for £4.99, largely because of the cost of the media itself. Our Dizzy-themed game packs were sold for £9.99 per pack, with each pack containing five games. Although it’s perceived to be a full-priced model, we were looking more at the entertainment value of these packs and collections. So our approach to selling games was still based on a budget-value mindset. We also sold Quattro Compilations, which were four-in-one packs with a theme such as Quattro Arcade or Quattro Racing.

Did the budget-games market influence your approach to games at your current publisher, Kwalee?

My experience of 8-bit budget games has definitely influenced our approach at Kwalee, and also shaped the principles that have made us successful. Back then, we’d develop and release an 8-bit game and watch it hit the charts. The same thing now happens on mobile – with short development cycles and the satisfaction that comes from seeing the work of small teams pay off with happy players. This doesn’t take away too much creativity and innovation – if anything, it encourages you to think about the fundamentals of game design. It’s refreshing to see new ideas pop up in the charts most weeks.