UNIT 3
Business Plan
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As the core of this Unit I created a final version of my business plan which I could use to base my presentation off of. I was quite happy with a lot of the work that I had already done towards creating the brand image in Unit 2 so, with some retuning based on feedback from my last presentation, based my branding off of what I had already. The main problem that my business plan had before was my budget and market research. I found it quite difficult to put together a solid estimate before but through some research I found ways to get a better idea of the market I wanted to enter, how to better estimate the costs of what I needed, and what publishers in my industry expect. I still found it difficult to give estimates of how my company would grow over time so, utilising some of the figures I used to create my Total Addressable Market figure, I gave a few different outcomes of how my company would turn a profit. I started with just enough to recoup to show how few sales we actually needed to achieve this goal, then I gave an estimate based on sales estimate from another game in the market sector, and then I gave a personal low estimate that I believe that we could achieve. I think by looking at different outcomes it gives a more rounded idea of what success could look like rather than trying to attain one specific number. I was much more happy with my revised budget this time around after committing more time to research about what the actual costs of exactly what I need are, and how much a publisher would be willing to spend. Learning more about the role of a publisher was also massively beneficial as I felt that I better understood what I could ask of them and that's why I felt comfortable forgoing calculating marketing and QA costs and just including it in my revenue share explanation. A publisher's role is somewhat different to just a regular investor as they not only supply capital to make your business work but also resources and connections, which I intend to make great use of. Something I would've liked to change is the visual aspect of my business plan. While the overall style I am happy with (colours, fonts, etc) I would've liked to include some logos, screenshots and concept art. Due to time constraints I felt that the writing and content had to come first, but in future I would definitely commit more time to trying to communicate my ideas visually.
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Demo
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My business plan places a lot of emphasis on the creation of a demo that I would shop around to publishers to show them that my game is more substantial than an idea, and that I actually have the skills required to make a game. For this project I only ended up creating a ~1 minute long video of my demo, as, for the purposes of the presentation, nobody would actually get to play it anyway. This was quite freeing in a way, as it gave me more time to focus on experimenting as whatever I ended up making only had to work for the section of the game that I built for the demo. Using Unity, I decided to build out a section of the game that showed off the game's core loop of scavenging, exploration, and overcoming environmental and combative threats.
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This is the rough plan I came up with. Although I ended up re-working the order of the moments in the final project to better reflect how some of the items would actually be used, it's mostly stayed the same. I also cut off the last room as I felt for an investment presentation it didn't really communicate anything about how the game was played. The demo starts with the player looting a room for a flare and some shotgun shells. The player then uses these items in the following events, showcasing how the player has to scavenge and expend resources to progress through the game. It also shows off some stealth elements when the first enemy encounter is defeated by a sneak attack. When the player first shoots their shotgun they set off a car alarm with a stray pellet. This communicates the threat that the environment poses. The main thing that I wanted to show in this trailer was the "detail" mechanics that I had implemented. For example opening a door or container isn't just pressing a button, it's holding down a button to grab the door and then opening it incrementally with the scroll wheel. I added these mechanics because I felt that they aid greatly in creating a sense of immersion by connecting the player more to the world and making the objects in it feel less like game props because they function like the real thing. This is something I feel has to be experienced to be fully understood, and while the demo wasn't playable it was at least easier to explain what my thought process with a visual aid. Although the art used for the demo was essentially non existent I didn't mind as the main purpose was to present the gameplay, but being able to give a better idea of what walking around in a properly rendered area feels like is definitely the next step as it makes my project feel that bit more considered and provides good credibility.
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Presentation
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Due to the product oriented nature of my enterprise my presentation naturally revolved mostly around my product as that is the singular focus of the company at it's inception. I looked into how to make my presentations more engaging and memorable, and my main takeaway was slide content and audience interaction. The worst kind of presentations and least successful at communicating information are actually the ones that have the most information on them; they become cluttered and droning. Having large chunks of text read straight from a slide is boring, so I tried to make this presentation feel quite lean, putting more pressure on me as a presenter to be able to talk going only of a few short phrases on screen. Overall I think I stuck quite well to this method although there are some slides I feel I probably should've cut down a bit more on. I made the theme of the presentation match the business plan, which again I like a lot and feel reflects our company quite well. However again I felt that the structure of the slides felt a bit stagnant and lacked on imagery. Having some concept art, changing the background to something with more contrast, or just moving the text around more could've helped to break things up more and make the presentation feel less like a lecture. Another challenge I faced was deciding what from my business plan was important to show, and what wasn't necessary. I decided to omit my budget sheets this time around, as it's difficult to read during a presentation, and the information was available in the provided plan anyway. I still endeavoured to make my spending and growth clear though, so I made sure to write up some general points about that. Although this did help, in my follow up Q&A I did have to clear up how much was being spent on what as my wording wasn't as accurate as I intended. Overall though I felt that my presentation was successful and effectively communicated the purpose of the enterprise and where I wanted to take it next.
