Introduction and Dizzy
Back in 1992, in a lengthy interview covering every topic under the sun, Amiga Power chatted to the CodeMasters team about, well, pretty much everything. For everything on the success of Dizzy to how the company wrote the quotes on the back of its own game boxes (yeah — they went there), check out the original article below.
Despite the image that continues to this day, Code Masters isn't two kids in a bedroom playing and occasionally programming games. Far from it – the Darlings do precious little (if any) coding at all these days. Instead, they had a successful – and yes, international – company, ideas dreamt up as school kids selling millions of units worldwide.
In the course of these interviews you'll be reading:
David Darling – Managing Director: Directly responsible for the bulk of the computer game development side of the company (among many other things).
Paul Ransom – European Development Manager: As his title suggests, Paul's responsible on a day-to-day basis for the development and progress of Code Masters computer (as opposed to console) games.
Richard Darling – Research Director: Richard spends most of his time with console development these days – this is definitely where much of the future lies for the Codies, though they're reluctant to leave behind the Amigas and STs, the Spectrums and C64s popular in Europe. Indeed, most of their successful NES games will turn up on the Amgia sooner or later, as the three of them explain…
On the success of Dizzy
David Darling: "We originally designed Dizzy for young kids and he's been good for them, but increasingly it seems to be that everyone's a secret fan! It does seem to be something to do with his character, but equally it's got a lot to do with the mental puzzles in the game – parents enjoy doing them too. In fact, often they play the games with their children, and get just as much fun out of them themselves, so perhaps that's the secret."
Paul Ransom: "Part of my job is to build characters up, and of course the most successful one we've ever had is Dizzy. We're sort of creating a Mario, though he's obviously not as big yet. At the moment Dizzy's far and away our most popular character – CJ the elephant is only two games old, Steg (the slug), Spike (the Viking) and Slightly (the wizard) are all new characters.
"With Dizzy, our egg character, we've obviously hit on something, though we're not exactly sure what. To be honest we still refer to him as 'Mr Easy-to-draw', which is what he is – just a big blob with a face, arms and big boxing gloves for hands. We've tried to give him more character and make him do more things in the newer games, but it's a very odd creation we've got here.
"The fact is, though, people like him – and he gives us a recognisable character to promote the games with, without having to fork out for a licence. Sure, the Hi-Tec Wacky Races property, for instance, would suit us down to the ground, but they had to pay for that, and we didn't.
"Actually, the interesting thing about Dizzy is it took six months from its original 8-bit release for it to start charting – for a long time we thought the game had been a complete flop. It was around the time we were doing lots of Simulators, and the Oliver Twins, who'd done some for us already, turned up with this odd arcade adventure instead of the game they were meant to be doing. We were a bit annoyed with them, but in the end put it out anyway as a sort of favour, and it stiffed, just as expected.
"Then, months later when we'd all but forgotten about it, it started to chart and just stayed there. It wasn't selling an incredible number of copies a month but it was consistent – it became a chart fixture for months. By the time we got round to the sequel so many people had bought the first game and were waiting for the second that it went straight in at number one. And the rest, as they say, is history."
David Darling: "Generally we think you're better coming up with your own charqcters and games – and Dizzy's the real proof of that. Some of the cartoon things Hi-Tec do would work as Code Masters games, but we always think it's better to develop our own. That way we can actually start to think about merchandising the characters back into other mediums ourselves. We're already working on a line of Dizzy products – clocks, mugs and the like. Goodness knows where we go from here, but it's getting interesting.
On the 'new-look' Dizzy
Paul Ransom: "For the new game, Spellbound Dizzy, which we'll probably release at Easter as part of the second Dizzy collection, we've added quite a bit to the character. He's got oxygen tanks and goes underwater for a bit, for instance, but mpore surprisingly, perhaps, he now has a whole range of expressions and changes them throughout the game. It might not sound like much to you, but it's big news for Dizzy!"
Richard Darling: "With each game we just try and give him a few more features, a few new characteristics. The more expressions he has and characters there are in the games, the better, really. Now you can tell whether he's happy or sad and so on.
"Dizzy's been our second release in the States on the NES after a game called Micro Machines, but it's really too early to tell how well he's going down over there."
Abandoned genres and games for kids
On being the Stock, Aitken and Waterman of the computer world
Paul Ransom: "Yeah, the Stock, Aitken and Waterman analogy. I guess it's fairly accurate really, in that we've got a formula for success and we're selling stuff people buy. Sometimes you get a bit ashamed of it I suppose, but people enjoy it, so we must be doing something worthwhile."
On not doing shoot-'em-ups any more
Paul Ransom: "We don't want anything to do with shoot-'em-ups basically – they're just not very successful for us. Sky High Stuntman's pretty slick, approaching Bitmap standards, but it's the first one we've done in ages, and we don't have immediate plans for more. I think it's perhaps because it's much harder to add any feeling of individuality or character to a straight blasting game."
On not doing Simulators any more
Paul Ransom: "It wasn't a conscious decision to stop doing Simulators as such – and indeed we might do more next year – but fewer people who come to us seem interested in doing them anymore. We're often led by programmers coming along and saying what they want to do, and most have been interested in cute games lately. Some are very proficient – they bring in complete game designs and characters they've created. It's great for us, because very little needs to be done with them before release."
David Darling: "You're right, there haven't been all that many Simulators lately, have there? We stopped doing them because companies like Alternative started doing some crappy 'Simulators' which spoiled the whole idea for us a bit. They've got money problems now so it obviously didn't work too well!
"In actual fact, though it's good to have healthy competition, we don't really think of the other original budget people as our main competition – it's more the Oceans and US Golds of this world we're worried about."
On games for kids
Paul Ransom: "It's true, the age group for our games does go very low – perhaps it's because the characters are cute, perhaps it's because the Codies have got a reputation of doing games for kids, I don't know. That doesn't mean we don't get lots of adults playing them though, particularly things like the Dizzy games which actually have some quite intricate puzzles in them.
"You'd be really shocked at how esoteric some of them are, but what we try to do is make it so they've ridiculously obvious once you know how to do them. You want to kick yourself for not having thought of the answer before!
"Lots of the adult game player we get are the type who like and trust our games and will go through them with the kids – it's very much a family thing – and in fact we're probably educating the kids in many ways."
Richard Darling: "We're quite proud of the fact that we produce games that anyone can get into instantly, and that means that they have to appeal to all age groups. That said though, we're aware that on the 16-bit machines many people are into more mature games, and that's something we're planning to get involved with too.
"Though it's not been properly decided, I don't think, we'll probably put these out on a different label – though we won't be hiding the fact that they're Code Masters games, they will still have our name on them too. I think the idea is that they'll be like sort of sophisticated, grown up and less cartoony versions of the Dizzy games – the characters will be more realistic, there'll be more text in them (though they won't be text adventures), and so on. We very much admire the interface in The Secret of Monkey Island, so that'll be an influence too."
Full price games and big rivals
On full price software
David Darling: "We've totally given up on the full price market on the Amiga and the various home computers. When we've done full price games – say Rock Star Ate My Hamster – they've worked much better as budget re-releases. It's not to do with the quality of the games not being high enough – Dizzy costs $50 or so on some consoles in the States because that's how the market is there, and it hasn't harmed sales in the slightest.
"I think the quality of our games is as good or better than the arcade stuff from Ocean or US Gold, but I don't see why we should charge five times more than we have to for it. We'd rather sell as many games as possible at a low price instead. You have to believe in what you're doing.
"At one point we were selling Amiga games at £4.99 and that was really lower than we could afford, but now we're at £7.99 it's a comfortable price point. We can still afford to do a two disk game like Miami Chase and put it out for less than ten quid. Apart from MicroProse we're the least pirated software house around, and I think one big reason for that is that we charges prices that most people can afford."
Richard Darling: "We've experimented with 3D games lately, but they're very difficult – there are so many about, they take a lot of work to program, and developers tend to get bogged down with trying to get everything looking realistic at the expense of gameplay.
"We've always been reluctant to get into that area because it's possible to get so much gameplay in a single static area – just look at Tetris – that complex programming adds nothing to the fun of a game, and indeed can quite easily get in the way.
"This is a problem the full price Amiga market really used to suffer from – so many games produced were just really graphics demos, and the average Spectrum release was often just as much fun to play. I think it's changing now though, and as full price game publishers start to get back into the idea of gameplay again, we're starting to investigate things like solid 3D which we wouldn't have touched with a barge pole before."
Paul Ransom: "There should be no difference whatsoever between the standard of budget games and full price stuff. The fact that a game is sold at a budget price is purely a marketing decision. I think that will become clearer as we start to produce more quality stuff on the 16-bits, with games like Hover Sprint and Bubble Dizzy. If you look at the 8-bit market our games are as good as anything anyone's doing – Spellbound Dizzy took five or six months to develop on the Speccy, and there hasn't been a better game this year at any price point.
"The only full price things we do now are compilation packs where we sell about five games for £24.99, but we always make sure we put a couple of brand new games on there too for value for money, maybe releasing them as standalone products later."
On Bullfrog and the Bitmaps
Paul Ransom: "As far as other 16-bit developers are concerned it's the Bitmaps I really respect for their very slick graphics, neat programming and the way they make established game sstyles exciting again. Though many people won't see it like that, Bullfrog are actually very similar – with Populous all they've done is take an established type of game, in this case the Kingdom one, and package it very slickly. When people call Populous original they're really missing the point."
On the challenge set by The Hit Squad
Paul Ransom: "The Hit Squad label is certainly giving the Codies a run for our money in the 16-bit budget marketplace, but we're a lot less worried about them than we were when Ocean first announced it. It's become obvious that there'll always be a market for original budget stuff too – we're not getting pushed aside by the re-releases.
"Part of what happened around the time of the Hit Squad launch was that we put our prices up from £4.99 to £7.99 to tie in with what was becoming an industry standard – the idea was that games at £7.99 would actually sell more because they'd be perceived as of higher quality. We were in two minds as to whether it was a good idea at first, but actually it's been good news for the consumer – the higher price means we can afford to spend more time and effort on our original 16-bit stuff."
On the idea of imitating successful full price games
Paul Ransom: "To be honest we've never really thought about it. It's true that we could spend our time doing cheaper, B-movie versions of successful games – in the same way as once a film like Pretty Woman is successful lots of people go out and make similar films – but we haven't ever really drummed up the enthusiasm for it. Programmers are proud people and wouldn't really fancy it in our experience – it's a bit sad to think we might be spending all our time doing that sort of thing really.
"The thing is, games like SimCity or Populous were examples of good games design, not slick programming. If we wanted to do a Populous rip off we no doubt could, but we'd be hard pushed finding people who'd want to do it. Programmers tend to be show offs who want to say 'Look what I can do!' with their games – they wouldn't fancy the idea of simply copying someone else."
Revenue and game design
On making money
David Darling: "Yes, we've made some. I've just bought a new four wheel drive Porsche which is one of the nice things you can do with it. We're turning over about £3.5 million at the moment, but I really think we could be a much, much bigger company in a few years' time. We've only just had our fifth birthday, remember – we've got a long way to go yet."
On the importance of Amiga game sales
David Darling: "They're obviously very important – 8-bit won't last forever, and while at the moment our 16-bit stuff accounts for 35% of the company's turnover, the bulk of that is Amiga. I suppose I'm surprised that it isn't more important. It's taken a long time to grow."
On game design
David Darling: "I still have a lot to do with actual game design. Big Nose The Caveman – he's in a console game at the moment, but will filter down to the Amiga no doubt – is one of mine for instance. He came, as most of them do, out of a couple of casual conversations and the idea just stuck.
"The problem is in knowing where to stop with a character – if you make him too jokey the whole product is conceived of as a joke. One idea I'm considering at the moment is whether to have Big Nose's nose grow each time he sniffs a flower until it reaches such a size it becomes a giant bomb he can use to blow everyone off the screen. I'm unsure as to whether this will work or simply look stupid – we're going to try it out, and if it looks funny we'll probably run with it. What we don't want is for it to look disgusting!
"The English and Japanese tend to like toilet humour, but the Americans don't, so we always have to be careful we're not going to turn them off with some of our jokes."
Richard Darling: "Some of the games we've developed for the American NES market will be coming to the Amiga in the first half of next year. We'd be foolish not to bring them over really – as cartridges cost $10-20 just to manufacture it's become that much more important to spend a lot of time and money on the development of the games we put onto them, and because of that we've come up with some of our strongest games recently.
"Micro Machines, our table top car racing game, where all the courses are set around rooms in a house, will be converted certainly. It's based on a popular range of toy cars in the States, but since they're not so well known in this country I think the game will be judged more on its own merits.
"Big Nose The Caveman is another one we'll definitely convert – we haven't started it yet, but the exploration/adventure of it will be ideal for the home computers."
On planning a new character
David Darling: "We hardly do any planning, to be honest. It's amazing how much happens with very little worked out beforehand. What matters is having generally good judgement and being able to make decent, sensible decisions on the spot.
"One thing you've got to recognise is where you're going wrong and put it right. With CJ the elephant, say, one of our more recent characters, the first game packaging depicted him as a fairly normal cartoon elephant, with grey skin, lots of wrinkles and so on.
"The minute that came out I knew it was wrong – he should be a much younger and more innocent character – so for the second game we've had him drawn completely differently, with smooth blue baby-like skin, big wide eyes and so on. Now he's much more Mickey Mouse. The trick is to keep adding elements and improving them to keep the character more interesting each time."
On printing your own quotes on the back of boxes
David Darling: "well, the thing is that if we've got a magazine quote we'd rather use that, but it's always good to get something on the back of the box, so we won't mind doing it ourselves if need be.
"We just used to mix the same words around in a different order to get a quote that sounded good, and yes, sometimes even we thought they were a bit over the top! I remember one that said 'I'm absolutely gob-smacked! It's the best game I've ever played!' or something which was a bit ridiculous."
On the general perception of Code Masters
David Darling: "People take us more seriously than they used to, perhaps because we specialise in original products. The computer whiz kid stories seem to have died down a bit anyway. We've had five years practice after all – we should be getting good at it all now."
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