Brad Wardell of Stardock is one of the rarest types of people in the game industry today; he's a 100% independent developer... who's innovating in ways the big boys of the industry wouldn't dare attempt. With titles such as Lightweight Ninja and the recently released simulation game, The Corporate Machine, Stardock is poised and ready spread the word on Drengin.net and it's impressive library of games to the world. Oh, and he's going to show everyone that even an Electrical Engineer knows a thing or two about video games.

Reno: First and foremost, I gotta ask this one question for myself: What's it feel like to be one of the little guys, the independent developer who designs games for himself? I know that many gamers would love to work for a Square or a Nintendo, but what is it like to be one of the guys that stands toe-to-toe with the giants of the industry?
Brad: It's actually quite nice because indies have a lot more freedom to create cool software. When we design a game, we get to focus on the game we want to make without it getting the idea diluted due to marketing, distribution, and retail concerns.

Reno: Many critics have dismissed the PC as a ship slowly sinking into oblivion when it comes to games. Being that all of your games have appeared on the PC, do you feel this is true, or do you believe that the PC is still a very viable platform for the latest and greatest titles?
Brad: The PC market continues to grow and will continue to grow into the future. It's just a different market demographic. If I'm going to play a strategy game it's going to be on the PC for instance. The PC really only needs to worry when HDTV becomes standard. Many PC gamers simply won't play games on a television.

Reno: Speaking of PCs and TVs (you knew it was coming!), what are your feelings on how Microsoft is handling XBox? It seems a lot of people have the preconceived notion that it's merely a cheaper PC, while Microsoft is attempting to market it as a game console. Do you think Microsoft is doing well so far, or are they doomed to fail by reputation from the start?
Brad: The XBox is basically a modified PC though and it shows -- or did at E3. Microsoft has a lot of marketing power so it's hard to say how much effect that will have, but they may find themselves in the same spot IBM did a decade or two ago when they learn that it's hard to get mindshare amongst the general consumer who thinks of Microsoft as the company that makes WIndows and word processors.

Reno: About Lightweight Ninja, it's probably one of the best examples of some game developers attempting throwbacks to the old age when platformers ruled video games. The question is, why did you opt for a totally 2D look rather than go with the popular trend and go with 3D graphics and 2D gameplay?
Brad: Mainly because the target audience for it is likely to want a 2D game more than a 3D game. On a console, for instance, if you make a platform game like that, it's gotta be 3D because that's way that type of game really has to be to sell. But on the PC, the people who like arcade games but don't have consoles want a nice simple 2D game. As cool as Mario 64 was, I couldn't play it, it was too complicated to control. I would have preferred a 2D game with nicer graphics.

Reno: The Corporate Machine sounds like a great concept, fully utilizing the net to connect gamers with each other in a struggle for supremacy in a chosen industry, not to mention the amount of control you have over your own corporation. In many universities (including my own), there are several courses that utlize simulation 'games' to teach the basic fundamentals of economics and management. Do you ever think games like Corporate Machine will one day be used in the classroom as a tool for teaching, or would you want them to be used that way?
Brad: Done and done! I read somewhere that Stanford and Harvard use Entrepreneur (the previous incarnation of The Corporate Machine) as tools. We've sold a lot of copies of The Corporate Machine to schools and universities already.

Reno: That's awesome! Goes to show you that games can always be used as educational tools. What do you feel about titles that are specifically geared towards education (aka edutainment)? Do you think they're a viable tool for younger kids, or simply a quick way to make cash?
Brad: The latter. Kids aren't dumb. Remember when you were a kid and someone you had a toy ray gun or a toy airplane? The more realistic it was, the better. Yet companies always kidify their stuff which insults the intelligence of kids. My 1 year old prefers to play with the REAL remote control rather than a toy one.

Reno: Do you think parents should even encourage their children to play video games at such a young age? For myself, I didn't start playing until I was 7 or 8, and yet I see a ton of parents buying Playstation games for their 3 or 4 year olds.
Brad: I think 3 or 4 is kind of pushing it. I severely limit my son's time on the computer (he's 4). He loves to "do dot-coms" but I think it's important that children develop their imaginations on their own. My son will spend hours with plastic forks and spoons and tape making "movies" (I'm not sure what plastic spoons have to do with movies but hey, it's his make believe). But once they hit 5, 6, 7 years, gradual introduction to computers and games can help get them interested in computers without having them take over their lives.

Reno: Drengin.net is your great online service that you provide for all of your games. Gamers can upload their high scores, chat with their buddies, not to mention play all of Stardock's games. It also comes at a price, although the business model is totally new, allowing gamers to pay once and receive all of Stardock's games for an entire year. Do you believe that other companies will look at Stardock and start adopting your subscription model?
Brad: I think so. Here's the basic problem with games at retail presently:

I go to the store, and I look at a game, I pick it up and ALMOST buy it. But something keeps me from doing that. How many times have you just about purchased a game and then changed your mind for some reason? So instead of them getting $30 or more from you, they get nothing.

Now, instead, put a few of these games together and keep adding to that list and you'll get that person to buy your stuff. In our case, someone says "The Corporate Machine looks cool...but...I dunno, it's $30.." Then a few weeks later they hear about LightWeight Ninja and then Stellar Frontier and they say to themselves "What the heck, I'll just get Drengin.net." So while we don't make the retai price of each individual game, we still at least get $50 (Drengin.net's cost) from them. I think other game companies will do this too. But I think you'll see them do it first with older titles. Sort of like how we have cable TV that plays movies a year after the fact, you'll have services that put slightly older games on them

Reno: When do you think the days of free online play with services such as Battle.net will fizzle out?
Brad: Not any time soon. Instead, I think you'll see services like that get additional "Plus" features. You'll have "Gold memberships" or something like that where they can get more features on Battle.net if they pay $4.99 per month or something.

Reno: I'm not too sure if you read fansites like TNL all that often, but here's a question that's sure to spark some controversy. How do you feel about the whole 'report everything' style of many fansites today? It seems that every game site will post anything in the name of site traffic and revenue, whether it be totally false or not. Do you think someone needs to step in and draw a line that's not to be crossed, or will this continue even further?
Brad: That's a tough one, because who would step in? Who would judge that? Heck, I just got done reading two of the major print game magazines that happily awarded "Best of E3" to games that weren't really at E3 but instead only shown in private suites off the show floor to elite members of the press. That sort of thing bugs me a lot more than the fansites stuff.

Reno: Yeah, I always found it weird that Metal Gear Solid 2 won the Best of E3 in 2000 from several publications, despite being shown only in video form. I definitely would have picked something like Warcraft 3 or Jet Grind Radio as the best of that year. Anyways, in your opinion what would be your Best of E3 for 2001? Please don't say Simpson's Road Rage.
Brad: [Laughs] I was most impressed with Dungeon Seige, Empire Earth, and that Nintendo Star Wars game (Rogue Squadron 2)

Reno: Are there any plans to bring any of Stardock's titles to the home consoles?
Brad: Resolution is the issue for us. As soon as they get to be high enough resolution (the consoles) then we can since our games tend to be sprite based/fixed resolution.

Reno: With the Gamecube, XBox and PS2 all sporting some sort of online capability, the PC has lost some of its edge, but not all of it. Other than better online game, what do you think is the PC's biggest advantage over the consoles?
Brad: Well that remains to be seen of course. Can you really imagine someone playing Diablo on a Game cube? Or playing Warcraft 3 on an Xbox? One big advantage may be the simple fact that you play computer games on a desk with a mouse instead of playing in the living room for all the world to see. When I was playing Baldur's Gate, it's just me the player sitting at the desk playing the game. As opposed to sitting on the living room floor playing it.

Reno: How the heck did someone in Electrical Engineering wind up in the game industry?
Brad: [laughs] I was a very poor Electrical Engineer.

Reno: Could you at least Electrically Engineer yourself out of a XOR gate?
Brad: [laughs... again!] Not without a couple of AND gates and an inverter!

Reno: What games are you currently playing?
Brad: Counterstrike quite a bit. Just finished Balder's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. Just starting on Startopia

Reno: What's the most recent game that had you just dropping your jaw in absolute awe?
Brad: Black & White for the first few hours was like that. Of course, a few hours later the awe changed to swearing.

Reno: What games are you anxiously awaiting (aside from your own, of course)
Brad: Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights are two I'm really excited about. Some of those new Nintendo Game Cubes might make me take the plunge. If only they were higher resolution!

Reno: So who would win a free for all brawl? You or Ty, the lightweight ninja?
Brad: Ty in a second. I can't even touch my toes! He'd snap me like a dead twig!

The Next Level would like to thank Brad Wardell of Stardock for giving us the opportunity to get additional insight and hope perhaps one day, he can defeat the ninja and Ty uncontested! For more information, click here to access the Stardock homepage.

··· Reno