An interview with Alice Taylor of Channel 4
This week, we have an interview with Alice Taylor, who is a commissioning editor for Channel 4. I’m sure many of you have heard about Channel4’s recent work with indie developers. I thought it would be interesting to catch up with Alice and find out what was happening.
NOT the real Alice Taylor
Phil:
I recently heard, I think it was in develop magazine, that you had earmarked a significant amount of money from C4’s budget for indie developed games. Can I ask how this came about and why you specifically chose indie developers?
Alice:
Yep, it was probably Develop magazine. I’m one of the two Commissioning Editors for Education at Channel 4, and it’s Education’s budget that I’m talking about specifically: currently a total of £4.5m per year to spend on internet-native projects aimed at teenagers aged 14-19. Which is to say, not *all* on games – but a hefty chunk of it is, and will be, spent on games!
Why we chose indies: Channel 4 actually has a remit to encourage and support UK independent production companies, although historically they were mostly television ones. Now they’re television, digital and games ones. Tomorrow, they might be television, audio, digital, games, mobile and locative ones. Not in that particular order, either! So we evolve.
Luckily for me, the UK indie games scene is awesome. Always has been, and hopefully always will be…
Phil:
How did you find those indie developers to work with? Also, how did you find working with those indie developers?
Alice:
Sought them out, mostly, through checking out their work. I play a lot of games, always have done, and it helps that I’m often a judge for indie games things (2 years on the Independent Games Festival at GDC, this year Indiecade, etc). I blog about games, too – bit busy these days, but I’m always noodling about looking for new interesting things. Lastly, we keep Margaret Robertson on a retainer: ex-editor of Edge magazine, she’s now a roving games consultant, and is nothing short of amazing in her absolutely encyclopedic knowledge of games and the UK games industry.
I’ll tell you in more detail now about what actually happened in The Finding of the Indies…
Firstly, by the way, I’m going to use a broader definition of “indie” than some might: as far as I’m concerned, if you make games and are independently owned by individuals, you’re a games indie of some description. We could spin off here for hours about what makes an indie an indie, and whether it’s aesthetic or income or output, but it’s a pretty simple business definition for the purposes of fulfilling our remit of supporting UK independents. All indies are independents, but not all independents are “indie”, if you see what I mean – but as I’m not in the business of only identifying the artistic, starving-in-a-garret type, that’s okay 
So, I’ll list ‘em.
We started with Littleloud: they make games, stuff in Home, gamelike experiences, and some websites. Oh, and lots of animation. I saw a game they’d made on the BBC website years ago, thought it was pretty sweet, and that we’d start with them. They produced Bow Street Runner for us, which hit the ball out of the park on so many levels. (Google Bow Street Runner or… sorry, long URL…
http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/C/city-of-vice/game/bow-street-runner/game.html)
Secondly was Oil Productions, a new ARG outfit, who outsourced some minigame-making to Player Three, a very well established UK indie flash game producer. Routes did spectacularly well for us in terms of reaching teens with science material, and the minigames have had 19 million or so plays – and counting. Big numbers for a science project! (http://www.routesgame.com)
Thirdly, Preloaded. A classical digital indie with a strong, strong reputation in web based games. They made 1066 for us: it’s the top result in Google for that date, above Wikipedia fer cryin’, and with nearly 7 million plays so far it’s really grabbing people’s attention. (http://www.1066thegame.com)
Fourthly, Six To Start. ARG/nu-story tellers. The Hon Bros. created Perplex City, and we went to them with a request for a game tackling privacy, security and online behaviour, which resulted in Smokescreen (http://www.smokescreengame.com) – just gone live.
Then the stuff still in development. This is probably where it gets more interesting for classical indie fans:
1. Privates. From Zombie Cow Studios. I contacted them directly after playing Ben There Dan That! which I loved. Cor it was brilliant. I just love their humour and style. Privates will be a PC download (free).
2. Cover Girl. From Tuna Technologies. They got in touch with me originally via Wonderland, and with a proposal for a game I loved the sound of. We met up, they seemed like top chaps, we signed a contract. Flash, maybe a PC version.
3. Ada (working title!), from Beatnik Games. I actually met Alex (now left) from Beatnik at the Three Rings party in San Fran during GDC; he emailed me periodically with “here’re cool things” stuff, and then with a “here’s our game” stuff, which is Beatnik’s up and coming (out ANY MINUTE NOW, right chaps?) Plain Sight. Terrorist robots with swords and antigrav, kinda: it’s special! PC/Mac.
4. The Curfew. The second game from Littleloud, with Kieron Gillen penning and Simon Parkin leading! Flash.
5. 2 x unnamed Big Flash games – think BSR – with Fish in a Bottle, and Preloaded again.
Phil:
Other indies who are interested in working with you would want to know how best to approach you and the kind of games you are interested in seeing from them. For instance I know one female developer who has a game that encourages girls to get involved in science, is that the kind of game you are interested in?
Alice:
Definitely. There’s a crisis in science in the UK, and not nearly enough kids and teens choosing it as a career path. We’d love to help change that. I love it too when indies have an insight into this sort of issue or problem.
14-19 UK teens are what we go for, as I mentioned, and soft learning, soft skills, so not typical curriculum stuff. Definitely not basic maths or spelling games, although if you have mathematical puzzles inside your bigger-picture game, that’s fine with me. The way we approach it is:
- Make a fun, amazing game, full stop.
- Make it free (in the UK, at least).
- Make it factually or educationally accurate and useful.
You can’t start with the latter, because if you lose the fun, you lose everything, right? But then again, pure fun without useful content, well there’s more than enough of that on the internet already. What’s the point.
But in sum: teens perennially need the same sort of “soft” education: sex, drugs, alcohol, relationships, health, careers, money. Then there are themes, zeitgeisty ones, currently “happiness” and “territories”, where we issue open briefs (www.4producers.co.uk tells you everything here). Then we look for interesting approaches and new talent. Our stable of games so far have a wild spectrum of content, ranging from privacy to civil liberties to sex to scientists to the origins of the police… I love that.
Want to pitch? Email me with an idea. That’s how it starts. If you have stats to back up your idea, and a novel approach, that’s always better!
This is the real Alice Taylor
Phil:
There is some talk of tax credits for games going around still and part of that is to encourage “British” games. I think that’s the same for C4’s remit? I’ve tried hard personally to define to myself what I feel a British game actually is, because I’m a bit old and have been around since gaming began in Britain. Do you feel that culturally there is such a thing as British games? If so, what do you think they have that makes them unique?
Alice:
Yeah I do, actually. Humour is one: Zombie Cow’s games are very British. But I think this “Britishness” is probably more about this situation where culturally-American games – Grand Theft Auto being the poster boy here, but APB too, and so many more – are being made in the UK. Kids and teens play these games, a lot, and so are growing up on a diet rich in American culture (despite many games’ British origins) and I suspect government are a bit worried that we’re all going to turn into the 51st state. If we haven’t already, that is.
There’s also this issue of talent leaving Britain for better prospects in the usual places: the USA, Canada, sometimes Japan, Germany, Scandinavia… If the UK games industry isn’t bolstered and promoted like the UK TV and Film industries, then it is indeed in danger of being exported.
My personal bugbear is that games are still reviewed in magazines, newspapers and websites under the banner of “Technology” (see the BBC as a primo example) rather than “Culture”: games should be reviewed and talked about in the same spaces as television, cinema, theatre, books and music. As an industry, it dwarfs the last four, and yet…
Phil:
While I do my own thing as an indie, I’m also an academic in the area of games. One of the most frustrating things about being a games academic, is the ignorance of management and their failure to understand how important games have become and will continue to grow as demographics change. Of course a large part of this is the age gap between “senior management” and the typical gamer age demographic (where I’m probably at the upper end). This is bloody frustrating because we could do so much more for games. I get the feeling that media companies like C4 have that same kind of internal struggle. Although I get the feeling that C4 has a better grasp of games compared to say the BBC. Do you ever get that frustrated about your bosses simply not “getting it” when it comes to the potential of games? Do you think the mainstream media understands the potential for interactive entertainment?
Alice:
Heh, all the time: I’m regularly called upon to explain this new games lark to someone. New! Imagine. It’s why we need a constant churn of data pointing out that games are like, really big. And important. I used to be employed by the BBC, and did a national study of gamers for this very reason: google BBC games research, and you’ll find it. It was powerful, that stuff, but still change takes time.
Phil:
To kind of press the point a bit, one of the things that irks me about external media when they approach games and gamers, is the notion that games are “for kids”. This essentially restricts games to the ghetto of hardcore fans and doesn’t really promote development in new directions. Of course developers and gamers themselves are also responsible for this. For instance, you are responsible for educational content is that correct? With a relatively young target audience? Why can’t C4 actually approach games and gamers from a more mature angle. There are plenty of very interesting, unusual and deeply considered games, especially in the indie space. Why do we see no coverage of the creative side of game development for instance?
Alice:
Pretty sure I know what you mean. Sometimes we use the term “playful experience” (cf Routes), sometimes too “interactive story” (cf Smokescreen) for both the purists who want to argue the finer points of what defines a game, but mainly to break away from the tyranny of the tiny word “game” that has to cover such an enormous category of products, ranging from Snake to World of Warcraft. It’s vast. And reducing it all to the word “game” is like squeezing a universe or two into a black hole. *blip!*
Not sure what you mean by approaching games and gamers from a mature angle. My target audience is teenagers, but everyone plays, including oldies .
Phil:
With audience figures dropping off and advertising revenue spreading out in other areas, I can see that media companies are going to have to consider methods of differentiating themselves. I can see that interactive TV and “online” content is a potential growth area as it tends to lock in customers in a more direct way (which I assume is easier to sell to advertisers). Do you think that in the future we will see more direct tie-ins between broadcast content and interactive online content?
Alice:
Dude, that’s a whole essay right there. But time’s a-pressing. IP that can cross borders and platforms is a good thing, but usually also a big thing. Imagine if you could play WoW on your android phone, I’ve always wanted that. Why can’t I grind while on the tube? Or on that 4 hour train journey where the trains going too fast for the broadband dongle to cope (Vodafone I’m looking at you). But if you’re a smaller project, being multi-platform is expensive. So you pick your winners, invest big … and hope they hit.
Phil:
Traditionally broadcast media’s approach to games has been to treat it almost as a curiosity and yet there clearly is a “gamer” culture, both amongst players and amongst creatives and developers. Do you ever think we will see a day when games are given the same respect and analysis as other creative art forms?
Alice:
See previous comment about games being classified as Technology. Not until that changes, no.
Phil:
Can I ask, what you personally find interesting about games? I know you have a great interest in them from your blog http://www.wonderlandblog.com (which is ace by the way), but what really excites you and interests you about them?
Alice:
Aim accuracy, of course!
Okay, seriously, I love playing with real life friends. Co-op L4D, 5-man partying in WoW, that’s my thing. Quake III Arena CTF. Team play, with everyone with A Job To Do. I adore that. Single player games .. euh, I only ever finish Zelda ones or horror ones, or Advance Wars when on an airplane. Games are what we do to socialise and learn, naturally – just look at kids – so playing a lot of sociable games is probably inevitably happy-making. I think people who haven’t yet discovered this are seriously missing out. One by one, they come over…
Phil:
Is there anything else you’d like to say to British indie developers?
Alice:
Keep being superb. What a history the UK has in games development. David Braben was an indie (heck, still is). Peter Molyneux was an indie. The Darling Bros. The Jagex Duo. Sir Clive Sinclair! My old office, I used to be able to see into his apartment. I could tell you some stories. But these guys, and so many many more, they grew from humble beginnings. We need more – and we need more women, too. The Sims is the biggest selling game ever, ever (and, by the way, 35% of Sims players are MALE, that’s a LOT of men) and the Sims team is over 50% female. Diversity is a winning formula, so get out there and mingle.
Phil:
Thanks a lot for this Alice. I’m sure it will be really interesting for British devs to hear your thoughts.
Alice:
You’re very welcome, zoombapup 
Top interview – keep up the good work!