Re: [pygame] award winning pygames.

["Talat Fakhri" <fakhriworld@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Brian,

Your point is very insightful.However I never made the proposition that you cannot make a commercially successful game through Pygame, infact quite the opposite(take it as a falsifiablity criteria of a theory). But to nail the argument in favour, I would like to see some commercially successful pygame, even though in theory it is quite possible that commecially successful game in Pygame is very much feasible.

And to reiterate my point, yes, tools might not matter much for a master. But to the general populace tools do matter. For example when did we hear of a successful and popular game in Logo? So, a few commercially successful games in Pygame will certainly help the case.

Regards.

On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 1:54 PM, Brian Fisher <brian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Talat,
I understand your point about having an award winning/commercially
successful game made with pygame proves it's possible to do so, but
honestly I find the idea that you *couldn't* make an award
winning/commercially successful game using pygame to be just an
utterly and obviously ridiculous proposition. So I don't see any
reason to try and disprove it.

The two reasons I think it's ridiculous to think one couldn't make a
succesful game using pygame, are first that pygame is a python SDL
wrapper. The SDL pieces have been proven to be OK to make a high
quality award winning commercial game (Gish, for instance), and python
is completely extendible through extensions - so definitely if you are
willing to complement pygame development with additional python
extension dev. it's obvious you can make a successful game.

The second reason is Mystery Case Files: Prime Suspects, and it's
sequels. If you know the casual game market, you know it sold tons and
tons (many millions in revenue for Big Fish). It was made in
Shockwave/Director. Before that nothing anywhere close to that in
terms of commercial success was made in that tool. Also, it is obvious
from looking at the game that you could definitely make the entire
thing in pygame, no problem.

So basically I think it's obvious about pygame's potential because
it's individual pieces have been proven out, and because it can make
exact copies of successful games... all that being said, I find the
question as to whether pygame improves ones chances to make a
high-quality game to be an interesting question.

Also, part of my point about saying most games are unsuccessful, is to
stress that the game itself has everything to do with how successful
it will be and the tools it was made with have very little to do with
it. As developers we love to kid ourselves that the tools are gimping
us - when usually it's us that is holding us back.

I would assert that the question that holds the key to telling whether
pygame will help make a "successful" game is whether you enjoy using
it, and enjoy making the games that it makes well.

-- 
Talat Fakhri,
Mathematician,
MindValley.