Straight from the Source: Vitei Backroom (Paper Garden)

Note:

CM = Chris McLaughlin
PM = Pauline Machabert
JC = Jetha Chan

Table of Contents:

Page 1 — Introductions and History
Page 2 — Working in the Backroom
Page 3 — Backroom vs. Frontroom and Creative Freedom
Page 4 — Throwing Chickens in VR
Page 5 — How to Organize a Flat Company
Page 6 — Escaping Nintendo’s Shadow
Page 7 — Wrapping up the Party

Page 5 — How to Organize a Flat Company

So when you decide on a project, is there a mini-hierarchy that’s created just for that project or is it still really free flowing?

PM: What do you mean by hierarchy?

When Chris was saying, like he had to give people tasks like this has to be done in five weeks, is that more like a traditional hierarchy or still very free?

CM: It’s still very free, there’s a little more of a hierarchy at that point but not that much of a hierarchy as there’s not enough people to be in that hierarchy [laughs]. More like ‘Drez’ who’s upstairs, ‘you’re doing art because you’re the artist’, so you just believe in yourself and make decisions. You don’t have anyone to tell those decisions to you, but we trust you as an artist to make those decisions. Peter, you’re the designer on the project because you’re the designer here and you have to make these decisions. And I guess whoever’s the designer of Tiny Escape is leading the design on that. So if there’s a question like ‘what’re we going to need, is it going to have a torch or is it going to have a zombie gun?’ And because it was such a short time we made decisions like now, for the next hour, because everybody else has to get on with their work.

So in those cases, it’s not like one person that has a clear direction, it’s just like everybody contributing their own ideas?

CM: Kind of yeah. We did say on Tiny Escape and then on Paper Garden it was Peter who was the lead on that. Especially for design, that one person on Tiny Escape was me and on Paper Garden it was Peter; you’re the kind of vision holder, I guess you uncover that. And when it comes down to it, everyone will defer to you on design decisions, but that doesn’t mean that we won’t argue with you! [laughs]

PM: There’s no-one that gives orders basically, there’s people responsible for something: like the art person is responsible for art, the programming person for programming and the designer’s responsible for the flow of the game, so when someone has a question for someone else, they ask. But they can still talk about it, and nobody comes to you and says ‘do that now’. So when you say hierarchy, there’s none but everybody has a defined role.

We all come up with ideas about what to do next and then the design person thinks that’s not in the design, the design person’s going to say ‘ooh, can you do it a bit more like that’ or something. It’s more self-driven but everybody has a role. There’s still a project manager though.

CM: The hierarchy exists not in terms of like this person reports to anyone or anything but more like a sideways hierarchy flowing through the organisation. Other organisations have hierarchies; if you’re meeting with other people or you’re communicating what’s going on with other projects, you have these requirements from them that need to be filled. So if you look at it through that lens then sometimes the person bringing these requirements, it can look like someone is ordering people around but really it’s not like that at all. It’s more like ‘hey guys, these people need these things, how can we get them those things?’

It’s like having those two meetings a day that really is how you communicate…

PM: For now like for example we’re three programmers so you could say there’s a hierarchy when for us, Chris will have the last word. Always. But we all come with the tasks together and we all group together and then we’re going to do a new task, we know what we’re going to do but we do it our own way, but usually we go and ask Chris. Like I would do it this way: ‘is it fine, is it compatible?’ Then we just validate with Chris. I know for me that Chris would have the last word, but I don’t feel any pressure or someone on top of me giving me orders or anything.

You have that freedom to contribute your own…

PM: Yeah, yeah. And if we have something to chat about, we chat about it, it’s more like we respect him. He has the lead because we respect him. And obviously, he was there before [laughs]. We don’t even think there’s a boss or anything.

JC: I’m astounded by just how positive you are! [laughs] No, 100% what Pauline was saying, for me, it’s slightly different in that I’m virtually driven by fear [laughs]. I will consult with Chris, but a lot of the time it’s like ‘okay Chris, this is what I’m thinking [whispers]: please don’t say it’s stupid’ [laughs]. And the fear of suggesting something that he’s going to be like ‘no, that’s not going to work.’ That’s what keeps me on my toes. But at least it’s a better product for me.

CM: I’m going to remember that! [laughs]

In the Backroom, the main language you use is English and in the Frontroom the main language is Japanese.

JC: The Frontroom was interesting in that the tech team was almost entirely foreigners, so you’d have your Friday meeting in Japanese in which – oh God, you didn’t used to have to do this – but when I joined the company we would have our Friday meetings in Japanese and just for my own purposes because I had never done a Japanese meeting before, I would start writing out notes so I could read them out, and I started typing up those notes. But it was a very quick jump from there to my director asking me directly for those notes afterwards. I accidentally precipitated this thing where we right after that, everyone had to do notes. [laughs] It was my fault!

But during the week, if you’re a programmer then you’ll do most of your communication in English. If our Nintendo representative was there, then we’d interface with him in Japanese as well as the director who’s Japanese. But in general, you could go a day or two without speaking in Japanese.

So that wasn’t really a challenge?

JC: No, not really. I studied Japanese for a really long time, longer perhaps than I should’ve for coming, and was at university for about three-and-a-half years and I studied here on exchange for a year so I’ve not had the experience of being in Japan and not knowing Japanese. It was intimidating in that I had never actually done it before, and the keywords you use in that situation were entirely new to me. I felt really dumb for a while. But I got used to it. [laughs]

Do you guys also speak Japanese or have you just started learning since you moved here?

CM: I learned Japanese before, I lived here about ten years ago to go for an internship and I’ve been studying since then but my Japanese is never as focused as Jetha. I spent a little bit of time at university, like a couple of modules. But when you’re not in Japan it’s hard to drive yourself and when you’re here, there’s one Japanese person. Previously we had a couple of others. But the main language is English so my Japanese definitely didn’t improve as fast as, like I’d see people start in the Frontroom after me and their Japanese level would shoot up and mine wouldn’t because there’s was no need to talk to anyone except for the guy at a conbini (convenience store). My Japanese is passable but it’s definitely not where I’d like it to be.

PM: I could speak. Before joining Vitei, I was in Japan for a bit so I got used to chatting. I’d say with Chris we have roughly the same level. When I was interacting with the Frontroom people when they’re Japanese, I was speaking Japanese. So it’s really useful for friendly conversations with colleagues. So if you can’t speak Japanese, it’s kind of difficult in the Frontroom to just make friends and feel normal there. So every time there’s a Japanese person, I do speak Japanese with them and if it’s a friend then it’s in English.

I’ve talked with a couple of other foreign employees in different companies and they’ve said that sometimes they’ve had troubles with the Japanese or communicating with their colleagues and stuff like that.

PM: I felt really, really nice to be able to speak Japanese there because you feel part of the thing. It’s weird to be in a country and not speak the language and fit it.

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