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 6 — Escaping Nintendo’s Shadow

One of the last questions I’d like to ask you guys is about the promotion of the Backroom. A lot of people, frankly, don’t know that you guys exist.

CM: That is very true [laughs]

How are you trying to get the word out?

JC: We’ve been very stealthy. It’s mostly been an unwritten policy, hasn’t it Chris? We don’t really…

CM: Don’t talk about the Backroom! [laughs]

PM: Do you mean the Backroom or Vitei as a whole?

Vitei generally.

CM: Especially the Backroom.

JC: Vitei generally… I guess as the Backroom is part of Vitei…

PM: It’s easy! The answer is really easy!

Giles’ interview will be published tomorrow.

I talked to Giles…

JC: The answer is that Vitei is Giles, and Giles doesn’t like talking about himself. [laughs]

PM: It’s easy, Giles doesn’t like interviews! [laughs]

[laughs] He was saying that with the Frontroom, it’s because Nintendo would rather people not know the Frontroom exists, so he had that feeling even when he started the Backroom.

CM: There was no real reason for anyone to know about Vitei, just because it was always second-party Nintendo games so Nintendo did all of the advertising and everything. I think some of it is definitely because Giles is quite a quiet, reserved guy, but with [the Frontroom], it’s like ‘why do I need to tell people about the company?’, because the company exists to make Nintendo games. Since the Backroom exists, that’s…it’s an opportunity we haven’t quite grasped. [laughs]

JC: We have a Twitter account, @ViteiBackroom, that we’ve been trying to keep active since the last BitSummit.

PM: Backroom is really starting to advertise itself, because Backroom is self-driven, whereas Vitei Frontroom, because with Giles… If the company’s going well, why would he advertise, if it’s not in his personality to do that? Backroom is a bit different because it’s the sum of a few people.

CM: I think it’s really interesting that because it’s so small, everybody has to get involved. Jetha does a lot of the Tweeting. Peter, who’s not here, sadly he does a lot of the Tweeting… Not sadly he does a lot of the Tweeting, sadly he’s not here!

Everyone: [laughs]

CM: Sadly he’s not here!

JC: I log in on a Monday morning and go ‘Oh Peter, what have you done!’ [laughs]

CM: He’s very good at public-facing, he’s such a nice, friendly, wonderful guy. If he was here this interview would be like ten times better! [laughs]

JC: Oh yeah, definitely.

CM: Everybody’s learning together. For me, it’s especially interesting because it’s something I’ve never had to do before. It’s a real learning process, but it’s good, it’s interesting. Hopefully doing things like this interview will help out a bit. From now on, especially now that we’re trying to make and sell our own games, we really need to work that out.

PM: To have a name.

CM: Yeah, and as I’m sure you know, you need people to know about you to buy your games, and there’s almost no point in selling a game unless people don’t know about you.

You’d definitely need to create some buzz about it.

CM: If we took Paper Garden or A Tiny Escape for example, and went upstairs and put it on Steam right now, no one would buy it. Not because they’re not good games – they’re great games – but no one would know and we don’t have enough avenues to get the word out. I think maybe my mum would buy it, and maybe [Pauline and Jetha’s] mums would buy it, but beyond that, pushing it and getting that critical mass is really, really difficult. I guess that’s why the big companies spend the same amount on marketing as they do on making a game. We just have to learn how to do that.

Definitely connecting with journalists, like – I don’t want to toot my own horn – but like myself and others.

JC: I was going to say, this sounds like a very self-serving argument!

Everyone: [laughs]

I think you guys should just invite me more often. [laughs] I might even start taking snacks from your fridge!

JC: As long as you leave the money for the lady. And so long as you don’t take my favorites!

I think that’s interesting, as I’ve been learning how to market myself as well, because I started my website about three years ago. It’s definitely something you have to learn.

CM: You have to learn and you have to never stop doing it. We started doing a lot, especially after the first BitSummit that I was at with The Modern Zombie Taxi Driver.

Was that BitSummit 2014?

CM: I think it was ‘14. Is that right? We did Paper Garden this year, last year we did A Tiny Escape and the year before we did Fractures, then Zombie Taxi. So yeah, it was four years ago.

PM: We’re in 2017, so it would have been 2013.

CM: Whenever it was, we did as much as we could, especially after we won the award. We were talking to everyone we could, meeting journalists. Then we started a contract with Sony and it went quiet because we were all busy. Then we were almost starting from square one on trying to get the word out again because we hadn’t done it for so long.

Party at Vitei Backroom!