Warren Spector
Warren Spector
Warren Spector is an American role-playing and video game designer. He is known for creating games which give players a wide variety of choices in how to progress. Consequences of those choices are then shown in the simulated game world in subsequent levels or missions. He is best known for the critically acclaimed video game Deus Ex that embodies the choice and consequence philosophy while combining elements of the first-person shooter, roleplaying, and adventure game genres...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionGame Designer
Date of Birth2 October 1955
CountryUnited States of America
My first encounter with video games was pretty conventional. I was travelling with my parents - we used to take long cross country trips in the United States every summer - and we went into a restaurant where there happened to be a Pong machine, and I was... a lot of quarters went into that Pong machine, let's just say.
I was amazed at how the life of a freelancer differed from running a remote studio for another company. I thought I knew what I was doing in 2004 when I left Eidos because I had run Ion Storm Austin, which was my own independent studio. I had run a business unit inside Origin, but being part of a startup is crazy.
I kind of get a next-gen game machine, but competing for the home entertainment business? We'll see how that goes.
The basic idea for what became 'Epic Mickey' began at the Disney Think Tank.
I like Disney stuff. No-one looks at 'Toy Story' and says,' Oh, that's just for kids.' Why is it that games can only appeal to a certain audience, but movies and books - I mean, how many adults read 'Harry Potter?'
I'm a big believer in pushing things too far and forcing people to pull you back.
I have no interest in guys who wear armor and swing big swords.
I have never made a game that wasn't explicitly about empowering players to tell their own story.
I've got a PowerPoint deck that I use for internal presentations, and there's a slide on it that asks, 'What percentage of your game is combat versus exploration versus puzzle solving versus platforming,' and I refuse to answer that question.
I've got friends who are literally working alone on indie games that have no prospect of profit or commercial success. I've got guys working on iPhone games.
I've done a pretty good job of hitting 18-34-year-old males, and not such a good job of reaching kids. Disney has done a great job of reaching kids, but maybe not the 18-34-year-olds. I figure I can learn a lot from Disney, and maybe, I don't know, they can learn a lot from me.
Seriously, I don't know if people would really tell you this. But in my dream world, the people who work for you would say, 'Wow, I didn't know I could do that until I started working with that guy.'
The reason our games generate so much revenue is because we're stupid enough to charge $60 for a box or $50 for a download or something. You need used games because most people can't afford those prices.
Used games allow more people, specifically younger people, to become game fans because of the lower price point.