The working title "The Last Stand" had been taken by someone else. The problem: Hidden Path hadn't named the game yet. It wanted quality games to announce at the 2007 Game Developers Conference as part of its then-new Xbox Live Arcade program. Defense Grid, built by the men who worked at Microsoft's Advanced Technology Group and who made sure Xbox games played and looked better on Xbox than anywhere else, would be one of the most highly produced downloadables on Xbox. The extra money was to be put into producing and polishing the game, potentially making it a premium offering for its Xbox Live lineup. It was a downloadable title being developed for twice what downloadable titles normally cost to make at the time. The concept for the game was bold and brash. The founders had deep connections to Microsoft, so they pitched them a distribution deal: Hidden Path would make the game, Microsoft would distribute it on Xbox Live. It begins after they'd begun making Defense Grid and pitched the game to their contacts at Microsoft. The story begins in 2007, shortly after Jeff Pobst, Mark Terrano, Michael Austin, Jim Garbarini and Dave McCoy founded Hidden Path. And Hidden Path had struck out to do it right out of the gate. It's why people make anybody's games at all: to eventually make their own.
DEFENSE GRID 2 SAVE GAME HOW TO
Hidden Path had poured all the money it could spare into a small project to make an original game: Defense Grid, a downloadable sci-fi tower defense title that it could call its own and that would prove Hidden Path was a company that knew how to make games. That was the message, delivered by Microsoft in the summer of 2008, just a few months before the game's planned release. It is the dark, very human and ultimately political underbelly of the business of making fun.ĭefense Grid was dead. It is a glimpse into the fickle world of business and politics that simmers underneath the buzz and excitement of making video games. This story could be about almost any game you've ever played and several hundred you never will. It's about a last minute save and a triumph that ultimately came at too great a cost.Īnd the most extraordinary thing about this story is that it's not extraordinary at all. It's the story of how Defense Grid almost went into the coffin before it ever saw the light of day and the machinations at the highest levels of the industry that conspired to close the lid. It involves a deal gone bad and a partner that couldn't be relied upon. It involves two big companies and one little one. And the people who screwed them before might be the ones now paying the bills. Even when a game or a studio fails, the people involved might still find another job. Those stories are too harmful to tell because this is business, and there are reputations to protect.
Many of the best stories in this industry don't ever get told - the true stories of why studios fail, how people lose jobs or gain them. Some studios lumber on for years, making games, releasing them, losing money, until inevitability eventually catches up to them and they die. Sometimes game development is just spinning your wheels, waiting for the big hit that almost never comes. Sometimes they cost so much to make they never make that money back. What's worse, a game that does get shipped doesn't always make money. The work put in on one game may lead to new work on something else, bigger or better. Technology can be retooled, assets redirected, entire ideas shelved and then resurrected years later. A game that doesn't ship isn't always a failed game. Part of why the founders don't tell this story relates to the business of making video games itself. They've simply not wanted to talk about it - on or off record. And yet, month after month, the story of what exactly happened with the launch of the original Defense Grid has eluded me. I've been in rooms where even certain members of that team aren't allowed. I've interviewed every member of the Defense Grid 2 team. I've read all of the design documents and industry reports. I've been reporting on the development of Hidden Path's Defense Grid 2 since April of 2013. headquarters, it's the one thing that they haven't offered to share with me - until now. In fact, in almost a year of building trust, conducting closed-door interviews, attending all-access meetings and spending hours on site at Hidden Path Entertainment's Bellevue, Wash. The founders of Hidden Path Entertainment tell the story now only rarely.
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