Why Did You Join Team Aurora?
Below is a brief narrative on why each of us at Team Aurora joined Team Aurora. We wanted to share our story or side of the coin with the rest of the community, friends, and fans alike! We hope you enjoy this post and feel free to comment or ask questions. We’ve got some exciting stuff coming up/out soon!
Jake “Tall-Kid” Jackson (Programmer):
Since the idea was first presented to me, I have been excited about being a part of an indie game development team. I never liked the idea of sitting in a cubicle for 50 hours a week while working on a game that I had no interest in at all. I always dreamed of being able to create games that weren’t quick releases designed to make the most money possible, but games that were actually new and fun to play. A game is a work of art and it should be treated as such. That’s why I was so excited when we decided to put our skills together to make a game that we actually wanted to spend time on. I knew that it would not only be a great learning experience, but also a fun and exciting project. I look forward to continuing this experience throughout the development process and to providing gamers with a game that was created with passion rather than greed.
Tom (Programmer):
I joined Team Aurora because I wanted more team experience creating games. For a while now I’ve been creating games by myself, usually doing the art, and on occasion I would hire an artist. That was the extent of my team experience. However, the real test for me was “Would I be able to work with other programmers who have different programming styles and experience than I?” Aside from the numerous team benefits, the project had a large enough scope as to where the Team could just pick it up and run with it, and all in all, have a great time! I wanted to see each and every one of us on Team Aurora prosper and achieve new levels in our skills, we are creating art, and are not main stream, and we make what we want because we want a game that’s fun and awesome!
Jesse (Programmer):
When the idea was first proposed to me to join a team of friends to make an independent game, I couldn’t have been more excited. I had always had an interest in making independent games and not adhering to the world of AAA titles. It seems that these days the big games are usually the least creative and are only developed to make as much money as possible, with as little risk as possible. It is the games that do something new and exciting that really grab my interest; the games that take the risk of being different from all the rest and not knowing whether gamers will like them or not. These inspire me to do the same – to take risks and do what is fun, not what is going to be the safest bet and produce the most money. With Team Aurora, everything is a learning experience. Even if our game does not become as successful as we want it to be, at least we all got a better understanding of what goes into creating an entire game – and that’s what really matters.
Bryan (Designer):
I thoroughly enjoy games. However, that is not all the drive needed to become a game developer. One needs to love games and everything that makes them what they are in order to enjoy making them. This is why I joined Team Aurora. I love everything about games. Much more to that, I enjoy developing games with a small group of my friends and making the games that we want to make. The experience of making a game like this is not just enjoyable, but is essential in stepping forward in the career of a game developer, not only for a AAA studio, but if we succeed with this team as well. Experience is a building block necessary to set a stable foundation for your abilities in the field. With a small team of my friends, rather than a large group of people I have just met, I can freely ask any, or all, of them what they think of my work and suggestions to make it better. With such a relatively small group there is a good amount of individuality. I enjoy developing games with my friends. I enjoy the experience. I enjoy being part of Team Aurora.
Jack (Community Manager / Programmer):
Indie game studios are our generation’s pirate radio stations. The classic triple-A companies that we have grown up with and that have imparted such a love for games in us have begun to grow stale, re-using old mechanics and concepts in order to appeal to the safe, predictable demographic. A formula for mainstream video game success has been determined, and as long as new games adapt that formula, they will never cease to make amazing profit. However, people who truly see games as an art form are dissatisfied with the current state of the game industry, and the desire for fresh content has catalyzed the independent games movement. Indie games provide the opportunity for truly passionate game developers to spread their ideas and create a new paradigm of creativity in the gaming medium, so that they can inspire further generations to love games the way they do instead of becoming disillusioned with generic war game after generic war game. In short, that is why I joined Team Aurora. The opportunity to do earnest work with my close friends in hopes of spreading our message and creating something truly unique is more than I could ever ask of a college degree, and so while I pursue my education at Champlain College, I’m honored to also be able to say that I’m part of an indie game team.
Jon (Designer):
Back when I was a small child, I would love to create my own card and board games. They were silly and rather simple but the process of taking my ideas and implementing them into a form people can play with and enjoy was what drove me to do it. In later years I got interested in computer animation. I eventually got into Blender, seeing as it was free. After playing around with that for a bit I found out that Blender had a game engine built into it. That’s what really sparked my interest in game design.
I joined Team Aurora because In my personal experience, good things usually come from innovation. Team Aurora exists because we think innovation is becoming scarce in the game industry. We would all like to work in an environment where we can throw our ideas at each other and create fun, innovative games. The people in Team Aurora feel the same way. Working like that is definitely where I want to be.
Ross (Designer):
Over the summer (summer of 2011) I had been talking to my friend Mony, who has been working with Island Officials doing sound work for their Nintendo DS games. We had been talking about how great it would be to start a game studio/company and make games the way we want to make them. At first it started as a “what if” and eventually turned into a “let’s do it!” I went off to college with the intentions of talking to my roommate and Team Aurora programmer Tom. In early October, Brett approached me and a couple of others with the idea of starting a game studio to create games that we would want to make/play. I instantly agreed and went about to ensure that this would take place. We had a meeting a week or so later and this is how Team Aurora formed. It has always been one of my dreams to start a game studio and become part of it. The fact that we can make whatever games we want, in as much or as little time as we want is amazing. I know that out of college within a large company I will not have nearly the amount of creative freedom that I do at Team Aurora. For this reason, I would like to see Team Aurora rise above just a college team and become an actual game studio that can contend with the likes of Team Meat or perhaps even greater! It would be a dream come true to realize Team Aurora as a major game studio in the future. Joining Team Aurora has been fun and challenging all at the same time, and I definitely want to stick with this team as long as possible. I have high hopes and high expectations for Team Aurora, but that is only because I know that we can accomplish them and become a force to be reckoned with!
Thanks guys for helping one of my dreams to come true! And thank you, readers and followers for sticking with Team Aurora!
~Ross Derham
