Monthly Membership
Game design is not a simple ten-to-six process. Good game design development happens at all sorts of times, in ten-minute chunks and ten-hour flights of inspiration in the middle of the night. It happens when you're playing, when you're watching, when you're resting, and sometimes when you're actually trying to get inspired! It's art -- even the business part is art -- and we account for that.
However, deadlines are deadlines. Give us a month, and we'll make something great. During the intro meeting and follow-up, we'll scope out a timeline and a plan. We have three different plans to choose from.
Small Projects
Something that takes a little bit of time over a four-week span, or a lot of time over two weeks. Some examples:
- Creating dozens of art descriptions for an existing game project.
- Creating dozens of card design concepts for an existing set of game mechanics.
- Doing an editing pass on a 40-page rulebook, a 150-card card set, a customer-facing game launch website, or other small but essential aspect.
- Doing a "vibe check" on a game project proposal. We can find its strengths and weaknesses, to make either the project better or your proposal better. (Or both!)
- Joining your playtest team to have an experienced external voice to act as a check against internal biases.
Medium Projects
Most projects fall into this category. These projects take a month of Nathan's time and have the priority over small projects and our internal prjects. Some examples:
- Perform a comprehensive review of a game project, no matter its current state.
- This is the best service we can provide - a fresh set of eyes with an understanding of the entire gamedev process.
- We'll deliver a SWOT analysis, breaking down your project's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities (for development), and threats (against the project from external factors).
- Anything from pre-alpha to post-launch, we'll pour through every aspect of design, business, player engagement, marketing, the whole thing or just the portions you choose.
- Create several game design concepts for your existing or licensed IP.
- With decades of experience working on licensed products -- FIFA, Star Wars, Star Trek, Magic: The Gathering, and WWE to name a few -- we know how to make great games that meet the needs of the license holder. We have also enhanced internal IPs with new projects.
- We will deliver design documents, detailing the thought processes and design concepts, as well as a prototype. Either playable prototypes of the game itself, card files or PDFs, or an abstraction of the game (for non-strategy projects).
Large Projects
First Pick Games can take on your large project. For these, you are acquiring the exclusive use of the entire studio team, and we can even pull in additional help as necessary. Almost any aspect of strategy game design and business development is available, let's talk through what you need and we'll make a custom quote.
After the project is complete, we will remain available to "service what we sell." If you have a quick question to follow up, jump into our Slack and we'll help you out straight away. If you need more in-depth assistance, our Ongoing Support membership is there to be the extra hand when you need it.
Let's Make A Great Game, Together
There is nothing quite like a great game, with a great plan to support it. We can help you get to the next step on your team's journey, no matter where you are. One 30-minute call might make all the difference.