在一个房间里 深度优先游戏 团队就像一群兄弟. 他们开玩笑，互相挑剔, but they are undoubtedly a family; a family that is able to work hard 和 support each other to achieve their dreams.

深度优先游戏 is an independent game studio founded in 2010 by 游戏设计 Department Chair 和 Course Director Ricardo Aguiló, 游戏设计课程主任Juan Sánchez, 和 游戏开发学士 毕业生Jon Schreiber(已离开公司). That initial team of three has grown into 13; the majority of whom are 满帆 grads, 或者教职员工 游戏设计学士 程序.

毕竟我之前在传统游戏行业工作过, 他们决定是时候做出改变了. The ability to self-publish a game opened the door for this new company; something that would’ve been unheard of just six years ago.

“深度优先游戏 was formed because we felt that our h和s were constantly tied [while working for a third party company],里卡多说。. “我们觉得我们可以把游戏做得更好, but we were always getting pushback from the publishers [due to deadlines 和 budgets], 这限制了我们的创造力.”

The most impressive part about this team is that they published two complete games while also working full-time jobs, something that Ricardo highly encourages for anyone interested in getting into the indie industry.

“如果你想创建一家独立工作室，不要将其作为唯一的收入来源. You’re not going to make games that compete with triple-A titles; that’s not what it’s about. It’s about finding these niches that don’t have a bunch of people targeting them. Your focus shouldn’t be to make a financially viable product (it’s great if you do) but your focus should be making good games.”

Gelatennis (适用于Android和Windows手机)是他们在2012年发布的第一款游戏, 和 is a high-scoring game reminiscent of Pong where the objective is to keep the most balls alive for the longest possible time. 拉力直升机于2015年在PlayStation 4上发布，是一款激烈的游戏, physics-driven, 直升机比赛经验. 这两款游戏都是使用Unity游戏引擎创建的.

对于独立游戏来说，深度优先游戏并没有传统的工作室设置. 每个成员都在各自的项目中工作, 和 when it’s time to focus on a major game integration or quality assurance testing, 这只是在胡安的房子(又名“制作办公室”)外完成的。. 为了保持项目和沟通的最新状态, 该团队使用Trello等网站, 谷歌驱动, 和Bitbucket都.

The indie game industry is the perfect place to explore different areas of a project that you may not have the opportunity to experience in a traditional studio. “If you’re a person who is content with working for someone else 和 just doing one job for many years of your life, 那很好. 作为一名艺术家在传统工作室工作之后, 我的工作就是从事与艺术家有关的项目. 当我下班回家后，我想制作自己的游戏, 我不会接受“我不知道该怎么做”这样的回答.胡安说。. Juan’s team lovingly refers to him as a “unicorn” because he is not only an artist, 同时也是一个程序员.

“如果你在做自己的事情, 你对这个项目的方方面面都充满热情. 如果我在为不同的知识产权持有者工作, I have to find something that I can get passionate about just so that I can get excited about waking up in the morning to go to work. But working on my own stuff is exciting all the time,” adds Course Director Fern和o De La Cruz.

游戏产业并非一帆风顺, 和 the 深度优先游戏 team unanimously names finishing a game as the biggest hurdle they face. “一个项目的最后10%需要付出90%的努力,副课程主任费尔南多·里维拉说. “It’s easiest to work on a game in the beginning because it’s new 和 things are changing all of the time; it’s exciting. Eventually those changes become smaller 和 less frequent 和 the focus shifts to things like fixing bugs 和 technical requirements checklists.”

“对你正在做的事情充满激情是很重要的, 但与此同时，在你所做的事情中找到激情也是很重要的. When you’re sitting around doing TPS reports 和 other boring aspects of the game development cycle, you have to find that passion somewhere so that you can push through that last 10 percent,副课程主任马克·布朗补充道.

营销也是独立游戏面临的另一个障碍, 因为光靠口口相传是不够的, 课程主任贾斯汀·加洛说. 深度第一游戏利用他们的 脸谱网 和 推特 accounts to announce new content, 和 also publishes their press kits on gamepress.com.

In order to overcome these struggles 和 be successful, the foundation for this studio is clear. “You need to find like-minded people who you can trust 和 like as people to work with. 你会陷入艰难的对话, you’re going to be passionate about things; all types of weird things are going to happen during the indie development cycle, 你必须和这些人好好相处,贾斯汀说.

“除了友谊之外，还必须有尊重，”马克补充道.

The indie industry is a good place to check your ego at the door, says Course Director Keyvan Acosta. “制作游戏并没有什么秘诀. 在学校, you will accelerate your wisdom 和 gain experience 和 counseling in addition to technical skills. 您将通过协作学习更好的实践.” An easy way to build up your portfolio 和 practice your skills outside of the classroom is to work on mods for existing games, 表明里卡多.

“如果你发现自己在玩《十大菠菜台子》，然后停下来说, “我得去做点什么,’那么你的处境很好,贾斯汀说.

展望未来, 深度优先游戏将在欧洲PlayStation 4上发行《十大菠菜台子》, 在Steam上也有. 他们还在与索尼合作开发一些原型机, 其中一个是Rally Copters的虚拟现实版本.

深度优先游戏的完整团队如下:

• Keyvan Acosta – 游戏设计学士 Course Director 和 游戏开发学士 研究生
• 里卡多Aguiló -游戏设计学士系主任和课程主任, 游戏开发本科及以上学历 游戏设计硕士 研究生
• Mark Brown – 游戏设计学士 Course Director 和 游戏开发学士 研究生
• Fern和o De La Cruz – 游戏设计学士 Course Director 和 游戏开发学士 研究生
• 马修·弗拉塞蒂 创意写作学士 游戏设计硕士毕业
• 贾斯汀加洛-游戏设计学士课程主任, 游戏开发本科及游戏设计硕士毕业
• Justin Murphy – 游戏开发学士 Lab Specialist 和 游戏开发学士 研究生
• 安德鲁·奥康纳-游戏设计学士的副课程主任和 游戏艺术学士 研究生
• Andreas Phillips – 游戏设计学士 Lab Specialist 和 游戏开发学士 研究生
• Fern和o Rivera -游戏设计学士副课程主任
• Juan Sánchez – 游戏设计学士 Course Director 和 游戏艺术学士 研究生
• 赖安- 录音艺术学士 研究生
• Lee Wood – 游戏设计学士 Program Director 和 游戏开发学士 研究生