From Boss Sprite to Loveable Clown Part 1: An Interview with Jay Tholen on Dropsy
In order for Indiellect to be a true place for all things indie gaming, I knew that it was best to go straight to the source. I wanted to actually interview indie developers and ask them about their stories. I wanted to ask them why they make games, and to ask them to share their knowledge. In this way, my writing can encourage other aspiring indie developers to boldly take their next step in development.
The First Inside Look
For my first post in my “Inside Look” category, I decided to interview someone in the indie gaming community in Orlando. I was fortunate to have a chance to interview Jay Tholen, himself, before he whisked away to Germany, the mind behind the ingenious and sublime point-and-click Drospy. Initially, I was introduced to the game Dropsy from a presentation by Jay Tholen himself at Indienomicon, the local meet up for indie gamers in the Orlando area. I immediately took to his game because of its retro feel and my personal love of the point-and-click genre.
I quickly jumped on the opportunity to connect with him and interview him. I was given a Humble Bundle that contained Dropsy and asked him if I could interview him when I finished playing his game first.
The Interview
I approached Jay Tholen over Twitter about an interview, telling him that I was just starting out as a blogger with content about indie game development. He was happy to answer a few questions for us, to tell us the inspiration for Drospy and finally to give advice to aspiring indie game developers.
EV: “How did you know you wanted to make games? Did you always know you wanted to make games?”
JT: “The desire really kicked in for me at age 10, in somewhere around 1997, when our family bought our first computer. I found a demo of Klik & Play (very early software similar to Game Maker) on a Sim Tower CD, and eventually joined the internet community around the program when my parents finally caved on getting internet access.”
EV: “Why do you prefer pixel art as a medium for your games?”
JT: “Pixel art is really just what I’m good at. I’ve been doing it for nearly 20 years and have probably lost the ability to perform half as well in any other visual medium. Hopefully pixel art doesn’t cycle completely out of popularity because I feel like a dumb baby when I pick up a pencil. I should probably practice more.”
EV: “How big was the team that completed Dropsy?”
JT: “For the first ~3 years it was just me. The team grew in mid 2014 when Jesse and David (from A Jolly Corpse) offered to help when my on-deck programmer ran into some personal issues. We had a core three-person development team from then on. David did the programming while Jesse did most of the NPC animations and acted as project manager. Acacia Lawson also contributed some wireframe animation work for Dropsy himself, and Chris Schlarb put an immense amount of thought and skill into the game’s soundtrack. Towards the end I contracted a few folks to help finish three or four of the backgrounds that were incomplete.”
EV: “How did you pick your team?”
JT: “I knew the A Jolly Corpse guys from my time in the aforementioned Klik community, where I learned about making games as a teenager. We ended up working together really well.”
“Chris Schlarb made a few sweet albums that I enjoyed so I made him do the Dropsy album too.”
EV: “How did you first conceive the story idea of Dropsy?”
JT: “Dropsy actually started out as a boss sprite in a zombie game that I made in my junior year of high school. I ended up scrapping the game, but I found Dropsy too interesting to just leave him languishing in some forgotten folder.”
“He was re-purposed as the star of his own ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ thread on the Something Awful forums in 2008. The community ended up forming the basis for Dropsy’s character: his childlike naiveté, his simple good-naturedness, and his desire to hug everything and everyone. The posters there loved him and would occasionally ask me when a full Dropsy game would emerge, so from 2010ish I started nailing down the lore that’d eventually form the basis of the game.”
EV: “What made you push to share Dropsy with the world?”
JT: “I had two primary motivations. I definitely saw Dropsy as my way out of my almost decade long telemarketing ‘career’. As a high school dropout with no college/university experience, I was thoroughly convinced that I’d never do something I liked for a job. At around the time I started working on the game, media using pixel art suddenly became something that people spent money on again. That was nice.”
“My second motivation is a spiritual and ideological one. There was no denying that Dropsy, outside of his obvious lack of good looks, had some sort of developmental disorder. Designing a game protagonist around this went from inconvenient to possibly one of the most exciting aspects of the project. I love what the game says about inherent human value. I like that Dropsy sees the good in those who can’t see any in him and overcomes obstacles almost purely through kind of selfless actions.”
EV: “What is Dropsy’s Myers Briggs Type (MBT)?”
JT: “I’d definitely call him extroverted; he loves the people around him and wants to show them they are loved. He’s very intuitive and feelings-oriented, and he prefers to watch what’s going on around him rather than quickly forming an opinion. So ENFP would probably describe him fairly well.”
EV: “What is the true message of Dropsy?”
JT: “There are lots of messages I think. A big one is “love your neighbor,” and maybe even a little “love your enemy.” Love, in the game as in real life, is a powerful force for good. Instead of enemies suffering crushing defeat or death, they discover that you’re not the monster they took you for and become your ally. This concept is a lot less naive than people think, and I think it goes untested way too often. Especially when political and ideological lines are drawn between people.”
EV: “Is this message something you feel is important to convey to your audience? Why do you want to convey that message?”
JT: “It’s definitely important. I’m not sure how much people will garner from a clown adventure game, but I’d love it if people took something good away.”
EV: “What advice can you give to aspiring game developers (like me) who want to get into independent game development?”
JT: “Don’t stop making stuff. If you’re making games by yourself or with a small team, your first few games will probably be pretty bad. You won’t think that until a bit later, but it’s true. Keep going and don’t stop! Don’t make one project your big make-it-or-break-it because that can potentially destroy you.”
EV: “What games do you enjoy playing and look up to?”
JT: “My favorite game is Earthbound. I love that it’s written from a naive kid’s point of view, and you get items like yo-yos and baseball bats and hamburgers. I haven’t played many games in the last few years other than the ones I’m working on, to be honest. I’ve enjoyed Shovel Knight and the new DOOM most recently. Gang Beasts has been lots of fun on local multiplayer.”
EV: “Do you have a favorite console?”
JT: “I think the NES is my favorite console, though it’s very nearly tied with SNES. It’d probably be something else but my newest is a GameCube.”
EV: “What is the future of your game development endeavors?”
JT: “A Dropsy update is in production, but it’s currently on a bit of a hiatus while one of our guys recovers from a pretty hard personal loss. We’d love to do a sequel at some point. I’m currently doing some background art and the soundtrack for a game called Monster Extermination Co. by Jesse, my Dropsy cohort. Also working on a sweet little versus puzzle/platformer with my friend Theory, and a new game tentatively titled Hypnospace Outlaw.”
Conclusion
Dropsy is an incredibly thoughtful and engaging point-and-click game. Its message of loving others and loving your enemy is a rare subject for video games. Love, as Jay mentioned, is a powerful force for good and the beauty of this game’s message is definitely worth experiencing for yourself.
If you would like to learn more about the actual game, stay tuned for the part two of this post, my game review on Dropsy. In the meantime you can purchase Dropsy on Steam and give it a go for yourself. It was a pleasure interviewing Jay Tholen, and I hope my part two game review of this post really inspires others to try out Dropsy and learn from the storytelling, design and style of Dropsy.
If you want to learn more about the Orlando indie gaming scene, feel free to check out Indienomicon at http://www.indienomicon.com.
For now indiellectuals, over and out!
