作者：Craig Chapple

去年六月，Sega宣称将在Racing Studio的灰烬中成立在英国第三家公司。

今年1月Sega Hardlight问世，并专注于为Vita创造一款独特的行动冒险游戏。

在接受Develop的独家访问中，Sega Hardlight工作室管理者Sion Lenton描述了是哪些人组成了其强大的团队，他们是如何离开Vita（至少是现在）并转向iOS，Android和Windows开发数字游戏。

Sion Lenton(from iab)

现在Sega Hardlight团队中有哪些人？

Hardlight是由一个小型但却敏捷的数字开发团队所组成，我们严格把控着创造性与质量。虽然我并不推崇“精品工作室”这一词，但看看我们的情况，待在西米德兰兹郡（游戏邦注：英国英格兰中部的一个郡）的农村中的一间古老的庄园内，我们就是这样的存在。

Hardlight是由Chris Southall（前SEGA Europe & America的技术总监）组建并运行的。

团队是由来自各个学科的开发者所组成，他们中的大多数都拥有10年以上的开发经验，不管是在物理还是数字平台上。

其中的一些人是来自最初2005年Sega Rally团队，也有些人是来自Sega的R&D团队，而剩下的则是为创造高质量产品并面向各种智能设备发行，同时提供给像《索尼克：释放》，《索尼克世嘉全明星赛车》，《帝国：全面战争》，《魔兵惊天录》和《征服》等游戏支持而特别招聘的。

结果便是他们具有很快的执行速度。我需要等上几周，甚至几个月的时间才能尝试一些新功能的日子已经一去不复返了，现在我只需要几天的时间便能够看到新功能。

我们的主要目标是利用Sega现有的出色IP并针对现代数字设备创造新作品，这也意味着不存在虚拟的控制者。

你们雇佣了多少员工？

我们现在拥有21名固定员工。这会随着约雇人员和四至八个月数字游戏开发的短期循环而波动着。这让我们能够不断调整团队去面对更多不同的产品。

现在我们的目标是保持Hardlight的小规模，但是我敢保证随着时间的发展我们将不断进行扩展，并基于成功的产品继续发展。

你们是否还在招聘员工？明年你们计划面向哪些岗位招多少名员工？

是的，我们的确如此。与此同时我们对于明年的计划是在寻找一些主要岗位成员的同时基本保持同样的团队规模。我们不仅在寻觅工程人员和设计人员，同时我们也需要QA支持人员。他们不仅会参与传统的漏洞测试，同时还会检验原型机制和初步构建。

我们投入了很多努力于原型创造中，在承受着短时间内创造出功能并明确某些内容是否可行或真正重要的压力之前，我们中的许多人已经付出了许多。

所以最终我们能够拥有最出色的团队去执行工作。每个人都有望为团队做出富有创造性的贡献，这也是在小团队中应该出现的情况。

我们希望工程师们能够不断提出问题去挑战设计师与美术人员—-反之亦然。这让我们能够不断努力成为真正成熟的开发团队。

为什么你决定加入Sega Hardlight成为工作室管理者？

在花了几年时间在无数项目中管理团队规模并因此花费了数百万英镑后，我觉得自己需要做出改变。

不管是在数值方面还是在创造性方面，手机市场都快速赶超着传统主机市场。这比创造另外一款FPS或赛车游戏更让我兴奋。

而Hardlight刚好提供给我机会去探索这一领域，我们的团队较小且非常敏捷，足以去探索这些新理念。我们的开发实践也允许我们在合理的时间范围内创新理念，而这一切在几年前都是难以想象得到的。

关于这一点最棒的一件事便是我们可以舍弃那些不可行的想法并继续向前行走。另外我们还可以利用Sega的一些出色IP，并拥有从头开始面向手机设备创造内容的机会。

致力于这些数字游戏的另外一个优势便是你可以了解人们体验你的游戏的许多细节，不管是他们是否略过了过场动画，还是他们尝试着完成一个特定的挑战多少次等等。

这些信息对于了解玩家的实际行动而非他们的想法至关重要，并且还能帮助我们不断开发并完善玩家手上的内容。

当你着眼于智能手机市场时，你会发现单单在2012年第二季度便出现了4.06亿款智能手机，之前季度的数值也差不多。

所以很显然，我需要为此做出改变。当你可以基于较少的成本去接触到数十亿用户并创造全新品牌时，你又有何理由花费数千万去瞄准一百万用户，或者说是主机用户？

你们的工作室瞄准了哪些平台？你们是否只会专注于数字或盒装零售？

Hardlight是一间数字工作室，这也是Sega近来专注于开发全新数字内容所创造的结果。

我们主张跨平台机制，即面向iOS，Android，Windows和其它OS创造游戏（专注于手持设备）—-尽管我们刚刚创造了The Creative Assembly的《Viking：Battle for Asgard》的PC版本，而在工作室从技术支持转向多种业务的过程中我们获得了一些额外的资源。

作为Sega的一部分，我们与所有第一方都维持着很好的关系，所以我们能够即时获得所有最新的硬件和软件，并判断那些才是对我们有帮助的。

工作室的主要关注点是放在哪里？你们是否会专注于特别的类型/授权，如赛车游戏？

这一问题并不是“我们将做些什么，”而是“我们不会做些什么？”

我们并未计划将自己限制与一种类型中，我们希望能够探索更多理念并找寻能够真正鼓舞用户的机制。

我们面前有许多选择，我们刚刚开始尝试，现在的我们先从一些较小的内容做起，即利用Sega的IP，作为钱主机游戏开发者，我们需要不断学习如何在数字领域创造游戏。

当你看到我们的地图开发时，你将会发现更多对于Sega IP以及最初IP的使用。

你们工作室有何长期计划？它是否会成为Sega主要的UK工作室？

Sega与其UK工作室之间的关系处于不断发展中，Sports Interactive和The Creative Assembly证实了这点，Hardlight也不例外。

我们真的觉得自己处在创新与技术的边缘。这是一个让人兴奋的领域，这么多年来我第一次觉得自己可以传达一些足以让人们开心的体验。这真的很棒！

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Interview: Sega Hardlight

By Craig Chapple

Develop speaks to studio manager Sion Lenton on the developer’s ambitions in the digital space

Last June Sega announced it was opening a third UK branch from the ashes of its Racing Studio.

Revealed as Sega Hardlight in January this year, the developer was focused on creating a unique action adventure game exclusively for Vita.

In an exclusive interview with Develop, Sega Hardlight studio manager Sion Lenton describes who makes up the 21-strong outfit, and how it has moved away from Vita – at least for now – and into developing digital titles for iOS, Android and Windows.

Who is currently on the team at Sega Hardlight?

Hardlight is made up of a small, agile, digital development team who’s focus is on innovation and quality. I’m not a fan of the phrase “Boutique Studio” but in our case, located in an ancient manor house in the rural outback of the West Midlands, I guess it’s technically accurate!

Hardlight was formed and is run by Chris Southall (former chief technology officer for SEGA Europe & America).

The team is made up of a wide cross-section of developers from all disciplines, the majority of them with ten plus years of development experience on multiple physical and digital platforms.

Some of them are from the original 2005 Sega Rally team, some are from Sega’s R&D team, while the rest have been hired specifically with a view to creating high quality digital products distributed on a wide range of smart devices as well as providing support for various titles such as Sonic Unleashed, Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing, Empire: Total War, Bayonetta, Vanquish.

A a result of this is that they are fast, really fast. Gone are the days that I would have to wait weeks, even months to try out a new feature, now I just have to wait until Thursday.

Our overarching goal is to leverage the outstanding IP that Sega has and create new products crafted specifically for modern digital devices, this also means no virtual controllers!

How many staff do you employ?

We currently sit at 21 permanent staff. This fluctuates as a by-product of using contract staff & short cycles of four-to-eight months on digital titles. This allows us to dynamically adjust our team profile to handle multiple products.

The goal is to keep Hardlight small for now but I’m sure we will expand over time as we build upon a foundation of successful products.

Are you recruiting? How many employees are you targeting over the next year and in what positions?

Yes we are, whilst our plan for the next year is to remain at roughly the same size we are looking for some key positions. As well as engineering and design positions we are also looking for QA support staff. They will not only be involved in traditional bug testing but also reviewing prototype mechanics and preliminary builds.

We put a lot of effort into our prototypes, many of us have been burned before by being rushed and pressured to create features with little or no time spent to find out whether something will work and most importantly, if it will actually be fun.

We’ve tried to create an atmosphere that facilitates creativity and allows ideas to incubate and grow. In my opinion the key factor in a great studio culture is not about pinball machines or dogs riding around the office on Segways, it’s the staff you hire.

As a result we are very particular and take our time hiring to ensure we have the best team for the job. Everyone is expected to contribute creatively which is how it should be in small teams.

We expect our Engineers to constantly question and challenge our designers and artists – and vice versa. This allows us to strive for excellence and also mature and develop as a team.

Why did you decide to join Sega Hardlight as studio manager?

After spending the last few years managing team sizes in the hundreds on projects costing millions of pound I felt the need for change.

The mobile market is fast overtaking the traditional console market in both numbers and most importantly innovation. This excited me far more than making another FPS or driving game.

Hardlight offered the opportunity to innovate in this sector in ways I hadn’t dreamed, the teams are small, agile and completely open to new ideas. Our development practices allow us to innovate and prototype ideas in a timescale that was frankly unimaginable a few years ago.

The great thing about this is that we can throw away ideas that don’t work, fail fast and move on. On top of that we have some frankly amazing IP to play with in Sega’s catalogue, and an opportunity to build something from the ground up for mobile devices.

The other great thing about working on these digital titles is the astonishing level of detail you can harvest about the way people play your games, from whether they skip a cut scene to how many times they’ve tried to complete a particular challenge.

This information is vital in getting to the root of what gamers do as opposed to what they think and allows us to constantly develop and tweak the product once it’s in their hands, and in so many hands.

You look at the smartphone market and see that 406 million smart phones shipped in Q2 2012 alone, that figure is pretty consistent for the previous quarters as well.

It became obvious to me that it was time for a change. Why spend tens of millions trying to target a million or so console users when you can reach out to a billion users at a fraction of that cost and create something brand new?

What platforms is the studio focused on working on? And will you be focused on just digital or boxed retail as well?

Hardlight is a digital Studio, a philosophy that is reflected by Sega’s recent focus on developing new digital content.

We are multi-platform, producing titles for iOS, Android, Windows & other OS – with a focus towards hand-held devices – although we just produced a PC version of The Creative Assembly’s Viking: Battle for Asgard as we had some spare resource during the studio’s switch over from technical support groups across the business.

As part of Sega, we have great relations with all first parties so we are able to keep up to date on all the latest hardware and software that’s coming through and figure out how best we want to use it.

What will be the studio’s main focus? Will you be concentrating on a particular genre/franchise, such as racing?

The question isn’t “what are we going to do,” the question is “what aren’t we going to do?”

We have no plans to limit ourselves to one genre, our ethos is more exploration of ideas and finding mechanics that we feel will stimulate and excite our users.

We have a huge box of toys to play with and we’ve only just begun to play with them, we are starting fairly small, leveraging Sega IP and as former console developers, learning about making games in the digital space.

As you see our roadmap develop, you’ll see some more surprising & delighting uses of Sega IP, as well as original IP.

What are the plans for the studio in the long-term? Will this be a major UK studio?

SEGA’s relationship with its UK studios is one of developing excellence, Sports Interactive and The Creative Assembly are testaments to that philosophy and Hardlight will be no different.

We really do feel like we are at the cutting edge of innovation and technology. It’s an incredibly exciting place to be and for the first time in years I feel like I’m part of something that can really deliver experiences that make people smile. That rocks!(source:develop-online)