A few days ago the lovely man pictured above was kind enough to take the time and conduct an interview with me. For those of you who don’t know him, Derek Yu is the independent game developer who’s worked on games like Quibble Race, Trigger Happy, and Eternal Daughter, among others. People slurp up the words of big time developers like spaghetti-Os, but it was really a nice change of pace to find out what drives and excites the little guy.

4cr: Okay, we’ll start with a generic question. Can you give a brief background of yourself?

Derek: Sure - I’m a 23-year old freelance artist living in the Bay Area… er, I like games!

4cr: Awesome. So how long have you been making games? When did you first realize that this is something that you would enjoy doing?

Derek: I guess I’ve been actually making games since around junior highschool. Gad, is that like 1994 or something? I started designing them a lot earlier. It was sometime shortly after the NES came out that I first got interested. Before that I was mainly into He-Man and MUSCLE… basically a lot of muscular men in toy form.

4cr: Awesome, me too! But purely in a hetero way, I liked He-Man, but I didn’t like him like him.

Derek: Yeah, um, me too! *looks around*

4cr: So you say you got into it shortly after the NES. Was it because that system inspired you to make games?

Derek: I’d say so. I mean, my parents owned an Atari, but I think the NES is what really made me want to make my own games. You know, it was a magical thing.

Shigeru Miyamoto was more important to me than Santa Claus as a kid. Santa was like Miyamoto’s bitch in my mind… just bringing the games for the big man.

4cr: Yeah, I could tell you were a big Shiggy fan after reading that short comic you made.

Derek: Yeah, I think he’s great. Not just the games, but it seems like his outlook on life is wonderful.

4cr: He sure is happy all the time.

Derek: Haha, yeah, well, I think that being happy is important. But yeah, maybe he does drugs, too.

4cr: He must’ve gotten the idea of using mushrooms as power ups from somewhere. So how do you come up with ideas for games? Is there a creative process where you say ‘I want to make this game using this style’ or does inspiration just come to you randomly?

Derek: Hmmm, well it’s tough. I try to look all around me, look at games I enjoy (mainly older ones).

Sadly, I always have to keep in mind that I’m going to have limited time and resources to develop games. That’s why most of my games are quite simple. It’s easy to be ‘too inspired’ by a certain game or genre. You know, you play a game you like, and then you want to make a game like it… but then add a twist or gimmick. I try to draw inspiration from other places (which is easier than it sounds).

4cr: Like what other places?

Derek: Oh, I don’t know, anything - movies, books, music, bugs, my friends, cheese… Something to give the game character.

4cr: Haha, nothing says character like cheese.

Derek: Some great ideas have come about over cheese. Cheese itself is a great idea.

I don’t know, I’m over-romanticizing my game development process. For the most part, a game idea just comes to me. Then, you know, I just try to make it fun.

4cr: So after you have an idea in your head, how long does it usually take for you to flesh it out into a working game? Does the development time vary greatly between each game or do you try to keep it in a certain timeframe?

Derek: Usually, when I first get an idea, I can’t contain myself and I go to work right away on it. I’m really impatient and I hate planning. Then, either the idea is good and I go with it, or (more likely) it’s bad and I scrap it. I’ve got plenty of unfinished projects. And yes, the development time varies greatly. Eternal Daughter took two years, and some of my other games (co-developed with Jon Perry) have been hammered out in a weekend. These days I’m on my own for the most part, so development takes longer generally.

4cr: What was the first game you made?

Derek: I guess the original Quibble Race is the first “real” game I made. Before that I made some simple text games, but I barely remember them.

4cr: Do you know about how many games you’ve created in total?

Derek: That I’ve actually released? I can’t say for sure… probably like a dozen.

4cr: You said you often look to older games for inspiration, why not look at newer games? Do you feel that gameplay has been traded in for better graphics in recent years?

Derek: No, not really. And I definitely enjoy new games. I do think that the limits imposed on game developers of yore forced them to be more creative, both artistically and with gameplay.

When you’ve got the capability to render photo-realistic graphics and do true 3d, you kind of just keep going in that direction. One of the main reasons I look to older games is because I don’t have those capabilities. That is, I’m limited in my resources as an indie developer. Also, since I grew up in the NES generation, I tend to look upon those games with more fondness.

4cr: If you ever had the chance would you take a job making commercial games or do you think you would lose too much creative freedom with that?

Derek: My biggest fear is that to get to the point where I’d have as much creative freedom as I’d like, I’d have to be the lackey of someone with bad ideas.

I’m too accustomed to having my way or working with people who see eye-to-eye with me. I feel like that doesn’t happen too often in the real world, though. So I guess it would depend a lot on who I’d get to work with.

4cr: Is there a dream company or developer in specific that you would love to work for?

Derek: Haha, hmmm… well, I’ve had my eye on Doublefine for a while now…

That’s Tim Schafer’s current company - they just released Psychonauts, which I really loved. One of the few gaming jobs that I’d love to have, other than be Miyamoto’s personal manservant.

4cr: Haha, get in line for the latter one.

Derek: Hehe!

4cr: What would you say is your favorite indie game?

Derek: Hmmm… Cave Story is probably the most obvious answer. But I feel that anyone would say that. Let me think… I’m really bad at naming ‘favorites’.

There’s also this really old “Click” game that always stuck in my mind. I think it was called ‘Sword of Cobalt’ or something. It was this RPG that was really short and kinda junky, but it just had this… ‘feeling’ to it. I don’t know, it’s hard to explain. The game had a lot of heart, I felt.

4cr: What is your favorite commercial game? Or favorites?

Derek: Zelda 3 is probably my all-time favorite.

4cr: A Link to the Past?

Derek: That’s right.

Damn, that first part, when you wake up in the middle of the night and you have to walk around in the rain… It’s pretty intense for a young kid who loved the original game.

4cr: Would you say Zelda is your favorite game series?

Derek: Yeah, I probably would. Although it’s really just the first and the third games I really loved. It’s not just the games, but the experiences I had with the games.

Zelda 1 I played together with my dad, and I remember us making maps and stuff. I guess it’s like the way a less geeky person might feel about baseball if they remembered playing catch all the time with their pops. (Although I did play catch occasionally with my dad, too.)

4cr: Haha, sure you did.

Derek: No, really!

4cr: Uh huh, moving on…

Derek: Well, only when the NES was broken.

4cr: Haha, of course. Going outside is the last resort for all of us geeks.

You speak so fondly of the older games from your childhood, but right now we’re preparing for the lastest wave of videogame technology. Is there any new system coming out that you’re really looking forward to?

Derek: Yeah, actually, I’m looking forward to all the big ones: PS3, Xbox 360, Revolution…

I plan on living vicariously through all my friends who buy them! Seriously though, I’m not sure I’ll have time to enjoy them myself. But no, of course the technology and new ideas all really excite me, however much I’ll always be into the oldies.

4cr: Okay, final question. Are you left or right handed?

Derek: Righty’s the one for drawing, mouse-clicking, pressing the buttons on gamepads, throwing baseballs when the NES is broken, and he gets all the ladies, too.

But really, it wouldn’t be the same without Lefty, so I can’t dog ‘im too much. Righty can’t do everything himself.

4cr: Yeah, it’s like playing a coop game. They both have their uses, huh?

Derek: Yeah, Lefty hits the tab key on the keyboard.

4cr: Haha, of course

Derek: Although strangely enough, Righty hits the Escape key. I guess it’s an important task, so I don’t trust Lefty to do it.

4cr: Haha. So is there anything else you would like to say before we wrap this up?

Derek: Yes!
1. This interview made me feel like an old fogie.
2. I’m working on another game right now!
That’s all.

4cr: Oh, exciting. Can’t wait to see the new game.

Derek: It’s just something small, but it should be fun.

4cr: Well thanks for your time and we’ll keep an eye out for that new game.

Derek: Hey, thanks!

I had a lot of fun talking to this guy and after the interview was over he was even kind enough to give me advice on playing Eternal Daughter. Thanks a lot Derek!

DerekYu.com is his personal domain where you can view his art and follow links to his games, but he also runs the extremely useful website TIGsource.com which always has the lastest news and reviews from the independent gaming circle.