If you've had trouble keeping up with the number of SingStar titles, it's because "by the end of the year, we'll have actually released 116 discs in four years," Tasmin Lucas, senior producer for Sony's SingStar franchise told professionals at the Paris Game Developers Conference on Monday.
One reason for such a staggering number of units is because consumers worldwide demanded that more versions of the competitive singing game: "'We need more songs, and we need more localized content,'" they'd say.
It's a lot of work for a 15-person London-based development team. "...I talk a lot about localization, because it's been instrumental to our success," said Lucas, adding that the franchise is a best-seller all across Europe.
But the heart of her talk was on the production tools required to produce so many titles. Asset management, Lucas told the audience, is at the heart of everything you do. "You need to track every thing you do."
"...It's difficult to understate the importance of tools programmers," Lucas continued. One of the studio's tools is named SingStar Asset Management, or S.A.M. for short. "Certainly we wouldn't be making 50 games a year without S.A.M. As with everything else we've done, it's been very iterative."
Lucas says they approached the tools seriously, using the mindset that it "could be something we could sell, if we needed to." She adds, "A good set of tools doesn't stand still."
"We're proud of the output from a relatively small team," says Lucas. She notes that they're able to stay small because they don't have a number of positions that developers normally have, such as 3D artists. But, they also have positions much developers don't, such as the music licensing department.
Still, all this productivity does have its casualties. "Launch dates go by with barely a murmur," Lucas admits. "And strangely enough, Sony's not keen on throwing us a launch party or paying us a bonus for every title we launch."
Ultimately, it returns to mindset. "We don't think like a game team anymore, we think link a business," Lucas said. "And that means streamlining, improving our processes."
The most recent SingStar is a new version for PlayStation 3, an online connected title in which users can download new songs and and create, share and view performances from other players, adding the all-important community aspect.
She calls the game, "the love child of YouTube and MySpace."
And if you think that SingStar will all be next-gen focused, Lucas revealed "There will be another ten unannounced PS2 titles."
2007 was a bumpy year for Singstar," Lucas mentioned regarding PS3 development: "I leave you to imagine what that involved.
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