Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Podcast Interview: Gene from Maid Marian...

Gene, from Maid Marian, talks about developing an MMO in his basement and reaching over 1.7 million unique visitors each month...

You can download the podcast here...
http//www.indiegamepod.com/podcasts/maidmarian-podcast.mp3

or listen to it here...




Show Notes (Thanks to our new intern, Grace, for the great notes)...
Interview with Gene Endrody of Maid Marion Entertainment

Interview was held at the Austin Game Developer’s Conference. Gene Endrody is the creator of Sherwood Dungeon, a 3D Massive Multiplayer game.
http://www.maidmarian.com/

Sherwood Dungeon started as a beta test of Shockwave when they released 3D.

He was working in the console game industry at Radical Entertainment during the day, when he began creating avatar based chat rooms in the evenings for fun. He put a Google ad at the bottom of the page to create revenue and it grew to the point where he could quit his day job after 2 years.

He developed a loyal community because they were there from the beginning and were allowed to be a part of the evolution.

He wanted to have the browser window scalable from the beginning. This way he was able to have it imbedded in small game sites along with his Google ad.

Last year he released Club Marion on his site. It was inspired by Club Med.

When not working on Sherwood Dungeon he likes to do martial arts and kick box.

His job IS as great as it looks. He always wanted a lifestyle business.

He may need to hire people soon, but is reluctant.

He says that since his game is free the expectations of customer service are very low. Also players help each other a lot.

There may be the ability for players to create their own rooms and islands in the future.

Take care,
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