YPSH : It's always a pleasure to chat with a new dev that comes to PlayStation Home, but even more fun when that new dev has a new line that many really want. Recently, you may have seen a teaser poster about Star Trek items coming to Home. I'm fortunate to have with us today the man behind the company that is bringing it to you. Brad Young is the Founder/CEO of Flashman. Thanks for chatting with us Brad. Brad : Hi Karen, thanks very much for giving us the opportunity to chat with your community and Star Trek fans who are waiting for the collection to launch on Home! YPSH : Brad you went to University of Western Ontario, Carleton University, Matsushita School of Business Tokyo, and UC Berkeley. Most of your studies were in Politics and Business. Before Flashman, you did many things not connected with the gaming industry. I read you even ran a newspaper called The Daily Sheet. Tells us a little about these days and what your interests were and some of the more interesting positions you held in business. Brad : I’ve always been curious about a lot of different subjects and love the challenge of doing new things. My undergraduate studies just seemed to flow naturally into graduate work and post-grad study as well and I found the Asia-Pacific region to be fascinating. I think it was Woody Allen that said “80% of success is showing up". For better or worse over the years when I have an idea I’ve often pursued it with great passion by showing up every day and working hard, and with a bit of luck mixed in and the help of some great people, attempted to build viable businesses. So yes, one of my early companies was a daily newspaper that I expanded to three cities and then sold, as well as an Internet software startup (neural network-based search technology) that we raised financing for in the 90’s. It’s important to try out new ideas and I think having a well-rounded experience set can prepare anyone for success no matter what they set out to do in life. I believe these business experiences have helped set up Flashman for success in the game industry. YPSH : Seems you had an interest in the Asia Pacific region. Brad : Yes, in the early 80’s Japan and China were starting to rise and for me knowing nothing about that region is was very interesting, so I started to focus my studies on that part of the world. After doing my thesis on Japan I was fortunate enough to receive a scholarship to study at a post-graduate school just outside Tokyo. It was my first time living abroad and the school was incredible, we traveled all over Japan learning about Japanese business, politics and culture. I subsequently went back to study Japanese in Kanazawa on the West Coast of Japan living with a Japanese family which was one of the great experiences of my life. My first job was handling Asia-Pacific business for the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, and also handled the region working for the Royal Canadian Mint and a couple of software companies as well. I’ve always been lucky enough to maintain that connection to Asia through my work and personal life. YPSH : So after all of this, how did you get into the gaming business? Brad : After years in software and technology I decided it was time for something new and took a little time off to try to figure out what that would be. In the end, I thought it would be wonderful if I could marry my passion for video games with my business experience and the more I looked at it, the more I realized that my recent software experience could dovetail nicely with the game industry. Starting another company seemed natural for me and I made a conscious decision to build a brand around Flashman from the very beginning – 10 years later I’m still really happy about the decision to move to the game business! YPSH : Would you consider yourself a "hardcore gamer"? Brad : The definition of “hard core” gamer is now getting trickier and trickier isn’t it? Since getting an iPad my mother plays some kind of game every day it seems, not sure if she would be defined as hard core or not. I do still find time to play when I can, typically hockey on console, FPS on PC like Battlefield and RTS games when good ones are available. I have to admit that as I’m getting older, work and family often take priority, but there are still many days when I realize it is the middle of the night and I’m still playing, so I guess that could be termed “hard core” :>) YPSH : You started Flashman in 2004. Back then, was Flashman more of a business consulting and financial services provider for the gaming industry? Brad : Flashman is set up as an entertainment services firm and we now focus on several areas. The first is working with developers around the world to help them build their businesses through corporate strategy, business development, PR/marketing, financing and licensing. The second is working with brand holders to help them drive into the game industry, acting as executive producers to bring their brands to life in the game space, and leveraging our PR/marketing expertise and business relationships to maximize the potential of their IP. Third, we are an avatar publisher with both Microsoft and Sony, both licensing and publishing brands ourselves like Star Trek, Mega Man, Garfield, Rocky, and Robocop, and developing collections for other brand holders as well. We have a great cross-functional team at Flashman that has a ton of game industry experience across the board. YPSH : You helped to bring well over 100 titles to market with some of the biggest brands in the industry, including the likes of Marvel, Family Guy, Street Fighter, Cars, Wipeout, Ghostbusters, Smurfs, Halo, and ESPN. Tell us a little of what you did for these clients. Brad : We’ve been fortunate enough to be involved with some great brands over the years, as well as some fantastic original IP as well. Working with our developer clients we have either found them work for hire projects (Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Family Guy, ESPN, Cars, POTC, Wipeout to name a few) or helped them bring their original IP projects to market (Divekick, Critter Crunch, Riptide GP, Pinball FX and Zen Pinball, amongst others). In other cases we have licensed brands for our clients’ use (Star Wars, Marvel, Streetfighter for our client Zen Studios pinball games for example), or worked directly with brand holding clients like The Weinstein Company to bring their brands to market. For our avatar business we have licensed some great brands, Star Trek being the latest and greatest so far. We do the business development to get these deals done, execute on product marketing and PR strategies, provide financing in some cases, and also help drive mergers and acquisitions where needed. YPSH : In 2012, Flashman Studios acquired Beefy Media. a production services company. Beefy had some good clients like The Weinstein Company (a major American film studio, multimedia production and distribution company), MGM (the worldís largest holder of modern films), Endemol (the worldís largest independent production company) and Capcom (a leading worldwide developer and publisher of video games). Was the Beefy acquisition just to acquire those clients or did that help Flashman Studios in other ways? Brad : Beefy was a great production company founded by our friend Adam Boyes, but he was moving on to Sony and wanted to sell the company. For Flashman this was a strategic move to enter the avatar publishing business, as well as position us more closely with brand holders as we developed this side of our business. From there we used this as a springboard to develop our avatar publishing business further, leading us to where we are now, about to launch our Star Trek collection on Sony Home. YPSH : How large of a company has Flashman Studios grown to? Brad : We are still quite small but nimble company with seven people. As I mentioned before, we have a great team, I can’t say enough good things about them. I’ve tried to nurture the Flashman brand over the last decade and grow organically, working hard for our clients and always working with trust and integrity. Wherever possible I encourage the Flashman team to work with an entrepreneurial spirit and aligned our business with our clients such that when they are successful, we are successful, and it has paid off so far. YPSH : Now your licensing and marketing experience has lead to working with CBS and the Star Trek Next Generation franchise. How did that deal come about? Brad : We have had a good relationship with CBS for some time now and as we did our research on the avatar collections we noticed a glaring hole with the absence of a Star Trek collection. Based on our relationship and recent experience with avatars we successfully negotiated for the license and will be releasing both Next Generation and Classic Star Trek avatar collections. We are all Star Trek fans here at Flashman, I grew up watching the original series, so we are really excited about the launch today! YPSH : Has Flashman Studios now become a developer for XBOX and PlayStation with artists and programmers? Brad : We are a publisher with both Microsoft for Xbox and Sony for PlayStation. We have a great producer John Tam here at Flashman, but outsource the development, and then Corey Fong and Sandra Yee generate great marketing and PR plans for the collections we do, working with the licensor where possible to cross-market the collections. We are currently doing a lot of fun stuff with CBS and the StarTrek.com community. YPSH : That brings us to your upcoming Star Trek release for PlayStation Home. Tell us about what to expect and when? Brad : 8-21-13 is the launch of our very first collection of Star Trek The Next Generation items for PlayStation Home. We have a full set of federation costumes as well as costumes from what we consider the most iconic of the alien races, the Klingon and the Borg. To go with these are a few animated props as well. YPSH : Will we see full avatars as well as separate clothing items? Brad : Currently we have full costumes and props because with a license with Star Trek the uniforms must follow guidelines as to not be mixed. For example, Klingon boots might not go well with a Federation uniform. These are one of the very tricky details we must work through with a partner like CBS. YPSH : Down the road, any additional future releases planned? Brad : Our goal is to bring a steady flow of palatable content to PlayStation Home. We are starting off with a collection from Star Trek TNG and have a large spreadsheet with some of the most iconic items you can imagine from the vast Star Trek universe. Our next release nearly completed and we are actively working on the next release after that. YPSH : Any plans for other virtual items besides clothing? Personal spaces? Brad : Our next release is in fact a Star Trek themed personal space. It’s similar to two rooms in one space , we just had to place sliding doors in there. We imagine users having fun walking in and out of the Star Trek automatic doors with the sound effects from the TV show. We will hold off on the surprise of what the space will be specifically themed after. YPSH : Would you like to see Flashman bring other franchises to PlayStation Home besides Star Trek? Brad : Yes that would be great. We are very active on Xbox at the moment, this is our first foray onto Home which is a different market with different consumer tastes, so we are hoping our experience with Star Trek will provide us with some input and we’ll see if any of our other brands might resonate with the fan base on Home. YPSH : Any future plans for other platforms besides XBOX and PlayStation? Brad : We’ve researched PC and mobile, but for now the models don’t seem to work as well outside of console from what we have seen. YPSH : Before we go, tell us what it is about PlayStation Home that attracts you? Brad : Home is fundamentally different from Xbox in the way consumers use the avatar items. On Xbox 360, Avatars exist primarily as part of the dashboard experience with consumers choosing items and using them in a compartmentalized, largely personal/solitary experience. In Home of course you have a much more interactive experience, showing off yourr avatar items with your friends and the larger community. Home offers a much more compelling and interactive experience for consumers with iconic brand like Star Trek we think. With the release of our first collection of what we consider more obvious choices we’ll continue working hard to bring more creative and interactive experiences with the Star Trek license. As you can imagine, we want to do all of the fun and crazy things as much as anyone else would want to with Star Trek in PlayStation Home. We have very active conversations about companions and locomotive items. YPSH : Thanks again for chatting with YPSH and its members. We always have a keen interest in the developers that power PlayStation Home. We hope Flashman sees much success with its Star Trek Next Generation release and look forward to hearing more from you and Flashman in the coming months. Brad : Thanks for chatting with us Karen, we hope that Star Trek fans will enjoy the avatar items we are launching on Home, as much as we have enjoyed creating the collection for them! This article is covered under International Copyright Laws and may not be reproduced in any form without the express consent of the author.
Great article and wow that's alot of stuff coming. Never expected any Star Trek items again after the movie clothes from a few years ago.
Going read this in full when home as on phone right now, but the content looks well made so im sure lots will be happy ( looks at @Firefly )
oh wow! Excellent interview! I'm really excited about Trek NG in Home. Very bold news! Karen has boldly gone where no Homee has gone before! Looking forward to tomorrow when my wallet will be a little emptier. Damn. Just bought FF14 too. Ouch. And Kikai and Dr Who last week. OUCH. God I hope I'[m not going to crack the $200 mark for this month in PS3. Ouch. I'm usually alot better than that. $5 a week is my prefered. I'm most excited about the main uniforms. I plan to get them all. All 3 male suits for one account, female for my alt. They look nice. I'm a little worried about the shoulders though. With that black to color edge I'm worried there is adequate polygons to support proper morphing when my toon moves his arm up high. But we'll see soon! But definitely buying all male and female uniforms. The Klingons look pretty good. But it seems a bit "empty" without the Klingon sash that goes over the left shoulder and right hip. That marks a Klingon's victories and medals. Also, I need a Battleth. Well I do for the male. There's a 99 cent one already made for females. Though they don't call it a battleth. The phasers, tricorder and visor looks perfect. Can't wait to get one. Definitely getting all. The Borgs have a great head. Really nice. The chest though seems a bit...well. not right. female is better than the male. Not sure I'll get one. Probably a pass. I love that more Trek stuff is going to be done. BUT, the idea of a Trek Themed Space....that gots me worried. Don't want a trek themed space. I WANT THE DAM BRIDGE. That's where most of Star Trek takes place. On the Bridge. It's where all trekkies desire to be. we need to see stars passing by us on that big viewscreen. And we need the weapons console to make phaser and photon noises. And we need the engineering counsole to let us make warp field noises. The bridge has a room it connects to. That's Picard's office room. With the little fishbowl we all like. Have to have fish in there. What I would love is to have us enter the space. Our screen is momentarilyfilled with a screen card featuring the Star Trek Logo. We here a few lines of the Star Trek NG theme. We hear a transporter noise, the screen card fades out and we are standing on the bridge! I would also add an easter egg. People WILL figure a way to get our avatars OUTSIDE of this apartment. There's nothing you can do. We are good at breaking through with all our little tricks. So, outside of the apartment, I want the whole Enterprise hull meshed. It don't have to be high rez. But I would love it to be there. So we can stand on it. That to me is what ALL trekkies want. At least for Star Trek Next Generation in Home.
Okay, part two. Cause I got a big mouth. If you really want to push this farther. I would make more parts of the Enterprise. And use the Elevators to transport us around. I realize Home's not set up for use to animate in an elevator. But inside an elevator can be a switch. So after looking at the bridge and ready room, we head into the elevator. A menu pops up asking where we go. And we click Engineering. And if we paid for it, we are teleported to another room in the mesh (just like the diamond and gold mansion) And zoom, we head to the Enterprise Engineering room. Or to the Captain's Quarters. Or the Sickbay. Or the Shuttlebay. Each room could be a separate purchase.
I also think you should go back and redo the Star Trek Classic content in Home. There is a male blue uniform and a gold one. (NO MALE RED SHIRT) Also a red female dress uniform. The content is already there. BUT there's a problem. Besides the fact the colors are kinda dark muddy and crappy, almost NO ONE HAS THEM. Back when Home Europe got their Trek content, we begged and begged our Home staff for them. It took a long time. But we got our wish. But it was like a twilight zone episode where your wish isn't exactly what you want. And it's a nightmare instead. Our wonderful and frustrating Home Staff never put the previous Star Trek content in a store inside Home. We couldn't purchase it in Home. It wasn't directly purchaseable online. Nor in the PSN store (directly). And it wasn't advertised. No advertisements in Home. None online. None mentioned to websites. No post in the Sony blog. NO twitter and no Facebook. And no thread announcing it in forums. So...how what did we have to do to get it? The staffer Glasswalls mentioned it, offhandly. Deeply buried in a thread. Where most people missed it. And you had to buy the new Trek videogame and rent the movie. And here's the kicker, after putting it where few would see it, you only had three days to do it! And most of us missed that!!!! So there are Classic Kirk, Spock, Uhura clothes in Home. BUT FEW have them. So there is still a market for them. And there are NO red shirt uniforms in NA Home. And no other colors for females beside red. And the colors are dark and muddy. And the female red uniform is not one piece (like in the show) it's two. And the shoes suck. Really horrible how it came out. But plenty of opportunity if someone wants to sell some classic stuff here. OH, and make a classic trek bridge. If you want, I got the blueprints of the stage sets. I can probably get you everything you need. I have a huge amount of reference on this stuff.
This is the blueprint to Picard's Enterprise Bridge. NCC-1701D. This is the first room you should make. Note the Bridge connects to the Captain's Ready Room and the Conference Room. If Flashman needs any more info, he can just ask. I got plenty. Or he can look up Mike Okuda or Doug Drexler. Those guys know Trek like no man alive.
I enjoyed this article very much in part due to the subject matter and also at an inside look at a developer. The original Star Trek on TV I loved but for the most part I passed on the others. I did watch and enjoy Voyager. I'm not a Trekkie but the thought that went into the original series was something I admired. I bought the Operations outfit because Commander doesn't fit me. I don't ever want to be in charge of anything at least for an extended period of time. Science Officer seemed natural because of an interest in Science Fiction I had. Operations seemed like a natural fit but I wasn't sure. I even though about getting in touch with a childhood friend to see what they thought would fit for me. What I'm saying is I put some thought into this. I also bought a tricoder. As for a Star Trek space, it had better be good. No games, the whole ship or a large part of it but based on the bridge. The only sci-fi space on HOME I've like so far has been The Complex if that helps. Were there to be a holodeck on a Star Trek space (is this a pun LOL) it would be HOME, or so I think. Good luck and safe journey.
What a great article!Im a "hard core" Home user ;-) and a huge Trek fan and I think this Trek content for Home is over due and most welcome!I want to buy it all lol!Im glad it's being made with such integrity to the Trek universe.There is only one way to obtain a Star Fleet uniform(in Home or where ever) imo and that way is honorably or not at all.I'm gonna guess that the personal space will be a shuttle craft,and I can't wait to see it! Amazing article Karen and thank you Flashman for bringing Trek Home at last
Firefly, I like the way you think. What would be awesome is if the create klingon romulon and borg ships personal spaces, along with enterprise space, and have space battles with others and their friends in their trek clubhouses or personal spaces. with bridge gameplay similer or better than the gameplay from the cutthrouts space gameplay. that would be cool!!!
I'm a big Trek fan. I'd be loathed to touch tng with a barge pole. I've seen the items in the store, The dev has done well with the artwork.
