Multivarious Games

Tim Fulton 0:09Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Confluence Cast presented by Columbus Underground. We are a weekly Columbus-centric podcast focusing on the civics, lifestyle, entertainment, and people of our city. I'm your host, Tim Fulton. This week, I sat down with Chris Volpe, president and CEO of Multivarious Games, to talk about his journey from working in healthcare to managing a video game startup, Multivarious' origins in the Columbus game developer community, Central Ohio's role as the gaming hub of the Midwest, and several exciting projects he and his team have on the horizon. You can get more information on what we discussed today in the show notes for this episode at theconfluencecast.com. Also, the Confluence Cast is on Patreon. Find out how to support this podcast on our website, theconfluencecast.com, or at patreon.com/confluence. The Confluence Cast is sponsored by Little Rock Bar. Little Rock Bar is located at 944 North Fourth Street in Italian Village. With 30 beers on tap, Little Rock Bar has happy hour from 4:00 to 8:00 PM every day. Every Tuesday, get $3 draft beers all night while you enjoy Rock Your Cock Off karaoke. Wednesdays is Everybody's a Comedian, hosted by Travis Haywicher. It's like trivia, but you prove your snark instead of smarts. Info, hours, and upcoming events at littlerockbar.net. Everybody's night should have a little rock. Enjoy the interview. Sitting down here with Chris Volpe, the president and CEO of Multivarious Games. Chris, how are you?

Chris Volpe 1:53Good. How you doing?

Tim Fulton 1:54Good. Tell us about Multivarious. What do you guys do?

Chris Volpe 1:57So I always sort of jokingly, offhanded say, uh, we change the world.

Tim Fulton 2:02Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:02So we do a lot of things. My typical business spiel is that we have three pillars at MVG.

Tim Fulton 2:07Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:07We have our internal development, where we make our own games, apps, you know, whatever.

Tim Fulton 2:11Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:11Client services, where we traditionally work with larger companies in healthcare and education. We'll develop apps and products for them, so right now we're doing a VR therapy app for, um, upper extremity injuries.

Tim Fulton 2:23Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:24Uh, we're working with Nationwide Children's Hospital on an app for kids with muscular dystrophy, a research and therapy app that's in global trials right now. We've worked with MasterCard before, OSU Battelle.

Tim Fulton 2:33Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:34And then we have our third component, which is our community, and that's where we, we host COG. That's, uh, I believe the largest community group in Ohio right now for game development.

Tim Fulton 2:43Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:44We've got about 1,400 members. We meet once a month, and then we also do GDEX, which is the Midwest's largest gaming expo. We host that every fall at the, um, Columbus Convention Center.

Tim Fulton 2:55Okay.

Chris Volpe 2:55And then lastly, we just opened up The Sandbox, which is a creative space/incubator for people wanting to do games and creative technology.

Tim Fulton 3:03Okay.

Chris Volpe 3:03And we did that through a partnership with The Idea Foundry.

Tim Fulton 3:06So let's unpack some of that.

Chris Volpe 3:08Let's do it.

Tim Fulton 3:09Any games that I would be familiar with or aware of that you guys developed in-house?

Chris Volpe 3:14Pro-

Tim Fulton 3:14Or is it primarily... I guess I'm trying to understand what kind of games they are. Are they just on your phone? Are they computer games? Are they on, you know, Xbox or whatever?

Chris Volpe 3:23Sure. So we call ourselves a full platform developer.

Tim Fulton 3:26Okay.

Chris Volpe 3:26So we can do it for anything. We have a game out right now. It's about three years old now, starting to show its age a bit, called Hatch It.

Tim Fulton 3:33Okay.

Chris Volpe 3:33Uh, H-A-T-C-H, uh, like hatch an egg, not like hatchet.

Tim Fulton 3:37Okay. Got it.

Chris Volpe 3:38Like, like serial killer. That's just a fun sort of puzzle adventure game. The concept of that is Dr. T, a Tyrannosaurus rex from the future, invents a time machine to go back to the past to save the dinosaurs.

Tim Fulton 3:47Okay.

Chris Volpe 3:48And of course, whenever you go back to the past, like something has to happen, right?

Tim Fulton 3:50Right.

Chris Volpe 3:51So the, the time machine blows up, and he hastily constructs this, like, shitty robot-

Tim Fulton 3:56Okay

Chris Volpe 3:56... for lack of a better word, and that's what you play as, and it's this robot that, like, it doesn't have any brakes, can't, doesn't have arms, can't control itself really, and you move it around a game board to hatch eggs.

Tim Fulton 4:08Okay.

Chris Volpe 4:08And so the goal of each level is to hatch all the dinosaur eggs in the level, and each of the dinosaurs has different impact on the game. There's different, like, environmental effects and stuff. So that's up for free on iOS and Android. It's been up around for a couple years. And then we're working on another game called No Mercy-

Tim Fulton 4:22Okay

Chris Volpe 4:22... which is a side-scrolling brawler, and that is currently, we're developing on PC and Mac-

Tim Fulton 4:28Okay

Chris Volpe 4:28... for Steam, and then we may release on PS4 or Nintendo Switch.

Tim Fulton 4:33Got it.

Chris Volpe 4:34So we're, we're-

Tim Fulton 4:34And Steam is a, and I'm not very familiar with this stuff, but Steam is a marketplace for purchasing games.

Chris Volpe 4:39Yeah. Think, think of Steam like the App Store for, for PC and Mac-

Tim Fulton 4:44Okay

Chris Volpe 4:44... uh, for video games. Yeah.

Tim Fulton 4:45Gotcha. Gotcha. And then-

Chris Volpe 4:47I believe it's the largest gaming platform in the world, I think.

Tim Fulton 4:50Well, I certainly see gift cards at, you know-

Chris Volpe 4:52Yeah

Tim Fulton 4:52... department stores for moms to buy for their kids.

Chris Volpe 4:55Yeah.

Tim Fulton 4:55So.

Chris Volpe 4:56S- Steam's a really interesting sort of business story.

Tim Fulton 4:59Yeah. Talk me th- How did it get started? How did Multivarious get started?

Chris Volpe 5:03Multivarious?

Tim Fulton 5:04Yeah.

Chris Volpe 5:04So Multivarious started as the sort of commercialization arm of COG, the community group.

Tim Fulton 5:09Okay.

Chris Volpe 5:10And that was in 2011, January 2011.

Tim Fulton 5:12And so this is a group that gets together and basically says, "Here's what I'm working on. Can you help? Can you give me feedback?"

Chris Volpe 5:19Yeah.

Tim Fulton 5:19But what's the structure there?

Chris Volpe 5:21So that's ki- that's kinda where it started. Now it's merged into, uh, we'll have, we meet first Saturday of every month at the Columbus Idea Foundry.

Tim Fulton 5:29Okay.

Chris Volpe 5:30Um, at 1:00, people come. Uh, we do, like, basic introductions, and then usually have, uh, between one and three speakers. Uh, those speakers will be either trying to, like, teach you something, or maybe they're showcasing a product they're working on.

Tim Fulton 5:42Okay.

Chris Volpe 5:43Or we might do, like, you know, a Skype call or whatever, uh, with someone from the industry. Then after that, it breaks apart, and then people start setting up their own projects to get feedback. People network. Uh, we get a lot of students who come and just wanna, like, connect with industry professionals and-

Tim Fulton 5:57Mm-hmm

Chris Volpe 5:57... and see what it's like. Um-

Tim Fulton 5:59How many people come down for it?

Chris Volpe 6:00So typically we get 70 to 80.

Tim Fulton 6:03Wow. Okay.

Chris Volpe 6:04Every month, and then the following week on Franklin Fridays, that, was that the second Friday-

Tim Fulton 6:08Mm-hmm

Chris Volpe 6:08... of the month? Yeah, we do Prototype and Play, where people come and set up their rigs, and they're just looking for feedback. So those are the two events that we do.

Tim Fulton 6:16So this group formed a commercial entity then?

Chris Volpe 6:20Yeah, so a few members of COG, the COG community, decided to form a entity in which the people making games at COG could then commercialize through.

Tim Fulton 6:31Okay.

Chris Volpe 6:31So the business would be set up so that every individual didn't have to set up their own business.

Tim Fulton 6:35Okay.

Chris Volpe 6:35Now, as you're fully aware, being a part of the s- startup and entrepreneur world, like-

Tim Fulton 6:40Yeah

Chris Volpe 6:40... it's a lot harder to execute and get things-

Tim Fulton 6:42Right

Chris Volpe 6:42... ready to commercialize, and-

Tim Fulton 6:44Well, and there's a certain amount of trust, and there's a certain amount of, you know, especially when you're setting yourself up to be an asset for another group of people, but you also have to make business decisions about, like, "Hey, we're not gonna release your shitty game 'cause it's not there yet." You know what I mean?

Chris Volpe 7:00Yeah. And-

Tim Fulton 7:02Did that work? I mean, did that model work?

Chris Volpe 7:03So it... Not really.

Tim Fulton 7:05Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:05So I came on in, uh, May of 2012, April or May of 2012.

Tim Fulton 7:10Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:11And the, one of the first things that I did, I've got a background in operations. At the time, I was also working at the med center.

Tim Fulton 7:17Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:17OSU, OSU med center.

Tim Fulton 7:18Mm-hmm.

Chris Volpe 7:18In healthcare. I've got two grad degrees in healthcare, so I was kinda, like, working in that startup space in healthcare.

Tim Fulton 7:23Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:24And when I came on, one of the first things, I was like, "Look, we just have way too many people doing way too many things." Like there's-

Tim Fulton 7:29Right

Chris Volpe 7:30... there's no organization, there's no clear vision, there's no operational controls on anything.

Tim Fulton 7:34Or accountability.

Chris Volpe 7:35Yeah, or accountability. So it really was, like, a community group that just kept meeting, and some people would work on a project, but, you know, I, I'm a big fan in sort of the clarity of vision, flexibility of purpose.

Tim Fulton 7:46Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:46And there wasn't really either.

Tim Fulton 7:49Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:49So one of the things that I started to do was kind of just organize what Multivarious was gonna focus on-

Tim Fulton 7:57Okay

Chris Volpe 7:57... and, and what we weren't really.

Tim Fulton 7:59Okay.

Chris Volpe 7:59So did a lot of sort of cutting and, and readjusting and things like that. And it wasn't like, you know, y- if you were working on a project, you were free to keep working on your project. It's just whether or not Multivarious was gonna spend resources-

Tim Fulton 8:10Got it

Chris Volpe 8:10... to sort of help that.

Tim Fulton 8:12Well, and so were people getting paid at that point? Were-

Chris Volpe 8:14No.

Tim Fulton 8:15You know, okay. So people were willing to, excuse me, able to continue working on their projects, but I guess I'm curious, were there a whole lot of hurt feelings during that process?

Chris Volpe 8:24There were some.

Tim Fulton 8:25Okay.

Chris Volpe 8:25I, I think one of the really cool things about our community and why we're so far ahead of other cities is that people really like what we're doing.

Tim Fulton 8:33Okay.

Chris Volpe 8:34Both Multivarious and just within our sector. Like, they really love it. They're passionate about it, and they wanna help people.

Tim Fulton 8:39Okay.

Chris Volpe 8:39So Multivarious, just back to your, your payment question, right now Multivarious is six full-time, five part-time people.

Tim Fulton 8:46Okay.

Chris Volpe 8:46But some of those part-time people aren't being paid. They're just, they just wanna be a part of it.

Tim Fulton 8:50Okay.

Chris Volpe 8:50But we're one of three game companies in Columbus that's, like, sort of sustainable and-

Tim Fulton 8:57Okay

Chris Volpe 8:57... and does its own thing. There's, there's very few in Columbus and Ohio. So most of the people that are doing this are hobbyists or just, you know, they have a full-time job and they do this on the side or whatever. But anyway, yeah, so there, there were some hurt feelings. There's just some, there's just some reality. It's not that I know everything, but, like-

Tim Fulton 9:15Okay

Chris Volpe 9:15... I have been in the business world for a while, and, you know, I've got a lot of experience in operational stuff.

Tim Fulton 9:21Right.

Chris Volpe 9:21And so there were some times where I'm just like, "Look, this thing is not ready." Or there was one project-

Tim Fulton 9:27Like this game?

Chris Volpe 9:27Yeah.

Tim Fulton 9:27Is that the kind of thing you're talking about? Okay.

Chris Volpe 9:29Yeah, it could be a game, but there's also people doing, like, interesting website stuff, or there's a few people doing, like, hesitate to call it, like, big data, but, like, data and analytics-

Tim Fulton 9:37Okay

Chris Volpe 9:38... platforms and stuff that were pretty cool. But yeah, there were some, there was a couple projects that, like, I was keen on and be like, "You know, look, we'll provide you expertise, mentorship, help you market it and whatever." But then they just kind of clammed up, and it became, like, you know, it was their baby. I was giving them advice on things, like, "Look, now, you probably need to construct it this way. Like, this, this part is not ready."

Tim Fulton 9:58Right.

Chris Volpe 9:59"This, this game loop does not function properly. We need to construct it like that." And yeah, they didn't listen to me, and then they started playing, like, other people in the community off of each other.

Tim Fulton 10:08Okay.

Chris Volpe 10:08And I was just like, "All right, we're not doing this."

Tim Fulton 10:10I mean, you have to walk away at that point and just be like, "That's their project." I totally get it.

Chris Volpe 10:14Yeah.

Tim Fulton 10:15Right.

Chris Volpe 10:15Yeah. Ultimately, it's up to them. It is their project.

Tim Fulton 10:18Right.

Chris Volpe 10:18But that's why we have a, we have a saying at Multivarious, which is you can't be afraid to kill your baby.

Tim Fulton 10:22Mm-hmm.

Chris Volpe 10:23Um, because everything... A- anybody who's ever done a creative endeavor, whether it's film or music or dance or whatever-

Tim Fulton 10:29Right

Chris Volpe 10:29... that stuff, those ideas, like, you've put so much time into them. Like, they're so personal to you.

Tim Fulton 10:33Right.

Chris Volpe 10:34But you have-

Tim Fulton 10:35Well, and it's hard to, one, get criticism-

Chris Volpe 10:37Yeah

Tim Fulton 10:38... two, change it based on that criticism, and three, be wi- r- like, it's almost like the serenity prayer, right?

Chris Volpe 10:44Yeah.

Tim Fulton 10:44Like, God give me the strength to realize there are things that I can't control.

Chris Volpe 10:48Yep.

Tim Fulton 10:49So yeah.

Chris Volpe 10:50I mean, eventually you just, you have to learn that being able to do constructive criticism is, like, infinitely important.

Tim Fulton 10:56Right.

Chris Volpe 10:56And being able to have that come at you and realize it's not personal.

Tim Fulton 11:01Right.

Chris Volpe 11:01And you need to ask yourself, like, is this idea, is this concept in the best interest of the project?

Tim Fulton 11:06Right.

Chris Volpe 11:06And, and sometimes people get too close to the project, and they can't see that.

Tim Fulton 11:10And so let's say I'm a hobbyist who-

Chris Volpe 11:12Mm-hmm

Tim Fulton 11:12... has a great idea, somehow has enough time to get a game to a point where it's almost ready to, like, go to market.

Chris Volpe 11:21Sure.

Tim Fulton 11:21Would you guys facilitate that for me? Going back to your original founding and the original purpose of Multivarious, would you guys be able to sort of, like, walk me through that process? Or would you take it and do it for me? How did, how does that work?

Chris Volpe 11:34Yeah, so that's kinda funny. We're actually, after, you know, six years of, of building Multivarious and doing these other things, we're actually kind of going back into that. So-

Tim Fulton 11:43Okay

Chris Volpe 11:43... so for example, the Sandbox, our creative space, much like the space we're sitting in here-

Tim Fulton 11:48Yeah

Chris Volpe 11:48... is designed to help people with their startups and their projects, like, be successful.

Tim Fulton 11:53Okay.

Chris Volpe 11:53So if you're an artist in a, let's say, an artist and a programmer coming in and working on a project, you may not know anything about, like, incorporating an LLC or how-

Tim Fulton 12:00Right

Chris Volpe 12:00... do you write an NDA or, you know, how do you get the legal documents for, for taxes or whatever.

Tim Fulton 12:04Right.

Chris Volpe 12:05So we can help with that kinda stuff, and we have, you know, business services that we can provide to people. And then what we have internally is just the expertise about the industry and, like, how-

Tim Fulton 12:15Okay

Chris Volpe 12:15... do you get stuff on the App Store, when's a good time to-

Tim Fulton 12:18Release it

Chris Volpe 12:18... release your app.

Tim Fulton 12:19Right.

Chris Volpe 12:19You know? Like, uh- Should you take this to an expo, or should you try to find an influencer? Like, those kind of things.

Tim Fulton 12:24Okay.

Chris Volpe 12:24So that's something that we're beginning to get back into.

Tim Fulton 12:28And so is it an incubator format? Like, are you guys investing capital and taking some equity? Or how, how have you worked that? Or is it a fee structure?

Chris Volpe 12:36So right now we are not, we're not putting in capital into projects yet.

Tim Fulton 12:40Okay.

Chris Volpe 12:40Although it's something we are talking about.

Tim Fulton 12:42Okay.

Chris Volpe 12:42So right now it's a membership, so when you get a membership at the Idea Foundry as, as a full member, you say that you wanna be a part of the Sandbox.

Tim Fulton 12:51Okay.

Chris Volpe 12:51And so-

Tim Fulton 12:52So this is not... Like, I have a co-working membership.

Chris Volpe 12:56Mm-hmm.

Tim Fulton 12:56You're not gonna look at my game that I developed, right?

Chris Volpe 12:59S-

Tim Fulton 12:59I need, it's like the, the people who have access to, like, the tools and stuff like that.

Chris Volpe 13:04So it, it's a little, a little interesting. The partnership that we developed-

Tim Fulton 13:07Has Alex figured that out yet?

Chris Volpe 13:09Well, I think we have-

Tim Fulton 13:10Okay

Chris Volpe 13:10... but it's weird.

Tim Fulton 13:11Okay.

Chris Volpe 13:11Which is totally fine. I don't mind. We're the weird kids on the block. I don't mind being weird.

Tim Fulton 13:14Right.

Chris Volpe 13:15So the way we look at it is that if you come in for a co-working membership or for Sandbox membership, the price is the same.

Tim Fulton 13:22Okay.

Chris Volpe 13:22The only difference is that you sort of declare yourself as wanting to be a part of the Sandbox.

Tim Fulton 13:28Okay.

Chris Volpe 13:29Now, if you are just some random person who comes in and you see what we're doing, you're like, "Oh, that's pretty cool," you're more than welcome to come over and chat with us and, and be a part of it.

Tim Fulton 13:38Okay.

Chris Volpe 13:39We're open to all the Idea Foundry members.

Tim Fulton 13:41So are you keeping, like, office hours?

Chris Volpe 13:44We don't have official office hours-

Tim Fulton 13:45Okay

Chris Volpe 13:45... but we're, like, there all the time anyway.

Tim Fulton 13:47And people-

Chris Volpe 13:47So we're there

Tim Fulton 13:48... can ask for meetings and-

Chris Volpe 13:49Yep

Tim Fulton 13:49... it can happen that way.

Chris Volpe 13:50Mm-hmm.

Tim Fulton 13:51Okay.

Chris Volpe 13:51And then if you become an official Sandbox member, we get you on, like, a backend where you can get access to our, like, our lawyer, accountant, healthcare, that kind of stuff.

Tim Fulton 14:00Okay.

Chris Volpe 14:00And they provide you discounted rates.

Tim Fulton 14:02How are you monetizing that?

Chris Volpe 14:04I'm not.

Tim Fulton 14:05At all?

Chris Volpe 14:05At all. Nope.

Tim Fulton 14:06Okay.

Chris Volpe 14:06So all of our, all of our business service partners are providing a discount as they're allowed to within the law.

Tim Fulton 14:13Right.

Chris Volpe 14:13So, like, the healthcare guy can't provide discounts. That's not something he's allowed to do.

Tim Fulton 14:17Right.

Chris Volpe 14:17But he can still talk to you and, and provide you-

Tim Fulton 14:20Okay

Chris Volpe 14:20... input and advice. But for example, like, our, our accountant, depending on what you need, can offer you 10% to 25% off-

Tim Fulton 14:27Okay

Chris Volpe 14:27... to the typical rate. So you can get a discount on that. We don't monetize any of that.

Tim Fulton 14:31Okay.

Chris Volpe 14:31Our, our goal is to create a channel that allows you to work with people that we know and we trust-

Tim Fulton 14:36Right

Chris Volpe 14:36... so that you can get the answers, because I, I think personally-

Tim Fulton 14:39Well, in the end, if they develop something that's successful, they're most likely going to work through you in order to do it, right?

Chris Volpe 14:47Yeah, that's, I mean, that's the hope.

Tim Fulton 14:48And so you get a cut of that.

Chris Volpe 14:50Yeah. All, I mean, we hope.

Tim Fulton 14:52Okay.

Chris Volpe 14:52But yeah, no, there's no-

Tim Fulton 14:53At the end of the day, if they have the business acumen and they have the human capital to do it, go for it. Good for you.

Chris Volpe 14:58Yeah.

Tim Fulton 14:59Right. Okay.

Chris Volpe 15:00But I, I always make the joke that, uh, I left healthcare to make video games. I spend 90% of my week not making video games-

Tim Fulton 15:06Right

Chris Volpe 15:06... just 'cause I'm the business guy, and there's always like, "Oh, you need two tax IDs? I didn't know that."

Tim Fulton 15:10Right.

Chris Volpe 15:10You know? What's a Dun & Bradstreet number?

Tim Fulton 15:12Right.

Chris Volpe 15:12So it's like every week you gotta figure out a new thing, or you'll get that, like, form from, like, you know, jobs and family services. They're like, "Oh, you missed a payment. You get, get a $25 fee or whatever." I'm like, "Did I?"

Tim Fulton 15:23Right.

Chris Volpe 15:23"Man, all right."

Tim Fulton 15:23I don't think I really missed that payment. Or when you incorporate a business and you start getting hounded to pay sales taxes, and you're like, "I don't sell anything though."

Chris Volpe 15:30Yeah.

Tim Fulton 15:31Yeah.

Chris Volpe 15:32Yeah, that's a... Yeah, if you start selling. So we only provide services.

Tim Fulton 15:35Right.

Chris Volpe 15:36So through the app stores and stuff, like when you sell something on Apple, Apple pays any taxes.

Tim Fulton 15:40Right.

Chris Volpe 15:40Then they, you know, they give you the payment, and that just counts as income, so that's not a sales tax thing.

Tim Fulton 15:45Right.

Chris Volpe 15:46But as soon as you start selling items, it's like, oh, well, now you need a whole other number.

Tim Fulton 15:50Yeah.

Chris Volpe 15:50You know, and it's just a lot of people just aren't in the position. Plus, you know, if you're good at programming, you shouldn't be wasting your time doing this stuff.

Tim Fulton 15:58Right. It's a lot of little minutiae.

Chris Volpe 16:01Yeah, it is.

Tim Fulton 16:01It's important minutiae, but it's a lot of little stuff.

Chris Volpe 16:04Yeah.

Tim Fulton 16:05And so, so let's say you're doing a project with somebody like Ohio State or Battelle.

Chris Volpe 16:10Okay.

Tim Fulton 16:10I'm sure that this can vary a whole lot, but what's that process look like in terms of, you know, from pitch to concept? Are they putting out RFPs that you're sort of like, "Hey, we can build that for you"?

Chris Volpe 16:23It, it really depends. So we don't do a lot of RFPs.

Tim Fulton 16:27Okay.

Chris Volpe 16:27I, and I could be totally wrong on this, but the RFP process for a lot of these things is so just insane. It takes so much time.

Tim Fulton 16:36Yeah.

Chris Volpe 16:37You're guessing, like, you'll get documents from them, and they're like, "Okay, well, make a re- proposal for this," and it's like two paragraphs of information. I'm like, how am I... I, I can't estimate this project-

Tim Fulton 16:47Right

Chris Volpe 16:47... you know?

Tim Fulton 16:48Right.

Chris Volpe 16:48So we typically don't do a lot of RFPs, though we have done a couple. Otherwise, it, it really depends. So I, I would put it like Battelle on the one end, since they do predominantly f- like, military projects-

Tim Fulton 17:00Yeah

Chris Volpe 17:00... and, and, like, federal funded projects and stuff, their onboarding and paperwork and stuff is ins- i- it's really insane.

Tim Fulton 17:07Okay.

Chris Volpe 17:07Like, there's, there's a lot of it, and-

Tim Fulton 17:09But once you're a vendor and then you do a second project, it's a little bit easier, I assume.

Chris Volpe 17:13It becomes easier. The problem with a lot of the military projects and a lot of federal contracts and stuff-

Tim Fulton 17:18Yeah

Chris Volpe 17:18... is the way that they do billing and payment is not really commiserate with startups.

Tim Fulton 17:24Are these like SBIRs and STTRs? You're not getting into that, right? Do you know what that is?

Chris Volpe 17:29Uh, yeah, yeah. We, we've done a couple of those, but-

Tim Fulton 17:31Okay

Chris Volpe 17:32... so this is, this is similar, but some of the other projects that Battelle works on. So, uh, so just for example, like, we're pretty transparent. Our, our rate's 150 an hour, right?

Tim Fulton 17:41Okay.

Chris Volpe 17:42So when I say 150 an hour and I just... a client approves it, like, I just charge 150 an hour, and, like, that's the end of it.

Tim Fulton 17:47Right.

Chris Volpe 17:47I don't really worry about time and materials and stuff. That's things I absorb in, in my process of business. But-

Tim Fulton 17:52Because you're working primarily in a digital space.

Chris Volpe 17:54Yeah.

Tim Fulton 17:55So you're not gonna, like, charge them for a new computer. That's a capital requirement for you.

Chris Volpe 17:58Yeah, exactly.

Tim Fulton 17:59Right. Okay.

Chris Volpe 18:00But when you do stuff in, like, the military contract, for example, like, you have to d- show where all the money is going-

Tim Fulton 18:06Right

Chris Volpe 18:07... all the time, and if you charge 150 an hour, they have these metrics where you're only allowed to, like, make a certain profit margin.

Tim Fulton 18:13Right.

Chris Volpe 18:13So as a startup, our goal is that our, our profit margin needs to be between 3 to 5X.

Tim Fulton 18:21Right.

Chris Volpe 18:22'Cause every hour, because we just don't have that much deal flow as, like, a larger corporation-

Tim Fulton 18:27Right

Chris Volpe 18:27... every hour of a developer's time needs to pay for three or four other-

Tim Fulton 18:31Right

Chris Volpe 18:32... people's time within my company.

Tim Fulton 18:33Right.

Chris Volpe 18:34So on paper, that looks like I'm making an insane margin-

Tim Fulton 18:37Right

Chris Volpe 18:37... right, per hour-

Tim Fulton 18:39But-

Chris Volpe 18:39... but I'm not And so that was like one of the things that we had to deal with. The other side of that coin, though, is that most of these contracts are, they're 250 to 500 plus an hour.

Tim Fulton 18:50Okay.

Chris Volpe 18:50So when I come in at 150 an hour, they don't worry about it too much.

Tim Fulton 18:53Gotcha.

Chris Volpe 18:54But that's just an example. But then we also do a lot of... Like Nationwide Children's Hospital is on a per-project basis, so we just do phases of this project.

Tim Fulton 19:02Okay.

Chris Volpe 19:02Each phase can range from, you know, five grand to 30 grand or whatever. So, you know, it, it really d- it really depends on if, if they're coming to us with an idea, or, uh, we've also sort of... Fortunately for us, but unfortunately for the, the people we're working with-

Tim Fulton 19:20Uh-huh

Chris Volpe 19:20... um, we've become known as a, as a place that comes and, like, fixes total disasters.

Tim Fulton 19:24Okay.

Chris Volpe 19:25Which is something we're proud of and we're really good at. The problem is, is, you know, they'll be working on a project. They put in 50, 75,000 into a project that just doesn't work.

Tim Fulton 19:35Right.

Chris Volpe 19:35And they come to us to fix it, and we're like, "Well, how much do you have as a budget?" And they're like, "Well, we only have 15 grand left."

Tim Fulton 19:40We already spent-

Chris Volpe 19:40Yeah, they already spent

Tim Fulton 19:41... we already spent our budget. Please fix it.

Chris Volpe 19:43Yeah, so we have to figure out, well, what can we fix in almost no budget-

Tim Fulton 19:47Right

Chris Volpe 19:47... to, to make it worth their time and, and provide value. Um-

Tim Fulton 19:50And sometimes you're just stripping down the project and saying-

Chris Volpe 19:53Yeah

Tim Fulton 19:53... it, it's now only gonna be able to do these things.

Chris Volpe 19:55Yeah.

Tim Fulton 19:56Right.

Chris Volpe 19:56Um, but we have a, like, a really good return rate on our clients.

Tim Fulton 20:01Okay.

Chris Volpe 20:02So I think a lot of our clients appreciate just our sort of honesty and being like, "Look, we c- this is what we can do for you."

Tim Fulton 20:07Right.

Chris Volpe 20:07This project was just poorly implemented in its first phase. Nationwide Children's was very similar to that. We received a project that was, had already been in development.

Tim Fulton 20:16Okay.

Chris Volpe 20:16This was three and a half years ago or whatever. And over the past two years, we pretty much just took portions out of it, inserted our portion in there. So now the project itself is, like, 95% our code.

Tim Fulton 20:28Okay.

Chris Volpe 20:29Minus a few things that are, like, black box that we can't get into or fix.

Tim Fulton 20:32Right.

Chris Volpe 20:33So, you know, sometimes it can be salvaged over time.

Tim Fulton 20:37Right.

Chris Volpe 20:37Um, but unfortunately the, the customer-

Tim Fulton 20:40Had, had-

Chris Volpe 20:40... ki- kinda had to take the hit on it, you know?

Tim Fulton 20:42Right. Indeed. How did you get into this?

Chris Volpe 20:45Uh-

Tim Fulton 20:45You were in healthcare before.

Chris Volpe 20:47Yeah, so I went... I, like, like I said, I was working at OSU, and I had this idea for an app, and I was, I was working with another guy, 'cause we were trying to develop this app for OSU.

Tim Fulton 20:56Okay.

Chris Volpe 20:57Almost as like a, a side thing. It didn't really have anything to do with our, my work.

Tim Fulton 21:01Okay.

Chris Volpe 21:01And so I saw this, this COG group, and I wanted to go and see if I could find developers to, to assist with this project. And when I was there w- we walked in, and I ended up talking to people for, like, hours. I sat down-

Tim Fulton 21:12Okay

Chris Volpe 21:12... I sat down with one guy for, like, an hour and a half as he was showing, taking me through what he'd been working on. And in my mind, it made more sense for me to join this, this community that already existed than to try to, like, pull these people out.

Tim Fulton 21:23Right.

Chris Volpe 21:23That's what started me being involved in it. The app on OSU's side didn't end up happening.

Tim Fulton 21:29Okay.

Chris Volpe 21:29But I'd still been working with these people, and it, it just seemed like, it seemed like there was a lot of talent, a lot of passion. It was, it was really exciting. It, it's just exciting to see, you know, 40, 50 people come, and, and these are all talented folks. Like these-

Tim Fulton 21:42Right

Chris Volpe 21:42... folks who are developing games are a part of our community or come to our expo, these are the same developers that are working at CoverMyMeds and Nationwide and IBM and Microsoft.

Tim Fulton 21:51Okay.

Chris Volpe 21:52You know? Like, these skill sets are transferable between a lot of different things.

Tim Fulton 21:55Right.

Chris Volpe 21:56So these people are super talented.

Tim Fulton 21:57And you are not a developer.

Chris Volpe 21:58I am not, no.

Tim Fulton 21:59Okay. Got it.

Chris Volpe 22:00My... I always say my job is to steer the ship.

Tim Fulton 22:01Okay.

Chris Volpe 22:02Yeah.

Tim Fulton 22:02Makes sense.

Chris Volpe 22:03No, I, I do a lot of the design, networking, stuff like this, podcasts. But yeah, no, I, I would love to learn how to code. I just don't have the time, man.

Tim Fulton 22:12Right. You gotta get your-

Chris Volpe 22:13And so-

Tim Fulton 22:13... your DUNS numbers-

Chris Volpe 22:14Yeah

Tim Fulton 22:14... all in order. Cool. Anything I'm missing? Is there more about, like, the Columbus video game developer community or app developer community?

Chris Volpe 22:22Yeah. I, I would, from my perspective, the development that we do and the projects we work on I think are really cool, and, and, and we're providing a lot of value. Like, like, the Nationwide project, for example, clinical trials across the world, early stage FDA approval. It's starting to show pretty-

Tim Fulton 22:36Wow

Chris Volpe 22:37... pretty good results compared to traditional therapies.

Tim Fulton 22:39Uh-huh.

Chris Volpe 22:39So, like, that's exciting to start to see those early stage numbers. It's too early to, you know, definitively commit to anything, but the really cool thing that I'm excited about is I travel a lot. So I go to San Francisco, Chicago, Indy, Pittsburgh, whatever.

Tim Fulton 22:53Right.

Chris Volpe 22:54We are five years ahead of any other community-

Tim Fulton 22:57Okay

Chris Volpe 22:58... in, in terms of game development and creative technology. Like, our community groups are larger, and more importantly, they talk to each other. So-

Tim Fulton 23:05Okay

Chris Volpe 23:05... in, in Columbus, we talk to Cincy, Cleveland, Athens, Dayton-

Tim Fulton 23:09Mm-hmm

Chris Volpe 23:09... Youngstown. Like, we're always sharing resources, and, and Shawnee State, for example, just had a games conference I went and gave a talk at. OU started the first Business of Game Conference earlier in the year that a lot of Ohio developers went to.

Tim Fulton 23:22Okay.

Chris Volpe 23:22So we, we coordinate. Like, when I'm in Chicago, like, the Chicago game dev groups, like, don't talk to each other.

Tim Fulton 23:28Okay.

Chris Volpe 23:28Like, there's a l- there's a clear delineation, like, uh, on the loop.

Tim Fulton 23:32Like, right.

Chris Volpe 23:33If you're, if you're outside of the loop, you're not really Chicago. But even within that, they just don't really kinda coordinate-

Tim Fulton 23:38Okay

Chris Volpe 23:39... with what's going on. But then we do stuff like GDX, our, our big expo, and GDX-

Tim Fulton 23:43And when is that?

Chris Volpe 23:44Uh, it's the last weekend of September. So we just missed it for this year.

Tim Fulton 23:48Okay.

Chris Volpe 23:48Uh, but next year it's the 28th through the 30th of September.

Tim Fulton 23:51Okay.

Chris Volpe 23:51So definitely put that, uh, save that date on your calendar. It's at the convention center. But that started as just a way for COG and, and Ohio developers to, like, showcase what they were working on.

Tim Fulton 24:01Mm-hmm.

Chris Volpe 24:02This was six years ago. It was gonna be in September. We had like 12 exhibitors, 13 exhibitors, something like that. It was a small thing, a couple rooms at the union.

Tim Fulton 24:10Yeah.

Chris Volpe 24:11Two weeks before the event, we just got, like, blown up with all these people emailing us wanting to exhibit and sponsor and, and speak.

Tim Fulton 24:18Wow.

Chris Volpe 24:18So we're like, "Well, what do we do," right? I mean, it's in two weeks.

Tim Fulton 24:20Right.

Chris Volpe 24:20"What should we do?" And I'm like, I'm like, "Let's, let's postpone it." Like, I think we had sold 60 tickets or something at that point.

Tim Fulton 24:28Okay.

Chris Volpe 24:28Which was fine. I was like, "If we can get 50 or 100 people to come to this thing on its first year, that sounds good to me."

Tim Fulton 24:32That was the goal, right?

Chris Volpe 24:33Yeah. But- We decided to push it back to December. First weekend of December ended up being the biggest blizzard of the season.

Tim Fulton 24:41Okay.

Chris Volpe 24:41Where six in the morning we're carrying crap in through ice and snow into-

Tim Fulton 24:44Mm-hmm

Chris Volpe 24:45... the, the union. But we ended up moving f- from the two rooms we were in to one of the ballrooms.

Tim Fulton 24:49Okay.

Chris Volpe 24:49We got the US Bank Conference Theater, I think is what it's called still.

Tim Fulton 24:53Yeah.

Chris Volpe 24:54We had all-day speaking sessions. We went from, like, 13 to 33 exhibitors, and we had 750 people from eight states-

Tim Fulton 25:00Wow

Chris Volpe 25:00... and Canada come.

Tim Fulton 25:01Wow.

Chris Volpe 25:02So just pushing that back really made a difference.

Tim Fulton 25:05Yeah.

Chris Volpe 25:06Now, fast-forward, we're looking at, you know-

Tim Fulton 25:09And I'm sorry, how many years ago was that?

Chris Volpe 25:10That was six.

Tim Fulton 25:11Okay.

Chris Volpe 25:12So this is, we're going into year six.

Tim Fulton 25:13Okay, got it.

Chris Volpe 25:14In 2018. So in 2018 we're expecting, you know, more than 2,000 people. Last year, or this year, we had people from 21 states and three countries come.

Tim Fulton 25:24Wow.

Chris Volpe 25:24So w- we have built this thing that just doesn't exist anywhere else in the Midwest.

Tim Fulton 25:30Yeah.

Chris Volpe 25:30I mean, even the, the, the speaking sessions, we have s- this year we had 75 STEM educational sessions. 75 throughout the weekend. Like, that-

Tim Fulton 25:38Wow

Chris Volpe 25:38... that's a lot of sessions.

Tim Fulton 25:39Yeah.

Chris Volpe 25:40But we're pu- we're constantly pulling in people from all over that are, like, looking to Columbus and looking to GDEX as being, like, the, the next, you know, the next place for the, for this industry.

Tim Fulton 25:50Right.

Chris Volpe 25:50'Cause right now if you go and you get a degree either in game development or it could be art, animation, programming, CSE, whatever, most of the jobs are on the coast, so you still gotta move out there.

Tim Fulton 26:01Right.

Chris Volpe 26:02My big initiative, and what we're working on right now, is a $10 million economic development initiative-

Tim Fulton 26:07Okay

Chris Volpe 26:07... to make Columbus, like, the place for this. Um-

Tim Fulton 26:10So you're trying to make sure that the predictions of the book Ready Player One-

Chris Volpe 26:14Yep

Tim Fulton 26:14... come true.

Chris Volpe 26:15Yes.

Tim Fulton 26:16We will have the fastest internet anywhere.

Chris Volpe 26:18Yes.

Tim Fulton 26:18And because of global warming, the only viable place to be.

Chris Volpe 26:21Yep.

Tim Fulton 26:22There you go.

Chris Volpe 26:23There you go. Yeah. We're actually working on trying to get a, uh, a little behind-the-scenes knowledge, trying to get a, um, premiere for Ready Player One here in Columbus. I'm part of a steering committee to do that.

Tim Fulton 26:32I mean, given that the trailer starts with-

Chris Volpe 26:35Yeah

Tim Fulton 26:35... "I'm from Columbus, Ohio,"

Chris Volpe 26:37Yep

Tim Fulton 26:37... it's like, "Oh, shit."

Chris Volpe 26:38Yep. So we're, we're talking to Spielberg's folks, Ernest Cline. We're gonna do something.

Tim Fulton 26:43Yeah.

Chris Volpe 26:43Like, even if, if, if it's not an official premiere, 'cause, uh, right now the premieres are in typical London, LA, New York.

Tim Fulton 26:50Right.

Chris Volpe 26:50But we're, we're really pushing to, uh, to do something. But regardless, even if we don't get, like, an official Warner Brothers premiere-

Tim Fulton 26:58Right

Chris Volpe 26:58... we're going to have some kind of event that will showcase-

Tim Fulton 27:00Absolutely

Chris Volpe 27:01... VR technology and, and all sorts of stuff. So that's, that's pretty exciting. But yeah, the, the rumor was for a long time that, uh, Columbus was gonna get cut from the movie.

Tim Fulton 27:10Really?

Chris Volpe 27:10Yeah. Uh, I, I think on the... I remember reading somewhere on the original screenplay that Columbus wasn't part of it.

Tim Fulton 27:15Huh.

Chris Volpe 27:16So when the trailer came out and those were the first, you know, five words or whatever, I was like-

Tim Fulton 27:19Right

Chris Volpe 27:19... "Yes."

Tim Fulton 27:20Yeah.

Chris Volpe 27:20"We got this."

Tim Fulton 27:21That's awesome.

Chris Volpe 27:22But yeah, there's a lot of excitement here. Our community is, I mean, really, really positive and, and driven. And with just us being so far ahead-

Tim Fulton 27:31Mm-hmm

Chris Volpe 27:31... on, on what we're doing, I'm, I'm hopeful that the city, county, and state will see the value in what we're doing and help to support it, and then maybe-

Tim Fulton 27:39Where are you going for those, you know, that initiative, those, those incentives, those grants? What does that look like at this point?

Chris Volpe 27:46So we're talking to quite a few folks. I'm not prepared to, like, give out any names or anything.

Tim Fulton 27:50That's fine.

Chris Volpe 27:51But-

Tim Fulton 27:51But economic development folks.

Chris Volpe 27:53Yeah, so the, the core of this goal is to create economic development and, and like you said, c- capitalize sort of on the, what's called the publisher end of it. So us helping other people get those projects out, and then-

Tim Fulton 28:05Right

Chris Volpe 28:05... we'll receive some, whether it's a rev share or equity or whatever on the back end, which would then, can then be reinvested back into-

Tim Fulton 28:11So a fund almost

Chris Volpe 28:12... a fund. Yeah.

Tim Fulton 28:13Okay. Got it.

Chris Volpe 28:14So it's, it's a, for lack of a better word, it's an investment fund, but w- we're sort of struc- trying to structure it a little bit differently.

Tim Fulton 28:21Yeah.

Chris Volpe 28:21But there's a lot of really cool momentum. Right now I'm, I'm in the phase of, as I close out the year, getting letters of support and whatnot.

Tim Fulton 28:29Yeah.

Chris Volpe 28:29So we've gotten letters of support from almost all the major universities, as well as some of our public and private partners, working with city council and, and others. So, uh-

Tim Fulton 28:38That's great

Chris Volpe 28:39... hopeful that 2018-

Tim Fulton 28:41That's when you'll raise that, those funds?

Chris Volpe 28:43Yeah, that's, that's when we're hoping to do it.

Tim Fulton 28:44Okay.

Chris Volpe 28:44And, and we're also creating, uh, I don't know when we'll have this out, but we've already been getting people who, just like normal folks, normal developers that wanna contribute money towards this thing. Like, I mean, we've had people range from, you know, "I'll give you $25," which is all they have-

Tim Fulton 28:59Okay

Chris Volpe 28:59... to 2,500.

Tim Fulton 29:01Okay.

Chris Volpe 29:01Which out of 10 million, that's not a lot, right?

Tim Fulton 29:03Right.

Chris Volpe 29:03But the fact that all these folks are, are wanting to do that, and they're not expecting anything in return. This, they're not looking at this like an investment. They're looking at it as a way to support something they love.

Tim Fulton 29:12That community, right.

Chris Volpe 29:13Yeah. So we're looking at creating a, um, I don't know if you wanna call it a platform or a website or what, where people can donate-

Tim Fulton 29:21Yeah

Chris Volpe 29:21... to just donate money to it, and provide a letter of support on the reasons why they would-

Tim Fulton 29:26That's great

Chris Volpe 29:26... they would wanna do that. So that's kind of our grassroots level function, and then we're working from the top-down function. 'Cause I, I really, really believe that we are, we're ahead of the curve on this, but it's an opportunity, right?

Tim Fulton 29:38Right.

Chris Volpe 29:38Like, a- like any opportunity, if you wait too long, like, you know, they-

Tim Fulton 29:41You won't be ahead of the curve anymore

Chris Volpe 29:43... yeah.

Tim Fulton 29:43Right.

Chris Volpe 29:43All it could take is somebody in Chicago that's got some extra money, and they're like, "Yeah, I'll throw 10 million at this thing."

Tim Fulton 29:49Right.

Chris Volpe 29:49And now we've lost.

Tim Fulton 29:51Right.

Chris Volpe 29:51You know? Right now nobody thinks about Columbus. We can kinda slip in the back. But if Chicago starts doing it, they're gonna really begin to pull people.

Tim Fulton 29:59Right.

Chris Volpe 29:59So I'm, I'm wanting to move fast, as fast as I can, which unfortunately is not something the public sector is known for.

Tim Fulton 30:06Right.

Chris Volpe 30:07But this is our, this is an interesting time. There's a lot of, I think, sort of progressively minded folks-

Tim Fulton 30:12Mm-hmm

Chris Volpe 30:12... in government right now in Ohio that are like, "How can we, how can we create new mechanisms for our economy?"

Tim Fulton 30:20Yeah.

Chris Volpe 30:20"How do we grow new jobs?" Like, and so I'm providing a new sector of development that just does not exist in Ohio.

Tim Fulton 30:26Right.

Chris Volpe 30:26So take a, take a shot at it.

Tim Fulton 30:28Indeed. Chris, thanks so much for your time.

Chris Volpe 30:29Yeah, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Tim Fulton 30:41Thank you for listening to the Confluence Cast presented by Columbus Underground. Again, you can get more information on what we discussed today in the show notes for this episode at theconfluencecast.com. Please rate, subscribe, share this episode of the Confluence Cast with your friends, family, contacts, enemies, your favorite gamer. If you're interested in sponsoring the Confluence Cast, get in touch with us. We can be reached by email at info@theconfluencecast.com. Our theme music was composed by Benji Robinson. Our producer is Philip Cogley. I'm your host, Tim Fulton. Have a great week.