Valve is a kitty and other video game company personifications

Mojang is a guy who just appeared out of nowhere, looking a tiny bit similar to someone else, and quickly became the most popular guy in town.

Maxis is a kind of friend who has a huge collection of dollhouses and plays with them very often, whether it's concentrating in the interior of one or managing many of them in one space, doing whatever the hell he wants to them. Of course, he was strangely absent ever since being introduced to a new friend, EA, who is suddenly picking up on the hobby and hoping to make a profit out of it.

edited 22nd Aug '12 4:47:09 PM by EarlOfSandvich

Paradox Interactive has to be a historical reenactment fan. :p

Konami is your friend who happens to be an ex-marine. His ideas are promising, but tend to get more long winded and overtly-ambitious as time goes on.

amidoinitright?

If Konami made games like Metal Gear and Contra exclusively, yes it would, since it would tie into your friend being the "tough-as-nails, I wanna challenge myself" type. But they do make other stuff too, and the only one amongst their group who has a habit of being overambitious is Kojima.

Now, why am I not suggesting an idea myself? Simple: a lot of the companies mentioned on the list tend to have some very defining characteristics. Bethseda makes really good open-world RP Gs witha strong emphasis on exploration, EA views everything from a marketing perspective, hench the businessman look, Valve's a cat due to the internet's lolcat meme and Valve's popularity, etc. I think it's best to pick a company that has a particular shtick, that way it's easier to "picture" them.

EDIT: Ah hell, I'll try one... Capcom! Capcom would be the "Ignores Everybody Else's Advice" guy. When you first knew him in high school, he was hands-down the most popular, badass kid in the school, and everybody knew who he was or what he did: even the jocks thought he was hardcore. Unfortunately, that got to his head and he started thinking he'd be able to handle himself wouldn't need anybody's help. Fast foward to today where he's running a company, but slowly dragging it down due to his hard-headedness and refusal to listen to his employees or even his customers. You'd associate with him, but wouldn't want to work or stay with him a long time due to how hard-headed he is.

Not really a "video game" company but:

Type-MOON is the girl who is really into competition figure skating and used to compete at state level for a really long time before moving on to nationals. She spent years perfecting a couple of killer routines that always wowed the audiences back home with their loving, excruciating, almost overwhelming detail but is eventually going to find out that when you're in the nationals, people want something more. Also, she has a thing for seafood. Absolutely loves it.

Atari is a historical figure. He became famous for a few years, then spent the rest of his life in obscurity, usually broke or sick. People still name their kids after him.

Digital Pictures is the father of Tommy Wiseau and James Nguyen (the auteurs who created The Room and Birdemic).

Koei was a history major in college, who then started writing fanfic about history (especially crackfics and multi-crossovers).

Working Designs was that super-dedicated fan who spent all his money on laserdiscs and import figures. He can sometimes be seen selling things at garage sales.

Way Forward Technologies is that brave guy who writes good fanfics about kids' shows, though he's better known for his original fiction.

Kairosoft is that guy who has a good business plan, and constantly rewrites it to fit into new venues.

Hanako Games is a cool hobbyist woman. She sometimes makes custom girls' toys, sometimes mods them into combat variants, and sometimes writes good alternate universe / crossover fanfiction about them.

Winter Wolves is a guy who used to love only sports and action movies, but after he got married, he discovered that he liked romance novels as well.

Bay 12 Games is that odd guy who lives down the road. He's been perfecting this one recipe for meatloaf for years. Last week, he spent several days on refining the crisping of the crust. Every time he makes a major change, you're not sure if you like it, but you force yourself to eat it, knowing that the taste will grow on you. You just wish sometimes that he'd stop refining the unimportant details and put some meat into the meal! Still, it's free, and it's always interesting. Every once in a while, he puts out a new hors d'oeuvre, but they tend to be lightweight novelties that largely distract from his meatloaf efforts.

My idea for SEGA is that guy who lost all his money when [insert event here] occurred, and now you often see him panhandling in the street.

I'm trying to think of something clever for Arc System Works, but the only things I can think of are related to music...

In light of Sega's recent copyright/patent trolling streak ^note issuing DMCA takedowns for every You Tube video with "Shining" and "Force" in the title even if they don't contain Shining Force footage, claiming to have a patent on touchscreen drag-and-drop and trying to sue Level-5 over a game that's older than their patent, and so on, I'd characterize them not as a panhandler, but rather the guy who was on the local news because he robbed a bunch of stores and now police are asking for information to track him down.

edited 13th Jan '13 9:18:03 PM by PoochyEXE

That makes sense.

Yager: One of your old friends who grew up and became a US Marine.

He doesn't talk about what's happened on his tours. What you can tell is that it fucked him up for life. He now spends most of his time in the bar drinking shots and muttering "...why?"

edited 14th Jan '13 6:00:09 AM by PippingFool