Learn from Creative Europe MEDIA grant recepient what it takes to write a successful application
When we say you can talk to Saša, we don’t mean it figuratively: the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) is organizing a LevelUp online session on November 5th from 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM, where Saša will share his first-hand experience. If you’re interested, please register at this link.
SGA recognizes the importance of this success story to the community, which is why Saša was a speaker at our last meetup. However, we want those who couldn’t join us in Niš to hear what he has to share, so we wrote down the conversation we had with Saša.
SGA: What did Entropic Island have behind them and what stage was Sova at when you applied for the Creative Europe MEDIA grant?
Saša: We as a team have known each other for a very long time and have a long history of various projects started and games that are still unfinished. But at the time of applying for the grant, we had only released one game – a miniature roguelike arena brawler, Lawbringer, and that was less than a month before the competition deadline!
Sova was just a concept at the time, but we had a pretty solid idea of what we wanted it to look like in the end. I was recently rereading our proposal and it struck me that a lot of the high-level design was already cemented and in the same form it came into the actual game.
SGA: Have you applied for other grants before? How familiar were you with the general administrative (not to say bureaucratic) side of the whole thing and did you have any help in this regard?
Saša: This was our first application and everything was foreign and unknown to us. The Creative Europe portal is not the most intuitive and a lot of things are vaguely defined and prone to (mis)interpretation.
Buuut, our then PM had experience in grant applications from other spheres, so he helped us a lot to navigate the admin part and, more importantly, find the form and language that suited the open call.
We also received tremendous help from the Serbian Creative Europe Desk – especially in interpreting the bureaucratic arcana and competition rules.
SGA: This open call is now (in)famous for its emphasis on inclusivity and environmental sustainability. How did you approach these segments in the application?
Saša: We weren’t great. 🙂
Our protagonist is a girl and we have a diverse cast of characters from different races, religions and cultural backgrounds. We deal with themes of identity, religion, transformation and the mixing of culture and history – all of which somehow tie into the European agenda. Inclusivity also implies accessibility, which is something we could have given a more concrete answer to.
On the other hand, we come from a fairly homogeneous background, so as a team we don’t have much to offer in that regard.
As for ecology, we tried (perhaps a little awkwardly) to draw a parallel between the two worlds. Sova’s world is changing and being built under the influence of ideology and the subconscious consensus of the people who live in it – the narrative literally becomes reality. We tried to connect this with the situation in the real world, where we are still quite divided in our approach to preserving the planet – and not always for reasons that have to do with science.
SGA: The technological basis of the project and innovation in this regard are also extremely important. Do you have any advice on how to approach this segment of the application?
Saša: We didn’t really know what was expected of us here, so we decided to provide as much detail as possible regarding the technical implementation and design – and I think that was well received.
I don’t think there’s a silver bullet here – everything matters. The committee is trying to assess whether your team has the expertise and capacity to see the project through. The best way to convince them of this is to provide a realistic, well-thought-out plan that covers every aspect of development. Of course, things change during development, but you should have a solid idea of what you’re building and how.
SGA: What do you think is more important for this open call – quality, that is. the originality of the proposed project or its relevance to the market?
Saša: I think one of the ideas behind the grant is to give a chance to games that have something new to offer, even if it’s not necessarily commercially viable. So I think this is a good place for original and somewhat experimental titles.
On the other hand, the game should have the potential to reach people and be interesting to an international audience. But the main question, in my opinion, is why this game should exist and whether the world will be a poorer place if it doesn’t see the light of day.
SGA: Since it requires a fairly large documentation, how long did it take you to write the application? Are there any risks involved in this endeavor?
Saša: It took us about three weeks of pretty hard work. From this perspective, I think we realistically needed more and made some mistakes in a hurry.
This is a big investment of time, but, in my opinion, it’s absolutely worth a try – provided you have a solid idea of what you’re making and that it fits the scope of the grant. Even if you don’t receive the grant, the committee is obligated to give you detailed feedback and you’ll do better next time.
As for the risk, the team is obliged to do what is written in the application. No one can guarantee the commercial success of the game, but you have to guarantee that you can carry out the project to the end. If you take the money and have nothing to offer as a result, Creative Europe may not pay you the full amount – or even ask for a refund of part of the funds!
Be realistic and plan your project well!
SGA: What feedback did you get on your application?
Saša: They praised our setting and the themes we were dealing with, as well as the way we integrated story and gameplay, especially in the roguelike genre, where that’s not a very common thing. On the other hand, the plot at that point wasn’t overly innovative or elaborate.
They said we had a good understanding of the mechanics, genre specifics and technical implementation issues. That the combination of gameplay and story felt fresh and created a unique experience, even though the individual mechanics weren’t innovative in themselves. They praised our approach to art and sound.
They weren’t thrilled with our marketing plan. Although we got some points for inclusivity and ecology, we didn’t really give very convincing answers.
SGA: How administratively demanding is this grant after you celebrate getting the money?
Saša: The real bureaucracy starts when you get a grant. Harmonizing EU requirements with the Serbian administrative apparatus is… a winding road. But it all doesn’t seem so difficult when you know that you’re waiting for a contract and a hefty sum of money at the end of the process.
After that, the whole project is surprisingly hands-off. We had a total of two conversations with the grant officer during this time. Once the project starts, until the very end, there are no administrative obligations. This was different before, but I think they figured out that it’s best to let the creatives do their job. Game dev is complicated enough without the administrative overhead. 🙂
In the end, there is a final report and substantial documentation around project closure, but nothing overly painful – especially if the team has properly documented their development path.
SGA: Thank you, Saša, so much for this! We believe that this type of first-hand information will be important to many indie teams.