DreamFeel

On the Thursday night before the IGF deadline, and after a few drinks, I decided 'fuck everything' and that I would attempt to get at least a trailer finished for the competition after all. I had previously given up and felt pretty awful about the prior month (most of the actual work just involved a couple small games which are neat and some writing). With new motivation, I pulled it all together a little and submitted. Right now this is 'It Clicks'; the name seems to change faster than I can type it.

I'm unsure about the video quality, Youtube - even in HD - isn't quite friendly to it, but it was nice to stake a marker of the game's development into the ground. Indie Statik noticed it and Cactus! It also continued my IGF submitting streak for the third year, so with that in mind I thought it might be interesting to take a look at some of the other games I've entered in the past and whether that might illuminate over two years of making games.

First, this is the trailer I made two years ago for 'One More Cup of Coffee', still yet my most interesting thing? A game you play by playing music on a keyboard. Who knows how I thought a three minute trailer made any kind of sense, a mini epic, especially when I had so remarkably little to show at this point. However the quotes from the game do communicate its glorious glorious pretensiousness. And I particularly like what looks like coloured film from a silent movie near the end. I finished this (finished with this?) at the very start of 2012, and was quite happy with a lot of the small scenes I added in the last week & the final poetic, playful text. Unfortunately the core game was still woefully opaque and I never put it out publicly. Regardless a really important project for me, you always learn the most from your biggest failures (and it's nice when these failures are games, and finished ones at that). Who knows I might return some time, the themes still really mean a lot. The judge's feedback was actually quite good, whereas from IGF 2013 it's still missing!

I entered 'Fuaim' in 2012, and I can't believe I recorded footage with mouse cursors in it! At least it's a sane 42 seconds. I really like the cheeseball music, it probably communicates some of the themes more clearly than the game actually does. And I still kinda like the very short-lived studio name for myself & Emily: "I PLAY MULE". The 'Fuaim' that was released was so nowhere near what I wanted to do and I always had plans to return, but I wanted to see if people cared and more importantly I felt I was busy with Shu. However very lately these designs have mega-evolved into something that makes me so excited I want to scream. 'Foom'. FOOM. FOOM FOOM FOOM. Tale of Tales gave a great talk at Game City and one part that resonated was the idea of taking your time and letting ideas simmer and stew for a while; it really does help.

I used to worry a lot that people would do my ideas before I could, I still kinda do every so often*. Four years later and this is so not close to ever being a reality. Sure sometimes there are similarities. I did initially get disheartened with early versions of Fuaim when a bunch of similar planetoid gravity mechanic games were announced (in the space of week, seriously). Cool things like Gravity Moon. This was another reason I wasn't super intent on properly making it when I finished the 'teaser'. Firstly, if you have any kind of voice than this 'worry' is so ridiculously moot. Though I haven't found that yet. And anyway that aspect wasn't what was really cool about Foom in the first place (and I suspect Gravity Moon too). Not to mention the slightly new direction I'm thinking about really takes the game to a completely new place. The only similarities being some themes and the structure of the main character's movement. Also, on that mechanic, my gravity is less about orbiting anyway and has v. different potentials. I should worry less. :P

* I have one big non-game development project, and one absolutely huge non-game development project I want to do in the next couple of years if I'm in a position where I can. If someone else gets there before me, awesome. These are things I want to see in the world. I realized recently talking about future stuff in specifics over such a broad medium as the internet serves little purpose though, especially with nothing to show, so I'm just VAGUE VAGUE VAGUE. Sorry!

This is Space Whale, which I also entered into the Student competition in 2012. The trailer isn't quite as tight as the one I made when the game came out in March this year, but I'm mostly sad that I replaced 'Cetacean' with 'Mammal' in the final cut. Back in February 2012 I pitched three game ideas for my team, this, believe it, was the least crazy, or perhaps it was simply the least pretentious. Amazing what we made in just over two months, I can only imagine if we worked on it in the final semester too. The focus of a team and the environment is something I'm slowly rebuilding. The development of this game taught me a lot and I still feel quite attached. Some ideas may make it into Foom. My original plan before graduation was to work on this more and release it. Damn. HINDSIGHT sure is something, haha. Hopefully I can at least get the rights back in the New Year when they can revert though I'm not sure I'll ever do anything with them.

So to return to 'It Clicks', it's the main thing I've been working on lately. It's a 'lil rough and I'm not sure how the game comes across but perhaps you can slight a taste of the feelings. I want to get this game out by December, a little first real release. Then Foom by next Summer (wow, things do take time). And then maybe start 'Gaps' and hopefully I will have been chipping away at 'What a horrible night' that entire time and that will be close to done. Then there's 'Séance'. And 'Dissolution'! And I want to do more tiny one-day games and jams. OMG. AaaaaAAAaah.