Hello everyone,

Thanks to everyone who tried the demo! I hope you liked your few minutes of wandering there. Now that the game is out, I wanted to look back at Shape of the world, and especially at how it came to exist.

I’m Stu Maxwell, and, in high school, I was the nerd who played a lot of Quake, though I’m proud of all the custom levels I created. Today, I’m an adult nerd who makes small parts of huge shooter games by day and, for the past four years, I have also been developing an entire indie game by night, which is finally releasing next week.

Shape of the World is about getting lost in a dreamy, exploration-driven game where trees, flowers and wildlife appear and fade as you wander. When I developed the game, I first wanted people to rediscover the feeling of being pleasantly lost… But as my personal and professional life became more and more hectic during the development, I began feeling a strong need for a place to retire, to breath, to escape from anxiety, stress and work. And in a way, that’s also what became Shape of the World.

A little background

It’s hard to believe I’m actually here. Shipping a game is difficult enough, imagine being a solo indie dev trying to build a game while working full time for another company and taking care of a family (brand new member just arrived). Well, I guess a lot of people here can empathize.

Fortunately, I was lucky enough to have a varied professional background. Back in my younger years, when I could go for months without even owning an agenda book, I enjoyed completing a degree in Fine Art. The immediate result was doing some fairly uninteresting graphic design work for a while, but I finally started learning about computer graphics and went back to school.

I then discovered that my city of Vancouver, Canada has a ton of video game companies. Oh, I thought, I could actually make Quake levels for a living (or something like it!). Getting a job fresh out of school, i tried roles (in) designing user interfaces and drawing environments, but it took me a few years to discover a discipline I really enjoyed: creating stunning visual effects.

Within a few years I had studied the worlds of UI, environment art and VFX. At my next job I started scripting and making shaders, so it began to feel like I really knew my way around a game. At this point I met up with an old friend John Warner who was making his very own game from scratch (called The Fall) and I thought… He’s not any more magical than me; I could do this too! What I once viewed as impossible seemed at least attemptable, and I started brainstorming and sketching my idea for a unique-looking exploration game.

Starting a fresh project is super fun. Creating concept sketches and paintings, then prototypes.

But eventually the plain and simple execution began and it got a lot more sweaty, especially as I tried to fit development time into my evenings after work and had a kid. That probably when the need for a place to relax in after a busy day at work or when life is not really going your way became the more significant and heavily influenced the direction I was taking with Shape of the World.

Surrealist game, very real inspirations

While the game has always looked and sounded like a surrealist and psychedelic journey, it’s actually inspired by the very real Stanley Park, located in Vancouver.

This park is where I first had the want to do a game about being slightly lost. There are endless trails through this old growth forest that’s oddly right at the edge of downtown, which is why I used to go there to bike. It’s very meditative at times, other times exciting, and I started noticing this feeling that I used to love as a kid: being pleasantly lost. This moment when you know you’re safe and you’ll find your way eventually, but you don’t know where you are so you’re free to pick paths on the fly and go with the flow. Being lost… It can be really nice.

So, I wanted to make an exploration game that celebrates that experience. It’s about wandering and discovering, and not worrying too much about sticking to the path. I found I could add to the disorientation by spawning and destroying trees all around you. The environnement ends up constantly changing, creating a somewhat mesmerizing effect where you never know what your surroundings will look like in next ten seconds.

I developed Shape of the World to be as peaceful and relaxing as I could. There is no clock ticking, no perils laying in wait, no game over moment. You decide your own pace without any exterior interference. When I come home, I don’t want to push my skills to the max any more, I want to put on headphones and explore. Now that it’s done, I’m so excited for other people with busy lives and similar wants to go on a relaxing stroll (and sometimes zip and fly) that lets them forget about where they’re going. I do hope they will enjoy the peaceful and surrealist journey wandering in the lands of Shape of the World.

Take care,
Stu Maxwell.