This is major news! Especially for my small quiet life that I have. I am officially announcing the JANE project! JANE is a first person point and click adventure game I’ve been working on for a relatively long time.

It all started in January when I discovered the game MYHA (game developed in 10 days for the “Myst Game Jam”). I got literally obsessed by this game. All the point and click nostalgia was concentrated in this short mini masterpiece game. I got emotional and I didn’t know how to react. I wanted to create something myself, something different, something amazing. I wanted to transform the love I have for these games into something visual, playable and enjoyable. I just wanted to make a game I’d like.

I started a paper prototype. It was very vague, and I didn’t know where to start exactly. Spring came next and I quickly lost motivation for the project. The main reason was that I had two jobs: my main job and a seasonal part-time job, for the summer. I had no time dedicated for creation. I had some time to think, though. I was mainly thinking about how to make a game easily, without 3D or complex stuff that would require long-term learning. Shivers, Myst, RAMA and Lighthouse: The Dark Being are games that inspires me, and I really wanted to create 3D environments. But I did not have time, and I quickly got unmotivated.

Why did I absolutely wanted to create 3D environments? I do not know, but I had to find a solution. This is where I got the idea of using actual photos, you know like real life photos! I love photography. I’m not a professional, but I like that. During summer, I decided that my game would be made of photos I’ll take myself. It involves more than just take some photos and put them in the game, but I was really motivated! Towards the end of August, I officially started the project.

It took a weekend, and JANE's story was written. The Puzzle Dependency Chart was also made during that time (which has been constantly evolving ever since). The game was finally clear in my head. I had an idea of how things would go in the game. The following weekend, I took all the photos (well, almost!) and created all the social media accounts I needed for the project (for Never Grown Up Games, actually). There you go! JANE was officially started in September!

It was so satisfying to have a project that was really started. I had a good base to start with. I was very happy with that! This is JUST the beginning of a fun journey of making a game: I had 150 photos for the game, but nothing else.

In the next devlog, I'm going to talk about how I edited the photo to get the horror/atmosphere vibe I wanted.