The second half of 2014 was when we decided to get serious about my desire to become an indie game designer. Sometime close to a year ago, I quit a project I thought I’d complete. After so many times sent doing this in the past, I made a decision that I was going to quit making indie games.

It was around this time that I met a Twitch streamer by the name of GandyManGaming. Gandy and I became very very close. It was at this point that I began work on a game that I would liken to ‘I Wanna Be The Guy’, with Gandy as the staring character. I never finished it, however, and after a series of games that I began and never finished, after competing in Look What I Made Weekend and actually finishing a game, I became hooked on A game called ‘Attack On Titan Tribute Game’, which turned me away from developing until sometime in October.

I have always been clinging on the edge of depression, but due to a series of events it was particularly bad at this point. That’s when I decided I was going to make a game similar to ‘Grey Matter’. After a bit of work on it, I reworked it to be similar to ‘The C Word’ (Edmund McMillan I a big inspiration, for me).

What Changed Since The Beginning

Originally, ‘Life’ was going to be the only boss, there was only going to be one song, the ending was going to be text only, the game was only going to take a month, and the overall quality of the game was going to be a large step down from what it ended up being. How it ended u evolving is just as much a mystery to me as it is to you.

What Stayed The Same

The black and white primarily words art style was originally meant for place holders until I could find a real artist. Everybody I sent it to enjoyed the art style, though. This coupled with the fact that I really started to enjoy it as well, and the art style stuck.

What Directions Did It Take Throughout

Early on, I decided that I wanted it to be a game that I could use to show my depression and my general outlook on life. This is why the death screen and bosses idea came into play.

All the stuff added from my personal life was an on the go kind of thing. I didn’t have any specific list throughout the game of things I wanted to include, rather I had a general idea of the final vision I want to see, and to be honest, I did a very good job realizing just what I had imagined to be the final game.

So, what took so long?

If you look back, there was many times when I said that I was close to done with the game. I had set numerous release dates throughout the project, and finally just released on the spur of the moment.

Part of the reason for it taking so long is how the scale of the game changed. Originally it was going to be small scale, and eventually it kept going up and up until it became the scale it is today (and I still would’ve liked to add more.)

Another reason it took so long was because of Ludum Dare. By the time Ludum Dare came around, I had been working solid on it for about a month. To me, this felt like a 10 year reject at that point. I kept working on a slightly improved version of Duck, Jump, Die! and co-founded Team Omi with Kazma. After that, and a couple prototypes (one of those will be my next major project after a quick mobile game with Kazma), I began work on NSF again, and worked on an off on it until the most recent major push which carried me and Gergaloth to release.

What Did I Learn?

I learned just how fun making a full scale game is. This is the first real project of mine that took more than a week max. I also learned that based on your previous experience compared to this one and to DJD, picking partners with like personality is important. Before Kappa and before Gergaloth, I absolutely hated working with teams. With them, though, particularly on NSF since it was a long term project rather than just a Ludum Dare game, I learned that working in teams can actually be incredibly enjoyable.

Another big thing I learned was on important design documents are. You don’t necessarily need to lay your entire game start from finish out, but getting just a rough idea of the mechanics, how playing it should feel, etc., is important.

So What Now?

I have the next few months already planned. I’m going to make a mobile game to test the waters with Kazma, then I’m going to work on turning one of the rotates into a full game with Lycanpoet, meanwhile doing the design of Duck, Jump, Die! for mobile.

I look forward to staying making games for the foreseeable future, and can’t wait to see what creations come out of it!