Bad news first, Good news last

Chamber of commerce outcome

Ok on my last post I said that I was positively waiting for the results of the contest hold by the chamber of commerce of my city and they came to me early than expected: they won’t give the $4000 budget to Human Piñata

They selected other enterprises that with information of first hand need more than the prize offered and with not so solid marketing analysis which leaves me with questions like what were the arguments to select the projects and why they didn’t follow a few rules of the contest that they rubbed in my face when I presented my project. I asked them about it and they say that it is “Confidential information” but as a participant I believe I have the right to know my evaluation specially when they congratulated me on the presentation and gave basically a perfect score to the business plan.

But these are the “bad news” now let’s get more positive

Party Planning

I make games because I love the design process, I enjoy coding and I’m passionate about project management so, will the chamber of commerce results stop the game?: no, specially with the support you show to the game’s concept.

I made a huge effort to get around 40% of the budget needed thanks to people close to me and the earning I get selling art on Teepublic and Redbubble. This means the scope and design of the game suffers from this limitations so I have to re do my planning taking into account the budget I have.

I’m currently working on the following:

• Project Manual for Human Piñata

• Game Design Documentation for Human Piñata

• Development Documentation for Human Piñata

• Visual Arts Documentation for Human Piñata

• Sound Design Documentation for Human Piñata

Why am I investing time on writing this documents? Simple: to try to deliver the best gaming experience for you.

To write all this documents I’m using the following bibliography:

• The Art of Game Design

• Game Feel

• PMBOK 6th edition.

It’s true you can only improve by making more games but I have been making prototypes for the last 2 years and I feel like I need a north to continue growing and literature is always a good compass.

I’m working hard to finish all of these documents to have the best game possible and to provide artists with tools to deliver the right assets to create the right experience. This documents should be finished by the end of December so I can pass from Planning to Execution.

Until I don’t finish the project schedule (as part of the planning process) I can’t give a tentative release date so I apologize that I gave inaccurate dates on the past but now I’m using the best practices (According to the Project Management Institute) to try to announce the most accurate date.

Conclusion

Human Piñata continues its active development but it’s in planning process for the rest of the year so I can do it in the more professional way that will translate (Hopefully) into a great experience.

Don’t worry the game will always deliver on its original story, quasi procedural system and even more so please stay tuned and prepare your best party hat!

Thanks for your support and until next time! ^_^ /