First Playtest: Blender Film & Games Conference

In October, we unveiled the first early prototype of Dark Queen at the Blender: Film & Games conference in Zagreb, Croatia. It was an exciting moment for us as this was the first time players got to step into the dark world we’re building.

The feedback we received was invaluable, players praised the game’s atmosphere and story foundation but also provided constructive criticism about areas needing improvement. We compiled an extensive list of things that needed to be changed and got back to work.

Round 2: Reboot InfoGamer

Fast forward to November, when we brought an updated prototype to Reboot Infogamer in Zagreb, the biggest gaming event in the region.

This version of the prototype reflected many of the changes inspired by October’s feedback and this was a chance to see how a wider and more diverse audience would react to Dark Queen.

The response was incredible and we noticed improvements in the overall player experience thanks to the updates and improvements since the previous version.

That said, we also uncovered fresh insights, bugs and areas where general quality of life improvements would improve the experience a lot.

Next Step: Playtesting with Our Discord Community

The next chapter in this process will be opening up playtesting to our Discord community (cough, cough, join it now: https://discord.gg/RVZ2FZmabT) sometime at the beginning of next year (hopefully).

This will be a chance to involve you all directly in the development process, giving you a sneak peek at the game’s progress while gathering targeted feedback.

Note for my fellow devs

I know that a lot of game developers lurk in these Game Jolt communities so suggestion for you all would be to try applying to showcase your game at a gaming conference like this (especially if it's held somewhere close to where you live).

It will give you a very clear deadline, force you to focus on what's important, and most of all, you'll get an awful lot of feedback that you may wouldn't have gotten otherwise.