The
game is called Sourpuss, which is the name of a race of grumpy aliens
that like to eat candy. You play as the cosmic bounty hunter
DANGERWIND who has to defeat them. The game features a hand
illustrated cartoon introduction and one medium sized level filled
with puzzles. Gameplay time is about half an hour, depending on how
quickly you solve the puzzles.
Check
out the trailer here:
This
project started as a week-long prototype. I was happy with the
results, but ended up shelving it for a while. This year I decided
fix it up and get it polished enough for a public release.
I
haven't done a solo effort like this in a while. Scope is a major
issue, you have to focus on a manageable set of features. And it
really makes you appreciate your larger dev team, when taking on
big projects.
I've had an idea for a short Unreal demo in my head for a while and finally took some time to develop it. I prototyped the gameplay and it felt solid and fun. But there was this feeling that it needed an introduction cinematic to establish the characters and set the tone.
So, I created a rough draft or "pre-visualization" in one day, and I was happy with it. It contained every scene I needed to tell the story, and I threw together scratch audio all at once, to get the timing right.
Then came the decision to commit to the rough and actually illustrate and animate it. I have this nagging feeling that, with the rise of AI-generated content, this type of hand-made animation will become a thing of the past. But I embraced it and gave it my all.
Here is a video of the rough next to the final. I'm very pleased that the original timing and framing of shots survived.
It's helpful for me to keep track of how long things like this take to do. So, I logged the hours:
Rough Draft: 6 hours
Final Illustration: 115 hours 😅
*Quick note: The music is a temp track that I do not own the rights to. I plan on re-doing the audio before putting out a playable version.
This was just a quick look at the cartoon cinematic process. I'm not announcing the game yet, but I hope to have an early access version to post soonish. Here's a sneak peek at some of the game levels in development:
It's been really interesting to lead the game design effort on such a unique title. Lili is a "screenlife thriller" meaning all of gameplay and storytelling takes place on a virtual desktop, and you (the player) take on the role of a modern-day hacker, breaking into systems, solving puzzles and driving the narrative choices.
Lili has to be one of the most exceptional game design challenges I've had the privilege to work on. We're using live-action video feeds from multiple camera angles (allowing the player to spy on other people), while presenting time-sensitive hacking challenges, and a variety of story-telling devices.
It's common in game development to work on something in the shadows for a long time without the opportunity to share. But amazingly, Lili was featured in the Cannes Film Festival immersive competition, as the first video game ever to be showcased in this category.
Additionally, because the story off Lili is a modern adaptation of The Scottish Play (Macbeth), we have partnered with the Royal Shakespeare Company to produce their first video game ever!
"Lili makes Cannes history as first ever video game to be showcased."
Hi all, wishing you happiness and health at the end of 2024.
This was an intense, interesting, and productive year for gamedev. 2023 ended with really bad news for gamedevs, which continued into 2024. For a variety of reasons, the industry took a big hit, and a lot of people are feeling the pain. My heart goes out to devs who lost jobs, or even left the industry altogether. It was a big loss.
I have been plugging away on my own journey, mostly working on indie projects and paying the rent. I can't decide if I'm more excited about working in Unreal 5, or happy to stay in my comfort zone using Unity. It varies from project to project.
My big news is that early in the year I took on the role of Lead Game Designer for iNK Stories in Brooklyn, New York. I have history with iNK going back almost 10 years, so it was great to reconnect with old friends, and make some new ones.
It's been an adventure working with iNK on several projects, spanning multiple platforms. I especially enjoy being on-site in NYC for collaborative sessions and motion-capture shoots. The clients and talent I have gotten to work with are top-notch. I can't wait for an official announcement to share!
Wishing everyone a great 2025, and the strength to take on the obstacles ahead. Keep your loved ones close, enjoy some gaming sessions, and if you have time, explore some gamedev ideas. Dare to dream, big and small <3
I've worked on a few Unreal Engine 5 projects lately, but due to NDA restrictions, I haven't been able to show as much as I'd like to. That's why I'm really happy to show the Galactic Horizon Demo I helped build with N-Fusion Interactive.
*Turn up the video quality if you watch the embedded video please!
**Skip to 30 seconds if you want to jump past the menus.
In this demo you take on the role of an interstellar traveler investigating various deep space planets. You analyze the atmosphere and local flora and fauna. Ultimately your goal is to determine if the planet is ideal for human colonization, interplanetary trade, or maybe should be avoided.
The demo was made by a small team using early versions of UE5 as they were released. Some things I learned more about along the way:
Sequencer (cameras, animation blending, and BP events)
UI Animation
Media Player/Media Textures
More Advanced BP Scripting
Ultra Dynamic Sky/Weather
Fluid Flux
Landscapes
Brushify
Procedural Foliage Volumes
Niagara Mesh Renderer (for flying ships and creatures)
Level Streaming
Cinematic Layouts
Displacement Materials on Nanite Landscapes
Manual vs Automatic LODs
After spending so long developing projects in Unity, it's really encouraging to dive back into Unreal and find out how my experience translates into the latest version of the engine. Some things are done the same, some things are done differently, but the underlying methodology is very similar.
But so far, in UE5, everything we make tends to be bigger, faster, and more detailed than what we've done in the past! I am loving this journey.
Image and video credit to N-Fusion Interactive (Jeff Birns, Jason Zisk, & Tyler Munden)
Here's my latest water simulation test using Fluid Flux in Unreal 5.
I love the results from Fluid Flux, but it needs to be used on somewhat flat and irregular surfaces to look the best. So I took a blocky stone texture and started breaking it up.
Then I extract and extrude the stone sections into models and placed them over the surface.
Push them back into Unreal and let the water flow over them. So cool!
When you work fully remote, your webcam presence is your professional presence. But depending on who you work with they may have different expectations on how you should present yourself. Gamedev tends to be more casual. The focus is on what you contribute, and it doesn't have to be a sleek corporate look.
This room is my dedicated office for work. But it's also where I game and socialize online. I try to keep it clean and presentable. And my background contains my personal interests, games, and decorations.
Of primary interest is my retro-gaming shelf. It holds four generations of working Nintendo platforms (NES, SNES, N64, & GameCube) with hundreds of titles (original physical cartridges), and a small CRT that fits perfectly into the shelf.
My walls have movie posters, and framed fan-art graphics for classic games (F-Zero, Star Fox). And behind me is my wife's futon/sofa, which we keep so that the office can be used as a guest room if friends/family want to stay the night.
Lastly is a cat bed and pub chair for my darling cat Izzy. She likes to make an appearance when I'm doing video calls. But she does get banned from the office when she gets too demanding of attention. I pay her back with fish puree later.
Let me know if you think my home office setup is appropriate, or if you have any tips. Thanks! <3
/Lastly: I always use headphones on video meetings to reduce line noise on the call. I suggest everyone do that!
The goal was to animate several billboards hanging from a futuristic city tower.
I started out with the building and five signs displaying static images. I copied the signs and arranged them into a 1920x1080 canvas to create a reference texture.
I brought the billboard texture layout into Adobe Premiere, then gathered stock videos to replace each sign.
The stock videos were imported into Adobe Premiere and masked over the static billboard images in the layout texture. A final looping composite video was created (MP4, 1920x1080) as well as an image to be used for UV mapping.
Then I used Maya to apply a single material to all the signs' display screen geometry. UVs were adjusted to optimally display each portion of the video. The signs were exported as FBX and reimported into UE5 with a temp material displaying the static image of the video.
The final task was importing and playing the composite video.
I copied the composite video into the UE5 project's Content/Movies directory.
Then, using UE5's Content Browser I imported the MP4 file into the same directory (Content/Movies) to create a File Media Source, Media Player, and a Media Texture.
The File Media Source contains the File Path to the MP4.
The Media Player controls the video playback, including Play on Open, Shuffle, Loop etc.
And the Media Texture renders the video to a texture, which can then be referenced in a material in the world.
I changed the material the signs were using to render the Media Texture linked to the billboard video.
The final step was using Blueprints scripting to make the Media Player actually play the movie at runtime. There are a variety of ways to achieve this. I did it with a custom event (PlayMedia) and an event tick that checks that the media “Is Ready”, then plays it.
The result is one Media Player being rendered on multiple screens, as if they are each their own video.
*This is a general runthrough of the methods used to achieve this goal. It is not a complete tutorial. There are plenty of existing resources that cover the various techniques used (like the Media Player). If you would like me to expand this article, or if you have specific questions, feel free to contact me!
I used to have a hard time keeping a house plant alive. But now I've embraced a small garden for the hot and sunny time of the year.
Gardening is a great way to balance out the gamedev lifestyle. It forces you out into the sunlight. Requires you to do some physical activity. And gives you valuable time away from screens.
As time marches on, you witness the cumulative change happening before you. Just a little bit of progress each day amounts to major change, and bears fruit in the end! Much like we hope for our gamedev projects.
It's been a very busy year. After a lot of hard work, it's nice to say that Aluna: Sentinel of the Shards is available on PC/Steam and Nintendo Switch!
Aluna as it appears on Nintendo's eShop
There were many aspects of Aluna's development I found rewarding. Working with established characters and creating a new adventure for them is a special kind of challenge I enjoy. And creating vast top-down worlds for the player to explore was engaging. I had to upgrade my PC just to handle our custom RPG Editor! The streaming engine can be extremely demanding when viewing an entire level at once.
Aluna's chunk-based world editing gave us a lot of options on how to lay out the levels. And I enjoyed creating 3d tile sets that could go in any direction, and rise or descend.
Here you can see a massive ziggurat constructed in our engine:
RPG Editor view of a level from Aluna
Same level zoomed in
And here is what it looks like zoomed in a bit closer. The gameplay camera is even closer in.
Reaction to the game has been positive, here is a review:
My favorite part of a new release is getting to watch players stream their gameplay sessions, either live or archived. People may react to different parts of the game in ways you didn't anticipate. It's exciting to see and provides a lot of late-night viewing when I can't sleep.
I meant to post more about Aluna right at release, but I've been swamped with more work since then. I decided to post now on the eve of GDEX 2021 in case any of my fellow devs are interested in what I've been up to. I plan on attending the con this weekend at the Columbus Convention Center. See you there!
Splash page for GDEX 2021, the local gamedev convention in Columbus, OH
What a long, strange, and difficult year we have been through. We lost some great people. I can't explain it. Can't quite get to grips with it. But I want to do my best to move forward. So here goes.
Aluna: Sentinel of the Shards, has been my main focus through these times. And I'm very proud of the work we've done on this game. The game will be released soon (probably next month: April 2021). And we have an amazing "Making of" video released.
It's a unique title. And I'm happy that N-Fusion Interactive was able to bring it from concept to completion. That's my favorite way to make a game. :)
More updates will come. But get your Nintendo Switch and Steam PC ready to explore this extraordinary world!
This sucks. You know what I'm talking about. But I don't want to complain too much because my personal situation is not that bad compared to what others are going through.
Actually most of my time was spent working from home before the pandemic, so I'm really thankful to be working right now. I'm also thankful for the measures taken by the state of Ohio to keep us safe. Columbus is a great place to live and we're all working together to get through this.
High Street is depressingly deserted.
So besides the outbreak, and the upcoming release of Aluna, there's even more going on! Chelsey and I moved in together. Well, mostly moved. We still have a lot of things in boxes, furniture stored in different locations, empty rooms waiting to be filled, and a dining room with no table or chairs. But there's not much we can do about it with the lock-down in effect.
Awwwwwww.
None of this seems to be bothering Izzy the cat. She's my new late-night gamedev buddy. My new alarm clock. And my new napping pal.
We're going to be okay.
Good luck everyone. Call your friends and family. Stay connected. Stay safe. Stay sane. And if you can, do some gamedev!
It's not every day you get to see the game you're developing appear on a large billboard in Times Square. So this was a nice morale booster for the team as we approach the launch of Aluna.
I'm thrilled!
(..and tired, a little burned out, but also thrilled!)
I'm happy to say that my current game dev project, Aluna: Sentinel of the Shards, was officially announced this week. Here's how the game is being described on TheXboxHub:
"...Aluna: Sentinel of the Shards will see us given the chance to follow the exploits of Aluna, the warrior daughter of a Spanish conquistador and South American nature goddess Pachamama. After being raised in early 16th century Spain, Aluna has escaped to the New World only to realise it was in fact her true homeland. And it is here where we fall into Sentinel of the Shards to head off on a quest through Inca mythology as Aluna strives to restore the amulet her goddess mother entrusted to her." Read more at:
From my perspective, designing Aluna and building her game world has been a great experience and I'm excited to see players' reactions when they take control of Aluna and explore her world.
The game will be available on PC, Xbox One, PS4, and Switch!
And I would also like to mention that I will be attending GDEX "The Midwest's Premier Gaming Expo" next month in Columbus, Ohio (October 11th-13th). If you're in town, let me know!
I turned 34 this week and I don't have any complaints. I've been busy so I don't have any hobby dev posts to present here. But my brother did give me a game design to prototype. So I'm looking forward to that.
Also, I have a new game release announcement coming soon this year! Stay tuned.
Until then, enjoy this llama plush I got at my birthday party at Dave & Buster's.
Thanks to Chelsey and Nick for making my birthday extra special this year. I love you guys.
Air Mail is one of my favorite games that I've developed. From concept to completion, and through release, it was a joy to work on and people responded really well to it.
Now I'm happy to announce that the game has been remastered for the Nintendo Switch. The controls feel much smoother on the Switch Joy-Con controllers. And the updated artwork looks amazing on a large screen.
We amped up the poly count in every scene. Re-did the lighting and material work (using the high resolution source art), and added additional effects to make an even more beautiful and immersive world for players to fly through.
The game is on a pre-release sale right now! And it will become available in just a few days on June 26th.
