Heavy lonely indie burden

Hello. My name is Ilya Mikhailov, I live in Kazakhstan in the city of Atone. I want to share with you my experience in developing my own game, The Woken Shadow.

I think at the moment it will be more correct if you watch this short (less than a minute) video.


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Yes, on the one hand, it's probably cool that one person modeled, animated, and programmed, and even wrote music, but one question arises:

Why did I do all this alone?

A long time ago...

It all started like everyone else - with an inordinate desire to create their own game. But there was one problem. Yes, there are a lot of ideas in my head, but I can also write music, and the whole game with what and whatever I want to draw, and write the script, but ... in general, there is no programmer in any place.


object levitation

Therefore, for three years, I with maniacal methodicalness asked everyone in a row “And you are not a programmer? Would you like to make your own game? ”Literally, every new person I met, or just crossed, I asked the same thing.


the protagonist beat someone

When it became clear that no one would help

Yes, for some strange reason, all the programmers in my city stubbornly preferred to stamp sites than to do something more versatile. By this time I already tried a bunch of game engines, abandoned several projects and came to Unity.


the main character from “The Woken Shadow” inside Unity

The plan was simple:
Nothing extra! Platform, no frills, everything is black and white, you run and try not to fall under the light (hence the name “The Woken Shadow” - ang. “Awakened shadow”), no plot, colored textures, three-dimensionality, nothing superfluous that at least somewhere time consuming. Over the next two minutes, I drew this sketch, and this is literally the reason why the whole idea of ​​the game was built.

the very first draft, then it was still not clear who it was or what he would do

Then, again, very quickly, sketched the concept of gameplay - hiding from the light, fighting, moving things. By the evening of the next day I had several musical sketches including the title theme, which set the whole atmosphere of the game. And after that, I did something that never ... NEVER! .. should not be done, if you really want to develop games - I went to work.

Designer.


characters from left to right: Shelltrap, Lurk, Shadow

Nine months later, in my arms, it was possible, so indiscreetly to say, a colossal amount - NOTHING. In reality, everything I did could be done in weeks for ... one. Of course, there was a thought process, preparation, planning, training in programming. But there is a huge difference between “doing” and “thinking” about what you are going to do. In short, I quit.

After firing

In the next two weeks I moved the project further than in all 9 months combined. But it was not a breakthrough. It's very simple - I fiddled for nine months and experimented with programming, and in two weeks I just collected all the groundwork. And that's all ... then I realized with horror that this project could not finish on my own. Again everything went in the second round, again I pestered everyone with the same question “Do you want to make your game?” And it ended with the same thing as the first time.


the very first demo (a glitch with transparent textures makes everything green though the textures themselves.)

In the end, there are two options

Find an investor who will invest. Or ask for money through crowdfunding.

I see both options in principle equivalent. In both cases there will be a few more people who will not only get sick of the idea, but most importantly will be financially stimulated. So I “straining a little” collected everything I did, took a video (it helped me with the shooting, made a good friend), assembled it, painted everything in English and laid it out on Indiegogo.


frame from video for Indiegogo - I am at the workplace

Now a little about the game itself

Firstly, the whole concept was lost due to long development. First of all, everything has become three-dimensional. There were two reasons for this: the first is that in Unity, at that time, the work with 2d was terribly clumsy. And secondly - to make a three-dimensional character, stick bones into it, to make the animation turned out to be many times faster than messing with sprites.
For example:

In order to make this monster (Swallower ang. “Swallower”), which jumps out at the end of the video, with modeling, texturing and snapping bones, it took me less than four days. And now you can do anything with this model and show it at any favorable angle, which increases the possibilities of its use.

Working alone, I came to the conclusion that what you did not do everything should be universal and be able to be used several times.
Again for example:

All these fancy drop-like stones are just one model, which is rotated at different angles and enlarged or reduced at different scales.

The most radical changes in the game occurred in the game mechanics itself. There was nothing left of "simplicity", for one reason - while picking with various mechanics they were just bored. That is, I, as a developer, have come up with a new development task for myself so that it is not boring. And some moments had to just cut. For example, there was an idea that a character could throw a spear at a wall, then you could jump on that spear and thus climb higher. But due to the fact that the spear is stuck at different angles depending on the throw, the idea did not work at all. Without this spear turned into something rudimentary. Then another idea appeared - you can grab a stone, throw it into the air, then throw a spear at this stone, and all this turns into a kind of meteorite that seriously hits the enemy.

the main character is aiming a spear at the enemy

Not radical, but rather evolutionary changes have occurred with the plot. As a person who loves “dirty paper” for me was a matter of principle, so that the plot was original and interesting. I myself know that even if the gameplay is fascinating, but if the story is not exciting, then getting to the end of the game becomes not so much a pleasure as a routine exercise.

The basis on which the plot of the game is built

There is a legend ... about an ancient mask that awakens God in you. The one who puts this mask on his face falls asleep, and at the same instant his spirit wakes up in the form of a shadow. You become as fast as thought itself, and as strong as anyone else. But if you die like a shadow, you will die forever. And of course, if something happens to your real body while you sleep, then the shadow will just disappear. And besides this, the legend says that the one who puts on the mask will not be able to take it off. If someone removes her from you while you sleep, you will die a terrible painful death.
This means that after you put on this mask you will have only two ways. Dying fighting like a shadow, or dying when all the vital forces of your real body run out ...

Will you cope with your task, for the sake of which you took such a desperate step and put on this mask?

And if the one to whom you can trust to protect your sleeping body?

sketch "Lurk" and his "Shadow"

And what is the result

As a result, only the name and the black and white gamma remained from the original idea. And there are several philosophical questions:
- What would have happened if that very first idea of ​​the game had been realized, in the original form in which it appeared at the moment of inspiration? During the long development time, I went so far from the original concept that now, looking at the first sketches, I see another game altogether. And if the development will be delayed for another year, and I look at the present moment, then what, I will already have three different games?