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What made me want to sign up to Tranzfuser in the first place was just what an incredible opportunity it was to get a kickstart in creating my own games. Tranzfuser is a competition funded by the UK Games Fund to encourage British game development graduates to independently create their own games. The winner received an investment for their company, and all participating teams got the opportunity to present their games at the gaming convention “EGX” in Birmingham.
Proposal Video
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Starting out, me and two of my friends (Kirsten Corbett and Nadine Bucknor, both artists) tried to gather a team together to fill in the roles we were lacking. The concept I had for the game already existed, and was intended to be used in an earlier university project but many programmers were intimidated by the concept. In the game, you would play as a blind monster who sees his way around using echolocation; anything that makes sound causes the world to reveal itself to you. (pictured left is the final monster concept, drawn by Nadine Bucknor)
One major obstacle in this project was the fact that we were unable to secure a programmer for our team. So, I decided that the game would have to become more of an environmental exploration type game, rather than the competitive horror game I’d envisioned before. This compromise turned out to be for the better, I feel, as the narrative I was able to deliver with the monster was much more fulfilling and players really made a connection with this character, in spite of the lack of dialogue. This was aided massively by my decision to make the game in VR. Though it was more of a challenge to develop for, working with VR was a fantastic opportunity to branch out and test my design abilities in a completely unfamiliar realm.
The concept transformed from a game where you were a big evil monster hunting down an old man in the woods, to a game where you’re a friendly spirit guiding a young girl who is lost in the woods. I feel like ultimately this actually was a change for the better because the higher focus on visuals and storytelling meant that the player was much more immersed in the world we’d built and focus on just playing with the central mechanic we’d made. (pictured left is art made for our game by Kirsten Corbett)
This was the largest and most comprehensive project I’d ever had to participate in. One thing I was charged with doing as team-leader was creating monthly developer diaries where we simply informed the people running Tranzfuser what we’d been doing all month. Below is an example.
As team leader, I had to manage all other team members and lay out plans for how we’d get the game in a state ready for EGX. What I have to do in order to complete any project is have a vision in my head of what it will look like when it’s done, then it’s just a simple matter of thinking of how to get from where I am now to where I want to be. So, when looking at it from that perspective, managing my teammates was just that easy. I was fortunate enough to have a team of dedicated people willing to work ourselves to exhaustion to get this finished. I created a Trello board and numerous Excel documents. My Excel documents would simply lay out what state the game should be in by the end of each week and what state it should be in by the end of the month, with individual tasks assigned to each member. The tasks were sensible and the scope was adjustable so we rarely failed to meet our individual quotas.
This game is very unlike my usual strategy/RPG based design, partly because I wanted to branch out and partly because of the interests of other team members, but it did still include my tendency for weaving narrative seamlessly through the gameplay and visuals. The environment itself tells a story of how this spirit was once worshipped by the locals but has long since been forgotten. We had to reduce the scope of the game due to time constraints, but initially I’d planned for the environment to evolve as the player ventured through the game; a timeline of this creature’s relevancy in the everyday lives of his worshippers. Starting from cave drawings and carvings of the creature, progressing into small shrines, then churches, and eventually just fading away until there are no relics of the spirit left.
Actually taking the game to EGX though was the true highlight of this project for me. I’ve been making games since starting university, but to come together and make something with people who’ve become my closest friends and have our joint-creation be presented for the public’s raw consumption is a sensation I’ve been thirsting to recreate with all of my projects. What I love about the public’s reaction is how it’s such an emotional experience for them. A tutor or industry specialist will look at your work from a logical and objective standpoint, but someone from the public is just being genuine with how they feel.
The reception began mixed, but we actually iterated upon it while at the event and before the end of day 1, our playtesting and on-the-fly fixes really made the feedback become overwhelmingly positive. Our project was ambitious, and I was glad that it paid off.
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We had some members of the public say that we were the best indie there, with one even returning with his friend and saying we were the best experience at EGX, and that was truly special to me. The game was highly approachable to people of all ages, with one kid excitedly just playing around with the mechanics of our game.
What people really liked about our game was the central concept and mechanic of blindness itself as well as the beautiful and melancholic atmosphere of the game, courtesy of our artists. Something that I’m rather proud of as a designer is that in spite of there being no tutorial to the game, the mechanics were simple and intuitive enough for most players to immediately understand the game with little to no instruction.
I’d never had the opportunity to showcase at an event like this before, and it was truly something special. I learned a hell of a lot from it, and it was after this event that I knew that I could be nothing other than a game developer.
