Can you tell us a little about yourself?

Duct Tape Games is a 3 man indie game developer studio in Melbourne, Australia. The three of us work on games in our spare time while juggling full time jobs, with the goal being able to transition to full time developers as soon as we can pay the bills off it.

Tell us about your game and how it works?

Broadside is a Pirate action game that puts the player in the role of a soon to be infamous Pirate. With tactical ship to ship battles and intense boarding action, the player will prey on trade routes, fight rival pirates and be the bane of the Royal Navy in their quest for Infamy. 

The core gameplay of Broadside is split into two main areas, Ship to Ship combat, and Boarding Actions. During Ship to Ship combat the player must manoeuvre their ship to fire broadside cannons at their enemies. A variety of ships are available to the player from small nimble Cutters to larger Ships of the Line with 100 or more cannons. After crippling the enemy the player can close in and fire grappling hooks to commence a Boarding Action. Boarding Actions will give the player direct control of their Pirate Captain to fight enemy sailors and capture the enemy ship. 

Fighting consists of active parrying, dodging and attacking, feeling reminiscent of a modern action game, but from an isometric view. The player will need to learn to avoid being surrounded while fighting multiple enemies, and choose when to use their limited supply of Flintlock pistols to take down more difficult foes.

What was the inspiration behind this game?

Our artist had the idea for a Pirate character he wanted to test, so we made a prototype over a weekend, and then kept going with it.

Tell us a little about the development of the game?

Broadside took close to two years of “hobby time” development. It was developed by three people.

Can you share some of the valuable lessons you learnt while developing this game?

Having a solid idea of what the game will be, and putting it down on paper before starting to actually develop is hugely important. We didn’t do this well enough with Broadside, which caused development time to blow out as we did retrospective design. Having a prototype early is also really valuable. Once you have a prototype working, you can quickly test your ideas and find out if they are fun or not.

What advice would you give to developers who are just beginning game development?

Start small, with a well defined idea of what you are making (even if that means a pong game or similar).
Always try and break down a feature into it’s smallest components, and create them one at a time (ie: Don’t work on “Stealth System”, work on “Enemy Line of Sight Checks”). If you are working with a team in different locations, set up a Version Control system as soon as you can, this will save a huge amount of time as the project continues.  Most of all, have fun and don’t be disheartened when things get difficult.

Are there final words you would like to leave with our readers?

Good luck in developing your own games, and please check out Broadside!

Thanks again to David and team for developing Broadside and taking time to share with other developers.

Check out Broadside here!

Can you tell us something about yourself?

I’m Tom, after beginning to learn to code at 14, going to university to learn games (where after a year I was hired for a year to work for Sony on the PS4) I decided to write a proper game. Thus GlitchedSoftware was born, and soon after, the first release of Zoon was compiled.

Can you tell us what your game is about?

Zoon is the game I always dreamed of when playing other spaceship-building games. The one designed from the ground up to do all those little things I wanted to do. Like design the eletrical routes for ships, or the floor and wall types, where do the lasers go and how will having an extra thruster in the airlock affect the flight of the ship?It’s fully multiplayer, stupendously enjoyable and rewarding and has epic levels of modding to make the game utterly your own.

How can we find your game?

Zoon Link

What inspired you to create this game?

The idea came originally when I was 11 and my dad would take me to Tesco. He’d let me push the shopping cart around and I’d pretend it was a great space-ship and drift around corners listing off commands in my head like “full power to the side thrusters”. No game could do this, so 10 years later I tried to write one that could.

Can you tell us about the development of the game?

I wrote the game alone, mostly because I started in the summer after my work placement when I lived at home, and secondly because I needed a very fast development cycle without management problems to avoid the idea dying. This also meant I choose using C# rather than C++, and only developing on Windows rather than multiplatform.

What are the most important things you learned when making this game?

Thinking ahead will make life easier. Bit of an obvious one, but even now I’m making big mistakes in my marketing simply because I didn’t take the time to think ahead. From coding to banking to life, everything is helped by making choices earlier and staying on top of things. My only argument against this is going back to my fast development idea, and how the only way to stay fast is simply to dive into things and try keep up with stuff as everything explodes.

What advice can you give to the newbies with game development?

The decisions you make at the beginning of a game’s development will haunt you for the rest of it. What engine, what language, what license, what level of user modding you’ll allow, everything should be considered before moving further ahead to avoid a ton of chaos and work down the line. If your serious about the idea, work out exactly what it is before starting to code.

Anything else you would like to share with the audience?

A lot of people think making games is a lot of fun and I’ll agree that it’s definitely one of the most rewarding jobs in the sense of being able to literally see what you accomplish. But I try explain to everyone who tells me they want to go into it, be ready for the “literally” thousands of long nights spent trying to make a single pixel change colour in a special way.

Thanks for sharing with us Tom and we look forward to new and exciting things from you in the future and best of luck!

Check out this GameDev Academy endorsement here

Can you tell us something about yourself? 

I’ve been developing games since 1983. In 1988 I took over the Amiga version of a parallel game development project called Micropolis. Before it the game was released it was renamed “SimCity.” Later I worked for Maxis as their Technical Director and Sims Publishing Director. I more recent years I ported Myst to the Sony PSP for SEGA Japan, Midway in Europe and THQ for the South Pacific. I still enjoy programming and find the HTML5/JavaScript interesting because games can be created quickly. I like the HTML5 Quintus engine because it is lightweight and easy to use.Games are a new division for JyotishTools.com which has mainly been in the business of developing astrology programs for multiple platforms.

What is the name of the game you have developed?

Crash the Drone!

Where can we find your game?

Crash the Drone link

Can you tell us how your game works?

Toss objects at the hovering drone to knock it out of the air. Tap or mouse click the screen to launch objects. You get 15 objects to knock drones out of the air.

Where did the idea come from for this game?

The idea came from recently seeing a news story about fans at the Staples Center tossing objects at a hovering drone to knock it out of the air.

Can you tell us about the development of the game?

I developed the game by myself and it took only a few days. It is very simple and makes use of the 2D physics engine in Quintus. Different objects will have different gravity and mass and interact that way when tossed.

What is the most important things you learned while developing the game?

I got more in depth into the Quintus engine and using different layers in development and object control. My previous game, “Drone Dodge” also HTML5/JavaScript game me the template to use the Android Webview for the Android version. Having experience since 2009 in developing Android apps I know how important a small footprint can be. Fortunately the game plays well in the Webview with only the addition of sound routines using the JavaScript interface so a third party webview was not required.

What advice do you have for young developers just starting out in game development?

Be original. Avoid doing “me too’s” except as a learning process. Games are more a creative medium than an engineering one. Writing a game from an engineering standpoint would be like writing music purely from a music theory standpoint (music was my college major).Be patient. Learn to walk away from the project if you hit a snag. Often the solution will come a few minutes to you after walking away and doing something else.Above all, remember it’s “only a game” which is something Will Wright liked to say when people got in a bind. Have fun creating your game and folks will have fun playing it.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Bryan for taking the time out to share his insights with our readers. We wish him the best of luck.

See link to Crash the Drone here.

They’re responsible for the “Horror fans dream come true” game Terrordrome: Rise of the boogeymen and had gained a certain trust from its followers regarding dedication and quality. Now they bring Land of Labyrinth and want to share it with us at the GameDev Acadamy.

In Land of Labyrinth, you are Sven, a young adventurer in search of his disappeared father, who must travel throughout a series of huge levels structured in form of mazes. Each one of them is unique in its style and complexity. But finding the exit is not the only difficulty as you will encounter various sorts of creatures that inhabit the labyrinths, some are dangerous, others might help you. Fortunately, you will be able to make use of magic potions, special weapons and other useful Items along the way. You control the main character in a 3rd person perspective. You can explore and collect different kind of objects along the way, Find secret places that hide valuable items, fight numerous enemies or avoid them by hiding and sneaking them out. At the end of each level you will encounter the guardian of the level, basically the final boss that you will need to defeat in order to progress to the next labyrinth. Until you reach the final Labyrinth and fight the Master of Labyrinth himself.

Land of Labyrinth will challenge your orientation and memory as well as your ability to solve puzzles, find secrets and put your fighting skills to the test. The game uses arcade and some RPG elements to provide the best labyrinthic experience in video games. We will primarily focus the development for PC and Mac and will also consider Linux and Android (Ouya) platforms along the way. It is powered by Unity 3D engine.

Where did the game idea come from?

I’ve always been fascinated with mazes and labyrinths since I was a kid, I use to draw complex labyrinths in a notebook and challenged members of my family or friends to solve them out. When Jim Henson’s movie “Labyrinth” came out, I was immediately mesmerized with it and it was indeed a big inspiration for making this game. Also I found no equivalent game in the market, there are indeed lots of dungeon crawler games out there (the closest kind of game compared to LoL), but nothing that really reproduce the feeling of actually being lost in a giant maze. I wanted a game where the main goal remains finding the exit, with dead ends and few cues, where you have to rely heavily on your orientation to find your way out. There are other strong influences directly coming from fantasy literature, movies like “Legend” and “Willow”. A trendy series of game books in the 80’ which has a maze-like structured story and Greek and Northern mythology. Games like Golden Axe, Rastan Saga for their efficient arcade gameplay and Skyrim for the aesthetic.

What can you tell us about the development of the game?

I went full time indie beginning of 2013 and started the development of Land of Labyrinth at that time.
I started creating the graphical assets and modeled some characters, I’ve made almost all the animations set for the hero and for some of the ennemies. I’ve worked alone during the first 8 months and then contracted a freelance programer to help me to integrate everything in Unity. The progress was considerably slowed down when my son was born and during the next 6 months.
Eventually I ran out of personal financial ressources last month so I had to find a job and I’m back to work on the game on my spare time. The game is still on development stage.

What are the most important things you learned when making this game?

Land of Labyrinth is not the first game I made but you always learn new things with new projects, specially when each one of them is different. I have never worked on a medieval/fantasy game before so I had to make lot of research on Medieval architecture and design, what was the people loved the most about Fantasy universe.
The first level also served as a prototype and as I was building it I learned lot of things about level design and the possibilities my game had to offer to the player in term of gameplay. It soon became clear that this could be an awesome game, not just only a maze game but also a great adventure experience.

What advice would you tell people who are beginning with game development?

I think it’s important to distinguish what is your goal when doing games. If it’s as a hobby it might be a great way to learn the development process and from there to know if you would like to venture further or not.
If you intend to make a living off of it, then keep in mind doing video game is serious business and is not only about just doing games, it’s about doing many jobs at the same time, doing things that you may not like but that you will have to deal with, it’s about entrepreneurship, management and keeping your passion and family alltogether. Are you up for the challenge?

We want to thank the guys from Huracan Studio for a great interview, and also  want to share a last thought of them with all you GameDev readers:

Independent games are a great source of creativity and freshness whereas the big companies have somewhat lost their soul along the way. Let’s hope the indie game devs scene continues this way and won’t fall into the dark side of greed and corporate when they eventually get to the top. Le’ts make this a family, not only a marketplace.

What do you think??

That’s exactly what happened with Dinger Apps, formed by two students from Brisbane, Australia. Later, a third student joined the crew. Currently, they are still studying and creating android games and apps in their spare time.

One of these games is Doodlechains an Android game inspired by “Telephone” which takes that concept and adds drawing pictures or doodles into the mix! Your goal is to draw or describe an image given to you by another Doodle Chains player. This creates what they call a “link” in the chain. Once you’ve submitted your link, you have to check out how the chain’s meaning has changed since the first link as a result of other players’ contributions. The results are mainly hilarious.

Where did the game idea come from?

We can’t exactly remember how we came up with the idea for the app. Around that time, we had been brainstorming ideas for new applications. The next thing we remember is us starting development on Doodle Chains. Yes, the application was named Doodle Chains from the start. We did think about changing the name of the application around the eight month mark however the name Doodle Chains stuck.

What can you tell us about the development of the game?

Development started out with just two developers. After six months of development, another friend joined to speed things up and help with the UI design. Overall, the application took approximately a year to develop. This time was so large due to university, learning curves of android development etc.

What are the most important things you learned when making this game?

There are two things we have learnt which are develop simple and assume your user base will not know how to play (even if the concept is easy) and will abuse the system (being inappropriate, not playing correctly etc.). Although we think the game definitely has the potential to take off, next time a simpler game that doesn’t take a year to develop may be a better option.

What advice would you tell people who are beginning with game development?

Develop something simple and pleasing to the eye. Take time with your beta testers and find out what work needs to be done to make the game easy to understand and addicting (so your users come back).

-Download Doodle Chains at the Google Playstore

Thank you guys for sharing your experience with us!

And for all you GameDev Academy readers, remember you feedback is very important for all those game developers out there

Adrenaline Rush was developed by Emil, an Indie Game developer from Romania who likes to write reviews of games. He describes his own game as “surely one of the 2D scrolling game that you would love playing.”

He believes that simplicity is the secret for success, so despite of the simple graphics, he’s added plenty of features that encourage the players to play and also give them a fun and entertaining experience for how long they chose to play.

What can you tell us about the game?

Well as simple as the car game it is, it has it’s own short story. You’re in a classic car, we don’t know for sure what it is, we think its a Ford car, for some reason, but if you like another car, it can be the one which you want as well, so if you like Lamborghini, Porsche or an other car that was popular in the late 80′s and 90′s it can be that one. The important fact it is, that you are on a strange road with two bands, and your car runs wild along the road. You can’t stop the car for any reason, and your speed goes up and up and as you go through the levels, cars will run beside you fast and faster, at one moment you will also see all kinds of crazy police cars drive along with you. The only way to save yourself is by driving the car until you get to the final level, which for us also remains a mistery.

What are the most important things you learned when making this game?

– Task scheduling
– Time Management
– Marketing Strategies
– The importance of a promotion plan

What advice would you tell people who are beginning with game development?

Start working on something, anything, no matter on how good or how bad is the idea, or the recourses you have at your disposal.

We want to thank Elim and invite you to check out just some of the features of Adrenaline Rush and, if you like it, remember to share this post

• 8 Achievements to complete;
• Awesome old cars including a police car which you can unlock;
• High score saving utility so you can show your friends how much you’ve manage to score and also challenge them to score better;
• Easy gameplay, you’ll just have to tap left or right for the car to move;
• Fun effects like explosions;
• Music and sound effects which mimics the ones that we’re used in retro fun games;
• is FREE to play!
Adrenaline Rush is surely a game that will put your blood in a rush. Join the race now and let us know how much you can score!

Download Adrenaline Rush at the Google Playstore

Ghostship Aftermath is the name of this game set almost 350 years in the future within the CDF universe (Colonial Defense Force).
In Ghostship Aftermath, you are one of a two manned team – ASET (Advance Scientific Evaluation Team) Who have been sent in as a primary evaluation team to investigate a possible infection. As a two manned team you must venture into the Icarus system where all communications have been lost for almost 2 weeks. The CDF Goliath is a war ship (Dreadnought Class) which has been sent to investigate the loss of comms with the Icarus system, she is now presumed a Ghostship.

As you find out what happened on board the CDF Goliath, a new story-line will emerge! one for your own survival! Be prepared for anything on board the Ghostship!

Where did the game idea come from?

Inspiration was taken from sci-fi and horror movies such as Event horizon, Alien, Aliens, Pandorum, the thing, babylon 5 as well as games such as Aliens, Doom, System Shock, Dead Space, Natural Selection etc. Mixed with a free roaming gaming environment, perma death, random gameplay events and multiple storyline branches. Our game has many unqiue elements which makes surival horror just that! Your skill and survavl instincts are tested if you are to survive!

What can you tell us about the development of the game?

I am the solo developer of Ghostship Aftermath. I could not have brought the game as it is now without the help of a few great voice actors, music guys and Rama and Jordan who are the only others to lend a hand for a short time.

As a single dev, i can honetsly sya the pipeline was effiecient! Come october i would have released the second the game which again is totally different, unique and brings something new to SCi-fi FPS. So 2 games of this quality in 2 years has got to have some sort of record for a dev, but my main focus and passion is on the game, as you will see. After i get the time to relax and read some of the reviews then i can be proud of what i have acomplished in 2 years of literally “Hell”

What advice would you tell people who are beginning with game development?

Be prepared for the long haul! Have focus and passion and think outside the box!

The lauching of GhostShip Aftermath is just around the corner and you can visit the sites below to know more about Mag Studios and Shaun!

http://www.ghostshipaftermath.com
https://www.facebook.com/GhostshipAftermath
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=175581955

What the game is about?

The main concept: Fast paced ARCADE Rogue-Like game.
Fight your way through an endless dungeon, levelling up your character by picking up the Loot drops of the Enemy Minions you destroy!

How did you build it in 3 days?

First, came the inspiration. I was in a RPG mood and also really missed playing really hard Arcade games that were absolutely unforgiving to the mistakes you would make, “mis-timed your attack?, mis-timed your special power? engaged a certain enemy in the wrong way?…. Bamm! you are Dead. No worries though, there are no loading screens, no press Ok to start again bla bla bla, you go right back into the action so you can try again”

Second, the “Design Document”….. yes that is it… there is no point on wasting time for something that is just for me and no one will ever see…. What matters is THE GAME!, hehe.

Third, I constructed a very simple moc Scene, only using 1 Cube (Scaled accordingly) per Game element, Floor, Player, Enemies, etc. Why? This allows me to determine the size of the objects that will be in the game, test Camera Angles, Lighting and the Feeling of the game in general.

From here I just make a copy of this moc and start to replace each placeHolder asset, with the actual game pieces.

For example for the Character you play, initially it was just a capsule (functionally it still is). Add some code to make it move, make the camera follow it, and here comes the magic (or maybe I’m just crazy), I start to imagine as if the game is already done, and I start playing with this moving capsule pretending that the it can hit with his the sword, using magic, enemies attacking(cubes standing still), etc. AND most importantly taking notes (in this case mentally) on the key ideas that come up.

Due that I have 8+ years of experience programming video games I have gained the ability to foresee what aspects of a game I can HardCode and what needs to be Generic(Programming Design Patterns, READ UP! if you’re planning to develop/program games someday)

And from here it’s just a iteration process:

1) Define Task (game mechanic / element) ->

2) Does it need to be well Programmed or can it be HardCoded? ->

3) Develop ->

4) Test (this usually takes 2-8 times more time than the Develop time) ->

5) Happy with it?

  – Yes -> Repeat from step (1)

  – No -> sit still staring at screen thinking, trying to specifically define WHY I don’t like it -> Repeat from step (1)

Tip: If you are stuck in step 5 in “No” for too long, stand up, go for a walk, or in my case a Longboard Ride, the answer comes to me and I rush back home.

The most important thing for me is to truly know/understand what it is I’m trying to achieve.

The wrong way would be something like: “what color should I paint my house?” and you start painting the wall without even asking yourself first “what is my favorite colour?”.

Working without a clear goal is the number one reason why projects fail, even simple ones like this. (I know… trust me)

What did you use to develop the game?

Unity3D, I even made all the graphics for only using Unity3D’s Cube, and animated them by code.

Due that this was a simple project for me, technically-wise, the biggest obstacle was forgetting to eat for 16 hours the first day of development… Don’t do that… Mr. Brain needs food to work properly.

And as always controlling impulses such as “Wouldn’t it be awesome if I added THIS THIS THIS THIS???…..”.  Take step back, determine what is the most important thing, determine that the develop time is not personally overwhelming, ok develop that (know your limits). Still have energy/will power? Ok we can do more things.

[button link=”http://daggio.itch.io/warriors-of-belirium” target=”_blank” style=”none, small, large, biglarge” title=”Check out Warriors of Belirium for Mac, Windows and Linux”][/button]

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Hi there guys, it’s been a while since I last wrote a tutorial here on this site. I apologize for my inability to find time to post more, but now I’m not here to just apologize. I want to announce about a new game I’m developing , it’s called Warriors of Belirium and is an action RPG in the same flavour of classic role playing games!

What game is it? It’s the game that uses the battle system whose tutorial I wrote some time ago. Long time ago when I wrote that RPG battle system tutorial I didn’t think of making a game out of it, I just wanna do something with Construct 2 and share the progress with people. But sometime in the way I thought “Hey I can totally make a game with this battle system.”, and so started my hard and busy day as an indie developer. Not only thinking about the gameplay, I also make game design, story, characters, sprites, and all the other stuff.

So, first thing I created was the story, because my original design lack that and I think it’s a must for RPG. The first thing I wrote was the main conflict, what’s the game is about? Is it a fight against demon? Who’s the demon and how can it roam freely on our world? Or is it gonna be a simple story about saving a princess? Then who kidnapped the princess and why?

The first thing to think about when creating the main conflict is “what do the heroes save? And from whom?” it can be about saving a princess or saving the world or maybe protecting an ancient family heirloom.

In my game, I chose the story of war. The heroes’ kingdom was invaded by neighbouring kingdom who is strong and famous for lust for battle, and the heroes must join forces to free their kingdom. This was the original idea of the story before it developed into an even more complete version of it. Why not saving the world, you ask? Because I want the game to have a sequel and because of that, I must be able to create a sequel from the story. If in the first game the heroes saved the world, there isn’t a threat more thrilling for next heroes in the second game.

After I made a rough story design, I moved on to gameplay. Thinking about what features this game will have in the final version beside the battle system that I made. This is a hard part because looking at the world of RPG, there are a lot of games with multiple different features that all look cool and nice yet implementing them all in my game seem next to impossible. Not to mention that I’m the sole member of my studio. Making an RPG sounds hard enough, making a full blown epic RPG with plenty of features seem… overwhelming.

So I have to cut down a lot of features that I actually want, and probably the players want too, but this is a decision I have to take.

First, the story will be linear. Following the main quest the player will only find one ending. This is because I don’t have the man power to make a multiple scenario RPG. Second, no customization system (or something like that). Players can’t make their own characters with their own look, even the existing characters can’t change their job. I’m pretty sure there are players who’d love to design their own character but unfortunately I can’t make a game that’s gonna totally satisfy them.

Good news is: there’s still a side quest for players to embark on! These side quests can make for a good place for grinding, and also there’s gonna be items that you can acquire only through side quests so this is a good addition to the gameplay!

One more thing I learned from this is project management. Initially, I planned to release the alpha version on February but turned out it have to be pushed back until April. No matter how well you planned your things out, there’s gonna be stuff that’s just not in your plan. Unexpected bugs, bugs is harder than expected to fix, maybe you’re sick sometime in the middle of development, some relative business you have to attend to no matter what, and more unexpected bugs. Bottom line is: estimate when you can deliver your game, and put a few more weeks into the estimates as “precautions”

Thankfully, now the game is now in alpha version! And I am currently running alpha funding for the game on itch.io over here. I will release it for more platforms later in the future. Please visit that page and support me in my journey as an indie game developer. Thanks!

[button link=”http://daggio.itch.io/warriors-of-belirium” target=”_blank” style=”none, small, large, biglarge” title=”Download and Play Warriors of Belirium for Mac, Windows and Linux”][/button]

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Tutorials by Aryadi

Joe developed an Android game called Dragonz and he gave the GameDev Academy an interview to tell us about his experience.

Where did the game idea come from?

Dragonz is a fast paced action filled infinite flyer. Control the dragon collecting rings while avoiding obsticles and cannon fire. About it, Joe says:

“I always liked the infinite runner idea, but wanted to give it more, so the player has more control over the movements of the dragon”.

What can you tell us about the development of the game?

Dragonz took about 2 months of development to reach the current stage, althoguh it’s still in beta, as there are more features yet to be included.

What are the most important things you learned when making this game?

This is my first publish, so the whole getting from the game engine to the play store was a learning curve.

What advice would you tell people who are beginning with game development?

Stick at it, use the forums and api’s to help you along, don’t be discouraged, it’s a long hard road ahead, but persever and you’ll get there.

Thanks Joe for sharing your experience with us. And don’t forget to visit his Facebook page because he will be soon publishing new games!