Glad you found the toaster! It’s probably my favourite too, though I also loved the jukebox having an affair with the light switches. I hope you’ll enjoy Lonesome Road, it’s my personal favourite DLC I think, though objectively OWB is probably better. I just love the vibes and the levels in LR.
Two very different games in the pipeline after. Alan Wake II was my GOTY last year so hard not to recommend it here. Have you played the preceding Remedy games?
I just sped through the entirety of Old World Blues today (I’m currently stuck at home). It was a lot of fun. I ended up sparing Ulysses but sacrificed ED-E to stop the bombs (I’m trying to be as morally good as possible for this play through, and though I didn’t side with the legion, idk if the fallout from the bomb would hit innocent people).
I played the first Alan Wake about 2012 when I was still in elementary school. Ever since then it’s been one of my favorite games of all time (Though, if given the choice between it and American Nightmare idk which I would choose). I currently have a save for control and enjoy it a lot, but I can’t find it in me to stick with it past maybe a few sessions lasting a week, so it has been a very slow burn game for me. I also have Quantum Break in my library from a Humble Bundle and I picked up Max Payne with the last Steam Sale, so those are lined up somewhere too.
Alan Wake 2 is amazing, but with the interconnected Remedyverse being what it is it also sort of wants you to “do your homework” - the experience is definitely enriched by having played Max Payne and Control before (with the AWE DLC of the latter being a direct bridge to AW2). The Quantum Break overlap is much more minor as they don’t own the rights to its IP. It’s fun for those who played it, but not necessary and not important.
I played a brief while after picking it up on Epic, but dropped it because it ate through my battery and I didn’t have time to figure out performance on launch. I did spoil myself on the connection of Control too Alan Wake (I’d rather sacrifice Control’s plot for the sake of my Alan Wake II experience), so I’m aware of a lot of the stuff, or can at least draw my own conclusions and fill in gaps.
Max Payne though I can’t say I know much about except I know the character Sam Lake plays in AWII is heavily inspired by Max Payne, that Max Payne takes pain killers to heal, and something about wife and kids I think?
Alex Casey (the detective from Alan Wake’s books) is essentially Max Payne - they had to change the name when making Alan Wake 1 because Rockstar had bought the IP.
There are callbacks in AW2 in both narration, atmosphere and character design that I really enjoyed, but you won’t miss out on anything story-relevant if you haven’t played it. Watching a couple of minutes of cutscenes from Max Payne 1 on YouTube is probably enough to get most of the references.
Hey me too! I released my first game on Steam a month ago and by all objective measures it was a flop, but as a hobbyist I’m still proud of it. It honestly did better than I thought for a small niche game that I did a terrible job of marketing, and my one review so far was quite positive so I’ll count that as a small win as I move onwards to the next game.
EDIT: Here’s the game because my reply is getting harder to spot below - store.steampowered.com/app/2792160/SnowDown/ - It’s a small Jackbox-inspired party game (using phones as controllers) but with real-time action and physics as you throw snowballs around and destroy structures.
Unfortunately I’ve found that the latency over streaming makes the game less fun to play than when joining locally (or over a faster video call service like Discord), but for my next game I’m designing it to be more streaming-friendly so I’ll definitely be looking at building an integration then.
This is super cute! If I buy these now for my friends and family but set it to deliver the gift near Christmas, would you get the money now? Or not til Christmas?
This looks perfect for when everyone is over on Christmas eve! <3
I’m glad you like it! I actually made my first prototype right before last Christmas so I could play it when my family got together, and people enjoyed it so much I just kept working on it.
As far as gifting goes, I actually didn’t know you could get Steam gifts that deliver later, so I’m not entirely sure of the answer, but I assume if they charge you for the game right away it would process the payment then too.
Full disclosure though, only one person needs a copy of the game to run it and play with a group. Everyone joins the game by visiting a website (generally on their phone), similar to how Jackbox games work. So there’s no obligation to gift copies, but if you still do I will be quite honored and grateful!
Aww, you’re adorable. I will buy the games closer to Christmas for everyone, my reading tells me that if I buy the game and the person does not accept the gift then they will give me a refund, so I imagine you won’t get the money until everyone accepts.
As someone who is also awkwardly treading the line between being a soulless hack and trying to get my work noticed by literally anyone: please edit your top comment with a link to your game.
I mean it. I can’t even muster the courage to post my renders to Instagram without feeling like some desperate influencer goof.
I can relate though, I’ve honestly avoided actively using social media for the better part of a decade, so dipping my toe back in the waters has been a bit of a struggle. I can’t help overanalyzing everything I write, to the point it becomes exhausting trying to regularly post anything. And then it often feels like an exercise in futility anyway when you’re lost in the sea of other posts.
So I figure for now I’ll focus my energy on making games and especially improving with the visuals (admittedly I’m a programmer first and foremost, so art is not my strong suit), and hopefully gradually gain more confidence.
By the way, I’ve really appreciated yours and everyone’s encouraging comments here! Funnily enough, this is the most attention a post of mine has ever received, and I wasn’t even intending for it
Considering you’re a hobbyist and probably don’t have marketing, it’s too soon to say it’s a flop. Many games like that pop off later once it gets seen.
I appreciate the optimism! I hope it can find an audience over time, but it’s definitely tough to stand out. For now, I’m aiming to just keep making games and improving, rather than giving up after the first try, which sadly seems to happen a lot out there.
Jesus. This makes it reasonable to just buy $100 worth of your own game every month, just to make sure. Assuming that the number of real sales cover Valve’s percentage and then some. Yeah, that’s a non-zero opportunity cost for you, and additional float for Valve, however petty it may be. But for a small developer, maybe that makes sense.
The break even point would be at a balance of 23.08$. However, if the account balance doesn’t expire, buying your own game to put you over the threshold would be checking the couch cushions for loose change level of desperation.
Oh, it’s petty cash to be sure. If you have $100-ish bucks to throw around, you probably aren’t going to miss much by not doing this. Unless, of course, letting someone else take even one dollar from you in this way is against your religion or something (i.e. the principle of the thing). Conversely, if you need the handful of dollars this makes, you probably don’t have that kind of walking-around money in the first place.
How do you get into this? Could you DM me the info and perhaps a good starting place? I can’t work right now due to an injury and I’d love to look into this
My experience is with iPhone (yeah yeah boo Apple).
Most of how I learned was just digging through Apple’s documentation, focusing on one goal at a time. How do I draw stuff to the screen? How do I handle touch inputs? How do I use the built in UI elements? How do I play sounds? How do I get GPS data? Things like that. I’d usually have an idea of a specific mini-project that would make use of a specific new tool.
Note that I already had some programming experience (although it wasn’t much) before I started teaching myself this way.
Just start by downloading XCode and playing with one of their sample projects. SpriteKit is particularly easy to get started with and there’s a sample project for it. (I’m assuming you want to make something like a game. If you want to make more of a utility app, look up SwiftUI).
I’ve been playing through Fallout New Vegas for the first time. Got it modded to look modern too so that’s been a really nice touch. New Vegas Reloaded is a bitch to get running but so worth it.
Fallout 3 was my very first Fallout and played it way back when it came out, then proceeded to skip new Vegas and played thru 4 back when that one released.
All this time I was time I was like damn, 3 is my favorite only because of nostalgia and actually ran a quick play thru back in April when all the Fallout hype started because of the TV show.
But I also bought New Vegas finally during this hype and am almost done with my first playthrough and wow I get why it’s considered the best Fallout game.
The RPG elements are perfection, the stories are so interesting and gameplay is challenging but fair. I’m so glad I can now understand all the hype behind this game.
4 was my first fallout. Got it passed down from a family member for the PS4, and played through the entire thing. Had maybe over 200 hours in it. Then I got a hand me down PS3 from the same family member with a copy of Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas. I’m disappointed though to say it took a few more years for it to stick to me as younger me was very stingy about the games he would play.
I think New Vegas being made by the remains of Black Isle allowed it to pick up some cool ideas and also grow the old ideas involving the west coast lore, while carrying what Bethesda constructed from scratch with 3, at least that’s my personal opinion.
But please don’t spend money on my previous games, I recognize that they aren’t that good I don’t want to burden anyone financially with them (I loved every minute of making them, but I was still a noob back then).
I will advertise this to my friends, they have lots of young people in their circles that go through games at a good pace. This looks right up their alley.
But please don’t spend money on my previous games, I recognize that they aren’t that good I don’t want to burden anyone financially with them (I loved every minute of making them, but I was still a noob back then).
You’re not my mum! I bought Be a Rock anyway. Keep going, make games!
Would you mind explaining how wishlisting a game helps the devs? Is it an algorithm thing? Will it be shown to more people when it is being wishlisted more?
One of my friends has your game wishlisted. That’s one more than I expected to see based on your post, so shoutouts to you for exceeding expectations! Hope you keep making better and better games. :)
It definitely helps. Every dev I’ve heard talking about releasing a game stresses wishlisting. I forget why, unfortunately. It might make it more noticable, sort of like likensub on YouTube.
I do know that refunding a game is the absolute worst thing you can do to it.
I think its because people who wishlisted will get a notification to buy it once its out, boosting the game’s sales at launch, giving it a better chance to be featured on the front pages
This is what I assumed,but if it helps in any other way, I’m happy to wishlist more games from small time developers.
I use likes and subs liberally on apps like YouTube or TikTok, even if I wouldn’t normally want to subscribe. It costs me nothing to do and gives someone else joy. Why wouldn’t I?
Eh, it messes up my algorithm but I don’t care. These Corporations know too much about me anyway, might as well give them a curveball.
You’re correct on the two thoughts you listed. Wishlisting also makes the game more visible before release. For example, highly wishlisted games appear in the “Popular Upcoming” section, along with some other spots. This increased visibility before launch then feeds into the two points you made. I believe games that are highly wishlisted before launch are also more likely to appear on the frontpage right after launch.
Funnily I saw the playthrough of your game in YouTube and it really looks like a labour of love. As the guy who did the playthrough suggested, still need to buy it as a thank you.
Or is that another game with a red button? The maker of the game I’m thinking about wrote a comment on YouTube
The game is called Shoot Your Friends. It’s a death match couch game for 2-4 players who share a screen and pilot tanks around an arena.
Please be aware that it is somewhat niche, it’s only compatible with controllers and local multiplayer. But if you ever get the gang over for game night it can be a fun way to spend the evening.
I don’t use a controller, but I bought two copies for friends that do! Keep going, make more games, add features! (Like maybe keyboard controls for us dinosaurs.)
Revenue divided by time is a depressing metric for anyone who starts trying to monetize their hobby, but that’s not the point. Do your fun project because it’s fun. If you make enough to cash out on Steam, get yourselves some actual trophies. Or pizza. Trying to make money will force you to do all the depressing capitalist things the big studios do, and then it’s not fun anymore.
Fanatical (if you are comfortable with going through external resellers for steam Keys) currently has a GOTY bundle with both Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas’s GOTY. I got New Vegas GOTY for a friend and picked up Fallout 3 GOTY for myself somewhere down the line
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