Howdy cyberpunks! We’ve been keeping our nose to whatever androids use instead of grindstones, and the game is really taking shape. As we’re wrapping up this project – one of the biggest either of us has taken on – we thought we’d share our feelings about it.
Jamie: Silicon Dreams is pretty much the most ambitious thing I’ve ever done. Bigger than finishing my degree, bigger than moving to a new country, bigger than – ok, not quite as big as learning German, because I still haven’t done that. But it’s up there, okay?
Danny: I’ll repeat what he said.
Making this game has been the single greatest undertaking of my life: academic, professional, or otherwise. I began working on Silicon Dreams without a single clue about how making a game actually happened in a practical sense. All the theoretical knowledge in the world can’t help when you’re slogging through the little fiddly every day things to make something as complex and intricate as a video game – learning to 3D model and animate comes to mind. It was a real challenge and there were absolutely days I thought I’d never be able to develop and hone all the skills required to be one half of a two-person team. I’ve still got a long way to go, but looking back I’ve come further than I could have imagined. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that making a game is a process, and one that I look forward to perfecting until the day I die – ideally with Jamie, cuz this guy is my game design soulmate ^_^ .
Jamie: *squees quietly*
Ahem. I’m also amazed we even got here. This game’s dodged more bullets than an action hero: there was a failed Kickstarter (lessons learned!), we scoped it way too low, we didn’t account for the importance of visuals, some publisher deals neeearly made it but then didn’t, and we were on the brink of running out of funding several times. Every step was uncertain, and we barely scraped through with a bit more funding each time (thank you Subotron Live Pitch!)
It’s been an intense, wild ride. We’ve had to develop the game rapidly while knowing that we’ve only got enough money to launch on date Z, so localisation has to be submitted by date Y and the trailer has to be finished by date X – and then we get a bit of funding and those all change. It’s felt like piloting a jet plane at the speed of sound but knowing that I have to land it on a runway the size of a parking space.
Danny, our next game is going to be small and easily scoped, d’you hear? Do you hear me Danny?
Danny: omg I hear you. so smol and easily scoped!
As Jamie said, the game has been a growing and shifting thing from the very beginning and it feels like a really good comparison to how he and I had to discover our process of how to work together. Re-scoping, delayed launch after delayed launch, the challenges were many. It’s not a perfect game, hell, by a lot of standards it’s probably not even a great game but it’s our game and we’re oddballs. So, measured by that standard, Silicon Dreams is a perfect game and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Jamie: I’m also so proud of how far we’ve come. My last game, Spinnortality, was a janky 2D game held together with ropey code and prayers. It’s fun to play, but horrible to work on because of my self-taught code. I hoped I could use everything I learned to code Silicon Dreams better. Lo and behold, Silicon Dreams’s code is ropey and awful, but less so. I simply could not have made this game five years ago, it would’ve fallen apart.
And it looks so good. I know there are beeeeautiful indie games out there, and our game isn’t The Witness or Gris. But I’m not a visual artist – so the fact that (largely thanks to Catt, our freelance artist) the game looks good enough to hold its own? I am chuffed.
Bottom line? 15-year-old me would be thrilled to play this game, let alone make it. Obviously I hope it sells loads because that would secure our financial future, but even if it only sells a handful I feel we can be proud of this weird, experimental narrative game about stuff we care about.
Danny: In my experience, the curse of being a creative is to never be rid of that tingling, sh*tty, demonic little sense of doubt: it’s not good enough, it’s too weird, it’s too political, it’s too… What even is it? Will anyone understand why we spent 1% of our time on this planet making this weird “game” about robots who talk to each other and have feelings?
But now, staring down the last, looming deadline? The sensation of all of those doubts and worries falling away ripped my breath out like a sucker punch – I am proud to have made this thing. For all of the jank and prayers that hold it together, for all of the things we wanted to add that were left on the cutting room floor, for all of its flaws, mistakes, and missed opportunities; this isn’t just the game that we wanted to make, it’s the game that we were able to make and I think there’s something beautiful about that. I’m so incredibly proud of our weird little cyberpunk baby… For all these reasons, despite all my doubts, and probably because it’s my first, this is the game, and the career, of my Silicon dreams. (lol, see what I did there? 😀 )
Jamie: Danny, that is the worst. But yes, I agree.
Silicon Dreams is veeery close to being done! If you haven’t already, please wishlist the game on Steam: you’ll be told when it comes out, and just wishlisting tells Steam that people are interested, which is super important for tiny indies like us.
