Hello, world!
We almost can’t believe it, but release day is finally here. We are Rename Studio and we are thrilled to finally be able to release to the world our debut title, Alt254. This adventure started a few years ago, when some of the studio members met at a games design master’s degree. After a few years of working for other studios, we decided to pursue our dream. We pitched the idea at a grants program here in Spain and got the second-best award, just enough to kickstart Alt254.
It’s been a very complicated road from when we met at class to this day – full of twists, bumps, ups and downs – but we made it in the end, and today we get to press (finally!) the “Publish” button. However, this is, hopefully, just the beginning of the real journey. We plan to add more content to the game, and we’re even thinking of new lands to explore and new adventures for you to live.
As you may already know, the game puts you in command of ■, a character made by a single pixel that will have to explore an island full of secrets in a journey of self-discovery. There’s one recurrent question we hear every time we pitch our project: why is the main character a single pixel? To answer this we have to go back to the “design table”. Antonio, one of the team members, asked himself: what makes a game really enjoyable? Its game mechanics? Its art style? Perhaps the narrative? Back in their first years, games were really funny although the art style wasn’t exactly sophisticated. We decided we wanted to have a go at that minimal art style. And what’s the minimum graphic unit? A pixel.
But we didn’t want to only have a pixel as the main character. We thought that idea was powerful enough to make a whole game around it. That’s how we decided to show the game in a 26x21 resolution. We had to do some testing to find the perfect resolution, one that was small enough to be a challenge for us but, at the same time, gave players enough space to have a pleasant experience while playing. This is not just an experimental game, we want players to explore its world, uncover its secrets and have fun while doing so!
You might say that Alt254 is a minimalistic Zelda. It’s no secret that Zelda has been a source of inspiration, as well as the Souls trilogy (yeah, we know, everybody says so but we really love those games). But, unlike Zelda, we believe our game focuses more on exploration, investigating the story and discovering secrets while you experiment with the game mechanics. Believe us, this game is one of a kind.
Alt254 is the result of those first design decisions. Now it’s finally in your hands; we hope that we were successful in exploring these concepts and ideas, but most of all we hope you enjoy the game. If you want to help us, spread the word and leave us your honest review once you play it. Best of luck out there in the world, ■!
