Hi, my name is Aidar and I am the lead game designer for Change Ranger. Today I would like to tell you my personal origin story, where the idea for Change Ranger came from, and how our team is developing the game.
My origin
You might say my path to becoming a VR game developer is typical. As a child, I liked to draw 2D cartoon characters, and I dreamed of becoming a cartoonist. Later, with the advent of computers, I became acquainted with 3D modeling and 3D animation. Designing in 3D brought, pardon the pun, another dimension to my art, and it quickly consumed a lot of my time. But it was when I discovered programming that I really got sucked into my computer. By age 12 I was spending all my free time in front of the screen building simple games and prototypes. With my characters now animated, they were that much more real, and it was that much more fun. You can probably see where this is going, right? From 2D, to 3D, to moving characters: the logical progression of course leads to virtual reality. So now — and I have to say I feel like the luckiest guy in the world — I’m fulfilling my childhood dream. The best part is I get to “work” in the coolest, most immersive, most realistic medium there is: VR!
The Change Ranger Concept
My inspiration for the game came partly from the X-Men character Mercury and the DC character Flash. I thought, wouldn’t it be cool if we could have the powers of those characters like stopping time, controlling the bodies of others while they’re “frozen”, redirecting bullets, and so on. Secondly, and here I drew inspiration from games like Super Hot VR, I wanted the player to be able to experience cool sensations like evading bullets. I really wanted the game to leverage the advantages brought by the VR medium. Thirdly, I wanted to add an element of thinking. This is why Change Ranger forces the player to solve a sort of puzzle in order to complete each level in the most creatively and funniest way. I know from my personal VR gaming experiences that it’s fun to play in the company of friends. This game uses humor as a way to make group play more enjoyable.
Behind the Scenes at Change Ranger
I proposed the idea for Change Ranger and oversaw the building of an initial prototype. At first it was called “Revenge” and was published on itch.io where it proved to be a very popular game. It was downloaded a lot and some bloggers even made videos (shout out to the channels Ben plays VR, Ctop, and everyone else who supported the game!).
There are currently six talented and dedicated people working on the game (plus me). Our team consists of two programmers (Zagit and Irek), one artist (Anton), one level artist (Igor), one level designer (Vlad), one screenwriter (Alex) and one game designer (me).
The development process is as follows:
- Alex writes the cutscene script and the content of the comics.
- Anton makes the character design and draws the comics.
- Irek writes the main architecture of the game.
- Vlad creates the test environment and arranges the characters.
- Igor sews the environment.
- Zagit collects and tests the levels.
- I oversee the general process, help out where I can, and sometimes create and test mechanics.
When we reach a certain stage of the game, we try to demonstrate it to the players. So, for example, our team created a prototype first, and then the first demo version. We collected feedback and made edits. Now, the second demo version is being prepared (tentatively to be released at the end of March).
Despite the fact that we are a small indie studio, I, like any developer, really hope that Change Ranger will appeal to a large number of VR players and will leave its mark as something new and interesting for the VR community. Our team is working hard to reach that goal. We are also very grateful to everyone who has written their opinion on this game. Your feedback has been incredibly valuable to the development process.
While we have set the release date for the game at the end of April, we have of course been deluged with numerous setbacks. Challenges we’re overcoming include the complexity of developing player and character mechanics, script docking, and so on. We also need to integrate feedback from the VR community, which of course takes additional time. We are doing our best to complete the game on schedule, but our priority remains releasing the highest-quality, most complete game possible.
Thanks to all,
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Thank you,
Joy Way Team 🤞