(Sorry for my poor English, my native language is not English.)
Thank you for your attention and support.
I'm very sorry for the delay. Because of the lack of technical resources, the characters in the game were made with the help of the art of the game publisher, but his resignation led to no one modeling the game characters. Our own artist Hengjie Liu has always been voxel modeling, and has no experience in general character modeling and mapping. Therefore, the roles in Chapter 5 are made with learning. However, this is not the most important reason. The most important reason is that I am frustrated. The failure of the game in business hit me a little bit, which made me lose some confidence, and with the lack of funds, I had more fluctuations in my heart. I doubt whether we can continue to do indie games, and I am frustrated by the confusion of the way ahead. I'm really sorry that "Watch" has been delayed for such a long time by shifting the focus to new projects and looking for other types of games. But fortunately, thanks to the help of the publisher of this game, we have survived for the time being. Although the road ahead is still tough, as long as there is a way, we will continue to move forward, and chasing our dream.
The game is finally finished.
There is no sense of relief, just feel very tired. This kind of tiredness is not only the physical and mental fatigue of making games, but also related to some other things, such as the pressure from living.
It has been more than two years since the beginning of the game, though completed, the game still has this or that kind of problems, but at least we have achieved a not small goal: The first time really completed a game making, our own game.
Before I talk about the game, I want to talk about myself as a game maker.
At the beginning of independent games, I always thought that the game makers just put all what they wanted to express into the game, and the players just need to play the game, and the people who make the game are actually irrelevant to the players, the players don't need to know the makers and remember the makers.
But the idea has changed a lot now.
Now I think the people who make the games are as important as the game itself, because they are the "Voice" —— The game is a mysterious bridge, the player stands at one end of the bridge, and there is a voice calling him at the other end. The player accepts the call of the voice, and bravely walks into the fog on the other end. He doesn't know what he will encounter. But when he finally reaches the other end, the fog clears, and he will see the person calling him. They may smile at each other or quarrel with each other, however, I hope that they will still hold each other's hands and cherish each other. The players will set off again and go to the next bridge, and the game makers will stay to welcome another friend. Maybe they will meet again at the other bridge.
I am 38 years old, the stern father of an 8-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy, the disobedient son of a 70 year-old man and a 68 year-old woman, the husband of a woman, a pseudo programmer, a fan of novel script writing, an immature and restless middle-aged man, a fan of slang against social injustice, a poor man, finally a independent game maker.
I am Joy Wong, the producer of "Watch". Hengjie Liu is the art of the game. "Watch" is our first indie game. Thank you for your attention.
In the beginning of making this game, the idea is very simple, even has given it a clear definition: it will be an amazing puzzle game. With considerable confidence, I started the journey of making this game. During this period, I participated in Indieplay's independent game competition with great confidence. I thought that I would win awards, but of course I missed. Up to now, it has not won any awards. Even so, I did not lose confidence in the game, because I knew that the game would be "unique". Although many people have said, isn't this "Fez"? But no, "Fez" is an excellent indie game that "Watch" can't match, it is a master-piece. "Fez" is one of the important inspiration sources of "Watch", and "Watch" is really like "Fez", but it is not "Fez". It has its own thoughts and soul, and has its own differences and characteristics. It is definitely not "Fez", because it is "Watch".
Another inspiration of "Watch" comes from an advertisement. This advertisement uses the principle of "Perspective" to turn a low step into a high wall that cannot be climbed. It gave me an idea - if "Perspective" is applied to the game, it should be a good idea..
The puzzle part of the game is very difficult, hard core, even if I put it for a few months, I may not know how to pass a puzzle for the first time (this is not a joke). At this point, I have to apologize to the players who have been defeated by the game. This game is really too difficult, but please listen to me to explain why I don't want to reduce the difficulty.
Because I am paranoid.
For example, in my opinion, children are not weaker than adults. This difference does not refer to the difference in physical strength, but in intelligence. What a pupil can learn, their ability to understand and their imagination will not be weaker than adults. It is only because the numerous and complicated rules of the adult world force them to follow and make them look like fools ( At this time, I suddenly recalled what a young American friend said to me. although he has no children himself, he said that a child is actually a small adult. At that time, I didn't know the meaning of what he said. Now I got it ). What I want to say is that, let a primary school student learn the basic concepts of calculus should not be a stupid idea. Learning it in college is no different from that in grade 3 of primary school. For children, we need to trust them. This may be reflected in my attitude towards the study of my daughter in grade 3 of primary school. When she comes to a question she doesn't know how to do (this problem may be beyond her normal learning scope) and asks me for advice, I always refuse it at the first time. I won't tell her how to do it or give her any hints. Instead, I just say "think for myself". To my surprise, in most cases, after thinking, she can always find her own solutions (Of course, these problems are not beyond her understanding range, I will not really give her a calculus test).
Of course, I won't treat the players as my daughter, and I will tell her how to solve the problems that she can't solve. What I want to say is that people's ability to solve problems may be underestimated by themselves, and their potential may be suppressed by themselves. Think about the origin of all the knowledge we have now, how the ancient people discovered and created the common sense that we are now used to. But now we still rely on these great discoveries and inventions of our predecessors, but we seem to have gradually forgotten our own imagination and creativity as human beings. Therefore, I paranoid that people actually underestimate themselves, and we should not definitely.
Perhaps, this kind of paranoia is very silly and naive, and you will think that my daughter is very poor (sometimes looking at her pathetic look, I really feel that way).
Yes, I often fall into such a contradictory situation - whether my ideas are too harsh, whether my goals are too big, whether I am too serious, and why? In order to find the meaning of human being? In "Watch", I really put this theme into the game, and rigidly added the plot into the original pure puzzle solving. Before I started to make this game, I had been thinking of a short story about a boy living with his grandpa in a deserted city with the background of the future world war, and in the story, I described the different attitudes and choices of different people towards the meaning of life. When I started to make "Watch", I suddenly thought that since I was making the game to express myself, why not add this story to it, so I added it. In the making process, I have also thought the lack of relevance between the plot and the puzzles. the plot seemed abrupt and unnatural, and can not be well combined with the puzzle. There is a lack of direct connection between the two. Until now, I still think so.
But when I got through this game again, by the end of it, my eyes were wet again. This is the same feeling as when I first designed the game. Maybe it can be regarded as a kind of worthless self moving which is not worth saying. However, I am really moved, it is a real feeling. It's important for me to be moved by the games I made.
Compared with the original plot, the current plot has changed. The original theme of the plot is to explore people's different views and attitudes towards the meaning of life in an extremely hopeless world. It has no clear answer to say what is the meaning of our lives. But now on the basis of the original discussion of the meaning of life,I added another new thought of my own life - the desire of human beings and its influence. For example, In order to make my game faster, I ignored my family.
I did not understand the good and evil of human desire, just as I did not understand the meaning of life. I am still ignorant of the value and goal of human beings in the current social situation. We can't help but drift with the river of life. We may even be the river itself, enjoying the pleasure of drifting, and never give ourselves time to stop and think. Or, sometimes we stopped and thought, but we can't understand the real value of ourselves. However, in a hurry, we have to jump into the never-ending river of life again.
Say sorry to the friends who can't understand the plot. The plot arrangement of the game is as hard-core as the puzzles in the game, which makes people confused. Some players have raised this fact. In fact, I have thought about revising it, but in the end, I didn't. Maybe it's due to paranoia. In the initial design of the plot, the plot arrangement of the novel was followed. Instead of using linear narration, different scenes were interspersed to form "Another Puzzle". The purpose was to increase the drama and make the game look "Unique". With the making of the game, I also began to think that the goal of this design is just to be "Unique"? I am not doubting the design pattern itself. I am just doubting the "goal" behind the design pattern. A design pattern cannot be denied because it is too strange, because it is only a means and should not be the "goal" itself. "Goal" is so important that I didn't think about it well before, but now I regard it as a crucial thing not only for game making, but also for other things. At the beginning, what I wanted to do was an amazing puzzle game. So how to make it amazing? It must be "Unique" and has "Creativity". So "being different" was my goal and "creativity" was supreme in my mind at that time. My understanding of the highest form of "creativity" was "making something out of nothing", it was the ultimate goal in my heart at that time. But now, my idea has changed a lot, taking something similar to a tool as the ultimate goal is not the best. What is the best goal? In my opinion, it's the "Core", the "Value", and the possible impact on our lives, and taking these as goals is my ultimate goal in the future (if I have the opportunity to continue to make indie-game). I would like to reference some words from a friend Zhichao Long, a game designer, "If the old JRPG used to give us a lot of imagination about Justice. Now the Justice of the game is just Decoration, and the Imagination of the game is the Law of the jungle. " (I think it's wonderful, my eyes are a little wet when I see this words.) Why do we take "Decoration" as our goal? Why don't we take the "Great" as the goal of our game? It's not just imagination, we need to try to make them real, and I believe we can.
"Watch" is also a memorial to my life. The people in the game are the people around me. In the game, Xiang'er, Ning'er, grandfather and grandmother are all ordinary people. In my life, they are actually my son, daughter, father and mother. The echo between the characters in the game and the characters in life is not intentional, but a coincidence. The names of Xiang'er and Ning'er are taken from the names of my son and daughter, which is intentional. Now, I can let them play the game I made. Maybe they don't understand the meaning of the story for the time being, or they may get stuck in the beginning because the puzzle is too difficult. But I think they will eventually get through it and understand it. In this game, there is something I want to tell them : Courage and Hope in the face of life. I also hope that they can forgive their father, because of the making of the game, I can't be with them most of the time, and sometimes I was angry with them because of some difficulties in the making process. I'm sorry, I'm not a good father. I still doubt whether my paranoid self can be changed, but I will try my best to spend more time with them in the future.
Thanks to the game publisher "DaDa" and his team, without their support, this game can not be done.
Hengjie Liu, thanks to him for making this game more beautiful and vivid.
Zhichao Long, thanks for his guidance on game design.
"毋啻", thanks to her modification of the text of the first chapter of the game.
"留盛夏一纸浮夸 よし" and "落秋FallingAutumn", thank them for their dedicated play testing of the game.
Jonathan Blow, thank him for his words and advice on the game. And all other friends who care about and support this game, thank you!
Finally, I look forward to meeting you at the other end of another mysterious bridge.