Thank you very much for playing Die Again!
Die Again has completed one year since its release
Also, there is a new update available for download with some new features
- There is a new appearance available. It is the Astronaut, ideal for surviving in outer space and for dying on planet Earth.
To unlock it, you just have to enter level 8: Horts.
If you already entered/exceeded that level, you must re-enter the level to get the appearance.
- You can modify the volume of the music and sound effects from the main menu.
- The options menu has been reorganized. It is now accessible from the main menu and includes the graphic options.
- From the avatar selection screen, you can switch between both red-blooded characters. Now it is no longer necessary to redo the tutorial to do so.
- If you haven't unlocked any avatar, selecting it will bring up a text with a hint to get it
- If you unlock a new look for your avatar, you'll be notified
- God Mode is much less annoying and can only be selected from the pause menu
- There are new items in the level selection, especially from Tutorial to level 3
- The background images of 3 of the endings have been improved, adding moving elements to them
- Fixed a bug that caused the score to accumulate between different levels.
- Fixed a bug that caused severe performance issues with God Mode
- Fixed a bug with God Mode that caused it to not count the death of enemies within your area and prevented you from accessing the next level, breaking the game.
- Fixed a bug in the introductory cinematic of the game in which the character that fell, when hitting the ground, made a rare movement that made it look like he was still alive.
- Fixed some buttons that were not selectable with the controller.
- Fixed some spelling errors in the Russian language.
- Die Again - Northern Front is temporarily at its highest offer for this celebration! It also has an additional level in its final stretch.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1354250/Die_Again__Northern_Front/
Finally, and to commemorate this great occasion, I want to talk to you about how the game started, its development up to the launch, and personally about this project that succeeded thanks to you! Without you, the game would be nothing like it is now.
Just a note that there is a long text below. Sit down and read at your leisure the whole story up to now
Pre-production
Die Again is not the first game I've made, although it is the first game that is much more than a prototype. Some of my previous games are Feels Like Home Already, an FPS shooter inspired by DOOM that I made and learned a lot from my mistakes. I was in charge of part of the programming and design.
You can download and play it for free at the following link:
https://gamejolt.com/games/Feelslikehomealready/337983
Another of my other notable games is Dash & Slice, a 2D platform fighter where I was in charge of the design and HUD.
You can download and play it for free at the following link:
https://wasdproductions.itch.io/dashslice
I've done more games, though those two are the most notable.
Regarding Die Again, I had a very primitive idea around summer 2017, although I wouldn't start working on a GDD until the end of 2018.
Without any doubt, the inspiration was Ajin, an action manga where some characters are immortal and their "death" allows them to be even more deadly. It's a work that using a simple change like immortality and regeneration gives us action scenes as unique as they are outstanding. Did you think it was a coincidence that the game will start with a character crashing a plane and coming out alive to fight in an even bigger battle?
If you liked Die Again, I think you're going to love Ajin.
Anyway, I started working on a playable prototype in summer 2018, with a playable design already defined on paper.
The goal was to make a prototype at a playable level to see if the risky idea of a shooter where when you die you can go to another body and both you and the enemy can commit suicide, could work.
Because of how risky the proposal was, I decided to get inspired by a good game to have at least a good playable base in case death and possession failed. That game was Hotline Miami 2, so whenever someone refers to it when talking about it I always have a little smile on my face.
Since programming without music is almost boring, during the whole development of the game I was accompanied by all the music from Carpenter Brut. Highly recommended.
In the end, I saw that the game had a future so I kept investing efforts in making the game a reality.
If you are interested, you can play it for free at the following link:
https://gamejolt.com/games/DieAgain/427549
WARNING: It is full of bugs, it is extremely ugly and it is a skeleton of the game you can play now.
Production
Die Again was the game I chose to make as my Final Degree Project. I made several researches (don't worry, I won't post them here) on possession shooters, top-down shooters at HUD level and so on.
In any case, because I have the charisma of a stone I couldn't attract almost anyone to do the TFG together, so I had a problem in front of me: Either I abandoned everything and joined the project of another group or I had to carry all the weight of the project by myself and try to make the project a reality.
You can see which option I chose and I will never regret it!
Then began the development of the game, refining the mechanics, changing the orientation of the level design, zoom the camera, and a long etcetera.
I invested a lot of time, because if I didn't work, the project didn't advance. Although, of course, I enjoyed every step forward I made in the project.
The problem was that in order to finish the game on time, I couldn't take care of the visual assets and almost none of them were created by me. Of course, I was in charge of the programming, design and production by myself, although I received some help at some point as well as testers that I will be very grateful to.
During the production of the game, Ignasi Bosch, a student of a Master of Music and Sound joined the project to make its soundtrack. Subjectively, I think he did a good job, although unfortunately, I have read some very derogatory comments with the work he did. Of course, music is a subjective thing but please don't belittle his work.
On the other hand, in December 2019 I will make the first trailer of the game, with the mechanics prototype and the art prototype already finalized. If you want to see the result, here you have the video.
This is when I wrote the story of Die Again was written between October 2019 and March 2020. I wanted to draw a lot of inspiration from From the New World (Shinsekai Yori), a work that focuses on worldbuilding so that around it are the characters and the main story is moved by the characters.
Also, I was looking for a story different from the others, with a unique worldbuilding, a main character weaker than the world around him, full of toxic attitudes and with few characters that are really benevolent.
Above all, I wanted the mechanics that made the gameplay unique to be the centerpiece of the story and the main theme to be the same: the suicide and self-destruction of humanity, with a very nihilistic result that is not to everyone's taste.
It was my first time writing a complete story and it shows in many aspects, especially in the ending. Honestly, I think it is extremely complicated to close a story well when you want to meet expectations, although I still believe that the Coward Ending is a success for how it integrates the themes of the main story.
In any case, the next stories I will write (if I do) will be more optimistic, or at least I will try to be.
During the final month of development, there was a day that filled me with illusion: the account @CanYouPetTheDog hizo un QRT:
It was a detail and the interaction with the dog is very bland (I have learned the hard way that I must work much more on this aspect), although I still remember it today with great happiness!
Finally, a couple of days before launch, I was warned that the game did not allow suicide due to a bug....
It was quickly fixed, but it almost launched the game in a totally unplayable state. That's why it's important to get feedback from players ;)
Early Access
On Thursday, May 14, 2020, the 24th anniversary of the release of one of my favorite games, Fire Emblem: Geneology of the Holy War, I released Die Again.
To my misfortune, it was 2 hours after Epic Games would start giving away the second best-selling game in history, GTA V. I took advantage of their store being down to launch the game, although it was a bad decision to launch the game that day.
Although the game performed moderately well in the first few days, it didn't take long for it to sink to extremely low numbers. I considered abandoning the game, making the final chapter in a hurry to leave the game and focus on other things.
But fortunately, the game reached 10 reviews, getting a rating on Steam and getting a lot of visibility that brought it back to life. Small games appreciate every review we get. If you have any little known indie in your library and you haven't done a review, write one, I'm sure they will receive it with a smile even if it's negative.
And then, a week later I found that the game was on the front page of Opera GX, where it received a huge amount of downloads.
I don't know how it got there, I spent 0€ of money on advertising so I thank the person who put it there from the bottom of my heart! You gave a boost to the game I can only thank you for that
All this gave me the impulse to keep working hard on the game!
During the Early Access there were a lot of updates, and these were some of the new features, in case you didn't follow the game from the first day:
- Levels 11 and 12
- Italian localization thanks to Erixstudio
- Spanish and Portuguese localization
- Russian localization (very poor)
- Chinese localization
- Steam Cloud
- New introductory cinematic
- Improvements in the tutorial level that changed it completely.
- Minor changes to the HUD
- Minor changes in visual feedback
- Main menu (Correct, until September 2020 there was no main menu)
- Balancing for enemies with Rifle and Shotgun. Especially enemies with shotgun
- Reduce the difficulty of the most difficult levels.
If you want to see how Die Again was during its first days, here is a gameplay recorded by Crazy Game News. They have changed a lot of things, especially regarding the tutorial and level 1.
During Early Access status, I considered releasing the full game as a pay to play.
But, in the end, I decided to release it for free but with a paid DLC. This DLC is currently known as Die Again - Northern Front.
Full Release
I made the mistake of releasing the full game too early....
It's something I will always regret. It had relatively easy to fix and game-breaking bugs, plus it was missing several important elements (like voices).
On the plus side, it was Die Again's best moment and I remember it fondly.
There were even fantastic reviews like the one by Hank Indie Games that you can see below:
I received many reviews and most of them were positive <3
Reviews help the game a lot, even if they are one word or negative. If you haven't written a review for this game yet, you can do it at this link.
And if you have already done it, I thank you <3
On the other hand, after the release I had to reduce the Die Again updates, because I had (and still have) work and I was working on not one, not two, but three totally different projects, one of them being Die Again.
In this launch period there have been great new features such as:
- Voices
- Reducing the size of the game by 66%.
- New appearances
- French localization
- And many more quality changes!
The future of Die Again
Although I'm preparing something very, very special, it's taking me a lot of time and unfortunately, I haven't managed to finish it in time for the 1st anniversary of the game :(
I only ask for your patience, there will be more Die Again, although the next updates will come later than all the previous ones.
Besides, I'm currently working on two projects at the same time, one personal (like Die Again) and another one more professional and with a talented team behind. It's still too early to say more, so look forward to it!
Finally, I leave you with my cat:
Finally, it would be helpful if you could leave a review of the game if you haven't already done so.
It's the best way to support Die Again!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1304450/Die_Again/