To my friends, family, and fans,
It's been 1 year since I first set out to create a video game. At that time, around the evening of this day in 2021, I drew about 2 or so images of Scarlet, and composed a rough but workable animation for her. At that moment, I remember yelling, "It's ALIVE!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuoKNZjr8_U
Before I get started with today's main purpose of writing, I need to emphasize that I'm still technically on sick leave (even if, best-case, at the tail-end of that). A week ago, I've had an absolutely nightmarish storm of dizziness / vertigo that left me bed-bound for a day. It gave me flashbacks to 2020, when I was bed-bound for a whole week! I am not exaggerating! Meaning, even though right now I am doing consistently better (even if with the help from over-the-counter medicine), I remain paranoid that another episode could start at any time! It is an episodic ailment, meaning just because I'm doing mostly alright for a day or 2 does not mean the problem is gone for good.
Excitement agitates my symptoms, and the whole essence of my creativity is excitement, so you can understand where blending the two is like fighting fire with oil. So, that's why I've taken the mantra of "Stay Calm; Stay Safe; Stay Home!" Grinding away at an MMO game is fine, but getting engaged with metal music is not. In fact, I've felt slowed enough where it's not safe for me to drive myself. Best I can do is ride it out. (As a matter of fact, even me writing this article to you has given me subtle discomfort with my head's balance, absolutely a warning sign that I'm not 110% A-OK at the time of writing!)
Now that I got all that addressed, this will be my most inoffensive update to my offensive video game hobby. Today, I wanted to give you some numbers for my video game The Way of the Badass! Meaning, if you get offended by numbers, then I have no sympathy for you.
There have been 89 Dev Diaries (Maybe 87 if Days 1 and 2 got lost to time, though those were barely any preamble if anything - the oldest known surviving Diary is Day 3, and that can be found on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYr4decTE3Q ), translating to approximately 1/4 of the whole year having a greater-than-negligible amount of time dedicated to this project.The longest-known Dev Diary (not in terms of how big the entry is, but how many days it spanned) was Day 85, when waiting for Steam.There have been 2 major milestones, and 1 minor milestone. The minor milestone was release on Steam.
2 small promo videos have been created, with at least 2 or 3 additional ones in the "ideas" phase.
The game engine clocks at 10 Days 22 Hours 6 Minutes 8 Seconds for how long it's been open with the project, though that also unintentionally counts a few lunch breaks. Meaning if I could work like a real machine (extremely unrealistic...whether hilariously or depressingly, that depends on who you ask), the game would already be done now.
Though there is no precise clock for how long drawing takes (without digging through every nook and cranny of all Dev Diaries), but a shot-in-the-dark guess is an average of 2 to 4 hours of human effort per drawing.
There are 68 different recorded voice lines just for Scarlet alone, though some of them may be redundant or unused. That's just the folder I have in my official work area.
There are 7 different weapons implemented.
2 story chapters plus 1 super slim tutorial, plus 1 challenge mode are all ready.
There are 10 songs made and available in-game, not counting rough editions or "raw resources" (like jamming just for fun).
According to the game engine, there are 162 different sounds grand total. That is counting all music, voice lines, sound effects, and any redundant or unused sound assets in the game engine.
According to the game engine, there are 575 different images grand total. This does count unused placeholders or images used for more than one object.
According to the game engine, there are 485 different objects grand total. In this context, an "object" is defined as any in-game, well, OBJECT, that has some coding properties to it - even if there is 0 code within said object or pointing to it. They're what make the computer obey the programmer's commands to tell the story of a bunch of sentient plush dolls and their adventures.
There are 44 different "rooms", which is each of the areas that has its own background and various features. This counts the main menu and various other menus, as well as the parts in-game. One or two of those may be depreciated, or have been created but are not yet accessible (like being meant for Chapter 6 when I've barely finished work on Chapter 2).
6 Companions are ready to go (or at least mostly finished, with some needing a bit of polish): Colonel, Violet, Earnest, Karl, Super Hobo, and Duke. Of those, half of them have not been narratively implemented yet, and so can only be accessed through the cheats menu.
The game has been out in the wilderness for almost 1 month, not counting other efforts to distribute the word through emails like this one.
I've gone roughly $250 over budget. That's for game engine license, my sound recording equipment to make a metal soundtrack, the fee for getting onto Steam, and $10 marketing
So now you have a rough idea of just how much went into creating this game, all distilled into a series of metrics and measurements. Now, what does all that get me?
There have been 3 contacts of organizations to discuss this game, though so far, 0 of them followed through to my knowledge.
My Youtube channel has 60 subscribers, and approximately 10 new ones over that whole year. This does count inactive channels or spam robots. Also, of those who joined, they may not have done so for my game specifically.
My Twitter account has 62 followers, and I believe approximately 40 new ones over that whole year. This does count inactive channels or spam robots. Also, of those who joined, they may not have done so for my game specifically.
Of all my communique, only 1 person consistently engages with me, and that is literally exceptional. I'll give you a hint: it's the figurative free space on my Bingo card, but life events taught me that not even that can be taken for granted.
My email inbox generally sees 0 queries regarding my game, and not counting robots, a single-digit number of traffic just in general. (About 20 messages through all June, and about one or two regarding my video game - which, funny enough, nearly ALL of those are the Dev Diaries themselves, since I send a copy of that to myself.)
Source cited:
https://steamdb.info/app/1998760/subs/
https://steamdb.info/app/1998760/graphs/
There have been 5 reviews on Steam, 2 positive and 3 negative. Yeowch.
All-time peak for concurrent players has been 2. Generally, it sees 0 people play.
I think that's enough data. What does all this say for me? I'll have to digest the reviews when I'm 110% free from sick leave (right now, I just don't have the stomach, but it's clearly high on my priority list). But, first impression tells me that I'm sure not knocking it out of the park. Most likely, there will be a time where most people will quietly forget this exists, all 5 or 10 of them. And you can absolutely see where no money-driven corporation would want to continue down such a path of sunk cost of time.
"The numbers, what do they mean?" I'll tell you what they mean. They mean, no matter how you slice it, I am NOT receiving a sufficient return on my investment! Truly, if there's no fun, then there's no point. Because at this rate, that's all I can hope to get out of creating this.
Right now, I'm going back to playing other video games...wash the taste of medicine and disappointment out of my mouth.
Semper Bellum!
Jay