Hey there everyone! We’re pushing an update to the demo today that brings bug fixes, a few quality of life changes, and three new languages: German, Japanese, and Simplified Chinese. Also included is a lot of behind-the-scenes work to support menus and the ability to pause. With all that out of the way, we’re aiming to return focus to making content. We’ll have more to share on that soon!
Rat 1 is always on the road with us.
Now for a Q&A with developers Boie and Nils. Let’s jump right in!
For those who don't know you two, can you introduce yourselves? Who are you, and why do you make games?
Boie: I’m Boie, a game developer/artist. I started getting into game development about 8 years ago. Before that I was a musician, but it wasn’t working out as a full-time profession. I worked for a while as a game designer at a company, but decided I wanted to make my own games. I discovered the Haunted PS1 community, and that flipped the switch for me that you can make small games in this DIY, punk-rock way.
Nils: I’m Nils, and I would say I’m an artist/game dev. I started messing around in Blender 10 years ago, making donuts and whatever. It took a few years for me to find the right outlet for it. I grew up loving PS1 games and got involved with the indie PS1 community, participating in game jams and having a lot of fun with it; the low-poly aesthetic has really informed my art style.
How did the two of you two meet?
Nils: We got to know each other through the Haunted PS1 community doing game jams.
Boie: When I posted looking for an artist, Nils replied way too late and the previous jam was already over. That was for a magical girl game jam. (laaughing) If we’d met sooner, CHILDREN OF SATURN would be a very different game. We decided to participate in the next game jam, which had an apocalypse theme.
Nils: Our scope ended up being too big for the game jam, but we knew we had something very unique on our hands and wanted to flesh it out more. That’s how CHILDREN OF SATURN was born.
What inspired the two of you to make a game about climate change?
Boie: Frustration and anger. When we started the game a year ago, it was hard not to think about this topic. It's so obviously happening in front of us. Everybody can see that the world is on fire: we have flooding everywhere, wildfires everywhere. Meanwhile Jeff Bezos is sending Katy Perry to space, creating more CO2 pollution in 3 minutes than any of us could in our lifetimes.
There are a lot of reasons to be angry, and that's a good impulse to start from with art. I had an experience going to climate protests and seeing young people protesting without their parents or grandparents, and that made me think, “Don't they care about their children's futures?” When the apocalypse jam was announced, the concept fit perfectly.
Nils: There's a lot of topics you could pick for an apocalypse scenario-- zombies and other fictional stuff. We realized there's a real threat, a real topic we wanted to talk about more. It was one of the very first ideas we had. When given the opportunity to say something important, why not just take it?
Boie: The idea of real-life footage came out of the frustration that we have to do more: it has to be more personal, more immediate, more real.
Nils: After we decided to go that direction, the wildfires started back up and it was horrifying to see that our game was the reality. In some ways CHILDREN OF SATURN is not a work of fiction.
I think the use of the camcorder as the game's framing device is so compelling-- experiencing the story in these disconnected vignettes leaves you piecing things together bit by bit. What was the inspiration behind that choice?
Nils: It's a great storytelling device because it makes it so much easier to put different scenes together, playing with lack of context and juxtaposition.
Boie: I find this slice of life style of storytelling very compelling. I think found footage is so good for slice of life because you can jump directly to interesting moments. You don't need to focus so much on complicated plots, a hero’s journey, that kind of linear storytelling. You can go directly to what you're interested in exploring, in terms of human relationships and the characters' experiences. We're also just found footage fans, especially Nils.
Nils: I'm also big into coming of age stories, so it's the best of both worlds.
Any final thoughts you'd like to share with our readers?
Boie: Stay mad about climate change. Be angry and hold on to that anger.
Nils: Exactly.
That’s all we’ve got this time! If you have any questions you’d like answered, let us know in the comments.
Thanks for reading!