Hello to all the gamers, and happy spooky fall season.
I, Bossy, am in the midst of working on Episode 2 of Muffles and BOY have I chewed off a lot. Creating the first Episode left me with a lot of ideas and directions to go and seeing those beginning to come to fruition has been so cool!
While I’m not going to divulge anything TOO secretive about Episode 2 (apologies to all the Episode 2 waiters) I thought I’d follow up on the sneak peak character I shared for Halloween day as well as some general thoughts on how I approach making a new Episode for Muffles.
Halloween brought along Jack
On Halloween I teased Jack! They will be one of the first new characters you meet on your Episode 2 journey and I’m really happy how they came out. They have a sort of grim, expressionless composure, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re a villain! Maddox has all kinds, and appearances can be deceiving. He’s even got a theme song! (You aren’t allowed to hear that yet.)
The (mostly) blank page of a new Episode
I love starting with blank pages. Anything is possible and I can let my imagination run wild. You can get from nowhere to somewhere exciting in an hour and feel on top of the world.
Blank pages are also extremely dangerous. It’s time off in la la fairytale land where nailing down specifics and keeping in scope play second fiddle to rooting out new, unique, and exciting concepts.
A goal in setting up Muffles with Episode 1 was to provide a sound foundation. A structure of how future episodes would look (~3 hour gameplay focused on combat and story) and the necessary plot hooks to easily transition into wherever the story might lead me next.
This is where the blank page meets restrictions. I can do whatever I want BUT specific conditions MUST be met.
Things like:
- A new Soulmask character
- A Hub area to venture out from
- New states and combat mechanics
- A mix of puzzles that iterate on previous ideas while introducing new ones
I wanted to call the stages on Muffles episodes for a reason. They were an opportunity for me to explore the same story and themes of the game in new and strange settings with a host of new characters. Each would have their own little self-contained plot arch that could dovetail into the story as a whole.
Tips on getting stuff done for aspiring creators
I understand that some of those reading this creatively minded and interested in working on their own projects. Whether it’s RPGs or anything else.
Some of the best feedback I can share is on the less fun part of the process- the ‘oh crap I actually have to make everything that I had ideas about’ part.
Some tips:
- Have deadlines, and keep them. The less experience you have, the shorter the timelines. Allow yourself to learn from making things quickly at first, and gradually grow into working on bigger projects over time.
- Limit ideas to projects you can and want to make. It can be fun thinking about how you would tackle making an MMO, but at the end of the day you got to ask yourself a simple question. Do you want to dream about making games, or do you want to ACTUALLY make games? Set your sights on what a solo creator can make in a few months.
- Your creative work shouldn’t be 100% unique. There was a time when I thought I should be striving for never before seen art/game mechanics/story/etc. and referencing what’s out there was copying. This is absolutely untrue and devastatingly unhelpful. Make sure you are making the kind of game you want to play that is based on games you already have played, and not on a game that is foremost fun to work on.
In other news
Wow, Episode 2. It’s on its way! I promise. You shouldn’t trust game devs when they say things like that without proof, but luckily you’ll only have to say a short (arguable) amount of time (release date not yet announced) to play it yourself.
In the future I might dive a bit deeper on how exactly I start work on a new Episode in-engine. There’s a lot of fans of RPG Maker in the Discord community and I certainly tackle projects in a very particular way that could be interesting to compare to other’s methods.
I’ve been enjoying many a cool and rainy walk these past few weeks as we transition out of summer and into the lovely fall. Best of luck to all you out there and I hope you get some time to enjoy the fall vibes as well.
Until next time…