For the last eight years of my life, I feel that every major decision I’ve made, every argument I’ve had, and every success and failure I’ve enjoyed, all led me to one realization: I must make a great video game.
It doesn’t feel like an aspiration or desire. It feels like an obvious duty.
Every article I’ve written, every person I’ve interviewed, every job I’ve had, every client, event and organization I’ve worked with, every tournament I’ve entered and every single person I’ve talked to about gaming has led me to only one conclusion: I must make a great game.
WE must make a great game, and we will.
Today, I, and one of my closest and oldest friends, Joseph “Jotapon” Garcia, are officially announcing our game studio Galaxy Bunny Games, and with that, our first game in development:
Joseph’s taught me video editing and programming. He developed Free Range Musings, an online publication that allowed us to explore gaming and esports journalism. And now, I’m joining him again, this time to make a great game.
Although I’ll be the face people see most, you must know Joseph is literally working five times harder than me. While I’m balancing game development with a full-time job, Joseph’s full time is Smithy By Day.
He’s working more than 40 hours a week developing SBD. It’s his sole obsession and focus.
We’re going to push each other and make a great game.
We may delay and stumble, we may cut our scope back, we may even scrap entire games before release; in fact, we’ve already scrapped one game.
Image of mechanics-testing from a scrapped game
However, it is our promise that we’ll always communicate and try our best to respond. It is also our promise to only release games we want to play, games we’re proud of. And finally, it is our promise to see every game through until at least 1.0/ full release. We will never abandon any game.
Even if a game isn’t successful, I still personally guarantee persevering to a 1.0 release. The only alternative is bankruptcy.
There are no excuses, there are no exceptions, there are no other options.
Don’t just take our word - let us prove it
We believe in our vision, our game and ourselves. Allow us to show you everything.
Ask us for screenshots and frequent updates and as much proof as you'd like. Don't give us your trust easily.
Push us to communicate. Push us to interact with our community.
Push us to be better and tell us when we’re failing you.
Finally, the most important part: I’d like to talk about Smithy By Day a bit.
I’ll speak super broadly as we’re still testing mechanics and nothing’s nailed down yet. The plan is that you run a smithy during the day time and gather resources at night.
Think Dave the Diver and doing caves in Stardew Valley.
I specifically wanted to design around blacksmithing because there’re so few games that go even remotely in depth. Games that focus on smithing typically lean on recipes or time management.
SBD will have those mechanics, but I also wanted to especially focus on the steps of making, let’s say a sword, and build several minigames around that.
You start by heating up metal, then an anvil hammering minigame, quench sword, handle/ crossguard assembly minigame, sharpening minigame, maybe some alchemy and enchantment minigames, and maybe even a jewel-socketing minigame.
Another mechanic I’d like to share, which Joseph’s currently working on, is how time will pass in the smithy. I really dislike stressing about clicking on workers immediately after they complete a task to min-max time usage.
SBD will not require you to know terms like micro and APM. Instead, we’re thinking of making time pass in increments.
As an example, the day could start at 8:00 AM; your character can walk around infinitely without time passing.
You click the sharpening wheel and play a minigame which locks your movement for 30 minutes. You then essentially pass turn, the clock speeds up and stops at 8:30 AM, and now your character can once again walk freely.
Finally, I’d also like to hint at one last feature: the story. All I’ll say is, if things go the way I hope, I think Attack on Titan fans will be very happy.
We’re ecstatic and obsessed with the path we’re going on. I can’t guarantee you’ll like Smithy By Day, but I know Joseph and I will love it.
At the end of the day, I think that’s all any artist can promise. I also think that’s something we can and will deliver.
I think, we’re going to make a great video game.
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