as some of you might know, I’m working on some projects in Unreal Engine. If you might be interested to test some of these out, drop me a message and I might invite you to a dedicated discord group. The game I will probably make available for testing first (and probably soon) is a very simple game with a randomly generated course in which all sounds and tracks are generated with metasounds patches, but I have two other projects in the works, one is a platformer (close to finish, more or less) and the other is a third-person thingy (very early development).
Hey, thanks for you interest! There are a few projects I’m working on, so it’s hard to categorize it all. There probably also will be some simple audio-related applications (synths based on Metasounds with some 2d or 3D GUI and/or gameplay-based sound generation or visualization-focused stuff). But the first project that’s gonna be available for testing is a mix between an endless runner and a hovercraft driving game - the focus on my side for this was making all sounds and music based on Metasounds and controlling the sounds with gameplay. It’s a very simple game, so one could check it out for a few minutes and probably already give some feedback. It’s also really small, around 300mb archived.
The other two game projects are more ambitious and it will take some time to make them available for testing. One is some kind of platformer with a post-apocalyptic setting in which you jump around, avoid or jump on enemies, but also you can swim in some levels and some other stuff. I already spent a lot of time on this including the music, like a dozen levels are already playable in theory, but there are some issues I have to fix, so not sure yet when I can get this out to testers. Third project is still in very early development, but I might upload a simple gameplay demo for testers at some point.
Working on a little synth with Metasound. Can be controlled with MIDI devices or keyboard and mouse (modwheel and pitchbend). Features multiple synth architectures and a drumset with different octaves mapped to kick, snare and hihat sounds. Started this to learn about MIDI input in UE, but pretty happy with this thingy so far, but a downside is that it’s standalone only.
Might extend this into some small workstation-type synth with an optional step sequencer for the drums and add a granular synth, multieffects, reverb and other stuff I built for different projects. Also going to extend on other aspects such as the reactive visuals for another chillout-and-play-a-bit type option. The option of using the keyboard with mouse for modwheel and pitchbend is fun if you don’t have a MIDI controller ready and want to play expressively. Still in very early stages and kinda experimental, so any input and feedback on this would is helpful. If you are interested, consider writing me a PM!
My platformer Pastapocalyptica is currently in advanced beta testing. If you want to join the party, let me know!
Here is an early preview video I made a while ago (feedback on the video is very welcome, too, of course):
I will probably delete the stuff again since nothing is finished, but any feedback would be really super welcome
Please don’t hold back, I know some of you guys have some graphics-related skills, tell me how much it sucks and get me back into reality so I write a desperate message to a guy I know who became a comic artist to get some help for the promo stuff ^^
Or some constructive ideas would be great, too, of course
[Edit: pictures deleted, will upload new ones soon]
Looks like standard indie game art affair to me, honestly. If you want it to look less cut-out (which may or may not even matter at all) you could always try color-matching or just subtle photo-filtering to bring the elements together. Or, sometimes just adding a really stylized shadow and just going for the cut-out look full-throttle can be another valid approach. Additional heavy filtering in just the right ways can kind of make it hyperrealistic.
I like the hand-drawn aesthetic of your logo quite a lot, too. People (including myself) obsess over their design skills a lot, but sometimes I wonder if that part really matters all that much in relation to the project / product.
Thank you very much, that is really helpful! I was hoping for you to drop in here Very happy that you like the logo!
I did some more color-matching type changes (with AI this time lol) and it really makes a huge difference… Going to try out your ideas and upload new versions soon…
Got a new version of the picture with character, now with a black suit (some people said the bright suit was distracting) and a new fireball (also got some feedback that the fuzzy fire didn’t work well with the other elements) - here is a comparison of old and new:
I’ve got a weird one – have you tried some of that blue parallax from the upper left one on maybe half of the bottom right’s backdrop? It seems like it needs an element of that blue contrast to break up the black and red!
All of this is a matter of taste, of course. And I usually don’t know what I’m even talking about
Nice idea, I’m def goin to try it out, maybe I also make the drink blue and put the blue background on the left side to balance it a bit… Thanks for the tip! Gonna upload new versions soonish ^^
Tried some more backgrounds including single ones and combinations of red and blue and more (I attached two with blue elements), but at the moment two of the single background pictures are my favs.!
There’s another version of my 2.5D platformer project which is basically the “release candidate 1” for a public version, either full release or “Early Access” (depending on how the to-do list looks before releasing it). It went through intensive alpha testing, but I would be very happy for some more beta testers - everything would be helpful, no matter if you do a full playthrough, check the main menu for machine-translation errors in a language you know well or try it out for a few minutes and let me know something about your system specs and the framerate you get in the first level…
It’s just for Win64 at the moment and I would recommend to play it on relatively current systems with a dedicated graphics card, but I could get it to run on some old laptops when using the right settings and switching off some VFX stuff in the menu. Feel free to write me a PN (or post here) if you are interested to test it!
Got any in-game screenshots? A lot of what I see lately on the design end (with other indie projects) is an image / design style that doesn’t really match the style of the game or convey what the gameplay is like by any stretch of the imagination, so it’s kind of hard to give an opinion on the banner all by itself, if that makes any sense.
I think a lot of people are kind of asset-flipping when this happens, though, so you might be in the clear. I’m really curious as to what it looks like on the inside, though. Cool stuff, and if I had any sense of beta testing or understanding things better I’d love to help out.
The character is the same model used in the game and the environment is also a screenshot from the game, so I hope it’s not completely misleading. But the in-game fireball looks different and the cocktail is only a price in a wheel-of-fortune bonus game
Good point about the screenshots.I already recorded some full playthoughs and want to cut it down to a short promo-video but that might take a while. I think I’m gonna take and post at least a few gameplay screenshots soonish, maybe on the weekend.
Also, any feedback on the game would be very appreciated, it really doesn’t matter how much you play it or what and how much you write. I got some feedback just about the look of some level or about the movement controls or the music or just something like “barely runs on my system” with some specs and everything is really helpful… Maybe I can convince you to try it out at some point
Everything usually goes to shit when I try to play it, so I can probably get it to break in a number of creative ways without even trying, which may or may not be of use to you. Also, if there’s any precision element, I’m likely to see it through and actually advance a little into it, but otherwise I can at least do the ‘jank test’, as I call it
Haha, that sounds perfect! A proper jank test might be exactly what it needs. And if you actually manage to get a little further into it, that would be awesome.
Gonna write you a PN with infos later. Can’t wait to see how you make this project glitch out!
