Developing a game in 30 Days, Releasing it in hopefully less than 60 Days — A transparent story (aka a Tale of self-induced Burnout) #3
Overview
Part 1: The first Week
Part 2: The Second Week
Part 3: The Third Week
Part 4: The Fourth Week
Part 5: The Fifth Week
Part 6: Week Six & Seven
Day 15
Yikes. More than half the time for the development is over already. And Dennis found out that by Sunday the SAGE 21 submission closes. And we could submit a demo for Eversleep which would mean lots and lots of visibility. Seems to become a busy week. And we need to get that steam page out in time as well to generate as many wishlist entries as possible within a short timeframe. Problem: He forgot the Logo on his home PC as he is in the office today. This week will definitely be interesting.
In the morning our Managing Director Jan came back from vacation and asked what we started here. He followed social media a bit and then spotted some meetings in the google calendar and was confused. So we tried to explain. He liked the idea. Although he now thinks that Dennis is a bit weird.
Also Dennis took some screenshots with the screenshot mode. And before going on Stream he also added the missing assets and tweaked my store description. The Steam storepage is now in submission.
It usually takes around 24 hours till things get approved (in case you don’t mess up stuff and need to correct things). We’ll unlock it right away to start collecting wishlist entries. However, in case you didn’t know: You can get the page approved months ahead of the planned reveal. Still keep in mind: If things get busy (usually around late August till mid November) it can indeed take a few days till Steam approves the pages.
In the evening Dennis continued streaming the development and added a few gimmicks and some cool color grading for Stage 2. Now he can finally start blocking this one. Gonna be important to finish it asap so we can submit to SAGE.
Day 16
Pitched the first Medium article to my GOG account manager contact bizdev. Will be interesting to see if he ever reads these words. In case he does: Oh hello!
Trying to get the game on GOG on launch as well.
On Stream Level 2 was fully blocked. But that’s not enough: The game now has a Steam Page. We will start sharing the Wishlist numbers per day once the backend updates (usually takes around 24 hours for the wishlist).
Still a lot has to be done as the banners are just placeholders for now. And we don’t have a trailer yet.
Day 17
No wishlist numbers just yet. But some progress on the the business side. Dennis finally has negotiated the deal terms with our Boss. We can’t reveal the exact details here but they are pretty fair from my perspective. And yes, usually, if you are working with a publisher, you should negotiate the deal terms before you actively start working with them. Keep in mind that Eversleep is a very specific case.
I have submitted the prices (2.99$/€) to Steam and got the approval in the night. Did take much less than 24 hour, that’s neat. Sadly I don’t have wishlist numbers for all of you just yet, the system did not update so far.
In the evening Dennis streamed the creation of the second stage. Time for the beach!
Day 18
Steam wishlist number still did not work till the evening. In the evening the numbers for the first day finally showed up. Considering Dennis unlocked the page during the Stream and that the page is still full with placeholder assets, I think we can be quite happy. Right now we’re at 684 Wishlist entries.
Besides that not that much was going on till the evening where Dennis finally started modelling the enemies.
Day 19
Dennis took a day off to play Hackerman and work on the SAGE demo. He even told me he wouldn’t stream. And he streamed. Of course. nemies got included into the game. A victory animation is now part of the stages as well, so when Hana reaches the line, a pose is a given. And an endscreen for the Demo was created.
Weekend: Day 20 & 21
The weekend was quite productive. Dennis finished the Demo for SAGE. But that’s not enough, right? A music stage was started. That’s also why we embed the tweet as Medium does sadly not support videos from what I figured.
Good thing: The SAGE 2021 submission is done. It will begin late August. And Dennis will finetune the demo even further. Current whishlist number is around 750.
The Submission for ScreenshotSaturday:
