nt-studios - Tumblr blog

[nt-studios]

Devlog - Refresh

Hey hey, it's been a while. Took a much-needed hiatus from development since the last time I posted and am now somewhat refreshed. I managed to complete my first round of updates for The Makeup Exam (mostly the main story scenes). More fixes in the works before official release, tho 🔧

[nt-studios]

Jam is over... so, now what?

Welp, the eighth Strawberry Jam has officially come to an end. Because of this, I wanna take a brief moment to share what I've learned the past month-and-a-half and my future plans up to this point...

As you may recall from my previous post, I made the choice to pause production on my current project to enter in this year's jam. I did this because I thought it'd be the perfect opportunity for me to take a small break from working on the same game I've been putting all of my attention towards for the past year now, and instead explore newer ideas that I've been wanting to tap into for a while.

I knew ahead of time that with a full-time job outside of game dev, this was gonna be a struggle. I would have to find the right amount of wiggle room within my busy day-to-day schedule to work on a fresh project under a tight deadline. And welp... the results kinda spoke for themselves. I ended up with an untested, unstable, nearly unplayable game by the time submissions closed. No matter how many bug fixes I tried to make postmortem, the game's concept just didn't work.

I'm gonna be completely frank here... this made me really upset the last couple of weeks. It completely shattered my confidence as a game dev and I nearly scrubbed my submission from the judging panel because I wasn't happy with what I made. But ultimately, I had to remind myself of just how much time and effort I put into this thing already. It would just make me feel worse thinking I did all this work for nothing.

All in all, though, this experience has made me understand my limitations a bit more. I felt trapped in my current project, like Mornin' Firebreather was the only thing I was meant to work on and nothing else. I was starting to feel a bit fatigued, so I used this opportunity as an excuse to break out of this cycle I've created for myself. But now I know that relying on a timed game jam to scratch this itch I've been having wasn't the right approach.

So now, what does this mean for the future of my game dev journey? The jam is over, so what're the next steps from here? Well... now I have a second project under my belt. Despite its flaws, the story is still something I'm quite proud of and honestly one I can't discard just because the game itself is crap. Therefore, I'm gonna be taking additional time to do some serious maintenance on The Makeup Exam (*without* a time constraint). I'll keep the original jam version up until maybe the end of this coming weekend, but then I'll remove it from itch and eventually do a re-release with an actual, playable product.

With that being said, I'm also gonna turn this Tumblr blog into a general game dev one, where I'll be posting devlogs and updates for ALL of my games instead of just Mornin' Firebreather. Now, this doesn't mean that I'm quitting production on Mornin' Firebreather. I still have big plans for that game that I haven't forgotten about 😜

But yea... that's pretty much it. I know this update was a little longer than usual, just had a lot going through my mind as of late.

[nt-studios]

A Month's Reflection and Updates...

We're about to enter February in a few days, and I've definitely been able to get a lot done for my game this past month. However, I'm gonna take a brief pause on development to focus on an upcoming game jam that's taking place next month.

As most of y'all are *probably* aware, Mornin' Firebreather was a project I made for last year's Strawberry Jam on itch. Since another one's starting up this year, I've been wanting to participate to see what other wacky ideas I can come up with.

I don't know how things'll turn out this time around since I'm much busier now than ever before, but it's worth a shot nonetheless. Just note that if y'all see a brand new project under my catalog that doesn't include dragons and knights... you'll know why 😅

[nt-studios]

Spent the day improving my rope physics 😎

[nt-studios]

Mobile Version

After going through my itch notifications, I noticed a few people who were wanting me to make a mobile version of the game. I've definitely considered doing this since the original Windows/web releases, but I just haven't gotten around to doing it yet.

With the deluxe game still in the works, I wanna focus on finishing that up first for the original platforms. Then, I'll see what I can do about going mobile.

[nt-studios]

Hey there! I mainly post on Twitter, pretty much just use my tumblr to check here lol, but your itch.io post reminded me to check in! Very much excited for your game, and have been making sure to have it on my radar since it first came out! Just wanted to wish you well on your development cycle and thank you for the work you've put out so far!

Tysm! I really appreciate the support ❤️

[nt-studios]

Derp.

[nt-studios]

Looks like we got similar resolutions this year 👀

Happy New Year!!!

[nt-studios]

Entering the New Year

I know this is a little belated... but Happy New Year everyone! With the start of a brand new year, I have a fresh set of ideas that I wanna implement into my game. I'll admit, development's been kinda slow given a bunch of different things've happened in my life the past year. Hopefully I'm able to complete a working demo at least in 2024 for y'all to try out, and eventually complete development in its entirety. Either way, cheers to new beginnings 🎉

[nt-studios]

Devlog - New Dialogue System!

Been working on a brand new dialogue system with new character looks, animations, and a much more efficient way for me to add long strings of text. Stay tuned :D

[nt-studios]

The train continues to chug along the tracks... After two pretty busy weekends, I finally got a freebie. More animations and scenes are now complete :D

Hey, it's been a while since I've posted any updates... but I promise I've gotten a lot done as far as Paula's storyline goes! Just finished some new sprites and scenes for our golden dragon lady (preview sprite above) 😁

[nt-studios]

Hey, it's been a while since I've posted any updates... but I promise I've gotten a lot done as far as Paula's storyline goes! Just finished some new sprites and scenes for our golden dragon lady (preview sprite above) 😁

[nt-studios]

Managed to get a bit further in developing Paula's portion of the game today, so that's good.

Welp, it took a little bit... but I finally finished updating the original story line. Now for the more interesting stuff 😋

[nt-studios]

I love your Game

Thanks!

[nt-studios]

can't wait for the Improved game! your really good!

Thanks! :D

[nt-studios]

Welp, it took a little bit... but I finally finished updating the original story line. Now for the more interesting stuff 😋

[nt-studios]

Just finished whipping up a brand new minigame! Here's a little sneak peek above.