defender's quest DQ2 Update and DQ1-HD Announcement So, it's been a while since we last talked about Defender's Quest 2 [http://www.defendersquest.com/2]. I have three big things to talk about today: 1. General updates 2. Announcing Defender's Quest 1 HD re-release 3. Progress on Defender's Quest
steam Fixing Steam's User Rating Charts Recently I wrote a big article [https://www.fortressofdoors.com/brave-newsteam-world/] about the new changes in Steam, and rendered my judgment: cautiously optimistic. After further reflection, my position is unchanged -- most of it's very good, but some things need work. NOTE: Although my tone throughout is quite
defender's quest Brave NewSteam World Over two years ago I wrote an article called The Holy Grail of Digital Distribution [https://www.fortressofdoors.com/the-holy-grail-of-digital-distribution/] where I described what an ideal digital game store might look like. In the last two weeks, Steam launched their long-anticipated storefront overhaul (which I'll call "NewSteam&
defender's quest Optimizing Tower Defense for FOCUS and THINKING - Defender's Quest The design philosophy for Defender's Quest [http:www.defendersquest.com] boils down to two guiding principles that play to the Tower Defense (TD) genre's strengths: 1. Let the player FOCUS 2. Test the player's THINKING Note the verbs. We don't want to
defender's quest The Quest to Upscale Pixel Art Hey everyone! So, we are currently looking very seriously at a console release for Defender's Quest II [http://www.defendersquest.com/2/]. Of course, PC is our top priority, and don't take this as an official statement of specific platform choices or anything just yet, we
business Follow Your Dreams!...Or Maybe Don't. I am filled with absolute terror whenever I get a message like this in my inbox: > "You inspired me to quit my job to make indie games!" (emphasis mine) For those of you new to this blog, my name is Lars Doucet [http://www.twitter.com/larsiusprime]
defender's quest Was Localizing Defender's Quest Worth It? Let's find out. First of all, our total sales to date, across all PC portals for the original Defender's Quest [http://www.defendersquest.com/1/] are: $656,000 USD gross 195,000 units sold Next, our monthly sales on Steam: (No y-axis label because Steam doesn&
dq2 Automatic Progress Tracking I have two jobs: 1. Make a video game 2. Tell people about it I'm much better at the former than the latter. Until recently, the "news" section of Defender's Quest 2 was conspicuously bare, not exactly a huge vote of confidence. That didn&
dq2 Will that crowdfunded game ever actually ship? So you come across a neat-looking new game on Kickstarter. It's got fancy concept art, it has some big names involved, and their pitch is really convincing! Surely this will be the game of our dreams? Well, maybe not. The failure of the Yogscast game [http://www.polygon.
business Dear Adobe: Support Haxe, save your Tools Dear Adobe, My name is Lars Doucet, I'm a game developer [http://www.defendersquest.com]; I can proudly say that I have been using your tools, and Flash in particular, for over 15 years. I love your tools, I think they're great, and I would be
news Doubling Down on Community So pretty much everybody is talking [http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-indie-bubble-is-popping.html] about this [http://gamasutra.com/blogs/RobertFearon/20140526/218535/Popping_The_Indie_Bubble.php] Indie Bubble thing [http://gamasutra.com/blogs/MeganFox/20140527/218539/Indie_Bubble_Buts_What_Do_We_Do_Now.php] and how it&
defender's quest Defender's Quest 2 Engine progress - resolution! A big thing I'm trying to work on for the DQ2 engine is robust support for multiple resolutions, particularly HD. The previous game was hard-locked to 800x600. Here's a screenshot from today's build of the DQ2 engine, using the DQ1 data set: [http://www.
steam An Algorithm for Discovering "Hidden Gems" So you've probably seen that Ars Technica article [http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/04/introducing-steam-gauge-ars-reveals-steams-most-popular-games/] that has magically reverse-engineered every steam game's gross (sales+free-key-redemption) numbers. Everyone's talking about this graph: [http://www.bugs.fortressofdoors.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/steam-meter-graphs-4.001.png]
defender's quest Nobuo Uematsu to work on Defender's Quest 2 So I promised everybody some news. I was originally going to post this yesterday, but that just happened to be Liar's Day [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Fools%27_Day], so we decided to wait one more day. Here's the press release we sent out
defender's quest Defender's Quest 2 March Update Alrighty! Time for an update on where we are in Defender's Quest 2 [http://www.defendersquest.com/2/]. Those of you who follow me on twitter [http://www.twitter.com/larsiusprime] know I've been active, but I sometimes forget that our followers are spread out over
haxe Flash is dead, long live OpenFL! I've been a stalwart Flash developer for 15 years, so nothing bothers me more than greatly exaggerated reports of Flash's premature demise. Even today, Flash remains a very viable platform with a large install base and a relatively healthy commercial ecosystem. Many [http://amanita-design.net/games/
defender's quest Playing Defender's Quest with the Steam Controller So I got back from Steam Dev Days. You might have heard that everyone who attended got a Steam Controller prototype from Valve, as well as one of the many Steam Machine models (courtesy of Intel). Bottom line -- it's pretty good! Read on for more details. This
WhoLetsPlay - 2014 plans Hey everybody! So, now that it's officially 2014, I thought I'd lay out some plans for how to get this little movement off the ground before all of our momentum peters out. So, here's today's agenda 1. Communication structure 2. Removing me
WhoLetsPlay: Getting Started Some quick context: read this Gamasutra post [http://gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20131219/207483/WhoLetsPlay__Protecting_Game_Videos.php] . I just sent this newsletter out for www.wholetsplay.com [http://www.wholetsplay.com/]: Hey everybody! Thanks for signing up for our newsletter as we try to work out the initial
defender's quest The Stegosaurus Tail: when "The Long Tail" grows spikes. You may have heard of "The Long Tail [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_tail]." For games, it means your sales start off strong and quickly taper off. This force drives the retail marketing cycle -- launch a game to extreme hype, sell it like crazy, then immediately
design On Procedural Death Labyrinths A few weeks ago Tanya X. Short said, "Never Say Roguelike. [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/TanyaXShort/20131119/204988/Never_Say_Roguelike.php] " I usually shy away from vocabulary fights and let smarter people than me hash it out [http://lesswrong.com/lw/od/37_ways_that_words_
defender's quest Defender's Quest II's "UnKickstarter" approach to crowdfunding Kickstarter is the go-to solution for crowdfunding these days, but I'm a control freak so I designed a custom solution for our upcoming game, Defender's Quest II: Mists of Ruin [http://www.defendersquest.com/2/]. No solution is one-size-fits all; we're in the unique
defender's quest Story-telling as Problem Solving: Defender's Quest (GDC 2013 Narrative Summit) We (Writer James Cavin and Programmer/Generalist Lars Doucet) initially gave this talk at GDC 2013 in the Game Narrative summit. I'm posting the slides and script here as a blog post, but if you prefer a video, you can watch a recording of this talk here [https:
Youtube and the new AudioVisual Literacy I've been thinking about writing, journalism, and Youtube a lot lately, and I just realized something: we're moving to a new form of "writing" based on recorded oral culture. Traditionally, "oral tradition [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_tradition]" had no recording
defender's quest Steam Linux Sale : Results Shortly after we published our giant sales report, Defender's Quest: By the Number, part 2 [http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/186940/defenders_quest_by_the_numbers_.php] , the Steam Linux client officially went public and was accompanied by a site-wide sale. The Linux sale featured every single