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Some Possible Plans: Divine Dreams Prequel, Pokemon Clone, Marooned
4 years ago - Edited 4 years ago3,929 words
Yesterday's panic and despair transformed to creative excitement overnight, though I'm still not sure what to do next, if Divine Dreams as planned might not be financially viable. Here are some thoughts about some potential 'short' projects I could maybe release by the end of the year.

EDIT: After thinking about this for about a day, I definitely prefer the first thing I describe!

Well, yesterday was interesting. I was hit by a wave of depression deeper than anything in ages, all the old thoughts of JUST ENDING IT ALL reared their heads at least briefly, but at night I struggled to sleep because my mind was buzzing with ideas. I was eager to get up and write about them, so that's what I'm doing here. I already said most of this in a response to a comment on ∞ yesterday's post ∞, but I want to elaborate on and further explore some of the ideas that I presented.

EONS AGO (December 2018), I wrote ∞ this blog post ∞ which began:

As much as I'd rather not, I wonder whether I should try making some short, simple apps in the hope of earning money, which I could then use as a place of stability so then I might be able to work on my passion projects with less worry...


This was followed by a couple of other posts where I brainstormed a few ideas, and eventually decided on what ended up becoming Sindrel Song: a 'quick' project that took at least six months to develop, and wasn't actually released on Steam until about a year after this post (and which in the end earned a pittance).

I suppose there are a few differences between now and then, though. I'd never released a game on Steam then, and I was still getting used to developing in Unity and 3D. Also, quite notably, I'd had major brain surgery in October 2018, just a couple of months before that linked post, and I had a month of having my brain bombarded by radiation to treat the remaining cancer through late December and early January. Obviously my mind was in a very different place than it is now! I'd say that these factors were the main ones that caused Sindrel Song to take so long.

Anyway, this return to brainstorming short, simple projects is something that comes up again and again, in a sort of cycle. It happened again following Sindrel Song (11 months ago), where I did ∞ some planning for a game involving Alora Fane's varnyn race ∞. I didn't get very far with it though, and the long creative process that eventually led to the formation of Divine Dreams followed not long after. There was also Belief, which I still love, but which I felt might have a similar level of obscurity to Sindrel Song and as such I decided to delay it while working on something more accessible. That morphed into Divine Dreams anyway, so it wasn't wasted effort.

I don't have a history of making short games, and I wonder to what extent they're actually a good idea. They seem like they obviously would be, in the abstract, because surely they'd take less of an investment to make, but it's easy to underestimate how long everything takes. Production, publishing, and promotion all take months even with something fairly small. It's why I like the idea of releasing something episodic, as it allows for building momentum.

That said, in ∞ yesterday's post ∞, I expressed my fears about whether or not an episodic idea would even be sufficiently profitable, especially now while I'm still quite obscure. Perhaps I'd be locking myself into years of financial failure? This led to some brainstorming about what 'quick' things I could do first. Here are a few ideas.



Divine Dreams Prequel

I love Divine Dreams, and have no intention of abandoning that! It'd be such a shame to have essentially six months of planning and production go to waste, so that's not happening. I'm going to do something with it.
The plan, as described in previous posts, has been something like this:

> The whole game will be a trilogy of three Episodes.
> Each Episode will contain six Chapters, each short, focused around a single dungeon.
> I'd release one Episode as a free demo, then perhaps I could release the others as I made them to patrons of a certain tier to test.
> Then, I'd review all six and combine them into a Chapter, which I'd release on Steam.

The stuff I talked about yesterday cast a lot of doubt on whether this would work, though. While MARDEK's audience grew with each chapter, even though they depended on the previous ones to make sense, perhaps here it'd be the opposite, with the audience dwindling after the first. And if that audience for the first isn't big to begin with, then, well, obviously that's an issue.

There was also objection to releasing the three Chapters separately if they're all so interconnected. Personally I see them more like sequels than parts in an episodic series, so it makes more sense to me to release them separately, but I suppose one narrative would be tying them all together. The alternative is adding them as DLC, though I wonder if that even earns money? Is the release of DLC given any fanfare? Would people check out an unfamiliar game upon seeing it getting new DLC?

It seems that episodic games typically have a Season Pass, allowing access to all episodes even if they're not released yet. So one option is to have three "Seasons" of Divine Dreams, so three Season Passes, and of course each Season would be six episodes, released as updates/DLC as they're finished. That's an idea.

I'm not sure what to do there. I could also just try to compress what I have into one big game and release that, but then there's a big chance it won't do well anyway, and then what? I'd also have to trim out a lot of what I've already got planned, probably including playable characters, and if it did do well, I'd have lost a lot of potential.

Another idea I recently talked about is making the first demo separately to the actual story episodes. That is, it'd use all the same assets, engine, etc, but in a different arrangement, detached from the main story. Kind of like ∞ what I made for the video demo I released a couple of months ago ∞ (in the actual story, those four characters would begin the Dreamcave section together; they wouldn't have to meet up like that).

This then naturally leads to a suggestion/some of my brainstorming from the comments on yesterday's post: What if I use the engine to tell a shorter, independent story using the world and assets I've already got, to introduce the game's concepts without investing too much development time into it or locking myself into a long commitment?

This is one of the ideas that I got excited about as I struggled to sleep last night, and there are a couple of possibilities that jump to mind.

One is to use these four protagonists, who I posted about recently:




I like them a lot... but the main concern is how it'd tie something about them into the narrative I already have planned, if I were to go through with making that. In the main story, Dayvha and Nytsky are childhood friends, and they meet Lavent when they join the cherubim (she's already a cherub). They meet Cywren (I prefer that name!) later for a brief adventure based on the Lake Qur section of MARDEK, but part ways with her soon after (that is, she's only playable for Chapter 4 in Episode 1). Dayvha reunites with Cywren again only after Lavent and Nytsky have left like they do in MARDEK.

So having the four of them travel together would have to be disconnected from that narrative in a way I don't like... unless I do some rewriting of that story to make it work.

There's a lot I'd like to use there, though. A cast of four would give a lot of variety, and I'm eager to explore mechanics like the 'resonar' swords I recently designed for Dayvha. I find that exciting. Still, I can't really think how it'd work in a story sense, and that matters to me!

There's another possibility:



In Divine Dreams, Dayvha's father is called Savitr, and he's the shining star of the Seraphim, their most renowned member, this great hero essentially, though he went missing a few years ago. Nytsky idolises him because of his status - and for other personal reasons I've explained elsewhere - while Dayvha is less enthusiastic because, well, he ran away, and wasn't really that great of a father to him.

Like in MARDEK, Divine Dreams would begin with a fantasy sequence, though instead of having Hero Mardek and Hero Deugan, Dayvha would just be himself, essentially, and he'd be accompanied by Savitr, who it's revealed at the end of the segment was actually Nytsky pretending. That'd be the player's first direct introduction to Savitr, right at the beginning of the game, but he's not set to appear in the plot again until much later, probably in Episode 2.

Dayvha and Nytsky are also trained by a seraph character while cherubim, who later joins the party. She's essentially a replacement for Donovan and Sharla in the Gem Mine/Dreamcave section and what would become the Sun-Temple-inspired bit, and a more interesting replacement for Jacques too.

Those things in mind, here's an idea:

Perhaps there could be a Prequel Episode kind of thing, short and snappy, set a few years before the events of Divine Dreams. You control Savitr, Seraph extraordinaire, and his young cherub apprentice, as they go on some mission in a new area that wouldn't be featured in Divine Dreams.

It could be a way to introduce the gameplay, set the scene, and hint at Divine Dreams' story (perhaps this is shortly after Dayvha was born, and they talk about Savitr's 'son back home', or perhaps at the end you'd get a glimpse of Dharma or something) without necessarily setting it up as CHAPTER 1 OF A BILLION MORE. So if it was a complete flop, I could call it a loss without it lingering incomplete.

Another idea is using the Muriance character as the villain. In Divine Dreams, he's a cult leader instead of a bandit (and I haven't decided on his name yet), and I'm imagining the cult being almost like a Pokemon EVIL TEAM in that they've got their own distinct look and battle music and everything. He and his cult are set to appear in the Dreamcave section (Chapter 3 of Episode 1), and again in Episode 2, but perhaps I could introduce them in this. Saves on idea generation, and the familiarity they'd have in Divine Dreams wouldn't be a bad thing (especially if this was kind of like a backstory for that character, and you saw what he became in DD).

This all sounds interesting enough in the abstract, though there are some concerns.

How long should it be? One dungeon seems like it'd be too short. Even MARDEK 1 had three dungeons and a hub. I could do something like that, but then it ends up being about half as long as Episode 1 is planned to be!

What should I charge for it? The original aim was to have an entirely free demo to maximise the number of people who'd at least give it a try. But I wouldn't want to make something like this just to release it for nothing. That'd feel like a waste. But then I'd also feel like I was charging too much if it was only a couple of hours of gameplay, if that. So I don't know.

I also don't know what I'd call it! "Divine Dreams Prequel" sounds clunky, and hints at something to come so it wouldn't really be self-contained. Something like "Seraph" or "Savitr" or "A Seraph And His Cherub" or "The Spectacular Adventures of Savitr" or "Splendid Savitr" come to mind, I don't know.

The seraph character who'd be Savitr's plucky young cherub apprentice here (I do like the enthusiastic youth paired with grizzled mentor dynamic, like Batman and Robin) is the only one of the planned Divine Dreams protagonists who only uses physical attacks (she'd be a straightforward heavy hitter, kind of taking Sslen'ck's role), though, which wouldn't really be a great introduction to the magic/music mechanics I have in mind! Savitr, too, has a weapon which doesn't translate well to an instrument, and is what it is for fairly important story reasons; I'd need to do some revising somewhere. There's another character from Divine Dreams I could quite interestingly include as an spellcasting ally, but that'd spoil the daring duo dynamic. He's sorrow, though, and an intriguing and colourful character in his own right, with a lot of plot relevance but not much actual appearance in Divine Dreams' planned story, so... hmm.

It's something to think about, anyway.



Monster Catching

Over the years, I've attempted various Pokemon clones, due to my love of the genre. One of my earliest game attempts - now long lost - was one of these, which was followed by Beast Signer, then Miasmon, Maybe there were some other brief things in there too. I tried returning to Miasmon several times, though none of those attempts ever went anywhere (they were all during Flash's final days anyway).

Recently, a bunch of random Pokemon playthroughs came up in my suggestions, things like this:



Apparently it was a trend for a brief period. Watching a few of those rekindled my desire to make a Pokemon-like game of my own... though I wasn't exactly going to drop Divine Dreams to do it.

As I watched some of these, other Pokemon videos came up in my suggestions with things like "CATCHING HUMANS AS POKEMON IN BLACK 2". In Pokemon Black and White 2, the 'PokeStudios' feature allowed you to take part in films, one of which had the premise that you were in a flipped world where Pokemon trained humans. The participants in these films were functionally the same as Pokemon in the game's data, to allow for battles against them, and this person hacked the game so that these never-meant-to-be-caught human 'Pokemon' appeared wild in grass. It seemed to be entertaining enough of a concept to people. Training humans and sending them out in battles! Lol!

This got me wondering about a game concept where you play as an alien, and you capture types of human and battle against other aliens' parties of humans. This ties into similar ideas I've had in the past, where human opponents represent various stereotypes. This is some concept art for Belief that I linked to a while back, for example:



I've even considered ideas in the past where some of these stereotypes evolve into others, virtual-pet-style ("Nerd evolved into Scientist!").

Something like that - where you're an alien catching people - would be conceptually amusing, and light on asset requirements. Since I wouldn't be designing a bunch of separate monsters, I'd only really need to make some basic human models which could share animations between them.

But maybe that could be taken a step further. Perhaps instead of being 'species' in this sense, every human you encounter is randomly-generated using a simple character customising system. I've wanted to make a 3D one for a while, and I've tried in the past, but my skills weren't developed enough at the time. It'd be interesting to take another shot at it.

Perhaps something like this could use a rudimentary version of Divine Dreams mechanics, where the humans have runes - randomised, of course - and use elemental or sentimental skills (elements are courage, fear, bliss, destruction, creation, sorrow, aether; sentiments are joy, sorrow, amity, enmity, lust, and fear) alongside slaps, kicks, punches, etc.

I can imagine a system where the humans battle one-on-one, and stand close enough that those punches etc physically connected. I could even animate them such that it really looked like the action and reaction were one rather than using a generic 'hit' animation... HMM.



Marooned

This led to a different idea that I've explored a number of times over the years, mostly privately. I've talked about this a bunch of times before, but one of the earliest games I ever made was a text-based thing called LONE WOLF. In it, you explored a grid full of rooms and did typical text-based stuff like "FONDLE MAN" and "CHOP OFF OWN TODGER". I was young.

Later, I revisited the idea as something called Marooned, which was a simple survival game, again with a text-based interface and a grid of rooms to explore.



You woke up naked, and had to rummage around in bushes and suspicious mounds of sand and such to find food and bits and pieces you could craft simple clothing from. There was a battle system, where enemies could target your limbs individually, or you could target theirs, which could result in severing eventually. I don't think I worked on that for maybe more than a couple of weeks, probably more than a decade ago.

I returned to it, sort of, in 2017:



This was while I was at university, not really doing the games thing as anything more than an occasional hobby, and I remember making this maybe around Christmas? It was mostly just me playing around, and I suppose using naked women was a way of pervily appeasing my loneliness (better to channel the urges creatively than just sit around watching porn, right?!?). I've always liked the idea of starting from nothing, though - when I was younger, I often replayed the beginning sections of games since this building up from simple beginnings was way more interesting to me than being powerful - so I liked it conceptually for that reason.



There wasn't much to it. You explored an area made up of these 'rooms', each of which could have up to four bits of scenery in the corners, and each of those had a random selection of items you could find. You could craft those items into clothing; eg Leaf + Vine = Leaf Thong, and Leaf Thong + Leaf = Leaf Bra. These clothing items got damaged and eventually fell apart as the limbs they were on were damaged. Each area you entered had a chance of triggering a battle, and those battles were meant to have both attacking and 'taming' mechanics (represented by the card suit icons), but I didn't stick with it long enough to really do anything with that.

That was, I think, the last thing I ever made with Flash, and I made the transition to Unity shortly after. To familiarise myself with Unity, I actually revisited this idea in mid-2018 (feels like a lifetime ago, though...) to make a kind of 3D version of this:



Again I was being pervy here by using a naked woman as the protagonist (a good opportunity to practice anatomy skills? This model irritates me now though because it uses a subsurf modifier and as such is too high-poly), but this time I was experimenting with random terrain generation, shaders, things like that.



Each time you start, the island is randomly-generated, and... that's about all there is to it, really. You can equip and craft the things you find in grass and bushes, like in previous iterations, but that's it. Again, I didn't spend more than a few days on this, since it was only ever meant as practice anyway rather than something I'd eventually release.

Still, it came up again as a possibility when wondering what I could possibly make... but sort of combined with other ideas, like the Pokemon-catching one. Here's what I have in mind:

You'd control a character - possibly customised - who awakens 'naked' (probably not actually if it was for public release) on a desert island. You then have to scavenge what you could find from bushes etc; you'd need to find food, and you'd be able to craft simple clothing items.

You'd also encounter other scavengers like you, which would trigger battles. These battles would be one-on-one, but you and the enemy could also have allies, who'd politely wait in the background unless switched in (like a traditional Pokemon battle). You could either kill them to harvest their items, or you could 'tame' them to join your party (you could have up to six members). Again I'd use concepts like runes alongside standard physical damaging skills.

The goal, other than just surviving, would be to find six Golden Keys scattered randomly around the island, and a Golden Gate, which could be unlocked with those keys (this was the 'plot' of the text version of Marooned; the gate's mentioned in that screenshot).

I imagine the graphics would be tile-based, similar to what I've got for Divine Dreams, but procedurally generated so that every time the island was different.

It could be tied to Alora Fane by saying that this is the Bold first awakening in their petal world after being 'planted' there by the Aolmna. It's loose, but the point would be not to make a narrative game.



So those are some ideas. Personally I feel that the Divine Dreams direction would be best because that's what I'm most motivated to make, whereas my interest in these non-narrative ones tends to dwindle fairly quickly. Plus I don't think there's as much of a hook to them that would make them stand out; there are already a bunch of similar games out there. At the same time, though, it's true that games with scanty narrative but a lot of potential for pure gameplay and replayability might be more appealing to people, more likely to be played by youtubers etc. But most indie devs make these 'toy' games which don't receive much attention. I don't particularly want to spend the rest of this year making one myself.

So maybe a Divine Dreams thing would be more remarkable, and would better demonstrate the direction I want to take my games in going forward, whereas the other possibilities would be more like detours.

It'd be nice to have some form of Divine Dreams I can release by the end of the year, but I'm wondering whether it's best to do this as this standalone thing, cheaply-priced, or whether I should just go through with the original plan, and have the first chapter (or a standalone demo) free, do a Kickstarter, get better at promotion... I mean, if I had a paid prequel that's about half as long as Episode 1 is meant to be anyway, then it'd be senseless to have a free demo for that Episode 1...

I'll need to think about it, and I probably should spend the next week or two just familiarising myself with the indie dev community and researching marketing. Perhaps I should mention MARDEK too, and I might send out some keys to some of them many who've asked me for them - or try using the giveaways thing someone mentioned - just to see if anything happens.

There's lots to think about.

21 COMMENTS

arnold5975~4Y
I really enjoy the idea of the prequel episode! That also rounds out the episode total to seven, correct? 3 for DD, 3 for Belief, and maybe one connective episode that hints at stuff in Belief and DD yet is disconnected enough to be its own story? It makes sense to me at least. The other less story driven games are also appealing, but the prequel might be the most productive one if you'd like to continue building the world of DD as a more active role. However, interesting opportunities arrive if you pursue the 3D, randomly generated 'Marooned.' If there's building and crafting capabilities (Which now that I think about it might be complicated!), you might be able to use other people's gameplay videos or screenshots of their builds to inspire how you'd design towns and other such places in DD and Belief. That way, the short game might lend some financial security while still adding to your development of Divine Dreams. It's an interesting idea, but I also have very little knowledge of game developing, so these ideas could just be born from naivete. Either way, I think you have some good ideas overall!
3
Ampersand68~4Y
Perhaps subtitles would work for a game name? Alora Fane: [Insert title] or [Insert title}: An Alora Fane Game/Tale/Story. An idea for adding a musical component to Savitr's macuahuitl(?) would be for him to rub notches on its sides with a small stick like it's a guiro [LINK] , which I think fits both stylistically (it's an Amerindian instrument) as well as with the character (a strong, assertive, rhythmic sound). Heck, you could even make it part of character/worldbuilding and make it so each notch represents a successfully completed mission, to reinforce the idea that Savitr's a Big Deal.

As for the Cherub, I don't think a sword is -that- difficult to make into an instrument. The concept of a "singing sword" isn't that out there, and provides a kind of preview of Dayvha's resonars. An explanation for why she doesn't use her sword in that way in Divine Dreams could be chalked up to trauma over the loss of Savitr, or some kind of vow keeping her from using them. Having them both use weapons that are clearly -weapons- but also having light tutorializing of rhythm-based segments would allow for the audience to ease into the concept both gameplay-wise and lore-wise.
5
Tobias 1115~4Y
Each notch - or 'tooth' - in Savitr's macuahuitl (it is one of those, since the culture he got it from is Aztec-ish) does represent something, which is a sort-of-important-ish thing in the story, and that's why I was reluctant to reinvent it... but now that I think about it, the plans for that are so nebulous that it might be a better bet to just invent an instrument for him. He'd probably make more sense actually if he was more impressive for his musical abilities than for HAS BIG SWORD. Exactly the same as Dayvha working better as a spellcaster than as a swordsman (though I also like the idea of him being a balanced jack-of-all-trades, and the resonars work nicely for that).

So rather than thinking how I could adapt his current weapon into an instrument, I'll do some thinking about what instrument he could have instead. Ideally it'd need to be something the player would immediately recognise as an instrument, and which could be used for physical attacking because it'd be important that both characters could use that basic action.

If he was the spellcaster, then his cherub apprentice could get away with being purely physical... but it also makes more sense for both of them to be able to tame their opponents, so it's probably better to reinvent her too as maybe focused on physical attacking and taming rather than just physical attacking.

Brainstorming time!
2
Astreon152~4Y
The teeth could maybe function as triangles ? And the "body" would amplify the sound ?

That way you don't need to redesign the whole weapon.

Or you could make it a rare instrument, like a psalterion/nonca.

Or something that would combine with a sheath? Like drawing the macuahuitl would produce sound.
3
Ampersand68~4Y
He's a Seraph, so it'd make sense that he'd have an instrument typically associated with powerful angels, and in that case, there's really only the one option- the trumpet. As for what type of trumpet, I guess that depends on Savitr's character design whether a trumpet with a simple or more complex structure would be fitting, both in look and also in what kind of songs could be played- I could see arguments for jazzy, militaristic, or even more exotic soundscapes depending on which direction you want to go. [LINK]

As for the Cherub, an upscaled pellet drum [LINK] could be used both as a kind of staff as well as an instrument capable of perhaps some rudimentary magic. Alternatively, a plucked stringed instrument of the lute family, held by the neck to smash enemies, as one does. I'm not really sure what would be fitting for this character (or even really Savitr) though, since I don't really know what their personalities are really supposed to be like.
3
Tobias 1115~4Y
Trumpet! Of course! I've been working on character designs for Savitr all morning, and I've found a look I like where he wields two weapons, standing in a pose that looks like spread wings. I imagine he taught - or at least inspired - Dayvha to take up dual weapons of his own, but I wanted them to have a more seraphic silhouette, so the foil-like resonars Dayvha uses wouldn't work for that. Currently I've got him with two swords with a series of chimes set in them, almost like the other weapon but split in half in shape, so they have a wing-reminiscent silhouette, which he plays by striking one chime against another to produce doubled-up notes.

It's interesting, though I can see a trumpet being appropriate both for an angel and for a heroic champion, like he's supposed to be, so I'll experiment with designs for that! I still want him to have two, though; perhaps he'd blow into two at once?

As for the cherub, she's got an axe combined with a guitar currently, because I feel that'd be more appealing/relatable/amusing to players than something more fitting but esoteric.
4
Maniafig222~4Y
It's good to hear some of the clouds of anxiety and depression have parted! They always pass in the end, even if in the moment it feels like it'll last eternally.

I still think it's impressive you made Sindrel Song while recovering from literal brain cancer surgery! Who else can boast of a feat like that?

I think the Divine Dreams Prequel idea is the best one, in part because your mindset is already focused on it, and in part because working on it would be efficient. Any work you put into this prequel will spare you work in the long run, models for characters and enemies can be reused, written dialogue will provide character voices you'll be needing later and maybe you could even make the game set in a location you're planning to use again in Episode 2? That way you can even reuse those tilesets, even if in that later episode we'll be exploring a different part of the area, or a more expansive version of what was explored in this prequel.

I suppose some of the questions regarding the release format of DD hinge on how well each episode works as a story with a beginning, middle and ending climax. I'm assuming they'll all still function as stories in and of themselves, even if they're part of a bigger trilogy, so in that sense I don't think having separate releases is unthinkable.

Cywren is a better name, yes! Still evocative of Siren, but also closer to the spirit of Elwyen's original name. Also, I'm shocked that Nytsky and Lavent would leave the party, shocked!!

Gasp, details about Savitr! I wonder how much of this was also true of the TD Enki... It sounds like he really does combine the characters of Enki and Social Fox, which I think is a good consolation.

Okay, so that Cherub has to be Collie, right? It has to be. She looks like Collie! Collie was going to be important in TM, maybe!! It has to be Collie!! TELL ME IT'S COLLIE! WOOF!!

I'm kinda curious what exactly Cherubs and Seraphs DO. The original had the guards, where it was kinda obvious what they did, whereas in TM there were the Cherubs and Seraphs, who seemed like social workers, somehow? Like, more problem solvers instead of like medieval fantasy cops. Do these Cherubs and Seraphs have a LICENSE TO KILL?!

Murias as the villain makes sense, his brand of villainy seems like the sort that could get defeated in one place and then pop up again elsewhere years later. I'm rather curious what his character is like, I'm hoping he's more of a charismatic cult leader inspired more by real cults instead of like a generic fantasy "I LOVE THE EVIL GODS UNGH YAS" cult leader!

Well, I think measuring MARDEK 1 as "three dungeons" isn't really right, since they are three very short dungeons, totaling just a paltry 5 screens. Chapter 3's Sun Temple alone felt bigger to me than all dungeons in MARDEK 1 combined, and it also had the benefit of being an interesting location.

Maybe the Sun Temple would be a good place for someone like Murias to recruit people and this quest to be set in? That way you could also reuse the assets later on. It might also be familiar for people who played MARDEK, since it had such a distinct feeling after the dull dredging through forests, caves and sewers of chapters 1 and 2.

As for what to charge for it, that depends on what you want this to be! Should this be a free demo, meant to expose people and hook them on to the full project? Or should this be a work that stands on its own merits, the sort of which you might be able to make more as sort of like self-contained episodes down the line? If that's the case, maybe the name Divine Dreams: Splendid Savitr would fit best, it wouldn't outright suggest there being more Divine Dreams games, but once more Divine Dreams games are made it'll be clear this one's related to them.

Hm, does the apprentice need to be a physical-only fighter? That would also get in the way of people who want to do taming-focused runs. It'd also mean you'd have no choice but to physically fight the cultists if they're the villains, I'm not sure how fitting that is!

As for Savitr, I do wonder whether all spellcasting needs to be based on instruments? Just because some are I don't think that means they all need to be, I always imagined what really mattered was making an emotional connection, be that through music or some other means.

I am curious who this third character is! He doesn't sound anyone in particular from Taming Dreams... Is it Saul?! He could just be a temporary party member, there during the middle bit to add some gameplay intrigue, but out of the way for the start and climax of the episode.

I sure do remember those PokéStar movies! Those were fun to make, even if the process felt arduously slow.

I don't think the idea is particularly appealing though. Having them be randomly generated makes it sound like nothing would stand out. There's also just not that much of a hook here, it definitely sounds like it'd just be a stupid irreverent gag game not really worth a second look if seen on a storefront.

I played Marooned! So I feel qualified to say that I'd not be excited to play it again. The market for games like these is a very saturated one, and the only way you're going to stand out as a solo developer is if you make an experience that has a really good hook or is very mechanically sound and polished. The latter of those options would exceed the scope of "small, short game made by a solo indie dev" and I'm not seeing the gripping hook either. I don't think you'll get your money's worth working on something like it.
4
Tobias 1115~4Y
I definitely agree about something with DD is the best option; I'm far more interested in it, for a start, it's more unique and in line with the world I'm trying to build, and it'd naturally lead to something in a way the others wouldn't. I suppose things like this are just "throw everything at the wall and see what sticks!", and of course most things usually don't stick. Valuable to throw them anyway though! Maybe.

Would you say that MARDEK 2 and 3 had endings? MARDEK 1 was so brief it's not really worth talking about in that way, but I had in mind a wrapping-up for the first and second Episodes something similar to how those ended.

Savitr here is heavily based on TD Enki, but he wasn't a member of the Seraphim in that, and it seems like such an obvious thing that I'm surprised I never thought of it! It explains Nytsky's and Dayvha's motivation to become seraphim themselves way better than them just 'wanting to be heroes' or something.

The seraphim could be described sort-of-similarly to the stupidly-named SeeD (which I always pronounced as CD even though it's obviously meant to be 'seed') from FFVIII. Those were hired mercenaries who went out from their Garden to help problems around the world, and here the seraphim do the same but less militaristically. Since FIGHTING MONSTERS is a thing in the world, they're trained to do that, so it's not all hugs and counselling (though they're trained to be compassionate at least).

The Sun Temple was too big! And then it led straight to a series of other dungeons! Too many dungeons! That's true though about MARDEK 1's 'dungeons' being so small. I wonder how big the ones in Divine Dreams will end up being.

It'd probably make sense to set a prequel chapter somewhere that would be revisited, but perhaps somewhere you'd revisit in the first Episode would be best since people who play that will get the recognition effect more quickly? Or maybe that'd be too quickly and it'd seem like reusing ideas too early? The Sun Temple is renamed in this and I'm unsure how well it'd work for a prequel chapter thing, but I'll definitely need to do some brainstorming about what would be appropriate!

Thinking about it some more, it makes more sense for Savitr to be a spellcaster, and while it's true that instruments don't need to be used for spellcasting, I like that as a concept a lot and I feel it's something immediately recogniseable to people which might add some easy curious appeal. So I want to reinvent him and his cherub apprentice to have instrument-weapons which make sense for them!

It'd also make sense if both characters in this were capable of taming, since I feel it's one of the most interesting things about the gameplay mechanics. So perhaps Savitr can do both forms of magic and powerful physical attacks, since he is supposed to be this amazing figure, while the cherub can use physical attacks and taming?

I need to work out what to do about this before getting too deep into it though. I like the idea of a prequel I could release before the year's over, which would build interest for the full story later... but I don't know if it'd be better or worse than just having a free demo for Episode 1. It makes no sense to have a paid prologue AND a sequel with a free demo! Or maybe that does make sense, to show how different or similar the 'sequel' would be?? I'll probably write a bunch of blog posts back-to-back about my thoughts as I figure things out!
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codyfun12329~4Y
Perhaps expanding the theme from music, specifically, to general forms of stage performance and/or creative work would provide more room for variety? I agree that instrument playing would stand out the most and is a good choice for as many major characters as possible, but as the roster fills up, especially for background characters, could there be forms of Sentimancy involving dancing or wand-motions-with-a-paintbrush or what have you?
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Astreon152~4Y
"It seems that episodic games typically have a Season Pass, allowing access to all episodes even if they're not released yet. So one option is to have three "Seasons" of Divine Dreams, so three Season Passes, and of course each Season would be six episodes, released as updates/DLC as they're finished. That's an idea."

Quick question: if people buy in advance, won't you somehow be forced to create the other seasons ? I know it's the plan, but if for some reason things do not flow smoothly, then would you have to refund the buyers ?
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Tobias 1115~4Y
I'd be 'forced' to create the other episodes in the season, but the way I imagined it, each Season Pass would be bought only at the start of the next season, and - like with TV shows etc - there's a chance of it being 'cancelled' for 'low ratings' after one season even if it seemed to be building up to something later. That's always disappointing, but common enough that I'd hope people would understand?

I'm still unsure whether to do the 'seasons' thing though, I'll need to do some research!
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JohnnyBoi45~4Y
I'll second the comment suggestion subtitles! My first thought was something like "Divine Dreams: A Seraph's Tale," just to connect it to the rest of the games. The DD prequel is much more appealing to me on closer inspection than Marooned, though maybe it's just because I have no interest in naked women? They seem fun enough but I do feel your games' main draw is the story and characters. I'm also not sold on those screenshots from the unity version of Marooned, though I am aware those are quite old now and you've improved a lot with unity since then.
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Astreon152~4Y
I vote for subtitles too !

Though if deemed too long, maybe a mix of the 2 would do ? Like "Seraphic Dreams" or "Dreams of the Seraph".

Or random bland RPG title like "legend/tale of the (extraordinary) Seraph"

Or if you wanna go with the "duet" route, "The Seraph and The Cherubim".
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Tobias 1115~4Y
I'm a bit embarrassed I even mentioned the old Marooned stuff here! I suppose it was just from panicking and desperately looking for what other ideas I have that I could possibly do something fairly quickly with. I don't think those would be worth it or would go anywhere though, and the DD one definitely seems the best bet.

I'm not sure about a subtitled title though; it does make sense, but it also hints at something to come, which might eliminate the whole point of trying to make it standalone? I mean, if I was doing that, why not just make the first Episode? But obviously they'd need to be tied together in some way... so it's something I'll need to decide on carefully.
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JohnnyBoi45~4Y
Don't be embarrassed about Marooned - it exists for a reason and it was surely part of you developing your abilities.

I see where you're coming from with the subtitle - my observation was that because it seems like you want to make something more like a prequel that *is* connected to the eventual series, a connecting title would increase googleability and possibly get people who play it more excited for more, while also giving you time to finalize your planning for Divine Dreams proper.
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MontyCallay101~4Y
Those are all at least decent ideas! Though I find myself liking Marooned the least - it's not a boring idea, but, as Mania said, it's already been done quite a bit.

I personally find myself liking what you had in mind for a Belief-like game a lot! I could see how that would quickly catch people's interests - being a parody familiar mechanics using concepts from psychological world. It would work really well with the humourous style your sketches are in, too! The stereotypes of course have the advantage of being immediately recognisable. That seems quite appealing as something that you could show off quickly and would be easy to understand, while still using your personal style and humour.

Though that seems to be a different approach compared to Divine Dreams, which you really want to make at the moment, with a greater focus on the characters and a more complex world and story.

Maybe it would make sense to have a "simpler" game like Belief, at first, that would be easier to promote? From what it seems to me, Divine Dreams, not unlike Sindrel Song, is a deeper, more ideosyncratic experience, which might make it more difficult to easily share with people.

Then, perhaps, if you've found some success with that, you could use that to draw more people into the Alora Fane universe and lore. If you can find a way to compress a Divine Dreams-themed game into a more concise package, I could imagine that being effective as well.
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Tobias 1115~4Y
Interesting that you say that Divine Dreams might be too idiosyncratic like Sindrel Song but Belief wouldn't be, but it seems like the opposite to me! DD is basically just a standard JRPG with some deeper themes below the surface and battle mechanics that (I'd say) aren't outside the range of variation for the genre, while Belief lacks that visceral, violent appeal of hitting things until they fall down.

So I've been imagining that I'd draw people in with a more standard experience (DD) before building up enough of an audience to get away with making something more experimental like Belief!

I mean, while DD has runes as a kind-of-optional part of its battle system, Belief runs almost entirely on those, in a way that might be difficult for a lot of people to easily understand. The skills would also be a whole lot less action-y, harder to demonstrate in videos and gifs etc.
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MontyCallay101~4Y
You're probably right! Maybe it's just that Belief feels more mechanically interesting to me, whereas I feel that "standard" turn-based combat is really overdone.

Sometimes I wonder how approachable the DD "lore" is, but that's not something that makes a lot of sense worrying about now! I do like the trade-off between approachability and interesting story and mechanics that I've seen so far from DD.
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peregrin1~4Y
I confess to not having read all the comments, so it's possible that I'm not giving you anything you haven't heard before, but here's go nontheless.

I think the anxiety you're having is one that entirely stems from the idea that you have to release these games exactly like studios release games. by having a production cycle, making some buzz before it releases, and then making your money from that crucial first week of sales. I think that, as a solo dev, this is in error. Unlike games like Braid, you also can't rely on a unique platform to boost your game's sales (in braids case, the xbox live arcade); however, I think you have the unique opportunity to utilize a new kind of market that's becoming more and more popular, which is patreon. I know that you already have one, but I've seen it and its clear that its not what you envisioned as your main source of income.

In essence, the objective of patreon is to divorce the payment for the creation of goods from the goods for which you are paying. Rather than making money based on individual sales of individual products, you're making a crowd-funded salary to create products *in general.*

Now, when you dont have any projects released besides sindrels song and a game you made many years ago anyway, its hard to develop the kind of personal following necessary to create that salary, but thats where the smaller content model you've already been working on comes in.

I think that your idea to make smaller content to make a name for yourself, and for your games, is a good one, and one that can be capitalized best by patreon. You might ask, how?

Imagine that you release this prequel to steam, and hopefully do more promotion than you have done, and get some buzz going on around your game. In the current model, all of your money is going to come from that initial sales boom around release. Now say, within the game, on the store page, in whatever promotional material you arrange, you advertise your patreon. if 10,000 people buy your game, thats doing pretty well for a little while. If, of those, 100 people join your patreon at 3 dollars a month, you're making a monthly salary of 300 dollars. As long as you keep the dev cycle up from there, those 100 people aren't likely to stop paying you, and you can get another bunch from whatever your next project is, and so forth. These patreon indie devs are a fairly common phenomena, apparently.

One has to ask then, what the heck are you going to put on your patreon, that will get people to pay for it? People usually pay money for *Things* after all, not just for nothing. Well here's a couple ideas.

-the big one is access to future releases. Some level, whatever feels right to you, but higher than the minimum level or 2 levels, should be a copy of your new project is whenever it releases.

-exclusive pre-release content. of the sort you usually post here, but perhaps in more detail. thing's of substance, that having access to doesn't ruin the experienced game. Thinking of things like new tracks for the game, brief video (shorter than 13 week video, definitely), behind the scenes information about preproduction and etc, kind of like what you put at the top of your "rethinking divine dreams" post.

-consider it as a third blog, where you might present a more sanitized, professional version of yourself, to an audience you would consider separate from this blog. They're paying you for your work, after all, so this blog would be pretty much nuts and bolts (even moreso than your development posts on here) Is a third blog post per week that much more on your schedule, after all?

It might even be as simple as that. One tier for access to the blog and personal thanks in the credits, one tier for access to the pre-pro content, one tier for a copy on release+whatever additional content like an ost and an artbook or whatever. (or perhaps, before official release?)

This way, you're using your games to funnel people into your patreon, and then your patreon is more of a source of income than your games. If that makes sense. It would necessarily have to go hand in hand with the constant effort to bring your product to new markets, and that kind of promotion quite frankly seems to be your weakest point right now. But I'm sure you get enough of that as it is, so I'll let it be.

Seriously, maybe watch some videos on how to make a successful patreon, or look at how other creators have set up their patreons, I think it has the potential to make this dream into a job (as horrible/promising as that might sound.)
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