Guess who's back...
Ha! New post in just under 2 years. Good gravy, where do I even begin? Star Fetched has been completed and released for about a year now. One of the major reasons I stopped posting for a while was because as Josh (Crescent Moon Games) and I began working on the game, we had a tremendous opportunity that was too good to pass up - Apple Arcade. Creating Star Fetched for Apple Arcade meant having an actual budget, so we buckled up and cranked development into overdrive to meet an insane deadline of roughly 6 months. In addition, I was no longer allowed to post ANYTHING in relation to the game until it was released. So my entire social media and web presence vanished for a time… Which was a blessing in disguise because less time screwing around on Instagram & Twitter meant I could get more work done.
I’m not going to say it was the easiest process. A tight deadline meant cranking out huge amounts of artwork on a daily basis, which sadly resulted in nearly no sleep for half the year and less time with my wife and kids. Rachael was incredibly patient and supportive during this time, but it understandably took its toll on us (we’re still a happy family, don’t worry haha). Another downside was that many of the features we had hoped to implement into the game had to be scrapped in the interest of time. The plot was basically whittled down to some quick dialogue and a few sentences of narration between levels. Some bugs remained in the game that we didn’t have time to sort out, and as one overly harsh game review from TouchArcade rightfully pointed out that the game felt incomplete. I won’t sugarcoat it, they weren’t wrong in their critique, though I’d argue it’s still a fun play regardless… But I’m biased.
However, even TouchArcade had to admit it was a nice looking game. I don’t want to toot my own horn, but this was an understatement on their part. I went into this entire process fearing that I wouldn’t have what it took to follow through to the end with this, but practice does make perfect and I essentially spent most of 2019 in a state of 24/7 practice. So much so that I inevitably scrapped all of my work on the graphic novel and started fresh when the game was complete because it wasn’t up to my standards anymore. More on that later though. What I wasn’t able to accomplish in features and plot, I made sure to make up for in visuals.
I’m happy with Star Fetched. Despite some bugs and frustrations, it’s a fun game. The controls are smooth, it looks great, it’s a fun run n’ gun (rhymes!) and if you want to kill some time during an extended bathroom break, you won’t be disappointed.
I also need to stress, this was an experience that I’m going to cherish forever. These kinds of opportunities don’t come along very often, and making a real game has been something I’ve been dreaming of since I was little. In addition to the experience, I got to meet some great people. Crescent Moon Games went from being a company I admired, to being a person that I consider a friend. I got to work with very talented people like our animator Chris and a very gifted team of developers. These are people that helped me bring a vision to life and who let me be as creative as I wanted to be (within the limitations of time). If you’re not supporting Crescent Moon Games, you need to fix that.
So… Now that Star Fetched the game is complete, what now? I’ll tell you what now! Star Fetched the graphic novel, 2021. I mentioned earlier I scrapped the original work. Honestly, I hate the original pages I did now, so I needed to start fresh and apply some of the skills I picked up over a year of nonstop illustrating. I began work on the comic earlier this year and I’m about 24 pages in now. The story has little to no connection to the game, but if all goes well, the followup comic will be (very) loosely based on the game’s plot.
So that’s my very brief update on Star Fetched. The game is finished, the comic is back on track and I plan on writing a few more posts about the last year or so that I’ve been absent.
Now go play Star Fetched!
~ M.
