1 year anniversary

It's been one year since GROSS was released, after being in development for over 18 months.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who gave this game a try, told their friends about it, gave me feedback, wrote a review or sent me some words of encouragement. Making a game is a huge journey and it wouldn't have been possible without you.

For the next two weeks, GROSS is 50% off. If you already own it, it makes an ideal present for in laws, new neighbors or as an ice breaker on first dates. And if you downloaded it from The Pirate Bay, now's a good chance to clear your conscience.

What have I been doing lately? One of the most requested features for GROSS has been co-op multiplayer, so I've spent the last couple of months learning the core concepts of networked multiplayer. I don't like learning in a vacuum though, I need to learn with a clear goal in mind.

Which is why my learning took and takes place in a new game that I'll release later this year. It's a relatively simple game, combining key elements from Snake and Bomberman into a four way multiplayer game where players can mess with each other in all sorts of ways.

I originally planned for this to take a couple months at most, but it turns out building a multiplayer game comes with quite a few challenges of its own. Also, making an AI that allows CPU controlled snakes to find their way out of tricky situations was and is a bit of a challenge.

This game will take another couple months. In the meantime I've put a Steam page up for it, so if that sounds like your jam, feel free to add it to your wishlist:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2678860/nope_rope/

Does that mean GROSS will get co-op multiplayer? Alas, no. Turns out, building a multiplayer game is very different from building a single player game. Since GROSS was not built with multiplayer in mind, adding it retroactively would be a huge task. A huge, very painful task. Essentially, it would require writing most of the game from scratch again.

So, what's going to happen then? Once "nope rope" is released, I'll start on a third game. This will be a full sized 3D game of a similar scope as GROSS, but with multiplayer support and a level editor.

The concept I'm working on at the moment is another TD/FPS game. Not a successor to GROSS, a completely different beast, but that should scratch the same itches and hopefully improves on everything that wasn't perfect about GROSS. This particular concept includes a non-human protagonist and a lot of 3D/verticality. For the older crowd: Imagine a Tower Defense game mixed with Descent and Tyrian.

Whether this will actually see the light of day or I'll come up with a completely different game idea is something time will tell. Sometimes when you flesh out ideas on paper, or when you build a prototype, it turns out they're not as good as you thought. That's just part of the process.

Well thanks for telling us nothing, is there at least a timeline? Due to different factors, not least of all my incessant need to eat food in regular intervals and my preference to not get constantly rained on (= have a roof over my head), I will return to working as an IT consultant again in a couple weeks. This means that game development will be a part time affair for me (2-3 days a week).

On one hand, this means that everything will take longer. "nope rope" will be released somewhere in 2024. The next big game will probably not make a public appearance before 2027.

On the other hand, this means I can take as long as I need with my games until I'm happy with the quality. I also plan to support my next game with new features and content for a longer time after it launched.

Is there anything else? Nah, that's me done. Have a happy 2024 you crazy kids.

• Chris/Wildcard