Hello. I’m Everette, aka Digx7, and I’m looking for work in the games industry. In the meantime, I’m working on various projects. This is my Dev Diary for 7/19 - 8/09.
Normally I try to post these every 2 weeks but life got in the way. So I just rolled 2 posts into 1.
So for this post you get 4 weeks, enjoy.
7/19 - 7/25
Art
I spent this week focuesed mostly on background art, getting parallaxing working, and concept art.
Also my drawing tablet arrived this week.
Lastly I had a church retreat over the weekend.
Background
I started the week by spending more time working on more background props.
I was focusing on getting blurred out props that can appear farther in the background. This is a technique that Hollow Knight makes use of and the fact that I’m not using pixel art anymore means I can do it as well.
I found out I can really easily add blur to an image in Krita using filters by just going Filter/Blur.
Well I was at it I also improved upon the ground tilemap and the enviromental particles.
Parallaxing
In my last post I talked about my struggles and thoughts on achiving a Parallaxing background.
I have since solved those problems.
I now have background parallaxing elements that can work consistantly with any given camera starting position, and even can be toggled on to be previewable in the editor.
My solution involved…
TODO: figure out what I did.
Concept Art
I spent part of the week making physical concept art for Ion, Six, and the enemies of Chapter 1.
I find that drawing physically on a sketch pad helps me lock in my ideas.
Ion and Six Concept Art
I’ve been giving some serious thought to the outfits that Ion and Six would wear.
Given that Ion is a squire in training under Six I’m liking the idea of Ion having to earn their full suite over the course of the game.
However, this means I would need to design at least 2 different outfits for Ion. At the moment I’m taking heavy inspiration from the Clone Trooper armor from Star Wars: The Clone Wars for Ions final outfit. Still a work in progress.
For Six I’m was toying around with what exact kind of western cloak he would wear. It turns out that there are alot of varieties.
At the moment I’m just trying to get the silhouette just right.
Chapter 1 Monster Concept Art
I began concept art work on for the monsters that you fight in chapter 1.
I wanted the grunt enemies to feel other worldly, challenging enough that special hunters make sense, but easiy enought that they make sense for the first enemies in a RPG.
Alot to juggle.
I landed on the idea of doing some combination of deer and fish. Deer because I wanted them to feel like something that could be hunted for sport. Fish cause I wanted something kinda familar, but odd.
I guess this is why Lovecrafian horror always relies on fish.
Ultimately I’m happy with the design.
As a benifit I also landed on an in world reason as to why these monsters somehow captured all the hunters requiring Ion and Six to be called in.
These monsters are actually cattle being hearded by this charater I’m calling The Shepeard for now. The Shepeard is someone who was pulled into this world by the portals and is just trying to protect their flock.
Given how heavly the story revolvs around the portals and the consequences of animals, peoples, and other societies randomly getting dragged in this feels like a really clean execution.
It will give the player a neat villian and allow Chapter 1 to be a mini version of the entier games story. Which reolves around an entire society being dragged in, and them not being super friendly.
I began sketching these characters in Krita to test them out in Unity.
Drawing Tablet
My Drawing Tablet
I ordered the XP Pen Deco 640 a couple of weeks ago. When I initially ordered I had a typo in my address that caused it to be sent back mid shipment. But after reordring it and double checking the address it finally arrived.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I addapted to it increadibly fast. I had always heard that drawing tablets have a bit of a learning curve as you get used to drawing not where your looking.
This was not a problem for me.
I don’t know if this means I’m just great at addapting, or if I’m just terrible at drawing.
The drawing tablet arrived near the end of the week so I wouldn’t really get to stress test it until the GMTK 2025 game jam I took place in the following week.
Retreat
I spent the weekend of 7/25 - 7/27 at a church retreat up in Big Bear Lake.
The retreat was focused on God in the workplace and what that looks like in our specific fields. It got me thinking on what it looks like to include him in my ultimatly very creative field.
Won’t say to much more on it as I want these blogs to focus on work an not personal life. But I will say that I really enjoyed that retreat and came back from it with a bit to think on.
7/26 - 8/2
I spent this week participating in the GMTK 2025 game jam and made the game FrostLoop.
I go into that process in more detail in my post The Making of Frost Loop (Game Jam).
8/5 - 8/9
After the GMTK 2025 game jam I wanted to work more on the art work I was not able to finish in time.
I decieded to release the artwork for the game as a Asset Pack called FrostPunk Trains.
I go into that process in more detail once the art pack is approved and released on all sites
8/12 - 8/15
I spent this week debating on weather or not I should continue work on FrostLoop. With 3 months of work I though I could get it to a full release version.
Maybe a release on Steam?
Having a fully released game on Steam would be a massive boon to my resume.
In doing some research I realized that there would be a Steam Next Fest running in the middle of October. Right before I would be planning to release if I kept to the 3 month dev cycle.
Could I make Next Fest?
A full steam game that went through Next Fest? How could that not look good on my resume?
Steam Next Fest Docs
But still questions abounded. Would it be good enough for steam? What does the upload process look like, when is the deadline to submit to Next Fest. Can you keep updating your build during Next Fest, or are you stuck with the first build you released.
So I began to do some research.
Turns out the registration deadline was 8/25, in about 2 weeks.
Panic.
Would I need to finish my game and get it ready in 2 weeks!!!
Turns out no, but I didn’t know that at first. By God’s grace there was a Steam Next Fest Developer Q&A on 8/12, the very next day after I realized this.
So I attended, and took notes like I never have before.
Even once the 1 hour Q&A stream was done I spent a good 6 hours researching everything I could to see how viable this option would be.
Steam Next Fest QA Dev Session
Research
Steam
You don’t need a live Steam Page to register, but you do need a steamworks account.
To paricipate in Next Fest you just need a Steam Page, and a Demo before the start of Next Fest (10/13)
Now the catch is that before your Steam Page and your Demo can go live they each need to go through certification. At least once. This takes 3-7 buisness days each. And if they fail certification you need to fix whatever failed and reapply for cert.
So at minimum you need to start the process 2 weeks in advance. 1 week minimum for your steam page and 1 week minimum for the Demo Build. And hope that nothing fails.
However, once you get through cert once you don’t need to do it again for any following updates to your steam page or build. This means I could be making updates to the Demo as Next Fest progresses.
Another element is that Steam takes the week before Steam Next Fest to run a private version of that for just the press. You don’t need to particpate in this, but doing so would be good for both my game and my resume.
Steam Next Fest Docs
Lastly all of this requires setting up a SteamWork account (Steams Developer Backend) which requires some legal paperwork. Some of which can take up to 30 days to process. Specifically the tax info
If it takes that long then I would miss the opportunity to particpate in the October Next Fest.
I also spent the day diving into the SteamWorks docs looking at everything from the graphical assets I would need for my store page, to the technical details of how to upload a build.
The steam stuff feels very doable, it just means I would have to get started on it ASAP. Rather than towards the end of my 3 month development like I was orginally thinking.
Part of my hesitation is that because I would have to start up this process so early I don’t know that my art (screenshots) would be good enough for final use. Perhaps I can update them as development progresses. It also means I would need graphical assets worked on ASAP as well.
Marketing
I spent time thinking through my solo developer marketing options.
Since I am doing this for a resume piece and not for $$$ I don’t need it to be a finacial hit. But it would be nice, and would be good to atleast try to market the game well.
My main avenues I could see would be through a YouTube Devlog, social media posts, and reaching out to influencers just before and during Next Fest.
The Devlogs are probaly my most important and this would most easily demonstrate to future employers my process for making this game. It is also the most timeless.
Steam Demos
Reaching out to influencers is a long shot and likely not to work. But if I focus my efforts on niche strategy game channels I might have better luck.
I also thought about and quickly dismissed the idea of putting a Discord together. Moderating and managing a discord server as a part time solo dev does not sound like fun. It might be doable, but not something I feel I will attempt.
Instead I know that Steam has a Community Hub section for each game. I will be using those for basic comunity interactions, bug reports, and feedback.
Beyond that I have options to make Reddit Posts, annoucements on X and Instagram. These last likely won’t be much use until traffic from my game starts getting driven to them. I could also take my Devlogs and clip them for YouTube Shorts, Reels, and TicToks.
Overall marketing is something I want to try, but is not a huge stresser for me as commercial viability is not a goal of this project. Completion is.
New Features
I gave some thought to what features I’d want in the full game.
The big ones are Maps, Heat/Coal use, and Research/Laws.
Maps Probably the biggest feature I had to cut from the game jam version was the ability to view the map.
I’d want the player to be able to view the map and see information about the upcoming spaces depending on what train cars they currently have.
I’d also want to add junction spaces where the player can choose which path to take, instead of just endlessly going in a big loop.
Also I’d want there to be weather patterns that move around the map causeing you to have to think about where to go to next.
Heat/Coal Use At the moment Coal is just used to power the engine. Also for a game that takes place in the snow heat is strangly not a concern.
I’ve dabbled with ideas surrounding you being able to using coal to heat up individual train cars. Maybe the weather patterns control the tempurature. If a train car gets to cold in increases the chance of a worker getting sick. You can increase the heating of cars but it increases coal consumption.
Also I’d want a way to control a trains speed. The faster it goes the more Coal it consumes, but the more spaces you move. I’ve given thought to some tradeoffs to this. Maybe you can only get the effect of some spaces by landing on them (like stations or random events). Maybe going faster through some spaces damages your train.
Research/Laws I’d want some kind of Tech Tree to allow you to unlock new or better trains.
Also for there to be laws you can enact to add effects and trade offs to your game.
Quality of Life Changes
Saving the game: I would like to make it where you can save and load your game from any turn
Polish Changes
I’ve given some thoughts as to what polish changes I’d want to focus on:
Improved the UI
In the Game Jam version I made the UI and Icons way to big for PC, so I’d want to decrease them. Also I’d want to add popup windows for when you hover over elements with your mouse.
Toggleble Views For seeing info about the trains at a glance. Info like
- Train Health
- Number of People
- Heat
A Codex To explain all the systems
Notifications/Hints Notifications for smaller things that don’t deserve a full event. Hints that can teach the player the game.
Improved Animations For some of the carts or elements
Improved Backgrounds To match the current map space you are on
Audio SFX and Music
##My Decision I decided to go for it.
It seems doable, I feel I could pull off both the needed code and artstyle.
Having a full Steam Game on my Resume would look amazing and I don’t have any other projects even close at the moment. Also not needing it to be commercially successful sounds nice.
The main goals I landed on are
- Release within 3 months (end of October)
- Hit Steam Next Fest
The side goals are nice to haves but not needed
- Make at least $100 off it (to cover Steam Direct Fee)
- Make a devlog of the process
With those in mind I began work.
My first Deadline is Steam Next Fest Registration (8/25)
Ideally you have a Coming Soon store page by then. You don’t needed it but it’s ideal.
A store page needs:
- graphical assets (Thumbnails in many different resolutions)
- 5 screenshots
- 1 trailer
It also takes a week for Steam to review your store page.
However, before this you need a SteamWorks account (Steams Dev Backend). A SteamWorks account requires you to pay $100 and send in some Tax info. Said Tax info could take several days to a month to process.
You need a SteamWorks account to apply for Next Fest or make a Store Page.
So I started by making a SteamWorks account.
Despite the site claiming it could take a week to process it only took a day. I guess when your a Sole Proprietor and a US citizen there’s not much to process. Larger foreign corporations likely take longer to process.
Next I began working on my store page graphics
Every Steam game has something called a Capsule image. This is the main key art or cover art you see for the game on the store. It is both the first thing the viewers see and it is used everywhere for your game.
It also is needed in many different image sizes. Steam provides a full list of the needed sizes.
To tackle this I’m making one image at the largest size. Then I’m scaling it down and moving around the layers for the smaller sizes.
For the screenshots and trailer I’m just gonna use footage from the current build of my game.
Luckily I can change out these screenshots, trailer, and even capsule art at a later date if I want to.
This means I can have a coming soon page ready by Registration (8/25) and then update it as the game build improves.
Maybe by my next post there’ll be a store page I can show.
Regardless this is what I’ll be working on in my free time for the next few months.
That’s all for this entry. I’ll be working on this game for the next few months so expect to hear more about it soon.
And as always: Don’t Stop Creating.
