We had another great year at the 48 hour insanity that is Global Game Jam! This year's theme was the Ouroboros Serpent image which we thought was highly creative change of pace.
We threw around a lot of ideas and then finally settled on the concept of two cupcakes trying to get to the basket by circling the globe, ultimately attempting to frost a baby cupcake with their preferred flavor. Give it a shot!
Welcome to our very first developer diary podcast, where Jason Nuyens explains a little bit about the nostalgic tone and Canadian identity of Marvin's Mittens.
Marvin's Mittens is in the home stretch. Levels are being tuned and getting a final art pass, audio is having some wrinkles ironed out, and Jason is slashing his way through our bug list without pity or remorse. While little niceties and fresh art assets are still being added periodically, the team hit an important milestone yesterday: I played through the whole game in release mode, start to finish!
This track is from near the very end of the game. Marvin finds himself pitted again the howling winds and vertical rock faces of Mount Taller, but must reach the summit to solve the mystery of the missing mittens! It's a bigger sound for Marvin's Mittens, but it's the ultimate challenge in the game, with this area really testing your powered up gliding abilities, and offering many more magic snowflakes to find if you can navigate the dizzying heights.
Breakfall has decided that Marvin will be ready THIS WINTER. Actual release date TBA, we're looking at a PC release before the holiday season. After such an incredible development journey, we're finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and we're super excited that we'll soon be letting you play our game! More details very soon!
Every sound has a story. Sometimes the story is "needed sound, took from stock library". But tales of how elephants and tires on wet pavement became the iconic howl of the TIE fighter, or chains and cement blocks were used to beef up the Balrog's howl in Lord of the Rings, are both fascinating, and really speak to the creative use of sound that audio professionals come up with.
Well, ok, more "mentioned" than "seen". But wow, did Randy Smith ever have some kind words about Marvin in the March issue of Edge, which, really, is a pretty spectacular (if not the very best) gaming magazine.
The Breakfall crew sent a delegation to the Carleton University Global Game Jam for the second year in a row, and it was a huge success! This year's awesome theme was "extinction". Our game, Eats, Shoots & Leaves was voted favourite game by Game Jam participants at Carleton, and given an honourable mention by the judges for "most mature execution"! The game features a panda with a shotgun who tries to swap the endangered status of both pandas and mankind.
