What the heck is a RoboToad?
Hey, thanks for being a subscriber! Having you along for the ride means the world to me.
This newsletter is the first of many, so I wanted to take the opportunity to introduce myself, set some intentions for the newsletter, and talk a bit about my game dev journey so far.
Who dis?
Hey there! I'm Tim, CTO (Chief Toad Officer) and the developer behind RoboToad Interactive. This studio is a lifetime of creative and technical pursuits coalescing as the mystic art of game development. I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to engage with the indie gaming community and share some of my wilder creations with the world!
What to expect
My goal for this newsletter, at least in the near term, is to act as a public game dev journal where I can share the rainbow of experiences that are: concepting, planning, and building a successful indie game and studio. My intention is to strike a balance between concrete technical details such as, "Here's how I built a procedural level generator..." and the more intangible experiential side that includes topics such as "Here's how I stay motivated even on the hard days..." I'm always open to feedback, so if any topics resonate with you more than others, please let me know!
The journey so far
A keen observer of my social media posts may notice something curious. Early posts feature a retro-inspired colony sim game with GIFs and videos showing off an RTS-style of gameplay. Then, abruptly and without notice, there are blurbs, GIFs, and videos showing a third-person adventure game with mini-games, inventories, direct player control... Wat!? I'd be remiss if I didn't at least acknowledge the shift in content.
The short version is that a year and a half ago, I took my first steps into the vast world of game development and settled on an RTS/Survival/Colony Sim concept without thinking too much about it. I spent the following months working on the aforementioned game that resulted in an 80s-tech "Cassette Futurism" inspired version seen on social media. At that point, I thought "This is looking pretty cool! Maybe it's time to start thinking about putting something up on Steam..."
Interestingly, the process of "getting serious," i.e. creating a website, studio logos, social media accounts, and sharing my work with the world led to a great deal of introspection (maybe a little freaking out...) and critical analysis of the game I'd spent so many months on. That led to a realization that the current project was missing the "spark" and just wasn't that fun. So I set out to find the fun! I kept all the parts of my work that I was most proud of (the universe I'd been creating, the art style, some 3D models, and general game dev know-how) and used those to hit the ground running on the new project. I'm very excited about the new game concept and will be sharing more about the mechanics, the story, and the vision soon.
Anyhoo, that's all for now. Thank you again for being a part of my journey, and I'm looking forward to sharing more details about the project in upcoming newsletters. Stay tuned!
Until next time,
- Tim the RoboToad