PLEASE START US OFF BY INTRODUCING YOURSELF:
I'm David, also known as @BlindCoco, a Game Developer from Montréal, and as BlindCoco Studios, we're creating Gales of Nayeli, a Strategy RPG inspired by SRPG Classics like Fire Emblem and Langrisser.
TELL US ABOUT GALES OF NAYELI.
I've been a huge fan of the genre, Fire Emblem especially. The main appeal for me is the fact that they are essentially infinitely replayable since you can change the composition of the army, and that would affect the conversation you would see, and the strategies that are available to you.
Gales of Nayeli came as a result from this desire to put even more stock into character interactions that depend on your party composition, and to make each character play very differently to drastically affect your gameplay options.
HOW HAS THE DEVELOPMENT JOURNEY BEEN
Development is going well. We're very proud of what we've done so far, and we're looking forward to bringing the project to completion, hopefully in the next couple of months!
WHICH GAME ENGINE DID YOU CHOOSE AND WHY?
We're working with SRPG Studio. The biggest reason was the ease of use to create the groundwork for the project. Although we eventually reworked basically every part of the engine at some point, it was very useful to quickly prototype maps and skills to "find the fun", which is a very useful concept in game dev.
WHAT'S BEEN YOUR BIGGEST DEVELOPMENT HURDLE SO FAR?
The biggest hurdle has been the sheer scope required to make the game that we've been dreaming of. To allow the degree of customization and replay value that we want to deliver, we had to write 300+ conversations, and animate 200+ unique classes.
We're insanely proud of the work we've done so far, but it has been a journey to get where we are!
ADVICE FOR FELLOW DEVS?
As a result, the main thing that I would recommend is to learn to manage scope. Start small. Especially when starting out, you want to gain the experience of closing a project, because you will quickly find that the final 10% of a project takes 90% of the effort.
ANY FINAL THOUGHTS?
Game Dev, especially starting out in the indie sphere, is something you do out of passion. It is a whole lot of work, and it can feel isolating to claw away at a project on your own for so long, but seeing the thing you made make people happy is one of the best feelings in the world.
Watching people play the demo for Gales of Nayeli (available now on Steam!) has been some of the biggest motivating factor for me as we're entering the final stretch of development. I cannot recommend it enough!
Thanks a lot for the opportunity. It was a fun and weirdly therapeutic introspective activity!
-David
❤️
