So… I’m writing again, and partaking in a little summer writing project (coined “Hot Blog Summer”) with my partner Dr. Lucy. Good gravy, folks, the amount of plugin clean-up I had to do to get this and my next post out is wild. 😅 While I’m editing my first meaty post, here’s how you can find me these days:
Mastodon
I’m over at irrsinn.life/@melissa, posting about Beat Saber, other games I’m playing, a bit of social justice stuff, and tech. Come chat with me there. I really don’t spend much time on Twitter these days aside from Future Proof Games work and folks I get push notifications for.
You would think that with all the sites I run, the podcast, and my day job as a web developer that I wouldn’t get worked up about things like game releases, but… yeah.
…I kinda like it. ^_^ I won’t forget the first time I played it on my Surface and used my finger to drag down a balloon. It felt tangible in a way that using a mouse to play the Flash game didn’t. Regardless of anything else about this effort, I’m convinced we did right by the game and by players in what we developed.
I’m also very stressed about it. In my 44-hours-after-launch bourbon-fueled relaxation, you’re going to learn a bit of why.
So we’ve been working on Exploit: Zero Day for a couple of years now, but I haven’t talked nearly enough about it here. It’s a web-based cyberthriller puzzle game where you play as a hacktivist, uncovering and battling against oppression and exploitation.
*innocent whistle* Totally not the sort of game I’d want to make or play, no…
It’s been in closed alpha for a while, but we’re ready to offer a prelude season of paid story: “Headless Swarm”. For details on the plotline and how it relates to the continued free alpha access, check out the announcement blog post over at FPG.
Folks probably know that I make video games as part of Future Proof Games, but maybe not what we’re doing at the moment. Many, many (many) years ago, Gregory made “(I Fell in Love With) The Majesty of Colors”, a very sweet Flash game about balloons and drowning.
As the site stats geek for FPG, I can tell you “Majesty” remains pretty damned popular. (Hell, it just got linked by Buzzfeed a few days ago.) It’s an evocative game that continues to appeal to folks wanting to explore the soft feelings of a big, weird, sessile alien. Problem is, Flash is finally actually dying — no phone/tablet can run it, and some browser configurations require user action before it’ll run Flash.
So we’re bringing “Majesty” to modern devices: Android, iOS, and Windows/OSX/Linux. And holy crap, this game feels great on a phone; moving the tentacle with your finger just feels real in a way that the tiny, mouse-controlled Flash version doesn’t. I’m excited to test it on tablets.
It’ll be out later this year and is being developed in parallel with Exploit: Zero Day, which will also have some big news soon. (I could write a whole post on the thought processes around dividing time between two projects for a part-time team like ours!)
Something that would really help the game be successful is if the desktop versions can launch on Steam. For us to do that, we need to make it through Steam Greenlight. If you have a Steam account, take a moment and vote for “Majesty”.
Something that would put a smile on my face would be if you left a cheery comment on the Greenlight page. Y’all know how the internet can be.
Ossuary—Future Proof’s first commercial game release—is part of the Steam Summer Sale and will be 25% off until July 4. If you haven’t had a chance to play yet, it’s only $7.50 (USD). If you’re on the fence, the demo, “The Hodge-Podge Transformer,” is also on Steam.
It’s been on Steam for a year and a month now, and it’s been a fascinating experience. After watching a few Let’s Plays of Ossuary and “Hodge-Podge,” we released an update in December to improve the tutorial experience and solve some colorblindness issues.
Our current work in progress is Exploit: Zero Day, a cyberthriller where you roleplay a hacktivist by making and solving puzzles. It’s pretty cool, and our alpha players are making really friggin’ awesome puzzles and stories. If you want in, hop on the monthly mailing list and you’ll get a key in the next newsletter.
