Category: Navigation


Get Well Soon! at the Made in Asia 2015!

March 9th, 2015 — 2:12pm

Hey folks! It has been a while since we have given real signs of life, but it is because we have been very much focused on a couple of events for the beginning of the year!

We will write more about that, but we were at the ScreenShake Festival to show our game to other Belgian developers early last month, and this month, we are going to be showing Get Well Soon! at the Made in Asia convention in Brussels!

We will be there from Friday to Sunday (March 13th to 15th) with the game at the BIGA (Belgian Independent Game Association) booth.

Continue reading »

4 comments » | Events, Get Well Soon!

Get Well Soon, going steady

April 16th, 2014 — 7:32am

After a little revision of the website (thank you Pascale!), we’re back with the latest news.

Get well soon!… soon!

As planned, the beginning of the year was all about Get Well Soon. We’ve had one workshop every two weeks, loads of discussions, plenty of work done from home… and we’re close to the end!

IMG_20140418_202955

General status

  • Scenario: almost complete
  • Texts: almost complete
  • Modelisation: almost complete
  • Textures: ongoing
  • Animation: to do
  • Music: ongoing
  • Sounds : to integrate
  • Dialogs : almost complete
  • Voice acting : ongoing
  • Development / environment (doors, monster logic, etc.) : almost complete
  • Cutscenes implementation : ongoing
  • Other scenario tools’ implementation (files, keys, closed doors, etc.) : to do

Some additional features

  • Awakening cutscene when you start a new game
  • The torch now can be off/on using ‘F’ key
  • Lamps have been placed in the corridor (on, off, sizzling)
  • Game icon added
  • Reset button added in the options menu
  • A few bugs fixed
  • A lot of new models, including:
    • Fidge
    • Indoor cycling
    • Conveyor belt
    • Espaliers
    • Convenient
    • Magazines
  • The monster is back!
  • To sum things up : a lot of work done but still a lot to do. Wish us luck!

Ludum dare

After FrenchCows took the big decision to disable the “pack” products to increase their “season” interest, our deadline was pushed back from three months to six. In consequence, we worked even more on Get Well Soon to make the game that much more interesting. The side effect being that we didn’t have the chance to participate to any more Ludum dare. We hope to finish in time to register to the Ludum dare of August. To be confirmed…

However, what we can already tell you is, next time, we will participate as.. two separate teams, which means we’ll develop two different games! That will give us a pleasant change and add some challenge… just because we can!

Comment » | Get Well Soon!

2014, here we go!

January 22nd, 2014 — 3:07pm

Sweet 2013

2013 was made of :

  • Ludum Dare competitions which boosted the team
  • the start of Get Well Soon!, our first game sold online
  • some abandoned projects (to make room for the new ones)
  • a few challenges accepted… and sometimes achieved
  • the discovery of new tools, which we loved!

But also :

  • 11 posts (against 3 in 2012)
  • a communication directed at you, with a continuous presence on social networks
  • and, of course, our participation to the FrenchCows initiative!

Looking behind us,  lots of our objectives were reached, despite a great deal of time yet again stolen by our day’s work. We can be proud of ourselves.

Let’s roll up our sleeves for 2014!

After so many challenges met in 2013 (and some still ongoing), we’ll have to work really hard for what follows!

The main objective, of course, is still to finish our first game actually sold online, Get Well Soon!.
This past few months, we started to have regular meetings and dedicated workshop-days, which we plan to maintain, as we realized working together motivates us a lot. Because let’s be honest, it’s not always easy to get back home from work to start working again on your own… even if we love it!

Once Get Well Soon! will be done, we’ll start a marketing phase, which we are total newbies at. But we hope to learn a lot.
Then… we’ll still have LOADS of projects waiting for us to work on!

Get Well Soon! the latest news

Instead of participating to this December’s Ludum Dare, GSM Productions dedicated the weekend to Get Well Soon!. We had the help of Dimitri, 3D specialist and good friend of the team.

Friends making a video game ?!? After trying different types of industries, like advertising, movies or entertainment, I HAD to try that new challenge ! Eyes looking more and more like screens as the hours go by, orgies of junk food, lack of sleep and cheap humor … gosh, how I missed all these ! And what a pleasure to bring my contribution to Get Well Soon!

And we did achieve a lot through the weekend!

outside
monster

You’ll note that the first level design is finished and the outside environment well advanced! The doors and windows are in place as well as the outdoors stairs. Textures have been done (not all definitive, but we’re working on it). Lots of objects have been modeled (and there are still many more).

room

From a more practical point of view, the mouse’s cursor is now hidden in-game and the main menu is completely over with, with the possibility to go back to it and then resume the game. The options now allow you to choose your keys and to determine the cursor’s sensitivity.

menu

Since we publish each week an updated version on FrenchCows (we will never encourage you enough to join this friendly community), the version’s number is now visible in the main menu.

And, to French-speakers’ delight, you can now choose your language!

Finally, talking about gameplay, the character cannot jump anymore and is carrying a torch. Moreover, the turn-based movement is back, a bit modified to match its application to the scenario… and monsters can open the doors.

We hope to present all of this to you soon! In the meantime, for the curious who want to follow the game’s evolution, we’re waiting for you on FrenchCows! 😉

Comment » | General, Get Well Soon!, Ludum Dare

Get Well Soon : a 2nd version for January

November 17th, 2013 — 10:38pm

After the success of Get Well Soon! on Ludum Dare 27, we decided to continue to work on this game. Our objective : to offer a second version by the end of the year.

Soon after, we stumbled upon the FrenchCows team who were looking for game developers willing to include their game in a pack, but also to get involved into a community and develop additional contents during three months. Their scope and ours being so alike, we took the opportunity right away!

So here we are, three months after LD27, with our first game available online!

What’s FrenchCows ?

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This French initiative sells indie games packs, but not only. The point is to bring together gamers and developers and to make the game evolve during the whole pack’s duration, which is three months.

Thus the game included at the beginning of the pack won’t be the same than the game offered at the end. And that’s especially thank to the players’ reviews! This asks a big investment from us, but it’s also a source of motivation!

If you want more information, go over here! And, even better, if you want to buy our pack (we won’t stop bringing it ;p), that’s over here!

A second version, alright, but what about it?

Level design

We will refine our game, but why not go further than that? We decided to create even bigger levels and we well intend to put this additional space to good use!

Preview de la nouvelle carte

A juicy preview of the new map

Graphism

We are first concentrating on design, before starting to texture. Some objects created during LD27 must be revamped, others were added on the to-do list since we have additional rooms.

Et oui. Un essentiel.

Yes. Essential.

Meanwhile, we’re working on the levels’ re-design, based on the map and on additional functionalities, like sliding doors… which – wait for it – actually open when you get near!

gws_20131116

Then, of course, we’ll have to rethink the monster’s design.

Development

As for everything else, we have two objectives in mind here : add new functionalities and improve what is already there.

Since FrenchCows, the diffusion platform with which we’re working, is French, we started by implementing translation management to make the game multilingual. Each message was linked to a code. When the message must be shown on the screen, the game send the code to the translation module which translates it into a message in the language chosen by the user.

We only translated everything into French until now, but if necessary, this translation module could handle more languages!

Furthermore, as previously said, the doors module was corrected. We added a new set of doors: the sliding doors.

Consequently, a door can now open because of the players’ action (for example, click on “space” to open the door) or when he comes near it (since sliding doors are automatic). Moreover, the opening system is different between classic doors (rotation) and automatic doors (sliding).

options

Last but not least, we worked on the menu. The fullscreen option is now working, as well as the “back” button which was bugged in the LD27 version. A language selection screen has been integrated to complement the language module asking to choose a language the first time you launch the game. The game also saves the player’s controls options, for those who like to customize them. The mouse’s sensibility can also be changed but this parameter isn’t implemented in the actual gameplay yet.

The main menu design has also been reviewed and improved!

main-menu

Our tools

Since GSM Productions was created, we could (and had to) get used to many tools. We thought it might be interesting to present those we’re currently using. Who knows? Some of you might find it useful! Later on, we plan on sharing a more detailed post on each of those tools, but in the meantime, here is a quick introduction.

Git

Any developer would tell you it’s fundamental to use a sources management system. Those tools are meant to preserve a history of all changes done to the code so you can go back if there’s any problem, and to manage simultaneous development and the conflicts those can provoke.

Among all the available tools, we choose Git. Git is quick and flexible and we’ve learned to use its strength thanks to Git-flow, a workflow proposed by Vincent Driessen. Without getting too technical, Git and Git-flow keep troubles away and allows us to work on (and keep calm) with a free mind!

Blender

A recurrent element of our history is the use of Blender. This 3D software is powerful and also the one the majority of GSM Productions’ members are the most used to, especially after following two years of training. Since the start, the opening, the way it is easily interfaced with most 3D engine as well as its functionalities made it an obvious choice for the team.

Unity3D

After some time (and some discussion, since our two developers are convinced linuxians), Unity3D was adopted as game engine by GSM Productions. For a team like ours, it’s in the end a natural choice, since even the free version of the software allow us to make our ideas come to life. Also, it’s the most robust engine we’ve worked with until today.

Comment » | Get Well Soon!, Tools

You can now buy Get Well Soon!

November 5th, 2013 — 10:07pm

Today is a special day for our little team. After so much time spent to work on small projects, our fist game is finally out officially!

We are hence proud to present…

Get Well Soon

Yes, it’s the same survival horror we developed during Ludum dare 27. Since then, bugs have been fixed and we associated ourselves with FrenchCows, a new French platform dedicated to indipendent video games, and we’re now part of their first bundle!

The new version of the game is available here at

 Frenchcows

 Even if you played the beta version we released for Ludum dare, don’t hesitate to buy the paying version! Not only the bugs are fixed but it will soon evolve toward a more complex environment and a deeper scenario!As a bonus, here is a promotionnal code which will give you a 10% discout:

a92502e716

Thank you to all people who supported us and to all people who will! We’ll be posting updates about next evolutions… until the final release in February!

Get Well Soon screenshot

2 comments » | Get Well Soon!

LD27: the results!

September 18th, 2013 — 6:57pm

This past Ludum Dare, the 27th of its name, was undeniably our biggest success so far, and feels like a milestone for us. The figures speak for themselves… Our result at the end of the post!

60+ comments on LD website!

We are happy to say more than 50 people left a review on our submission page from LD27 !

Even though this is partly due to the fact we played and reviewed/rated 100+ games ourselves (among which 20+ the very next day of the LD), it’s still feels amazingly good, and is definitely a big improvement on the amount of feedback we got on our previous entries.

The most common complains relate to functionalities we unfortunately didn’t have the time to develop (more lines dialogs, more animations for the monster, sound effects for the monsters and items, textures problems) or which we didn’t even think about even if they seem obvious in hindsight (offering to skip the introduction is a big one). Furthermore, the lack of proper testing made the game quite difficult in the end…

Moreover, people thanked us for having thought about AZERTY keyboards (since I tried several game without success because they only worked on QWERTY, I can only agree), and a big plus was certainly Unity 3D allowing us to propose the game on Linux, Mac and PC (and a web version later).

However, the big successes of our game are that it is regarded as scary (it has been compared to Silent Hill, to Slenderman, which is somewhat of a hyperbole, but flattering nonetheless), that it has a strong introduction, particularly through the addition of good voice acting and, for most reviewers, that the idea of a turn-based survival horror feels fresh.

That latter point is interesting though, as commenters seemed to either like it and find it innovative and suspenseful, or hate it for being contrived and frustrating. In the end, it makes us think that the idea behind it is mostly sound, but it needs to be reworked to better function in the context of our particular game. Pretty exciting though, and to share that excitement, here are some of our favourite comments :

« The introduction is sublime. The artwork.. wow it’s really impressive. I love the idea of 10 seconds for us to move, then its the ennemy turn. Great narration, the cinematic transition add a nice touch.  » (archaeometrician)

« The ambiance is incredibly well done, and I had to play in windowed mode instead of full-screen because it was waaaay too stressful to me :p » (Erhune)

« I love the voice acting, I love the arts during the beginning, nice paintings, I love the inventory look, wow, just wow. Hard to believe you did that in one weekend. So little bugs, nothing gamebreaking. The experience is amazing. I stepped up when I saw the two monsters on the lower floor… I kept coming back because I wanted to know the back story of all this… but also kept dying. Haven’t finished it yet, but I will keep it preciously and get to the end of it once and for all!  » (LordHellMaX)

And of course there were many, many others, all of them read and appreciated by everyone on the team. Thank you all for playing!

More feedback!

But that is not all, in addition to all the comments we got from reviewers, we also spotted Get Well Soon in a couple of posts from people on the Ludum Dare site, like

But wait, there is more!

Videos!

We also stumbled upon people playing Get Well Soon and recording themselves. It was thrilling to hear players react to the game as they were experiencing it!

Here you can hear some quick thoughts around the 18:30 mark :

And this one is a longer let’s play which goes into much more detail, by someone apparently not taking part in the Ludum Dare. Awesome!

CreepyGaming.net

And perhaps the biggest piece of unexpected feedback was a humbling piece published on creepygaming.net, which you can find an excerpt of below:

“As the title reads, I’ve had the proof that Ludum Dare is not only a competition against time where all kind of experimentation can be made, in fact, it seems like it can also be the trigger to make way more solid games in all regards, perhaps not optimized in the contest, but polished nonetheless. This, is actually Get Well Soon‘s case, a compelling experience result of the efforts of GSM Productions. Then again, I’m not here to say that it can’t objectively be improved in any way, but I consider myself definitely astounded by the feeling of completeness that I tasted while trying it out.”

(Read more on the website)

Thank you very much kind sir for thinking so highly of Get Well Soon!

Conclusion : our results & a little parting word

Jam had 776 participations… and here are our results:

Coolness 100%

#5 Mood (Jam) : 4.32

#15 Audio (Jam) : 4.01

#27 Overall (Jam) : 3.89

#72 Theme (Jam) : 3.63 (reminder: the theme was “10 seconds”)

#96 Graphics (Jam): 4.04

#98 Innovation (Jam): 3.49

#186 Fun (Jam): 3.19

#339 Humor (Jam): 2.23

So we’re 27e on 776, and in top 5 for the mood! And even though we didn’t end up as high for Graphics, our rating is still above 4/5.

Our other results are all in top 100, except for Fun and Humor (not exactly the main point in a survival horror game). And even for those two points, we are in the best half…

Sounds, music as much as voice acting, certainly played their role in our results: we are in top 20 for those!

We feel a bit euphoric for having done such a finished game during LD and for seeing it so well received!

But what that means is that the road is still ahead of us. For the first time, we feel like we have something really worth polishing and extending into a proper game. All the support we got is only serving to boost our resolve to come back before the next Ludum Dare with a new and improved Get Well Soon to conclude this happy episode in the best way possible!

3 comments » | Get Well Soon!, Ludum Dare

August

September 4th, 2013 — 7:20am

August was essentially centered on our big (recurring) event: the Ludum dare! So let’s start there…

Ludum Dare 27

After the enthusiasm of April’s LD26, we were eager to start LD27! When we discovered the theme, “10 seconds”, we stopped for a moment… to start again when we had the idea of a new kind of turn-based game. GSM Production proudly presents its first survival horror

Get Well Soon!, our entry for LD27, is then a game base on the mood: music, sounds, designs, we did everything we could to create an oppressing atmosphere… And it’s entirely 3D!

Theme: 10 seconds

Title: Get Well Soon!

Type: survival horror

Platforms: Windows, Linux, OSX, Web (Unity 3D)

Format: 3D

Download and play

Language: English

Pitch: “It was 5 months ago, I think. 5 months ago that the accident happened…

A descent into hell where you will have to avoid silent monsters… But be careful, you can only move for a much as ten seconds until… their turn comes.

carte

Let’s play: beware: spoilers! If you want to learn more about the game by yourself, don’t watch the video!

A first feedback: Bastien

bastienAll in all, the game far exceeded our hopes by matching the idea we had of it. Usually, we end the Ludum Dare with that strange sentiment that yes, it is awesome that you made a game, but how great would it have been to add this or that… Here, we are fully satisfied with the result, and the comments we are currently getting (thanks for playing everyone!) seem to confirm that.

And this feeling, no matter the final placement of our little game, is something priceless. We feel proud of having played to our strengths and to have come out of top, for the first time really. As a team, we think it shows that we are maturing, and starting to know how to work together better. Hopefully to your enjoyment!

Bloboy

Bloboy’s Journey didn’t really go forward this month. We implemented the vertical slide and tweaked the jump so it felt a bit more realistic. We were also supposed to work on light effects on Bloboy’s sprite but the task was harder than we thought

This lack of progress is also partly due to the Ludum Dare. Even if the event only lasts three days, there’s a lot to organize which makes it time-consumming. After the Ludum Dare, we also thought we might perhaps switch Bloboy’s Journey on Unity 3D, but we still have to discuss this with the whole team.

Comment » | Events, Get Well Soon!, Ludum Dare

June/July

July 27th, 2013 — 9:10am

God, let’s dust off a little… First, a last review of the last Ludum Dare !

Ludum Dare 26 : results

Results are now available! Reminder: only LD’s participants can vote for the other games. Votes are made on some criteria and, in the end, we receive only results for criteria with enough votes.

There were 2346 participants to LD26. For the JAM (the category we were in), we were 736.

Our results were not that bad :

#211    Graphics(Jam)    3.44

#236    Overall(Jam)    3.24

#307    Fun(Jam)    2.81

#355    Theme(Jam)    3.06

#409    Innovation(Jam)    2.50

#1775    Coolness    26%

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Comment » | 3D, Bloboy's journey, Ludum Dare

April/May

June 2nd, 2013 — 11:49am

Well, we HAD to be late for a post at some point, hadn’t we? Fortunately, we have a bloody good reason.

Ludum Dare : WE DID IT!

Ii took place from 27/4 to 29/4 (or, more accurately, 30/4 at 4 a.m.). All current members of GSM participated, that to say three less than during our latest JAM ; but everything went well !

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Comment » | Bloboy's journey, Events, Ludum Dare, Navigation

March

April 2nd, 2013 — 5:15pm

#GAM February and March : OneFailAMonth (but working on it)

They started the challenge with lots of determination. But unfortunately, it requires a bit too much time from our developers for them to be able to fully focus on it.
However, projects have been making progresses!

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Comment » | #GAM, 3D, Alun Hevel, Bloboy's journey, Ludum Dare

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