Team A Active Members:
Project Manager / Designer: Andrew Bittman (bittman)
Production: Sam Mayo (mayo)
Programmer: Craig Peebles (Zoid)
Programmer: Matthew Tuxworth (BattleElf)
Artist: Stein Lagim (Serashi)
Artist: Edwin Vargas Cortés (Edwinvg)
Sound Designer: Jay Taylor (jay)
August Report
August is usually a quiet month for me. It lacks important birthdays, provides few new games and is usually spent cursing the end of winter and looking ahead to spring. However, August was the month Freeplay was scheduled for; our first tangible milestone and goal since we began the project something around 6 months ago. July and August felt particularly hectic as we worked with an energy I had not encountered since Death Metale’s conception in February.
After many hours of work on my team’s part, and many hours of stressing over impossible hypothetical scenarios on my part, we had a prototype to deliver at Freeplay 2009. It was no longer the baby Death Metale that we were slowly nurturing, but suddenly a young child we renamed to fit its image more correctly.
“Cosmos Concerto” was our new child. Our prototype was able to provide equal shares of imagination and temper tantrums, but though it has plenty of room to grow the image of what Cosmos Concerto may be in a few months was steadily becoming clear.
Team A, despite our lack of team naming cohesion, was able to present Cosmos Concerto within Experimedia – Freeplay’s publically open sector. Craig, Sam and I stood (for sitting was a rare gift) amongst a collection of published games, some other independent works, game-course-promoting tertiary colleges and one brave 3D artist. Though it pains me to say that “The Force Unleashed” got a lot more attention than our little table, our two days at Freeplay were not without a level of interest.
I was somewhat amazed at the level of positive feedback, even more so by the amount that attempted to play the game even after we explained it was nothing more than a prototype with no real discernable ‘gameplay’. The feedback helped me clarify a lot of the ideas we already had, whilst helping me focus on what the audience is looking for in the playable and finalised game. I was also amazed at the amount of times we used the line “It’s like Audiosurf meets Lylat Wars”.
So by the end of Freeplay, I was a happy, albeit tired, producer of Cosmos Concerto. In fact, the further I get away from Freeplay’s exciting Peggle Ragdoll conclusion, the happier I am with the progress of my team and what the future may hold for the game. I told many a person that we hope to have a properly playable game due for the Game Connect: Asia Pacific 09 conference in December, and I’d hate to have them think we cannot live up to expectations. Three months is not a long time, especially when, after 6, I would say we’re probably on the wrong side of halfway with the game, but so long as we can keep soldiering on Cosmos Concerto will see the light of day; and it will be some kind of awesome.
Cosmos Concerto Progress
For now, we have some things to show our progress for those who were unable to catch us at Freeplay. Browse at will, feedback is always greatly appreciated and sometimes just leaving short comments goes a long way.
Mock screens based on existing models:
http://steinlagim.com/Freeplay.rar
The prototype displayed at Freeplay:
http://www.squad3.com/files/CosmosConcerto.zip