Dev Log #22 + Project Risotto: We make a game in 5 weeks

Hey all :) I've just posted Dev Log #22, which (apart from the main topic of this post) shares a bit about a trip to a familiar hilltop Jaro

Hey all :) I've just posted Dev Log #22, which (apart from the main topic of this post) shares a bit about a trip to a familiar hilltop Jarod and I took recently, so it's worth a read ;)

But what I mainly want to tell you about is our current adventure in game design...

In a blog post I wrote earlier this year, I explained a bit about the idea of Poly Haven getting a little into game development. But in a nutshell:

We’re exploring the idea of making video games as a means to prove the usefulness of our assets – to show that the assets we make can indeed be used for the purposes we intend them – much like how the Blender Studio creates open movies to prove and improve Blender itself.

At the same time, we’d like to explore if we can use this as a potential method for funding the creation of our 3D assets. Funding a team that makes free content has always been one of our biggest challenges (I did a talk about it a few Blender Conferences ago), and we’re wondering if selling video games might be another good way to supplement your support on Patreon.

So, starting in October, we jumped into a 5-week sprint to make a game, any game, and get a clearer picture of what this idea might look like (and how much we’re in over our heads).

The game that we make this month will be shared exclusively with you guys on Patreon to give us some stakes and accountability. Since this is more of a learning experience than a real game project, we won’t be publishing the game anywhere else.

And let's be honest, it's not going to be anything impressive. No one on the team has any experience making games. Working on assets for games, yes, but nothing remotely connected to the task of designing and implementing gameplay at all.

We don’t intend to become game designers ourselves. Poly Haven, at its core, will remain an asset platform. Rather, we want to be able to relate to and better work with designers and developers we hire or collaborate with in the future.

The broad idea is this: Learn a bit about game development this year (through this 5-week sprint and a jam or two) so that next year we can hire some talent and try to make something worthwhile that suits Poly Haven's mission too.

Working on games may lead to more and better assets, but of course at the cost of a bit of our time in the short term. We're super grateful that we have you guys to support us and allow us to take these risks and explore ideas safely <3

-Greg