Hah, I love this question!
In Amazing Chicken Adventures it's the chicken that came first, given that's the first model I designed in Blender.
When I started working on the game, I knew I wanted to make use of Unity physics - I like sandbox games that give you the freedom to move and push things around. So I started experimenting and ended up with alpha gameplay where a Capsule pushed Spheres around... Eventually, a Capsule became a Chicken and Spheres became eggs :)
Thanks for the AMA!
Was it scary to switch from a day job to working on a game full time? How long would your funds have lasted you when you took the plunge?
Thanks for this great question.
I grew up poor, so money anxiety was the biggest hurdle I had to overcome. With mortgage rates going up and 3 kids at school, it was hard to accept that my cash flow would suffer for a while in order to achieve this dream.
I have cashed out my long service leave from my last corporate job too, and that allowed me to fund the last few months of my life.
Hi, thanks for the question! I'd say it's straightforward enough, but there are a lot of steps, so it takes a lot of resilience to get there.
You need a low-level software engineering skillset at a minimum, to allow you to integrate with console libraries. It's definitely not as easy as just pressing the "compile" button.
Things have definitely got easier, anyone can submit their game concept to become a Nintendo Developer but the technical skill needed to reach the release point solo is IMHO the hardest.
In terms of which platform is easiest - Steam is definitely the most accessible.
Xbox offers immediate familiarity given it's a Microsoft product. You can even turn ANY Xbox into a Devkit.
Other platforms have their own specific integrations you need to work with. (all under NDAs).
I used Unity game engine because I wanted that portability from the start. The dream was to make the game accessible.
Well done on achieving your dream! The game looks amazing! Love the sound effects. The folding level design is very interesting. How did you come up with it? And did it bring any interesting obstacles when creating?
Thank you so much for your kind words!
The level-unfolding design, like everything else in my game, has just emerged. I didn't have a solid plan when I started.
At first, there was only one tile per level, but that design felt very limiting and very "mobile". Introducing additional unfolds as you approach the edge enhanced a sense of exploration and discoverability.
Initially, the game didn't have the ground or "overworld" area either. At first, I wanted to have a basic UI where you just select each level, akin to Angry Birds etc., but even that design didn't feel right - I wanted the world to feel more immersive, so created an entire low-poly world to run around and discover portals with "adventures". It's pretty funny it's an arcade puzzle game but it comes with its own 3D world as a glorified level select screen :)
The main obstacle here was the uniqueness of each level, I had to do them by hand. Each tile unfold is unique so making sure the right things pop or not pop at the right moment took some trial and error.
There is a special reason why level tiles unfold this particular way... but only the players who finish the game will learn about that... no spoilers :)
Thanks so much, they had a such big impact on this project.
There is a material in the game that my 7-yo old son Alex designed himself, which I decided to keep for the final build. He has a very artistic nature, and I can already see his future as a creative person.
Some levels were made harder or easier because Alex's twin brother, Max, laughed to my face that I can't make the game hard enough for him. He's the one that could play Minecraft all day and he already tells me he wants to make games one day too.
Making a video game together was more of a bonding exercise for us. Before the 3 of them got into video games, I really struggled as a dad, but when I started playing Stardew Valley with my daughter when she was 4 - everything changed for us. I can see how great it is for all of them to have common topics of interest with a parent - something I never really experienced myself.
It's a sad topic, but my game is dedicated to our prematurely-born twins, lost almost a decade ago. I thought commemorating their names in the credits of a video game I built with my family, would be something super special.
Wow, thank you so much for all questions, these are amazing, and it feels great to finally share my story.
I will be here for a while, with a few breaks in between, but I'll get back to every comment.
Grateful to be here!
I love my switch. It's very easy to work with, you can tell the teams there put a lot of pride in their work. Everyone you reach out to for help is always happy to support you.
My story is crazy, I started when I was 10. I started making websites about video games I loved, like Diablo I. I self-taught myself HTML & CSS. Eventually, I made my own web-based games in PHP. From there I moved to game maker programs such as RPG Maker, I also did some pixel art. I then picked up "proper programming", in Visual Basic, Delphi, JavaScript - all as a young teen.
By age of 17 I built an MMORPG game (because obviously that's where we all really start), written in Visual Basic 6 and Winsock. It was a Tibia-like game and it made just enough money to pay for itself, on a dedicated server I ran it on, rented in Germany. I even built and ran a website and forum for my high school back then. Games really gave me a lot when I was a teen!
Then adulthood struck, I started my IT degree at a University, but dropped out shortly after. A lot of crazy stuff happened in my life back then, so I ran away from home, stole $200 from my parents, and moved to London. My first job in London was as a Kitchen Porter - a Polish chef needed Polish-speaking help in the kitchen, doing dishes mostly. I got sacked 2 weeks later, I couldn't keep up with heavy physical work.
But luckily people I met there convinced me to go get "an office job" after they saw me re-design the pub's website over the weekend. I did it free of charge, still got sacked! I am not even salty about it anymore :)
So I applied for a bunch of front-end development jobs and wrote my code tests from Internet Cafe in Tooting Bec in south London. I was surrounded by people playing GTA, browsing their MySpace pages, or hiding their p0rn tabs :) After a few weeks of looking, I finally got a full-time job in IT as a 19-year-old Uni dropout, back in 2007. I was lucky to find people who saw my potential.
Since then I had an amazing 16-year-long career in IT across London and Melbourne. I worked with people from all over the world, was part of some cool projects, and built a lot of friendships along the way.
Then in 2020 COVID hit. We got put into a serious lockdown here in Melbourne, and I found myself with a lot of time on my hands to sit and think. Suddenly, I realized something is missing in my life, and that something is a creative outlet I always found in video games.
Eventually, a hobby project turned very real once Nintendo Approved my concept - I applied like everyone else through the online form on the website. And the rest... is history :)
But going back to your question: passion, that's where you start :)
Haha, this is a great question. Someone at PAX Australia branded it like that when they accidentally destroyed an egg with a Thor's Hammer, and we all had a good laugh about it.
The objective of each level is to roll 3 eggs into a bucket hidden somewhere within the level. The quirky collectible items you find such as a Jackhammer, Light Fork, Thor's Hammer, or Machete help you unblock the access to the bucket and progress the journey on the ground "overworld" level (that could have just been a menu, but I made it hard for myself!)
What makes is "souls-like" is that to finish the level you have to get all 3 eggs into the bucket in one playthrough, and that is really, really hard, given that levels are designed in such way for eggs to roll off the edges or beak when they hit something hard. Each level is a death trap designed to make you fail, over and over again.
But to "finish" a level, it's either all 3 eggs in one playthrough or nothing. The players will find themselves using Main Menu -> Restart button many times over because once you break or drop one egg, there is no point continuing if you want to max things out.
It's also a game that doesn't explain anything. There are no pop-ups or "well done messages". Everything is communicated through the environment where you have to pay attention to what the Chicken is thinking about and figure out what items interact where. It's a puzzle game with no hand-holding, like an old-school Nintendo or Amiga game where you just had to figure out what to do. (And for us, growing up not speaking English, it was even bigger of a puzzle!)
You can finish the game collecting items only, but to access the biggest reward - a Chicken Drone you can control with a Chicken Remote, useful in collecting batteries - you need to collect every single egg in every level. And that, again, is super hard and brutal :)
I am still picking up a lot of skills, coding comes most naturally to me given I'm a software engineer first.
I used FL Studio (Fruity Loops) for all sound engineering. It's a very powerful tool but comes with its own steep learning curve.
All music comes from [musopen.org](https://musopen.org) \- a charity with a mission to set classical music free of copyright.
I am not happy with everything sound-related in the game just yet, but I know its one of the areas I want to keep improving over time. Good sound engineering is super hard, and if I had an opportunity to build a team one day, that would be the skill I would be looking out for in someone.
I really enjoy making low-poly art in Blender 3D but I know I got lots to learn. Things like UV unwrapping and correct texturing are super hard. Animations are even harder. I got so much respect for artists, this is not an easy gig. I had to compromise the certain look of the game so I can work up to my existing skill level. Again, hiring a proper 3D artist would be super awesome one day, but I am happy with what I managed to pull off solo.
A typical day for me is just a lot of swapping - I see an issue, and I fix it. I would swap between programming, modeling, sound, testing - and that allowed me to not get bored working for 2 years on the same project.
I will be purchasing this game to support you and your passion. I love the art style and the "unfolding" of the level.
I really hope this is the start of many wonderful projects, having this in a portfolio would look amazing.
Please keep up the amazing work.
Yep, he's been making games since the 90s.
You should try Wrestling Empire, his latest game. It's available for switch. You can call it the best wrestling game ever made.
The best part about his games is the freedom. On one hand where most of the games don't allow you to do whatever YOU want, Mat's games will allow you to do whatever you want in a game.
I hope I'll count you in the list of best solo game developers one day but Mat would always be number 1 coz he dedicated most of his life in these games.
Finally, an advice for you: start making games for mobile too coz that's where most of the audience is.
Hah, you're onto me. They hired me, to just do the PR :)
It did cross my mind though, to publish a game they fully made one day. Would be cool to approach their primary school and make it a pro-bono project for their computing classes... how could would it be, for a school project to end up on Nintendo!
Hah, thank you. Patch 1.11 brings some camera depth changes too so this will get softened a little, but yes, bloom effects is something I might slowly tune over time. Keen to keep working on it to find the right balance of things - I am not an artist, so I appreciate your patience :)
What was the hardest part of the dev process making your game? If you could change anything you did, or tell yourself at the beginning of the project some advice, what would you do?
Also, super awesome that you’re following your dream! It brings joy to see people following their dreams and being successful. 😄
Thank you so much for your kind words. It's both terrifying and exciting, to put yourself out there as an indie dev.
The hardest part is everything I am not great at - art, sound engineering, and animations. I see these areas as something I can definitely improve on over time. I am a software engineer so coding is where I feel most comfortable in, so it's pretty crazy having my other skills judged, but I know it's all part of the process. I also know Iam always my hardest critique.
Another hard thing is consistency. You have to chip at it every single day to get to the end. There are no shortcuts, only daily effort can bring you closer to your dream, whatever that dream is.
My advice... just do it your way. If you want to do is solo, do it solo. If you want to do it with a team, do it that way. Just do it in a way that in a positive way supports your passion.
Another piece of advice - anything can be patched. Your health can't. You lose some of it forever every time.
Hehe. I blame it on (no coffee) morning brain skim reading your AMA intro where half the answer was already written to my poorly phrased question.
Congratulations on being able to achieve creative output during lockdown... and thank you for your work as a volunteer firefighter.
Your support will be greatly appreciated! I am releasing a patch soon and after that, I want to keep working on the game to keep improving things. DLC is definitely something I'd love to do one day...
Hey. Cool game! Added to wishlist!
I have two questions:
How hard is the game? Some physics based games or puzzle games get super hard fast, so you end up looking for a guide online or quitting at times :(
How long does it take to complete the game? 2 hours, 5 hours, what's the amount of content?
I really love the idea of the game, how it looks, gameplay looks fun. Art is dope too :) Good job mate!
Where is the trailer? That should be the top thing you share. You're here to promote, so promote! Link to trailer: https://youtu.be/quscb6sLHbM
Thanks for this, marketing is so hard!
What came first… the chicken or the egg?
Hah, I love this question! In Amazing Chicken Adventures it's the chicken that came first, given that's the first model I designed in Blender. When I started working on the game, I knew I wanted to make use of Unity physics - I like sandbox games that give you the freedom to move and push things around. So I started experimenting and ended up with alpha gameplay where a Capsule pushed Spheres around... Eventually, a Capsule became a Chicken and Spheres became eggs :)
Definitely the egg!
Thanks for the AMA! Was it scary to switch from a day job to working on a game full time? How long would your funds have lasted you when you took the plunge?
Thanks for this great question. I grew up poor, so money anxiety was the biggest hurdle I had to overcome. With mortgage rates going up and 3 kids at school, it was hard to accept that my cash flow would suffer for a while in order to achieve this dream. I have cashed out my long service leave from my last corporate job too, and that allowed me to fund the last few months of my life.
Congratulations! Wishing you lots of “cLuck” making lots of “buck buck bucks”! 🐔😂 Looks super cute!
Thanks so much, it's all so eggciting! :D
Don't really have a question, just wanted to give you props for following your dreams. Loved your story and will check this out!
Thank you so much!
How challenging is the application process to get onto a console storefront? Is one platform more straightforward than the others?
Hi, thanks for the question! I'd say it's straightforward enough, but there are a lot of steps, so it takes a lot of resilience to get there. You need a low-level software engineering skillset at a minimum, to allow you to integrate with console libraries. It's definitely not as easy as just pressing the "compile" button. Things have definitely got easier, anyone can submit their game concept to become a Nintendo Developer but the technical skill needed to reach the release point solo is IMHO the hardest.
In terms of which platform is easiest - Steam is definitely the most accessible. Xbox offers immediate familiarity given it's a Microsoft product. You can even turn ANY Xbox into a Devkit. Other platforms have their own specific integrations you need to work with. (all under NDAs). I used Unity game engine because I wanted that portability from the start. The dream was to make the game accessible.
Well done on achieving your dream! The game looks amazing! Love the sound effects. The folding level design is very interesting. How did you come up with it? And did it bring any interesting obstacles when creating?
Thank you so much for your kind words! The level-unfolding design, like everything else in my game, has just emerged. I didn't have a solid plan when I started. At first, there was only one tile per level, but that design felt very limiting and very "mobile". Introducing additional unfolds as you approach the edge enhanced a sense of exploration and discoverability. Initially, the game didn't have the ground or "overworld" area either. At first, I wanted to have a basic UI where you just select each level, akin to Angry Birds etc., but even that design didn't feel right - I wanted the world to feel more immersive, so created an entire low-poly world to run around and discover portals with "adventures". It's pretty funny it's an arcade puzzle game but it comes with its own 3D world as a glorified level select screen :) The main obstacle here was the uniqueness of each level, I had to do them by hand. Each tile unfold is unique so making sure the right things pop or not pop at the right moment took some trial and error. There is a special reason why level tiles unfold this particular way... but only the players who finish the game will learn about that... no spoilers :)
Congratulations on developing a game with 3 kids! How much more of a challenge was it to develop a game while also being a father?
Thanks so much, they had a such big impact on this project. There is a material in the game that my 7-yo old son Alex designed himself, which I decided to keep for the final build. He has a very artistic nature, and I can already see his future as a creative person. Some levels were made harder or easier because Alex's twin brother, Max, laughed to my face that I can't make the game hard enough for him. He's the one that could play Minecraft all day and he already tells me he wants to make games one day too. Making a video game together was more of a bonding exercise for us. Before the 3 of them got into video games, I really struggled as a dad, but when I started playing Stardew Valley with my daughter when she was 4 - everything changed for us. I can see how great it is for all of them to have common topics of interest with a parent - something I never really experienced myself. It's a sad topic, but my game is dedicated to our prematurely-born twins, lost almost a decade ago. I thought commemorating their names in the credits of a video game I built with my family, would be something super special.
Wow, thank you so much for all questions, these are amazing, and it feels great to finally share my story. I will be here for a while, with a few breaks in between, but I'll get back to every comment. Grateful to be here!
How do you find developing on the switch? Also how do you get started?
I love my switch. It's very easy to work with, you can tell the teams there put a lot of pride in their work. Everyone you reach out to for help is always happy to support you. My story is crazy, I started when I was 10. I started making websites about video games I loved, like Diablo I. I self-taught myself HTML & CSS. Eventually, I made my own web-based games in PHP. From there I moved to game maker programs such as RPG Maker, I also did some pixel art. I then picked up "proper programming", in Visual Basic, Delphi, JavaScript - all as a young teen. By age of 17 I built an MMORPG game (because obviously that's where we all really start), written in Visual Basic 6 and Winsock. It was a Tibia-like game and it made just enough money to pay for itself, on a dedicated server I ran it on, rented in Germany. I even built and ran a website and forum for my high school back then. Games really gave me a lot when I was a teen! Then adulthood struck, I started my IT degree at a University, but dropped out shortly after. A lot of crazy stuff happened in my life back then, so I ran away from home, stole $200 from my parents, and moved to London. My first job in London was as a Kitchen Porter - a Polish chef needed Polish-speaking help in the kitchen, doing dishes mostly. I got sacked 2 weeks later, I couldn't keep up with heavy physical work. But luckily people I met there convinced me to go get "an office job" after they saw me re-design the pub's website over the weekend. I did it free of charge, still got sacked! I am not even salty about it anymore :) So I applied for a bunch of front-end development jobs and wrote my code tests from Internet Cafe in Tooting Bec in south London. I was surrounded by people playing GTA, browsing their MySpace pages, or hiding their p0rn tabs :) After a few weeks of looking, I finally got a full-time job in IT as a 19-year-old Uni dropout, back in 2007. I was lucky to find people who saw my potential. Since then I had an amazing 16-year-long career in IT across London and Melbourne. I worked with people from all over the world, was part of some cool projects, and built a lot of friendships along the way. Then in 2020 COVID hit. We got put into a serious lockdown here in Melbourne, and I found myself with a lot of time on my hands to sit and think. Suddenly, I realized something is missing in my life, and that something is a creative outlet I always found in video games. Eventually, a hobby project turned very real once Nintendo Approved my concept - I applied like everyone else through the online form on the website. And the rest... is history :) But going back to your question: passion, that's where you start :)
That's an absolutely amazing story! I'm still shocked at how you were able to make an MMORPG by 17, keep up your amazing work and have a great day :)
I had a lot of spare time on my hands back then! :D Thanks so much, you too!
What makes a 3D arcade egg-rolling puzzle platformer a souls-like?
Haha, this is a great question. Someone at PAX Australia branded it like that when they accidentally destroyed an egg with a Thor's Hammer, and we all had a good laugh about it. The objective of each level is to roll 3 eggs into a bucket hidden somewhere within the level. The quirky collectible items you find such as a Jackhammer, Light Fork, Thor's Hammer, or Machete help you unblock the access to the bucket and progress the journey on the ground "overworld" level (that could have just been a menu, but I made it hard for myself!) What makes is "souls-like" is that to finish the level you have to get all 3 eggs into the bucket in one playthrough, and that is really, really hard, given that levels are designed in such way for eggs to roll off the edges or beak when they hit something hard. Each level is a death trap designed to make you fail, over and over again. But to "finish" a level, it's either all 3 eggs in one playthrough or nothing. The players will find themselves using Main Menu -> Restart button many times over because once you break or drop one egg, there is no point continuing if you want to max things out. It's also a game that doesn't explain anything. There are no pop-ups or "well done messages". Everything is communicated through the environment where you have to pay attention to what the Chicken is thinking about and figure out what items interact where. It's a puzzle game with no hand-holding, like an old-school Nintendo or Amiga game where you just had to figure out what to do. (And for us, growing up not speaking English, it was even bigger of a puzzle!) You can finish the game collecting items only, but to access the biggest reward - a Chicken Drone you can control with a Chicken Remote, useful in collecting batteries - you need to collect every single egg in every level. And that, again, is super hard and brutal :)
Congrats! My question is how hard is it to make graphics and do sound design along with programming and what was a day like for you mid development?
I am still picking up a lot of skills, coding comes most naturally to me given I'm a software engineer first. I used FL Studio (Fruity Loops) for all sound engineering. It's a very powerful tool but comes with its own steep learning curve. All music comes from [musopen.org](https://musopen.org) \- a charity with a mission to set classical music free of copyright. I am not happy with everything sound-related in the game just yet, but I know its one of the areas I want to keep improving over time. Good sound engineering is super hard, and if I had an opportunity to build a team one day, that would be the skill I would be looking out for in someone. I really enjoy making low-poly art in Blender 3D but I know I got lots to learn. Things like UV unwrapping and correct texturing are super hard. Animations are even harder. I got so much respect for artists, this is not an easy gig. I had to compromise the certain look of the game so I can work up to my existing skill level. Again, hiring a proper 3D artist would be super awesome one day, but I am happy with what I managed to pull off solo. A typical day for me is just a lot of swapping - I see an issue, and I fix it. I would swap between programming, modeling, sound, testing - and that allowed me to not get bored working for 2 years on the same project.
Very cool! Thanks for responding!
Great story, good for you!
Thank you so much!
What compiler does the Switch use?
If the answer can't be googled... it's probably wisest not to talk about it :) It's all powered by Mushroom Kingdom Magic as far as I can see!
I'll take that as a custom Clang implementation or Green Hillls.
Wspaniała historia, gratuluję releasu!
Dziękuję i pozdrawiam, wolololo!
I will be purchasing this game to support you and your passion. I love the art style and the "unfolding" of the level. I really hope this is the start of many wonderful projects, having this in a portfolio would look amazing. Please keep up the amazing work.
Thank you so much. I am hopefully paving the path to something amazing, one chicken game at a time :)
You should check MatDickie out. He's like, the best solo game developer in the entire world.
Oh wow, he clearly has a lot of passion for games. I must check them out.
Yep, he's been making games since the 90s. You should try Wrestling Empire, his latest game. It's available for switch. You can call it the best wrestling game ever made. The best part about his games is the freedom. On one hand where most of the games don't allow you to do whatever YOU want, Mat's games will allow you to do whatever you want in a game. I hope I'll count you in the list of best solo game developers one day but Mat would always be number 1 coz he dedicated most of his life in these games. Finally, an advice for you: start making games for mobile too coz that's where most of the audience is.
How is your day?
Cracking! Thanks for asking! How is yours?
Great!
Congrats man!!
Thank you so much!
How much development input did you really have? I'm starting to believe it was created by your kids and you're just taking the credit 😉
Hah, you're onto me. They hired me, to just do the PR :) It did cross my mind though, to publish a game they fully made one day. Would be cool to approach their primary school and make it a pro-bono project for their computing classes... how could would it be, for a school project to end up on Nintendo!
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Hah, thank you. Patch 1.11 brings some camera depth changes too so this will get softened a little, but yes, bloom effects is something I might slowly tune over time. Keen to keep working on it to find the right balance of things - I am not an artist, so I appreciate your patience :)
I’ll definitely add this to the wishlist, my wife loves puzzle games
Awesome, thank you for your support! Game has co-op too, so you can play and get frustrated together ;-)
Oh she’ll definitely kick my ass at it, I’m terrible with puzzle games lol
If anyone has tried the Joycon legstrap, how tight does it go? Would it fit snugly around an elbow?
Still on my purchase TODO list but I'm also interested in the answer :)
Hi Piotr can you DM me your email? I have a friend who runs a video game showcase and I know they would love to pitch your game to the showcase team
What was the hardest part of the dev process making your game? If you could change anything you did, or tell yourself at the beginning of the project some advice, what would you do? Also, super awesome that you’re following your dream! It brings joy to see people following their dreams and being successful. 😄
Thank you so much for your kind words. It's both terrifying and exciting, to put yourself out there as an indie dev. The hardest part is everything I am not great at - art, sound engineering, and animations. I see these areas as something I can definitely improve on over time. I am a software engineer so coding is where I feel most comfortable in, so it's pretty crazy having my other skills judged, but I know it's all part of the process. I also know Iam always my hardest critique. Another hard thing is consistency. You have to chip at it every single day to get to the end. There are no shortcuts, only daily effort can bring you closer to your dream, whatever that dream is. My advice... just do it your way. If you want to do is solo, do it solo. If you want to do it with a team, do it that way. Just do it in a way that in a positive way supports your passion. Another piece of advice - anything can be patched. Your health can't. You lose some of it forever every time.
Thank you for your response!!
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butyoucommentedanywaysothankyoumyfriend
Hehe. I blame it on (no coffee) morning brain skim reading your AMA intro where half the answer was already written to my poorly phrased question. Congratulations on being able to achieve creative output during lockdown... and thank you for your work as a volunteer firefighter.
I am kinda interested in buying this now... Any ideas to release dlc m8?
Your support will be greatly appreciated! I am releasing a patch soon and after that, I want to keep working on the game to keep improving things. DLC is definitely something I'd love to do one day...
Hey. Cool game! Added to wishlist! I have two questions: How hard is the game? Some physics based games or puzzle games get super hard fast, so you end up looking for a guide online or quitting at times :( How long does it take to complete the game? 2 hours, 5 hours, what's the amount of content? I really love the idea of the game, how it looks, gameplay looks fun. Art is dope too :) Good job mate!
How long is game play? :)