Hi there, I had a couple of people asking if there was a way to listen to the soundtrack for my game. I wrote and recorded these songs myself and I'm pretty pleased with them. I'm probably going to reuse the "Trial of Izil" in Dawn of Dawn because it might be the best song I've ever written! I record my songs just using a mini synth, an acoustic guitar and an 8 track. I've uploaded it to YouTube. You can listen here:
Making the game.
For anyone who is interested I thought I'd talk a little about the making of the game. Here are some random bullet points:
- "In Greek mythology, a little owl traditionally represents or accompanies Athena, the virgin goddess of wisdom, or Minerva, her syncretic incarnation in Roman mythology." This is where the name for the game and Izil's power came from.
- "Using her gift of strategic inspiration, she implanted the idea of the Trojan horse into the mind of Ulysses, who then directed the creation of the famous gift. Virgil called it “Minerva’s gift of death.”" This mythology is what inspired Izil's special move and is why I decided to name his Dad Ulysses.
- The name of their ship "The Ra" is a reference Egyptian god of the sun. This was actually a mistake at first, I meant to name the ship after Horus, the god of the sky (who has an owl head) but I ended up liking the name "The Ra" so I left it as it was.
- So basically I just googled "owl Mythology" >_<
- I always planned for the Dad to die at the end. It is why Izil trips in the very first scene. I wanted to come up with a strong reason for him having a "low ego" for Bruised Ego's. From the start I had the final scene planned out in my head, I wasn't sure if my animation skills would be up to job of pulling it off, but it turned out pretty close to how I imagined.
- I wanted to have a visual change in Izil by the end of the game, which is why he doesn't use the knife/sword he has in the concept art. Instead at the end he is holding his fathers broken sword, which in my interpretation would go on to be his weapon for Bruised Egos. Obviously he gets his "uncool" bandanna from his dad at the end. Just me trying to give the bandana some sentimental value.
- My original idea was to for the game to be more of a tower defense game, where Izil would build turrets and other defenses to protect The Ra. However I realised that if I wanted to focus on story I'd need to make the gameplay more simple (especially as it took me the full first week to draw, animate and program just Izil.
- I don't often get to watch Kyles streams live, I usually watch the VODs on YouTube, even then I don't have the time to watch full videos. So this was the first time I had heard of Dark Schippie Dues. I'm not sure if there is previous lore for him. I saw some people in chat saying that my version of him was a drastic lore shift! I just wanted to go a bit crazy with it. I figured the phase 1 fight would be generic in terms of using the concept art. I didn't even give him arms, which is why he only kicks. So I wanted to go over the top in phase 2 and 3. Fun fact, his weird body and arms are hidden under his top in phase 1. In some animations you can see the gloopy drips under his top.
What's Next from me.
I'm going to fix the glitches in the game. I'm going to make a chapter select. I'm going to make an easy mode for the final level.
After that I'm really trying to convince myself to leave it at that. I'm way too tempted to make a mode called "Dark Schippie Trials" where you fight the other characters from Bruised Ego's in the Court of Dark Schippie Dues. Just because I love the characters chat and Kyle designed, I'd love to bring them all to life in some way. I'd love a shot at animating them. However, I think the amount of people who would actually play this would be pretty small for the time investment. I should really get stuck back into Dawn of Don. For anyone reading this who doesn't know, I'm currently working on an Easy Allies fan game called Dawn of Don. I only have Brandon's, Brad's and Damiani's biomes to finish. So I really want to push to the end of that. If anyone is interested I'll post the trailer below. Unfortunately for me, I learned a lot about animating during this game jam, so I want to go back and make Don's (and enemies) animations smoother and more "cool" looking. I've also already added more detail to the levels so my current version already looks better than this trailer. But it's here for anyone interested.
Finally thank you to all the kind and awesome messages about Minerva's Lost. I put my heart and soul into it and this community's reaction to it has made the whole thing worth it. So thanks again. You are awesome.
(Sorry if this is a bit of a self indulgent post. I don't get to talk to many people about my stuff other than my long suffering fiancée!)