The Last Axe’s Journey

As we have already told many times, ‘The Last Axe’ began as a submission for a game jam in 2019. The theme was “only one”. After a quick brainstorming session, we decided on an action type game where you have one weapon that you can use only once before having to pick it up again. Forty-eight hours later we had the submission for the game jam (which you can still play here *https://bromberry-games.itch.io/the-only-axe*) and ‘The Last Axe’ was born. Now, what lead to it becoming a bigger project?

Those forty-eight hours were some of the most fun and productive for me personally, and there was a general excitement between the three of us. We made a game in 48 hours, after all! You see, this wasn’t our first rodeo. Our first game took about three months from start to finish; a fast and planned rodeo. Our second, unpublished one took six months to complete. The first one was bigger, better, and, in my opinion, a solid game. Yet, despite the second being minuscule in scale compared to the first, it took so much longer. So much so, that a general apathy towards it appeared. If you want to keep the metaphor, we sat on a bull that wasn’t thrashing around, it wasn’t even moving. After we finished it and built the alpha for the store, Google blocked it due to some data shenanigans, but we weren’t even fighting it. It seemed like it was accepted with relief. So you can understand our elation and euphoria after making a game that was bigger and more complicated than the ones before… in just two days!

However, this lead to a problem that was to be diagnosed only much later when we hit another rut. We did the one thing you shouldn’t do. We fell in love with our prototype. We decided against starting a new project or continuing another that was in the early stages, in favor of increasing the scope of this prototype to something more. When we tried to mold the thing we had to some genre which would fit, the roguelike option seemed to promise enough content, so we went with that. After that, we were trying to decide on a feeling for the game: industrial horror, steampunk, sci-fi, etc. We thought of a storyline that could be added, but ditched it along the way. And if you haven’t noticed by now, the thing that was missing with this project was a direction. We had a clearly defined goal and time window: one randomly generated floor, with three weapons, three enemy types, and a boss – in three months. Sadly, it wasn’t specific enough.

At first, we were making quick progress, but soon the lack of direction was becoming apparent. I made two mistakes that lead the development to be dragged out. In my search for a nice feel for the game, I experimented a lot with different textures. Painting and repainting the same models 5-6 times – I was wearing out. Then, hoping to create better scenes with nicer lighting, I convinced the others to switch to the HDRP in Unity midway through, which lead to all the textures needing a rework…AGAIN. Also, all the particle effects were screwed up for good measure. Mea culpa. All this made me fed up, and, again, the apathy was creeping in. Somewhere along the line, we passed the three month deadline, which was in November, with a small nod, and kept on postponing every task to the following week. These tasks were small ones: texture some small pick-up item, create a simple particle effect, etc. The excuses I made to postpone them were equally small. I wasn’t feeling satisfied, and, to be honest, kind of unhappy. The one goal for our Twitter was hitting #screenshotsaturday, but I hit it less and less until I simply didn’t post anymore. It felt like we were resigning from the idea and wanted it to be done with without putting in the effort to actually finish it; the same feeling as with the second game. Thankfully, the three of us have created an environment where failure is accepted, but giving up isn’t, and where we support and motivate each other through these slumps.

After all our exams and obligations were done with, we sat down and talked about whether we are taking this indiedev business seriously. The answer was ‘currently: no’, but we were determined to turn it into a ‘hell yeah’. How would we do that? One word: consistency. So, for starters, we decided that we would finish it within a week. And damn if we didn’t! We sat down and obliterated the tasks. Some were thrown out, others altered, but, one by one, we completed them, until, after a sweaty Saturday, I had the honor of dragging the last one into the completed tab. We completed our goals: randomly generated floor, three weapons, three enemies, and a boss. All running, modeled, textured, lit, emitting effects! Some things don’t work the way they should, and some things look like they shouldn’t, but we learned from them and we’ll apply the lessons to the games to come. Because that is what it’s all about, making games – consistently.

Bromberry Games’ Ivan :)