Hey there, Gamers and Game makers!

In this week's blog, we're going to talk about making a trailer for your game and cover some tips that will give you a more stand out professional quality video.

First off, why should you care about having a trailer for your game? Well, trailers act as one of the first things people will look for when they hear about your game and you'll need it to create excitement for your game as well as it acting as a call to action. Ok let's break down some key tips for making your game trailer.

1: Short and sweet
In an age where people are consuming media on a continuous basis online, you need to make sure your trailer has a chance of not only being seen but watched in its entirety. To do this, aim to have your trailer no more than one minute long. Make sure to fill these 60 seconds with the best elements and moments from your game so that it showcases the strong points of your game. It should also be very clear what your game is about and what the gameplay is.

2:Don't giveaway to much
It can be tempting to try cram everything into the trailer. To show off every aspect of it to the player. However try to avoid doing this. You'll find people engage more with your game if you tease them with say one really good bit and maintain an air of mystery or suspense in the trailer. This can make the player want to actually play the game in order to get deeper into that mystery and find answers. It's very important to maintain some secrets about your games story.

3:Don't overuse effects
When editing a video, especially a trailer it can be tempting to start going wild with the effects and fancy titles but try to hold back on that. Your trailer is supposed to convey your game in the best possible way and once you start going over the top with effects and titles or transitions, you run the risk of taking away from your game which ends of doing more harm than good. For a trailer like this where you only have 60 seconds, open simply with a logo or splash for the game and company if applicable. If your trailer doesn't require a lot of text or transitions in the trailer then don't force them into it. Keep it simple.

4: Avoid using VO unless it's needed
We've all heard some pretty bad trailer VOs and the main problem with a bad VO is that it can take away from what might be a really good game but because the VO was cringy it made me stop watching a trailer for a game I might have been interested in. So unless your game trailer really needs a VO, avoid using one and if you do really need one I would advise going the extra mile on that by trying to budget for a professional VO actor.

5:Let folks know where to find your game!
One huge mistake I notice in some indie game trailers is that the trailer itself can be great and the game will look fantastic but at the end of the trailer I'm left with no information at all. I've no idea when the game is coming out or where I can get it and sometimes I'm not even told the name of the game. So it's hugely important to have a call to action at the end of your games trailer. Make sure at the end of the trailer it's clear where I can find out more information about the game and how I can keep up to date on it's development.

As always I hope this has been of some use and if you have any questions, feel free to get in touch or leave a comment below.

​Until next time!

Hey there, Gamers and Game Makers!

In this week's blog we're going to look at how to strike a good balance between the 9-5 commitments of everyday life and working on an indie game.

As some of you will know, I recently decided to return to college as a mature student to pursue my degree in Software Development. College at the best of times is quite the time consuming commitment which can leave you very tired at the end of a long day and if you're like me you have many other things you want to dedicate time to. So, how do you strike that balance between work and game development?

Well first off it's important to note that everyone is different and some of what works for me may not work for you.

My college day kicks off at 6am. This includes my morning routine before catching a bus commute to college to be there for a little after 8am. I don't really mind early mornings much and I tend to be pretty perked up in the morning. So when it comes to finding a balance between college and game dev, it comes down to simple time management. When I get to college just after 8am, I don't have a class until 9am. So I use that hour to work some design elements out on paper for my game which I can later test at home.

My days vary at college. One day will be pretty busy from 9am until 5pm while some will have breaks of up to 3 hours between classes. When I have a gap like that, I use it wisely to get on top of college assignments and stay ahead of my work. If I can get my assignments out of the way while still in college, it reduces the amount of college work I need to take home with me thus resulting in more time I can dedicate to my game dev work. When I get home at about 6pm, I'll go for a run and have dinner before I jump into doing a few hours of game dev work but I'm careful not to stay up late working on it. Otherwise I run the risk of burning out and all my work then suffers. It's important to remember your health comes first.

I'm lucky with my current college timetable as I have Wednesday's off which affords me time to not only stay on top of college work but also time to dedicate to my game dev work. A big part of making sure you use your time wisely is to keep to do lists. I end everyday with a new list of short tasks I aim to complete the next day.

It's also important to keep in mind that you are only working on your game in small bursts now and not to feel discouraged if you feel like it's not coming along fast enough. Don't look at the game as a whole that needs to be finished as soon as possible. Break it up into small milestones that you can hit every week and slightly larger ones that you can hit in a month. Don't feel bad if you miss a milestone. Life happens and what's important is that you keep at it.

Keep track of your day to day list. If you only get an hour in the evening, that's fine too. Focus on the priority task on your list and make as much headway with that as you can. I personally find I'm at my most productive with my game dev work in the evenings but some may find they work better if they get up an hour earlier and do some game dev work before starting the day. Everyone is different and you need to find what works for you. I'm only a couple of weeks into my college course and I'm still tweaking my routine to see how to best make use of my time. 

As always I hope this has been of some help to folks and if you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment below or get in touch by email.

​Until next time!

Hey there, Gamers and Game Makers!

This week's blog is just a quick update on my first week of college as a mature student. So, week one down and I'm still standing. Returning to education, especially third level education after several years of working on games sure was a shock to the system. However I settled in far better than I thought I would.

As someone who is quite socially awkward at times, I was happy to get to know some folks very quickly. On the class side of things I found my first week of lectures and labs to be very well presented. The staff are very friendly and most importantly, very good at teaching the subjects. Overall, my first week has been a very good one and you know you're a mature student when you come in at 8.20am and do some maths for shits and giggles.

As for my own Game Dev work, that continues and I'm still finding the balance between College, Game Dev and my actual life. You can be sure I'll write a post on balancing this stuff very soon.

Until next time!

Hey there Gamers and Game Makers!

For this week's blog I'm doing something a little different. I'm a huge fan of watching people play my games. It's a great way of getting feedback on something you've made so you can improve upon. A lot of the time though watching people play my games makes for some funny moments and some priceless reactions.

In the past I've made some reaction compilations of folks playing some of my games but this past week, I've been looking back on some of my older games and some of my newer games and as a result I started watching new let's plays of them. I had a lot of fun watching these and it inspired me to make a new video. An updated and extended reactions video featuring some of my favorite reactions from before as well as some new ones. The video is made up of various let's players reacting to some of my games from the past few years and at the end of the video some of the let's players talk a bit about what they thought of what they played. You can watch the video below and I hope you guys enjoy watching this as much as I did making it.

Until next time!