TWO demos for the Kickstarter and other news

I'm working on two different playable demos to present as the example of my game Cyka, which I'll be seeking some support with through Kickstarter.  What kind of two demos?  Well, one demo is being developed with the Unity game engine and one is being developed with Unreal Development Kit.  And they're both representing two great versions of the game Cyka.

One game, two game engines. six stores!

I needed two versions to fulfill the potential of this game.  I wanted this game to be available for as many platforms as possible and to play seamlessly cross-platform and persistent-world online between those platforms, and for that, I'm choosing the Unity game engine to develop the "standard" version of Cyka.  I wanted this same game to be even more visually-stunning, the environments to be even more destructible and interactive, and to be available for Steam (which currently does not support cross-platform with such other platforms as mobile devices), and for that, I'm choosing the UDK to develop the rather "enhanced" version of Cyka.

This second UDK version will be called Cyka: Steamed Edition (fitting for a steampunk-themed game), will include the Cloud Quest mode found in the non-Steam special edition of Cyka called Cyka: Cloud Quest Edition, and the present plan is that it will be priced lower than the original wider-platform version of Cyka.  But both versions will be huge genre-bending experiences, beautifully-rendered, done with 100% quality, and put you in the company of thousands of gamers online.  And we still plan to enter our a working demo of each version of our game into the Independent Game Festival (IGF) and IndieCade 2013 both next year, and yes, we aim to win the top prizes in both (we're that confident about the brilliance of this game).  My company PolyKhrome will be pushing the limits of both game engines, as our game pushes new limits in the genre of online action real-time strategy games.  I explain it all here on my developer's blog.

If you'd like to know a little more about what game I'm creating, please visit my development blog.  And if you have any questions or comments about the game or my company, please e-mail me at PolyKhrome@gmail.com (soon to be BrianLockett@PolyKhrome.com when our official website is complete).  Some details about the Kickstarter have already been revealed, and there's more to come in coming days.  I've got some great offerings in store for supporters, but without the demos, they mean nothing.  So PolyKhrome is diligently working to develop two demos that'll blow you away.

If you're interested in possibly joining PolyKhrome, send me an e-mail and provide me with a link to your website, blog, or portfolio, and we can talk.  I'll provide more details then, but I can say that while experience with Blender and Photoshop are preferred, we can work with users of other software, but good experience with Unity and/or UDK is necessary.  We'll be looking for an assets artist or two (characters, environments, props, and 2D elements), an additional game programmer or two (preferably one with some network programming experience), and an illustrator with some graphic design experience.  Later, we'll be looking for an additional game musician/sound designer, though we already do have plans for later seeking a particular amazing freelance game musician in mind.

Also, this summer, I'll be starting back my Operation Moogle effort on the side.  It was a project I started last year to respond to Square Enix's call for an organized effort to be enough of a united voice saying we wanted a Final Fantasy HD collection from them of their most beloved Final Fantasy titles of the past.  Last year, we went into a hiatus as summer came to a close, but this year, we're picking up right where we left--and our supporters are ecstatic!  And Square Enix are listening--we currently have an employee with some brass at Square Enix following us on our Twitter page!  If that sounds interesting to you, check it out, sign our petition, and take our poll--your voice counts.

And finally, I'm excited about the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2012 (or E3 2012), just 12 days away!  Personally, I'm very interested in the only officially-announced next-gen console to be showed there, the Wii U from Nintendo, as both a gamer and an indie game developer.  I've been following the development of this console for the last year and a half, back when it was just a mysterious project, and when it was finally unveiled last year at E3 2011 (and I talked about it here on this blog last year), I can say that I immediately saw what I could do with that system.  It immediately addressed some of the things I wanted to do with gaming, and its controller is really all I can ask for as a game developer.  I can definitely say that the Wii U will be in PolyKhrome's future, as soon as we become a better established to do so with our current work!  I'd love nothing more than to see the likes of Cyka II (which is already being planned) on the Wii U someday...

Anyways, folks, that concludes this post.  I hope to hear from some of you soon!  I tell you, this is going to be one exciting summer, folks!

- Brian