Once upon a time, I had a dream. A dream of a new way of handling quest tracking, in interstellar airports run by dogs.
A PupperDex.
Working with Dave Makes, our incredible UI artist, those horrible MS Paint mockups turned into something that looks a lot like this:
LudoNarraCon ended a couple weeks ago, and boy are my arms tired!
No, but seriously.
Why are my arms so tired.
LudoNarraCon wrapped up a couple weeks ago, and as part of that event, I streamed the creation of the Candy Plane - something that'll actually exist in the game world, now! You can watch that above, and a playthrough of the currently-available version of the game below:
I'll cut to the chase - we're a part of LudoNarraCon this year!
In case you don't know what LudoNarraCon is, it's a showcase held through Steam. Developers show off footage of their games (and even full demos) - all from their homes! It's an accessible, proper game event, all focused on narrative-heavy titles, in a time where every other event is getting canceled.
I'll be streaming (and looping) footage of Dog A...
2020-04-23 08:51:24 +0000 UTC View Post
For my day job, I make games. On weekends (and nights, when I can manage it), I also make games - this game about dogs in alien airports, to be specific.
To no one's surprise but my own, that means I am often tired.
However, this week, it has had unexpected dividends.
I learned how to do really effective horror.
Allow me to introduce you to Mr. Bucket.
I just finis...
2020-04-14 05:28:49 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
With all the changes and updates that have occurred since our last non-incremental build, I think this might be our largest revision yet. Fortunate timing, too - we were just featured in a big ol' Xbox showcase you can watch in the link below:
<... 2020-04-06 05:45:40 +0000 UTC View Post
It's 3:42 AM in El Paso. We just announced the delay of SkateBIRD to 2021 (I've been the story/narrative director on it!). The world is on fire - and every time I work on this game, I forget that a little bit.
I spent a long time telling myself that I was a person who could be productive even when everything else fell down. If the situation made me unhappy or the conditions were <...
2020-03-31 10:19:48 +0000 UTC View PostI spent an agonizing series of hours extending the plane system yesterday. Every time you board a flight in Dog Airport Game, there's now a chance you could encounter one of four airlines.
2020-03-09 22:15:03 +0000 UTC
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Okay, that headline promises a bit more salacious content than I'd like. However, today, we made a giant announcement:
Dog Airport Game is coming to Steam!
You can wishlist it right now!
And we got a fancy trailer!!&nbs...
One major shift in this build captures the kind of changes we've been making to Dog Airport Game this month.
Remember how you couldn't read your boarding pass in shadow? The darkness would obscure it completely? Yeah, that's gone now.
In lieu of jumping into adding more shops and dogs (though development of those is ongoing), we've continued to take steps to polish what ...
2020-02-26 02:16:14 +0000 UTC View Post
2020-02-21 07:03:08 +0000 UTC
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You can keep a secret, right?
As of 4 AM this morning, all music in the game is part of the original soundtrack now being created for An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs. I'm delighted to announce that our chosen composer is RJ Lake. He's gone above and beyond knocking it out of the park - to the point where we already have several tracks ready to go.
What you'l...
2020-02-20 00:21:05 +0000 UTC View Post
It has been nine days since we last spoke - and I come BEARING GIFTS!
In the previous build, looking in this direction would drop the average framerate from over 100 fps, to roughly 15. We called it the Bad Direction, and feared its presence, while also acknowledging it was a primary location in the airport.
The problem is light, you see. I first started buildin...
2020-02-08 03:52:33 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
It has been a hell of a time since PAX South. Folks went absolutely bananas for our boarding passes, and the game in general. I did a postmortem of the event on Twitter.
Since our last build, we have had a metric ton of content additions (...
2020-01-30 04:12:20 +0000 UTC View PostYou know what's really cool? When everything clicks, and you see something that perfectly encapsulates the world you're creating. That's what Ben Chandler (of Wadjet Eye fame) made possible with the key art for An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs.
2020-01-23 06:28:57 +0000 UTC
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Heya, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
I have to fly out for PAX South in like 24 hours. Attached, you'll find the information sheets I'm bringing to the show (including the controls, which actually aren't needed because they're now listed in-game!), and the link to the build that'll be in San Antonio. It has much prettier UI thanks to Dave Makes, and a bunch of assorted content additions I can't remember right now because I'm very tired.
Oh! There's a coffee cup that can block out ...
2020-01-16 03:40:12 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
The results of the poll came through, and we're getting the next Patreon build after PAX South, when the issues have been fixed and I am slightly less panicked. I wanted to be chill about this, but uh: t-thank you for doing that. You have spared me, and I appreciate it.
Speaking of PAX South - I'll be in San Antonio from January 17-19, showcasing the game in the brand-new PAX Together showcase booth on the main floor!...
2020-01-10 22:49:11 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
I'm going to be at PAX South, in the newly-announced PAX Together showcase on the main floor! Attached to this poll is an exclusive look at the boarding passes we'll be giving out! It's a very exciting time for Dog Airport Game, and I'm extremely sick going into the new year, which is less pleasant!
I'll have a new build of the game ready when I go to San Antonio, which raises a question - when do you want the newest build of the game up...
2020-01-01 09:09:14 +0000 UTC View PostHappy Almost-New-Year! I'm finally reading Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud, and it's validated both this project and my entire existence.
One chapter of the book focuses on the power of the cartoon. I'm paraphrasing, but the basic idea is that the closer an image is to the abstract/iconographic, the more relatable it becomes. We can turn two dots and a curved line into a smiling fac...
2019-12-28 07:43:58 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
I thought this would be a small update. A little mid-month refresh of the airport as we go into the holidays. Maybe a couple new shops. A few new plane dogs.
That is not what happened.
We've got new interactable objects with systemic consequences (vending machines, garbage cans, etc.) spread across the airport, a major side quest in...
2019-12-17 01:47:21 +0000 UTC View PostYeah, that's a bit of a clickbait title, but it's the same quiet criticism that runs through my head every time I use a purchased package to improve a part of Dog Airport Game.
What if people write off my game, because they recognize that starscape, or that pair of shoes, or that character model?
Will I become an asset flip?
[Link to my talk on this subject at 2019-12-07 21:07:09 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, Dog Fans and Cat Conspirators!
I promised monthly (or more!) updates, and here we are: less than a month after a busy Patreon launch, and I've got a build for ya that represents a pretty dang big boost to the gameplay, content variety, and structural integrity of the game. You can see some of these changes in action within the video link below:
Hello, Dog Fans!
As was prophesied in the part of your patron tier description that said " updated monthly (or more)! ", a big update to An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs is landing in the next few days.
IT'S GOT
- New carpets!
- New stores, including Patron-chosen chew toy restaurant High Steaks!
- New art, including a revised peop...
Hello, Dog Fans!
I'm doing the very first Dogvelopment stream of Dog Airport Game via this Twitch link on Wednesday, November 20th, at 10AM PST/1PM EST/6PM GMT!
That's tomorrow!
Gonna have to miss the live show? No worries! I'm planning to upload the archive to YouTube and Twitch. It's just a matter of making sure that the stream setup works, and I don't play a...
2019-11-19 07:21:24 +0000 UTC View Post
I'm a cat owner, but I love dogs. I'm making a game about dogs, in airports. I have lost too many nights of sleep looking through public domain stock photo libraries of Extremely Good Boys and Girls. The reason for this love is among the nerdiest things in my life; a life filled with nerdy things:
As an intellectual construct, I believe that dogs - the essence of dogs - are the single ...
2019-11-07 06:29:01 +0000 UTC View Post
This is the first post-No Quarter build of Dog Airport Game!
- Get a ticket!
- Find your gate!
- Successfully take a flight!
- Do it all in less than 15 minutes, because this is still a timed build!!
You'll find the attached controller map (also adjusted post-No Quarter) useful, as the controls aren't shown in-game yet. We will also have rebindable keys in the game in the future - we just had a tight timeline to wrap this up, and I am still very tired!
Hey folks!
I've got an uber-busy period ahead of me.
Hypnospace Outlaw, which I narrative designed, is launching March 12th. It was nominated for 3 IGF awards, so I'll be at GDC/San Francisco during that period to attend the ceremony--feel free to say hi if you're around!!
Alongside that major milestone, I've got a looooot of super cool announcements I ...
2019-02-21 23:20:23 +0000 UTC View PostI'm writing this at 1 AM and I have to be in class in like 4 hours but I don't CARE because I have been ENLIGHTENED
HARVEY
FREAKING
BIRDMAN
He's a character from the traditionally-animated past, when the best original superhero they could come up with was an off-brand bird-headed dude. Now a lawyer, he takes on absurd cases, sleeps with class warfare terr...
2019-02-13 08:01:06 +0000 UTC View PostIt is so damn refreshing to watch a horror movie without a point.
I've seen a lot of mixed critical reaction to Velvet Buzzsaw over the past few weeks, and I think it's due to a fundamental break between what people wanted this movie to be, and what it actually is.
Velvet Buzzsaw is a straight-up Pandora's Box story. Something horrible is unleashed upon the world and spreads, set upon the backdrop of people so absorbed in themselves that they don...
2019-02-08 08:10:55 +0000 UTC View PostI'm going to say something that sounds a lot like hyperbole, but I promise that it isn't.
Resident Evil 7 is the best first-person game ever made.
I don't know why this game - in a series that I always struggled to understand on a fundamental level - clicked with my brain SO HARD, but it did. I wrote three gosh 2019-02-03 11:12:31 +0000 UTC View Post
This movie chosen by a "Fennelsher" patron.
SOLO FRICKING ROCKS, ACTUALLY
Can we talk for a second about how much of a miracle this movie is?
It was essentially handled by two distinct creative teams (three if you count the scriptwriters, who had their own vision of the project), and still feels like a cohesive product in tone and narrative. It's got some of the neatest action setpieces in the Star Wars cinematic universe, and adds new technology, outfits, and...
2019-02-03 08:49:53 +0000 UTC View Post