A Green Pledge; A Roadmap to Becoming a Carbon-Neutral Studio

A Green Pledge; A Roadmap to Becoming a Carbon-Neutral Studio

This, then, is our first step to becoming carbon-neutral; a pledge to sustainability regardless of how much bigger we might get. The commitments laid out below will be followed as the teeny-tiny team we are today, but also honoured with every new project, every new hire, and every step we take to becoming a bigger studio, and making bigger games.

11 Books Every Indie Game Developer Should Read 📖

11 Books Every Indie Game Developer Should Read 📖

I’ve become fanatical about reading as much non-fiction as I can that will improve my approach to game development, and the business of making games. In independent development — without the crutch of budget, manpower or time (or all three, let’s be honest) — a very different outlook and skill-set is required for success when compared to the world of AAA.

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Introducing the Zero-Budget Game Marketing Manual

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Introducing the Zero-Budget Game Marketing Manual

The Zero-Budget Marketing Manual is a resource for independent game developers and smaller studios to help maximise marketing efforts. Specifically, the book is aimed at developers with little-to-no marketing budget, with strategies, resources and actionable advice for marketing on a shoestring.

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Pay What You Want For Headspun (Even If That is Absolutely Nothing)

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Pay What You Want For Headspun (Even If That is Absolutely Nothing)

If you've been curious about our FMV/Adventure game Headspun but been put off at the idea of spending money (eww) perhaps this email is for you! We're opening the floodgates and throwing a Pay What You Want Weekend over on itch.io - meaning you can pick up our quirky narrative game for as little as absolutely nothing at all. That's cheaper than literally any price you can think of! 

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Headspun Reward for $2 Patrons! (Limited Time Only!)

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Headspun Reward for $2 Patrons! (Limited Time Only!)

As we approach the start of the new year, we’ve given our Patreon page a lick of paint in anticipation of a big 2020 for Superstring on Patreon. As well as revamping all of our rewards tiers, we’re now offering a copy of our FMV/Adventure hybrid Headspun (your platform of choice; PS4, Xbox One, Switch or PC) to ALL new Patrons - which includes those coming in at the base $2 tier.

THERE'S 60% OFF HEADSPUN FOR BLACK FRIDAY!

THERE'S 60% OFF HEADSPUN FOR BLACK FRIDAY!

It's that weird day of the year where we celebrate things being cheap and buy a bunch of stuff we totally don't need. You certainly don't need our FMV/Adventure hybrid Headspun - which has a ludicrous 60% off until Sunday - but maybe it will make you happier in some small way. Why not allow yourself that little endorphin rush from purchasing something at a silly price, and bag yourself a copy of our little narrative game in the process.

The Next Project & The Post-Headspun Era

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The weeks after Headspun’s launch have been a wee bit crazy. Thanks to everybody who has supported and picked up the game so far - I hope you’ve enjoyed it. To be transparent, the game had a somewhat bumpy launch and there’s been a lot to respond to, fix and move forward from. That’s a postmortem article for another time, however. This little post is about the future.

Three bits of news for right here and now, then:

ONE: OUR NEXT GAME IS OFFICIALLY IN DEVELOPMENT

There’s little to say about the specifics here, but Superstring’s second game is currently in full production. Headspun fixes and mop-up work will be happening in tandem, but our main focus now is on the new game. The only thing I’m happy to share here (other than the teasey image above) is that it’s an altogether different experience to Headspun, and both bigger and smaller at the same time.

TWO: OUR NEXT GAME HAS, IN PART, BEEN FUNDED

Thanks to Creative England, Superstring has received funding to help bring this second game to market. Headspun was developed without any backing and very much on a shoestring. For game 2, we now have a little bit in the pot from the outset, which makes realising the vision we have for this project that much easier.

THREE: SUPERSTRING HAS GROWN!

Thanks to the above, and Creative England’s belief in the new project, Superstring has now grown to a two man operation (for a time) as we welcome Kwok Law to the team. Kwok is a multi-talented artist, but has been predominantly brought on board as a UI/UX designer to help build the copious amounts of UI the new game requires. Welcome aboard, Kwok!

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That’s about it for this update; we’ll have more to share on our new game before too long. We’ll also be looking to our Patreon community for feedback on early builds of the game - which is a big part of the moving forward strategy. The plan is to open the studio doors, so to speak, and bake transparency into the project’s development to iterate more quickly and iron out any issues much earlier on in the process. More on that soon, too.

Until next time x

Jamin