Year 2023 in Review

2023 has been a very trying year from literally Day 1. The year has been a rollercoaster. Between dealing with some cyberbullies and cyberattacks on New Year's Day and throughout the year, to the constant state of flux in the tech and game industry, this has been a year of peaks and valleys. 

We had LVLUPEXPO, Anime Gaming Expo in Fresno, So Cal Gaming Expo, and shared a booth for San Diego Comic-Con earlier this year. Instead of hauling big computers, we began experimenting setting up a few Steam Decks attached to TVs instead. It works, our setup time was cut to a fraction, and we were able to save a lot of space hauling things. For any indie game developers that are reading this for some reason, invest in Steam Deck(s), a few Docks, and turn developer mode on. It makes demonstrations at shows a lot easier to set up and tear down. This setup we were able to polish and show it at PAX West in Seattle this year. I have to give Paul, Matt and Mizore credit for holding the fort down in Seattle this year, I was not in the right mental mindset for the show this year. I hope my next experience at PAX West will be better. (Through no fault of the show itself. PAX West was a fantastic show.)

We went to GDC, while the show wasn't too great (it really had its issues this year), we learned from our last trip in 2017 and made a point to go there with an agenda and the three of us were able to accomplish that goal. We were able to confirm that Spellbearers is coming to current consoles (Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and PlayStation) because of the contacts we made at GDC. This has been a great achievement for the studio. I also have to give a special shoutout to my friend and game developer Larry Kuperman who was a big help in getting some initial conversations that led to these meetings.

Since 2019 or so I had a goal to visit the east coast and I was able to finally get that off my bucket list after several years of delays due to the pandemic. Our group of friends flew out to New York, we got yelled at on a train to Connecticut, we stayed in New Jersey and rode a ferry across the Hudson River, took the subway (against many people's suggestions), got to see a lot of NYC landmarks, got rained out in Philadelphia, and went through Delaware and Maryland on train to visit Washington DC. 

I lost my grandfather who was really like a second parent to me. I made every effort to see him on Sunday mornings whenever I was in Los Angeles and he would talk about his adventures and stories, and I would share any new adventures I went on and my successes and failures I was having. I got to meet an aunt for the first time and meet some cousins and a side of the family I never knew. My grandpa inspired me to go on adventures of my own, to make sure I know who my family is and where we came from. I'll remember those words.

Right before Thanksgiving, we released a giant patch for Selatria: Advent of the Dakk'rian Empire on Steam that enables Cloud Saving and Steam Deck compatibility for the first time. It also includes the ton of changes we've been cooking to prepare for the full release. I sound like a broken record when I talk about when the game is going to be done, but I hope that this shows that we've put a significant amount of effort into polishing the game in preparation for the full release. We'll also be putting a patch for Advent sometime in January that addresses some glaring bugs that were found over the holiday season.

In 2024, I'd like to focus a bit more on myself. I've gotten a bit too comfortable with where I'm at and I feel I'm falling behind, even if I might not be. A friend mentioned that I have a "grind mindset", but I don't really know what I'm working towards. I spent a lot of 2023 fighting smaller battles and not enough time looking at the bigger picture. Spending more time trying to stay afloat, looking for immediate projects without getting the necessary skillsets to be able to get out of that situation entirely or fighting social media algorithms to try and get our games noticed without properly delegating it to someone or team that can handle it. It's a lack of self-fulfillment. Some in my circle have suggested settling down in one location, or finding a significant other and/or starting a family, or simply switching jobs and getting more money, but I don't believe any of these will solve the underlying problem.

I'm looking forward to taking some leaps and risks into the unknown. To learn that new game engine, to overcome anxiety and set up conversations with those publishers, to bring old projects to the finish line, to ask for help when it's needed, and consider new and alternative opportunities. To continue to travel to new places. Time to embrace the growth mindset. 

I'm glad to see 2023 come to a close. I don't know what trials 2024 will bring, it really is filled with question marks as of this blog entry, but I hope to find some personal fulfillment out of it. 

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Selatria Release Date Window (No, Really)

 Selatria (Full Version) is going to be released in mid-April 2024 for Steam and Steam Deck.

We will have a playable demo and steam codes available for sale at next years LVLUPEXPO in Las Vegas in April and SoCal Gaming Expo in Pasadena in June. A big shoutout to our team for hanging in there all this time. There's an ongoing joke between the team that I announced it way too early for August 2012, and I wanted to not repeat that mistake. We're wrapping up loose ends and side stories now, and using this time to get in a lot of testing done.

We are likely going to keep this a Steam-only release right now, if you see a game page for Selatria direct to some kind of .exe download that's not on Steam, it's not legitimate as of this posting.

All in all, I'm excited to bring this 13 year development journey to an end and looking forward to what's next.

(And we still beat Duke Nukem Forever)

Whim Independent Studios - Development Log #72

Here is our 72nd update with what's going on at Whim Indie! We’re currently at the PAX West convention in Seattle and have some new information to share. By the way, if you're at PAX West, come and visit us this weekend at Booth 3118 (or Booth 3218 if looking at the PAX West map, all roads lead to Rome.)

- Spellbearers Switch Port and new Steam Pricing

Fresh off PAX West, we’re happy to announce that the Nintendo Switch version of Spellbearers is officially in development! We’ve been working on this port throughout the past few months, and we’re excited to be working on our studio’s first console game. Other consoles including PlayStation and Xbox will be coming in the future as well.

We’ll have more to share about the Nintendo Switch version of Spellbearers in the coming months so please keep an eye on future updates.

We’ve also permanently decreased the price of Spellbearers down to $9.99* (USD), so there’s never a better time to give the game a play. We would really appreciate reviews for Spellbearers (good or bad), please let us know what you think.

*Note that the price may vary in different regions/currencies. -

Selatria: Advent of the Dakk’rian Empire - Version 1.90 Patch

Originally we were planning on putting the final patch of Selatria: Advent of the Dakk’rian Empire on August 25th, but we hit some performance snags. Jon was able to fix these issues, and we’re going to delay the release to September 15th so we have some time after Labor Day to give it a final playthrough and make sure everything still works and is compatible.

This patch will finally make the game compatible with Steam Deck so that the game can be enjoyed on the go for the first time. This patch will also set the foundation so that files can be carried over to Selatria: Full Version with minimal issue.

We really appreciate your continued support and positive feedback on Selatria. Thank you so much and we’ll work on applying this feedback to the second half of the game.

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Return of the “On a Whim!” Podcast! - Season 4 now Recording!

We have begun recording episodes for the On a Whim! Podcast. Season 4 is going to be a bit different as we’re recording episodes a decent time in advance as opposed to the week of or the week before to account for our various schedules so we can keep a consistent schedule of episodic releases.

We also have a brand new logo for the “On a Whim!” podcast, created by Jessica M. Jacuinde as well as a revamped music package done by award-winning indie game composer Chase Bethea.

We’re putting a lot of effort into making Season 4 the best season it can be with more guests and insights into the studio. We also do live recordings on our Discord and the audience is welcomed to participate and chat with us as we record our episodes. A great chance for Q&A with the hosts and guests in the show. 

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Screen Smash - “Is it Worth It?”

I was a guest on a recent episode of Screen Smash where I talked with the hosts about pricing of indie games and how Vampire Survivors affected Spellbearers and our future games. Please have a watch!

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That’s it for this development log!

Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, and join our Discord! 

Purchase Spellbearers on Steam!

Listen to the "On a Whim!" Podcast

Follow whimindie on itch.io
Wishlist Selatria - Full Version on Steam

Subscribe to our Marketing Newsletter!

Remembering My Grandfather

Remembering my grandfather - Husband, Father, Grandfather, Great-Grandfather, Great-Great Grandfather, WW2 navy veteran, electrician, worked for the newspaper in downtown LA, raised a great family. He told me he always wanted us to know our history and make sure we kept in touch with one another.

I was grateful to hear his stories, about our family history, and your words. He was a fighter until the very end and i hope to keep the family history alive for future generations so they can hear and pass on your stories to future generations.

When no one really believed in me or the studio, he would be the one to always tell me that we were gonna make it, that we were going to be successful. I did whatever I cold almost every Sunday morning that I was in California to make it out to see him, no matter how tired I was. 

The world lost a Grover today, and I love and miss you grandpa.

Rest in Peace: Grover C Wimberly, Jr. - February 12, 1928-September 1, 2023

Whim Independent Studios - Development Log #71

Happy May!

Here is our 71st update with what's going on at whimindie! This one is going to be a bit more Selatria focused, but also have some information on Spellbearers updates and upcoming conventions. 

Selatria

We will be pushing one more final update to Selatria: Advent of the Dakk'rian Empire on Steam. This will be considered Version 1.9x (where as the Full Version will be 2.x) - Version 1.9x will roll-in the hundreds of changes and improvements we've put into the upcoming full release. Although this includes a lot of gameplay changes and several bug fixes, the biggest change is that we're aiming for all versions of Selatria to be compatible with the Steam Deck, and this will set the foundation for that. 

Though Selatria: Advent of the Dakk'rian Empire will continue to not have Steam Achievements, save files that are carried forward to the Full Version will have achievements that are mostly retroactive. If you completed Chapter 3, they will all trigger/check upon finishing the first cutscene in Chapter 4.

Shadoe has also worked to re-record and edit the soundtrack to be compatible with Steam Deck, and we're now working on improving the performance on the Overworld so that it doesn't slow down on the Deck as much. 

Selatria running on Steam Deck - Overworld Test Map

The Overworld is the biggest problem with the Deck at the moment. As you can see in the above screenshot, it's running at 60 FPS, but only after we stripped out all of the events and even the clouds from the area. So we're going to try our reworks and make adjustments in pieces to see if we can have a similar experience to the Desktop version. 

There's also some other pain points that we still need to fix and adjust for a smooth experience. We are aiming for a late-Spring or early-Summer release. This may be adjusted due to several other high-profile games coming out.

As for the full game, work is continuing on the final chapter of Selatria. Most of the cutscene work and boss battle designs are completed, it is quite an uphill battle tying the different sections of the game together. Jessi, who worked on our trailers for our previous games, has begun work on the trailer for the final game, and hopefully we can show that soon.

Spellbearers

We heard your feedback, and we're planning on adding mouse support to Spellbearers! The mouse will act as a cursor for what direction the Spellbearer can shoot in. It can also be used to click options on the menu. We also plan to have it compatible with touch screens such as on the Steam Deck.

However, we're also working on updating the whole project to an LTS version of Unity so we can continue to provide stable updates for the game moving forward, so I will have to ask to wait on this feature a little longer. Sorry about that!

GDC 2023 Retrospective

This is the first development log entry since our time at GDC. I have a lot of mixed good and bad emotions to say about GDC. It has been 5 or 6 years since we last attended. The first time, we didn't know what to expect, didn't have any games released or to show, to be honest, feeling like it was a waste of time. 

This year, however, we went in with a battle plan and got a lot out of it. We were able to have meetings and get contacts with the teams at Xbox and PlayStation, so things seem quite promising on the console fronts. Hope to share more concrete news soon. Some pictures below...

After meeting the ID@Xbox team, they gave us ID@Xbox boards. (Note the year! Eerie.)

Mizore and I meeting Tim Sweeney - Founder/CEO of Epic Games

Stopping by PlayStation HQ on the way home... for good luck

Though GDC went well for us as a studio, the overall show had very big problems. Especially with attendees who were drugged, harassed, and assaulted at the convention or GDC related after parties. This isn't what the game industry should be about. I am wary about going next year or taking any team members next year. I was already concerned about our team members when we split up to do different activities. Conventions (and associated after parties/dinners/etc) like this should be safe for all.


So Cal Retro Gaming Expo 2023

We will be demonstrating Spellbearers, Selatria, and Star Rider at So Cal Retro Gaming Expo in Ontario, California this upcoming weekend May 6-7, 2023. We're taking time to improve our newest game Delivery Issues using feedback we received from LVLUPEXPO and it will not be at this show. We hope to share more news about that game in the future.

Buy tickets for So Cal Retro Gaming Expo here

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Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, and join our Discord! Hope to see you at So Cal Retro Gaming Expo!

Purchase Spellbearers on Steam!

Listen to the "On a Whim!" Podcast
Follow whimindie on itch.io Wishlist Selatria - Full Version on Steam

Whim Independent Studios - Development Log #70

Hey all, it's been a little while since the last development log, and I wanted to talk about some updates going on with whimindie for this year. This update is going to be a bit more text heavy than demonstration so thank you for reading this.

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Addressing the 2023 New Year's Day Cyberattack

As some of you may have seen and heard, I fell victim to a cyberattack on New Year's Day. After doing some travelling during the holidays and not getting much sleep (and not thinking clearly), I received a message from someone who I thought was trying to get their game up to a point to where they could pitch it to our studio. Little did I know that I was going to be the target of a cookie stealer Discord scam which used my personal login information on my computer to troll my Facebook and LinkedIn accounts, attack several other accounts (including Amazon and Reddit), and have them take control of our itch.io developer account. 

For three weeks, they turned our itch.io account into "Wyntale" and uploaded versions of our games that contained malware and other viruses, using the same method that compromised me. After working with the itch.io Support Team, we were able to restore our account on Thursday, January 26th, and we rebuilt all of our pages and content and put our games back online on Saturday, January 28th.

We have taken measures to protect our studio accounts so that we can collaborate on updating our game pages in a way where 2FA-methods can remain enabled and we will no longer be accepting new game pitches/demos in a way we have done before nor will we allow play my game downloads on our Discord or through DMs. 

If you're reading this and have visited or downloaded anything from "Wyntale Independent Studios" or "wyntale.itch.io" during the period of January 1-26, 2023 I recommend to please clear all of your cookies on all of your internet browsers, delete any installed programs that look suspicious, and run your antivirus programs and rkill to stop anything weird that may be running in the background. 

We have also upped the requirements of new people joining our Discord that they must have a verified account with a phone number and unable to interact for 10 minutes so that we can evaluate those who come in and out of the channel. Furthermore, legacy members who have been sitting unverified on the server and haven't agreed to the rules of the Discord will be removed from the Discord on February 1st, 2023. 

Thank you for your continued support and this is a situation that we will make sure will not happen again.

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Updates to Selatria

This is finally the year that we're working to complete Selatria. We're bringing a lot of hands on deck from our other projects to be able to finish cutscenes, dungeons, battle adjustments, and generally tie things together for the final game. We also made a handful of adjustments to the core game to make it Steam Deck compatible. 

This Spring, we're going to be pushing out one final update to Selatria: Advent of the Dakk'rian Empire to update it with all of the features that we've developed for the final game and to finally give it some much needed compatibility with the Steam Deck. A shoutout to Shadoe and Jon for making all of the conversions required to get it playable. We still need to figure out a handful of bugs, so please wait a little bit longer if you own the game and have been trying to play it on go with the Steam Deck. 

With Selatria: Full Version we will have a simultaneous launch for PC and Steam Deck so you can play on the go/docked or at your computer. We're aiming for the second half of the year for the full version and hopefully we have more details and updated assets to share soon. 

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Upcoming Conventions!

This upcoming weekend, we will be making an appearance at Anime Gaming Expo in Fresno showing and selling Steam codes for Spellbearers! 

We also have plans to show Spellbearers and Selatria at our return to LVLUPEXPO in Las Vegas in mid-February, So Cal Retro Gaming Expo in early May, and at a special shared booth at San Diego Comic-Con in July! 

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Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, and join our Discord! See you soon at Anime Gaming Expo in Fresno and LVLUPEXPO in Las Vegas! It's good to be back.

Purchase Spellbearers on Steam!

Listen to the "On a Whim!" Podcast
Follow whimindie on itch.io Wishlist Selatria - Full Version on Steam Wishlist Corpse Castle on Steam

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Post-Release Depression and POC in Game Industry

I'm going through a post-release depression atm after Spellbearers. I try not to use that term lightly, but a lot of symptoms are there. I'm tired, irritable, sad, lethargic, and have lacked the drive and motivation I usually do to keep things moving on over the past few weeks. 

Even with Spellbearers being successfully Kickstarted, we used a lot of personal funds to make sure the project kept going and didn't become another Kickstarter failure as well as keep as much of the team together as we could during uncertain COVID times.

The typical advice I've received should have me glad I released the game. "You're farther than the x% of devs who didn't finish. Good job!", but at the same time I feel like I've wanted out after seeing how poorly the game has turned out to be financially.

It has had me consider really just looking at it and stopping and exiting while I could. I think it's the burnout speaking, but I needed some time to focus on repairing the damage to my savings/bank account to save the Spellbearers project. Selatria also needs to be finished.

Seeing today's news about Yoshi-P and POC was a good wake-up call on why I need to keep trying to make games. Yoshida is my favorite game developer and idol and it's heartbreaking to see his words come off like a politician in regards to Final Fantasy XVI. I would have liked to see this as a template to create more people of color. They could implement a character randomizer using their own implemented tools for XVI characters instead of having the generical look.

I also want to say I'm very thankful for the \team at whimindie to keep things positive and moving along with our games while I've been mainly offline to collect my thoughts while I've been in this funk. Please give Spellbearers a play. Thanks for reading.