Top down 2D shooter

Inspired by:

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Core gameplay

• 2D top-down shooter
• Asymmetric Local Co-Op
• Two robots with different abilities
• Focus on upgrade and survival mechanics
• Exchange of parts

“Two outdated robot friends are escaping scraping while being chased by various government officials”

Unique selling points

• Gradual degradation
• Robots slowly lose their functions
• Part sharing system
• You have to share parts to upgrade and repair your robot
• Dropped parts can be used by enemies
• Asymmetric gameplay
• One player is playing on keyboard, other on mouse only

Gradual Degradation

• Players gradually lose functions
• Damage results in lost functions

Parts Sharing System

• Sharing and exchange of parts necessary
• Trade functions between players

Asymmetrical gameplay

• Carl is controlled by keyboard only
• Jeremy is controlled only by mouse, and only he can swap parts between the two of them

What have we achieved

• 15+ minutes of gameplay
• 3 hand crafted story levels, with story screens in between
• Including bossfight that incorporates parts mechanics
• Endless arena mode
• Interactive tutorial
• 12 unique degradation mechanics

Tutorial

• Interactive
• Explains the parts system
• Instruction bubbles

Level 1

• 5+ minutes long
• Get from point A to B, backtrack to generators, run away

Level 2

• Survive for 5 minutes,�while fighting hordes�of enemies
• Luckily there are spare�parts around
• Enemies take a lunch�break once in a while

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Level 3

• You have only 3 minutes 26 seconds
• Kill the Boss within time limit
• Boss mechanics interact with the parts system
• He also has a second stage and bunch of minions

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Endless Arena

• Endless game mode, survive for as long as you can, with more and more enemies spawning every minute
• Used as a public alpha �for gathering feedback,�layout was later reworked

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Story screens

• Three of them
• With story and screens, obviously

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Artstyle

Marketing

• Terrible acquisition rate, marketing is hard
• Silicomrades FB Page
• Silicomrades Web Page
• FB Ad Campaign
• Several Reddit posts
• Silicomrades Public Alpha on Itch.io
• Silicomrades business cards, handed out at GDS

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Silicomrades in numbers

• 257 Trello tasks planned and completed
• 463 commits into repository
• 87 scripts, with 4930 lines of code in total (excluding blanks and comments)
• 689 asset files
• 6 dollars donation received through itch.io
• 525 page visits on itch.io
• 205 unique alpha players
• 23 hours longest hackaton - we took a nap, lead artist did not
• Jetbot animated in 90 different directions
• Net profit -266$�

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Outside the Fox Team

Jan Holan�Team Lead, Lead Designer, Programmer, Copy

Mikuláš Hrdlička�Lead Programmer, Designer, �QA, PR Manager

Štěpánka Kološová�Sound Designer, Artist, Level Designer

Jakub Eremi�Lead Artist, Animator, Level Designer

Who did what

• 128 hours tracked on Toggl
• Analytics, marketing, PR
• GDD QA
• Added most of the tweens into the game
• Programmed
• Part System
• Weapons
• AI
• Animation controllers
• Minor tweaks and bugfixes
• Level 2 objectives
• Interactive tutorial
• Part of bossfight

Mikuláš Hrdlička�Lead Programmer, Designer, �QA, PR Manager

Who did what

• 130 hours tracked on Toggl
• Team Lead
• Meetings, synchro calls, decisions, issues management, work allocation, deadlines, roadmap, morale, solving team disputes
• Lead Designer
• GDD writing, original ideas, inspiration, design consistency, keeping vision on track, copywriting
• Testing and feedback
• Programmed
• Defect system
• Health and damage systems
• Most of UI
• Most of game objectives
• Bigger half of bossfight
• Minor tweaks and bugfixes

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Jan Holan�Team Lead, Lead Designer, Programmer, Copy

Who did what

• 103 hours tracked on Toggl
• User Interface
• Briefing screens, Pause menu, Credits
• Inventory and parts system graphics
• All icons
• Marketing
• Team logo
• Business cards
• Facebook Ads
• Level design
• Cooperation with sound designers

Štěpánka Kološová�Sound Designer, Artist, �Level Designer

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Who did what

• Over 500 hours estimated
• Lead Artist
• Character design
• Story screens
• Over 50+ scenery objects
• Animator
• Two main characters and enemy fully animated
• Sparks, explosions, muzzle flash and other particles
• Level Designer
• Added scenery to levels
• Also sound designer, in his spare time

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Jakub Eremi�Lead Artist, Animator, Level Designer

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Who did what

• Pretty chill guy from Charged Monkey
• Tons of useful feedback and insight
• “Playing this is physically painful”
• “Jetbot is total asshole, nobody wants to be Jetbot”
• “Eight animation directions are more than enough”
• “Too much good”
• We are still not sure how to pronounce his surname

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Petr Strecker�Team Mentor

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Thank you for your attention!

Any questions?