Ben Lochmann

Ben Lochmann

@blochmann.bsky.social

CEO Pixel Maniacs - Working on ChromaGun 2: Dye Hard

373 followers793 following135 posts

Ben Lochmann reposted

Thanks for your visit, Digital Minister of Bavaria, Dr. Fabian Mehring, Member of the Bavarian Parliament Jochen Kohler and City Council Sabine Sendner! Was a lot of fun showing you our office and showing, what we are working on in Nuremberg! 😍 Photos (c) Bavarian State Ministry for Digital Affairs

Ben Lochmann reposted

Tavernkeepers, this is the moment you've all been waiting for... Tavern Talk Stories: Dreamwalker is now out on all platforms! ✨🐝 🥹 Head over to Steam or the Nintendo eShop and dive into the wondrous world of Asteria. The Drowsy Dragon is waiting for you! youtu.be/4Wq9naaoGdU?...

youtu.beTavern Talk Stories: Dreamwalker - Launch TrailerTavernkeepers, this is the moment you've all been waiting for... Tavern Talk Stories: Dreamwalker is now out on all platforms! Head over to Steam or the Nintendo eShop and dive into the wondrous…

It's Always Happy at Chubby's (our next game) Kickoff fast food restaurant visit! (The game takes place in a fast food restaurant). The prototype phase of the game has started now. I'm really looking forward to this one! 🍔

Ben Lochmann reposted

Indie Outpost Nuremberg on May 4th at 6pm! 🥳 New location: großer Saal inside the KunstKulturQuartier! - Lucas Pöthe (Blossom Path Games) will talk about their game "Valkyrie Rising: Hordes of Ragnarök" - Josephine Dransfeld from toy manufacturer Heunec talks about merchandise production

Ben Lochmann reposted

.@szde.bsky.social writes about our game (translated): 𝘗𝘪𝘹𝘦𝘭 𝘔𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘢𝘤𝘴 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘕𝘶𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳𝘨 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥 "𝘊𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘮𝘢𝘎𝘶𝘯 2" 𝘢𝘴 𝘢 𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘪𝘹 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 "𝘗𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘭" 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘉𝘰𝘣 𝘙𝘰𝘴𝘴.

Welcome, Limpho Moeti! Limpho is our 1st employee outside of DE, working from South Africa 😍 She is supporting us with our influencer marketing tool as a BizDev. Limpho has deep knowledge about BizDev and gamedev. She's also Chair of the @igda.org! 🤯 I'm really looking forward to working with you!

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Also, huge thanks to PM Studios for being supportive all the time and trusting us as a team in this, to our families, friends, and industry colleagues, who have been very supportive during this long time.

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- 12 February 2025: Release of the game on all platforms! Thanks to everybody for the ongoing support on this project. You really need a long breath to launch a video game from start to finish 😅

This would not have been possible without the support of all the public funding (big shoutout to the FFF Bavaria & the digital ministry of Bavaria, to the German games funding, and the German Aerospace Center, which is handling those fundings!).

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We never had a publisher before and only had experience with self-publishing games. We built a vertical slice that was highly targeted for publishers and even sent out custom builds per publisher, so that we could mention them in an easter egg within the 5-min demo. After maaaany calls and pitches:

- Jan 2022 (that is 4 years ago 🤯), we started working on the concept of ChromaGun 2: Dye Hard, with support of the fantastic Bavarian games funding program of the FFF Bavaria - March 2022 - August 2023: Working on a polished vertical slice, with the goal of finding a publisher for the game.

Ben Lochmann reposted

In total, we worked 23.736 hours on ChomaGun 2: Dye Hard. Here is an overview of how much each employee with a general contract of >20 h/week contributed to developing our game in the span of four years. On top of that we worked with interns, part time employees and freelancers.

We have implemented 10 workdays of charity leave per employee, per year! 💃 I got the idea after we started building consoles and PCs for the children's home in Nuremberg.

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To give our employees the same opportunity, we’ve implemented a 10-day annual cap for charity work, covered by the company and tracked separately to remain compliant with funding regulations. The definition of "charity" is entirely up to the employee.

Disclaimer: We may need to adjust this annual cap depending on the company's situation and how much the team utilizes it, as this is a significant investment for a small indie dev.

We have implemented 10 workdays of charity leave per employee, per year! 💃 I got the idea after we started building consoles and PCs for the children's home in Nuremberg.

I realized that in my position as CEO, my pay isn't strictly dependent on my hours - an advantage when doing things like occasional charity work, as I don't have to worry about hitting a specific hour count for my next paycheck.

Ben Lochmann reposted

She prayed to God for her cat. The answer… Well. Not quite as expected. WIP our trailer (●'◡'●) #indiegamedevelopers #indiedev #indiegame #roguelite #インディーゲーム

Welcome to the office, @mimustudio.bsky.social! One year after starting their Nuremberg-based company, Mimu UG, Sumunthana (Ploi) and Watcharid (Alfie) have finally gotten their self-employment visa and moved from Bangkok to Nuremberg to start a new life here. Looking forward to working with you!