The Funtastic

The Funtastic

@thefuntastic.bsky.social

Maker of games and things, namely Cadence www.thefuntastic.com

124 followers116 following70 posts

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Cadence is out now! Make music by solving circuits. It took 13 years to figure how to do this well! Beyond the puzzles: ๐Ÿˆโ€โฌ› Pet Ren, the cat! ๐Ÿ“œ Enjoy Ren's life philosophy (all text is skippable) ๐ŸŽน Use the sandbox to make music ๐Ÿงฎ Or explore turing complete contraptions

The Funtastic reposted

The Funtastic reposted

This is wonderful. A chill puzzler that at times feels like wiring up old synths, but in a manner thatโ€™s entirely approachable. Perfect fodder for fans of puzzles and/or people who like making chill audio loops. Thereโ€™s also a built-in construction kit so you can fashion your own levels and melodies

The Funtastic@thefuntastic.bsky.social

Cadence is available on: - Steam: l.madewithmonsterlove.com/wishlist - iOS: l.madewithmonsterlove.com/ios_preorder Make sure this gem doesn't pass people by. Please share or leave a review if you can - it really does help with visibility!

@eddybox.bsky.social I don't think we've ever met at any events, but just wanted to say osmos is probably one of my favourite games from the early days of the app store... Was very influential on me as a baby game dev! Also didn't realise you worked on Gibbon. A++ Execution!!

The Funtastic reposted

This is like those EDM songs with Alan Watts talks layered in I reached the end with just a few bonus levels left, mostly through trial and error and intuition. It's not a long game in that sense, and I don't have the mind for the sandbox, but it's serene, uplifting, and beautiful Do check it out

The Funtastic@thefuntastic.bsky.social

Cadence is out now! Make music by solving circuits. It took 13 years to figure how to do this well! Beyond the puzzles: ๐Ÿˆโ€โฌ› Pet Ren, the cat! ๐Ÿ“œ Enjoy Ren's life philosophy (all text is skippable) ๐ŸŽน Use the sandbox to make music ๐Ÿงฎ Or explore turing complete contraptions

Cadence is out now! Make music by solving circuits. It took 13 years to figure how to do this well! Beyond the puzzles: ๐Ÿˆโ€โฌ› Pet Ren, the cat! ๐Ÿ“œ Enjoy Ren's life philosophy (all text is skippable) ๐ŸŽน Use the sandbox to make music ๐Ÿงฎ Or explore turing complete contraptions

Me: Spends 13 years making game. Also me: Wakes up on release day to find the big RELEASE YOUR GAME button on Steam is no longer there... AFAICT, I'm "missing" an image that I've had for six years?!? Waiting for a response to my support ticket and feeling very defeated right now...

Btw this is also the exclusive premiere of the new trailer! I don't know if people still care about trailers anymore, but I gots one! Irony: the game is the best its ever been! But interest has waned to it's lowest point. Signal boosts hugely appreciated! :)

Using Unity after several years absence: I've been pleasantly surprised to find state of most things is better than I remember it. Unity's IAP Purchasing is not one of those. Message from my future self: Just use RevenueCat...

The Funtastic reposted

We're excited to announce that applications are open for the Draknek New Voices Puzzle Grant 2025 ๐ŸŽ‰ The grant will award $15,000 to five thinky puzzle game developers from all over the world, and a year's mentorship with genre veterans. Deadline: September 28th More info ๐Ÿ‘‡ grants.draknek.org

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There are now almost 60 levels! Translation: We have a video game folks! ๐ŸŽ‰ I'm hard on myself, but wouldn't be possible without features I started mucking with years ago. It's edifying to see my instincts come good - they just needed generous brain-in-the-cave immersion time to crystallise!

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More levels had always been a "later" problem. Of course, this was naive. Level design is an intricate art, later arrived and I had to confront that my programmer brain was avoiding the problem. I knew how I wanted the arc to feel, but I wasn't really sure how to execute it...

I wrestled the blank canvas so many times over the last months But one happy accident at a time, I teased out new patterns and crafted a journey that ties together so much of what only existed as ambient potential before. My favourite levels weren't designed, so much as discovered.

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Simple example: for ages Cadence couldn't competently tell you how many levels you'd completed ๐Ÿ˜… The new overworld menu now does that job well - but it's table stakes. It doesn't move the needle or make people care, but they do care if it's missing...

Crucially, Cadence just didn't have enough levels. Game length isn't a good metric for quality (Monument Valley only had 10 levels). Puzzle games especially see high drop off rates as levels get harder. But people still want to experience an arc, and end somewhere different from where they began

As I explained to a novelist friend: "You wouldn't release a book without an editor" As a reader you don't want to see spelling mistakes. As a gamer you might tolerate some bugs, but a game still needs to meet many expectations...

This is the most conceptually challenging tile in Cadence. Have been musing for years if I should even build it, and how on earth to telegraph it to users. Fitting the last piece of content is my best work to date - really happy with the polish here.

Paid Dreamhost $1000 over the last five years for a broken wordpress website because I was too lazy to port my email away from them. They rubbed salt in the wounds by making me pay an extra $20 cancellation for a "free" domain registration from over 10 years ago ๐Ÿ™„

Today I was brutally attacked by truth...

@goshki@goshki.vigeo.dev

Solo indie #gamedev sounds really cool until you find out it's 90% of the time deceiving yourself that your game is 90% complete. And that completion of the last 10% takes another 90% of the time. And another 90% is hidden in the last 1%. #indiedev

This has been a brutal leadership lesson: Explaining an idea to a room full of 15 people, and getting 15 different interpretations back. Especially when nuanced. And that was just 15, not 400! I have a lot more sympathy for the derivative nature of AAA now...

Max Nichols@maxnichols.bsky.social

Another HUGE factor is creative alignment and consensus on a large team. One of the hardest problems in big teams is getting everyone working towards a shared vision, consistently. Doing this is the job of the creative director. And it's, just, logistically very hard!

I need to get over the idea I'm only capable of "programmer art". But also pulling off something you have no rights to is pure magic... perhaps I should start believing I can't program to recapture that beginners joy? Anyway, can't close Blender, because how cute is this guy I made?!? ๐Ÿฅน

An e.g. of how mad gamedev in 2025 is: Great, look at this niche games festival full of my prospective audience... ...with 477 niche games. That's more than the entire number of games that launched on Steam in the 2013, the year I started working on Cadence. ๐Ÿชฆ

Always immensely jealous of the games Alan designs... This game builds on previous titles in a really satisfying way!

Draknek & Friends@draknek.bsky.social

The Electrifying Incident is OUT NOW on Steam and itch! Featuring the monster from A Monster's Expedition in a brand new sci-fi setting! Explore a mysterious facility, manipulate the electrical hazards and find a way to the source of the problem.

Surprised things I've forgotten about are still making ripples: 10 years ago I participated in a game jam for, of all things, the Swedish traffic department. Someone recently got in touch with me because they are still using the game for youth outreach and they want to update it