Interview No. 186
Interview By: @The-Great-One
Patreon Post Date: August 23, 2023
Today's guest is one of the most dynamic game creators on the site. From taking the shooter genre to new levels, with titles All-in-Gun, Dynacore, and Pain Reaction, which would win the Daily Feature. To redefining the platformer genre with Wall Clip, which would win him a Daily 2nd Place, The Right Turn, which would win him a Daily 3rd Place, and Fruity Tower, which would not only win him Daily 4th Place, but would be the highlighted feature on the Frontpage. This is just a small taste of the variety that our guest offers. I am pleased to welcome, @Prox276.
Q: We begin at the beginning. You were born on April 26th in Germany. What part of Germany do you come from?
A: That's true. I've spend most of my life in Lower Saxony, its more quiet parts at that. Nothing too exciting but I hope to escape to a big city when I go to university to study computer science. There isn't all that much to do and most people come here to retire, so yeah, not exactly silicon valley.
Q: What do your parents do for a living?
A: My mother works as a cashier full-time and my father is a former truck driver who is currently on unemployment benefits due to medical reasons. We've never had much money but it's enough to make ends meet.
Q: What was the first video game you ever played? How has the experience shaped you as a game developer?
A: I don't remember the exact first game I ever played, ironically enough I think it was probably some flash game that originated on Newgrounds because that's the type of game I was playing non-stop at the time. Like with many others it made me value creativity, individualism and dark humor. I think you can see that shine through in some of my newer games.
Q: How and when did you become interested in game development?
A: Video games have been an integral part of my childhood I always wanted to express my ideas through this interactive medium but for the longest time I lacked the skill, willpower and/or tools to learn how to make games. I've probably spent hundreds of hours in Little Big Planet and Super Mario Bros. X as a kid, using the built-in tools to create my own games, which I'm guessing is was what sparked this fascination at first. Around the age of eleven I began to dabble in various game engines but I never followed through with actually making a game since I initially found the learning process tedious and frustrating. What kickstarted my gamedev adventure was 2kliksphilip's "The Game Making Journey" series, which made the game development process seem a lot less intimidating.
Instead of the hyperpolished console games I came to expect it showed something way more achievable for thirteen year old me. I installed Clickteam Fusion 2.5 the same day and made my first game; Blob's Adventure, a very simple platformer looking back but still a start!
Q: How did you find Newgrounds and why did you join?
A: At first I was just looking for another platform to publish my games on to gain some recognition I wasn't getting from itch.io alone, but I quickly found a sprawling community of very talented creators and excited players alike. Since then the Newgrounds release of my games has risen from "just upload it and see what happens" to top priority for me. Updates always release first on NG and I try to add medals and other API Integration where possible. Overall I cannot thank the community enough, it's safe to say that I wouldn't be where I am now if it weren't for their feedback and encouraging words! I'm still surprised I blew up the way I did on here!
Q: Your first game on Newgrounds would be something I have never seen before on the site. All-in-Gun. Where did the idea for this come from? Looking back on it with what you know now, what would you do differently?
A: I took part in the GMTK Game Jam 2019. The theme was "only one" and I created a top-down shooter called "Upgraded". Shortly after I took the theme and decided to create a new game with it on my own terms. The result was "All-in-Gun", a game where everything is controlled using only one input. It was the very first game I ever uploaded to Newgrounds, which is why it is still a huge milestone for me. It has held up remarkably well but I still think that it is a huge mess on a technical level and it has a lot of flaws in it's design. To put it harshly the artstyle incoherent and uninteresting and the game has pacing problems with a lot of levels feeling like a tedious and frustrating test of precision rather than the high-speed action game I wanted to create, so I would definitely work on those two aspects.
Q: An inventive concept of not only the platformer, but the changing platformer is The Right Turn. Playing SHIFT here on the site and seeing how the game changes by simply modifying the level. This is a flipped version of it. Was the platforming aspect built first then the turning added or was the turning aspect thought of first? How did you pull these two things together into a game?
A: The game was designed around the turning mechanic from the start. I just followed my intuition concerning how a game like this would work in real life. The spring at the bottom, which you use for jumping, was inspired by the way you launch a ball in a game of pinball and mechanics such as flipping the box to flip gravity came naturally through that way of thinking.
Q: I want to know about Dynacore. How did @TomFulp inspire it? This is one of the biggest games you have made. When did this project begin? When was it complete? What hurdles did you overcome when making it?
A: Dynacore is by far the biggest game I've ever made, and even that would be an understatement. It took two years start to finish, starting development in September of 2020 and releasing in August of 2022, although it was supposed to release in late 2020. At first it was nothing more than a short game for a school assignment but it quickly ballooned out of control. My previous games were more primitive so there were a lot of hurdles, mostly in technical and design related aspects. The dungeon generation for instance took many iterations, some of them late in development when I had to painfully rework it to work with the existing code. I definitely bit off more than I could chew so Dynacore ended up taking much longer than it had to, but hey, that's the cost of learning! I've made a video on my YouTube channel where I talk about Dynacore's development in a bit more depth, so you can feel free to check that out if you wanna know more!
Q: Fruity Tower has been your latest game. It would not only grace the Frontpage, but Tom would showcase it as well. Was this game in production at the same time as Dynacore or did it come after its completion? Where did the idea for Fruity Tower come from?
A: Fruity Tower was a submission for the Juice Jam II, a game jam me and a few moderators from our game development discord server "Game Dev Bois" hosted, so it was in production well after Dynacore was released. The theme was "Paying the Price", which I struggled with for a while before I came with the idea of fruity tower, partially
inspired by Minecraft funnily enough. I always found the simple mechanic of losing all your items on death fun. You could choose to play it safe and return to your base to store and use all the loot you found, or you could venture further into unexplored territory, risking everything for more items. I tried to imitate this risk/reward dynamic in fruity tower by letting the player choose how far they go in each run before "chickening-out".
Q: You have genre hopped here and there throughout your development history. I would say that you have perfected the Shooter Genre of games in multiple styles. Each game though doesn't feel the same. How are you able to adapt this genre into these styles so naturally?
A: That's a good question. I feel like the top-down shooter genre in its most basic form is so simple that it can be adapted to fit many different styles. Even just changing the player speed, acceleration or bullet velocity goes a long way in changing the feel of a game, so it's kind of a blank slate for any type of project. Apart from that presentation plays a large part as well; I believe in substance through style. The visuals and music of a game influence the way a game is played and perceived more than many realize. Just attaching even a simple story and world to a game is enough to make the game flow naturally.
Q: What are the key differences between game programming and game designing?
A: Game design is more about crafting every aspect of a game to fit an idea. You can change a game's design by adjusting many different aspects such as visuals and sound, with code being just one of the tools of game design. A good programmer isn't necessarily a good game developer because like any tool code can be underutelized, overused and misused (like for example adding mechanics that are technically impressive but don't make the game any more fun) and knowing when and how to use it to create a good game is what makes a great game developer.
Q: For new game developers coming to the site, what advice do you have to give to them?
A: Have fun with it! Experiment! Push the boundaries! Don't look at ratings or views, just make the stuff you want to make and everything else will come sooner or later! If your game doesn't excite you it won't excite anybody else. For the longest time I created the games I thought I "should be making" but once I dropped that notion the whole process became much more fun, fulfilling and personal.
Q: You're also a musician here on the site, making music for your own games and releasing your own albums. How and when did you become interested in music?
A: It actually happened pretty recently and very suddenly. As a solo game developer I was forced to learn how to compose and produce music, but I later found out that it was one of the most enjoyable processes of game development for me. Something about making music was just the quickest path to get into "the zone" for me. Since then I've picked up alto saxophone, electric guitar and bass and it's been a big source of inspiration for me that doesn't seem to be stopping anytime soon.
Q: What is, in your opinion, the definition of video games?
A: I'm gonna sound a bit full of myself but bear with me. I think it's important to look at a game as an experience first. It's not an interactive movie, but something that transcends the sum of its parts. The screen you play it on, the controller you use the control the character, the game itself, it all forms an experience.
Q: What can we expect from Prox276 in the future?
A: I am currently working on a chiptune EP in the same vain as my previous album "Cat Issues" called "Melochromatic", I'm aiming for a release this year but with finals approaching school has got me busier than ever. I've also started getting more comfortable in Godot and I've set myself the goal to start working on my first commercial game before 2024. I don't wanna promise anything because I'm still looking for the "perfect concept" to fill out my unreasonably high expectations but it's probably going to be more story-oriented, perhaps more linear than something like Dynacore.
We now come to the questionnaire invented by French talk show host Bernard Pivot, and adapted by my idol James Lipton.
Q: What's your favorite word?
A: Kraftfahrzeug-Haftpflichtversicherung
Q: What is your least favorite word?
A: Queue, sorry but there's no way that's pronounced as "Q".
Q: What turns you on?
A: The On-Button.
Q: What turns you off?
A: When they don't tip the waiter.
Q: What sound or noise do you love?
A: The sounds of rain at night.
Q: What sound or noise do you hate?
A: The sound of a fly buzzing.
Q: What's your favorite curse word?
A: пиздец, I live in a Russian household so I hear it a lot. It has a lot of meanings but often just means "Shit".
Q: What job or profession would you most like to take rather than your own?
A: Independent Indie Developer
Q: What job or profession would you least like to take?
A: Waiter
Q: If Heaven exists, what would you like God to say to you when you arrive at the pearly gates?
A: Kraftfahrzeug-Haftpflichtversicherung
Prox276 has the ability to take one game genre and adapt it into a variety of games. These are games which you have certainly played with similar controls. Not in the similar fashion though. He finds a way to perfectly marry game design and development in a way some designers and developers can't. His creativity and insight are remarkable. No two game feels alike. If you haven't played any of Prox276's games, you're doing yourself a great disservice.
The Interviewer is a part of Dohn's Desk Productions
[ SUPPORT ON PATREON | SUPPORT NEWGROUNDS ]
