mokagachas

[mokagachas]

im sure it'll be fine!

CONTEXT: pt1 / pt2 / pt3 / pt4 / pt5 / pt6 / pt7 / pt8 / pt9 / pt10 / pt11 / pt12 / pt13 / pt14 / pt15 / pt16 / pt17

[mokagachas]

happy springtime allergies! 🌸

The flowers at this time of year are so lovely! sniff sniff sniff… They’re pretty enough that I’m THIS close to forgetting the pollen up my nose. So it goes. Regardless of springtime allergies or not, it’s Snoozy Devpost time!

If this is your first time seeing us, hey! We’re Snoozy Kazoo, a game dev studio of six guys who make dumb, silly, and fun games. We made the Turnip Boy games, and we’re currently in the midst of working on our latest game, Hobnobbers!

This month, we're getting into our task management workflow to help all you fellow indie devs out there!

What's Snoozy been up to?

Ah…! We’re so, so close to being able to announce something really exciting…! But you have to forgive me. I can’t say anything yet. Keep your eyes peeled — there’s going to be a LOT of exciting Snoozy News™️ come May. Even if I can’t say the big deets yet, I can at least drop this link right overrr here for you merch heads out there…

Cool Makeship Link 👀

Buuuut since we can’t talk about our projects, let’s talk about the next best thing: Project Management! This past month, Snoozy switched from our old task-tracking system to a new system called Codecks. Imagine if you could track your project progress with a deck-building roguelike, and that’s what Codecks is! It’s a nifty little tool specifically made for Indie Game Developers, which we just happen to be.

And to clear the air: no, we are not sponsored in any way by Codecks. Though if Codecks is reading this — we’d totally love to be!

We wanted to share how this system has been working for us, so any aspiring indie devs out there can see if this system is appealing to them and potentially benefit from it!

How it works

What’s made Codecks click for us is how it blends structure with playfulness. It doesn’t just let you organize your work — it encourages you to think about it in terms of clear progress paths, visual layouts, and deck-building metaphors.

We kept falling off of our past task systems because jugging a game’s worth of art, code, design, writing, marketing, and bug-fixing while ALSO needing to come up with constantly updating organization methods is. Hard. Codecks simplifies that process!

Codecks organizes itself into Cards, Decks, and Projects. Cards are tasks (like “Animate a Hob’s death!”), Decks are chunks (animating a Hob would go in our ‘Art’ Deck, but you could split it up further into a ‘3D Animation’ deck while also having a ‘3D Modeling’ Deck), and Projects are, well, projects! (‘Hobnobbers’ is, well, our project!)

What we like

Myyy personal favorite bit of Codecks is how it handles Conversations. Conversations can be had on any card, which makes it really easy to find discussions and notes on particular topics. In the past, we’ve used Discord to talk about ideas, critiques, and problems as they’ve come up. When notes are discussed quickly, they don’t necessarily quality for opening up the whole task itself, which has made remembering clarifications like “Wait, what resolution did this sprite need to be, again?” as simple as pulling up its relevant card.

Other people on the team love the ‘Required Effort’ settings, which allow you to set an amount of effort for each card and then see how much total effort a single person has. Basically, all of us adore the fact that you can use Markdown (which I, Yukon, am currently converting this post into for the Snoozy website haha). There are just a ton of little quality of life features that really feel like this tool was made by indie devs, for indie devs, and it’s really smooth to use!

But I’m just a little guy. Just a Small Man. With Few Dollars?

Codecks is free for up to 5 users on a team! If you’re a solo developer working on a project in your spare time, it’s probably more than suitable for you.

Aaaand that was our non-sponsored shilling of this tool we really like! There’s only so much we can say without going too into the weeds of it, but we hope that giving you a peep into our processes helped you out!

Team Corner!

It’s back a second time! Almost like it’s always going to be here!

This week we’ve got… badadadum, Jake! Our musician and developer!

What are you most excited for in Hobnobbers?

I’m most excited for the physics. Some of my favorite games have really robust physics simulations like Gang Beasts, Motor Town, and BeamNG.drive. I love sandbox games that have fun and unexpected environments to explore in a tactile way.

What’s something you’ve worked on in Hobnobbers recently that you’ve found particularly frustrating?

Audio Volumes and spatialization. In a 3D game, each space needs to sound different, and sometimes dialing that in just right can be a pain. Large open rooms and tiny little tunnels sound different in real life, and they will do the same in Hobnobbers, after lots of tweaking and iteration. Coming from 2D development, this literally opens up a whole new dimension of sound design.

What kinds of feelings do you hope for the Hobnobbers’ music to bring about?

I really want to mix dreamlike folktale and plastic consumerism. I am super inspired by I spy books, grimms fairytales, folk/americana music, and toy instruments for the Hobnobbers musical palette, and the music comes very naturally when the inspirations are so vivid. A lot of Hobnobbers is about simulating something tactile and physical in a digital space, and I hope to channel that into the music.

Yay! Thank you for your time!

Andddd we’re all wrapped up!

As a reminder, feel free to send in questions for us to answer right here on our Tumblr, or join our Discord and ask questions in the “ask-the-devs-❓” channel!

Keep your eyes peeled for this upcoming month in particular — we’ve got a lot of cool announcements coming up!

As per Devposts, see you next month!!

[mokagachas]

im a mess and behind on everything and world is scary right now but. hundred lines coming out today and its about to be my whole personality

[mokagachas]

genuinely "the best starter VN is the one you're the most interested in" is the best advice there is on the topic. like i even recommend checking out indie OELVNs on itchio and stuff to look for specific niches of subject matter you're into if you just want to see how you vibe with the medium, you don't have to start with the classics if they don't appeal to you and if you DO want to get into the ones that are big in western otakudom it's still a good idea to start with one that's in step with your existing fiction interests

genuinely the only things i'd actively advise against for starter VNs if you're actually interested in getting into the medium for real are "parodies"/"subversions" made out of contempt for "dating sims", if nothing else please start with something earnest and true

[mokagachas]

if i was a smarter man id have planned to do some arknights charm POs for the anni but i decided to do it post my con in june. Well

[mokagachas]

*flirting with an older man* when i was born you had already attempted suicide once

[mokagachas]

do we fw them

[mokagachas]

In all seriousness Jv, how much is Tumblrcom worth now? IIs it too big for us users to band together to buy it? Or would the running of the website be too difficult.

No web experience here, just a Tumblrina wishing we could pull rescue here.

I've talked about this in the past... the problem is not how much would it take for Automattic to sell the site, the problem is the operating costs. Even if you get it for free, you need several millions per month just to pay the infrastructure of the site. Running tumblr for month, without even paying salaries, costs more than what AO3 makes in donations in an entire year. It's not "let's get the money together and buy it!" it's "let's get the money together... every single month, forever", which I don't think can't really work.

[mokagachas]

sometimes u find out your life affected others in ways u cld never imagine and lifes worth living again . Softsmile

[mokagachas]

when kasane teto sang rot for clout i felt that in my heart and soul

[mokagachas]

mario kart world is 80 usd digital and probably 90 usd physical like should i just explode

[mokagachas]

"there is only one woman on my fave list" so far. Shooting E at Volo with a blowgun.

happy tdov!

[mokagachas]

idk if ill ever go past sketch but wanted to do some lighthearted doodles

[mokagachas]

(truthless recluse voice) im crashing out!!1!!1!!

[mokagachas]

suicide postponed they remembered my girl exists

[mokagachas]

alrighty thats enough ( low polys your mostima )

[mokagachas]

merry ides of march devpost!

Ahhh, it’s that time of year again; another lap around the sun and another day closer to the Ides of March, the day that Julius Caesar got skewered through by his beloved friends! Sweet, sweet memories… But no matter! It’s Snoozy Devpost time!

If this is your first time seeing us, hey! We’re Snoozy Kazoo, a game dev studio of six guys who make dumb, silly, and fun games. We made the Turnip Boy games, and we’re currently in the midst of our latest release: Hobnobbers!

This month, we'll be getting into how we concept our characters!

What's Snoozy been up to?

A lot we can’t talk about, actually, but a lot of behind the scenes work as we’ve been nailing down various elements on Hobnobbers! Part of this work has manifested itself in, of course, Hobnobbers art style!

As with any game- or visual project, really- it’s important to spend time on concepting ideas and styles, so that the project has a strong foundation. Hobnobbers is no exception, and our lovely Creative Director, Jen, has come up with a workflow to ensure this works out!

We’ll be introducing a new character to convey this idea: the Gacha Goose! The host of one of our in-game shops, the Goose is an intimidating bird that controls a puppet girl.

(Note: Despite the name ‘Gacha Goose’, there will be no microtransactions in Hobnobbers! Fret not!)

The Process

Concepting is broken down into 6 phases:

Outlining the goal

Research

Sketch

Feedback

Refinement

Finishing

Outlining the goal is a process of figuring out what we want the design to be. In terms of utility: is this character an early-stage boss that is meant to introduce the character to the whimsy of a game’s world? Are they a shop-keeper? An intimidating mob enemy that can kill you in one hit? In addition, what sort of feelings do we want this character to invoke? For the Gacha Goose, we wanted the player to despise the Goose and feel pity for the girl. What specific vibes would help convey these emotions?

Taking the time to write down your goals before starting to draw can set a strong foundation that snowballs into the rest of these stages! Conveying as much information as possible with visuals alone is particularly important for games, where players don’t have the time to read a novel before playing.

Research

...is self-explanatory, yet sometimes the longest stage in the process: we collect reference materials that achieve the goals we mentioned in our first section, and see what we can learn from them!

For the Gacha Goose, medieval and doll-like pieces of clothing served as big inspiration. We ended up looking at a lot of clown-adjacent pieces, porcelain-esque prosthetics, and watercolor illustrations to get closer to our final idea.

Sketch

...is when all the ideas that have been worked on reach fruition for the first time. It can be messy, but just slamming together a variety of different vibes and looks to see what invokes the right feeling. Many different concepts should be made here, in order to keep in mind the next round…

Feedback!

It’s time to show the concepts to an audience. We do several different types of feedback: an internal one with just the team, a semi-internal one with friends and family of the team, and one with Camp Kazoo over in our Discord.

Not only do we ask for what people like best, but also what they feel about the design. Sometimes context is given for the character’s role in the world, sometimes it isn’t; finding out what that ‘first gut feeling’ is important.

Refinement

...is the actual application of the feedback that’s been received. It is a process of reflection, reassessing our goals, and figuring out how to marry what people think with what the purpose of our design is.

It should be noted that one stage of refinement isn’t the end of the process- going back to Feedback after finishing up another iteration and getting even more notes on what people think is just as important! Just be mindful of reaching a done state at some point. You’ve got a whole game to make, after all, and iterating constantly on the same idea will make for a game that never gets shipped.

And we're done!

The final result of our beloved Gacha Goose’s design is…

…

…oops! We’re keeping that secret for now! ;p We’ll be showing her final design in future updates, so keep your eyes peeled for those!

That’s our concepting process, out in the open! We hope it was insightful, and perhaps even helpful to other game developers out there! Now, onto other news…

Some new looks...?

We’re not just updating our game’s aesthetics; we’re updating our own! If you had peeped our website within the past few months, you’d have seen that everyone on the team had somewhat different icons; but no longer! We are all now united under the banner of having an Anime Profile Picture… okay yes perhaps incredibly minor compared to the epic task of making a game But. Look At How Cutie We Look Anyways.

Team Corner!

It’s back! Our favorite little place to meet different team members and bombard them with questions to foster a parasocial relationship with them! What fun and whimsy!

This week we’ve got… badadadum, Jen! Our Art Director!

What are you most excited for in Hobnobbers?

I’ve been really enjoying our concepting phase! It’s always fun to create new characters/environments and figure out what makes them tick. We’ve also been playing around with some UI design, which is personally one of my favorite things to work on. I’m excited to continue to see these things make it into the game! There’s always a point in development when all the pieces kind of click together, and you can see the fruits of everyone’s disciplines start to create something truly unique!

What’s something you’ve worked on in Hobnobbers recently that you’ve found particularly frustrating?

I feel most in my element when I’m working on 2D assets. Whenever I touch anything 3D, there’s some growing pains that come along with it. All in all, I get really passionate about learning new things, so it’s been pretty fun. When I start concepting characters or mocking up UI screens I feel like I can take a breath of relief though. I’m hoping some day 3D feels as natural as 2D to me!

What’s a source of personal inspiration for you as you design characters for Hobnobbers?

When it comes to the world of Hobnobbers, I’ve been really inspired by Studio Ghibli films! I love the soft world building in films like Spirited Away or Princess Mononoke, and how they handle spirits and folklore within these films. I’m hopping that we can create some interesting characters that players can really speculate about, but not necessarily get all the answers easily. I kind of want the players to create the answers themselves.

When it comes to the stores and what we call “whimsical consumerism”, I’ve been inspired by games like “Bombrush Cyberfunk” and, funnily enough, a game called “Breaking da Rules”, an old Fairly Odd Parents game made by THQ. Bombrush I just love those Y2K vibes, and it was a big inspiration for creating the runner. Breaking da Rules has a great way of creating these very whimsical and silly spaces. They also have this great ability to mesh 2D and 3D elements, which gives us some inspiration as well!

Lastly, I’ve been really inspired by old fantasy books. I love absorbing and learning from materials that inspire me, and recently I’ve received this book called “Arthur Spiderwick’s Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You!” (A long title I know.) I can always go on Pinterest, but having physical resources from fantasy artists that I feel like to me are “the greats” gives me a lot of inspiration.

Yay! Thank you for your time!

Andddd we're all wrapped up!

As a reminder, feel free to send in questions for us to answer here on our Tumblr, or join our Discord and ask questions in the “ask-the-devs-❓” channel!

See you next month!!

— Kiki