DEV Blog

OCTOBER. 1, 2023

It’s just about here. 100 Halloweens, my first game is about to launch in 2 days. But If I back up a bit there are some interesting notes to share in the development.

Several years ago, I explored the idea of opening a haunted house. Having worked in a few growing up, I thought one closer to my location could be a good bet. Demographics, business plans, and financial discussions later…I just couldn’t get the numbers to work unless I was unrealistic in my projections.

I pivoted to the idea of creating a haunt in VR.

I started my career (many years ago) as an animator/editor using 3D Studio in DOS. We used to stay late into the night as a frame would render and drop over to the Beta deck. I love to look back, but things have changed so much over the years. I don’t know if I miss it or not, certainly not the agony of how long it took.

Anyway, with a background in 3D, art and film, I felt I had a lot of the angles covered. I debated Unity and Unreal and messed around with both of them. But I fell in love with Unreal Engine and stuck with it. The early day of the “VR Haunt” didn’t last long. Unreal Engine comes with several game templates. 1st person, 3rd person, race game, etc.

I was drawn to the third person one right away. One of the scariest games I’ve played was Dead Space. There was just a sense of immersion with Isaac, and great game design that kept the intensity high through the game. I don’t think 3rd or 1st person is better than the other, it comes down to what you are trying to go for and the esthetic. Resident Evil series Vs. COD Vs. Fallout…they both have pros and cons.

What I was sure of was that I had a lot of work in front of me.

That was a year and a half ago.

Mostly nights and weekends, which is tough to turn off your real job and focus on something else. I also think it’s really hard to do something like this without the support of your family…which I had. Thanks guys.

Looking at where the game is now, is a far cry from white box layouts and learning how to do simple things in Unreal. It’s not everything I wanted, but being a one-man team, you have to make some sacrifices, or it can scope creep into a lifelong project. Decisions about creating or buying an asset or focusing more on the types of combat vs. sneaking around and avoiding the AI. Just getting the enemies to stop running into walls and staring at them. I think all developers, even AAA games feel they are launching something into the world that they could work on for another year.

I’m proud of the game, and I hope anyone that plays gets the classic haunted mansion vibe with some interesting gameplay that is a little different every time you play, with several ways to play it. I grew up playing arcade games where a quarter is your life. I brought that into this game (no save). It might piss some people off, but like most things in life, nothing is ever as easy as you think it will be without doing it a few times.

I’ll dive into more on how the game was built, some of the bigger challenges and what’s next for Ghost Box Games in future posts.

Thanks for reading,

Jas