A Hardy Developer's Journal

Hello there in the new year 2010, Dear Reader! I hope it is already treating you well. Welcome after our long December slumber which was caused by many different things (that I was busy with). Among them was my determination to release the reinvented version of Frantic Franko demo right for 2010’s start and HardyDev’s 1st birthday which happens today.

Franko will get a whole, separate article soon, so I won’t divulge too much on the game right now beyond providing the link to the new demo and mentioning that the game will still undergo all kinds of tweaks and modifications before the full release in March, so any kind of feedback will always be very valuable to me, especially since I made many risky design choices you won’t find in other games. (more…)

As a reviewer, you can’t help not having particularly great hopes when asked to review a first time developer’s indie game. Especially a project that a single designer without any game-making background spent 5 years on. Yet a reviewer’s life can be full of surprises – Remigiusz Michalski’s Downfall provided what I quite frankly consider to be one of the finest stories told in an adventure game in the last 10 years. Moreso it really takes advantage of being an involving player experience – challenging you with choices and actions that have real emotional impact. Some time ago I wrote down my own personal experience of playing the game, and today I have the distinct pleasure to  pick the mind of the creative genius behind Downfall… (more…)

I must admit before I even begin to pass judgement on this game that the indie adventure scene has never truly grabbed me. Many years ago, when money was tight and the school nights long and uneventful (how I long for those times now!), I would occasionally grab a free Adventure Game Studio project and give it a whirl. Sadly, for whatever reason, I could hardly ever enjoy these games. (more…)