Week (50): 09/12/2013 – 13/12/2013

We have been working on this undisclosed concept this week. We set a deadline on thursday for a first playable protype. We've finished the to do list and included even more elements for us to test. The team is very happy with the result, and also with the progres and speed this concept is going through. Somehow everything seems to work out exactly like we want to.

We made plans to stay in development with this concept until we have clearance about the contribution for the horror game. At the end of Januari we are planning an announce more info about the this undisclosed project.

If everything goes according to plan, we are searching three new interns from Februari to July 2014. We have been setting-up profiles to for them to present at their universities.

Below a nice panorama picture of our current office :)

EDIT* Few things are blurred, because this is still undisclosed content ;) more of that in January!

Week (49): 02/12/2013 – 08/12/2013

This was a special week. We can not be very clear about this yet, but over the weekend Koen came up with a new idea for a game. He pitched the idea with the team and with certain friends and family. Everyone at and around KeokeN Interactive thinks this 'idea'  has great potential and is worth investing in.

Because we are waiting on a contribution for our horror game, we decided to work secretly on this new game concept, before we will announce anything. It turns out development for this concept is going much faster than expected and generates much more potential. It also fits greatly on what we stand for as KeokeN Interactive, rich and playfull game experiences. Will the contribution kick in, we will have to 'shelve' this idea for the time being.

We will leave you this week with a great compilation of website backgrounds made by "Leon Tukker" our concept artist.

Week (48): 25/11/2013 – 29/11/2013

To form a better perspective of the game world and what type of style we would like to have, we decided it was time to create a few concept scenes to walk in. Leon made a lot of concept art and has worked on some basic models identifying these pieces of art. We created two "hallways" representing a piece of the Labyrinth. By doing this it's easier to spot mistakes, or make new decisions what to or what not to include in a final direction of art and composition.

Johan was able to include a basic "breathing" system. It's still in development before we can run an effective test. When this is done we can cleary determine if this is the direction we like to have.

Jaap our researcher has come-up with some great historical and perceptual meaning for certain aspects about the Labyrinth and will be up for discussion next week. This will create a more solid "backstory" for our game. Ofcourse we want to keep the game about "the player" instead of a designed character.

Week (47): 18/11/2013 – 22/11/2013

Leon and Koen have been talking about the "style" of the game. Leon started to make concept shots from first person perspective to define an artistic composition and view for the labyrinth. He created different types of concepts.

Because it's hard to come up with something, Koen assembled a scene with different 'free models' to show the amount of quality we could reach within just a few hours of assembling and tuning some effects. By doing this we have something to talk about for the team instead of talking about 'ideas'. It also motivated us to finally have a picture where the game is heading.

Kaj our character artist is busy on the 'demon portraits'. The portraits are used at the end of the labyrinth, showing you which demon was chasing you and a little backstory. This is the concept sketch of 'Rokurokubi' a japanese demon.

Johan finally finished a efficiently generating labyrinth. When generating very large labyrinths it keeps performing great. This was one of the problems we had with the old model of generating a maze.

Because we have the Oculus Rift, we had one of the Moms over at our office. We recorded a very funny video about her using the Rift.

Week (46): 11/11/2013 – 15/11/2013

Oculus Rift finally arrived! We have been testing some great Oculus supported demos. Mainly focussed around First Person views. We want to figure out a great feeling of control when playing with Oculus Rift. After playing a demo of "Tuscany" we were very happy about the Rift.

Johan implemented the Rift in our game and played some scary soundscape allongside and we were already getting freightened about our own game.

Leon is working on some new concept art. It's focussed around the point of view in the game and is creating ideas how a player should be able to see the breathing patterns.

We also finished the business and marketing plan. We submitted all the files to the Gamefonds and hope to get a contribution to the project! Gamefonds is a great initiative for dutch game developers, you should take a look at their website! http://gamefonds.nl/

Week (45): 04/11/2013 – 08/11/2013

The website was finished and we would like to have some fun. A week before we saw a video of 'Jigsaw' living with some students. We thought that video was very funny, therefore we made one ourselves. It's about Jigsaw visiting the KeokeN Interactive Headquarters. A little too much time went into the video, but it turned out pretty fun. We think if we are creating fun games, we also want to maintain our social networks with fun stuff.

We have also been working on a business and marketing plan to get a contribution from the Gamefonds foundation.

Leon has been finishing website backgrounds and started to create new concept art for the game.

Week (44): 28/10/2013 – 01/11/2013

A very busy week. We decided to finish the website first. The plan was to launch the website on thursday. Johan, Koen and Leon have been working late hours to finish it, and we succeeded! There are still a few performance problems, but we are working on that. The launch of our new website means there will be much more time to work on the game.

Leon is still busy finishing the backgrounds for the website. Our goal is to have six great and artistic background banners in different color schemes. You can see one of the backgrounds and the pictures of the website launch below!

Week (43): 21/10/2013 – 25/10/2013

The game concept is getting stronger and stronger, but it somehow doesn't achieve as much meaningful gameplay as we like. The week started with a heated discussion again between Koen and Paul. We decided it's bad for the atmosphere if we keep doing this. It's very hard to create solid game mechanics with a team that is focussed on setting, music, and visuals.

From now on we do not stress the team anymore with this part of game development. We are in need of a serious game designer.

Koen invited Achraf to KeokeN Headquarters. He's one of the game designers that already helped out in the game designers meeting a month ago. Achraf and Koen were able to 'fix' the concept and get it way more interesting than before. We strive for rich and beautiful environments, compelling music, fun gameplay and lots of replay value. Finally we have a structure to hold on to.

The planning told us we wanted to announce our game this week. Luckily this was possible because the concept was not changed, but edited and fixed. Leon created great promotional art. Wednesday we released the info we are working on a new type of 'horror game experience'. Every playthrough will be different.

Below you can see the promotional art spread around our social networks pages.

Week (42): 14/10/2013 – 18/10/2013

Because the concept is still in development, Leon has been busy on new KeokeN Interactive website backgrounds. Johan was able to generate a large Labyrinth in different sizes. He was busy on generating "open spaces" in the Labyrinth. Controller support is included as well. 

It's very important that the first person controller is working smoothly. Johan is working to optimize this.

As a start-up developer it's essential to do some networking besides development. Koen and Johan went to a starter meeting in town. A talk was given about ways to use social media for your business. We were convinced we knew some before this presentation, but Kristian proved us wrong. Besides confirmation on how we do things with social media, we now know a lot more in-depth what it is about. We created a plan for the future of our social media accounts based on these new ideas.

Below you can see the new "underwater" background for the KeokeN Interactive website by Leon.

Week (41): 07/10/2013 – 11/10/2013

Concepting went on and on this week. We were talking about the Labyrinth's 'architechture'. Leon made some beautifull concept art pieces for the walls of the labyrinth. He decided to do this on paper and leave the digital painting for a change. Koen brought a large artbook collection for Leon, to get more inspiration into the office.

The meetings about the game concept were mainly focussed on meaningful gameplay. This team is not very experienced with 'designing a game'. One of the strongest parts of the team is their ability to create compelling music and beautiful concept art and 3d environments. Therefore it is extremely difficult to get all our minds in the right direction when we try to define specific mechanics and rules. It may sometimes lead to heated discussions. We keep agreeing on the fact we want a horror game taking place in a Labyrinth filled with special 'open spaces'. 

Paul made some nice 'moodboards' focussed on a special horror element or environment. A few of them shown below.

                 

 

Week (40): 30/09/2013 – 04/10/2013

We moved to our new office space! We made a great deal with the owners of the building. Besides moving the entire business, we kept going with concepting and designing the game. It's also important to keep track of your competitors in the industry. Research is an ongoing proces, so Paul volunteerd to be that guy that keeps track of all the 'horror games' releasing.

Designing an original concept is hard. Especially if you want to do something completely new. We think it's important to hold of serious development until a solid game design is agreed on.

We also need concept ideas for different 'open spaces' within the labyrinth. Leon was able to create a few of these concept art pieces. You can see the new office and new concept art below.

Week (39): 23/09/2013 – 27/09/2013

After a full three weeks of brainstorm and concepting, we concluded that coming up with a decent 'game design' structure was hard to achieve within this team. Because some of us have little experience creating specifically for games, it's hard to convince eachother what is important when creating a game. Besides having a good atmosphere and an awesome soundtrack, we want to have engaging gameplay with high replay value.

It was time to do something about this problem. We thought it was a good idea to gather a team of different game designers and do a brainstorm about the game for 3 hours at least. Koen set-up the meeting and was able to facilitate this in an conference room in Utrecht, snacks, sandwiches and drink included ;). Luckily all gamedesigners contacted to take part in this meeting agreed and thought it was nice to meet new people and help us design a better game.

The meeting went very well. We were able to create a lot of ideas and got confirmation about the ideas we already had ourselves. We want to make a "scary" game. What's more scary than the 'unknown'? Also when individual player information is being used in the game, could be very interesting to scare people with. How does the game know that my name is 'Peter'? a simple example.

We want to thank,
Vincent Da Silva
Achraf Cherabi
René Hirnborch
Kuba Vohnik

For their presence, support and us leeching their creative brains!

We were also looking into larger office space in the 'Schiphol Area'. We need to be representative to our clients and guests! We've done some research and viewings around town and finally decided to Headquarter in the Center of Hoofddorp. The place looks stunning, and is perfect for a start-up like us!

To end this post, Leon created another stunning piece for the Website shown below.

Week (38): 16/09/2013 – 20/09/2013

It's hard to create a new type of horror game. We don't want to create a simple linear story that drives people crazy with cheap jumpscares. We want something special, something not done before. This week Koen was back from his Holiday. We presented the work that was done in the previous week. All the research was discussed and we iterated on that note for our own concept.

Paul en Jelle made more sound effect & music concepts.

Leon created more and more environmental art.

Johan our programmer was able to create a random generating labyrinth and had his hands full on the website of KeokeN Interactive.

Yes, the game is going to have a lot of random elements, and takes place in a large labyrinth. 

We know a lot of industry veterans would say, it's bad to start with art, music & sound, but since we are a developer that is specialised in creating deep and engaging experiences. We think it's great to get motivated and inspired by concepts we created and steer our way through these elements. Below you can see a few shots we made this week.

Week (37): 09/09/2013 – 13/09/2013

Week two of development. Our Director/Producer Koen went on a short holiday to Tunesia. He needed a short break, because he did not remember what a beach looked like anymore. So when Koen was taking time coming back to his senses, we continued development on the game and website.

We decided that the website needs large full screen environment art to set the tone on 'atmospheric' games. Therefore Leon started to create large pieces of environmental art for the website. We decided to have six pieces of art. These art pieces will slide by over time when visiting the website. A short example you can see below.

We also took time to create new concept art for the game. We already decided the game takes place in a large Labyrinth, we do not exactly know what type of gameplay will be accompanied with this idea, but we are working on it. Leon tried to define 'hostile' environments in these concept art pieces. A few examples below.

Week (36): 02/09/2013 – 06/09/2013 (Project Start)

The start of a new game project always brings excitement! The first part of development is to create a solid game concept. That's why we started out with a huge brainstorm. Our goal is to create a new type of horror experience combined with a strong atmosphere and great soundtrack. Besides this, we need a strong gameplay system that is fun and logical. 

To showcase a game we also needed a new website. The old KeokeN Interactive website is looking like an old portfolio, so we like to change that rapidly! Because we stand for "rich and playfull" game experiences, we need a website that greatly communicates these aspects. That's why we also started to work on the new KeokeN Website.

Our Environmental Artist 'Leon' started to create some basic concept-art to create a starting point for style. Jelle and Paul our Music & Sound composers created some music that fitted within this style. A few examples are shown below.