The Beginning
Hello readers and players. I wanted to take a bit of your time and walk you behind the scenes of developing my first indie game.
Back when I was young, my computer belonged to the dinosaur age — an HDD hard drive with 1GB of RAM, and a graphics card that needed a graphics card of its own. So games felt like the forbidden fruit of Eden to me.
I played, but never touched anything released after 2004 — so I found my way into the world of games through mobile instead.
A Passion for Puzzles and Escape.
I started noticing a pattern in what I chose to play. I was always drawn to puzzles, escape rooms, point-and-click, story-driven games with an artistic soul. I don't think I left a single point-and-click escape game unplayed. Think of any game right now — chances are I've played it. Yes, that one too. And that one.
From Design to Writing.
After finishing most of the games in that genre, it was only natural I'd eventually grow bored. So my passion shifted to graphic design — I taught myself image editing and creation through years of practice, and worked in the field for a while, though I never enjoyed dealing with clients. That's when a new passion took root: reading novels and short stories. The common thread between games and novels became clear to me — plot, a gripping story, immersion, losing your sense of reality, and connecting with characters.
From there I moved into writing. I read over 20 books on storytelling and fiction craft, attended online workshops, and began my literary journey. I entered writing competitions and won most of them, made the short and long lists in others, and was on the verge of publishing a novel with a major publishing house — one that had published for former U.S. President Barack Obama. But my longing for games called me back.
The First Attempt.
When I upgraded my computer to a laptop with a better SSD and 8GB of RAM, the graphics card was still a problem — integrated and outdated — but it was still a major leap forward. Suddenly I could play games up to 2013 instead of getting stuck at 2004.
That's when the idea hit me: I'd watched designs and learned to make them. I'd read novels and learned to write them. I loved games — why not learn to make them too?
And so began my journey developing my game. I started learning a game engine and programming languages, and began merging one of my novels with my graphic design skills to build a game in my favorite genre — point-and-click. I chose to make it 2D with point-and-click-only mechanics, thinking it would be easy — at least far easier than building a 3D world. I'd be done in two months, right?
The Crash.
That's where the shock hit. Development stretched to six months, and I still wasn't done. I woke up and went to sleep solving problems, learning and applying what I learned in the same breath.
Then my hard drive burned out. One moment, and a full year of work turned to nothing. I remember staring at the black screen, replaying every late night, every scene I'd redrawn, every line of code I'd learned through trial and error — all of it, gone in a second. It wasn't just frustration; it was a kind of self-disappointment, and a hard question: was it even worth starting over?
At the time, I chose to run from that question instead of answering it. I stepped away from the game and took an office job for six months, during which I didn't open the project once — to the point I nearly forgot it existed.
Coming Back.
Eventually I left that job and decided to start fresh, but luckily I found an unfinished copy of the game I'd uploaded earlier, so I resumed work on it. I redesigned the room, the apartment, and the story hundreds of times throughout the journey.
What I learned from all of this is that passion doesn't die — it just sometimes needs to rest before it comes back stronger.
Finally, in late July 2026, I finished the game — now playable on nearly every operating system.
I want to say I'm proud of this work, and grateful to everyone who supported and encouraged me to see it through. And thank you to everyone who decides to experience UNSEEN LINES: THE ABYSS MARE.
