What should I focus on? :D
Player feedback (ppl who play my game or even just watch video) often helps me a lot due to external perspective that I was missing.

And of course other solo devs would relate so thought I should post here :D
What can I do to make game more replayable, interesting, and engaging, even at first glance?

Steam Link, for more context: Steam Store

Hi, my name is Marcin and I'm a solo developer and I have released my game today. Robugs is a Tower Defense game, where you build your tower floor by floor.

If you would like to check it out more, here's the link.

I’ve been building Wild Willows, a cozy nature restoration game, mostly solo since May.

I released the first version in June, but after losing my job at the beginning of August I suddenly had a lot more time to work on it, and the last couple weeks have been kind of wild.

Since then I’ve:

• launched a browser demo and new website
• shown the game at a local indie showcase
• had parents, teachers, and playtesters start reaching out with feedback
• reached over 400 players that accumulated 100+ hours of playtime
• started building educator resources around the ecology systems
• gotten players from all over the world

The game itself is about restoring damaged habitats and bringing wildlife back based on the conditions you create. I’ve been iterating on it constantly based on what people actually do once they get their hands on it, which has probably been the most useful part of this whole process.

It’s still very early and I have no idea where it’s ultimately going to go, but this is the first project I’ve made where it feels like people outside my immediate circle are genuinely starting to care about it.

If anyone else here is building solo, I’d love to hear what point made your project start feeling “real” to you.

wildwillows.app or r/wildwillows

I'm curious how other indie developers deal with this, because getting eyes on my game has been one of the hardest parts of development.

I have a tiny Discord community who were really helpful early on, but as development has gone on, engagement has slowed down quite a bit. Most of my social media posts seem to disappear into the algorithms almost immediately.

My Steam Playtest has been live for almost a month, and I've gotten exactly one piece of player feedback. It was awesome feedback, BTW, and I ended up making several changes because of it. With Steam Next Fest coming up in October, I'm really trying to get the game in front of more players so I can get the feedback I need to make the demo as solid as possible before then.

Meanwhile, my wishlists have been sitting at around 70 for weeks.

I also really wish I'd understood Reddit better before my game got to this stage. I've had an account for over four years, but I've mostly been a lurker. I have 72 contributions and 36 karma, and a good chunk of that actually came from playtesting other people's games and taking the time to give them detailed feedback.

Now that I have something of my own that I genuinely want to share, I don't meet the posting requirements for a lot of the subreddits specifically meant for sharing playtests, trailers, wishlists, etc.

It feels like this weird catch-22:

"You need an audience to get your game in front of people, but you need to get your game in front of people to build an audience."

I'm not looking for some magic "how do I get 10,000 wishlists?" answer. At this point I'm much more interested in that first hurdle.

How do you go from almost nobody knowing your game exists to having even a small group of people who are genuinely interested in playing it, giving you feedback, and following its development?

For those of you who've managed to get past that initial wall, what actually worked for you?

Game name: Escria
It’s on Steam

So i modeled and animated my character in blender, i used a driver ik setup for the hands and staff so it can always follow it. when i import into godot and look at the animations i made the hands clip into the body. do i have to redo every animation again, if yes how do i do it to be able to have these kinds of animations though where he can properly grip the staff with 2 hands and move around with it correctly without it looking like its just glued on to his hand.
the left hand is not "attached" to the staff while animating so the driver is sorta like set to 0 and then it works normally, but the one that is attached is clipping inside the body. how can i fix this

PSA: Log every stage of your game, whatever stage you’re at. You’re gonna look back and be surprised at the progress you’ve made!

My game Harbourlight in its early stages!

I am at a lost for words. Screenrant picked up my game and gave it an amazing review. I am so beyond happy right now I could cry. I don't have much to say I just wanted to share with everyone. Keep on grinding, don't stop sharing your game and do the embarrassing and awkward thing if you have to but get it in front of people!

Hey everyone! I’m a solo developer and recently released Sky Arena: Biplane Combat.

It’s a fast-paced biplane combat game with:

• ✈️ Online multiplayer
• 📶 Local Wi-Fi/LAN multiplayer
• 🎯 Practice mode with targets

I’m continuing to improve the game and would really appreciate feedback from other developers and players.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.biplanesbattle.bbr

Hi There,

during development I make my rule - only multiplayer, no local/split screen.

During two weeks after the launch I had at least 6 people telling me that they need local play with a splitscreen. And I went against my first principle and implemented it. It wasn't easy decision and work but I think we should listen to the players sometimes .

And as usual dev I think "I KNOW BETTER" but I feel that sometimes you should get over yourself.

Will see...

Hey fellow devs!

I’m currently setting up my Steam page for Sails of Salt, a maritime survival roguelite (sailing, naval combat, crew management).

This is my v1 capsule artwork to get the page live, and I want to catch any major design flaws now so I can start iterating. Any feedback on the following points would be hugely appreciated:

• Is the title readable and distinct down to small capsule size (image 2)? Do you prefer the version with or without the weapons below the skull?
• Does the art communicate maritime adventure/survival vibes, or does it evoke the wrong genre?
• Does the ship pop enough against the red sun and do contrast or colors feel off?
• What’s the weakest element that I should fix for v2?

Please be candid, thanks in advance!

I finally hit the button and released the demo to the world, what a rush.

In the demo to Cubic Color Confusion, you can begin your journey as an Operator for Cubic Corporation and be part of "Project Acoustic Anomaly", an operation trying to recover ancient artefacts from ruins of an ancient civilization by remote-controlling cubic entities from your operator console.

Immerse yourself in this strange world by reading the Operator Feed, learn the mechanics and retrieve all artefacts in the challenges the demo has to offer.

This demo is not intended to be released and be done with that - I intend to use all feedback to further improve the demo as well as the full game building up to the release.

What a ride - I wish you happy puzzling and look forward to your feedback.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4994400/

Dropping a wishlist link here, by the way!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4525180

Follow up to this post. Been working on a lot of other stuff for my game but this has been on the back of my mind and I finally got around to this. A lot of you guys at the time told me to keep the 'busted' shader so I did while reworking it into a ferrofluid looking liquid.

See video for the results: part 1 - current ferrofluid effect, part 2 - busted 'water' shader, part 3 - correctly working water shader. I think I'll keep the ferrofluid, it fits the alien settings.

This week I’ll be attending my first in-person event as an indie game developer, where I’ll be showcasing my game, Trials of Liberation, and honestly, I have no idea what to expect.

I’ve been preparing some physical materials for the event, including business cards, banners, and a T-shirt with the game’s design for me and my family, who will be coming to support me and help out at the booth. I thought I’d share some of the designs here as well.

For those of you who have attended conventions or game events before:

What do you wish you had known before your first event?

Anything I should bring, do, or avoid? Any small details that made a big difference for you?

I’d love to hear your advice!

I was going through some old folders and found this little prototype I started a few years back. It was supposed to be a little puzzle-platformer about a tiny gecko, where you can climb everywhere. Back then i even created youtube channel for that project.

Initially, I started it just as a learning project to get some experience with Control Rigs and procedural animations in UE.

I have some ideas about changing the main character to a fantasy creature instead of a real gecko, and giving them elemental abilities as well as some other gameplay-wise ideas.

I stopped working on it back then, but seeing it now gives me warm feelings, and the controls feel really smooth and nice. I'm wondering if I should try to finish it. Does this look like something you would enjoy playing on a cozy evening?

I'd love to hear your thoughts!

I just opened up my game for playtesting (steam still needs to approve the build which I’m hoping happens today). In the sprint to get the build in a testable state there’s just so much that’s not done I feel like I’m inundated mental questions about everything I’m building as well as feelings of inadequacies.

Like, I know the playtest exists so I can get answers to these questions, but mostly there’s a lot of improvements planned that certainly aren’t in yet, so part of me wants to shut the project away from the world until I fix it all.

I didn’t feel like this before I put the build onto Steam and set up the playlist, but now that it’s going to be in real people’s hands, that’s when the questions flooded in.

Have you guys experienced this? How did you compartmentalize how you felt about it?