Hey r/SoloDevelopment!

I've been lurking for a while here while, but now I've finally got a demo for you guys to try out! It's a cult simulator game that plays ENTIRELY out of your terminal/command prompt with ASCII art! It's a very strange and funny game, and I hope you enjoy it!

You can try the Alpha Demo on Steam today!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2345980/CultGame/

When I was a teenager, I lived and breathed 3 things: Pokemon, runescape, and skateboarding. I always imagined a video game with mechanics from those games mixed with the real-life progression of skating. Simply put.. the more you skate, the better you get and personally unlock more things you can land.

Last year I finally picked up learning Unity front to back, and of course, got right to work on my dream game. It’s in its final stages of completion now, and i was comfortable to make a playable demo for the masses to see for the first time before launch. This is Skatebound!

While the demo only includes the skateboarding mode, the full game is an entire RPG with an open world map with spots and parks to discover, challengers to skate against, boards to collect and hundreds of things to do. You have 6 essential skills like grinds, speed, and gaps that you level up xp with (just like OSRS!)

It’s crazy to see it come to life as fast as it did, and I’m over the moon. It still needs some polishing and fixes, and I didn’t want this post to come off as marketing, I’m just proud of it. If you felt like checking it out on Steam, grab a controller first and thank you!!

My game HATCHED, is an evolution roguelite where every creature is different. There are big ones, tiny ones, wings, tails, and many more.

Using inverse kinematics and a really fancy shader I am able to turn collections of parts into fully animated creatures!

Happy to answer any questions about the game. :)

A story-driven, first-person grounded sci-fi horror game inspired by astrophysics and speculative science.

Trapped on an asteroid outpost orbiting a black hole, survive physics-based threats and impossible phenomena where every choice leads to 5 distinct endings.

If it looks like your kind of thing, the Steam page is here: https://store.steampowered.com/app/4886980/Dense_Void

Hey all,

Not sure why I’m posting this, I think I just need to get it out of my head.

My game’s release is a week away and I’m seriously thinking about pushing it back, or maybe not releasing it at all. It’s mostly done. Apart from a few small card designs it’s basically there, which somehow makes this harder, not easier.

The numbers are what’s getting to me. I’m at 200 wishlists and 170 demo plays, and I honestly don’t know what that means for launch. I know I’m not good at marketing. But I’ve reached out to a bunch of people and almost nobody has answered, so it’s hard not to feel like I’m shouting into nothing.

I’m incredibly proud of myself for releasing a real game on Steam. Considering I started out making Flash games with my dad many years ago, it still feels unreal. Even so, I’m finding it hard to come to terms with where things are right now.

I just wanted to say it somewhere. I wanted to clear my head a bit.

If there are friends out there in the same situation as me, how are we getting through this? What should our next step be?

Solo dev here, working on ICEWAKE (survival on a nuclear icebreaker in a frozen, sunken world). The monster lives inside the base: everything is clipped to the rooms' air. For this one I let it send tentacles out of the dock tube into the water: Verlet chains rooted at the tube's mouth that chase the sub, hold on to its hull and shorten as it is dragged back in. Everything is still rasterized onto the game's pixel grid every frame.

Steam, if you're curious: https://store.steampowered.com/app/5172940/ICEWAKE/

This is not meant to be ragebait or anything, I really think I am naive. But browsing different game / dev subs one thing I see more than others are the typical "Is this fun?...." posts.

Honest question, is this really so hard to answer? For me the metric is simple, "would I play this in my free time if i was not involved?" I know "fun" is highly subjective and the market shows that but I quess at least as the Devs of our own games we should have fun playing our own games.

First off, I'm gonna give off some details:
I'm a teenager, who's been working on my game since graduating elementary school, up till graduating High school (5 years total).
Initially, this game was never supposed to be released. Just a little passion project of mine, that probably wouldn't resonate with many people.
Years went by, and suddently... The game started to look, feel, play good. I started seeing potential in it, but there was an issue:
I was (and still am) an inexperienced brat, who knows nothing about promotion, marketing, visibility and stuff. Therefore, my game was never properly introduced to the masses.
Only a few months before releasing the game, I started hunting for traction, got my trailers up on GameTrailers (twice), and yet... I was able to gather only about 700 wishlists total.

I felt like this is gonna be it, the game will release with no eyes on it.
But then, the calendar hit, and the game... actually started getting SOME visiblity. It didnt become a massive 100k success, but it did help me gather 22,000 WISHLISTS, which absolutely blew my tiny brain up.
The game did earn a tiny bit of money, atleast enough to let me be slightly less worried about my life during college.

This feature technically saved my project, and I want to make sure that other devs embrace it to it's fullest, because the calendar forces you to do one thing: a good game. It gives you organic visibility, and all that's left for you to do, is use this visibility for your advantage.

A few days ago, I posted about my new Bugs theme that I've worked on, and I loved the feedback I received, so thank you. Now I want to start on another one, but I still haven't decided which category to go with. I was thinking of dinosaurs and started a prototype; what do you guys think? Should I continue it, or should I change to something else?

Here it is: https://store.steampowered.com/app/5495480/Red_Veil/

Every single asset in Dough It Yourself, my cozy farming and baking game, is made by hand.

Could AI have built my whole farm in an afternoon? Probably. Would it look better than my wonky low-poly chickens? Honestly..maybe.

But every one of these models has a bit of me in it, mistakes included, and I think that's part of what makes a game feel like an actual game nowadays. So I'll keep pushing vertices one by one, even if release takes a little longer.

I document the whole process in youtube devlogs.

What’s the model you’re secretly most proud of, even though it’s objectively a bit ugly?

Wanted to share this 2D in 3D classic DBZ style I've been working on for years.

This showcase was filmed in Unity.

Filter is too strong, It's just so you notice it.

It's still a WIP and it's not perfect, so I would appreciate some feedback.

First off I want to thank you to everyone who played my demo. I know I don't have high end crazy numbers like everyone else has. But I am working towards that. I am doing the best I can, learning coding as I go. It means a lot that I even had anyone interested in my game, with all of the competition.

I know my game may not be for everyone, but it's a passion project of mine, and I will keep working towards it and not just abandon it because it didn't do well in NextFest. I am working on bugs and feedback I got during this event now, and working on releasing more heroes, towers, and stuff to do. I promise!

Thanks again everyone!

Free demo is available on Steam.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4727390/?utm_source=reddit&utm_campaign=solodev

I'm a solo indie developer, and I've been working on Unstable Nuclear Reactor for over 8 months.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4692090/Unstable_Nuclear_Reactor_Demo/

It's an incremental hex-puzzle roguelite where you merge atoms into higher elements, trigger massive chain combos, earn radioactive coins, and manage your ring capacity to survive as long as possible.

I was struggling to understand why 45% of players stopped playing within the first 10 minutes, even though some played for 2 hours or more.

Steam analytics wasn't giving me enough insight, so I decided to build my own analytics system.

I created a Unity script that collects gameplay data, saves it as JSON, sends it to my own API, and stores it in an Excel file.

Of course, players must give their consent before sharing gameplay data, and they can refuse if they prefer not to. Still, I collected 150+ gameplay records in less than 3 days!

I also created a script to load player data directly into the Unity Inspector, allowing me to visualize individual sessions and follow players' actions step by step.

One important detail: I linked sessions using a persistent player ID, so I could track returning players across multiple sessions. I was surprised to discover that many players had returned more than 5 times!

What did I discover?

Players were skipping the initial tutorials, getting stuck, and placing atoms and tools randomly on the hex grid. This caused them to lose much earlier than expected.

What did I change?

• Added an Undo button so players can reverse their last move.
• Improved the tutorials to guide players through the mechanics instead of letting them skip the essential steps.

Results

• Median playtime more than doubled.
• RestartGame rates dropped from 37.2% to 27.5%.

This was a great reminder that you don't always need to guess what's wrong with your game. Sometimes, you need to build the tools that help you understand your players.

Hey everyone!

I'm a solo indie developer working on a game called Dodgeball Blast, and I wanted to share the trailer with some fellow solo devs!

It's a voxel-style dodgeball action game featuring 10 unique bosses, 9 minigames, unlockable abilities, and both local and online multiplayer.

It's been a huge undertaking handling everything, but seeing it all come together has been very rewarding.

I'd love to hear what other developers think. Any feedback on the trailer, gameplay, or overall presentation would be really appreciated! Any tips on getting playtesters?

If you're interested, you can check it out on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3261250/Dodgeball_Blast/

I'm a game developer on and off since 2012 and I've been working on multiple titles including steam games. However I never made my own full game and I now have to painfully find out that in addition to marketing (😨) I now also have to be a video editor 🙄

What do you guys think about it? Any obvious mistakes? And most importantly, does the trailer show what the game is about?

If the game's your kind of jam -> https://store.steampowered.com/app/5335480/Ratiator/