The status of "Samer Hills"

Hey Samer, whatever happened to that one game project you were working on? You know, the one you posted to Steam GreenLight over here? Hmmm... I believe it was called Samer Hills? Yeah, this one. 

That is a good question Samer (just play along with me). Let me tell you what is going on because I believe I haven't been really been clear about it's progress and to be honest, I have been a bit confusing because I tend to say something different each time. I recently posted this update over at the game's Steam Greenlight page (yes, as of this post Steam Greenlight is still up and is still a thing. I posted links to my game's Greenlight page exactly 5 times already in this post......) 

Anyway! as I was saying, I recently posted this update on the Steam Greenlight page because I felt it was important to keep the page... well, updated with news relating to the project. However, with Valve's upcoming Steam Direct system, Steam Greenlight can be taken down any day now and who knows if anyone will ever be able to visit those dead Greenlight game pages anymore. 

With that said, I think it is a good idea to simply re-post the update over here on my blog for future reference. Now, I will shamelessly copy paste and quote myself:

Status of the project:

"Just a quick and possibly final update I post here on this game's Greenlight page. Since I have been going back and forth between saying that the game is "temporarily shelved" and the "game is still in development."

So that there isn't any confusion, I want to clarify the current status of this project and my plans. I don't want to sound like I am repeating what I have said in previous announcements, but here is what's going on.

-The game is NOT canceled.

-The game is still set to release/finish development this year (2017)

-I am reworking the game to be something more than what I originally had planned. I have a completely different vision for what I want this game to be and I want to implement all of my ideas into it and tweak it until I feel it is the game I want to put out there. This will be a bigger game with more than originally planned. I want to create an immersive world with multiple characters and multiple story-lines occurring.

-I am planning on changing the game's name to something entirely different. It will no longer be called "Samer Hills". Therefore if the game gets greenlit on here in time before Direct comes out, this game will launch under a different name.

-If greenlight is eventually taken down and replaced with Direct and this game has not passed it's greenlight campaign then that is okay. I will finish the game and look into my options for releasing it. As of this update there still is no exact information on how Direct will work or how much the fee will be. So I can't promise a direct release at this time. But again, I will look into my options for publishing and see if I can work with Direct.

Anyway, thank you everyone once again for the support and interest in this project. Admittedly this greenlight page isn't really getting much views or visits. However, for those few followers I feel it is important that I continue to share updates and the status on the project here on the greenlight page. At least while it is still up.

Thanks everyone once again. I appreciate all of you!

-Samer Khatib (snowconesolid)"

Originally posted on "Samer Hills" Steam Greenlight page here: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/updates/868133785/1496360496

On 6/1/2017. Original Page may be removed in future.

Anyway, that's all I wanted to share today. Also, I finally setup an indiedb page for Samer Hills. You can find it here: http://www.indiedb.com/games/samer-hills

More updates soon. 

Thanks for reading.

Hello 2017... it is about time

     It is about time I finally post a proper 2017 update. So, whats going on? What ever happened to the new game project? Where is the new Steam Greenlight that was suppose to be posted at the end of December 2016? Do you even still make games? Alright, so I haven't been very active on the blog and have been doing a terrible job communicating about progress on current and new projects.

It is near the end of the first month of 2017 and I am just now going to talk about my plans for the new year. I did mean to get this post out way earlier but life just gets in the way sometimes. First of all, happy new year to everyone (a bit late on that one) 

     Anyway, although it seems like I haven't been very active, I have actually been working really hard on a lot of new things. I have a lot planned for 2017 that I want to get done and put out there, so it has actually been a busy first month for me. I'm actually working on multiple new projects and juggling back and forth between them. I will get more into that in a moment. First, I want to talk about the main project. The most important project that I am working on, "Samer Hills". 

     Whats up with "Samer Hills"? Why isn't this finished and on Steam yet? So, this is a project I started working on shortly after releasing my first game on Steam "Potato Thriller". I have been posting so many blog articles over the past few months talking about this project and even kept making promises I couldn't keep like saying I would have the greenlight campaign for the new game up before the end of last year, or having the entire project done at a certain date. Despite not keeping these smaller promises, there is one promise I will keep and that is that I will eventually finish and release this new game. Some people think that I just got bored, or lost motivation and canceled the game, but actually, the game is far off from being canceled. I have been spending most of my time working on "Samer Hills" and have made great progress on it even though I haven't really been sharing the progress made every step of the way. I won't make anymore promises and announce deadlines, release dates, etc anymore. I learned my lesson. It will be available when I am ready to make it available. But I would like to confirm that I am indeed working on the game and going to release it as my second Steam game. 

"Samer Hills" is going to be a big game. I have made a lot of progress on it and here are some more recent screenshots and images from development to showcase the progress I have been making. Also I will share some more details about the actual game. 

Environment: First, lets talk about the setting of the game. 

Lovely eyes...

I keep saying "Samer Hills" but what is it? "Samer Hills" is where the entire game will take place. This will be the main setting for the game and it is the name of an old abandoned town as well as the main characters hometown. This game will take place mainly in outdoors types of environments. So settings like forests, caves, streets, farms, etc is where most of the game will play out and the kind of areas the player will get to explore. There will also be some indoor settings like the characters house and some buildings that the player will eventually get to go to because of the game's story progression, but for the most part, outdoors settings is a main focus point. In my previous game "Potato Thriller",  about 90% of the game took place inside house/building type environments. The entire first half of the game took place in a long house type setting while the second half took place inside of a challenging tower. My new game, is kind of the opposite of what "Potato Thriller" did.

Gameplay: This game will be entirely a third person game. There will be various features like puzzle solving, fighting enemies, avoiding traps, quick time events and so on. I am doing my best to keep the game entertaining and fresh from beginning to end so I am developing it in a way where it constantly introduces new gameplay elements and throws surprises at the player. 

There will be traps, different weapons, etc. 

Story, Genre, Characters: "Samer Hills" is going to be a post-apocalyptic horror/thriller game with a non serious and more comical tone thrown in. One of the games biggest focus is on the main character himself. I mentioned in an older blog post that the game will let you see what the main character goes through on his adventure and how he changes throughout the experience. However, throughout the game you will come face to face with many other characters in the games worlds and learn more about them. The characters will be unique and interesting and hopefully memorable. That is something I really want to achieve with this project. Creating memorable characters. 

                           

Look at those blood fxs!!!

And here is just some extra screenshots from development:

When will the Greenlight come out?!?!?

     What is taking so long? I am really working hard and taking my time with this new game project. I want this game to be perfect and better than any other game I have ever created. After all, the game does have my own real name in it (so egotistical I know.) "Samer Hills" is going to have a lot in it. Especially plot. This is going to be my biggest, most polished and possibly weirdest game ever. So I am really going that extra mile and putting in a lot more effort into this game than any other project I have worked on. It has to turn out exactly how I am envisioning it to be. 

I know that there is a good amount of people who visit the blog daily to check for updates on my projects and I think that is so cool. I mentioned this before, but the fact that there is a good handful of people out there who take time out of their own day to see updates on my projects and come visit my blog means the world to me. So thank you everyone for being so patient. I will do my best to keep posting daily. I think the game will turn out better this way. I aim to deliver a really bizarre yet intriguing entertaining game with unique characters and personalities as well as a believable post-apocalyptic game world that you can get pulled into. I want this game to be a memorable experience and hopefully contribute a really unique game to the indie gaming community. 

     

OTHER PROJECTS:
     Before I end the blog for today I want to talk about one more thing that I plan on doing this year and that is getting more into YouTube. I have brought this up numerous times throughout the years. Saying that I want to start using my YouTube channel more and start posting daily videos and content, etc but never really got to it. This year, 2017, however is different. I really want to use my skills as a 3d artist/animator/developer etc beyond the scope of just making games. I want to try and do new things and expand from just being a indie game developer. What better way to share content, ideas and art through YouTube right?

     Earlier I did mention that I was working on other projects and those other projects are short animation videos that I started working on for my YouTube channel. Here is a little preview.

Looks weird I know and that is because the content/animations I will create and post to YouTube most likely will be weird.. Just like my game projects. The point is that, I love creating and I will continue creating as long as I enjoy to do so. But yeah, I have been working on a few short animations which will be going onto my channel later on in the year. At the moment, my main focus is finishing up my next game, but after that I hope to post videos on a daily basis on the channel.

Lots of new content to look forward to. I am really excited and motivated to create and share all these new experiences. I have a really good feeling about the this year and I hope to make 2017 my most productive and best year yet. I am really just an artist with a lot of strange ideas and I wan't to get as many of those ideas out that I possibly can. Thanks for reading and more updates coming soon! 

By the way, most of these screenshots I posted in today's article are more recent screens I posted on my twitter. I am not as active on my blog, but I am very active on my twitter account and post almost everyday, for more daily updates follow me here: https://twitter.com/snowconesolid (I am sometimes annoying on twitter)

Here's the plan... (Next Steam Greenlight campaign)

     I have been making excellent progress on my next game project and I gotta say, I have never been so excited about anything I have ever made as much as I am for this new game. Anyway, I don't want to start rambling on about how much of a good job I did on my new project. That doesn't mean anything at all. Instead of going on and on about how great I think my game is - I need to actually focus more on completing it and getting it out there. Gotta tone down that ego. Sheesh!

     Anyway, in all seriousness, yes I have been making excellent progress on the game however, it is no where near complete. It's not even close to where I want it to be yet. That is not necessarily a bad thing. I am taking my time with this one and polishing it up in every area as much as I can. Polish and quality is something I have been talking a lot about lately here on the blog and it is something that I am really stressing and pushing into the next game. I want the game to be as good as I possibly can make it.

      As much as I am proud of my first Steam release Potato Thriller. This game will be nothing like Potato Thriller in anyway. Not even close. And I don't want it to be like Potato Thriller actually. As I said in an older blog post, I have grown and matured a lot since the release of Potato Thriller and really have learned and become more skilled as a game developer. I want this next project to show that. I am capable of more Potato Thriller type games. 

I know I often say this, but I will try to say this in the least braggiest way as possible - This is going to be the most polished thing I have ever worked on. Damn! that still came across as egotistical... Honestly though, I am just really excited about the work I have put into this project and I keep trying to show that in the blog updates but it comes across as some looser indie developer who is really full of himself. But it really is not my intention to come across like that. 

Next game has dev's name in the title... Say's he doesn't want to 

come off as egotistical...

     The reason I want to share this next game so bad is because when I originally released Potato Thriller, sure it had some fans but, it also had a lot of other people who criticized it harshly. 

And I have said this before, but I always accept all forms of criticism. I have nothing against negative criticism at all. I actually even agree with most of the criticism I got over Potato Thriller and this is really one of the main reasons as to why I am trying to improve and show that with my next game. I feel like I kind of got this image as some kind of "hack dev" or some cheap indie dev who doesn't care about the quality of their games and just puts stuff out to make a quick buck. That is not me at all. I care so much about the quality that goes into my games. Hopefully I can do that with my next game. And I am really excited to get it out there and share it with the world. I love video games so much and respect them as the wonderful art form that they are. I'm very passionate about games. It's cheesy I know.

WOOOOW character has different uniforms built in!

     This game will definitely be a 2017 release. But hopefully early 2017. I had originally planned on launching the Greenlight campaign on Steam for this game by the middle of the month if I reached a certain point in the games development. Unfortunately that won't be happening. So here's the plan (for now) - I am not that far off from hitting that "certain point" in the games development. What I want to do is get more done. My goal is to try launching the Steam Greenlight campaign by the end of this month and then hopefully finish and release the game early 2017. No promises just yet. Might not happen. But that is what I am aiming for and working hard to stay on my schedule. In the meantime there will probably be less blog post and updates but I will come back on here and share more whenever I get a chance to do so! If I launch my Greenlight campaign before the end of this month then I will definitely post an update here on the blog.

Until then, this might be the final post of 2016. If it is, I hope everyone has a safe and wonderful holiday break. Spend time with your families, play some video games! See you in 2017!

Things are gonna get weird...

Surprise game very soon (P.T. Remake?) and 2016 plans.

     Just wanted to post a quick update about this secret horror game project I have been putting together over the past couple weeks in my free time.  In a previous blog post I said that I was pretty much working on P.T. Or at least my very own version of P.T. Like I said earlier, I have been a huge fan of the Silent Hills project ever since the P.T. demo came out and was really bummed when I heard that it got canceled. The P.T. demo was even removed from the PS store as many of you probably know. It has been some time since all of this has happened. By now i'm sure that a lot of people in the gaming world have probably even forgotton about the whole Silent Hills thing. P.T was such an impressive demo because it was something that really stood out from other modern day horror games. What I mean by that is, it was actually scary. I love horror games, but I haven't actually felt frightened by a horror game in a while. P.T was different. The atmosphere and everything was just so well done. The jump-scare got me more than once and it was just an actual awesome experience overall. I will talk more about this later on.

Staying on topic. I had so much inspiration from the P.T. demo. It was a simple first person game but so perfectly executed. I have been working on my own P.T. since October. It's kind of like a remake but definitely in my own way. It's also different in a lot of ways. But yes, this game I have been working on (on and off whenever I had a chance too) is very much influenced and inspired by the P.T demo. I am making this game in honor of the Silent Hills P.T demo.

 I have gone through so many revisions for my own version of P.T (which I want to discuss later on maybe in a video?) But  I am finally at a point in the games development where I feel satisfied with it, the game feels right, plays right and feels like P.T. This is also definitely an interesting game for me to make and different from the other games I created. I just wanted to say in todays blog post that I am almost finished and plan on releasing my new game very very soon. Probably within the next few days or so. :)

Other things...
Anyway, I wanna wrap things up for today. I will have more updates real soon. I said a while back in another post that I wanted to start doing video updates. Maybe I will get to this tomorrow. But I want to have a video up soon kind of discussing more about my P.T game, where this blog is going, where I am going with my indie games career (well hobby I guess, not really a career). I also want to start to get more into youtube. I don't just want to make indie games anymore. I want to expand. I kind of want to give this blog and my games a face, a more human side. I want to interact more through youtube and the blog. I want to update on a more daily basis. As I said, I plan on doing video updates over some stuff i'm working on, maybe do some tutorials for unity and blender3d, answer questions and even do a couple of my own lets play videos. Cover some other indie games other small time devs like me have made. I want to help out the indie scene more and be more active.

A lot of new things planned going into 2016. I'm very excited as always. Again I will cover this more in depth later on. I might have my first "real" youtube video out covering my P.T game and the future of all of this "Snowconesolid Productions" stuff. I want to thank all the readers and players out there who visit my blog and check out my stuff. It means a lot to me. As always, stay tuned. More updates coming real soon. Happy holidays everybody. Peace.

2015 gamedev plans. The Next generation of Snowconesolid Games

     Here I am again. I know I haven't been updating the blog as much as I said would. I have not been as active on the unity community forums either. But i'm still here. It's 2015 and "Snowconesolid Productions" is still around. I am still here. Still developing games. Still creating whatever I imagine. Sharing ideas, artwork and interactive experiences through my creations. Still a huge fan of Blender3d and the Unity game engine.

"Snowconesolid Productions" is definitely no triple-A game development studio. Non of my games so far have received millions of downloads/plays and I am sure that not a lot of people have even heard of  this development blog.

What is "Snowconesolid Productions" ? Snowconesolid Productions is a indie game studio run by a solo optimistic game developer who is passionate about creating not just games but experiences, artwork and memories. A indie developer who is not afraid of putting up his creations no matter what the feedback is. "Loved it", "hated it", "worst thing I ever played", etc. Comments/ critiques, etc. Any feedback is always welcome and accepted. A indie developer who loves to continue learning and improving his development and artwork skills.  I am Snowconesolid. This is what I love doing. This is my true passion.

I still find it hard to believe how fast time fly's by. I started learning game development and the other areas of the pipeline such as 3d modeling, animation, etc back in 2010. It's 2015 now and I have learned so much throughout these years. I have come so far in my indie development journey. Looking back at my first couple games and my first 3d models and comparing them to what I can do now really shows that I love learning and improving my skills. My dedication to creating. There is a huge difference in the quality I can deliver now in both game design and art compared to what I could do when  I first started.

For example, comparing two of my games:

"MoonLight Mountains : First Discovery" (A game I created and released in 2012. Something I made that was more experimental. A project I created when I was still learning game dev.)

with something like

"Hide-n-Seek Winter" (Created and released in 2014. One of my newer more polished games ever created.)

These two titles are night and day different from each other in every area. The game design, the gameplay mechanics, 3d models, animations, etc. There is a huge difference in quality that is clearly visible between the two games. And for both of these titles, I created everything from scratch on my own. Every art asset, all the logic behind the game and so on. If anyone compares the two they probably would not think the same developer created both of these.

That's what being a good developer is all about right? Learning from previous projects and experience, improving your skills, listening to what others have to say about your work, constantly training and improving your knowledge daily.

I love creating games. I love 3d modeling. I love animating, I love programming. I love creating storylines and characters,  I love being a indie developer.  It is 2015 and Snowconesolid productions is still going strong. My journey as a indie game developer will never cease as long as I can continue to create.

2015 Plans:

     Now that I have the long "New Year" blog intro out of the way I can share my plans and goals for this year.

New Games!
This year I just have so many new original ideas planned out. Currently I am actively developing my next game. Actually, I have been developing my newest game for about two weeks now. It is still very early in development. Down below I have some screenshots to share and more info about my next game.

Old Games brought back to life!
Yup!. So also, I plan on rebooting some of my older games. Revisiting some of my first original game releases and re-creating them from scratch. Taking my original ideas for those games I made when I was still a beginner game maker learning how to make games and using my current skill set I have today to re-create them to be how I originally wanted to make them in the first place. This is something I am really looking forward to. I have been wanting to re-visit some of my older games for a while now and see how I would approach them differently now because I am a completely different developer today compared to when I first created these games years ago. It will be a really interesting challenge for me that will really test my skills.

The new games?
While I look forward to re-visiting my older game projects and giving them a reboot... this is something I plan on doing later on. I am not focused on rebooting my older titles at the moment. When the time comes I will talk more about re-creating my older games later on. For now I rather focus on creating my new game ideas. I want to deliver new experiences. And as I mentioned above, I have been working on my next game already for a while. I rather create something new first and then consider rebooting older titles.

So anyway, here is little early preview of my next game project. (Screen Shots not final):

Early preview of "James" in Blender3D. My newest original character who will star in my next game:

In unity. Setup. Early testing, etc:

Early preview screen of what the final game will look something like. Rendered in Unity. Actual in-game screen shot:

Once again these are still early development screenshots from my new game and nothing is final yet. I am sure I will be changing a lot down the road as I continue to develop this game. Also if you follow me on twitter you may have seen me post these screenshots earlier.

Game Info?
At the moment I don't have very much to explain about the game because I am still planning it out myself (especially the storyline) as I work through it but here is a general description for it:

"Jelly Space" project (Working title) will be a 3D immersive third person stylized level based puzzle/survival/adventure game. The game storyline follows "James" (our main character) as he journeys through a surreal space world, trying to find his way back home after an unexpected accident.

Lost in space and low on fuel, players will be placed in Jame's boots and must overcome unusual obsticals and strange encounters as they try to survive this harsh journey back home.

Platforms:
This game will be both for pc and mobile platforms.
I plan on releasing this game for Windows, Mac and Android platforms.

This will be my first game release of 2015 and I am very excited to continue sharing progress on the project down the road. I will have more info later on in upcoming blog posts.

Who is working on this project?
As always, I am going to be 100% responsible for this game project. Just like all my other games up until now, I will be developing this solo. I will be responsible for creating all of the 3d models/ art assets, game design, mechanics, storyline, etc from scratch. Whenever I work on my own game projects I like to take full responsibility for them. I like being able to say "I created everything in this game on my own" no matter how it turns out. It is a really rewarding feeling and achievement and a personal development style for myself.

What happened to Jelly Stack?

You might remember that in my last blog post (the last blog post I made in 2014) I mentioned that I was working on a quick short one week project called "Jelly Stack". I even said I would have it finished and released before the end of the 2014 year. Unfortunately this never happened. Plans have changed and as I thought about it I realized this is not the kind of game I want to create. Stacking a pile of randomly falling jelly blobs seemed like a boring idea to me later on. It seemed like something that has been done too many times before. I don't want to create clones of games like this. I want to create new and original games with more meaning and storytelling. Anyway one thing lead to another and then I ended up creating this character:

Jelly Guy:

Then this character ended up leading me to start creating my current game project I was just talking about above ("Jelly Space"). So actually, my upcoming game is all branched off my original simple idea for "Jelly Stack". It's amazing how one thing usually leads to something completely different. Who knows what else will change down the road as I continue creating "Jelly Space"? We will see...

2015 Conclusion?
My main focus this year and with all my upcoming game projects is about quality. This is something I will really stress as I develop my newest games. I want to prove that I can produce high quality games on my own with all the skills I have gained throughout my  past experience. Lots of focus will be put into every area of the pipeline (great quality graphics, fun gameplay mechanics and so on)

2015 is going to be an awesome year. I have so many new games planned that I want to create this year. It might be a little soon to say this but I'm going to go ahead and say it anyway because of how confident I am.

Personally, I think that this year, 2015 will be my best year ever as a indie game developer. I strongly believe that I will create some of my best and most memorable game experiences ever this year and I am just so excited to get the ball rolling. This year will be my year to really prove and show just how far I have come in this indie game development journey of mine. Using all the knowledge and experience I gained throughout the years, 2015 will show the kind of quality games I can truly produce.

This is definitely an exciting time for me. For "Snowconesolid Productions". It will be my biggest year yet for sure and I plan on delivering top quality professionally polished game releases. I hope to create interactive experiences that everyone will enjoy playing. Experiences that will really be memorable.

Thanks for reading and once again I am extremely excited to start creating my newest game titles for the 2015 year. I am looking forward to sharing progress as I develop my new games here on the blog. So stay tuned for a lot more updates down the road!