State of yyrGames, Summer 2023 edition
Hi everyone! It's been a while since I posted anything here--or released anything, for that matter--despite the fact that I've actually gotten a lot done as of late. So, I wanted to take the opportunity to update you on exactly what I've been up to.
My focus remains Super Duper Multitasking, and while there is still much left to do, I've gotten a lot done over these past few months. All of the minigames are done, for both the main game and Versus mode; I've added the new single-player Gauntlet mode, which is thrilling and fun; I've added a Tutorial and two new Training modes; I've implemented a ton of bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements; and, I've also added one of the most highly-requested features for the standard Quickplay mode: fast-forward! Now, you'll be able to skip up to the first 90 seconds, and go straight to the real action. You'll still be able to post your time to Leaderboards, too! (You'll need to have already lasted twice as long as what you want to skip. For example, you'll be able to skip the first minute if you've already lasted for 2 minutes.) That being said, I still need to add most of the new Missions, separate the Missions out into courses, add a couple more bonus games and UI improvements, and update the Leaderboards/Stats/Achievements/data file to support all of the new content. I am hoping to finish all of this in 2023, and to shoot for release sometime in the first half of 2024, possibly alongside the "non-multitasking" minigame collection I mentioned earlier. I greatly apologize that you've all been waiting for so long, as I promised this expansion 3 years ago already, but I promise all of you, it will be worth the wait! It's practically a whole new game--one with far more replayability than before--and I can't wait to unleash it upon an unsuspecting world. Please look forward to another playtest video soon!
Believe it or not, my best-selling game at the moment is...Falling Plus on Xbox. I'm not sure how that happened, but it's selling far more on Xbox than it ever sold on Windows. So, it makes sense for me to put something more out on Xbox ASAP. I'm currently working on a port of Sharpshooter Plus; I started it a couple of weeks back and it's already almost done. It's more or less going to be exactly the same as the Steam version, except that it will only support controller play (no touch or mouse support). I hope to have it out before the summer is over.
Bungee Ferret Tossing 1.5 is still coming, but I'll be honest: I need to improve the character graphics a bit, and that's going to take me a little while. After Sharpshooter Plus on Xbox is out, I'm going to start working on that again. I'm sort of working on it in bits and pieces in between other things; since Super Duper Multitasking is my priority, I'm not going to focus on BFT until I'm close enough to release to spend the last 1-2 weeks kicking it out the door. So it's hard to say when it'll be done.
Snake360/Snake Party and CardArcade are my remaining IPs that I haven't yet brought back since their Xbox 360 delistings. I used to feel that I should wait on Snake until after I built more of a brand. I no longer feel that way. However, I will need to rebuild the graphics, because they didn't even look great in 2008 (and were about as efficient as trying to carve a stone statue using a butter knife). The earliest that I can look at that is the middle of next year. But I'll be honest, I also would like to work on something entirely new. Currently I'm sitting on a few concepts. One is a multiplayer-focused 2D combat game for up to 16 simultaneous players; one is a twin-stick shooter-like that would use a lot of random generation; and then I have concepts for not one, not two, but three separate rhythm games. So there's a lot, and I only have a single brain, two hands, and not as much freetime as I once did. I'm sorry that my pace has slowed to what it has, but my hope is that the set of yyrGames available to buy in 2028--which will mark the 20th anniversary--will be at least as large and diverse as what was available in early 2017 before the XBLIG delisting, if not moreso.
Lastly, I will mention that I will soon be looking into redesigning the Web site. I mentioned that this was coming some time ago, but support is now winding down for security updates on this aging version of Drupal, so it's time. Please look forward to a fresh coat of paint and some new content (finally!) soon.
Thank you very much for your continued interest and support of yyrGames! I appreciate it very much!