Artwork for podcast In The Keep
Boris Brnčal | Adventure Games, Sobriety, Homelessness
29th October 2024 • In The Keep • In The Keep
00:00:00 01:01:34

Share Episode

Shownotes

Boris Brnčal is a narrative designer, game director, and producer at Incidental Minds, an upstart game studio based in Slovakia. He is also a teacher at VŠMU and Skyro, a school focusing on AI and game design in Bratislava. Here we discuss living a sober lifestyle, Incidental Minds' upcoming games, my obsession with classic Lucas Arts' Point 'n Click Adventures, and the many difficulties faced by the homeless which is a huge inspiration for Boris' upcoming game Grayton the Detective. | https://www.linkedin.com/in/boris-brn%C4%8Dal-0909a2164/ | https://x.com/IncidentalMinds | https://store.steampowered.com/app/3280660/Grayton_the_Detective/ | https://incidentalminds.com/ | https://inthekeep.com/ | https://www.fearzinemagazine.com/

Mentioned in this episode:

Call of Saregnar

callofsaregnar.com

Stellar Valkyrie

birdgame.space

Support

https://inthekeep.com/

Transcripts

hey in the keep listeners looking to get your horror fix this fall check out beine beine is a physical and digital

magazine focused on horror games Nostalgia and titles from Indie Studios and developers we are currently running

our Kickstarter for issue 2 and have lots of cool goodies available find the link in the description and help us

deliver an awesome physical magazine featuring over 70 horror video games

[Music]

[Applause] [Music]

uh it's been a long time since I've seen you and when was that um good gracious

anime show in Slovakia in uh yeah I mean it was yeah probably

March yeah I'm not sure it was so nice to meet you um and

everybody there it was like a really like a once in a time once in a lifetime kind of event for me uh I was just

invited kind of on a whim to come speak at that conference and then uh while I

was on stage I remember like at some point you know I was like anybody here know what it's like to be a game producer and you raised your hand you're

like yeah I am a game producer I was like get your ass on stage then yeah

yeah that that was that was really really cool and thank thanks for that also thanks for inviting me

here I'm really grateful yeah man how do we pronounce

your last name I mean it's bral but I mean you can pronounce it like Vernal

or something like that D me and Alex were saying beforehand it's okay to unmute if you want to laugh uh for this

but we were saying it's Barnacle like SpongeBob SquarePants is always complaining oh barnacles and like like

but uh no so you definitely have an Eastern European name with no not enough vowels and too many consonant uh

something that we've noticed yeah yeah I mean I mean for me it's

but I heard that it's like hard to hard to pronounce for many people

like even like even maybe like Polish people or something I don't

know maybe not polish they they probably can't pronounce it but like some other

nations so did you uh you grew up in Bros lawa or in the kind of local area

yeah I mean yeah I mean it was like uh we moved three times when I was

younger and uh it was all around the area of bra Slava the Western

Slovakia uh but but yeah it was it was like smaller towns

mostly uh and the last seven years I'm living in Bri Slava and it's it's great

here I love it I was really impressed with the culture like just to how how kind people are and how personable

people are the sense of humor um especially because at at the time I was living in Scandinavia which is much more

I would say like a I think you and I talked about that a lot kind of when uh when we were at the little Afterparty

you after the event but you know I was just so taken a back by how unperson

Scandinavian culture can be and then like being in Eastern Europe being in like you know being in Bros laava and

Prague for a couple weeks was just such a a warm reminder of what home is like

because for me it's the same thing like people are much more open they talk to strangers you know they're very

approachable uh every everybody wants to drink with you that's what something I really noticed like immediately as soon

as I set foot into the country it's like everybody's trying to get you to get hammered and I'm like uh you know we

could go slow you know we could have a couple you know here or there but you know maybe not get absolutely shitfaced

in the middle of the day and they're like ah you know it's the you're not really living the Slovakian lifestyle

unless you're you know drinking schnaps or vodka or whatever with this and you know I'm like holy cow guys like calm

down calm yeah I mean I mean actually I I don't drink alcohol at all so yes yes

so I'm probably like not really a slow

in I find it really interesting how cultures kind of base their entire identity off of drinking and then you

know like there are always going to be people who don't drink within that culture and then like that's a different subset of their you know who they are

yeah like tell me about it yeah oh I mean I don't like the like drinking

culture and I try to to enhance people to not to drink uh

so much and to enjoy time sober and like playing board games and just talking and

yeah what what is it that drove you to be you know to to just live a life of sobriety like why is this such a uh you

know thing for you I mean I I don't see a point in like being drunk yeah uh cuz

like it it basically kills your brain cells and and like I don't know I don't

know how to explain it but like I don't feel it's it's natural and it's needed

and I feel a lot better better when I just have fun and uh being like in the

moment without being drunk you know I mean I guess I guess my question is more

like did was there some event in your life that drove you to that lifestyle or

was it just sort of natural for you so like maybe you know for some people it's like oh you know my dad was drunk and I

just never wanted to touch alcohol because of that or some you know it could be anything some people it's like you know they were their family were

tolers and then you know when they were 14 they had their first Jack and Coke and they went off the rails you know you

never know it could go either way so I guess what I'm really asking is like what was your experience that kind of

like LED you to live that lifestyle oh I mean U it it was kind of natural for me

I mean I was raised that way like an nonr non-

drinken uh family and also my

my ex-girlfriend's dad started to drink a lot and it was like really

traumatizing and after that I am even more encouraged to discourage people

from drinking I feel you um do you do you like find yourself uncomfortable

around people who do or are you able to just kind of like respect that you know some people can can't handle it yeah I

mean I can I try to I try respected but like when someone is like too drunk and

disrespectful I hate it oh yeah man that's that's something I think everyone shares it's like you know the the moment

that you're no longer you know talking to someone who's capable of the handling their faculties and like actually

articulating their ideas it's like oh yeah we're done here yeah there's no point in argument with a with a drunk

person but I would say that there are certainly like plenty of people in the world who can get along just find you

know uh drinking having fun you know like it could be anything any substance

you know uh and then they find a way to just live in the world and and be

perfectly reasonable but then there are also always going to be people who uh you know fall off the deep end so yeah

of course it must be interesting for you to live in such a culture and you know and have that mindset so yeah I mean sometimes it's uh

it's like people don't get it like why I don't drank the

like I don't care so much you know let's Okay I mean you can do

whatever you want uh interestingly enough though the the game that you're working on has you know a lot of themes

that I think are maybe maybe not exactly on point but you know reminiscent you know the the hobo and everything kind of

his lifestyle and uh I'd like to get a bit more into like what you're working on and you know who you are career-wise

yeah I mean I would prefer not to call him a hobo but a homeless

gentleman okay uh because I mean he's he's

a like originally wealthy guy who ended up

like unfortunate on street and uh he's trying

to get better by solving a big case and to become a real detective basically

rich guy who who ends up on the street like I

heard in my eyes the name basically like graeton gryon something like that and

like based on that I I knew I wanted to put him

into probably into America but also the

problem with homelessness it's so much uh different

from from the Europe and it felt

like it would not work in Europe so much as it would work in the setting of of

Cleveland and us it's something really interesting that I find uh with a lot

of I would say Europeans that grow up in places that aren't you know like kind of first world

ish so this sort of uh Romanticism of

America and what it can mean to be American it's I don't think it's because it's better in America necessarily it's

just like the upward momentum like the the potential to move you know up and down in the United States is uh I would

say objectively greater than it is in Europe you know in in Europe you can do a lot of things you have a lot of

freedoms and you have a lot of wonderful things going on for your thank you for listening to in the key please consider

taking a moment to leave a review comment a like And subscribe on your listening platform of choice it really

helps it's greatly appreciated if you really love the show and want to see it grow consider supporting us bya patreon

supporters get episodes early exclusive content and updates chances to ask questions to guests access to in the

keeps video games and whatever else I can do for you every little bit helps this podcast directly supports my

ability to do what I love the most and to take care of my growing family you can find links to everything that

I'm talking about here over at inthe keep.com thank you bless you and enjoy

the [Music] show Society uh overall but it's like

you know if you're it's much more difficult to move up and down the the food

chain whereas uh in your story especially talking about America uh talking about

homeless folks you know Cleveland Ohio whatever you know you have this

character who is uh skilled you know he he has a means

of earning a living and yet he like doesn't fit in and he has to deal with homelessness as like a you

know a part of his own morals and I think that there's a large

part of our society here in the states that are actually living that lifestyle so it's a really beautiful thing to talk

about yeah thank you and uh it's it's basically like hard

for me to to Really stay realistic on this because I don't

live in the US I don't live in Cleveland Ohio I have never been there but like

I I went to the United States states uh

8 years ago and I spent three weeks there so where uh it was New York like

New York City and peros New Jersey and also uh somewhere near

Baltimore okay Baltimore Columbus

right is oh [ __ ] it's no oh Columbus it's the other town

that was like near it uh what's what's the state Jesus uh Maryland Maryland

yeah yeah so Baltimore Maryland and Columbus in

Maryland and like Upstate New York also so I I experienced this like the

difference of culture and all the like also contrast of of the

like poverty and and

wealth oh and it felt like so inspiring to me

so basically that experience kind of like stuck in my head and I I needed

to tell stories based on on those feelings I had

and so it combines all the worlds of poverty and and extreme

wealth and also like the world of crime and world of

investigation and uh gen General General

wisely uh it's like a 2d narrative game

a to the narrative Adventure game uh combining the classical point C

Elementary games and life is trange like games yeah I think that's an interesting

bridge is something that you and I talked about uh quite a lot I think that you know the night of the Afterparty

from from the event that we were at but like people think of pointand click in

adventure games and in generally they think of you know Full Throttle they think of I have no mouth and I have my screen they think of you know day of the

tentacle that sort of thing um but by technical of course all of The Telltale

Games I had the pleasure of like having a breakfast with with u and a few drinks as a matter effect with David Bowman who

worked at tail tale uh for a really long time and then life of strange was of course another example and I would also

throw until dawn into the mix is like a big influence in the genre but they're

still technically point and click adventure games just because you move around in 3D space doesn't mean that you're not pointing clicking and

adventuring so uh yeah it's really cool to see what you're working on man like just like the little teaser trailers

here and there of course you're not marketing it too heavily yet but um I'm a huge fan of the genre I'm a huge fan

of what your uh you know what your vision is yeah thank you man oh I mean I mean

it's it's still an adventure game but like it's not point and click because you don't point and click right uh yeah

but like it it will be like you can choose uh between the direct move

movement and the point and click movement so uh both the fans of the classics and the new new games uh would

could be happy hopefully what to you are like the

three greatest point and click games of all time or I should say adventure games of all time yeah oh uh it's it's a

tricky question so um so if if it's just sping

CLI adventure games uh I would say that like the game that inspired me the most

uh is Slovak game veso Havana which was

um voice acted by a Czech uh voice actor or like a real

actor ohus it's it's hard to pronounce for me

because it's in Che and there is the like hard hard to say

r i I hope I say right uh so I mean the

game has a check name because it was it was uh distributed by a Czech

company but it was originally Slovak and it it was a game that

I I had been raised on basically and then uh then it was like

it was like maybe all the cullet pillars of

Earth by by deik

and and I would really allow to mention some of the classics but it always feels

weird to mention Classics because it's like yeah of course everybody knows that everybody knows that you know like if you say okay yeah like because I'm

always going to go back to the you know the classics themselves like I'm always like Full Throttle Full Throttle like it's like it's the [ __ ] grm Fandango

it's like they're the best the best of the best and it's like if you mention them it's it's sort of like cheapening

yourself but at the same time it's like no the are truly great standout games all the Lucas art games um you know

everything that really came out of that era is like it it's such a great medium for gaming because it's so low stress

you know it can be and I would say that Telltale really innovated the the style of it with like kind of the timing

sequences in The Walking Dead and especially in Game of Thrones their their version of Game of Thrones you

know it would really force you to make a decision within a limited amount of time and that was very interesting but at the

end of the day you know you know you're just exploring the environment and whatever's going to happen's going to happen uh the time element coming into

it was something that I thought was really cool and unique um but it was a later Innovation so you have games like

uh you know like you're not really pressed for time in Grand Fano you can do whatever you

want to do you know you could take as long as you need to take to figure it out it's not really going to change the

experience um that's something that I think games have you know over time over the last 20 years or so games have

really oriented themselves around like player completion because otherwise you know people get bored uh it's a very

real thing I think everyone's experienced that where it's like you try to play a game and then you just get bored and you never revisit it you know

same as like cracking up in a book or a movie that you never finish watching or whatever a TV series that you just kind of Lose Yourself you know uh whatever

yeah exactly and yeah yeah I'm sorry uh yeah exactly that's our Point like we're

trying to that's that's a really big challenge for us to to crack this like

the boredom of like uh

of like the bill game play um of the classic adventure games they're great

but they were made when uh there were not so many

games and people would have more patience for for

them basically so it didn't need to be like time pressed and people would enjoy

it now every time you publish a game you're competing with you know Minecraft and fortnite yeah yeah of course you're

you're literally just compete like why is that you have to sell someone on the idea that this is a more valuable use of

their time than jacking off you know playing fortnite or playing Minecraft or

you know whatever else is you're you're buying people's time you're really trying to convince them that like what

you're doing is worth their while and their money uh that's a it's it's not

easy so especially in the entertainment industry it's like definitely not an easy

task yeah and and for the other game U I would say either Broken Age or the night

of the rabbit yeah so yeah I really I

really love the uh if you ever played I have no mouth on I'm mus scam I think I

mentioned it earlier but it's like actually don't but I can I can at least

look at it yeah night dive Studios did a uh a remaster of it maybe you know

within the last decade or so uh it's really really good it's it's it's such a classic Point CL game but it's based on

this short story you know by a guy Nam harlon Ellison and it's such a cerebral thing like you

have to inhabit like all these different characters within the story and like kind of like live their live the hell of

their past and like why are they condemned to the to to the Purgatory that they've been sentenced to and

they're all programmed uh not programmed they're they're ruled by this computer that like you know is its existence is

there to punish them so it's sort of this like kind of take on hell but it's such a great game really really true

this game really beautiful artwork it was all done uh by HR Giger if you're

familiar with his work from Alien or you know that kind of stuff like yeah he he definitely um was huge influence on that

game I see I mean it it sounds cool oh I mean I'm not I'm not so much

into the classics I mean uh it might sound like really

really bad but like um I'm more into games like life is French until the um

and so on so on I played a lot of Po click adventure games oh but

mostly mostly those that nobody knows and actually I I remembered a game

stupid Invaders which was like also my favorite when I was a child

so maybe that would be in the like top top five or

something that's awesome man did you uh did

you did you have a favorite game growing up maybe when you were like you know kind of in that adolescent phase that

was really spoke to you and inspired you to do what you're doing

now I mean these games like Vino harana uh super

Invaders zo zo Tycoon and Age of Empires

too 2 is one of the greatest games ever made for sure yeah I love that

game I don't know I mean I have like really bad

memory so so I for me there are just like there are

certain games that no matter what I make I'm always going to draw reference from like there there're just always going to be influences and of course I've

mentioned a lot of the point and click stuff so far so I'll avoid that but you know like I have a Resident Evil tattoo

on my arm uh Resident Evil 4 will always and forever be one of like the the high marks the high water marks of you know

great game development to me uh yeah of course the entire series of course and

they've always broke ground in different ways and everything of course Silent Hill uh is another one that I think is

like the survival horror genre as a whole uh recently just a conscript came

out which is more of a 2d take on the same genre but it's like about you know a soldier in World War I in France who

is you know basically like you know it's essentially the same game as Resident Evil just the setting and

the you know topics are different not instead of zombies it's you know German soldiers or whatever um but very very

good really incredible okay um there's just there's so many

opportunities out there to really explore and uh expand your mind through

games really I really love doing that yeah of course and also H dentos

too was like one of the games that I played and that inspired me and then later on

uh when the this war of Mind came yeah

uh it it it was like holy [ __ ] like you can do this with a game like you can you

can communicate messages like that I mean that was that was like huge for me well tell

me more about your game and like what you're working on oh so we're actually working on two

games um your company and everything like shout it all out yeah

so thank thanks so my company is called instal

Minds uh and we are focused on meaningful games oh just like just like

11 bit with that this war of mine and frostbank we try to convey some

messages and make something unique make some art

uh and make games that not only

entertain but also can give you something more uh but

like experiencing something you you could not experience in real life

or yeah I mean that's like basically every game how do you fund it like what do

what do you do for money I guess is the question uh we we received Public

Funding for for the two projects uh one of the projects

is is great on the detective about the homeless detective and the other project

is we resist about Slovak partisans during

Second World War and uh both of these games were

funded by Slovak art ccil so we are really thankful and hopefully we'll

receive some other funding by Publishers and create

Europe it's so crazy how often times in Europe games are funded by the

government you know like uh I worked on this project called combustion that's still going to come out but you know we

ended up in a situation where it's essentially like the Norwegian government is funding the entire project

you know and like the publisher is just going to have to like eat what they invested at first and then just kind of rely on the Norwegian government to

finish the game you or at least fund the finishing of the game um and that's cool but there's nothing wrong with that it's

just more like and in America that's far less likely you're going to have to find a proiv a private investor or you know

someone who has been of money they want to throw away uh potent and I mean throw away like literally just like see what

happens because it takes so long to make a game it's a it's a big investment you know if your game costs a million

dollars and it takes you three years to recoup on an investment it's you know anything less than a million dollars

like holy [ __ ] it's a lot yeah

yeah so currently our main project is called great on the detective

it's a 2d narrative Adventure game about a homeless

detective uh and the goal of the project is basically to tell a

story and do it in a way that there like

kind of new because we combine the mechanics of the classic for CLI adventure games and

the new adventure games uh but staying in

2D while having some Unique Mechanics like e dring mechanic where

you move your cursor around the around and you can hear the sounds

all that are like the closest to a cursor but it's still in 2D which was like probably never used

before and then we have a clue

system or we can call it uh deduction system it's really cool it's like um so

my having very limited understanding of what the game is I've only seen like the YouTube clips and stuff but like so

you're playing as this guy who is a detective but he's been somehow rendered

homeless um that's kind of hard to imagine so like can you kind of give me like a brief understanding of what the

story is like why he's in the situation yeah um and who's the writer

are you the are you the principal writer of the story or is this someone else so the main protagonist of the

story is gron who used to be wealthy but for the past

seven years uh he's been homeless and he had his own

butler but as kraton became homeless his Butler Cherry also became homeless so it

is kind of like mix of drama and

comedy uh while I mean we're sticking to to the

realism but trying to trying to put there some

like oh F you love this show and you love

supporting Indie video games please take a moment to check out in the keep's upcoming Stellar Valkyrie built in the

gz Doom engine this retro firstperson shooter puts you in the universe of space bird Bounty Hunter Falon who is on

a mission to save his ex-girlfriend from the evil black star cult just type Bird game dospace that's BD

game. Pac C into your browser hit enter and smash that wish list button and stay

tuned and now back to the

show element and uh greaton

greaton is like greaton is kind of like

antagonistic like he he generally enjoys d by himself

because like he's not so liked uh in the community and uh Jerry his ex

Butler is is always there for him and uh he makes him coffee he makes

all the like small things that Brion doesn't care about or like cannot do

because he he's The Mastermind he cares about uh the big plans the big

images and he doesn't know the like small details the small practical things

and uh as as he used to as he used to

be like really wealthy uh he he

studied at University he's like he's really well educated but

uh he he doesn't know how to do those small things and the Practical

things and he doesn't really like doing like everyday jobs so he's always trying

to make his life easier in a way and to

find shortcuts uh until he gets to the point where there are no short

shortcuts and uh Jerry gets arrested and gron

cannot greaton cannot even make his own coffee so he's like experiencing a really hard

like really hard times and he gets confronted by reality

and now now he's in in the point where there is like no way back and

like uh he was

in like [ __ ] pile at this point but like now he is like even

even he's like even deeper in [ __ ] uh and like he he needs to do something uh

to get back to his to get his dignity back

basically and he he never really was a real detective

in his life like he never he never worked for

police uh he never was a private

eye but uh as he became homeless uh it

seemed like a good way for him

to to make money as people always needed

something so he's more like an an informant than he is an

investigator in a way it's like he's kind of on the streets and like he has the you know the the knowledge of what's

going on but it's not like he's a detective it's more like he's an informant you know tell the detectives

what's going on maybe no I mean I mean he's really investigating but he's doing he's doing

like those like small newspaper how it's called

uh when someone uh puts in the newspaper like they're looking for a dog or

something like that how it's called Uh advertorial or you know

basically he's just he's solving small problems he's Smalling like local problems yeah small local problems for

like really uh small fees and he's like he's doing just f

mine uh he he makes like few hundreds per

month it's like uh he never really works

on a big case and he's a he's like really smart and he he could have solve

a big case but he's he's scared uh he's

like he's like scared of to success basically but at this point as Jerry

gets arrested gron decides to finally solve a real case a real detective case

uh which police is trying to solve and there is a bounty for for solving the

case and uh finding the Golden Spoon of joh De Rockefeller cuz it's like a local

Museum uh 51 in East Cleveland

Ohio and yeah he's trying to to get the money and get back to his

life and it gets it gets complicated on the way interesting

medium for storytelling you know like the because you're gonna have multiple branches of kind of like different

decisions he could or couldn't make or you as the player would or would not make you know uh in his

issues uh going off the vein of like what like you know what life is strange is like or what What U until dawn is

like you know there's so many different branches you could go down uh how are you going to solve the issue of you know

like because a lot of people I think find these games like they have so many branching paths and then they kind of ultimately lead to the same result uh do

you do you see yourself kind of having like one unified story to tell or or having multiple different avenues that

the player could go down I mean basically depends on the money that we will get for the

development uh but basically we're thinking about like going with the one

Avenue way but uh having like

different like side quests on the way

and and like uh impacting the other people

around and by impacting the other people they

will basically they they will basically

impact the story uh as it goes on not in the

like not in the way like Detroit become human that's like totally out of our

budget but kind of like life is strange way of like changing some facts and

situations context and yeah you can you can change

um the like occurrence of some events and uh like if you if you have if you

help one guy he can help you later but if

you I mean you can you can be really me basically it will have

consequences uh either Co or bad I mean it's not like if you do bad things

you only have like bad consequences because it can lead you to some some

consequences that are basic basically good for you but like morally bad in a

way so it will help that yeah it's a real anti-hero kind of situation um yeah

kind of yeah I mean greaton is gron is basically on anti-hero who

can be not such an [ __ ] basically like you can you can

try um I mean in his in his heart he's

good but like he can act like a real douchebag sometimes and you can decide

whether to go with the like douchebag way or all the

like like nice way but like it will probably be more complicated for you if

you go with the like easier well not easier we do like nicer way sometimes

because like I mean we want to show the

like real issues for for like someone being down on luck

basically so like he doesn't have so many options and

he it's like hard hard to decide for him whether to do like good things or

bad things because he doesn't have many

options but you can you can try uh to be a good person I

I don't want to spoil things so I'm trying to be as diplomatic as possible

uh but yeah there's a great modern hip-hop song called options by group

called Hippie Sabotage very good uh but like one of the kind of like key lines

in the song is uh you know I'm just dreaming of a future with some [ __ ] options like it's such a

big part of the human struggle is like kind of feeling trapped with it and I think that's why adventure games really

you know uh resonate with people a lot is because you only have a limited number of choices and you have to figure

out what's the best option for me at this time given the circumstances and that's how you

progress it's such a such a beautiful thing I think all gaming kind of comes down to that but it's like you know it

could be more obscured whereas uh you adventure games

are much more direct and the consequences of your actions maybe

horror games Come Close yeah I mean as as you mention it

like yeah yeah um being homeless uh in the narrative

kind of like being homeless kind of makes sense with the genre because yeah as you

mentioned uh you know limited options there and so uh the

narrative uh doesn't feel like so forced uh because

the mo the modern day detective would have like at least mobile phone and uh

he would have internet connection but like Kon is homeless you know so he

that uh it's also like early:

so many phones there were like almost no

smartphones and Brighton just have

to have to solve it not the like classical way because like he he has his

own unique ways of of doing things which

is kind of unique for Bron for the game basically it's it combines the weird

things uh you do in classical pent click adventure games and the realism because

we try to still stay with the narrative and

with the real realism as much as possible

so so it's also a challenge for us does it make sense of course and you

like some of the most annoying things in any games even some of the greatest games of all time like Final Fantasy 7

like where you you're like a you're supposed to like I don't know pump this

machine exactly in time with the rest of the group you know and you're supposed to just figure that out for yourself and

then you know point and click games are so much more guiding typically like it's it's an interesting Dynamic and

dichotomy as a matter of fact because you know the game will

uh steer you I wouldn't even say steer you in the right directions like you can't progress unless you go in the

right direction you know like you're just going to be stuck unless you figure out what you're supposed to do that's pointing click down to a [ __ ] T

but uh typically you know if it's designed well you're going to know what you're supposed to do or you're going to

be able to figure it out you know relatively easily um that's such an interesting W line to walk um as a

developer as a designer and you're you know everything about you know about

what your game signifies it seems like it's going to be really cool narrative wise I'm just kind of like you know you

mentioned life is strange a lot we've talked about until dawn I've mentioned The Telltale stuff you you say it's more

of a blend between the uh the classics and like kind of the modern way of doing

the style of game but you know I guess what I'm really interested to hear about

would be more about the gameplay itself like what's it actually like um and if

you don't have that answer yet that's okay it's just like something I want to get to eventually sorry sorry what was the question sorry

that was really longwinded I guess the question is like what's the game play like what what is the game itself like

what do you do in the game yeah so uh in the game you you basically go go around

and explore uh you interact with characters

you interact with the places you have inventory

interactions uh you can combine objects to like in the

classics uh but you have a clue system where

you you basically collect evidence and

you and you decide on on the deductions

of like what what greaton is going to take out of those evidence of theid

you're basically like at the core you're paying the bills like you're you gotta make a

living not really not really I mean it's it's really like story based like

uh like at at the beginning

you uh you find yourself at a uh at like

crime scene or not really a crime scene at first remember Batman Arkham

City sorry uh yeah yeah kind of Investigation

mechanics and stuff like where you know he's a detective of course he's the world's greatest detective he's Batman

so like you're using all this kind of like weird technology or whatever to like see Footprints or you know like

data you know and it kind of the game kind of guides you to Clues

um is it like that or is it maybe a bit more subtle yeah I will I will answer that uh

in in in few minutes but I wanted to say something else first of course of course

so I'm sorry for that yeah Al so at first you find yourself at a place of

investigation and you try and you're trying to find some Clues

to uh to get at the core of

like like how to get

to how to get somewhere basically not to spoil anything uh

and yeah the first first case is like really really easy just to uh get you

get you to to the mechanics and Katon as he home he doesn't have

such a like Hightech gadgets like like Batman of

course he actually has some like uh makeshift

stuff right I will not spoil on that but like he he he does have some like

makeshift makeshift gadgets and he also uses his intuition

like he he's The Mastermind he can he can he can connect the dots basically

like he knows like these these two pieces of evidence are

connected together and there is like there is like

some deduction based on these two right

but he he can see like many deductions from the connections of

evidence and uh he needs to decide because uh I was

thinking I mean they uh they already had something like this

in in the in the Sherlock Holmes games from frogwares but I I got to this this

mechanic by thinking about like uh TV shows about detectives who

who just see like few pieces of evidence and they connected to together and they know

exactly like what happened which is like I don't feel like it's realistic

because they they could see the connections but there could be like many

ways it could let to so I was thinking like how to do it and uh we were trying

to figure it out and I I basically designed this

system and we we also enhanced it uh I don't know

if I showed you the demo but like we have a new demo which will be like so

much better with the UI

and and yeah uh you have you have a note notepad uh like a diary basically

uh where you have the or or we can Co call it a case book

maybe you have this case book uh and the case is split into Parts like

small subcases and you you gather evidence for all of those

in the area of of the crime or the area of

investigation and you decide on those deductions and it connects uh

into into subc [Music]

conclusions what ever happened to the good old days when computer roleplaying games spent more time telling great

stories than stressing you out with season passes and needless grinding call snar is our effort to bring back the

best in RPGs play in the immersive world is two friends Adventure into a murder mystery that lands them in the middle of

a battle between Gods head over to call of sar.com that's call of s a GN

r.com for more info be sure to wish list on [Music] [Applause]

[Music] Steam and

and there are like different subon conclusions based on on your decisions based on those adductions that you're

you had Chosen and you can you can always you

can always change it the deductions and based on the subc conclusions if they're

like compatible together you'll get some like major conclusion on the case and

and it can either be like really really wrong or

like like somehow wrong or like super super right but like

uh mostly it's not so obvious which one is right

only only it's based on the logic of of the whole

thing where can people find your game you know go ahead and kind of like plug like where can people will find information about what you're doing your

company uh what you're developing and like wish listed or that kind of stuff we don't have a steam page just

yet but we're trying to to make it we

just we're just figuring how figuring out like how to get through the tax

information because we were uh forbidden two times uh from the

steam based on like I don't I don't even know why but like

we we didn't came through the

tax uh tax checking information like there is like

no problem with our taxes but like you know forgot it okay um

anyways yeah uh so we're we're working on it we're working on like running the

steam page but we don't have it just yet uh but you can find our website in

incidental minds.com and there are like some smaller games

that we made and there is there is a link for for a gameplay

video that we have which is like not so up toate and hopefully we will have a link

for the Sim page and the newer video soon on the

website which really awesome thank you so much it's really like inspired by you really glad that we

got to meet and everything and it just such a weird happen stance but I I I couldn't tell you enough you know maybe

it was the wine or whatever but like how much I love the genre and how much I want to see it continue on I you know

longterm speaking I want to also develop a point and cck game maybe a little bit more classic than what you have in mind

but yeah it's it's something that's a deep deep you know passion of mine and I

really uh I really care for what you're doing I really care for what you're uh you're working towards and it was such a just weird happen stance to bump into

you when I did yeah that's great to hear uh I'm

looking forward to your game uh do you do you have some like Concept

in mind I'm not going to talk about it yet because uh I have to read the entire

script it was originally like something that I was writing for you know a large publisher and then the IP fell through

so I'm gonna have to if I want to continue that particular game I'm gonna have to rewrite it uh another one is

sort of I'm going to make a point and click game no matter matter what another one that I have in mind is sort of like a

mafia story maybe a little paranormal or whatever but you know it's just

something that I've had um you know tucked away for a long time and I'm

waiting for the right opportunity to actually you put it into de to

development yeah see that's that sounds great I mean I would love to play some

action game based in like the settings of MAF or something like that well we'll

see what happens I'm looking forward to you know all of your storytelling and everything that you create it's a really

inspiring story thank you so [Music]

much so great to hang out with Boris and uh get to know his story and just all of

his wonderful thoughts and everything um make sure you're keeping an eye out

for anything that incidental Minds puts out here in the near future I'm really looking forward to all of it it's I kept

going on and on about it during the show but yeah huge fan of that genre huge fan of the whole Adventure game scene in

general it seems like it's coming back and I just want to be on top of it but also you know the deeper stuff that we talked about as well so uh make sure you

give them a like a shout a follow all that stuff keep an eye out by the way I want to thank all of you wonderful

people who are supporting the show as usual thank you to Shannon an Michael

Fred Brad dots and the rest of you as you jump on hopefully very soon because

this will continue to be a thing all the time really the podcast is back I know

it's like three episodes deep now uh maybe you didn't believe it but it's truly here so I want to thank John of

the shred for our awesome theme song a reminder to like subscribe review

comment wherever listening whether that be YouTube or Spotify or apple or I don't know there's like a bajillion

places to listen to podcast but uh just the number one thing you can do is tell a friend you know tell a friend that's

the best at least one other person just like hey check out the show uh what else we got yeah go over to

in.com all the ways to supported there uh articles you know about what we got

going on make sure you wish list our games Stellar Valkyrie and Callos snar

are on go away I promise I know we've been talking about this for years and years and years but you know it takes a

long time to make a video game as I found out much love I love you God loves

you stay in the keep

Chapters

Video

More from YouTube