My Wild Dream Game
A project I first thought of when I was 17
Hallå pals!
Jonas here with another issue of Indie Notebook to get some ideas out of my noggin, and to inspire you to do the same.
Somehow I can’t say anything about the stuff I’m working on right now. So instead, let’s dive into my archive of past projects. Actually to one very specific game project I first thought of in 2013 when I was 17 years old.
My Wild Dream Game
Back then I used to hike by myself in the forests around where I grew up, and I went adventuring with my friends quite often. We would walk across a mountain called “thief mountain”, or we would follow a river to see how far we could get.
This was around the time when the original, browser-version of Don’t Starve came out.
I didn’t know anything about game development at the time, but these adventures and Don’t Starve inspired an idea that I’ve never been able to shake off, or fulfill.
Something I loved about going on these adventures was when an unexpected obstacle would show up.
There was this one time where me and a bunch of buddies were walking through a forest and got blocked by a shallow but wide creak. About 2 or 3 meters. Everyone in this group has very different personalities, so we all crossed it differently.
I threw my bag across. Then I backed off and ran towards the river and jumped across it.
Then the next guy found a freshly fallen tree, just thick enough to hold his weight, laid it across and balanced over.
My next friend also used the fallen tree as a bridge, but he used two branches like ski-sticks, because he didn’t want to risk losing his balance.
My third friend took his shoes and socks off, and rolled up the legs of his pants. Then he just walked through the river. We dried his feet with toilet paper.
I wanted to make a game where these different types of approaches could all work! And where the main obstacles in the game would just be these sorts of environmental hazards. Rushing rivers, steep cliffs, paths blocked by thick foliage. Just a game about wandering and exploring your own way with fun consequences.
And I wanted you to be able to take your backpack off, toss it across the river to make yourself lighter. Or fall into a river and lose the bag as you tumble around under the surface. Then save yourself on a rock and then chase after the bag by skipping between stones.
I wanted it to be a game where you would rarely ever die. Instead you would just end up in these situations where you end up somewhere you didn’t mean to go or you lose something.
This is a pretty wild idea for a first game project. There was just no way for me to make something like this. I had tried to make simple platformers in Unity and Game Maker by following tutorials. But I didn’t even have the patience to finish a tutorial, let alone an actual game.
But I could dream about it. So I started designing it in my head and doodling. At first I just called it “Imaginary Game,” but then I quickly got more invested and started calling it WILD WILD WILD (yes in caps). I shared the drawings online, I wrote vaguely about what I imagined it to be, hoping that maybe the winds of the internet would bring someone to me who could help me make it (nobody ever showed up).
Somehow I knew I couldn’t learn programming. I believed that I wasn’t the type of person who could learn to code, I just saw myself as an artist. But an artist can learn to make 3D art in Blender. So I followed tutorials and eventually got the hang of it. I tried to build the art for the game.
I made this texture sheet inspired by some low poly 3D with pixel art textures that I had seen online.
I assembled this scene in Blender and tried to figure out how to move it over to Unity. I also tried to understand why that brick wall was semi transparent. I never figured it out, these kinds of mysteries were everywhere for me back then.
I made this wonky rig and run animation for the character. I was proud but frustrated with the stuttered movement. It took a long time to smooth out all these rough edges in my 3D workflow.
While I was doing all this WILD WILD WILD-stuff, I was also drawing a comic strip called “us with plants on our heads” (yes, all lower-case). It was taking place in pretty much the exact setting that I imagined for the game.
I wanted to put these characters into the game too and fill it with these odd little stories.
This idea has lived in my mind on and off for a long time. In 2017 I made this concept art.
I already imagine the game to look quite different from this picture. There was something in the mood and colors of the original sketches that I liked more.
If I were to work on the game now I would go for a more uneven and messy shape to the ground. It’s just too flat and Mario-like here.
The last time I remember working on WILD WILD WILD, I was trying to program some sort of weird, 3D UI for the inventory, where you sort of had to fit stuff inside a sphere. So the inventory was actually a physical space that you had to manage. I’ve got a gif of that working in another game prototype over here. It would work fine in a 1st person game like I’m showing there, but WWW is supposed to be a 3rd person game.
It’s been a couple years now since I physically touched the project. My interest never died, I just got distracted by other projects and obligations.
In a lot of ways I would say that Surmount has a lot in common with WILD WILD WILD. It’s a climbing game, all about overcoming environmental challenges and using stuff from your backpack. I think the most obvious difference is that Surmount is very vertical, instead of more horizontal. And we didn’t lean into all the ideas I mentioned as much as I wish we had.
There’s a bit of a different vibe too though, WWW is supposed to be more artsy. Surmount is more traditional.
Now I know I’m probably capable of bringing this idea to life. I just know it’s a large ordeal and as I’ve said before, that’s not the type of commitment I’m looking for right now. And what is this even? Is it an actual game idea I should bring to life some day? Or just a lofty aspiration to try to capture?
I’m not sure yet. But it only existed in my head so far. It feels good to write it out like this for the first time.
Some games with a bit of that WILD WILD WILD essence
Death Stranding
A Short Hike
Zelda: Breath of The Wild
One Piece Unlimited Adventure
Don’t Starve
Spelunky
Minecraft
Cubeworld
Mosa Lina
❓ Question time
Do you have any projects like this that lingers? Let me know in the comments or by replying to this email!
Panel of the week
(from Space Deer)
Thank you for reading Indie Notebook! I’d love to hear what today’s issue made you think about.
Take care and have a creative week.
I like the idea that we can't burn out if we have a project that we know is our future and is everything we've ever wanted to make. This is like a little radar that tells me whether or not I subconsciously think something will succeed (if I'm not motivated, it's because deep down I know it won't mean something), and the radar will tune itself over time.
No projects linger in my head; just many nice motifs and designs that I might employ some day.
Some say ideas are a dime a dozen; that execution matters. I still think about how hard Miyazaki worked to ideate Ponyo and the image boards; it was not easy to come up with those ideas.
That does sound like the type of experience that could practically inspire a whole career in game development :) Very cool.
I remember "us with plants on our head" and getting the sense that you maybe had a bigger vision for it than what was apparent in those comic pages. This is some new Jonas lore, hehe.
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I'll write you a private message about an idea that lingers with me...