Like many developers, I have a giant brainstorm list of many more ideas than I'll likely have time to realize. That's where Iron Lung sat following my trip to a Loch Ness museum in 2019, where a random bit of narration got me thinking about the idea of being underwater taking fuzzy pictures of some unseen creature. It sat there for a few years afterward, while I worked on projects with New Blood and DreadXP and went through a series of prototypes that all ended up shelved for various reasons. It's been hard to get any larger solo project to "stick" since Dusk, and frustrating to continually start a game only to end up stalled on it for whatever reason, with too much work in it to comfortably abandon but not enough to brute force my way toward a release.
Throughout that time I kept coming back to the basic idea of Iron Lung, and thinking "I should really just do this." It was a simple concept, befitting a short simple game. And eventually "I should really just do this" turned into "ok screw it let's just do this." I spent a few months working part time to create what was basically a small experiment that I didn't expect or need to sell very well. I just wanted to experiment with the concept, and get back into both self-publishing and serious horror, which I hadn't really done since 2015.
I expected to maybe sell around 5k copies in the first month or two and have a little following of people who liked the niche concept. At the time of this announcement Iron Lung has sold roughly 37k copies and holds at 95% positive reviews and has blown past all my expectations. I didn't expect so many people to resonate with the gameplay or the approach to horror, or be so drawn into the world (which I've always planned on expanding on at some point, so don't worry!).
So I guess what I'm trying to say in a very roundabout fashion is "thank you." I'm immensely grateful for the support you've all shown for this little idea, and I genuinely don't feel like I deserve it. Iron Lung is just an idea I thought was cool and wanted to try out, and I never expected it to be this popular. I've said this in the past, but it really does mean a lot to me that I can do stuff like Iron Lung, or Squirrel Stapler, or Dusk '82, and you guys are willing to give it all a chance and enjoy it for what it is, even when there are bugs, the visuals aren't the best, and they aren't Dusk 2.
And speaking of bugs... I just released Iron Lung patch 1.2 onto the public branch. This is mainly to address two of the biggest issues in the game: the resolution not defaulting correctly, and "The Jerma Bug" where you could accidentally hit a checkpoint while running into a wall, resulting in an effective softlock. So
hopefully new players won't be running into any more gamebreaking problems.
Do what's next? Well... I plan on adding trading cards and achievements at some point soon, as well as some requested quality of life features like control rebinds and gamepad support. I'm considering the possibility of adding more lore-related stuff since people are hungry for that, but I'm not sure if I will or what form it would take. As I said, I
do plan on revisiting the world in some fashion regardless. I'm not sure when since I tend to just do whatever seems like a good project at the moment, but... hopefully soon. A lot of people have requested a VR version, and I'm gonna consider that although I don't want to promise anything. Same with console ports. I'd
like to port Iron Lung to consoles but I've run into some issues with porting my older games because of their short length, so we'll see.
Now... if you're new here, and are like "man I wish this guy made other games I could play" then
have I got news for you! I've made a bunch of games, and hope to make many more! If you want to see everything I've done, and/or want to follow me to keep up with future releases, check out
my Steam creator pageI've even got a handy bundle of everything I've self-published, if you want to splurge:
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/24702/The_David_Szymanski_Publisher_Bundle/
And now, a handy bundle with Dusk, Dusk '82, and Iron Lung together, if you're into fast-paced shooting action as well as horror:
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/25842/IRON_DUSK/
You can also
follow me on Twitter, although that's mostly cursed memes and general clowning, not so much game development.
Oh and uhh... make sure to check out the Iron Lung goodies folder in the install location for some fun stuff :)
