Hank: Drowning On Dry Land News

Hey, everybody!

Kuba from My Next Games here. Sorry for ghosting you on the update last month, but we've got some epic news to spill! We totally scored a spot at the Indie Showcase during this year’s Digital Dragons! Can you believe it?


Digital Dragons is a super cool gaming conference that happens every year in Poland. It's like a big party for video game peeps from all over Central Europe. You'll find game developers, publishers, investors, and all sorts of industry experts hanging out and having a blast. One of the highlights is the indie game showcase, where small game developers can show off their awesome projects.


Our game made the cut and ever since the news dropped We've been busting our butts getting ready for this awesome event. From tweaking gameplay to making the graphics pop, we've been working non-stop to make sure our game stands out. So, yeah, the newsletter had to take a backseat while we rocked the Digital Dragons prep.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1937880/Hank_Drowning_On_Dry_Land/

All the hard work, late nights, and endless cups of coffee paid off big time and our game earned the prestigious Special Recognition award! Can you believe it?


It's honestly hard to put into words just how honored and appreciative we are. This recognition means the world to us, and we want to extend a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has supported us on this journey. We're still pinching ourselves, but rest assured that this recognition has only fueled our passion and motivation to create even more amazing experiences for you. Stay tuned as we continue to work hard and bring you more exciting updates and surprises in the future. Together, we're on an incredible adventure, and we couldn't be happier to have you along for the ride.

Cya around,.
Kuba (I'm the guy in the meddle)

Hey, everybody!

Kuba from My Next Games here. Ouu… how the time flies, It’s already March and it’s time for another one of my updates. Last month I told you a story of Hank: Straightjacket, a free game we’ve made by accident while working on our new project.



Today I thought I would introduce you a bit more to the hero of our games.

Hank Bukowski is a recovering alcoholic who in a moment of weakness suffers a relapse. When he wakes up from a drunken stupor he realizes that he came in possession of a very unique superpower - he became a time traveler.



Feeling a need to repent, Bukowski starts to use his new ability to help others undo their mistakes. However, believing that he can always revert time and simply walk away from any harm, he decides to take a step further. He puts on a mask and assumes a new persona, a crime-fighting vigilante roaming the dark and dangerous streets of Lucrum City.



To downtrodden citizens, Hank is seen as a masked vigilante who, thanks to his incredible resourcefulness, mobility and survival instincts, emerges unscathed from even the most unpredictable encounters. They, as well as his numerous adversaries, do not know that Hank manages to escape death thanks solely to his ability to time travel. All this makes him lead not a double, but a triple life.



At the beginning of his crime-fighting career, Hank has ironically called himself Mayfly, partly after a creature that has a lifespan of 24 hours and partly because of his real-life nickname - Barfly.

With time, the great opportunity he was given started to be his biggest downfall, he relapsed. Realizing that he can barely save himself he started to run away from the responsibilities he once sought out.



His costume started to show wear and tear, his equipment broke and was never fixed. He started to look like a bum pretending to be a superhero. He even stopped covering up his tracks. Once someone overheard his real name when he was yelling at himself while peeing in a dark alley. Even though he was still protecting the citizens of Lucrum City, his reputation has gone down drastically.

That’s all for this month, Cya Around
Kuba

Hey, everybody!
Kuba from My Next Games here. How’s everyone doing in the new year? For us it’s been busy. Last month, we won a grant for a video game prototype! (I’m the guy in brown pants in the photo)



The competition was organized by CRPK Poland and we entered it with a proposal for a small point-and-click game - Hank: Straightjacket. Here’s the story of how this little adventure game came to be:

We were about to start working on a new dialog system for our main project - Hank: Drowning on Dry Land - and we wanted it to be a bit different. In a regular game when the conversation starts the game pauses - you talk to the character and you’re basically unable to do anything else. We want to change this and allow players to interact with the world while still in dialogue. There are some challenges that stem from that approach, though. What happens if the player does something noteworthy during the conversation? Wouldn’t it feel strange if the hero broke a piece of furniture and the npc didn't react to it? We had some ideas on how to tackle those problems but we couldn’t be sure they would work without trying them out in an actual game. And so we went on a rapid prototyping spree…



…Two weeks and five gallons of coffee later we finally had a build and a working prototype of the system. As a side effect we created this tiny escape room experience. We were quite surprised that it was even playable! So, we called it Hank: Straightjacket and decided to release it as a free game. If you’d like to giving it a go - here’s the link:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2277670/Hank_Straightjacket/
Cya Around,
Kuba