A new trailer has been released as part of 2022’s Gamedevs of Color Expo Direct.

The post Little Hellions coming to Steam early access October 31st, 2022 appeared first on Schadenfreude.

Hey! Welcome to my lab! I’m Professor Onion, one of the Underworld’s leading torment scientists. I use they/them pronouns. My lab assistant, Bomb Pig, and myself will be your guides to all things Schadenfreude as we continue our research on the mysterious Game Machine.

I’ve been hard at work for the past 7 years (!) trying to bring the Underworld to life in your curious realm via a video game for video game machines called Little Hellions. Frankly, I’m kinda done with it 😅. That’s why I’ve made it my business to start streaming my work every Monday and Friday (4:00 – 8:00 MST) until the game is finished, so I can finally move on to the next thing. I hope you’ll join Bomb Pig and I on this adventure of torment scientific self discovery!

For post stream watchers out there, VODs will be archived on Schadenfreude’s YouYube channel.

The post Welcome to the lab appeared first on Schadenfreude.

The Six-66 received an ember award from Digital Alberta, a not-for-profit promoting digital talent across the province. The category was “Emerging Sector”, which is basically for things that ~uh~ don’t fit into other categories. So I guess that’s on brand right?

We’re honored to be recognized alongside such big projects. Thanks DA!

The post Ember Awards 2019 appeared first on Schadenfreude.

If you’ve seen the trailer for Little Hellions or have caught us demoing the game at various events, you may have seen this cute little box.

It’s called the Six-66, it’s our custom DIY fantasy console. It’s fully functional and runs our games. It supports advanced technologies like cartridges and wired controllers. It’s one of a kind (and not available for sale). It’s basically Schadenfreude’s mascot.

But … why though? It’s kind of confusing. I can’t buy this thing but the game runs on it?

What?

It’s ok, you’re fine. It’s really not a big deal. You’ll be able to play Little Hellions in the places where games go. But we did this for fun and to see if we could!

Early in development, before we had nailed down our release platform (more on that when it comes), we had difficulty demoing the game in a convenient way. You have to haul around a lot of equipment in order to show a game. It’s a lot. We also didn’t want to give the impression that we were making a PC game. After all, we’d like the game to be available on PC eventually, but it’s not our target for release. So Devon from Violet Games (Little Hellion’s publisher) came up with the idea. “If we can’t say what platform we’re on, why not make one ourselves?”

The shell

I’m not particularly savvy with hardware, so I largely focused on the design myself. I wanted something cute and tangentially demonic, kind of encapsulating Schadenfreude were it a real world object ~ with retro sensibilities considering the couch friendly design of our first title. So I began by looking for inspiration – and I found it in the Famicube by Android Arts. It’s a concept for a fantasy console in itself, one exhaustively designed and documented by Arne Niklas Jansson, the person behind Android Arts.

(Their work is exceptional ~ give it a look!)

But I quickly found my concepts much too derivative of Niklas’ work, so I decided to get in contact with him.  After briefly running the idea by him, he was kind enough to give me some feedback and an ‘ok’ on the concept.

I hadn’t really been exposed to the Famicom before seeing Niklas’ work, so I was quite taken by the toy like profile of the cartridges. Knowing all the games I’d like to make after Little Hellions, I decided to include a cartridge slot to sort of future proof the design for showing new games when the time comes.

It was around then that I began discussing production options with a buddy of mine, Arthur Hobden, who is a 3D printing specialist. Over a couple months, we went back and forth as he modeled the console’s shell for us, specifically designing it in printer friendly component pieces. Through this process we unintentionally arrived at several design motifs that would loop back into Schadenfreude as a brand, including the “sawtooth” motif and the use of primarily black and white.

PolyJet printing and painting was done through proto3000. There was a limit to the print quality we could achieve with our budget, but overall, 3D printing was the best solution for our purposes. In retrospect, we probably went a little overboard with just how many parts compose the console ~ it will for sure explode if we’re ever unfortunate enough to drop it.

Internals

While I worked on the design with Arthur, Devon figured out what it’s guts would look like. Fitting everything within the shell’s silhouette proved to be a challenge, so we settled on using a board not too dissimilar to a Raspberry Pi. The exact internals are as follows:

⬥ Lattepanda Alpha 860 w/ Windows Pro (newer models available)
⬥ Aukey 4-port USB3.0 Hub
⬥ USB 90° right-angle (low profile)
⬥ Tactile Button
⬥ LED’s

For the complete list of materials, check out Violet Games’ take on the project.

Construction

As for putting the whole thing together, it took the better part of a day. I’d explain how it went, but you can just watch the whole process below!

And that’s it! The Six-66 is an ongoing project that will evolve alongside Schadenfreude. I’m sure it comes as no surprise that we learned a lot while building this first version. We hope that, through gestures like this, we can show that indies shouldn’t feel creatively constrained by their limited resources.

Till next time, keep make’n stuff and eat some pizza or something.

The post It’s called the Six-66 appeared first on Schadenfreude.

Congratulations to all the devs who participated ~ making games is hard ~ and thanks to everyone who came out to support us!

The post Design & game showcase appeared first on Schadenfreude.

Little Hellions is a competitive four player arena battler with a twist ~ players can’t attack. Instead players can “hex” one another, that is, trade places instantly. With enough spatial awareness and sharp timing, players can evade deadly traps while swapping opponents to their doom. The last one alive is the victor!

Trailer below.

Little Hellions is our first commercial project and has been in development since 2015. It’ll be available ~ when it’s ready. If you want to keep up, you’re already in the right place. Stay tuned for further development news as it comes. 🖤

For our presskit, look no further.

The post Hello Underworld appeared first on Schadenfreude.

I have a creeping suspicion that being a person on planet Earth will always feel like the end of days?🙃

It’s easy to imagine the simplified, abridged version of the past as somewhere easier to be. Without the compromises, the dirty details, the moment to moment struggles – “then” can seem a lot more appealing than it really should be. But the fact of it is being a person has and will always be hard. There will always be struggles, regrets – things left unresolved. People determined to hurt others whether it’s because of hate, ignorance, or more than likely ~ both. History never “ends” and we don’t “know better” just because we’re on the present’s precarious edge. We’ll continue to make mistakes and hurt each other.

In short, video games can seem kinda irrelevant in 2019?

While, again, I won’t gesture towards saying we know better ~ I think it’s safe to say at this point that games certainly won’t save us. Yes, games can say and do so much. They can truly touch another person’s heart and be there for them in difficult times. As Matt Lees put it much better than I “Games are places where disenfranchised people live”.

But even so (as he also pointed out), at least for now the reach of games is limited by who games are made for. Who has access to technology, or the novelty to even afford it? Who is “intended” to be holding a controller, or can even comfortably use one? Regardless of the highs many of us have experienced with games, the uniqueness of the medium is also what bars it from reaching the people who can truly benefit from it.

All of this makes dedicating oneself to developing games ~ difficult to navigate ~ to say the least. I wouldn’t be surprised if, in a room full of indies, I was the most pessimistic about games as a whole, or at least the culture surrounding it.

And yeah ~ I get it, a game studio certainly doesn’t make a great first impression with the words “video games might not be all that great”.

But nothing can grow without a little self reflection, and games’ capacity for good can only be broadened when both the people playing and making them become willing to examine their limitations and blunders. Games criticism is by no means a new thing. But a generation who’s grown up with it and games, navigating tumultuous times full of existential threats? That’s new. And maybe good? Probably?

~ Maybe? ¯\(ツ)/¯

While I don’t have any illusions that Schadenfreude will further carve the path towards gaming as a vehicle for social good, it’s easy to compel oneself to find the virtue in one’s work, especially in a creative endeavor. As much as I would like to turn this around and say “but games are good! Schadenfreude will do good!”, those aren’t really my words to say are they? What I can say is that I want to try to make cool things about loving yourself and others. Fun and silly things that, hopefully, help people feel proud of who they are. But the success of that is not mine to judge. I must be pragmatic ~ my games and art may very well not change much of anything. I could even make things worse if I’m not careful. But I wanna try. I wanna help. I want to put smiles on people’s faces and help others find acceptance and self validation. And I, myself, want to learn.

So yeah, this is a video game company. Yes, it needs to make money in order to exist. Capitalism is still here. But we’re also a platform by the nature of our existence and by the fact that we have a developing audience. We don’t want to take that for granted. If people can make room for another indie game company, then the least we can do is make it some sort of force for good and self reflection, despite the limitations.

So ye humble gamer, if you’d have us, we’re Schadenfreude and we wanna be good to you. Maybe make a joke or two while we’re at it. It’s up to you to decide if we succeed in the end.

~ Jace

The post Forgive me father for I am about to game appeared first on Schadenfreude.