In addition to working on The Witness, I am a partner in the Indie Fund, a group of successful indies who finance imaginative indie games under developer-friendly terms. Our fund has been around for almost 2 years now, and I am happy to announce that our first funded game is about to be released. It's a first-person puzzle game called Q.U.B.E., made by some guys in England called Toxic Games. They are just out of school, this is their first game, and they managed to make it without a programmer!
Q.U.B.E. will be available on Steam.
Wow, looks great. No programer, was it made in Unity or something similar? I’m really glad to see a first person puzzle game.
Yes, they appear to be using the unreal engine/dev kit.
That’s great, I love this type of games. The more FPP (Firt Person Puzzler ?) the better!
Andrew, it seems to be made with UDK, see the bottom right on their site :
http://qube-game.com/about
lol you beat me to it. I saw the new trailer at Indiegames and I was going to comment it here because you (Indie fund) are supporting the game financially. I am exited about this one!
But Jonathan… “Steph Thirion’s Faraway is now the 5th project backed by Indie Fund” wait: Dear Esther, Faraway, Q.U.B.E, Monaco.
Those are 4 games, What’s the 5th they are backing up?
There were 5 but we ended up canceling funding for one of the games, so there are only 4 again, and you’ve listed them.
Was the canceled one Miegakure? Why was the other game canceled? The developer’s wishes or it was too expencive…
SSAO, meet the Power Glove.
I got it guiz! It was the new GameInformer. Check it out!
I was pooping and I never skip a page, I always go trough my mags in order and never skip, But on the index with all the new and flashy AAA games that I recognize; An image caught my attention and I didn’t know what game that was so I had to skip to page 56 and that game was:
http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/1620/gitwfront.jpg
http://img847.imageshack.us/img847/8413/gitwindexp56.jpg
http://img714.imageshack.us/img714/2237/gitw1.jpg
http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/1285/gitw2.jpg
http://img846.imageshack.us/img846/3225/gitw3.jpg
http://img836.imageshack.us/img836/3978/gitw4final.jpg
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/37/stwi.jpg/
Last one is the old one from Playstation in case you missed it. Sorry for quality but best I could do!
Obviously this is GI’s I claim nothing I didn’t do it. buy their mag… blah blah blah.
Now, Jonathan said that “A high profile gaming mag” would put out pics, but will it be covered on mere or just here? Well, if you see The Witness somewhere else make sure to share! I only get Playstation and GI mag.
Also forgot to mention… Fucking major spoiler! on page 58, bottom part, second column, second paragraph (A puzzle is solve. A really cool one at that!)
Be careful Jon, if you tell people a lot (The reviewers when they review the game) they might think is dumb and easy because they didn’t figure out anything because you told it to them or they read it in some article from someone you told.
Don’t even give any more hints or clues even though you might change the puzzles later they might already get the idea and think its not interesting or important.
Well, that part spoilered 2 or 3 out of 350 puzzles, so I don’t think it’s particularly bad.
I felt like it’s necessary to at least start to communicate a little bit of what the game is about, so that I don’t have to keep saying “no really, it’s not a dumb maze-solving game, but I won’t tell you what it is.”
Of course the actual puzzles in the game go way beyond this. The reason I felt comfortable talking about this one is just that there is so much more in the game.
This was the major magazine story I was talking about. Now that it’s published we’ll start thinking about putting more information online, in this blog or elsewhere.
Yeah, you’re right. And this *was* pretty big! They gave the game the second biggest place/space in the! The main story or main game this month was that South Park game and they give those ten pages, then the second biggest story of the moth they give 4 which was The Witness and then they give a third game a little space which this month was GTA V. But yeah its a big space in the mag, I hope this happens more often with more indie games. You are doing something great Jonathan!
About the spoiler, Not that the puzzle was solved and yes you will have many more things *but* is the way in which you see them! I just imagine me playing the game and being stuck on the monastery and accidentally looking through the square hole thing and seeing the path for the first time. As you said, the player couldn’t guess and now that moment will be lost but that’s my fault. But what about reviews? I don’t care about scores but everyone else does and that’s how a game sells to the uninformed who don’t know your name or cause. People might not be as impressed you know?
I’m just over reacting though! That won’t happen probably. I think people will be very impressed just tell them things backwards or in a not interesting way so that when they play it by themselves they can be amazed. Again: good luck and the game keeps looking more and more awesome and hopefully it can launch on a console simultaneously with PC (hopefully on the PS3 first) and iphone.
Well, from what I have seen, I want to see more. And I don’t mean that as an unsatisfied statement, I just can’t wait to play this game. I’ve only just stumbled upon it today, but I’m quite glad I did.. Jonathan I tried to find a contact method but I assume it’s prefer people do so through here.
If you are looking for a composer perhaps, I’d like to offer myself up for consideration. I’d also rather not do it through a public thread so if there is a way I could contact you, should you need composition examples or sound design reels, please don’t hesitate to do so. I’m a massive Braid fan, and I know this can be considered somewhat a shot in the dark but if you are looking, I will not waste your time, whether you decide to take us on board or not.
Keep up the great work and you already have my purchase for this next game. I’m very inspired by your previous work in Braid, and the indie fund initiative you have going already promises a great first game!
Thanks for your time,
Chris.
Supposedly The Witness, unlike Braid will have no music or themes only environmental sound effects. Since its supposed to be more realistic and you know… There is no music in real life.
This direction seems more interesting and trying to immerse you more and create and atmosphere but I just loved the music Johnathan picked for Braid.
Hey Justin. I love that idea! Definitely makes the players ears focus much more on each sound they hear. Recently played English country tune which did that and I can only say I loved the approach. Really made me listen to the sound, and being a puzzle game, when you spend a long time approaching a puzzle again and again, it’s good to not have a grating sound palette.
sounds intriguing but is also a shame, since i listened to the braid soundtrack for hours on end… and it happens maybe once every two years that i find a game soundtrack so great that i will listen to it on its own.
Being a right prat, I posted this in the QUBE thread. I meant to post it in regards to witness. Sorry for the idiocy on my part!
and they managed to make it without a programmer!
…or artist, apparently. ;-)
IMO, you should really also link to desure and gamersgate… even though i have no information on how much developers get there, i have read multiple times that steam rips them off (especially indies) and on top off that, you basically have forced DRM…