I was not lying, when I said that I have been working on this game for a very long while. In fact, the version of the game that I am currently working on is not even the first re-imagening of Unsafe the game. 

After the first version of Unsafe crashed and burned, I took a long hiatus from developing this game. I was somewhat burned out and Didn’t really like the style that I had developed together with Silas Amdi.

However, after a while I became restless and that let me to start up Unsafe once more. This time, however, I wanted to try something new. These are some of the first explorations of the direction that I wanted to go in with the re-imagening. 

This version of Unsafe was to be a bit more cheery… which might not have been the right way to go, in retrospect.

Never the less, I got pretty far before I eventually shut this game down as well.

I have been working for a while on creating an engrossing narrative for Unsafe, and as is the tradition for games, that includes cutscenes. 

Herein lay an issue for me. while I love cutscenes, I was very much aware that would not be able to make AAA level cinematic content. Luckily, AAA is not the only way to go and I have been playing around with some ideas for cutscene creation, which could be equally as good… or at least equally as good for this project. 

what you see above is a test for a paper craft style cinematic style which I might employ, if I get the opportunity.

It spent an embarrassing amount of time designing my protagonist for Unsafe "Wendy". I hadn't really anticipated how difficult rigging would be, despite my knowledge that there are entire educations devoted to the subject.

This, combined with a big design overhall, meant that I ended up spending approximately 3 weeks out of a 3 month period on designing the Character, which by anyones estaimate is unacceptable.

That said, I did learn allot about the subject and I ended up with 3 different character models for Wendy. the first of which is Wendy in her night shirt.

The idea behind this design was that Wendy would start the game by waking up in her own bed. I ended up killing this idea, but not before I finished this character model.
 

Part of my process in making games, is making these quick drawings. I make these to get a sense of what i should add and what ideas are better left on the floor. 

for this drawing, I was trying to figure out how I might add a bit more colour to the visual identity of the game, without ruining the grey/black/blue feel of the game. that is why I added the orange door, to see how I might be able to get that to work within the world. 

There is still some work to be done in trying to make sure that these colours mesh completely and more yet, to get it into the game world, but this is a first step.

Unsafe has been in the oven for quite a while. I go back and forth between thinking that I have been working on this since 2012 and 2014.

You see, in 2012 I wrote my bachelor thesis for Kolding Designschool. The Project that I created at the time, was a horror game concept revolving around a young girl who has to escape an apartment building. while this certainly wasn’t Unsafe, some of the major building block were there: the game stared a female lead, the tone was dark and it featured a monster which was invisible.

If you want to know more about this game, you can see it here:https://sylvesterhansen.wordpress.com/portfolio/a-game-of-grief/

I eventually abandoned the game , simply because I needed to get on with my life. 

Then in the spring of 2014, when I was just finishing up my masters degree at Kolding designschool, some friends and I decided that it would be a good idea to create a videogame that could pepper out portfolios. 

what we eventually came up with was Unsafe, all be it, in a very early version. The game that we designed together was to be a 2D horror title featuring a much earlier version of the Wendy that we know today. 

My friends and I eventually split up and the game underwent so many changes that it became virtually unrecognisable from that initial 2D pitch, but those main elements remained the same: the game stared a female lead, the tone was dark and it featured a monster which was invisible.

So I sit here wondering, have I been working on this game for 3 years? or just one?

One of the most annoying thongs about making videogames, is that much of the progress that you make is so minute, that it barely bears mentioning. 

For instance, Right now, I am working on making a system that will make sure that my character will look in a direction before turning in that direction. It is the kind of movement that makes a character believable as human, rather than machine, but also the kind of movement that is a btich to create. 

These are the kinds of things that takes months to create, and these are the kinds of things that will push a game from good to great, but while you are doing it, you kind of feel dumb and not really like you are doing much at all. 

All I can do at this point, is to hang in there and trust my vision, because right now I can't see the forst for all of the trees.

Unsafe (the game that I am developing) is a third person game, which means that you don't have much of a game if the player character cannot be controlled. This does not only mean that you have to come up with a way that the player can control the character, you also have to put that plan into action. 

This is where scriptig comes into the picture and our good old friend, trial and error. 

Cursing at your screen, because the player is walking right, when she should be walking left or potentially just floating away into space, when she should be staying grounded is not my idea of a good time. The good thing about working in Unity is that these issues can be iterated upon quickly, so you don't have to stay stuck for long.

Never the less, this becomes frustrating for a visuelly minded dude like myself, who would rather be making pretty backgrounds and writing up a compelling story.

Making a videogame is dificult, no matter how you slice it, but being set back almost a month, because you thought you were good at something you actully suck at, makes it that much harder.

Never the less, I have finally started working on the game in earnest and that requires some Concept art and while I can draw, I have never been good with large scale concepts. That is where these kinds of sketches come into the picture. These quick little drawing, made in my notebook give me an overviewof what I want to create and then I can go into unity and just make it, which is allot easier than spendeing days cursing the fact that I am not a better artist.

i hope to be able to share some real gameplay footage with you soon, but tll then, you'll have to make do with this.

Is there anything a nice relaxing weekend of animation?

Yes, I have finally, after 3 weeks of rigorous rigging work and one complete redesign of my character started animating for real. This will be my first time animating in 3D, so I don’t quite know what to expect, but I am positive that I can put something nice out there. 

Here is hoping at least.

I have been spending my time, over the last couple of weeks trying to put together the game that I want to create and the simplest things are really causing a stir. Right now, the problem that is most present is the problem of rigging.

The problem is that I want to animate my own character, and this is new to me. The game that I am creating is a 3D horror title, so custom animations seem in order, but the issue that I am stumbling across with almost ungodly frequency, is how one created the right digital puppet.

The process of making a 3D character move and imitate life is called rigging and honestly, it is an art in itself. I dabbled in it, for my last game "Cryogenic" but I have really had to get into it for this game... and honestly, I hate it.

I have had to redesign my character 3 times, because I made some minor mistake in a previous rig. This means going back t square one and starting all over. All of this means that I am weeks behind my estimate, but damn if I don't have the prettiest character model you have ever seen. 

The good thing is that I am very nearly finished, I just need a couple of things to be done befere I can officially start animating.