My long rant about a lot of things, mostly about my game.

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I am about to partake in a bit of a general mind dump. as I feel like its a good time to talk about general stuff going on. The first thing I have a lot to say about right now is the state of my game and future prospects as well.

So you may already know my game is in a "coming soon" status on steam.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/719180/Revulsion/

I have already done a lot to the game since I made the trailer! I have reworked the hud already and even addressed some general issues.

I am currently holding back on the release of the game just a little bit as I want to make sure I square everything away with Epic. I need to tell more people about what I am doing in general. I seriously am kind of coming out of left field with this.

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Some things I want to mention about Revulsion in general.

I have full creative control over Revulsion and its a project that I have personally wanted to make for a very long time. I have talked to many people about the idea and pretty much nobody seemed to think it was a good idea. I never had a solid chance to convince anyone that the idea of combining classic arena shooters with Dark Souls and Borderlands would be a good idea.

Only recently have I even had a chance to put together a demo of the project where I was able to see how things could flow. My first attempt using UE4 flopped because I made mistakes using the technology and failed to produce a platform that I would be able to build upon.

I had people tell me that the idea is stupid and I should just give up. "Do it properly" which basically translated to sit on my thumb like a good little boy and forget about it. I should only strive to do perfect ideas. Which has become one of my most hated concepts in my career. Perfection has always been a fools game and if you are not willing to stick your neck out and take a risk its never going to happen.

Who the hell determines what a perfect idea is anyway?

I will tell you one such example, the vast majority of "perfect" ideas come from people in suits who salivate over Candy Crush clones. Lets add 50 million micro transactions to every aspect of the game and sell it for 80 USD with a 120 dollar super ultra version!

Who cares how this effects the game or its balance.

Even the word gameplay is also now being reconsidered by many. Gameplay is now wrong think and is touted as being "ableist". People should be allowed to pay extra to skip fucking boss fights.

Can anyone explain to me how how, in an ever shrinking middle class, that somehow charging additional money for skipping boss fights, isn't in and of itself ableist? What about people born with very little money? Is it assumed that everyone who views the word "gameplay" in a negative context automatically can shell out money like it grows on trees?

I find the entire debate in general to be almost anti-intellectual in that its being proposed by people who should honestly know its nothing more than empty moral grandstanding.

The only people who make these kinds of arguments tend to be upper class and out of touch. Most of them are barely even classifiable as gamers anymore. And many of them are riding on waves of rank nepotism and cronyism handed down from the heavens above because of one successful project 10+ years ago that is usually tossed aside like trash for more Cow Clicker clones.

"Arena shooters are just not profitable in today's market."

There is no logical reason why this is the case. The fundamentals of compelling / addictive gameplay have never changed. In fact, we are seeing examples in other genres where that style of open ended challenging level design and high skill curve are openly welcome.

If Dark Souls was first person and it had guns you would be looking at a modernized classic shooter. I have tried to explain this to so many people but one way or another the idea is shot down. Its better to "stick to what works" or "why would anyone want to play that when they can just play Doom."

The reason the genre has fallen out is neglect not because the world has "moved on" damnit!

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First and foremost, I love arena shooters like Doom and Quake. My love for classic shooters is where I started in the game industry. Doom was the first FPS that really captivated me. You may remember the age old arguments of the eventual decline and dumbing down of the FPS over the years.

So for me I have watched the arena shooter slowly dwindled over the years. This topic is something I have talked about endlessly before in the past. Even in the case of Doom 2016 we saw people treating the idea of doing classic single player with hesitation as though it was some kind of radioactive isotope.

If we live in a world where Id software, the company that started the genre, is surprised that Doom 2016 would be successful as it was, then there is little hope we will see the genre revival that I would personally like to see.

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Something has got to give.

Revulsion isn't perfect. I will be working as hard as I can to round it out as much as possible though. What I want it to do though is show people a functional, working example of what I have been talking about all of these years. A FPS that retains the classic semi open ended level design. A FPS where death is not some "we avoid because it might cause frustration" aspect where we carefully baby and coddle the player along in hopes they will see the next awesome cut scene.

Even if what I am doing completely flops and I am unable to support myself. I will still have this example to point to. So I can kindly shove it directly up the sphincter of anyone who is confused about what my design idea actually is / was.

I want people to see this and copy the idea and build upon it. I want to show a style of FPS where you can check all the old school boxes and while still doing something new and the experience is about the players choices and not just a hand held cinematic experience.

Don't like the Minecraft graphics? Clone the game with something you like better. So I can play it. The genre isn't dead, the only thing dead is the passion for the genre.

Peace out! This rant was long! But I needed it.