Now that Rustclad has been announced, you probably have lots of questions. We’ve tried our best to answer some of the more common ones here, but if you have any other questions that are keeping you up at night, feel free to fire us a message over at contact@skulltheatre.com and we’ll do our best to get back to you!
What is Rustclad?
Rustclad is a unique new indie video game that’s under heavy development over here at Skull Theatre. It’s the conceptual game-baby that’s gestating in our bellies of innovation.
What kind of game will Rustclad be?
Rustclad is an interactive 3D world, with lots to see and do. It’s a game about exploration, identity, and customization. It’s a game about perspective, entropy, and adorable little robots. But in its heart, it’s just a good old fashioned adventure game.
Wow, that was pretty obtuse.
Yep, sorry about that. Rustclad is still very early in development and we’re really excited about the world that we’re building, but we’re not quite ready to share all of our secrets just yet. Enjoy the pretty pictures for now, and check back soon. We’ll be posting tons more information about Rustclad in the weeks to come.
Are the scenes in the video representative of what Rustclad will look like?
Yes and no. There will be countless visual improvements between now and when the game is finally released. From here on out, we’ll also be focusing our efforts on building the world that tells our story, which means that all of our visuals will start coming together in a really cohesive way. The final game is going to look better. Way better.
Hey, this game engine doesn’t look like Unity.
It’s not. For Rustclad, we’ve opted to write our very own game engine from the ground up. This gives us an incredible amount of flexibility, especially since we need to work with a very unique art style – and lets us produce some pretty spectacular effects. Also, it’ll be blazing fast. You’ll see.
The art style looks pretty unique. What gives?
We’re glad you asked that, Mr. theoretical reader! We decided to try something a little bit different with Rustclad. Virtually all of the art in the game comes from real-world objects that are scanned in using a technique called photogrammetry. Basically, what this means is that we build an object by hand, take a bunch of photos of it, and then run the photos through some tools that convert the images into high-quality game art that can be used in our world. So far we’ve been overwhelmed by the results we’ve been getting, and we think that these techniques can have some pretty fantastic implications for the indie game development community. If you’re interested in learning more about this process, take a look at the 3D Capture section of our blog.
That sounds like a lot of work…
It can be, but we think that the results make it worth it. We’ve also custom-designed our engine to help us out at every step of the way. And honestly, getting to build a video game by hand is its own reward.
Who’s making Rustclad?
Our game company is called Skull Theatre, and we’re based out of Seattle. So if you live in the area and you recognize some of the art in our game, it might be because we stole it out of your back yard. Lock your gate next time.
How many people are working on Rustclad?
At the moment, two. Echo is our resident code monkey and is responsible for building the engine and maintaining the art pipeline. Boone is our art goddess who divides her time between building the physical art models and constructing the world. We’ve been enjoying the flexibility of a small team in these early stages of development, but we’ll be growing our team as the project progresses.
When will Rustclad be released?
The release date will depend a lot on how much funding we can round up, but we’re hoping to get our game out to you sometime next year.
I want to help out!
Being such a small team, we’ll definitely be looking for help in many areas during the days to come. However, we’re intentionally keeping the team small for the moment as we finalize our game design and start laying the foundation for the world of Rustclad. Regardless though, we’re always eager to hear from game developers, artists, photographers, and musicians alike who have an interest in unique indie projects. Send us a message at contact@skulltheatre.com!
Are you going to use kickstarter to fund the game?
Almost certainly, but our focus right now is on building a community, and then we’ll start thinking about how we’re going to pay for all of this. The best thing that you can do to help us out right now is to spread the word to as many people as possible!
This looks lovely. For which platforms will it be released?
We’re focusing on the PC right now, since we feel that we can make the best-looking game with the resources that we have there. We’re not opposed to the idea of releasing on other platforms though, and as our team expands, we’ll be seriously considering the best way to get our game out to as many people as possible.
The short answer is, we aren’t going to stretch our resources too thin, so that means focusing on PC for the moment. But the future may bring new opportunities.
Wow reminds me of Wall-E This is so interesting! And your ideas are so fresh. Pretty amazing that all your work are the products of only 2 people. How did you find each other?