I'll be Brave, Tomorrow
Developer: InkForge Studios
Roles: Creative Director, Project Manager, Business Manager, Producer, Lead Designer, Marketing Lead, QA Lead, Co-Writer
Release Date: 25 September, 2024
A first-person narrative adventure game, telling the story of a sick child playing a 2D platformer. Made in partnership with Great Ormond Street Hospital Charity!
I'll be Brave, Tomorrow was the first large-scale project we developed at InkForge Studios. The initial idea for the game came from myself and co-director Archie Crampton, and from there we built the InkForge Studios team around the needs of the project.
For the game, I acted in many different roles, as we were a small indie studio. Acting as Creative Director, my responsibilities also included those of Producer, Co-Writer, Marketing Lead, and more.
Creative Director
As Founder and Creative Director of InkForge Studios, I was the guiding force behind the games development. What started out as just myself and co-director, grew into a team of 7 for this project.
It was my job to ensure that the growing team could work together and keep on schedule with the project. With the game having both 3D and 2D sections, a clearly defined artistic pipeline was set up to ensure quick and easy iteration on ideas and levels.
I also developed a close partnership with Great Ormond Street Hospital charity for the project. As a former patient myself, we pledged 50% of the games revenue to them, as well as worked closely together on aspects both within the game and in the hospital. We added art from in-patients into the game, and I even ran a game development class at the in-patient school!
Business Manager
An important part of the business process for InkForge was mutually beneficial partnerships, such as the one developed with Great Ormond Street Hospital charity. We were able to develop these further through in person events around the country, such as Insomnia, London Games Festival, WASD, and more.
I also was behind sourcing funding for both the project and the studio. I tackled this through both crowdfunding and grants. Another income source was through winning a competition during our time at Falmouth University, a mock Dragon's Den event where we pitched to industry experts and won over $3000.
Marketing
With my previous experience in content creation, I took the role of marketing for the studio. This included trailer creation, running social media accounts and creating short form content to market the project.
I also created lots of promo for our successful Kickstarter campaign, which raised over $5000.
Writing
Another important aspect as Creative Director was the narrative of the title. Based on a child in hospital finding escapism through a 2D pixel art platformer, I focussed on overall story beats and major narrative moments.
Furthermore, I also worked closely with the Writer on the project on dialogue, ensuring it reflected the child protagonist and felt authentic to the real life experience of being in hospital.
Design
With a previous 2D pixel art project I had made, I had the skills to create engaging 2D platforming levels which I used as Lead Designer on the project.
I developed over 15 2D levels for the game, introducing enemies and mechanics, and weaving in story beats organically through gameplay.
AWARDS
Porting
My final task on I'll be Brave, Tomorrow was to port the project to Nintendo Switch by myself.
This was by far the most challenging task I have ever accomplished during my time in the game industry. Without previous coding experience, this pushed me to rapidly learn lots of skills in order to accomplish a well made port.
