Taco Gun
Quick Overview:
Taco Gun was our first true game project as Floating Island Studios.
It's a 2D Couch-Coop game, set in a universe where food is ammo
The leading mechanic of the game is an inverse of most known shooting mechanics, meaning you shoot your enemies full of food until they explode.
Health in this game is counted up in the form of calories, and the more calories
the player has, the slower he moves.
Taco Gun's characters are unique, each with their own different weapons and abilities
The levels are also unique, all taking part in different areas of the same "world" with dynamic elements like obstacles, trains and Ufo's as well as randomized powerup pickups throughout the game.
Project Goals:
The main goals of this project where:
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To create a fun family-friendly game that's very accessible to all ages.
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To maintain world design consistency on a visual and gameplay level according to the "food can kill you" concept.
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To create a common design ground for a newly founded game development team of varying backgrounds and skills.
Taco Gun was released on Steam on May 17th, 2018
Check out our Steam page Here!
Playable Demo:
Trailer:
My role in this project:
Taco Gun is being created by an indie team, so wearing multiple hats is par for the course; that being said, these are the hats I wear the most:
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Game Design
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Project & Team Management
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Programming
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Level Design
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UX Design
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Marketing & PR
Post-Mortem:
Developing Taco Gun was an amazing experience for me.
Taking my first game from pre-production to a Steam Release was certainly very challenging, but I did learn a lot as a developer and game designer.
We did have many obstacles and challenges along the way of course, swapping from Unity to Game Maker Studio 2 early in production, team instability that arises from the reality of working for free as an Indie developer, running from expo to expo showcasing our game, a one week delayed release and all other kinds of hiccups.
But I am proud to say that we managed to overcome every single one of those speedbumps and finally release the game on May 17th 2018.
We worked almost 2 years on Taco Gun, but throughout the course of development I managed to learn and experience many things that I would've never imagined I would.
From making that trailer storyboard, to managing translators for 12 different languages, to growing and evolving as a game designer and level designer whilst still trying to keep project management going properly, drafting the UX of the game and planning, facilitating and implementing social media, influencer and PR marketing strategies, It was VERY hectic, but I sincerely really feel like I wouldn't have traded the life experience of developing this game for anything.
Now regarding Taco Gun's launch on Steam, it was far from a commercial success,
our early decision to not include online Multiplayer functionality really hindered our commercial viability on a platform as competitive as Steam. Not to mention our complete lack of any sort of promotional or marketing budget beyond expos and social media. We didn't break even in the end and are still pursuing Taco Gun's tail through Steam sales and online bundles, but the truth of the matter is it failed commercially.
Although we where prepared for it, this fact came as a disappointment post-release, realizing the game you just finished making won't really pay you back for all the hard work you put into it, was a bit harsh.
Alas, I like to see it as a wake up call.
Games are very hard and expensive to make, even a team of veteran developers making their dream game can fail and game production is a very complicated beast, but this to me is but a challenge to understand it deeply and mold myself into the best developer I can be making the best games I can.
As an ending note, I'd like to state that although Taco Gun might've failed commercially, I can't help but feel like we succeeded. Getting our game out the door was a professional leap for all of us and I'm really proud of everyone that poured their heart, time and passion into it. I can't wait to see what the future holds for every single member of the Taco Gun team.
