SMGstudio

@GregamanX i appreciate the feedback and I know exactly the issues with the levels as they had external timing elements to them. We did have Assist Mode there from Day 1 in MO1 but it can be easy to miss. Reduce danger slowed down those levels.

@Synecdoche thanks. Playing coop with the kids is the best as mine dont care about getting the best time just smashing stuff

@GregamanX that's a shame as we added the ability to skip levels if stuck and extend time in "assist mode". We've tuned the difficulty for this one but it will have some tricky parts but the levels are non linear now.

Me personally (Ash here) I find solo much harder vs coop

@Vek thanks! and yes the better the game or the better the initial hype the less you need to discount as you just continue to sell well for years. And also have so much $ from the initial success that a sale isnt even needed. You're already rich!

@bluesun Alcohol warning was we have a line from IRIS that says "is that ethonol on your breath" and we had no time to re-submit with it removed :/

@NEStalgia RE business sustainability. It's like any business you need to balance costs. Spend $5M making a small game and you'll struggled to be profitable. The allure always is (like any creative field) to have a breakout hit. Spend $1M on a game and make $100M. Look at cinema. There's so many "cheap" Horror films made for $1-$10M as they make solid profits. It's much riskier to make a $100M film than it is a $300M film.

@Eel hha yeah I couldnt work out why. Could have been a creator/article or feature somewhere but couldn't trace it back. And as a dev/publisher it's so annoying!

@sfb haha yeah you are the 5%

@NotTelevision It's like ANTZ and Bugs Life. Both games have been in development for a while, we announced in late 2018 and they did in early 2019.

@TheUnrestCure Great to hear. We've tested it on our kids younger and older and everyone had fun! For younger kids we have options to make the game easier too

@Robzilla Secretly funded by the lawyers of the world

@LegendOfStewart yes there is a physical release. Details already out there as handled by Sold Out

@holygeez03 shhhhhh

@Spanjard The monkey has a pretty solid alibi. Although stay tuned for the Netflix "Making a Monkey-Murderer" series which will be a 12 part series and create MORE Q's than As

@aaronsullivan Yes very different game play. More physics less rules

@tendonerd we might have to get you in to consult for us

@C-Chakra two gazillion

@holygeez03 the giraffe died of natural causes after living a full and positive life in the small town.

@Pod we have 2 'humans' in the game and the rest are characters. Just happened to be this combo in mid production

@SBandy no that is a different game called 'get packed' :/

@Moon touch we removed as we couldnt get the quality we needed.

Separate channels for voice and FX makes sense

@Moon thanks. Future patches yes. We're collecting any major and minor issues now. Future TD... not sure unless we can do something really interesting with it

@shaneoh Yep we missed them. They will be there for V2 of this!

@Moon it's a different type of TD as it has moveable heroes you control. Which then adds an RPG element. I love Defence Grid too but that's a set towers only deal.

@SachmoJoe Hollow Knight and also Armello and Golf Story already had their own sales organised.

@DoomPlague Golf Story had their own sale organised

@Bloodmetal Good choice!

@Sim1 thanks. Good to have some games to fill up the spare minutes here and there

@shaneoh Yep we missed them!! doh. I put a public call out a few times but they didnt jump in. Will reach out direct next time

@NotTelevision this fair shade

@n0body thanks!

Ash here from SMG. The video is a joke/bit of fun as it's meant to counter the OTT nature of the game.

We're always trying new things all the time as Michael Bay asked for too much $ to shoot the video we had in mind.

PSA: All the footage was FREE stock footage so no food wasted in the making of it.

@SmaggTheSmug RE funding. When we founded SMG we received funding to help pay for salaries. As games take time to make and you dont get any revenue until you release. So working for a year with no $$$ makes it hard to start up. The government funding (which was 50% loan and 50% grant) meant we had some runway. We repaid our 50% and also paid MUCH more than that in salary tax, and corporate tax. So the small investment from the government of less than $200k total has resulted in 25 FT jobs, millions in revenue and millions in tax paid by the company and those 25 jobs. Pretty good ROI!

To clarify Death Squared is still making revenue and more than we made on launch month. The other platforms sold very badly as we came out at a noisy time (right after Switch, BOTW, HZD, and many other big games) We feel lucky we landed on Switch when we did.

cheers
Ash

Game Dev here: Note: You CAN play this single player as a standard puzzle game. It just also has more content for 3 or 4 player and can be also enjoyed as co-op.

But it is even harder as single player puzzle game as requires more left and right brain thinking.

And thanks for all the positive comments. We're excited to bring it to the Switch as the platform and audience is perfect for the game.