I haven’t made a blog post in a couple of weeks. The reason is I’ve been ironing all out the game issues so I could put something up about my next game, a 2D sneak ‘em up called TURNOVER.

You play a desk jockey who becomes caught in the middle of an armed, corporate takeover attempt. Instead of sticking around for a resolution, you make a desperate attempt to escape the madness. Armed with only your patience and wits, you must escape the standoff alive!

The title “Turnover” is a business term that is defined as “the rate in which employees leave a company”. The original working title was “Hostile Takeover”, but I was afraid the game would be mistaken for an action game, so I changed it. I think Turnover is appropriate enough given the story.

Landing Page: http://turnover.themaninthecape.com

IndieDB: http://www.indiedb.com/games/turnover

Steam Concept: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=190757379

The video shows the game as it is right now. There are 4 prototype worlds that I created to test out my engine and implement some of the core gameplay ideas. These will likely be the first introductory levels to ease the player into the game. Right now, the game is in the late-prototype stage. The engine itself is finished enough to enter development.

In the upper right corner of the HUD in the video you can see a Stamina Bar. Certain actions, such as running, throwing objects, and interacting with things will expend Stamina. The player will have to be judicious in their interaction with the world in order to have enough Stamina to do what they need to do.

Under the Stamina Bar is the Noise Indicator. This is used to give the player a general idea of the generated volume of their actions. Things like running, stepping on objects, knocking things over, etc will generate noise, possibly alerting nearby enemies.

You can also pick up and throw objects to distract enemies, as well as possibly accomplish other tasks. You can also look ahead to help plan your escape.

The reason I added the subline “…in two acts” to the title is because something will happen in the story that alters the gameplay halfway through. This should help mix things up and hopefully keep the game interesting until the very end.

What’s Next

Things are shaping up solidly, but there is still a hell of a lot to do. I have major portions of the gameplay already planned and laid out. The major actors in the story are written and the plot is essentially finished. The game will enter development proper within the next week.

I have enough planned to know what direction the game is headed, yet enough unplanned that I have some flexibility to experiment.

The Future

I hope to have an alpha build ready to go in early 2014. I don’t have a set release date and I likely won’t be able to determine one until things start rolling.

The game will be available for Windows XP SP2+, Vista, 7, and 8. I am currently planning for Linux and I expect the game to be available for Linux.

it’s way too early for it right now, but I’ve been knocking around the idea of putting up a low-goal Kickstarter at some point down the road. It would be used to help with various development and administrative-type costs. I’m not entirely sure If I’m going to do this, but it’s something that I am open to.

Some Background

Back when I was working on my first self-made game, The Man in the Cape, I went through a lot of the “I’m not sure I will finish this” and the like, so I never really put much out there about the game until it was ready for release. It went through some testing, but I was never really able to pull in much feedback before the first release.

After the game was out and the pains of doing a project like that for the first time were over, I decided that I was going to be more proactive in publicizing what I am working on. So, here I am, nervously posting about my game early in development.

I always love to hear what others have to say, so post over at the one of the social pages, shoot me a tweet, or message me here. Thanks for checking out Turnover, and I hope it looks like something you’d like to play.