The First Business Trip

Wow, a business trip! That’s the first time I can say that. Is trying out Chunithm and meeting up with old friends part of the trip? You bet!

In all seriousness, I have been in Singapore for my studies, and the occasional holidays after that. But the last time I was there was in 2019. I would have gone there again in the subsequent years but Covid got in the way. With all the WFHs (Work From Home) we are doing I really do miss going out of country. Maybe, the change of scenery would energize me… And I really need that in recent times.

As of right now, all the preparations are complete. Charts are done, poster is done, builds should be stable enough in both iOS and Android. Hopefully, we don’t run into too much trouble on-site but you never know. Let’s talk a bit about the charts though. 

The Charting Death March

I procrastinated on the easier charts (normal and hard) and I essentially did a death march – in last week I made 9 charts (4 normal, 5 hard) in 3 days. THAT should really, REALLY not happen again.

I think one chart per day (regardless of difficulty) is enough so that I don’t burn out. Any more than that is just asking for trouble. Charting has always been a hobby of mine but this time, I am doing this as a job. When your hobby becomes a job… things really are different. Also, charting is obviously not the only thing I am doing in this project, so it shouldn’t suck out so much of my time.

To remedy this issue, I will open up application for charters after our first closed beta test. I think two charters should be enough. But I will say this first so that I don’t give off the wrong expectations.

  • I probably can’t pay you much money (if at all)
  • I prioritize willingness to learn and contribute
  • You have to be prepared to revise your charts, possibly a LOT until you get up and running.

So yeah, that’s the gist of it. As bolded above, if you are really willing to learn we’ll get along just fine. With this little discourse done and over with, let’s discuss about our (business) trip.

The Business Trip

Okay, so about Gamescom… Singapore is close to Indonesia, I have lots of friends from that country and overall I enjoyed my time there. So it’s a no-brainer for me to take the chance to go there. I feel blessed to be able to participate in this, especially considering that we went public only 4 months ago.

So far, we may be missing some major features, but I believe the game is good enough so far… and we are about to find out whether others feel that way too. I’d say there will be some encouraging words… and some equally spicy comments as well. But to be fair, this is something we absolutely must be ready for. Also, it’s better to get the spicy comments now (during the development phase) rather than later so that we can adjust properly.

Unlocks and achievement systems are among the missing features, so we don’t have much of a core loop other than just playing the songs at the moment. Next month, hopefully we can start making progress on these, along with the UI.

So anyway, our goals in Gamescom Asia are these:

  • Put our game on the media spotlight (actual news sites, youtubers, streamers, etc)
  • Get some feedback on the game from people we don’t know before
  • Networking (Meet up with fellow devs etc)
  • And most importantly… to learn. Life is a never-ending journey of learning, my friend.

Lastly, we have prepared something for Gamescom Asia’s PRIMETIME (think of it like their version of Nintendo Direct), which should premiere on 19th October, 8PM GMT+8. Once we get the video link I’ll tell you about it as soon as possible! It should also contain further information regarding our collab with Berry Melody as we have promised.

Overall, this promises to be a hectic week. We’ll probably have a LOT to write about after this event. Look forward to our updates!