I pulled the trigger: Last Fuse on Steam!

If I were a youtuber, I'd probably put a clickbait title like "I made a Steam game in 10 days" haha.

Jokes aside, after listening to the comments here and maybe just me being crazy, I decided that...

I will officially be developing Last Fuse into a full Steam game.

This is deja vu for me, because I last did it with Stormbridge, my random idea from the previous Brackeys 2024.2 jam.

Making this game was such a serendipitous moment. Just like last time, I had no idea I would be making another Steam game. I just wanted to make something cool and fun, FOR FUN. And you might think going to Steam is natural for me because I already have games on Steam, but no. Truth is, I was still super nervous about actually doing it. I hesitated a lot, because this is a decision involving significant commitment.

I decided to YOLO in the end, and once I decide something, I make it happen. I don't just say "I've decided to make a Steam game", I actually go ahead and setup the store page, trailer and prepare the marketing assets. 

With that, I would like to announce Last Fuse's steam store page, which I created on the 10th day! I hacked it together very quickly with as minimum effort as I could afford.

Making the page was fun, and it helps that I love making visuals and GIFs. But I was also lucky that I locked in the game's genre early on and my development process incorporates polish and juice from the beginning. This allows me to go all-in. I guess I'm just wired to be weird that way.

Btw if you like it, feel free to wishlist it so you'll be notified when I release the renewed demo there with the suggestions from all of you. (Thank you for the feedback, I will work hard to improve!!!)

This officially marks Last Fuse as the fastest game I've ever taken to Steam? After the last day of the jam, (7th day), I spent the next two days resting and chilling at home with family, as well as playing everyone else's games here. On the 10th day, I made the storepage, spent the entire day crafting all the Steam art. The storepage would've went live earlier, but Steam has an approval process, and I made a mistake causing it to delay, so I had to wait.

How I make the Steam artwork

For those interested in how I made the artwork, I create specific 3D scenes that give me maximum control over the composition, colours, lighting, skybox, post processing, particle systems' timing and environment design. I control every aspect from the brightness of explosion, skybox's rotation, camera angle, rim lighting, and layout in 3D in real-time as the game runs, then create a snapshot of that 3D instance for me to edit anytime in future.

It's like a 3D screenshot:

But unlike a 2D screenshot, I can move every element individually, like moving a ship from foreground to background. 3D effects like depth of field are applied in scene naturally, rather than in post, giving real-time feedback and iteration on the composition. I can make the explosion bigger, smaller, or even make it purple, like this:

I also create savefiles specifically for trailer footage, with turrets placed at strategically "beautiful" positions to maximize visual appeal. lol.

As for outputting different aspect ratios (such as portrait vs landscape), I have a "base composition" and then carefully designed each scene for each resolution required. I design in Scene View, and observe the camera's output in Game View. Each "3D snapshot" is saved as a scene, able to be revisited anytime in future. What's cool is if I changed the models or update the assets, or if I want a purple bomb to represent the game instead of this orange one, I just need to re-take the screenshot - the composition and lighting are all saved, so it's "future-proof".

The challenge with Last Fuse is it is VFX heavy - explosions, and bullets are moving, dynamic elements that I wanted to convey in the art - but they need to be static for the capture. I experimented with different bullet "sprays" and patterns to find one that sells velocity and action.

I then experiment a lot, finding the "perfect" combination of composition, colours, contrast and readability. It's hard as design is subjective, and I listen to so many opinions it leaves me confused sometimes XD, so it's not actually perfect in the end.

This technique helps me also capture screenshots at maximum fidelity and intentionality.

I've already begun working on a renewed Steam version of the playable game. Here is a sneak peek into one of them (Foundations) which I've already begun working on.

Once the jam is over I will release v0.8. As well as a work-in-progress Endless Mode.

I already made some QoL changes, such as displaying steel per second below the steel count, as well as displaying the resource being lacked while building. These were all observations I made from playtesters.

Next step: Roadmap?

The game has to pick one of the two options below:

Campaign (play a single run for a long time):

Similar to traditional city builders like Frostpunk and Havendock. You play a single map and keep growing bigger and bigger.

Roguelike (each run is short, but highly replayable):

Each run is maybe 15 minutes and you restart afterward, but there are different ways to play the game and upgrades. Playstyle can change based on bomb type / map design. E.g. Thronefall, Domekeeper.

I will then be preparing a post dedicated to the roadmap for Last Fuse. Here are some ideas on the drawing board (tentative, unconfirmed, no idea which, if any, will make it into the game):

• Perk System - Unlock random perks and perk slots. Combine perks to level them up.
• Player specialization - Equip perks to specialize into builder, industrialist, or warfare builds.
• Endless Mode
• Weather - e.g. lightning storms, radiation, heat wave
• More enemy types, enemy loot
• Bomb upgrade tree
• More turret types
• New buildings, resources
• Islands in the distance, can build unique buildings, or meet NPCs, or scenarios
• Setup production chains/boats to transport island materials to construct the bomb, or cooling liquid for the bomb
• Different map
• New win condition: Expand with foundation and destroy all warp gates
• UnderwaterI don't know which ones sound the most fun, so feel free to share your thoughts or even suggest new ideas.

Lastly, I've setup a section of the discord for Last Fuse, so if you do join, select the 'Last Fuse' role if you wanna discuss this game.