DEVELOPER Q&A / AUGUST 2022

In this month’s instalment, we have our answers from our last developer Q&A! You submitted questions to us and we have some answers! Take a look!

‍

1. Why did you decide to change the game’s title and the font of it?

Season is a super common word, so it’s hard to find in the store (“season pass” and the like are hard on SEO). We felt we needed to make a change so that the community could find the game on selling platforms. It was a very practical problem!

2. Can we get a full track of the opening song in the original trailer?

Our music composer is currently working very hard on the final stages of mixing and mastering. The track of the opening song will be shared in the coming weeks in this Discord server. We’ll provide a secret link for the community. Stay tuned!

‍

3. Season’s visual and narrative design pulls from a variety of places for inspiration, how do you make sure these different perspectives are incorporated evenly?

The world of Season comes from a variety of sources! The creative team were inspired by real-life encounters with people they met while traveling around the world.  Others were inspired by literature (Octavia E. Butler sci-fi/fantasy novels), or films (new wave Chinese cinema from Bi Gan, documentary filmmaker Wang Bing, Taiwanese filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang) to shape the game.

We also have a Diversity Advisor who was brought on board to work on the game. They help ensure we are developing the game with a variety of perspectives in mind. Our workforce also consists of 46 employees and our ratio is quite interesting for a small Indie Game company. We count:

• 12 women, 1 non-binary employee and 29 men
• 14 of our employees are member of visible diversity
• 20 of our employees were born outside of Canada!

Finally, we have two core beliefs for the world of Season.

1. We want the game to be a celebration of cultures, to create a varied and realistic world that pulls from a variety of different sources. A layered and lived-in experience.
2. We also want a sense of wonder & curiosity, since the audience is global. wherever you’re playing, we want players to discover a new way of thinking or looking at the world. Replicating the feeling of seeing something through new eyes.

‍

4. What does the team think of the owyr9f8yhq2w “cult”?

It’s a really funny idea! It’s so nice to see the community engaging positively with the game in that way. A few people in the community thought the poll was rigged in the favour of Toupet but it was just how the numbers ended up in the end when combining Instagram and Twitter results together. Everything is so secret, it’s natural that people will try to come up with these “cowspiracies.”  

The owyr9f8yhq2w cult might not be real, but we still love owyr8f7yhq1y.

5. After completing the game, will the player be able to watch back and listen to all of their recordings?

This feature is not available for the moment, but it’s something we’d really like to plan post-launch.

‍

6. Which earthly places inspired Season‘s landscapes the most?

Many earthly places inspired the team: Spain, southern Italy, Scotland (amazing for swamps), Vietnam, China and Japan provided great inspiration. Chinese director Bi Gan’s first feature film, Kaili Blues, was also a major inspiration for the team.

‍

7. How populated is the world of Season? Is it hard to find NPCs, or will we see them everywhere we go?

There are NPCs in the game that are part of the main storyline. Estelle does travel alone for a while but when you meet the NPCs you will see how they are preparing for the change of the season.

‍

8. Does the game have a Photo Mode?

The game does not feature a photo mode. However, photography will play a big part in the game and will be used as a tool to unlock its mysteries.

‍

9. What is the name of your favourite cow in the game?

We ran an internal poll and the results speak for themselves:

‍

10. Do you plan to publish a demo or something playable?

We do not have a demo ready or planned right now as we speak, but we’re trying really hard to publish one before the game launches. Stay tuned!

‍

11. What is your favorite ice cream?

We did a quick survey with the team and came up with a variety of answers:

Cookies N Cream, Vanilla, Soft-Serve Chocolate, Pistachio, Chestnut, Saba Tappei, Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey, and Lavender Honey!

‍

12.  How personal is Season, is there a part that is a reflection of you or your experiences?

From the lead writer:

A lot of moments, stories, and observations from my actual life made it into the writing, but there’s also many parts that I absorbed ambiently or came from books. There’s a peculiarity to real stuff; a surprising element or a contradiction. Inspiration is electrical/associative/nonlinear so I didn’t sit down knowing who or what I would elegize in the writing. I can see it now though.

‍

13.  What’s the process of conceptualizing a character and bringing it as a lifelike character in-game?

In the early days of Season’s pre-production, when we were still trying to establish the overall world look and feel of the game, we did a lot of experimental concept art of both environment and characters.  Please take a look at this blog post published in February to learn about the process.

‍

‍

14.  Is the game fully voiced? Who is in the voice actor cast?

All conversations with the cast of characters you will meet in the world will be voiced. The available languages will be English, French and Japanese. The voice actors/actresses cast in the game will be unveiled in the coming weeks, stay tuned!

‍

15.  What are the accessibility features that are going to be included with the game?

We know how important accessibility is to players (and it is very important to us too!) and we want to make Season available to as many players who want to experience it as possible.

We’ll have a more concrete answer and specifics closer to launch, and we welcome ideas or feedback that could help more people step into the world we have created.

‍

Thank you for taking the time to read our update! We’d love to hear your thoughts on our Discord, where you can talk to the developers, share your own inspirations, and learn more about Season.

Don’t forget that we also have a newsletter that will share some different information you won’t get in our blog posts! In our next update, we’ll be talking more about “what is a season”!

Be safe in your journeys, and never forget.

With love,

‍