👋 Welcome!

The response to the first CodeWithTom newsletter has been great and I want to start by thanking you all for joining me here. That said let's dive right into this weeks game development news.

IndieDevDay '23

IndieDevDay is Spain's largest independent video game fair and this year it's even bigger than before, with an exhibition space that is eleven times larger than last year at 8500m2. The event is being held in Barcelona on the 8-10th September. Expect plenty of awesome workshops, talks and interesting games to checkout. If you're interesting in manning a booth they're currently taking submissions, so be sure to apply today if you'd like to take part.

Psst! Every week I feature several of your in-development indie games at the end of the newsletter. If you'd like your game featured please get in touch via Twitter or email me directly at tom@codewithtom.com.

Women Creators Program '23

Epic have just announced the Women Creators Program 2023 and are now taking applications to take part until the 11th September. Over the course of 5 weeks, they will be teaching 100 creatives from across the globe to build cross-platform experiences within Fortnite using the newly released Unreal Engine for Fortnite. Those taking part will be mentored by 10 women creatives and receive guidance from Dancing Atoms Studios. A great opportunity if you're looking to break into the industry or expand your skill set.

Developing a Boss Fight in Unity

Rubber Duck Games recently did a technical deep-dive into the process they went through to create one of the boss fights in their game Evil Wizard. This post covers everything from the challenges they faced when designing the boss, prototyping, designing her extensive behaviour tree, testing, balancing and more. It's a wonderful exploration into the complexity of designing an engaging boss fight and serves as some fantastic inspiration and technical insight for game developers. I highly recommend setting aside some time to give it a read.

Koira Announced

Studio Tolima just announced their debut game, Koira. This charming, hand-drawn, adventure sees you embark on a musical journey to save a cute little puppy. You'll need to use your powers to protect your new friend from danger, traverse a musical forest, solve ancient puzzles, meet curious woodland creatures and more. The developers did a short interview that gives you a bit more insight into what Koira is. It looks stunning and I personally can't wait to play it.

Your Games

Time to shine a light on some of your indie creations. This week CodeRed has been adding some more fantastic looking gameplay to their game Little Scavenger, a cute stylised isometric action adventure game that's worth an eyeball.

Alexandre Kadri, creator of Temp Zero, has been adding some juicy new spells to their upcoming game. It's looking extremely satisfying and I'm personally looking forward to following the progress on this game.

If you prefer a more old-school game, you should definitely checkout the latest updates on Island of the Caliph, a retro first person fantasy RPG. Creator MKSchmidt has been working on some updated archery animations and I have to say I love the entire look and feel of this game, it's going to be a fantastic and unique experience.

Until next week...

As always, if you liked this please let me know over on Twitter or drop me an email directly at tom@codewithtom.com with your feedback.

Thanks for reading. Until next week, take care.

Tom