Frozen Synapse by Mode 7 Games - Developer Interview
by David Montgomery-Blake · 08/12/2011 (10:32 am) · 43 comments
Frozen Synapse was written in Torque 2D by an extremely dedicated team of indie professionals. The ratings for their game speaks loud and clear:
"Ceaselessly thrilling." 9/10 (Edge)
"Expect it to make a lot of people's Top 10 lists this year." 9/10 (Destructoid)
"Excellent and inventive...it's such an achievement." 9/10 (Eurogamer)
"A superb effort...this is the best indie game of the year so far." 9/10 (Honest Gamers)
"The most moreish and brilliant game I've played in years." 95% (bit-gamer)
Frozen Synapse is the ultimate tactical game on PC and Mac. It brings the simultaneous turn-based strategy genre bang up-to-date and lets you give detailed, accurate orders to your squad: classic gameplay with a modern interface. It includes single and multi-player tactical gameplay.
If you love the game (and we can't imagine that you won't!), then make sure to go vote for it at the Golden Joystick Awards!
We caught up with the Ian and Paul from Mode7 to see what makes this game tick!
Please describe Frozen Synapse in your own words.
Frozen Synapse is the ultimate tactical game! You and your opponent have a small squad of soldiers; you both issue orders to them that will be carried out in the next five seconds. Test your plan, hit the "prime" button and watch the results of your decisions play out.
What was your role on Frozen Synapse?
We're a small company (three of us in-house!) so I ended up doing a variety of different things. I was responsible for art direction, audio, music, writing as well as some aspects of the single player design. I also handle all the PR, marketing and business development for Mode 7. I'm busy!
What makes your game unique?
It's the only modern simultaneous-turn-based tactical game. FS combines a classic, under-used form of gameplay with a modern interface and aesthetic.
What was your inspiration to create Frozen Synapse?
Probably Laser Squad Nemesis was the biggest influence. Our Lead Designer Ian played a lot of it in around 2004 and started thinking about ways that he could distill the experience into something a bit leaner and easier to get into.
What was your development process like?
We worked on Frozen Synapse over about four years while doing contract work to support ourselves.
The game started with a basic 2D prototype that was then refined until we had the mechanics working. After that, we concepted the art and started to get some of the actual rendering system in place.
The art and gameplay then evolved together until we had a multiplayer prototype, which we fleshed out into a beta and released. We then spent the next year tweaking that and working on the single player side of teh game.
How many people worked on the dev team? How did you work together?
There we three of us in-house and we had several external contractors as well.
We tend to do a mix of remote working and working in the same location - different situations work for different tasks.
How long did it take to create?
Around four years.
How did you accomplish QA and beta testing?
Robin, who is our in-house tester, does a lot of testing work. We also all extensively tested the game when it was coming up to beta and launch.
But probably most importantly, we had a brilliant community that built up throughout the beta - that included a group of people who were very keen to volunteer their time to help us out - we're very grateful.
What software/tools did you use to create the game? Why did you use those particular tools?
We used TGB - actually a pretty old version; 1.1.3 I believe. I have a huge amount of experience with Torque going back to my 3rd year project at University which was a Tribes 2 mod. We originally planned on using a fully 2D rendering approach which is why we started on TGB, but in fact we ended up writing our own renderer.
Describe 2-3 of your biggest technical hurtles and how you overcame them. Give as much detail as possible, to the point of getting uber-technical.
We didn't have all that many technical difficulties really. Getting the server (which is written completely in TorqueScript) to be fast enough for thousands of simultaneous players was certainly difficult, and involved having multiple instances accessing the same SQLite database. I'm still not sure if SQLite was the right choice, but it has a lot of advantages."
At GarageGames, we love the game so much that we have decided to share it! As Eric noted in his blog, we have a Community Power Hour on fridays where we interact with the community.
Sorry for the short notice, but at 12pm Pacific time (7:00 PM - 8:00 PM GMT), we will give away 10 licenses for it on Steam. Just post at that time with a positive comment for Mode7 Games and Frozen Synapse! They've worked hard and deserve good vibes from the community!
In the meantime, download the demo while you wait and get playing!
About the author
Community management and development, Educational computing systems and lab management, Flex, ActionScript, JavaScript, PHP, C++, C#, Perl, Python, Ruby, LUA, etc.
#22
08/12/2011 (1:16 pm)
I've been trying to make time to play this game. I love strategy games and this art style is fantastic. 
#24
Edit: handle is "konradk"
08/12/2011 (2:24 pm)
It's been an amazing game ever since we could EA get it! :) Haven't had much time to play recently, but here's my best turn so far:Edit: handle is "konradk"
#25
08/12/2011 (2:29 pm)
/me Likes This 
#26
Frozen Synapse is the Steam Weekend Deal this weekend and is 50% off if you buy it before Monday 10 AM Pacific Time. Sounds like a good time to pick up a copy if you are on the fence =)
08/12/2011 (3:13 pm)
Just in case no one has mentioned it:Frozen Synapse is the Steam Weekend Deal this weekend and is 50% off if you buy it before Monday 10 AM Pacific Time. Sounds like a good time to pick up a copy if you are on the fence =)
#27
08/12/2011 (3:17 pm)
It's been a long time since I've found a game so engrossing - I honestly play far too much of it :P. My handle is Bakerman if anyone wants a game! 
#28
08/12/2011 (5:34 pm)
HUZZAR!
Great work there chaps, always good to see an Indy team punching into the ranks of the multinational funded big-boys.
#29
EDIT: Wow, the first strategy game I've played that I don't suck at. Maybe because the lack of an RT before the S...
08/12/2011 (6:14 pm)
That's very impressive graphically, I read the whole article thinking it was made in torque 3D.EDIT: Wow, the first strategy game I've played that I don't suck at. Maybe because the lack of an RT before the S...
#30
08/12/2011 (9:47 pm)
I remember some progress posts about this game and I'm glad its been a success. 
#31
08/13/2011 (11:06 am)
This game is just plain awesome, add me as friends if you want to play sometime, nick is Shpuld 
#32
Congrats on the success, you guys deserve it!
08/14/2011 (9:59 am)
FS is very impressive and I am so glad to see it doing so well on Steam.Congrats on the success, you guys deserve it!
#34
08/15/2011 (3:46 am)
Thanks very much for the lovely comments, everyone. We've been amazed by the reaction FS is getting and it's made all of the work worth it. 
#35
Anyway, to a more interesting question.
You noted that you ended up writing your own renderer. What was the reason that made you go down that road? (Out of sheer curiosity)
08/15/2011 (12:59 pm)
Great job ;) I really enjoy the game. I am only missing one thing.. Co-op. It would be awesome to be able to team up 3v3 in that game. No change in gameplay except that each player plans it's own character. Chance of that happening? (crossing fingers)Anyway, to a more interesting question.
You noted that you ended up writing your own renderer. What was the reason that made you go down that road? (Out of sheer curiosity)
#36
08/15/2011 (1:34 pm)
This looking great! Also the video.
#37
The custom render path basically arose due to experimentation with art style. Originally, the game was to just be 2d sprites, hence the choice to use T2D, but simple top down soldier guys just looked too boring. Then we were experimenting with 2d + shaders, which started us branching out beyond what the stock render path supported.
About that point, we decided to go with a more 3d look - gave more visual depth, better effects, and made animation easier - but by then a lot of the gameplay stuff was written within T2D. We decided it'd be easier just to bypass the standard render loop, rather than try to port the whole game to TGEA, eventually dropping shaders all together in order to support just about any current hardware (from netbooks on up).
So in short, it wasn't that we decided up front to use T2D and gut the renderer, that was just the path of least resistance as we experimented with art style for the game.
08/15/2011 (4:18 pm)
Michael, Ian is planning to try adding at least 2v2, no real eta on that that I've heard of though.The custom render path basically arose due to experimentation with art style. Originally, the game was to just be 2d sprites, hence the choice to use T2D, but simple top down soldier guys just looked too boring. Then we were experimenting with 2d + shaders, which started us branching out beyond what the stock render path supported.
About that point, we decided to go with a more 3d look - gave more visual depth, better effects, and made animation easier - but by then a lot of the gameplay stuff was written within T2D. We decided it'd be easier just to bypass the standard render loop, rather than try to port the whole game to TGEA, eventually dropping shaders all together in order to support just about any current hardware (from netbooks on up).
So in short, it wasn't that we decided up front to use T2D and gut the renderer, that was just the path of least resistance as we experimented with art style for the game.
#38
Once i start it, I play it a couple of hours everday(to bad that i have to work :() and i really love it :).
The only thing I don't like about this game is, that there is only the one blue style. Would be cool to have some different colors ;).
08/16/2011 (11:50 am)
This Game is just awesome :). Once i start it, I play it a couple of hours everday(to bad that i have to work :() and i really love it :).
The only thing I don't like about this game is, that there is only the one blue style. Would be cool to have some different colors ;).
#39
It's a really excelent game. Beautifully done. Guys at Mode7 really know their game.
Congrats to them
08/17/2011 (11:47 am)
damn - spend a few days not showing my face around here and miss out on this.It's a really excelent game. Beautifully done. Guys at Mode7 really know their game.
Congrats to them
Associate Scott Burns
GG Alumni
Offtopic:
Hrm, timestamps are off by an hour.