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We heard about it at the SDCCM, but finally got to check it out in Barcelona. Here we catch up with Uprising Studios to learn all about their sewing/adventure game set in 1910's Salamanca.
"Hi Gamereactor friends, this is the Barcelona Game Fest, and this is two weeks, just two weeks after the San Diego Comic-Con in Málaga, and you know, in Málaga I was already, I was hearing about a game called Toymaker, you guys gave a talk at the gaming plaza, and now you're here, you're showing the game, and everybody is telling me, you have to go check it out, and I know about your writer as well, Ángel Luis Sucasas, so I've been looking forward to trying it out, and it looks fantastic."
"Thank you.
So, there's a lot of, as we say in Spain, a lot of fabric to cut here, because we have to talk about several things, but tell me about the main gameplay loop, because of course this is all about making toys, but there's a narrative drive to it.
Yes, so, thank you first. Yes, Toymaker is a game about crafting plushies, but with an intense narrative, also depth, I would say."
"Like the story is based in a local legend, in a folkloric legend from Salamanca, which is called The Cave from Salamanca, and it explores the city of Salamanca in the 1910s, but at the same time you have to manage this shop that you have inherited, and it is indeed a plushie shop, you have to craft the plushies with your sewing machine, and then you can customize them, and then you have to explore this story with the different characters, different characters from Salamanca, from the city, from the different, also, I would say like, some people would be from the higher class, some people from the lower class, so you have to explore these relationships and this story, and move forward with the game."
"Tell me a little bit more about the sewing mechanic. I love it, the game looks really rewarding, even if it's just with a mouse and clicking, but it feels like really clicky and really nice, so what can you tell me about this main mechanic, and how long every game are you going to be doing this compared to the exploration and the sort of dialogue?
Okay, so, actually, on one hand I would say that players could do it for as long as they want, because even though we, to move forward with the game, you have to explore the narrative, but even though that's the case, you could actually just explore the crafting if you want, and the different customization of the different plushies, so I would say that in terms of, if I would have to say a percentage, I would say like 45% mechanics, 55% narrative, maybe, or maybe something like that, or 50-50, but actually you can just craft plushies if you want, and then explore the narrative at your own pace, actually."
"The sewing mechanic is something that we really wanted to do, because we felt when we started the project that it was something really interesting, that it hadn't been done, and we wanted it to be really, really manual, like try to really transport this, well, the actual sewing process to the game, so you have to take the pattern with the mouse, you have to move it, then you have to press space, because we don't have a pedal like back then."
"You could use a sim racing pedal.
True, true, and then you move it, and you craft it, and, well, you do it slowly at the beginning, because at the beginning it's hard, like sewing itself, but then you get used to it, and, well, you improve, and you can do it faster.
Where did you get inspiration for that? Did you consult any sort of pro sewing grandma or something?
Actually, both David, who is my partner in the company, and myself, we both have families that were in the world of textile, so to speak."
"My grandfather was a tailor, and David's father used to work in a textile fabric in Béjar in Salamanca, and when we wanted to, we wanted at the beginning, we thought we wanted to explore a more cozy, we wanted to create a cozy experience, and when we started thinking about that, and thinking about what we wanted to do, and what we wanted to tell, we related to this, we, to our families, and we wanted to explore this, well, all the sewing, and the tailoring, yeah, so that was the inspiration, actually, behind it."
"And it's already, I mean, the poster is beautiful. Are you gonna, I don't know, if you've ever considered to use, like, actual, real brands, manufacturers of these machines, that we know and love, because I think many people, you know, our age, or your age, would remember having these at home.
Have you considered this, exploring this sort of collab with actual Sigma, or whatever, or Minerva, or Alpha?
We would love to, we would love to, I would love to. I gotta say that I tried to talk through LinkedIn to some of them, but none have replied for now."
"Okay, okay.
But I would love to.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And in the story, are we gonna meet any historical figures from the Spanish history, because, of course, you know, knowing Ángel, and knowing, you know, how historical Salamanca is to Spain and to Europe, so are we gonna meet, is there gonna be any cameos of sorts?
Yes, it will be. Miguel de Unamuro, of course, he was living back in that moment, in 1911, in Salamanca, so we will actually, yeah, we will explore this a little bit, of course."
"He will be, he's going to be one of the characters in the game, which, yeah, one of the characters that you can explore, and get to know them, yeah.
Okay, and final one, you come from Scarf, which is, you know, it's textilish, but it has nothing to do with this, but it was a 3D adventure, completely different game feel, so how was the switch for you guys to come from that experience to this very 2D artwork-based and, you know, dialogue-based mechanics and gameplay?
Well, at the beginning it was a challenge, because it's true that it's easier to continue in the same path, but also we wanted to scale back a little bit the project, we wanted to explore a different side of game development, we have wonderful 2D artists, like David, and Leyre, that now is, he sits there, and we wanted to explore what they could do, and we felt also that the 2D for the sewing mechanics, it would be great, actually, so we decided to change and go to 2D, but at the same time keep working on games that everyone in the family can play, and also that, you know, they are not hard to play, and that have an interesting story behind."
"She's an artist in the game, the main artist?
Yes.
Yes, ok, we can do this very ad hoc, so that, as she missed the interview, we can do this very live, so, Leyre, I have a question for you if you don't mind, I'm David with Gamereactor.
Nice to meet you, Leyre."
"Nice to meet you.
I wanted to ask you just a little bit if you can join us here, we can push Celer, and we wanted to have you for the interview, I just wanted to ask you what was the main challenge, you know, trying to represent these beautiful patterns and fabrics and machines and the whole thing into this beautiful 2D artwork of yours.
I mean, we also have another artist, which is David, and David already set up basically the art style of the game, which was like basically Art Nouveau, because in Salamanca there's a lot of very nice reference for that, and, yeah, so the main challenge, I mean, we don't really make plushies ourselves, so we had to kind of imagine how a pattern could represent a plushie, for example, how to link the small thing to the end result, basically, so."
"And then you even have to customize it afterwards.
Yeah, of course, yeah, there's a lot of details that you can put to the plushie and, yeah.
Fantastic, you can come, Celer, thank you so much for your time, guys, I'm looking forward to playing the game and to sewing my way through Toymaker, thank you so much for your time, enjoy the show.
Thank you very much."
