Read the article and stick around for info on a giveaway
Dan Fornace, the lead behind Rivals of Aether himself
A few years ago, a young ambitious mind by the name of Dan Fornace decided to create a student game while he was in college. That game, Super Smash Land, ended up changing from a hobby to a career. Unlike many other Smash Success stories, Dan’s life doesn’t follow the same suit of one day waking up and seeing the game blow up.
Dan Fornace is currently residing in Seattle, WA, and he works on the game full time. As an independent developer for the past few years, he’s been doing what he loves, but there’s always a lot on his plate.
Rivals of Aether next to Super Smash Land
Dan Fornace started as a student in Drexel University in Philadelphia as a solo Game Dev. He started by making a few games, but he did a solo project for a game jam and had a lot of fun, so he wanted to try the solo route again. He tried to make something that was simple graphically in scope, and after playing Tower of Heaven by askiisoft, inspired by the Gameboy aesthetic of the game, he made a mockup for a Gameboy-style Smash Bros. His friends liked it and told him he should turn it into a game; he realized it went hand-in-hand with his want for a solo project.
He stashed the game he was working on and set out to work on Super Smash Land. He collaborated with two musicians, inversphase and flashygoodness, but handled the rest of the project himself. It took about 6 months to complete it, and a few more months to make a nice trailer and release it.
From there on, after college, he worked as a Game Designer on the former XBLA team. His job was to give design feedback to some of the games coming through the pipeline on Xbox 360; he was lucky enough to be put on some great titles when he first started out: those include Trials: Evolution and Mark of the Ninja. When Xbox One production was starting up, he was assigned to Killer Instinct, and thanks to his work with Microsoft and Double Helix he learned a ton about traditional fighters.
He worked with Chris Charla on the XBLA team and was excited to hear about the ID@Xbox program (The XBLA team’s successor) when it started up. Since he still wanted to base himself in the Seattle area and had previous qualifications, he was a perfect fit to help start the program with Rivals of Aether.
Rivals of Aether is in the same genre of the Smash games that is available currently on XBLA and Steam through a program called “Early Access”. The choice to put the game through Early Access has made financial burdens for such a small team easier, but it’s definitely added a workload to their time.
The development process has been a bit all over the place. The team started out as two people, just Dan and his composer, flashygoodness. In time, the team grew to 6 regular workers and 3-4 more irregularly. “I look back on the early days with a weird sense of nostalgia. I remember creating Wrastor from start to end in less than a month to show him at an event while Etalus took about 6 months to complete thanks to the increased work of being live on Early Access.” Dan describes the stress, but the gain of being on Early Access
Picking up speed for Rivals was definitely a lot slower-paced than people would think. Dan had a Rivals thread going on Smashboards for about a year before launching on Early Access. He was developing a small fanbase then. A few smashers also knew Dan from Super Smash Land, so they were excited when he announced that he was making an original Smash fighter. Rivals itself had a pretty big burst late last year when launching on Early Access; to him, it was surreal watching Mango play it on stream and enjoying learning the characters. He’s pleased that many players gave it a shot and that the game already has an active competitive community.
Rivals of Aether in early development compared to now
That security has come at a cost for them, though. Early Access has definitely been a bittersweet experience for the team. The upside is that people get to check the game they’re laboring for while they’re still working. It definitely slows down development some, though, as prioritizing fixes and features players are asking for while also creating content in the background. Etalus was set to complete in December 2015 in the schedules before launching on Early Access, and instead, he was released in March 2016. Between that time, the team worked rapidly to add in a ton of balancing updates, a developer mode, and a native Dinput support system.
The other downside of Early Access is the feeling of some players getting burned out before the final release. Many players already feel they have experienced enough. “Hopefully our full launch makes a big enough splash to bring people back and check out all of the improvements. One positive side of doing Early Access is that the platform fighter genre is getting more crowded, so being a front-runner has definitely helped us out.”
Dan runs a day like most indie devs would expect themselves to--delegating tasks from a checklist and working as hard as he can to gear up for the official release date of Rivals of Aether. Some days in the indie development route can lead to all sorts of inspiration and work; other days can turn hectic. Thankfully, due to having a big team, the team feels pretty confident about launch approaching soon.
For inspiration, a lot of shows Dan watches inspire his visual or story ideas. He doesn’t play as many games as he once did, but he used to play a lot of League of Legends. If looked closely, a lot of moves in Rivals of Aether were heavily inspired by League of Legends.
For motivations, sometimes reading forums can kick Dan to work. Especially people asking for new features or waiting for updates.
The plan is to make the full launch as amazing as possible with features and then to expand on the roster after launch. The main reason is to make the game feel complete. There will be a story mode as well as a fun single, or multi, player mode called Abyss mode. They are aiming to launch full- time sometime this winter on both Steam and Xbox One. After that, the roster expansions will begin.
“Our current plan is to add an indie guest then add four more original rivals, then another indie guest and close the roster off at 14. We also plan on supporting Rivals of Aether at large events and working with some organizers to schedule large tournaments during this development.”
What comes after? Trevor, the team’s second programmer, and Dan have some ideas for what it could be, but right now the team has so much on their plate that they can’t think about it.
Dan loves to get to the point: For all wannabe designers, with talented people who can supply art, music, and coding already filled with ideas, don’t be ‘the idea guy’. Learn how to art. Learn how to script. Learn Game Maker. Learn Unity. Learn HTML . Learn them all and create a game. “If you want to make a game, no one will be more passionate than you are about it. So you need to be able to do the work and not lean 100% on other people.”
For other roles in the industry, Dan advises to get involved in the communities of games that anyone who wants to work on games wants to do, and collaborate with people that they meet. You’d be surprised what your fellow gamers are capable of. The Smash community on its own has proven it over and over again with projects like the Smash Doc, Project M, VGBC, and more.”
Dan Fornace can be found here while Rivals of Aether can be found here
The official SmashBoards x Dan Fornace giveaway can be found here - The winner gets a copy of Rivals of Aether on their platform of choice and an Orcane plush!
A few years ago, a young ambitious mind by the name of Dan Fornace decided to create a student game while he was in college. That game, Super Smash Land, ended up changing from a hobby to a career. Unlike many other Smash Success stories, Dan’s life doesn’t follow the same suit of one day waking up and seeing the game blow up.
Dan Fornace is currently residing in Seattle, WA, and he works on the game full time. As an independent developer for the past few years, he’s been doing what he loves, but there’s always a lot on his plate.
How it all started
Rivals of Aether next to Super Smash Land
Dan Fornace started as a student in Drexel University in Philadelphia as a solo Game Dev. He started by making a few games, but he did a solo project for a game jam and had a lot of fun, so he wanted to try the solo route again. He tried to make something that was simple graphically in scope, and after playing Tower of Heaven by askiisoft, inspired by the Gameboy aesthetic of the game, he made a mockup for a Gameboy-style Smash Bros. His friends liked it and told him he should turn it into a game; he realized it went hand-in-hand with his want for a solo project.
He stashed the game he was working on and set out to work on Super Smash Land. He collaborated with two musicians, inversphase and flashygoodness, but handled the rest of the project himself. It took about 6 months to complete it, and a few more months to make a nice trailer and release it.
From there on, after college, he worked as a Game Designer on the former XBLA team. His job was to give design feedback to some of the games coming through the pipeline on Xbox 360; he was lucky enough to be put on some great titles when he first started out: those include Trials: Evolution and Mark of the Ninja. When Xbox One production was starting up, he was assigned to Killer Instinct, and thanks to his work with Microsoft and Double Helix he learned a ton about traditional fighters.
He worked with Chris Charla on the XBLA team and was excited to hear about the ID@Xbox program (The XBLA team’s successor) when it started up. Since he still wanted to base himself in the Seattle area and had previous qualifications, he was a perfect fit to help start the program with Rivals of Aether.
Rivals of Aether's uprising
The Logo Art for Rivals of Aether itself
The Logo Art for Rivals of Aether itself
Rivals of Aether is in the same genre of the Smash games that is available currently on XBLA and Steam through a program called “Early Access”. The choice to put the game through Early Access has made financial burdens for such a small team easier, but it’s definitely added a workload to their time.
The development process has been a bit all over the place. The team started out as two people, just Dan and his composer, flashygoodness. In time, the team grew to 6 regular workers and 3-4 more irregularly. “I look back on the early days with a weird sense of nostalgia. I remember creating Wrastor from start to end in less than a month to show him at an event while Etalus took about 6 months to complete thanks to the increased work of being live on Early Access.” Dan describes the stress, but the gain of being on Early Access
Picking up speed for Rivals was definitely a lot slower-paced than people would think. Dan had a Rivals thread going on Smashboards for about a year before launching on Early Access. He was developing a small fanbase then. A few smashers also knew Dan from Super Smash Land, so they were excited when he announced that he was making an original Smash fighter. Rivals itself had a pretty big burst late last year when launching on Early Access; to him, it was surreal watching Mango play it on stream and enjoying learning the characters. He’s pleased that many players gave it a shot and that the game already has an active competitive community.
Rivals of Aether in early development compared to now
That security has come at a cost for them, though. Early Access has definitely been a bittersweet experience for the team. The upside is that people get to check the game they’re laboring for while they’re still working. It definitely slows down development some, though, as prioritizing fixes and features players are asking for while also creating content in the background. Etalus was set to complete in December 2015 in the schedules before launching on Early Access, and instead, he was released in March 2016. Between that time, the team worked rapidly to add in a ton of balancing updates, a developer mode, and a native Dinput support system.
The other downside of Early Access is the feeling of some players getting burned out before the final release. Many players already feel they have experienced enough. “Hopefully our full launch makes a big enough splash to bring people back and check out all of the improvements. One positive side of doing Early Access is that the platform fighter genre is getting more crowded, so being a front-runner has definitely helped us out.”
Learning more about Dan
Dan's old setup for Super Smash Land
Dan's old setup for Super Smash Land
Dan runs a day like most indie devs would expect themselves to--delegating tasks from a checklist and working as hard as he can to gear up for the official release date of Rivals of Aether. Some days in the indie development route can lead to all sorts of inspiration and work; other days can turn hectic. Thankfully, due to having a big team, the team feels pretty confident about launch approaching soon.
For inspiration, a lot of shows Dan watches inspire his visual or story ideas. He doesn’t play as many games as he once did, but he used to play a lot of League of Legends. If looked closely, a lot of moves in Rivals of Aether were heavily inspired by League of Legends.
For motivations, sometimes reading forums can kick Dan to work. Especially people asking for new features or waiting for updates.
Thoughts on the future
A few fans, including SFAT, playing Rivals of Aether at PAX South
A few fans, including SFAT, playing Rivals of Aether at PAX South
The plan is to make the full launch as amazing as possible with features and then to expand on the roster after launch. The main reason is to make the game feel complete. There will be a story mode as well as a fun single, or multi, player mode called Abyss mode. They are aiming to launch full- time sometime this winter on both Steam and Xbox One. After that, the roster expansions will begin.
“Our current plan is to add an indie guest then add four more original rivals, then another indie guest and close the roster off at 14. We also plan on supporting Rivals of Aether at large events and working with some organizers to schedule large tournaments during this development.”
What comes after? Trevor, the team’s second programmer, and Dan have some ideas for what it could be, but right now the team has so much on their plate that they can’t think about it.
How to get break into the industry
The Rivals of Aether Developer Mode
The Rivals of Aether Developer Mode
Dan loves to get to the point: For all wannabe designers, with talented people who can supply art, music, and coding already filled with ideas, don’t be ‘the idea guy’. Learn how to art. Learn how to script. Learn Game Maker. Learn Unity. Learn HTML . Learn them all and create a game. “If you want to make a game, no one will be more passionate than you are about it. So you need to be able to do the work and not lean 100% on other people.”
For other roles in the industry, Dan advises to get involved in the communities of games that anyone who wants to work on games wants to do, and collaborate with people that they meet. You’d be surprised what your fellow gamers are capable of. The Smash community on its own has proven it over and over again with projects like the Smash Doc, Project M, VGBC, and more.”
Dan Fornace can be found here while Rivals of Aether can be found here
The official SmashBoards x Dan Fornace giveaway can be found here - The winner gets a copy of Rivals of Aether on their platform of choice and an Orcane plush!
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