What’s growing on, Buds?
The seed is officially out of the bag, we have made our first attempt at getting project funding!
While we’re still waiting to hear back from Østnorsk Filmsenter (should be sometime this month!), we’ve slowly started shifting gears from pre-production into real production.
A Small Gap into the Industry
Applying for our first round of funding has been a milestone in itself. The competition is steep! The development grant spans both the film and games industry, and as newcomers, we’re trying to stay realistic while still hopeful.
Leading up to the deadline, we’ve been hard at work mapping out multiple strategies: one if we get funded and can ramp up production, and one if we don’t, allowing us to adapt and strengthen our application for the next deadline in October.
Either way, we’re not stopping!
Building a Sustainable Company
Making games is fun. But building a company is a whole other challenge.
The past six months have been a crash course in the not-so-glamorous side of game development: accounting software, business registrations, using our own money since the company doesn’t have any... Did you know that just keeping a Norwegian AS running costs 400 NOK+ a month at minimum. And that’s before things like hosting this website.
Nearly everything comes with a cost, and there are a lot of hands reaching for a slice. That’s why building a strong financial foundation has become one of our key priorities. And it takes time!
We’ve taken our time to create a strategy that allows Glueplant Games to grow sustainably, but the truth is: like any company, we’ll need income to stay alive. Until then, we’ll keep the development of Steps going. Maybe slower, but always forward.
Steps' Progression So Far
So yes, we’re still making a game, and it is a lot of fun too!
Over the last month, we’ve been working on:
- Refactoring the player’s movement
- Rebuilding world block functionality
- Implementing the player character and NPC animations
- Laying the groundwork for this website
On the surface, Steps may look exactly the same as before. It may seem like unnecessary extra work, but underneath, the systems are cleaner, faster, and far easier to expand. That’s the power of a good refactor.
It might not be the most exciting thing to show off, but it’s a crucial step for long-term quality and our sanity. As any dev knows: if you don’t take your time to breathe and clean your code now, it might spaghetti you out of existence later.
Website, Vision and Strategy
We’ve also started building out this website and a prototype has come together smoothly.
The visual direction is inspired by the cozy, colorful look we used for our Pangstart pitch deck; light, inviting, and slightly whimsical. It fits what we want Glueplant to represent.
Through workshops with Østnorsk Filmsenter in June, we’ve also been working on defining our niche as a studio: to create cozy, colorful, “adult-friendly” games. We want to make games for adults without explicit adult content, but create experiences that resonate with older players through symbolism, subtle themes, and deeper emotional undercurrents.
I also wanted a kind of studio where I can share everything with my kids, without needing to close tabs when they walk into the home office. So, we think that bringing a light and cozy vibe to our website would fit our thoughts for the company and our way of making games.
July may be quiet on the outside, but internally, a lot is shifting. Whether or not we secure this first round of funding, our direction is clear: we’re in this for the long run!
Thanks for sticking with us, Buds.
And as always, see you next month^^