Hey everyone, it's Aaron here! As you can see from the title, my new game that I've been working on for 3 years, LOST INSIDE Act 1 is now out and available to play for free on Steam, Itch.io & Gamejolt!!
I've been waiting for this day for so long and cannot wait for you all to finally get a chance to play this small little indie game. I will link the game below!
I have also composed the entire soundtrack for the game as well. You can listen to all 50 tracks by clicking here.
Thank you all for supporting my game dev career since Shine Within. It means the world to me that I can express my storytelling through the medium of games. Thank you for being patient and please enjoy Act 1.
Kind Regards Aaron
LOST INSIDE Act 1 releases April 5th
Hey everyone it's Aaron here. I am very excited to announce that the first entry of my game series LOST INSIDE Act 1 will be released on Steam, Itch.io & Gamejolt on April 5th.
I have been working on this game for 3 years now, and have poured a lot of energy into creating it. I cannot wait for you all to finally have a chance to play it.
If you haven't wishlist the game yet, you can give it a wishlist below:
It's been such a long journey, however I'm very excited to share this game with you all. ːsteamhappyː
Kind Regards Aaron (Ayetoons)
LOST INSIDE Act 1 is now on Steam!
Hey everyone, it's Aaron here! Today I have some very exciting news for you all! the very first entry of my newest game LOST INSIDE Act 1 is now on Steam!
The game is fully complete and will be released on Steam this year for free, I will be announcing the release date closer to the release!!
In the meantime, I would appreciate your support with the game. You can do this by simply giving it a wishlist, doing this would help me out a lot with the future of the game, and would mean the absolute world to me. I will be linking the Steam page for the game below:
Thank you all so much for the support, I've worked so hard on this act of LOST INSIDE. I can't wait to show it off to you all!! ːsteamhappyː
Kind Regards Aaron :)
Lost Inside Act 1 Update
Hey everyone, this is Aaron here.
I can't believe it's been another year already! It's crazy to think that Shine Within is already 2 years old now...((*It only just feels like yesterday when I released the game.))
This makes me very happy knowing that my game is out there for people to play. I never in my wildest dreams thought that people would enjoy the game as much. It's just been an absolute pleasure being able to express myself in a video game medium.
I've been swamped this past year working on my latest game project Lost Inside, and I'm finally at the point of development where I can now openly talk about the game itself.
However, before I do. Firstly I wanna thank each & every one of you who have played Shine Within, you all have given me the confidence to express my storytelling in the video game medium. I am forever grateful for you all giving me the time to show off my little indie game. Even 2 years later I have noticed that people are still experiencing the game for the first time which is so wild to me. I can't wait for many more memories to come. For that thank you. <3
Now, shall we dive into my next project?
OoOoOoO!!
What is Lost Inside?
Lost Inside is an episodic game series that is a sequel to Shine Within. The premise for the game is that many years after the events in SW, the Spirit World is still in a corrupted state. You play as a human who has stumbled their way into the Spirit World. The only way out is if you can fulfill the prophecy and save the spirit monsters once and for all...
This will be a much bigger game than SW since this will play more into the story and characters that you meet on your journey. That's all I'm gonna say about it for now.
The game will be seperated into 3 games: ((*Act 1, Act 2 & Act 3))
Why will it be episodic?
The reason for this is mainly because game development takes a really long time, especially for a solo developer like myself. Since I'm creating this game mostly alone, breaking it down into 3 Acts is much more achievable to create & is a much healthier option for my mental health.
My main plan right now is to create Act 1 and release it so I can get feedback on the game and improve on it for future acts that I make. I want each act to feel different than the other Acts but to continue on with the same story.
Lost Inside Act 1 Progress:
Alright, now it's time for the meat and potatoes of the update!
When I first started actually developing Act 1 back in early 2022 everything was going smoothly except for the programming itself. Since I am not a programmer, creating this was a huge challenge for me alone. This is because Lost Inside is a much more complex game than Shine Within. I was spending most of my time programming the systems for the game but wasn't able to add in the content since I kept experiencing bugs after bugs after bugs... ((*I guess you can say that it was pure chaos. xD)) By the time I got into the actual game content, everything was taking much slower to implement since the back-end code for the game was pure mess and wasn't working as expected.
When all hopes were lost, a programming chad saved the day...
Through making Shine Within I was able to meet really talented game developers. One of my good friends xandersauce who is a very talented programmer checked out the build for Act 1. He loved the vision that I had for the Lost Inside game but knew with the programming side of things that the game was slowly slipping from my fingertips.
He gave me an offer to help me create better systems for the game that would make development for Act 1 much quicker and more efficient to create. This would give me the time to focus on the contents of the game whilst he was able to help with the systems needed. However, the catch for this was that I had to scrap Act 1 and start it all over again...
This is exactly what I did.
Now back to 2023...
Act 1 was completely reprogrammed from the ground up in Game Maker Studio 2 from the very start of January and was all feature complete until late February. I was able to get started on coding the games actual contents from March this year which took a lot quicker to create as xandersauce was able to create his own systems for me to easily add dialogue and cutscenes to the game.
After March everything went very smoothly from there.
I'm so happy to announce that since September, Act 1 is now completely playable from start to finish and is now heading to the polishing stages of development.
Wrap Up
It has been such a long journey since the start of Act 1 and I'm so grateful for the help of xandersauce. Seriously without him, the game probably wouldn't be where it is today. The development progress has been really enjoyable this past year I was able to get the ideas that I had from pencil and paper into the game itself. It has been such a great feeling to finally see the world that I envisioned come alive.
Overall I'm so much happier about the progress of the game and can't wait to share more details about it soon?...
((*Also check out xandersauce's twitter account, his literally insane!))
Anyway, that was the update I wanted to share with you all!!
Now, back to work!...
Kind Regards Ayetoons
Shine Within / Lost Inside Discord Server: https://discord.gg/7Q8MkJNMzZ
Shine Within OST: https://ayetoons.bandcamp.com/album/shine-within-ost
Hello, my name is Aaron, people know me online as Ayetoons!
Today is such a special day as it’s the 1st year anniversary of my game Shine Within. Releasing my game was such an unreal experience that I will never forget.
(( I just can’t believe it’s already been a year already!…))
Shine Within is a very personal game I’ve always wanted to make for many years now. It was a game that I couldn’t stop thinking about in my day-to-day life. One day I felt this creative urge to give game development a go & create the game that I’ve always wanted to make. Since I’m not a game designer or a programmer It was very difficult for me to start development straight away.
As I started working on Shine Within I broke each of the elements of the game into multiple chunks which I was able to learn as I went along throughout the game's development. I was able to create the game alone as I did all of the writing, art, music, sound effects & programming all by myself. It was a very difficult process as I’m more of an artist than a game designer, however, I’m always excited about trying new things that are outside my comfort zone.
The memories that I have working on Shine Within is a feeling that I will always cherish forever. I just had so much fun developing the game which I loved every minute & second of it. Seeing the world come to life in a playable state was an amazing experience. It was just so unreal to see my vision finally become a reality. With enough determination & motivation, I was able to see through the game to the very end. 2 years later I finally was able to release Shine Within to the world!
Looking back now, I’m extremely proud of what I’ve created, I just can’t believe that I was able to create the game from start to finish. Even though everything about the game was super challenging to make, I tried to remain positive throughout the game’s development which paid off at the very end. I’m also very proud of the music as well, since I’m not a musician this was my very first musical project, I had so much fun creating the game's atmospheric music. Since this is my very first game I’m so happy & proud of what I was able to create and accomplish.
It always puts a smile on my face knowing that there are people out playing & enjoying Shine Within. I’m incredibly grateful that people are able to have that experience with the game itself.
Since releasing Shine Within has taught me a lot about game design & how to take creative risks. I now feel a lot more confident programming & creating music which is something I’ve never expected to learn. Looking back now at Shine Within it has now motivated me to keep working on future projects & improve over time.
I just want to thank my friends & family for giving me the motivation to finish Shine Within. I also wanna thank my game developer friends as well for helping me when I truly needed it.
Also lastly, I wanna thank everyone who took their time out of their day to play Shine Within. Thank you so much for giving my game a chance. It really means the world to me knowing that you’ve played my game. I loved all of the feedback & support that you’ve given me throughout the release. From the bottom of my heart thank you. ((Before I finish off this post I have one last announcement to make…))
((OoOoOo…))
I’m very proud to announce my new game:
LOST INSIDE is my new game project that’s a sequel to Shine Within!
This is a story-driven game that expands the lore & story from Shine Within that is set many years later after the game prior. This game will contain more story elements & character interactions that will all tie together into the main story of my games series. You will also meet characters that were foreshadowed in Shine Within that will get a bigger role in this game.
((I would love to explain more about the game however the rest will be a secret for now…))
Since this game will be a much bigger game than Shine Within, I’m going to take as much time as needed to make sure that it’s the best game that I can possibly make. The game will come out when it's done.
((See you in 120 years from now!))
If you want to support me or to be updated on the game’s development you can follow me on the following links below:
Once again thank you all so much for the support of Shine Within. It means the world to me that people still play the game to this day.
Now then I must go back to development, So until next time…
Take care.
Game breaking bug is Fixed!!
Hi Everyone, I just wanna thank you all for supporting my game Shine Within, It really means a lot to me to see you all play the game and enjoy your time with it. ːsteamhappyː
I've made a patch update to the game as I fixed a game-breaking bug that occurred right near the very end of the good ending route. (The issue was with the text overlapping causing the game to eventually crash. However, it should be all fixed now in this new update!! :D)
Once again I just wanna thank you all for the massive support within the last few days of release. It has been such an unreal experience to finally share my game with everyone which I'm highly grateful for this opportunity.
If you have encountered any bugs throughout your gameplay or just have any questions about the game in general please don't hesitate to ask me and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.
You can also join the Shine Within Discord server where I'll be posting updates about the game as well! The link will be provided below!
