WORLD PREMIERE: Announcing "The Time I Have Left - REMAKE"
WORLD PREMIERE!
The world has spoken! It's time for The Time I Have Left to modernize itself.
Since we don't want to be left behind by the times, we have decided to skip ahead and release THE TIME I HAVE LEFT - REMAKE, a glorious quintuple A reimagining of the unreleased classic with all the modern features you all want and love!
Take a look at our new trailer, and don't forget to wishlist now on Steam to get EXCLUSIVE REWARDS*!
From the ashes of fixed camera angles and turn-based combat, true modernity will rise!
*There are no actual rewards
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Happy April Fool's Day from the team!
Happy Holidays from The Time I Have Left!
Happy Holidays from The Time I Have Left!
Thank you all for this 2023! We can't thank you enough for being around.
It's been a crazy busy year...the team has grown, we have improved our pipeline and development has progressed a lot. We are still working as a small team without publishing support so there are still a lot of things to do, but development marches on smoothly and we are still hard at work cooking a lot of new things for next year!
To celebrate, here's an illustration by our amazing artist neuneunou, you can follow her on Instagram.
See you around in 2024!
Giveaway! Win a T-shirt of "The Time I Have Left"
Have you seen our official The Time I Have LeftT-shirt? Read below and participate in our giveaway for a chance to win one!
How to participate?
Answer the question “What would you do if you only had 6 hours left to live?” in any of the 3 platforms:
STEAM: Leave a comment in this post with your answer.
DISCORD: Leave a comment in the #tshirt-giveaway channel with your answer.
Multiple entries are allowed as long as they are from different channels: one in Discord, one in X/Twitter, and one in Steam.
When's the deadline?
Entries can be submitted until December 3, 23:59 UTC+1.
A week after the deadline, we’ll pick an answer at random and publicly announce the winner's name on all platforms. We'll contact the winner through the platform the answer was sent from. Make sure you can receive direct messages.
Rules
Inflammatory, politicized, or otherwise unsavory answers will not be eligible. Keep things safe for work, please!
T-Shirt sizes are subject to availability (XS-2XL).
After contacting the winner, we’ll wait up to two weeks for a reply. Failing to receive one, we’ll randomly select a different winner.
We reserve the right to invalidate the participation of any suspicious contestant accounts such as but not limited to: bots, fake accounts, inactive accounts, stolen accounts, giveaway accounts, etc.
We will try our best to ship the reward but if it becomes infeasible for some reason to ship it to a specific address, we’ll randomly select another winner.
We can’t take responsibility for missing packages, damage incurred during shipping, or any issue or additional costs associated with customs or your local courier services.
We reserve the right to modify or add additional rules if the situation requires it.
For your safety, please double and triple-check the account contacting you! Pay attention to the spelling and any special symbols so it matches our account:
We are looking forward to all your answers, best of luck!
The Time I Have Left - Turn-Based Carnival Stream
Here we are again!
This time we are taking part in the Turn-based Carnival Steam Event, be sure to check it out to discover some incredible games!
We have prepared a lengthy stream program that will be airing during the week. We have some new runs at our last demo by streamers Sei Ishimaru and Marina Seri and also a special in-depth look Q&A at our combat system!
The Schedule:
This time, the whole program will be pre-recorded and streamed continuously on loop, that means that instead of using a time system for the different sections we will have a sort of “playlist” running at all times. The stream will keep with the following schedule:
SLOT 1: Silent Demo Run
Duration: 45 min Language: English (Content, no commentary)
A silent run of our latest demo with a well-balanced approach. No commentary on this one, just gameplay stright from the game.
Duration: 14 minutes Language: English Host: Yite (Creative Director, The Time I Have Left)
Yite, will host a special developer feature discussing some of the unique aspects of The Time I Have Left’s combat system, including answers to some of the most common questions we have received during development. Don’t miss it if you want to know more about our turn-based combat system with an active twist.
SLOT 3: Gameplay by MarinaSeri
Duration: 45 min Language: English Host: Marina Seri (YT)
Our guest Marina Seri will play The Time I Have Left's Gamescom demo. This run ended up being pretty exploration-focused and a good example of one of the many ways to progress in the game.
Duration: 14 minutes Language: English Host: Yite (Creative Director, The Time I Have Left)
Yite, will host a special developer feature discussing some of the unique aspects of The Time I Have Left’s combat system, including answers to some of the most common questions we have received during development. Don’t miss it if you want to know more about our turn-based combat system with an active twist.
SLOT 5: Gameplay by Sei Ishimaru
Duration: 1 hour Language: Español Host: Sei Ishimaru (YT / TW / Twitch)
Our guest Sei Ishimaru, will play The Time I Have Left's Gamescom demo. Sei’s run is pretty different, with quite a bit of combat and a different approach to exploration!
Once we reach the fifth slot we will be back at the first, so you have plenty of chances to catch the content that interests you most.
Some of our previous trailers and the current schedule will also be played in between slots.
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We have a couple of extra surprises these coming days, one of them coming very soon. Stay tuned for a chance to win…something!
Whew. Our second time at Gamescom came and went, and it’s been very exciting! We’ve met many new friends, and saw plenty of people try The Time I Have Left, which was a blast.
Over the last month we’ve been showing bits and pieces of the changes and improvements to our game, and there’s been a lot of new developments as well! We’ve been showing this stuff over on our Twitter, but it’s high time we share all that with our community here.
DELAY TO 2024
Let's tackle this first, since delays are always disappointing.
Most of you already know that we are a very small, self-funded team and (as of the writing of this announcement) still searching for a publisher. We really apologize for making you wait a little more than anticipated, but rest assured that we are giving the game our all so it is worth the extra wait!
GAMEPLAY TRAILER
We finally unveiled our second trailer on IGN's stream during Gamescom. Did you catch it? If not, it’s also live on our youtube channel!
It features some of the new gameplay features and our redesigned UI, plus hints at new enemies, boss-battles, new environments, and even more of the story.
In addition to that, we were interviewed by a few publications. Keep an eye out for them once they release!
SKILL PATHS
In The Time I Have Left, you unlock new abilities to use in combat by exploring the world, collecting clues, and unlocking story entries in our Database system.
Last time we demoed the game, progression in this front was linear, and every clue and entry was about equal: Going out of your way to find hidden clues allowed to earn skills early, but it did not feel rewarding enough.
To address this, we classified each entry as Critical, Optional, or Secret. Each category has its own progression path, with its own skills waiting to be unlocked!
The Critical path is unlocked as you escape Colony 7. It provides the bare minimum skills you will need through your journey.
The Optional path requires you to be attentive and take in the environment. These skills are not mandatory but will add variety and help you find your preferred play-style.
Finally, to obtain the skills from the Secret path, you must engage and understand the ins and outs of Colony 7 and its previous inhabitants. They are your reward for solving optional challenges or stumbling into secret locations.
SKILLS LOADOUTS
To balance out the increased skill count, we introduced skill loadouts to limit the amount of skills you can bring at any given time.
You can edit your loadout at Waiting Rooms, where you can also save your game and restore your Willpower. You have limited slots, but these will expand as you progress through the game. Skills from the Critical Path are automatically equipped and do not occupy any slots, but the rest do.
You can also save loadouts and quickly swap between them!
NEW ENEMIES & TARGETING
We've already added a couple new enemies, but plenty more are in the works!
Some enemies have body parts that can be individually damaged and neutralized by specific actions. Break them, and you will limit the enemy's attacks and abilities.
For example, one of the new enemies has powerful ranged attacks: By damaging their right arm enough, you can prevent them from using them any further.
We also started using some Motion Captured animations. We have just started using this new workflow so it's still not too evident in the game, but you can expect animation improvements in the future! Not only is this a great productivity boost, but we are also having a lot of fun with it!
MULTILAYERED DETAILED INSPECTIONS
One of our main gameplay modes is the “Detailed Inspection”, where you shift into a first person camera perspective and use a pointer to explore and interact with various items. We are still experimenting with it, designing puzzles, and expanding its functionality.
One of the latest improvements is having multiple layers of inspectable scenes: After interacting with specific objects, the camera zooms into a new position; you can zoom back out by pressing the cancel button. This lets us hide key items and other secrets.
OPTIMIZATION AND STEAMDECK
During Gamescom, our demo for The Time I Have Left was fully playable on both PC and the Steamdeck. There is still plenty of work to do, but we have made great improvements to performance that will also benefit those of you with less powerfull PCs.
We more than doubled performance on lower end systems without sacrificing any visual quality. It was really hard work!
We'll make sure to keep an eye on performance to ensure everyone gets to experience The Time I Have Left at its fullest.
AFTERWORDS
That was a lot of news! As per usual, thanks for reading! Feel free to join our Discord to get in contact with us, and follow us on Twitter to keep up to date on any news.
See you next time!
The Time I Have Left - Fear Fest + Indie Dev Day Livestream
We just got back from Gamescom, but we already have a couple of events lined up:
The Time I Have Left will be featured in this year Fear Fest!!
We will be at the Indie Dev Day in Barcelona! (Come say hi anytime if you are around)
To celebrate the ocassion, we will have a lengthy streaming event during saturday including some live and pre-recorded footage centered around The Time I Have Left!
Stream Schedule
Saturday (All times are CEST, world time available on time links):
We will have a cool playlist showing all the trailers we have released so far and a pre-recorded playthrough of our Gamescom demo with no commentary. Check out what's new and prepare your questions for the development team!
16:00 - 18:00h Main Event: Gamescom Demo Developer Walkthrough (English)
We will play The Time I Have Left's Gamescom demo and comment on it live. We will answer questions from the chat of course, but you can also leave your questions in the comments section (or any other of our channels), and we will tackle as many of them as we can during the stream!
We listen to and read all your comments, so you can take this chance to ask us anything about the development, tell us what you think about the game or give us any kind of direct feedback (even more so if you have played any of our demos).
18:00 - 20:00h Trailer showcase and Silent Demo Run (Replay)
We will close the stream with a re-run of the morning playlist for those who prefer watching their playthroughs when the sun starts to set.
20:00h End of Stream
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This stream will be the perfect recap for this summer of events and announcements, so if you missed how the game's shaping up during the summer this will be an opportunity to see how things have changed.
The Time I Have Left Gamescom 2023 Trailer release
We have just released our second trailer! This time, it showcases a lot of gameplay, and plenty of new content, and it even has some hints as to where the story might be heading. Be sure to check it out! And we would absolutely love to hear from you!
Also, we have updated our Steam page and website with new images, gifs and info!
You can also join our Discord server and discuss the game with us 👍
The Time I Have Left at Gamescom 2023
Hi everyone!
We are back in Köln, Germany, for Gamescom 2023!
We have an updated demo with lots of changes and expanded features, so if you’re attending Gamescom, please drop by and say hello! (We don’t bite. Mostly.) You can play The Time I Have Left at the Indie Arena Booth, hall 10.2, booth 98.
But if you can’t attend, don’t worry! We’ll be LIVE on the Indie Arena Booth Twitch stream today at 11:25 AM (GMT+1) streaming a playthrough of the demo and discussing its features. If you can’t catch the stream live, don’t worry either, it will be archived.
Also, we have a surprise ready for Gamescom, so stay tuned!
Design Talk: Time Limits
In 6 hours you will be dead. It is fated to be. Even so… Is there anything you would like to do before the end?
We have been repeating this hook non-stop for the past three years. It captures the essence of The Time I Have Left and (most of the time) is received with positive curiosity.
But a question always arises: how does the timer tie into the game?
Hi everyone! Yite here with another development blog, right before the Gamescom season starts (we will have another one soon!).
The time limit is probably the most difficult core concept of TIHL to properly convey — and understandably so, since its uses are mostly associated with acting under pressure and going fast.
"Isn't it too stressful?"
“How am I supposed to explore thoroughly under a ticking timer?”
"Will I have to repeat the 6 hours if I run out of time?"
These are just a few questions that we have heard many times during development.
So today I will discuss them briefly and hopefully not only clarify our design intention when creating a “time-driven narrative escape adventure” but also, in typical Ground style, take a brief look at other narrative games and RPGs from the past that incorporate a sort of time limit into their design.
Let’s dive in!
Isn't it too stressful?
Short answer:
It’s not! There’s plenty of time to find your way through the main story, time flows slowly in combat and during menu navigation, and there are safe rooms where time completely stops. Take your time to explore and use your remaining time to hunt for secrets.
Long answer:
Everyone understands the urgency of time: no matter if you are late for work, you are taking a test, or you have to pay your bills by the end of the month: We all feel the pressure of time in one way or another, so it’s a given that including some type of time mechanic will ramp up the intensity.
Long before video games, tons of competitive activities had included timers in their rules. From chess, all sorts of competitive sports, board games, and racing had already included timers into the mix to push the tension of an encounter.
Many early video games were digital versions of those same board games, sports, and races, so it makes sense the timers were quickly adopted by the medium, even more so in the arcade times when time was money (literally). There are also modern incarnations of these timers such as certain incremental games and other forms of limited free-to-play models.
Limiting game time in old-time arcades would add some extra pressure and also bring in more precious quarters (or pesetas here in Spain. Yeah, the same ones you use to buy rocket launchers in Resident Evil 4).
We are already stressed enough in our daily lives, so, understandably, some people are against an additional restriction that adds urgency to their gaming time, especially when playing adventure games, which are usually methodic, slow, and narrative-driven.
We set ourselves to do something different though, because we know that there is also another way to understand time: if you are in control of your actions and spend it on the things you want to do, no time is wasted even if under a limit.
In TIHL, the timer is always there and rarely stops. There is a sense of urgency pushing you forward, and there are also actions that will require you to spend some time, like resting to recover Willpower (your other main resource). It is an important core mechanic and as such it needs weight and consequence in the game, but that does not mean that it’s there to make your life harder.
You will have plenty of time to find your way out, to explore even more than what is right in your path even. When in combat or navigating the menus, time will go ten times slower than normal, and inside a Waiting Room time stops completely giving you plenty of space to plan ahead.
We could have named the game ‘I don’t have time’ but went with ‘The Time I Have Left’ for a reason!
How am I supposed to explore thoroughly under a ticking timer?
Short answer:
The time is yours to use. All the time that is not used is lost at the end of a chapter, so once you locate the exit of the level you can decide what to do with it. There are plenty of secrets worthy of getting out of the main path, and even if it does not seem like much at first, Aline still has 6 hours left.
Long answer:
In TIHL you have to find your way by gathering clues in Colony 7. You can find clues in both third and first-person exploration, and those same clues will act as unlocking conditions to get new story fragments.
Unlocking and reading story fragments will give you hints to reach the end of the chapter and also point to secret areas that hold even more clues. And with every few unlocked fragments, you will get new combat skills that might help you overcome difficult enemies down the road.
Once you locate the exit of the level you can decide when you want to leave. The most important thing to note is that all the time that is not used will be lost. You won’t gain anything for finishing a chapter with 30 minutes remaining in your timer, in fact, that time will be gone by the start of the next.
In TIHL, time is meant to be spent. To be pushed as much as you want on the things that matter most. And of course, you will have a big part in deciding what that is.
Will I have to repeat the 6 hours if I run out of time?
Short answer:
You won’t! The game is divided into separate chapters that follow the main narrative. As long as you beat a chapter in time you can keep up with the game’s story. You can also save your game in multiple slots (just in case!).
Long answer:
When creating TIHL, we looked at tons of examples and explored many ways that timers can be used in games, specifically in adventure games and RPGs: from the story time limits of Valkyrie Profile and Lightning Returns to the calendar deadlines of Shenmue and Persona.
Jordan Mechner was one of the pioneers in creating experiences that present their stories under a timer. Games like the original Prince of Persia and The Last Express were built around the timer.
WARP’s D also pops up in discussions about narrative adventure games on a timer.
D was a unique first-person cinematic adventure game at the time, built entirely on pre-rendered video sequences that force the player to solve the mystery in 2 real-time hours. The original Prince of Persia also had a 1-hour time limit to beat the game. Both games had timers that were not always present on the UI.
These games highlight both the great and the not-so-great aspects of a starting point that is similar to ours. The premise to beat the game in a set time limit is enthralling, and repeating over and over sections until you manage the “perfect run” is a challenge that can hook you for hours. But it can also get tedious after a short while, hurting the narrative nature of the game.
Another drawback of many games with timers is their length. You can’t make a 30-hour game set on a timer that blocks people from reaching the end unless they master it (can you?) so most are short, running on 1-hour or 2-hour time limits.
To expand their length but keep the time limit aspect, some games break their structure into loops of some kind. Like the 3-day cycle of The Legend of Zelda Majora’s Mask or another game that has appeared in the past in our developer blog: Breath of Fire Dragon Quarter (Which could be argued that it does not technically run on a timer, but still works similarly, limiting your playtime and encouraging repetition).
The time limit in BofDQ is not measured in minutes or seconds, but it’s still a ticking bomb that signals the end of the game. The D-counter on the top-right of the screen fills naturally just by moving around and fills faster when using certain actions, if it reaches 100% the game is over.
TIHL is also designed with replayability in mind and it will be very difficult to get everything in one go, but it does not mandate you to repeat the whole game every time your time runs out.
The game is divided into chapters, each one with its time limit, area to explore, and objectives. The timer is always rebalanced when changing chapters, so the best approach is to leave the area with as little time remaining as possible.
You can save your game resting at any Waiting Room, including one right before leaving the area (just in case you change your mind after leaving!). But remember that your save slots are limited, so your decisions matter in the long run.
We *may* have something in the works for those that want to get everything in the game…but those are news for another day!
Closing words
I hope that after reading today’s post you have a more solid idea of how the game works and some of your doubts about the timer have cleared. The team will keep doing their best to take you and Aline through a unique time-driven adventure.
And, as always, please share with us your comments and suggestions in the comments or join our join our Discord server!
We will have another post soon detailing our summer plans. Stay tuned!
Design Talk: An iterative process
Hey everyone! Nitro here.
Game development is an iterative process. As ideas get explored and features implemented, they are refined, remixed, replaced, or even completely discarded. Like the Ship of Theseus, the change is continuous enough that it can be hard to distinguish when one iteration of the game’s design ends and another begins.
While different in its implementation, the current design for The Time I Have Left retains most of what we originally envisioned: A game built upon exploration, narrative, time limits, and accessible gameplay.
In this article, I’ll cover some of the original ideas and how they grew into their current form through iterative development.
The timer was a much more punishing mechanic in the first iteration of our design. Time would start the moment you begin the adventure and would not stop until you beat the game, pausing and loading saved games notwithstanding. The six hours Aline had left to live would happen in more or less real-time, not even slowing down when you were checking out the menu!
There were downsides to this approach: Levels would need to account for the varying amount of time remaining you could enter them with, and mistakes early on could have consequences later on. To make matters worse, it detracted from one of the core themes of our game, which is to make the most of your time. This design encouraged rushing through levels as fast as possible to have more time available for future stages. It was anathema to our intentions, so we had to rework things.
To fix this, we made it so each level has a unique time limit, and your remaining time is discarded after you finish the stage. If you finish the level with half an hour to spare, that half an hour will be lost! This encourages players to go back and explore some more, to think about what they would like to do with the time they have left.
Additionally, we decided to slow down or even stop the timer in certain circumstances to encourage immersing yourself in the story. This way, you can read story entries without fearing the pressure of the clock.
PACING
An escape adventure
Originally, there were several ways to escape Colony 7 and each route would take you through different sets of areas, similar to how paths branch and combine in OutRun. While the genres and overall experience greatly differs, the core concept has plenty of overlap: A race against time through a heavily branching path.
This approach required a great amount of work, resulting in zones being smaller than we wanted, and making it likely that most players would never see much of what The Time I Have Left has to offer. It also made balancing the experience much more difficult, so in the end we decided to condense the multiple escape routes into a single adventure.
The current, more straightforward design lets us tune the experience much better: We can focus on making each level have a different feel or focus on different gameplay aspects, thus ensuring the experience never feels stale or repetitive!
There are still lots of secret areas, but they are now contained within larger stages instead of being smaller levels locked behind secret alternative routes.
We planned to make the experience evocative of RPGs whilst maintaining the focus on narrative and adventure. To that end, we put in small, simple action sequences, somewhat reminiscent of random encounters. These were meant to break up the pacing, add gameplay variety, and expand on the narrative.
Our first approach didn't quite have the desired effect but it was nevertheless positively received. With each iteration, we slowly converged towards a more or less full-fledged combat system.
The core concept remains the same: Aline is defenseless in a strange, otherworldly place, and her only option is to endure an onslaught of threats until she wakes up. While the original implementation was closer to a QTE in spirit, our current iteration is closer to a traditional turn-based RPG with an active twist.
During the enemy turn, the player has to properly read what action the enemy is performing, and the player is tasked with evading those attacks. Good timing is rewarded with extra resources to use during your turn. Over time, we leaned further into these nascent RPG mechanics, adding skills for the player to unlock, a rating system that grants XP points for good performance, and more.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
While the ideas we left behind were interesting, iterating and being open to change helped us to find the fun in The Time I Have Left, and we are looking forward to seeing what you all think of the final product once it’s ready!
Of course, things in the cutting room floor are never truly lost: Sometimes, previously discarded concepts return when the environment is right for them, be it this game or the next.
I hope this article has given you an insight into how games change while in development. As per usual, I cordially invite you all to join our Discord server or drop a question below if you have any questions!
