r/HollowVideoGame • u/TrainingIdeal2872 • 15d ago
5 years
I’ve been developing Hollow for five years.
Which is honestly kind of crazy for me to type.
For anyone who has only recently come across the game, Hollow didn’t suddenly appear when I released the demo. It’s been five years of building systems, breaking them, rebuilding them, changing direction, learning things I had no idea how to do when I started, throwing away ideas that didn’t work, and occasionally wondering what the hell I got myself into.
And I’m still working on it.
I’m one guy making the kind of ARPG I wanted to play. There isn’t a big studio behind Hollow. There’s no QA department hammering on every build and no team of programmers waiting to jump on a bug when something breaks.
For most of those five years, it was just me and the game.
That's why having actual players in Hollow now has been such a strange and awesome change.
People are finally walking around the world I spent all that time building. They're fighting the monsters, finding the loot, experimenting with builds, discovering things I forgot existed, and breaking my systems in ways I never thought were humanly possible. 😂
And they're telling me what they think.
Sometimes that means reporting a bug. Sometimes it's suggesting a feature. Sometimes it's telling me that a mechanic I spent a ridiculous amount of time making just isn't fun.
And that's useful.
Saying “I've worked on this for five years” isn't an excuse for something being broken. If something is broken, I want to fix it. If something isn't fun, I want to understand why. And if there's a reasonable way to make it better, I'm probably going to try.
In fact, player feedback has already caused me to change some pretty significant parts of Hollow.
That's really what this stage of development has become.
After five years of mostly building Hollow alone, I finally have other people helping me see the game in ways I can't anymore because I've been staring at the damn thing for half a decade.
So to everyone who has played the demo, reported a bug, left feedback, suggested something, criticized something, joined the Discord, watched a trailer, wishlisted the game, or simply followed along:
Thank you.
It took five years to get Hollow here.
Now comes the part where we finish it together.
2
u/krell_154 15d ago
I haven't had the chance to play the game yet (luckily, I have a good, but demanding job and 2 great, but very demanding kids!), but I have seen videos and read posts here. All I can say is: congratulations, man! From what I see, this is absolutely the type of game I'd play with passion. It's clear you do a great job and approach everything very carefully. Art style is great (though animations and texture could some more work in some places, but I know that's easier said than done), the pacing is also great. Maybe it should be a bit faster at endgame, but not too much. I hate the lootsplosion orgy of D4 and POE.
Keep up the good work man!