Back in January, the indie video game title, Animal Well, received an announcement trailer, with developer Billy Basso confirming the game would be the first title published by Bigmode Games, the studio made by YouTuber Jason Gastrow (aka Videogamedunkey or Dunkey). The game immediately drew attention from gamers, not only because of Dunkey but because its cute, pixel visuals were unlikely mixed with a spooky, sinister tone. I got the chance to check out a preview build of Animal Well at PAX West 2023. I came away from it delightfully intrigued.
What Playing the Animal Well Preview Was Like
My preview time with Animal Well was only 10 minutes, but it was enough to grow an appreciation for its mechanics and gameplay. I started out emerging from a flower, controlling a small blob creature. There were multiple paths I could choose to advance, showing that no two people were going to experience the demo the same way. What I did immediately notice, however, were hidden paths behind or below the scenery. Sometimes these paths were the actual path forward, while other times they led to hidden areas. As someone who likes to fill in maps with Metroidvania titles, I am already salivating at the thought of getting 100 percent completion in Animal Well.
While the demo was somewhat relaxing, moving my little blob and exploring, there was something unnerving lurking in the shadows, too. Indeed, I came across a terrifying cat ghost, who chased me around and prevented me from progressing. Luckily, I went off the beaten path and found some fireworks. These were enough to rid the spirit from my lane. After that, I figured out some puzzles utilizing levers and precision jumping, all the while searching for more hidden paths.
Taken as a whole, Animal Well has a great mix of genres. It feels decidedly simple one moment, as your character can only move, jump, and use fireworks. But while you get caught up in the feeling of Zen exploration, something like a cat ghost can suddenly appear, breaking the dreamlike stupor you are in and forcing you to adapt to a more frantic flight and fight mode. If Animal Well keeps these two systems perfectly balanced outside of the preview, we’ll end up with a truly unique title players will be talking about for years to come.
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While I only had a short time to preview Animal Well, I also talked with Basso, who was a delight to converse with and answered a few questions off the show floor. Here’s a transcription of that interview.
What games or personal experiences convinced you to make Animal Well?
I think throughout my whole life I’ve loved playing games. When I was first getting into game development I remember seeing Indie Game The Movie in 2012. At that point, I was already a little bit into game development and learning to program at the time and making a promise to myself that I would eventually someday do a solo product. After that, I worked at a couple of different studios for about a decade.
Then six years ago, I started this as a side project. I just always wanted to make kind of a Metroidvania 2D game on my own and I didn’t have any opportunities to do that. I wanted to take a lot of the things I have loved in other games. The game mechanics of survival horror games, but then take them out of the Grim dark aesthetic that is always coupled with them. What those feelings and mechanics that you get out of those games are and turn them into something different.
I’m also taking some inspiration from older Nintendo games, some of the scary parts that are in Super Mario Bros. 2 and 3. Things that surprise you and are stressful. And honestly, those are some of my strongest memories. Being terrified of the sun in the desert. Trying to divert you. It’s kind of a game about little things like that. And just creating this really intimate interconnected space that you can feel like you are gaining an understanding of while finding secrets.
I had seen Animal Well before it was picked up by Dunkey’s company. Was there difficulty finding a publisher?
It was interesting. Two years ago, I reached out to Dan Adelman, who used to work at Nintendo and later on was working on Axiom Verge. I knew he had a good track record of helping small indie teams or solo releases. So I reached out to him and we started working together. And he has a lot of industry connections. He knew how to get localization done and who to talk to at the time, which was PlayStation. Our plan was just to self-publish. We got to Summer Games Fest. But during Day of the Devs, Dunkey made a wrap-up video of summer games and gave little shout-outs and I remember that. He was excited about it. And so I was very flattered that he didn’t make fun of the game. Like, just mentioning the game would have been fine. He’s genuinely nice.
Then at Tokyo Game Show, three months later, Dan and Leah (Dunkey’s wife) started talking on Twitter and they followed each other. It was because we took a selfie with Shuhei Yoshida that I think they let us know, ‘Oh, we’re starting to publish soon. We haven’t announced anything yet. I feel like we should maybe talk about that.’ I said, ‘Well, we weren’t looking for a publisher, but this could be really cool.’ We had a few meetings with them and talked about what they wanted the game to be, they played the demo build. It just seemed like we had the same idea of what we liked about it and they didn’t really want creative control of the game. And the YouTube channel has a big audience and, a big reach. Then he made a whole video about it. It’s been just a really good thing, very flattered.
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Do you feel indies are more visible nowadays because of events like Indie World?
There’s definitely more support from the bigger companies, which is good. Nintendo, PlayStation Indies, ID@Xbox. Everyone finally gets it. It’s important to support indies, they are a vital part of the game ecosystem. It’s where all the creative ideas are coming from and years later, they trickle up into the AAA game. At the same time, there are more indie games than ever. Curation and visibility are harder and definitely important. Reaching out to press and YouTubers and getting advances are important, it’s like a client success has enabled me to actually do the proper marketing thing.
Oftentimes, gamers can get tired of the AAA sphere and some titles feeling samey, visually and gameplay-wise. Do you believe indies fill that itch to play something original? And do you ever worry indies will fall into the same trap of homogeneity?
I think it’s a spectrum. There are some people I think that do try to make indie games and their primary motive is still profit, so they will do market research to see what’s the hot new game and chase after that. I don’t think it’s a good strategy. You’re very likely to fail.
I think there’s always going to be people who want to do something that is driven by love because I think so many people love video games. When that’s the case, when people are organizing, making new things instantly, following a template; as long as there’s a love for video games, someone’s gonna do it. Games are getting easier, more people are buying games, and there are more Let’s Plays. It’s easy to be cynical and see the media that’s out there and get distracted by it. I think there will always be a core group of people that try to make good stuff, it’s just maybe more challenging.
Animal Well will be released for PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and PC via Steam. There is no solid release date, but Basso is shooting for sometime early next year.
