• Document Video games’ Starstruck Galaxy combines social options with AI-assisted music creation.
• Impressed by Guitar Hero and Pokémon, it took second place within the newest PGC Helsinki Very Large Indie Pitch competitors.
• The sport incorporates a live-loop-pedal system the place gamers can gather devices and jam with bandmates.

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Finally yr’s Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki, we as soon as once more ran our Very Large Indie Pitch competitors. This speed-dating-style occasion, which we frequently take to exhibits around the globe, presents builders an opportunity to current their video games to professional judges and acquire worthwhile suggestions. It is the last word networking, game-honing, prize-winning occasion for indies. 

To offer you a glimpse of what The Very Large Indie Pitch is all about, we sat down with Document Video games CEO Rob Edgington to speak about his sport Starstruck Galaxy (beforehand Jamland), which got here in second place on the occasion in Helsinki late final yr.

To submit your individual sport in a Large Indie Pitch session, go to our web site to seek out out the place the subsequent BIP will likely be and to use.

Inform us somewhat about your self and your indie studio. Who’s on the crew, and what are their inspirations?

Rob Edgington: Document Video games is a small studio based mostly in Worthing, UK, and we’re constructing a social music sport for cell known as Starstruck Galaxy.

Earlier than founding Document Video games in 2022, I co-founded a neurotechnology startup known as Paradromics, the place I designed AI and silicon chips for brain-computer interfaces. Whereas this was an interesting and impactful subject, I could not shake my need to pursue a artistic profession within the video games business and produce Starstruck Galaxy to life.

For the previous two years, I’ve largely been working as a solo developer, however in the previous few months, I have been actually lucky to seek out two unimaginable teammates: Bence Kovacs and Gabriele Caruso.

Bence is an professional in growing audio synthesizer plugins and has a ardour for creating playful musical experiences, so he is the proper match to develop our music engine. Gabriele is a 3D artist, avid Guitar Hero fan and gifted musician, so he is creating the placing punk/anime artwork you’ll be able to see in our sport.

Collectively we wish to construct a music sport for a brand new technology – one which makes use of trendy cell know-how to create an AI-assisted music-making expertise with unprecedented social gameplay.

Inform us about your newest undertaking that you just pitched on the competitors.

In Starstruck Galaxy, gamers dwell out their musical fantasies making authentic songs, jamming with pals and AI, amassing devices, and competing in Charts and Battle of the Bands competitions. Suppose “Music with Mates” meets Pokémon.

We intention to do for musical concepts what Instagram did for pictures, the place gamers do not simply create music, however share, have fun and validate their inside musician by social gameplay. On the coronary heart of the sport is a live-loop-pedal music creation software, which permits gamers to layer up tracks from devices they’ve collected within the sport.

Within the pitch, we demonstrated this core loop sport, in addition to Problem modes, which educate gamers the best way to write music and make the subsequent massive hit. Final however not least, we’re growing generative music AI that may jam alongside gamers as AI bandmates, and generate an infinite number of musical devices for gamers to make use of.

How arduous is it to outlive as an indie developer?

I would not be capable to do that with out the assist and assist from my spouse, Sarah, and I am very grateful that I used to be capable of begin Document Video games with some monetary runway. This has allowed me to totally decide to the undertaking. Nonetheless, scaling up the crew remains to be an enormous problem. With how tough it’s to lift finance from non-public or public sources nowadays, it is robust to plan or depend on securing any exterior funding.

That is why we’re targeted on working lean and attaining key milestones. I am grateful every single day that I get to work on one thing I like and hope to maintain doing it for years. Moreover, I’ve lately began doing AI contracting and consulting, so in case you need assistance with AI tasks, please get in contact!

How was your expertise pitching as part of the Large Indie Pitch?

It was a fairly wild expertise. It was truly the primary time we might proven the Starstruck Galaxy to anybody outdoors of family and friends, so we went into it actually not understanding in any respect the way it was going to be acquired. We had been pleasantly shocked! Seeing the judges having fun with the sport will likely be a reminiscence I will not overlook in a rush.

What do you’re feeling you will have gained from these experiences, and what do you continue to hope to realize? 

Putting as one of many winners at this occasion has given us an incredible enhance in confidence and validated that the final two years have been effectively spent. There’s nonetheless a lot we hope to realize, and to not sound too corny, however this actually seems like only the start!

Our speedy objective is to launch Starstruck Galaxy to a small viewers to exhibit stickiness, collect information, and use that momentum to lift seed funding for full growth.

What are your hopes for this sport, and do you will have any plans for future tasks? 

I need Starstruck Galaxy to develop into one of many greatest cell video games on the earth. It is a dwell ops sport with a common enchantment – it does not simply allow you to make music, it allows you to dwell out the dream of being a celebrated musician.

I envision our sport turning into a vital app, a go-to platform for capturing and sharing musical concepts. Considered one of our firm’s core tenets is to create authentic experiences powered by trendy AI methods, so you’ll be able to positively count on extra modern tasks from us sooner or later.

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Wish to showcase your thrilling new sport? We host Very Large Indie Pitch occasions all year long, so you’ll want to preserve a watch out on our occasions web page for an occasion close to you. The subsequent scheduled occasions happen in London this month and in San Francisco in March.