We have a new project and we released an early playtest: Win The Date. Check it out!
This is the story behind it.
Cuddlr – warm little experience
Have you ever been scrolling through a dating app and thought it felt like a game? That’s the observation that started our journey. Cuddlr was made for the Queer Winter Game Jam in the month of December 2024.
For many gay people, a cold winter is a time to browse their Grindr apps and scroll. We noticed how this browsing of profiles feels like a game, where you could try and see which profiles might fit together. We wanted to recreate this experience in our game.
It was fun and time-intensive to create all the art for our game and make the UI. With time running out, we couldn’t figure out a unique mechanic. We decided that a concentration game was the perfect choice for us, it is simple and it conveyed exactly the feeling of matching profiles that we were after.
Responses to the game were mixed. A lot of people didn’t understand what was expected of them, even when we added an explanation screen. And the worst part: when people did understand the rules, it seemed they were not enjoying it.
Poundr – gay dating app simulator
The Jam was over, and we felt like a missed opportunity. We made all those characters that we liked, and matching them activated our imagination.
We realized that we had two main things missing:
1. A logic by which to match profiles.
2. A clear goal for the player.
That’s when we decided to create Poundr. Still, with the same concept of matching profiles on a dating app, but this time we added stats to each profile, and you were playing a gay app engineer who had to maximize user engagement with the app.
We made a prototype, we were so excited that we decided to open a steam page for the concept.
That’s when we got the first blow. Steam banned our game.
We made a mistake: in the version we uploaded to Steam we used stock photos from Pexels. We thought that as long as the game is unpublished we don’t have to put effort on the art. But once we asked an executable to be approved for playtesting, we got a ban on the project. We learned that depicting real people in a fake dating situation is a big no-no for steam. We wished to update it with our art but it was too late.
Moving on – Game Jams
Well, we thought, that’s ok. We are indie and queer, maybe the mainstream distributer is not for us, let’s just figure this out and release it on itch. That’s when we got hit for the second time. We couldn’t seem to be able to make the game fun or interesting.
We just couldn’t make the concept work. Frustrated, we gave up on the project, we went on to game jams. We tried our hands at 3d queer horror with Trapped, made a queer crossword with images in Beyond Crossword, and made a narrative puzzle game Unlock to Erase.
But those cute characters didn’t get out of our head, we kept wanting to bring them together. That’s when we came up with the idea of putting them against each other.
How to Win a Date?
Did you ever get that feeling when you go on a date, that the person in front of you isn’t actually trying to get to know you, but instead, they are trying to dominate the situation? Unfortunately, in the gay dating scene, that is something that we’ve experienced quite often. Putting aside how horrible that situation in real life, it’s a great experience to explore in a game. That’s how we got the idea for the gay date card battler Win The Date.
Suddenly, everything clicked. We finally have a mechanic that is not only fun and strategic but also explores a real, nuanced part of our community’s experience. Our hope is that by gamifying this dynamic, players might be better equipped to recognize a toxic “date-battler” in real time and feel empowered to walk away.
After a long and winding road, we’re back on track and more excited than ever. We know there are challenges ahead: refining the way too complicated mechanics, building a meta-game, and squashing bugs. but we’re eager to tackle them. We believe we have something truly special on our hands.
Curious to see what a gay dating card battler looks like? Check out the latest prototype and let us know what you think!
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