Brian (Infinite Bits): How long was the game in development, from conception to what's on the web today? Which stages of development were the slowest/fastest?

Joe (Chronotron): I started production last October (2007) and released the game in May. Getting the initial platform game plus time-travel elements came together surprisingly fast. The slowest stage was the 2 months spent debugging and refining various components. It didn't necessarily take the most time, it was just the slowest process.

What has been your experience with PAX, specifically being selected for the PAX 10?

PAX was amazing! I was exhausted the entire time, but I didn't want it to end. All of the other winners were so nice, and I think the conversations I had with them were the most valuable thing I took away from the show. To be honest I kept being surprised about my little Flash Game being taken so seriously. I kept waiting for someone to point out that I didn't belong there. But I guess I made a fun game, and it seems that's what's important at PAX. I hear IGF is kind of cut-throat, but none of us saw each other as competitors. I'm glad I was able to thank Jerry Holkins personally for his part in creating the PAX 10.

Are you interested in porting your game to XNA, and would you like to submit your game to PSN or XBL?

I'm fascinated with the idea of trying to port Chronotron to XNA, or make a XBLA compatible version. A developer at 5TH Cell mentioned that Fable II Pub Games were done in Flash originally. It's definitely something to research. XBLA is a really great service for casual game players and indie developers alike. WiiWare isn't out of the question either, if I were to find an Nintendo certified partner.

Were there challenges being an indie developer you'd like to share? Were they enough to make you want to join a larger, traditional game company?

In my case, I'm not just an indie developer, I'm a part-time indie developer with a full-time job developing educational and corporate training games. So the biggest challenge is just to find the time and energy to develop my own games. Chronotron had a certain momentum to it though. As soon as it got to the point where it was obviously interesting people, it would have been hard not to work on it during every available hour. The point of doing this was so I could work on my own ideas. If I joined a larger, traditional game company, I'd still have to work on my own games in my spare time.


Where do you see Chronotron moving from here? Would you eventually like to make a profit from the game?

Just because the game was free doesn't mean I haven't profited from it. The free Flash Game industry works because large game portals such as Kongregate and Addicting Games pay developers to license or sponsor their games. With Chronotron, I had a sponsorship deal with Kongregate. Kongregate paid me to put their logo and a link to their portal in the viral version of the game. The deal also allowed me to include advertisements in the preloader of the viral version of the game, and allowed me to sell non-exclusive licenses to other portals. So if you see a version of the game on a site with no ads, no links to Kongregate, and the bonus levels unlocked, that means that site paid me to license the game. Otherwise you're seeing the free-to-host viral version, which makes me money through ads, and through the Kongregate sponsorship. Kongregate also shares ad revenue with me for the ads on the Chronotron page on their site.

Were there any games that were inspirational in creating your game?

I read an article about Braid when they had just started talking about making it. All I really knew about it was that it was a platformer that let you play with the flow of time. It got me thinking about what kind of time-travel game I would make. I decided to focus on the idea of looping time to assist yourself because it inspired all these different puzzle ideas. I also remembered TV ad for Blinx which said you could pause and record time in it. That was the inspiration for making the time travel controls be similar to VCR or audio player controls. The biggest inspiration for the gameplay was Blizzard's SNES
game The Lost Vikings. Portal also inspired me to try to build the levels in a way that each new puzzle built on something you would have had to figure out in a previous puzzle. The informative signs on the wall are also somewhat Portal-inspired.

Finally, what are a couple of your all time favorite games?

The game I think I've played through from start to finish the most is Link's Awakening for the Game Boy. I'd also have to say Sacrifice was an incredible game that was no where near as popular as it deserved. I still go back and play through that game now and again.