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Hello Ladies, gentlemen and those of a non-binary nature, my name is Daibhi and this is the Gamerhub community. After the amount of buzz that followed our interview with Jorg Tittel, I thought I’d get round to interviewing again, and this time it’s the turn of Astrodreamer Studio ahead of their up-and-coming game, A Bonnie Odyssey. A Bonnie Odyssey might well just be the best kept secret in the Scottish indie gaming community and to a person, it looks absolutely fantastic. A bit of admin is required though: This interview was conducted on the 19th of October in 2023, and unfortunately, Dundee was right on the path of Storm Babet, which means that getting this done took a bit longer than my usual turnaround for an interview, but better late than never.
I caught up with Blair Watson, the producer at Astrodreamer Studio.
Daibhi: So then Blair, tell me about yourself: How did you get into this?
Blair: My story is a weird one. Interesting place to start. I, like a lot of people in Dundee, graduated from Abertay University. Dundee’s a huge, huge gaming hub. ~I graduated and then, pretty much immediately burned out of the gaming industry. I went into a few different things and ended up doing a bit of writing. Strangely, it was through that, that Jordan Hastings (who’s our studio director) hired me on to be the narrative designer for a project at Astrodreamer Studio. That project kinda went on the backburner but through a strange kind of conflict of different skills and abilities, I ended up staying on here as the producer.
Daibhi: Okay, thank you. Just to let you know about who I am, my name is Daibhi Armitage, and I’ve been working in and around videogaming for a decade or so. I review videogames for Gamerhub on Microsoft’s Game Pass and upcoming games that haven’t been released yet. Basically, I’m a nerd.
Blair: You’re preaching to the choir there, mate (laughs)
Daibhi: Tell me about Astrodreamer Studio. How did it all come about?
Blair: So, Astrodreamer was founded in 2021 in the middle of the pandemic. Although I wasn’t part of the actual founding crew, I had good friends who were part of the crew who did found it. It came about, because like most people, everyone who graduated from Abertay or other sort of games related courses around then, everyone stuck at home. Everyone who was mates, started making games. Everyone in that same bracket, who had an idea, had a passion and decided to create something. So Astrodreamer really started with what still is our first game. Our Debut title, A Bonnie Odyssey.
The intention was to be this sort of digital hike through the Scottish wilderness, and that came about genuinely because of Covid 19. We were all stuck in at home, keeping everyone else safe. We all took our passion for being outside in the Scottish wilds and decided to turn that into a game. And so, Astrodreamer was born.
Daibhi: I couldn’t help but notice this: I interview a lot of people and indie gamers and studios, but your studio is by far the most LGBTQ inclusive studio I think I’ve ever seen. Was that intentional? Did it have any bearing on A Bonnie Odyssey?
Blair: Yeah, I guess it did. It was always kind of intentional. We preach accessibility and inclusion as part of who we are and what we do. We really believe that a diverse workforce of staff and people who are happy with what they do make and create great things. We want to foster a bit of that and we have members of our staff, workforce and local community who are part of the LGBTQ community. We want everyone to not only feel welcome and accepted but also that this is a place for them. With a Bonnie Odyssey, we wanted to preach that a little bit further. The main character, Zoe, has a fiancée who is also female. We didn’t want it to be an in-your-face thing, where this defines the character, we wanted it to be like anything else. Just another facet of her character.
Daibhi: As all good inclusive writing does.
Blair: If it makes anyone feel welcome who would have otherwise might not have, then I think you’ve done a good thing. I think the demographics of who are playing games is becoming more and more obvious as time rolls on. During the -pandemic especially, people who would have never considered themselves gamers before have picked up gaming and become a part of that community. We need to make sure that everyone in that community feels welcome and accepted and represented. It’s something that Astrodreamer Studio believes really strongly about. It’s something that we didn’t want to be out with- We didn’t want it to be our identity in its entirety, but we wanted to make sure that everyone knew that we are that accessible, inclusive and friendly studio. We wanted to steer away from tokenistic aspects and move towards a genuinely open workspace. One of the things we had to cut from A Bonnie Odyssey was interactions between Zoe and her fiancée, because that kind of character lore doesn’t have a super-strong bearing on the game. It’s just another facet of her character that we bore in mind whilst writing and designing her.
Daibhi: Was part of the reason why A Bonnie Odyssey looks the way that it does, and has this setting due to… Well, Scotland’s a pretty desolate country, as a result of the Highland Clearances. Did that have any bearing on the development?
Blair: Not specifically the Highland Clearances, it was more to do with the isolationistic aspect of the highlands. It wasn’t supposed to be quite as on-the-nose as to reference that. It was more to do with the time and the place where the game was developed. We all felt alone and isolated during the pandemic, we wanted that sense of melancholy. The Wilderness is the same. It’s wide open, it’s alone, it’s desolate, but at the same time for us, it’s based on the places where we grew up and played as kids. The highlands and islands of Scotland. Jordan’s from up north, near Inverness. We’ve got friends and family who grew up around Shetland and Orkney and that part of Scotland has very close-knit communities that must have been… I think it feels quite isolationist, even with global events surrounding it. There’s still something wholesome, something homely about it that draws you to the nature aspects. We didn’t want to go quite as political as referencing the clearances, but there is this aspect that it’s definitely this place in Scotland, where something has happened to force out the natives. It feels isolationist because of that something. You can read into that how you want. Whether that comes from the history, Covid or other things.
It’s a fair thing to ask. I think we’ve done it unintentionally and hit the same sort of themes. A horrible thing has happened, and we were drawing more on the time period when the game was planned and started development but there are definite parallels. I think there’s a lot there that resonates that I’m going to use a bit more when talking about A Bonnie Odyssey! (laughs)
Daibhi: I’ve spoken to a lot of the Scottish Indie gaming community and the consensus is that we’re all looking forwards to playing this game, Blair.
Blair: I would hope so! We worked very long and hard on it, and it’s one of those passion projects that we’re proud to see come to life. We talked about it, and it’s based on very wholesome grassroots, community-based development style. For where we’re at, we’re really proud with it being our first game.
Daibhi: You should be very proud. I can’t wait to review it. I noticed you’ve only picked Steam to launch it on. Is there a reason for that?
Blair: So, originally when we started out, it was entirely under our own strengths, having never gone through the whole process before. We went down the self-publishing route, we were lucky to secure some trust and investment from people who believed in our vision and the game to help us develop it further and that was done with the understanding that we would self-publish with degree that we could on Steam. Since then, things have built upwards, and we’ve built momentum. There have been a few publishers who have been quite interested in the title and eager to talk about porting. Our lead programmer, Jake, is basically the Tony Stark of code. When we put it to him, he explained he’d been experimenting with porting the game already. We’re at the point now where Steam is still the goal, it’s the first platform we intend to release on, we’d like to partner up with a publisher who knows about a few of the aspects we could use some support in. Porting, localisation and marketing. With this, we could really push out onto Xbox, PlayStation and Switch. We’ve been experimenting with them all and fingers crossed, A Bonnie Odyssey will be coming out on to PCs sooner and consoles later without too much of a delay.
Daibhi: The other format that’s interesting to note is that in Scotland, there’s a homebrew community of people using the SEGA Dreamcast. Is that something you’d be interested in porting to?
Blair: You know what? I hadn’t thought about that. I have a bit of a fondness for the Dreamcast. I haven’t played it in years, but I used to use it for playing fishing games. I’m going to have to look into that.
Daibhi: When can we expect a release date?
Blair: We’re aiming for a 2024 release. Providing that we’re still on track. A later console date for release could be in the works if we find a publisher willing to help us with that. We’re being vague because if a publisher comes in strongly and wants a simultaneous launch, then we’d have to accommodate for that. For the time being though, we’re aiming for 2024.
Daibhi: Whereabouts is Astrodreamer Studio based?
Blair: We’re based in Dundee, not far from Abertay University, in a hub designed for small businesses. We have a really neat place to be and develop A Bonnie Odyssey. There’s other small creative businesses here alongside us. Having this creative atmosphere around us is great, I love it, and we’re genuinely not far from the university. A lot of our people came up from Abertay University, with it being one of the best universities for the industry.
Daibhi: How does it flow when you’re working?
Blair: Because of the size of Astro (we started with four of us working), we grew to 18 in aa short space of time. That sort of expansion required us to have separate rooms, and there’s a lot of back-and-forth between the two rooms. One for artists and the other for coding. We try and keep the office culture relaxed, with the office being brightly decorated and filled with LEGO. We have our big logo painted by Tabbi (our lead artist). We try to keep things very vibrant and fun. There’s always some lo-fi beats playing out and we keep as much of a friendly, university-style feel as we can while still being professional. We always have coffee, jokes, and we have an event every month. We’ve had film days with a projector and popcorn, we’ve had board game nights and we’ve had axe-throwing. We try to make sure that everyone feels like that they’re part of a group of friends, trying to make the games that we love. We genuinely believe that if you feel that you’re in a relaxed environment, you’ll be more relaxed and creative as a result.
Daibhi: We do similar here at the Gamerhub Community ourselves!
Blair: We’re also big believers in mental health days. If you need a day to take to yourself for your mental health, you take it off, no-questions asked. It doesn’t get counted as an absence or a sick day, you just take it off and get yourself sorted. We don’t track it. If you believe in people, and they can curate their own work time, you get that trust back tenfold. Everyone feels looked after that way. Most indie studios have gone this way. I think it’s a backlash from major studios’ approach years back. We don’t crunch. We don’t put undue pressure on the team. We always say we’d much, much rather a longer period of development than we would crunching and throwing more money and staff at a problem. If it’s going to take longer, it takes longer.
Daibhi: Has the recent opening of Dundee’s gaming convention centre had an impact?
Blair: Not terribly. We haven’t seen much of an upswing or turnaround. Things have been ticking along at a pretty steady rate. Dundee’s always been at the centre of gaming, and Abertay has always had a solid lot of courses with gaming. Every year, there’s been hundreds of graduates, and there’s a vibrant scene in Dundee. There’s a meetup, which we sponsored in October. Things like this have always been a thing. Things keep adding to it. We have a small but healthy ecosystem for games, right now, we are feeling the crunch from the wider videogames industry in the UK. There’s been this rubber-banding effect, and the coding bubble has well and truly burst. We are all feeling, especially smaller studios like us. We still give back to community around Dundee, with Abertay being down the road. We frequently engage with the Santander employability scheme, which helps recent graduates get jobs. We’ll open the door whenever possible.
Daibhi: Do you hire non-graduates as well?
Blair: Absolutely. Whilst a lot of our team are graduates, some of our team have come in through a million different avenues in gaming. I myself was a graduate from Abertay, I never used my degree. I came into Astrodreamer through being a writer. We get people from all over, and not everyone was Dundee-based, with people moving into the city. It’s not exclusively graduates here.
Daibhi: Speaking of that bubble bursting, has the current cost-of-living-crisis affected the development at all?
Blair: I don’t thing it has affected the development specifically, we’re very lucky to have the place that we’re in. I think the staff are feeling the harsh realities of living. We do what we can to make sure the staff feel free and comfortable in that. If they want to talk about issues, we’re there. It’s why we focus on making sure that the staff have mental health days when required. The games industry is high value, so we sit slightly above this crisis, but games are made by people, and tit’s the people we need to look after.
Daibhi: Is the gaming bubble in nearby Edinburgh affecting you in any way?
Blair: I don’t want to say it’s hindering, but the bigger cities, the bigger gaming companies. There’s this strange, trickle-down effect that affects smaller Indie companies and studios like us. When we started, we started with ABO, but we had a lot of co-development work. We worked on a lot of games, like Agatha Christie’s Poirot- The London Case. Blazing Griffin worked on that.
Daibhi: Has climate change had an effect on that? Are you, for example, carbon-neutral?
Blair: We spoke about our green footprint and things like that before four our studio, we found it hard to make a significant impact within our small building. Our green policies dictate through the building. We try for a high-speed, low-drag approach. Anything that isn’t essential, effectively. We don’t have transport issues. We hire locally. In order to help this, we always offer remote options. Working from home is never off the table. We keep that as a solid option. It’s a good way to keep the staff looked after and helping the environment.
Daibhi: When ABO comes out, how much would it cost?
Blair: When we started forecasting this, the number was in dollars because that was the data available. Realistically, we’re looking at somewhere in the region of £20. We also have to factor in the Steam discounts and things. We’re probably going to have an average cost of around £16, but the RRP cost should be £19.99.
Daibhi: Are you going to be doing special editions?
Blair: That’s something we’ve discussed. There’s a small but substantial whiff of features, alternate takes of line readings we’d like for the game, but due to our philosophy of not putting too much pressure on the team, there are features that we’ve had to scale back, and there’s been internal discussions about directors’ cuts. I think that depends on whether we can get the backing of a publisher. That’s the next big thing for us. We’ve had a lot of interest already. If we can get one to sign on and say “yep, we’re down for porting this to consoles, marketing, and here’s some money lads” then we’d love to do it. 100%.
Daibhi: Will there be a physical copy?
Blair: I’d love to say yes, and we’ve had that conversation with one of the publishers who is interested. I’d love to get my hands on a physical copy. It comes down to whether the publisher we hope to get can do physical distribution and it’s something that I’d like to push for on the Switch. Fingers crossed!
