JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time news & patch notes

Join us Thursday, February 23rd, from 8:30pm to 10:30pm ET, for the final instalment in our Given Time Debut Playthrough. Witness Mei's trajectory as the last wisps are gathered and her interstellar trip conclusively resolves. Our jett scouts on this ultimate mission will be two of Given Time's core dev team: Richard Flanagan, who you may know from the hit game FRACT OSC, and design/dev/QA powerhouse Zack Wheeler at the jett's helm. It's likely that Patrick, Dan and Craig will make an appearance, coming along for the ride from the Flor Kolos and up Tor. to go From Crypt To Cradle. Join us as we close out the JETT: Given Time campaign, traversing the final narrative beats! Stop by and give us a hearty 'ahoy' in the chat, if you dare. Note: If the stream chat sputters, you can message us on Twitter at @jettxyz. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/1bee28ad32a1a94838c941818609957d64a262c9.png In this Feb 23 instalment of our Given Time Jubilee of livestreams, we'll be solving the most advanced brine wisp puzzles, and proceeding beyond, unravelling some of the mystery that lies at the heart of Tor, all while chatting about the development process behind this unique game, and answering questions from the chat. **Spoiler note:** The final section of Given Time that we'll be playing on Feb 23 has a hefty risk of story spoilers, but also: it's okay to intersect with JETT's unorthodox science fiction story from an odd angle. Where is the stream happening, you ask? We'll be streaming right here atop JETT's Steam page. We hope you're digging JETT so far! If you find yourself becoming a bit of JETT-head, note that we'd love a warm Steam review and/or a good word somewhere on the internet, wherever prospective JETT-heads may be. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5a3a225a2c052940b127e523b7b4346ba2567bc3.png

Join us Thursday, February 16th, from 8:30pm to 10:30pm ET, for the next instalment in our Given Time Debut Playthrough. Our jett pilots this outing will be two of Given Time's core dev team: Richard Flanagan, who you may know from the hit game FRACT OSC, and design/dev/QA powerhouse Zack Wheeler. If conditions are right, there'll be another cameo from JETT co-creator Patrick McAllister, who worked closely with Zack and Richard on the intricacies of design in JETT: Given Time. Come along and spark some wisps, shoot the breeze, and see what JETT: Given Time has on offer as the playthrough moves into the deeper waters of the broad mid-section of the campaign. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8a855471326a2c1d2fc9d639091938e534d3091a.png Surface any good words or Qs in the stream chat, or on Twitter at @jettxyz. In this Feb 16 instalment of our Given Time Jubilee of livestreams, Richard and Zack will be resuming their campaign in the latter half of the free-roaming mid-section of Given Time, solving the more advanced brine wisp puzzles, while chatting about the development process behind this unique game, and answering questions from the chat. Where is the stream happening, you ask? We'll be streaming right here atop JETT's Steam page. It should be a fun laidback time! A few other JETT Squad folks might be hanging around, online and in chat. Perhaps we'll see you there as well? **Mild spoiler note:** The section of Given Time we'll be playing on Feb 16 has a low to medium risk of story spoilers. It'll give a strong sense of what JETT gameplay looks like in its more intense energy levels, and you'll get a clear look at how Given Time's ecosystem puzzles work. Still, you may be safe enough to watch the stream and listen in, no matter what level of JETT-head you may be be. Even if you haven't cracked into The Far Shore yet, it's a beautiful game, if we do say so. Just drop off before you see too much, haha. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5a3a225a2c052940b127e523b7b4346ba2567bc3.png There may also be some high-fiving on stream, as we've recently gotten word that JETT has earned Valve's Great On Deck stamp of approval! In any case, we hope you're digging JETT so far! If you find yourself becoming a bit of JETT-head, I'll note that we'd love a warm Steam review and/or a good word somewhere on the internet, wherever prospective JETT-heads may be. Note: We'll be wrapping up the Given Time Launch Month Jubilee with another livestream next Thursday February 23rd, kicking off at 8:30pm ET.

Howdy, folks!

Richard here, with great news regarding JETT on deck:

• We're now officially verified as Great On Deck.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/94fad4c7b8720be9bf5613698e5e8a67f87347b7.gif Patrick's hard work in optimizing JETT for the Deck hardware has really paid off. Not only does the game play really well on the Deck, but it's a great platform to experience The Far Shore and especially, the chill, player-directed nature of the Given Time expansion campaign. So: grab a pair of headphones and curl up somewhere cozy with your Steam Deck and JETT. Hope you dig JETT on Deck and if you do, and if you're so moved, don't hesitate to spread the word. Oh, and if you haven't left a review yet, please do so, as it really helps JETT find its way to new folks. Thanks in advance!

* Fix for potentially getting locked into cockpit early in Given Time. * Slightly better mouse interaction in pause menu. * Fix for UI sometimes not showing when resuming activities. * Various smaller fixes.

On Thursday February 9th from 830pm to 1030pm ET, join Given Time design contributor and stream co-pilot Richard Flanagan aka @phosfiend, with Given Time design/dev/QA powerhouse Zack Wheeler aka @tankooni at the jett's helm for the next instalment in our Given Time Debut Playthrough. JETT co-creator Patrick McAllister from Pine Scented Software will stop by tonight's livestream, too. Patrick handled the bulk of the technical and engineering aspects of JETT, and worked closely with Zack and Richard on the intricacies of design in JETT: Given Time. Come along and spark some wisps, shoot the breeze, and see what JETT: Given Time has on offer. Surface any good words or Qs in the stream chat, or on (what's left of) Twitter as a reply to @jettxyz. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/c632b90889799333f3e2db7b2d0b7d3a05d1bbe8.png Oh, and you've arisen and are playing Given Time, take note: on this February 9th livestream, Richard and Zack will be starting in broad free-roaming mid-section of Given Time, poking at puzzles, getting in and out of JETT dev rabbit hole conversations. This section is narratively quite sparse, so there's a low risk of spoilers. You're probably safe to watch the stream and listen in, no matter what level of JETT-head you may be be, even if you haven't cracked into The Far Shore. We'll be streaming right here atop JETT's Steam page. It should be a fun laidback time! A few other JETT Squad folks will be around, online on and off stream. Subsequent Given Time streams are scheduled for Thursday February 16, with the end of this limited series slated for Thursday February 23rd, all kicking off 8:30pm ET. They'll wind up on the Superbrothers HQ YouTube eventually, and when they do there'll be a link here. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5a3a225a2c052940b127e523b7b4346ba2567bc3.png

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/eb3a57b98234617d1b79b2c4bcba736a04f57811.jpg JETT's out! Ahhh.... that feels *so* great to say. With last week's debut of JETT on Steam and with the release of Given Time, we're feeling well satisfied. Our 1000 year interstellar dev trip has run its course, and now a distinct and newly-complete videogame vision is widely available, forevermore. To those of you who have embarked, deployed, adapted, persevered and/or arisen with us - thanks so much. This is an odd, ambitious, multi-faceted project. It has been a labor of love for all involved, and so it's very heartening to hear from those of you for whom this thing resonates. It's a thrill to think that people will be discovering JETT for years to come, now that it's out in the wyld. It's our fond hope that it might someday earn cult classic status. On that topic, hey: if you're enjoying your time in the world of JETT, and if you are so moved, please do lend us hand with a positive Steam review and/or leave a good word someplace, and thanks if you do. As of this writing we're a week out from January 31st, so here's a round-up of some post-launch news and press, including JETT folks on the Noclip podcast, some positive Given Time coverage on Rock Paper Shotgun and an 8/10 review in Edge Magazine, as well as a recent article featuring Looking Glass alum and JETT Squad 1.0 lynchpin Randy Smith, plus some details about JETT Squad Thursday evening livestreams in February, and QA housekeeping including an update on the turbulence some of you may have experienced this weekend, and even a SHODAN cameo (!). Phew, that's quite the bundle! So, ready to stumble reverently onwards? {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/7f6d59b7d2806f7df027b66a5a36f8434c1ecb6b.png JETT DEV X NOCLIP PODCAST We've been chatting with Noclip lately, and a recent JETT dev conversation has been published as a podcast. From @noclip on Twitter: ------------ BONUS PODCAST - We talk to the developers of JETT about their decade long journey creating the original Far Shore campaign, and last week's release of Given Time." If you like game design talk, this is for you! 🔊 Listen: https://noclippodcast.libsyn.com/the-decade-long-creative-development-of-jett 📺 WATCH: https://youtube.com/watch?v=5U4YhmsRezA ------------ It was a treat to get together and chat with Danny about JETT's unusual dev path, and its satisfying completion with Given Time's release. About Noclip: Noclip does a weekly podcast with dev chat bonus episodes, but they're primarily a videogame documentary outfit, headed up the ever amiable Danny O'Dwyer. You can find well-crafted and well-informed documentaries on everything from Thief and System Shock, to all things Half Life, with excursions into the smaller-team space with docs about System Era's Astroneer and Supergiant's Hades. Anyways, Noclip's YouTube channel is excellent and worth exploring. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/d0854dcd4bad76c2a438c0208ac08e173f35fec3.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5c5c60632d1410ae6dda373fb2abb2733545c758.jpg ROCK PAPER SHOTGUN x JETT: GIVEN TIME Some good words about Given Time from this direction, worth a read! "A new expansion sees Jett become the soaring sci-fi open world it was meant to be. Given Time has made The Far Shore blossom beautifully into its final form." Thanks to Jeremy Peel and Rock Paper Shotgun for shedding some light on JETT and Given Time! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/58d6fd4fee340acb25495605ddf453882b6906f7.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/a4d74008f21cb673c7e41b61d2a8145616cd5f7f.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/a3fb2e25bd87f9cf4176b94642817d8bc4033791.png ROCK PAPER SHOTGUN x RANDY SMITH - A JETT SQUAD ALL-STAR Also on Rock Paper Shotgun, and also from Jeremy Peel, comes this recent profile of Randy Smith. Thief developer Randy Smith says "immersion is totally incompatible with ego" Jeremy's article covers Randy's career from Thief, back in the Looking Glass days, with some discussion about immersive sims, and the article includes a mention of Tiger Style's Waking Mars, and Randy's contributions to JETT. Randy came into JETT's orbit initially as a design contributor from mid-2017, helping us here and there, before plugging in full-time in mid-2019, bringing a wealth of production experience and design chops, and becoming a JETT Squad lynchpin through some fairly complex stages of production, up until The Far Shore deployed in late 2021. I think Randy's design contributions to the project really come through in Given Time, where ecosystem-puzzling and free-roaming gameplay come into focus, and where players are given time to soak in a world that reveals JETT's immersive sim aspirations. As The Far Shore deployed, Randy passed the torch design-wise to his understudy, dev powerhouse Zack Wheeler, whose name you will encounter again at bottom of this post. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/4d06cc0ce171ebd7702719235ace32545aa99a70.png ^ Randy Smith is @wavesallday_ on Twitter, and he's presently cooking up a fresh new videogame. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/3317d5ed6ae464626f8518bed8493b30e1388bd9.png It's thanks to Randy that fellow Looking Glass alum Terri Brosius climbed aboard JETT Squad in 2020, plugging into Priscilla Snow's work on JETT's choral and spoken language (detailed in a recent squad profile), and adding capacity to the dialogue-shaping and story-editing efforts, alongside myself, Randy and Nick Suttner. Terri, who voiced SHODAN in the System Shock series, also voices Misha in JETT. Misha, as some of you may know, is the level-headed and determined commander of Mei and Isao's scout unit. She is tasked by Space Program Overseer Jao to direct the investigation of Tor's solemn cone -- the source of the hymnwave -- from her perch on the command deck of Ground Control, atop Scout's Prospect. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/36cdfa3ced86aa51d5ec8b42b8ba7d70127d2e73.png JETT: GIVEN TIME IS AN EDGE 8/10 It was a delight to see JETT: Given Time get a warm welcome from Edge magazine's Chris Schilling in the March 2023 issue's 8/10 review. “...this generous and welcoming expansion is deserving of any time given over to it." The snippets above go a long way towards describing the new campaign. For the full review, and a whole lot more besides, with great coverage on the world of videogames, all beautifully laid out, seek out Edge magazine in print and digitally. Fun fact: Both JETT: The Far Shore's 2021 release and Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP's 2012 PC release scored 8/10 with Edge magazine. That's a pretty decent run, particularly given how unorthodox these designs have been. Feels pretty good! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/7bce106386514297e6f5ee7f0895bc0eaa36f585.gif QA HOUSEKEEPING + WEEKEND TURBULENCE Some intrepid jett scouts may have experienced turbulence over the weekend, as we pushed out some hotfixes. Apologies for that. Regrettable. Patrick at Pine Scented has been on the case, addressing a handful of the more prominent issues in a recent build, and he and Richard Flanagan are on duty, responding to tickets, finding remaining wrinkles, ironing them out, and surfacing patch notes. We'd like to pass along a big thank you to all jett scouts and community members who have been helping us along in the discussion threads, you've been great. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5a3a225a2c052940b127e523b7b4346ba2567bc3.png SPARK WISPS WITH JETT DEVS THIS THURSDAY On January 31st we kicked off JETT's jubilee, getting together for a launch livestream with a range of JETT Squad folks playing The Far Shore and cracking into Given Time. This is now archived here. As JETT's February 2023 'Jubilee!' enters its second week, there's more in store. On Thursday February 9th from 830pm to 1030pm ET, join Given Time design contributor Richard Flanagan aka @phosfiend and Given Time design/dev/QA powerhouse Zack Wheeler aka @tankooni for the next instalment in their Given Time Debut Playthrough. Subsequent Given Time streams are scheduled for Thursday February 16 and Thursday February 23rd, kicking off 8:30pm ET. Come along and spark some wisps, shoot the breeze, see what JETT: Given Time has on offer, and surface any Qs in the chat. Oh, and you're playing along, take note: on February 9th they'll be starting in the free-roaming mid-section of Given Time, poking at puzzles, getting in and out of JETT dev rabbit holes. There's a (very) low risk of narrative spoilers, so not to worry, you can join in even if you haven't cracked into The Far Shore. They'll be streaming right here on JETT's Steam page. It should be a fun laidback time. A few other JETT Squad folks will be around, and may stop by the stream. Until then - stay sharp, scouts, and go gather them wisps! c {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/ebeb7555f0b33dc791aa187570e8c16ecdb3af83.png @craigdadams @superbrothersHQ @jettxyz JETT.fyi > hop on the Superbrothers A/V - Enthusiasts newsletter {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/deace20006458fa45d0aee26bbd95dd0e79bc065.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/c90f68c8aea3a7f3c5c33ea787d05dc2d9931fe4.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/89846f2a3dc151f35ca1fa32762d3e4d87467d5f.jpg https://youtu.be/1a12KAlwnJ8 https://youtu.be/ilZo8W8cHFA

* Resolved issue with occasional missing ghokebloom. * Resolved issue with environmental objects occasionally being missing. * Tweaked scene LODs a bit to avoid some extreme pop-in.

Temporary rollback to before serious LOD issues were introduced.

Quick fix for Jett not being visible when first loading into a level.

* Fix for Hector grapple causing the vehicle to be difficult to control. * Mitigation for issue where environmental objects are sometimes not showing.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/858ee453e1e3e27d120b0175295bdc8c0ff4581f.png https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3lfq60RO90 Today's the day! Arise with us? As of 10am ET today, January 31 2023, this is true:

• JETT's Steam debut + New 'Given Time' campaign is now available!
• Oh and as of now, JETT's on sale: 40% off on Steam.
• Did I mention JETT is pretty great on Steam Deck? Well, yep - it is!

I'd love it if you checked things out and took the plunge. “...this generous and welcoming expansion is deserving of any time given over to it." - Edge If you do take the plunge now, I should mention that February 2023 is a great time to play JETT, as we'll be playing and streaming too. More on that below. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/d6112f26e05e2e8d794e427350edd4a2e3e5e276.jpg Patrick at Pine Scented and I have been carving out the unusual genre-space and distinctive universe of JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time for a thousand years err.. I mean… a decade now. It’s a cool project and we’re plenty proud of it, and we’re so glad to have delivered on the vision, and in a satisfying style. Feels good. Bringing JETT to Steam in its now fully-realized form, with the brand new Given Time campaign hitting across the board on Steam, Epic and on PlayStation, feels cool-as-hell. This a special one, one we hope will find its people, stand the test of time, and go on accumulating JETT-heads from here on out. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/59019bbeadf1d71118e73f15862074d161850d6a.png To mark the moment we've lined up a Devs Launch Day Livestream from 12pm ET to 3pm ET on Tuesday, January 31 at JETT on Steam. I'll be hanging out on stream with JETT Squad folks like scntfc, Richard Flanagan aka @phosfiend, Patrick at Pine Scented, Priscilla Snow aka @ghoulnoise, Sam Bradley, dev powerhouse Zack Wheeler aka @tankooni, and more. Come on over and hang out? We have some other livestreams on the calendar in February 2023, with some of us playing through Given Time over the course of three Thursday nights. More info on that towards the bottom of this post. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/09b2b66eccc642027ae3f23be7550f4eb8398bb4.png In any case, we hope you dig JETT's unorthodox videogame vision. Tsosi bless! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/2e61864ca1fd6120cc3c5e628771d2c53b87365c.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/a67943ac07c5a24d5cd86ffee571445b4eb72015.png We've put in a fair amount of amount of honest effort in these last several months, preparing and publishing some pretty solid materials on JETT, Given Time, the process of their creation, and the JETT Squad itself. I've been working alongside the excellent Dan Berry, Richard Flanagan, Dustin Harbin, and popagenda's Nick Verge to get our comms effort aloft. Just to give you a sense of some of the thing things we've been putting together lately, here's a sampling: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/3632750825578792262 https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/5310340507211946263 https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/3642880749849600159 Go to the JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time - News Hub for more.

With launch day finally upon us, join the development team in celebrating the debut of JETT: The Far Shore on Steam, and its brand new expansion, Given Time. Check out live gameplay as the game's creators are joined by a rotating group of JETT Squad members, who contributed art, code, music and voices to the game throughout its development. We'll be running for a few hours, so feel free to dip in and see the game, say hello, ask questions, and commemorate the epic thousand year voyage ten year journey culminating in JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/3afaf7a9505c6be91c8a09879840dccf91b9606a.gif Hey folks! Richard from phosfiend systems here (you may have read about my small contribution to Given Time here). I'm going to interrupt Craig's regularly scheduled dissertations on all things JETT to bring you a good bit of Steam Deck news ahead of the launch on January 31st. When we put out the demo some intrepid scouts among you attempted to fire up JETT: The Far Shore on your Steam Decks. We heard your concerns about rough performance and we secured a Deck so that we could dig in and figure out what's up. Patrick of Pinescented has been hard at work on getting JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time running nicely on the deck and progress is going well! A weird GPU bottleneck was the main culprit and there are still a few screws left to tighten but huge strides are being made.

I've played it, and not only does it now run really well, but the Deck is a super chill platform to experience the game on.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/a68796417d5657b1433d6eb0b9850b8accd39264.gif{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b27e535257ed8ad761f5544518ff4e2b4f4a4a9d.gif The open-ended nature of the Given Time expansion is especially suited to the intimacy of the Steam Deck and we look forward to folks exploring the world in this way! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b60602364a81ee15cc450cb375d791aed7e02ba9.gif{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/545061e52db04cd474668224072b2d3219255231.gif As an added bonus, the performance optimizations Patrick has been employing for the Deck should also have a positive effect on how the game runs on all PCs. In my experience so far, these optimizations smooth out a few subconscious hiccups and have the game feeling silky; yielding absolutely divine carves across the terrain of the far shore. Thanks to everyone for the interest and feedback, we couldn't have made this progress without you. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/039f864a56d5ff98ea581e3e2af75bafec828d2c.gif{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5d8e4c41817ae53a712a564cb82adbb6c14881b6.gif I should note: we have yet to complete the Deck Verification, and there may be a few final touches to be done on this update before it's fully ready for release, we're looking forward to sharing it with you. More news on this to come, but... get psyched! Cheers, -Richard https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/3404184263846060375 {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/21204c07c2d81a96236b2ae6c05ada833c91fa51.png

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/e10260664efa40757e628e1578fcb3d1d68e382e.jpg Hello! Official JETT tsagas scrivener Dustin Harbin here, with a fresh squad profile focusing on two of the all-star contributors essential--in different ways--to defining the distinctive voice and soul of JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time. A process which, as you’ll see below, was as complex, multi-layered, and nuanced as the game itself. Over the 10 or so years of JETT’s genesis, I’ve been involved in a few different ways: sometimes just as a friendly ear, or someone to whip up some Jules Verne-y scifi drawings, or draw stylized portraits of all the squad members. Often I’d come back to the project after long absences to discover enormous changes had been made while I was off doing… whatever a freelance cartoonist does with their time. Without exception, I was always floored by the changes, usually occurring after Craig and Patrick added some new wunderkind to the squad. But, when I was asked to audition for the (starring, some say) role of “(Gloomy) Skeptic,” I was introduced to a whole new upgrade: someone had created an entire phonetic language for the game, and the voice actors were delivering their lines 100% in that invented language. Whoa, what? {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/a197b169620bc22c44ad2c97fea6361361373f3d.jpg look for me in JETT's memorable prologue and I'll give you a word of encouragement Fortunately, I had just 3 lines, which was plenty, because turns out it's hard to emote when you’re making some sounds nobody has ever heard before. So, consider the plight of one Firas Momani--the ubiquitous voice of JETT scout Isao--who had a very significant amount of these lines to record, working with Priscilla Snow and Gordon McGladdery, along with Gordon’s team at noted Canadian videogame audio outfit A Shell In The Pit. It was Priscilla who developed the distinctive in-fiction language, which was referred to internally as “Volega” (more on that below). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/c1b6dddd3322b38c7276701d83925932e1284509.jpg In any case, I sat down (at my desk, via email) with Priscilla and Firas to talk about the process of doing the voice work for JETT. I’ll start with Priscilla, because they were the inventor of the language itself, and on-hand for each (remote) recording session. Not to mention, also the voice of Caro in both The Far Shore and the new Given Time campaign, joined by A Life Well Wasted host Robert Ashley, reprising his role as Observer in the Mother Structure. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/c0cc795ae393c46870bd08882e485b04e0ba7731.jpg DUSTIN HARBIN: Priscilla, we met in the middle of the hustle-and-bustle of remote recording all the voice acting during Covid lockdown, and I wasn’t as in the know as everyone else about your (giant) skillset. What was your background pre-JETT? PRISCILLA SNOW: I studied theatre in college, spending half my time studying acting, and the other half doing everything from carpentry to sound design. I used any free time I had writing and performing music at tiny DIY spaces. By the time I graduated in 2015, I’d already started working on small narrative Twine games with Kevin Snow, who was also a student at the time. Later on we got married, worked at our soul-sucking day jobs, and collaborated on games whenever we could (The Domovoi, Beneath Floes, Mama Possum, Southern Monsters). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/f73b1cf29e52d5739d934890d979a92e264d41d3.jpg Eventually I started doing more music and sound for games around 2018 (Voyageur, A Good Snowman is Hard to Build, Can Androids Pray), then in 2019 I took up a contract as sound designer on Iron Man VR and moved to Seattle. DH: It’s always funny to me, how many people I know who are almost entirely self-taught in their actual jobs. This should be taught to college freshmen: don’t stress about picking a major, because in ten years you’ll just be doing whatever it is you care about then anyway. So how did you come to be involved with JETT? PS: It’s kind of a long story! I had just wrapped Iron Man VR; I hadn’t even posted that I was about to be looking for work, and Andy reached out to me out of the blue because he’d seen me tweeting about Sacred Harp music (not exactly a trending topic). I’d grown up hearing about it, in part because I’m a direct descendant of Benjamin F White, the “shape note singing master” who co-published the songbook The Sacred Harp in 1844. Well, it turned out that Andy had been using Sacred Harp and other similar traditional forms of choral music as touchstones for a piece in JETT. When he asked if I’d be interested in signing an NDA and learning about a Top Secret project, we realized we were living in the same neighborhood! So, we met up soon after. Once I knew about the project, I was excited to step in and compose a choral piece for the game, drawing on my experiences with choral music and folk music– initially that was my only task! Write one (1) song. DH: Haha WOW that’s bonkers–I had no idea that was your original mission, considering the herculean contribution you ended up making by the end of everything. What was the thinking that went into creating an entire language out of whole cloth for the game? PS: The first thing I did was create a set of syllables similar to solfege (used in shape note singing) or swara (used in classical indian music). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/6db2cf0fb1c2d12b2473c98a793546119c5438eb.jpg These ended up being “Vo, Le, Ga, Ni, Ha, Xi, Me, Vo.” This was the foundation of the choral music; some parts sing those syllables with their associated pitches while other parts sing over them with lyrics. I came up with the lyrics while improvising a melody over the recording I’d made of myself singing all the fake-solfege parts, then tweaked them until they felt natural to sing. Once it felt natural I was like “well, what does it mean?” and I started to give the lyrics a translation. I presented the music demo and what I was doing with the lyrics to the team, and I was pretty much asked on the spot if I’d be interested in expanding on that and turning it into the actual language of the game, as well as voicing one of the Scouts in the cast (Caro). It was a little daunting! But I’d really enjoyed the process of creating the lyrics, and I was Available for Work, so I signed on and once the choral music was further along, I started digging through the scripts. The seed of the language was those first lyrics I’d made up: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/50a445227ef14fb932ed58ef5809150f3c77a268.jpg (a screencap of the first verse, from the document I presented) Because I am the way I am, I really just ran with it. I wanted the language to feel like it was logical, like it had history, like it was evolved from earlier languages the way our own are. I didn’t want it to sound overwhelmingly like any particular existing language, but I did cut myself slack when it came to grammar; Volega follows basic english grammar, it was going to be too difficult for me to create translations otherwise! While some words changed a bit between the choral piece and the language used in game, I justified this to myself by thinking, “the song uses archaic Volega! it’s like singing in latin during Mass! my ex-Catholic roots are showing!” DH: I am losing my mind with this Tolkien-esque “I’ll just make up a language because this song was great” chutzpah. Were there crazy hurdles to jump (and potential pitfalls to watch out for), linguistically? PS: I think the biggest one is just that some combinations of made up words are really hard to say when you’re used to speaking English primarily! A word might be fine on its own but then you put it in the context of a sentence it can become a stumbling block that needs to be shaved down in some way. Sometimes all I needed to do was change the “phonetic” representation of the words I prepared in the scripts we used to record from, other times it was like “ok this word happens maybe twice in the entire game, let’s change the word completely.” {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/9cba2ac13ffb66be6aa94260ec5ffcfeefb39e6b.jpg But the biggest hurdle was that we did not have the time or inclination to do wall-to-wall fully translated, fully acted VO. Most of the work I did really involved handling the “fragment system” I came up with and was made possible with the work Nicholas Zhang did at ASITP creating our “voice tool.” The TLDR; most of the cut scenes or more intimate scenes inside Ground Control are fully translated and voice acted. When you’re in the JETT, we’re using the voice tool and “fragments”. Key words like names, locations, actions, and even certain phrases, (and many variations therein) were recorded by all the Scout characters and intermeshed with “nonsense/filler” fragments. The voice tool kept track of which fragments need to play and who says them; I hand picked nearly every fragment you hear in the game. I would go to sleep and hear these fragments in my dreams… If JETT ever has a wild reboot/remaster in the future, just know I would never turn down the chance to make the whole game fully translated! Putting it out there! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/30f415c4d1a6d6c810565e4b38f51790a46ba080.jpg DH: Oh I see–once you’d created a new language with its own syntax and vocabulary, you and Nicholas created a proprietary tool to implement it across the entire game. Haha, sounds easy-peasy! Do you have a background in languages? Do you speak multiple languages yourself? PS: I’ve always been interested in languages and dialects. My family moved a lot (military) and we ended up in Europe for a few years when I was younger. So I picked up a little German and Italian, the English TV was all British, so my little rural south Arkansas accent got MIGHTY twisted up. Later on I studied Spanish in school, then German in college, out of nostalgia. As someone who’s found themselves living in Quebec I’m often mad at myself for not choosing French at any point. So I’m not currently fluent in anything but English and (this is a stretch) Volega. I am working on the French, however… DH: Volega is the name of the JETT language? Where did that come from? PS: Yes! The first three notes of the invented solfege system, “vo, le, ga,” is where I got the name for the language! Volega. Vo-lay-ga. DH: I just read the wikipedia entry for “solfege” (well, the first part anyway, before it gets extra technical) and now it makes perfect sense. How did the voice recording work, vis-à-vis (that’s French, by the way) working remotely, Covid, etc? I mean, I know what I did to record my little part, but I only had like three lines. Was anyone recorded in person (besides yourself), or was it all remote? PS: It was all remote! In fact, Covid hit just after I finished writing the choral piece. I was (still am) devastated! I’d been dreaming of standing in a room full of singers, actually getting to hear this piece performed by living breathing people, and then we had to go and have a virus–that spreads on our breath–turn our whole world upside-down. So probably a good 60% of the voices in the choral piece are me singing as different kinds of people (old, young, boisterous, timid, etc) with some light re-pitching where I could get away with it. We also recruited Terri Brosius (the delightful voice of Misha, and an integral part of the game itself!!) to sing some parts. Andy brought in a few really great singers to cover the lower range parts. The piece still has not been recorded in its entirety, but I hope to make it happen, someday. The game’s VO was totally remote, for me. But some actors actually got to record over at A Shell in The Pit in Vancouver. I was present on every single recording session, mostly using Zoom, co-directing with Gordon McGladdery, and helping everyone work through the process of performing their lines in Volega. When I recorded Caro it was a bit more solitary; I had to handle my recording setup, direct myself, and edit the takes down to the ones I thought would work. When we recorded Firas (the voice of Isao), we actually had it set up so that Gord was running Firas’s Reaper session using a remote-control feature on Zoom. So I was in Seattle co-directing, Gord was in Vancouver controlling Firas’ computer, and Firas recorded from the east coast of Canada. We made it work! It was obviously a less than ideal scenario but when you’ve worked in indie games long enough, being scrappy and making the best of what you have is never really a surprise. DH: All this is making me feel downright lazy. I feel like I could ask questions about this all day, but on that note let me turn to the voice of Isao himself, Firas Momani. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/336196fff31f681084e3429fb80fffad4031de6d.jpg Firas is one of those people who do everything, coming from the Toronto animation industry, along with fellow JETT alum Sam Bradley, who came on in 2019 as co-lead art director. Firas is a director, designer, storyboard artist and experimental filmmaker. We got to chatting and dug into his experience with JETT, art, animation and more: DH: So Firas, how did you end up voicing Isao, anyway? FM: I was told that my voice was internalized into Craig’s mind-space after some lengthy discourse involving space, its fabric, worlds, myths and ancient scriptures. Craig and I are old friends, and I’d helped him with some voices on a JETT prototype, back when he and Patrick were working on a VO proof of concept. I'm told my voice then became inextricable from the character. When the time came to record voices for real, Craig reached out and we booked it. Initially there was a plan for me to go over to Jim Guthrie's shedquarters to record alongside Sam Bradley, but then COVID hit. So instead, Priscilla and I got the work done, working entirely remotely. So, Isao emerged from that space, and once he had my voice he took on his final form. I feel like he and I are one, working together to satisfy my dream of traversing a sci-fi space epic. DH: What is it you do when you’re not voicing a very chatty co-pilot character in a scifi videogame? My understanding is that you’re not normally a voice actor. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/d4ea6197029ae9495c4a45e146de2b7d895f5e3e.jpg from Firas’s sketch blog FM: I wear many hats: I primarily do storyboards for animation and film studios, do character designs and take on Assistant Director positions. I have a sketch blog where I do illustrations and character designs, while making my own short films, that I write and direct myself, that range from live action to stop motion and traditional 2d animation. I also make my own techno beats in my studio. DH: Now I’m just scrolling through all these super lively drawings, zowie! Looking at your site, and from what I’ve seen of your work from talking with Craig, you go all over the place stylistically, both in your 2d lineart for concept stuff, and your more involved animation and film work. What are some of the influences that got you to where you are currently? Or, that inspire you currently? {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/20cf66e6ba4213aeff201ad9046ea8c7c2914e9f.png FM: I’ve been drawing as far back as my memory can go. Then I got into art within a timeline format and how that’s used to convey narratives. I found that aesthetics contributed to the feel of a film for example. I pick the visual style to reinforce the story and the feel of the films I’m making. For example, in the surreal short film, A Half Man, we have a man who is only half there, that is trying to keep his life together. Symbolically trying to keep things from falling apart. He’s split in half in a way where his organs are exposed making him feel vulnerable, and the puppets built were a little rough around the edges making them feel unsturdy. Even the film had grain and scratches to convey the feel of the main character, that his world is rough and at the edge of falling apart. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/500deff8fe177784285608455418fc6ea452c572.jpg from the film A HALF MAN. Watch on Vimeo. ** Hi-- JETT creative director Craig Adams here, writing from the editing room to note that Firas and I go way wayyy back, The last time we worked together I was contributing to one of Firas's project: I did a bit of concept art for his award-winning short film THE ADDER’S BITE back in 2010. It's a vivid experience! You can see the video on Firas’s Vimeo site. ** My illustrative drawings are my own personal style though, and I’m currently working on a videogame with that signature style. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/ea161bea46b8fd6933226b6cc3f8b22f4d70c6cc.jpg DH: Oh man I would kill to see a whole project in this style. Speaking of, er, personal style, have you done any other voice work besides Isao? FM: Only in a limited capacity as part of my filmmaking, in an experimental film I had shot playing myself as the filmmaker behind the camera for a moment. But no, not for video games, until JETT. DH: Wow, from there to getting thrown into being a voice actor as one of the main characters in a game being recorded in three cities at once. Was it bonkers to play the game for the first time and have yourself teach…yourself…how to fly the jett? FM: Yes. Bonkers is the appropriate wording. Other fitting words can be: radical, trippy, mind blowing, fantastical and woohoo. Having my own voice speak back to me through a space scifi videogame is truly strange and is as personal an experience as it gets. I’ve only (mostly) heard my voice in my own internal monologue or through my mouth, so hearing it externalized through something else but also directed at me was truly a mind bender. I love it. DH: How long did it take you to get into the flow of “speaking” Priscilla’s Volega language? FM: I didn’t take too long, being familiar with different languages and having an interest in them made me incorporate some of my knowledge into it. I treated it mostly as sound and rhythm and my knowledge of languages and obsessiveness with etymology made me familiar with some of the phonetic roots which helped me contextualize the dialogue. DH: Now that you’ve been a main character in a videogame, do you think you’ll pursue more voicing work? FM: I’m open to it, though I don’t see myself as such really. This was just an exceptional and personal project that I couldn’t say no to. I’m forever grateful for this incredible experience. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b267bde1169a6cb723635c7b0a01b79c1e32d999.jpg Thanks to both Priscilla and Firas for sharing their time with me and answering these annoying invasive perfectly reasonable questions. I don’t really work in video games myself–I just occasionally draw 2d lineart assets and conduct the odd interview–so it’s always incredibly eye-opening, the number and complexity of all the elements that go into every corner of a game’s creation. You can check out more of Priscilla's work at their website, Twitter, and Instagram; and Firas can be found at his sketch blog and Vimeo page. And of course, you can read more about JETT: The Far Shore and jump on the semi-regular newsletter list at jett.fyi, and follow along on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. With Given Time’s January 31st release just days away as of this writing, I’m excited to sit down again with the game knowing everything that went into the voicing. As it is, I’m only now getting around to listening to that Scooby-Doo foley podcast everyone was talking about back when. Always one year behind the zeitgeist, that’s my rule! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/34ff01fb4906dc73fd45eb200c2e7a30d55ee837.jpg See you on January 31st for JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time’s release on Steam!

Hello hi there. How're things? Craig D Adams here, from the ol' Superbrothers A/V mothership, creative director on JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time, a videogame co-created by Pine Scented with music composed by scntfc. I've got some significant top-level JETT news for you today!

• JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time launches on Steam on January 31 2023

To get a sense of what's in store in the new Given Time campaign expansion, please check out this ~two minute showcase clip! ^ So, what'd you think? Interested? Hope so! We've been crafting JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time for over a decade now. Bringing JETT to Steam in its fully realized form, with the brand new Given Time campaign, is incredibly exciting. Got questions? The answers to many JETT questions lurk below!

JETT: GIVEN TIME MINI-FAQ

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/78e49e15a233ca8d8e1413b84a6b347985b98cf6.png I haven't started/completed The Far Shore. Can I play Given Time? How do the two campaigns work, progress and save data-wise? You’ll be able to start the Given Time campaign separately in the main menu, whether you’ve played the original game or not. Progress in the campaigns are saved separately, so you can start one and switch to the other, and back again, although JETT is probably best enjoyed chronologically. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/491d3d1bd0f5285c2547ca286dc31384893e5a54.jpg How does the story of Given Time relate to < whatever happened > in The Far Shore? The new Given Time campaign takes place three years following the end of the events of The Far Shore. Note: some very light plot spoilers ahead in this paragraph. As the player character Mei, you'll awaken to find yourself in an emptier and quieter Ground Control. With only one other scout awake and a weathered JETT waiting outside for you, you'll embark on a solo quest to discern the will of the wisps before finally revealing the secrets of the hymnwave and discerning the nature of the wyld, the eons-old entity at the heart of Tor. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/31955669df6a1e7413352247a09e4b8e893101dd.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/576371f01ba10a71b817ae45809cde2aeb5f8603.jpg What can I expect, gameplay-wise, in Given Time? You will have to use your JETT scout knowledge and skills to survive in this rich and distinctive ecosystem, proving yourself as an aviator and a scientist. This solo journey offers more freedom and less dialogue, as you investigate new and mysterious phenomena. Given Time's gameplay revolves around finding rainbow resonances and hatching brine wisps, which are hidden in unique locations and offer interesting problems to solve. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/4cb2402b462b2968baddb9b41d921c0b5e29b51d.jpg The expansion offers a more open-world experience with a player-driven adventure, where you'll be able to explore and discover the game world at your own pace. There is much to uncover and explore, and the story will tie up some of the threads left dangling at the close of The Far Shore campaign. What's the status on JETT on Steam Deck? In this post, some good news - JETT is looking to be pretty great on the Deck, turns out. https://steamcommunity.com/games/1761600/announcements/detail/3632750825578792263 {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/e104a813b176de53c42b404053d6168750b31b30.jpg Can you sell me on Given Time in just a couple sentences? The Given Time expansion is a generally relaxing open-world sci-fi adventure where you'll encounter action-packed puzzles, challenging survival elements and visual prog-rock spectacle. With the release of Given Time, JETT's vision is fully realized. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/417c7733f248f6ed48c9d75a9c5e007a917d90fd.png Is there any early buzz on JETT: Given Time, and if so, what is it? We think Given Time is pretty cool, and encouragingly it seems as if the fine folks at Edge magazine have enjoyed their time with it a fair bit, judging from a Given Time preview in issue 380, from a few weeks ago. We're eager to see how it goes over in the review. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/e9267ba93308e3c09860a30a2971d6327b02fee6.png Where can I find out about more about JETT? Look to JETT.fyi for all kinds of info, where you can hop on the Superbrothers A/V - Enthusiasts. To dive deeper into JETT's creation myth, here are various longreads from me. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/9b0e4715168c44f5500cbc3071f5be78b2478380.png

• How No Man's Sky and Firewatch relate to JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b1bdc4223f512e6bbd77d07b394885a25c12a25e.png

• How JETT's design relates to Metroid Prime, Monster Hunter and Fumito Ueda

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b45f862336c99f439a84173349a8f7ccb3555511.png

• Superbrothers: from #sworcery to JETT - a catch-up post

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/9b0e4715168c44f5500cbc3071f5be78b2478380.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/92166d48202f31bbaace84aacff175c37af58a35.png Imagine: it's 2013, you're a small team, you've previously made a small but well-regarded game, and now you're swinging for the bleachers with an ambitious new design. You and a pal have been cooking up a science fiction videogame where you explore a planet and survive from two perspectives: you can walk around and talk to people, then you get in a jett and you can zip around the planet's surface, gathering things and figuring things out in an interesting wilderness built with procedurally-placed ecosystem tools. Now, imagine you tune into a 'The Game Awards' type broadcast (the last of the VGAs?) in late 2013, and you see this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCgWabJssVI Whatever you may think about No Man's Sky, there's no getting around the fact that from that first trailer, it has drawn a high level of attention. So, back to imagining you and your small team and your 'walk around a bit and then get in a jett and zip around a mostly procgen game-world gathering and crafting things' videogame. Well, now might be time for a little reflection, to tease apart how your vision aligns, and where it contrasts, with the new 800-pound gorilla in this genre. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/2559f72d2c0c0e242ebb0ed8a3b5e28188f4e2aa.gif We kept on with our vision for JETT through 2014 and into 2015, with all its Monster Hunter and Metroid Prime -inspired nuances and wrinkles, getting to know what we could and couldn't do with procedurality. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/6926004339899510462 {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b21cbdadff2b612c8cb92695c3b87933ef4837cc.gif We were working through designs that involved gathering and crafting, and figuring out what kinds of scenarios could hold people's attention, while we kept the focus on the science-discovery angle and attempted to side-step the usual extract-gather mechanics. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/96425a8f7dfe1fe59da2bd58129ab490ab023588.gif We had our Destiny-inspired menu system up and running, and when we saw that's what Hello Games was up to with No Man's Sky we felt ah well, yep, that makes sense. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/83e23996faedf305a25ce5ca09cfcdaf1498e465.gif In the wake of No Man's Sky emergence, attention was drawn to the enigmatic singularity of procedural generation through 2014 and 2016, the whizbang of it and the endless possibilities and such, and I found myself remembering playing and enjoying Frontier: Elite II back in the day, a miracle-work in hyper-ambitious interstellar procgen that ably demonstrated to me both the allure and some of the limits of this approach. Once the whizbang of procgen wears off, you've got to actually play the videogame: to get a grip on the controls and comprehend its systems and find them interesting or meaningful, and find a groove in its rhythms and patterns. In any case, at length I had to admit that Frontier: Elite II was just not my cup of tea. Still, Frontier: Elite II is absolutely worth a look-see, if you're unfamiliar! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/cc5ada07c98cdf9b4929387aa52373786db0c111.png https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJdz7x9hpUA My most vivid positive memory of playing Frontier involved parking at a base on a moon in orbit around a gas giant, then ratcheting up the flow of time x10 and watching a cosmic ballet unfold before my eyes, with the moon I was parked on wheeling around the gas giant, day turning to night, the stars in the heavens whirling, every start representing a potential destination, and with the other moons and planets in the surrounding solar system visible in the distance, moving in their orbits. Magnificent! (FWIW: My least positive memories of playing Frontier tended to involve me setting a destination, setting a course, switching on my autopilot, ratcheting up the flow of time and kicking back.... and then suddenly colliding with an unseen planet or somesuch. Alas, haha.) {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/51e2e20488918bc441fda8bd08dc06559a6c26cb.gif With my Frontier: Elite II experience in mind, and my 'proc-gen is an endless miracle' expectations securely in check, I'll admit that I found a great deal to appreciate in the vibe, style and craft of No Man's Sky when it shipped in 2016. Those colors! That music! The pizzazz! It's a pretty magnificent thing, no doubt. Still, as anticipated, I struggled to find my footing in the actual videogame experience. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/4289533c5c69907fbc929732051227fea79a2396.png For one thing, I learned that as player, I tend to prefer experiences that are more curated and feel contained and completable, even if they feel vast at times. Or, put another way, from a designer's point of view, I identified that my player type, whatever type that is, needs an immediately engaging on-ramp -- hook me!! -- and then I need some meaningful-to-me structure to motivate my continued engagement, and ideally at some point I could use some characters to start to relate to and begin to care a bit about. These reflections helped me recalibrate my feelings about what JETT could and should be. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/0875a0bcc16c90ad9de89d343819bf9a67c2fa17.jpg Something else I spent a lot of time considering relates to the underlying narrative/mechanics in science fiction / space fantasy exploration games. As a teen I was so blown away that Frontier: Elite II contained a universe at just ~500K, and I recall having no particular qualms with how vacant and colonial everything was. The narrative premise seemed in-line with 50s and 60s science fiction, the kind probably written by European white men, authors like Clarke and Asimov that I had been reading at that time. In the 90s, the deeper scrutiny of 'explore/conquer/extract' fantasies hadn't reached many teenager's bedrooms, or at least it wasn't particularly itchy to me at the time. However, as an adult in the 21st century, a witness to the impacts of our civilization and its values, I've found that I struggle to resonate with stories and designs that replicate and dress up those capitalist/colonial concepts. I get that there's a reason our species enjoys these types of activities, and that these designs are reliable in videogames; but for me, I can't help but ruminate regretfully that this is the case. As we carved out JETT's cosmology, we talked about how it might stand as an interesting work of science fiction, something that could soar with spectacle and escapist thrills, hit notes of awe and dread, and carry within it a story that involves characters who represent the best of us, within a reasonably enlightened and thoughtful culture, struggling to tread lightly while they see to their survival. Science fiction can be a pretty fantastic lens through which to view complex interrelated science and nature concepts afresh, particularly concepts that involve processes that function on timescales other than the human lifespan, and it can be fascinating to contemplate our species and our lives from other vantage points. So, it's hard for me to not to get a bit bummed out when the role I'm offered in an expansive science fiction videogame is limited to being a cog within a society engaged in thoughtless conquest and the relentless extraction of materials from pristine new worlds. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/740c7a27103c311f412dbd8c3cdd911b931bb7ae.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/2dac5844d78206dace8945eeab248b0f5bffae1f.png FROM PROCGEN TO STORYTOWN {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/11806531e541fdda293a356f646d7346061142f4.png In any case, as we continued to explore JETT's design space we had plenty of other avenues to consider, and we began to shift and narrow our focus. At some point in 2015 or 2016 we ended up jettisoning crafting entirely, and pretty drastically limiting the gathering, in part to avoid having to accommodate things that felt extractive, in part so as not to have to bend our fiction too much. (Another upside: less UI work for the two of us to get bogged down with, haha.) We made sure to re-center ourselves on JETT's core vision -- the feel of snowboarding, the various Metroid and Monster Hunter ideas, the vibe and tone and our philosophical approach -- but we started talking more about how to strengthen the narrative elements, and how to get those elements to more reliably surprise, intrigue and resonate. JUST ADD "JUST WALKING" {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/04edb892bff4bac154578f08815ce306a5b1a29b.gif walking around Ground Control's habitation room, circa 2016 I was growing fond of the world and the characters we had been carving out in JETT, and I could see a lot of potential, but by 2015 we just hadn't spent much time building these elements out. I began to see a path forwards that would involve putting more attention to the narrative and on-foot spaces. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/ae64b11aa17be9a0ec1c3ebfb7fd24249a344815.png At this time we were looking towards Blendo Game's 30 Flights of Loving (2012), which we had as our reference point for narrative-first DIY first person, with its smash cuts and clever lo-fi staging. We looked over at the interest in first person narrative experiences, with the A/V focused Proteus and the more literary Dear Esther coming up in early conversations, then Gone Home, and then Campo Santo's Firewatch, announced in 2014 and released in 2016. We asked ourselves: if we aspired to a high level of care for a few of JETT's on-foot spaces and sequences, in what ways could that deepen the overall experience? I loved everything about Campo Santo, from its Campo Santo Quarterly to all the all-stars at that studio to their lovely debut Firewatch, and of course I'm psyched about their upcoming effort Valley Of the Gods. In any case, I thought Firewatch was a treat to play, nice and finite with some good momentum throughout. (Fun little Firewatch x JETT crossover: In 2017 we had Firewatch design person (among many other things) Nels Anderson step in for some JETT design consultation). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/0b9957c19311496c4d96b47f9fceaf7730e4bbca.jpg One thing the Campo folks wisely did was avoid encountering living characters up close in game, similar to Gone Home. This avoids a lot of complexity. I seem to recall there being a fair bit of talk about 'forensic storytelling' around this time. However, for JETT I thought: damn it, let's commit to encountering characters who are living their adventure alongside us. Sure, it's a type of madness for a tiny two-person team to aspire to tackle all that, but we had a 'maybe we can figure this out' spirit. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/96c077db6174cd7f73dd88dd343cc55a3524ce89.jpg My bet was that we'd find our way to a good enough level of animation and emoting, but stylized enough to be feasible. I figured we could problem solve the scope and production processes. We had a plan of attack on how to avoid the kind of complexity that would come with English voice-over, by relying on written dialogue primarily and working out our own distinct VO path. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/35000f82dbd1e7551fc3dada33c1a6af4b16492b.jpg It took a fair bit of honest effort from a lot of folks on a lot of sides to deliver on JETT's on-foot narrative ambitions, but I'll admit that I love where we landed things. I feel JETT: The Far Shore is a distinct and interesting work of science fiction, and I like that some of the characters and their concerns come through, as they overcome obstacles and stumble reverently forward. I'm psyched about what's in store for people in the JETT: Given Time campaign, with its distinct premise and approach to narrative, as it progresses, deepens, reveals and concludes things. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/ee589e9a0fc15a674422e2e23918f4f1e85e2bd9.png EVERY ATOM PROCEDURAL PAIN-STAKINGLY HAND-CRAFTED {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/0f57e311a7ab96f63080c891c08dc49a5641fada.png In any case, the path we set out on from ~2016 to 2021/2023 was one where we kept the things that felt would make the best and most distinct JETT, and this involved some streamlining of doodads and fussiness, while keeping the action, expansiveness and imagination, while we made efforts to raise the bar for our first person spaces, pulling in people to help, and putting some pressure on our collective storytelling chops. We figured this unorthodox synthesis of design elements might have a decent shot at carving out a genre-space all its own, something that could be familiar enough for people to hook onto, while being distinct and interesting enough to linger in their minds. So, if you were drawn to No Man's Sky but you wish there was some meaningful narrative concepts and thoughtful mechanics to get a grip on, or if you loved Firewatch but you were left itching for an opportunity to dig deeper into some ecosystem-puzzle-gameplay, well then may I say that I fondly hope you'll find some of what you're after in JETT. If you haven't already taken it for a spin, I'll mention the JETT demo is up now. JETT in its entirety is launching on Steam real soon. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/1eb4bfd5565d62b61225ef22a090bcba2342644c.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/edf50a120f307434e9207f1cd37a80c6e6d0c728.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/dd4583df8d09915e884291e2eadfd6069b24805f.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/436721ae330c1f617260616301660b1f70facb25.png OVER AND OUT, FOR NOW If you read all the way to here then... wow! Hope you enjoyed this, and thanks as always for your attention. If you'd like to read up on how sworcery led to JETT, and how JETT's interstellar demo came about, you might enjoy the following post. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600?emclan=103582791472437081&emgid=3625990351998747746 If you're curious to read about JETT's deisgn inspirations, among them Metroid Prime, Monster Hunter and the videogames of Fumito Ueda, here's a longread about that. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/6926004339899510462 As ever, to get in the loop with Superbrothers and all things #sworcery, please like and subscribe and so forth. Wishlist JETT on Steam and Download Demo - it helps!

• Play the prologue to get warmed up, and ensure your PC rig works.
• Note: We recommend playing on a controller, with headphones!

Hop on the Superbrothers A/V - Enthusiasts newsletter via jett.fyi Thanks for giving JETT some of your time, scouts!

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/b1bdc4223f512e6bbd77d07b394885a25c12a25e.png Ahoy there, scouts! Perhaps you've played some JETT, and you're curious about its design inspirations and aspirations. Or perhaps you have yet to really dip in, and you're curious about what JETT's like to play once you're set loose in your jett on the mythic ocean planet of the far shore, with all of its wonders and hazards. Or, perhaps you're reading this in February 2023, you're experiencing the wonder of Metroid Prime Remastered (!!!), then you clicked through to figure out where JETT and Metroid overlap. Wherever you're at, if you're interested in how JETT's design came to be, what we were going for, and how Metroid Prime, Monster Hunter and the videogames of Fumito Ueda factored into design conversations between Superbrothers (that's me, Craig, hi) and Pine Scented (that's Patrick!) over the years, then hey, why not dive deep and read on below? {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/08b5c9e8d87736b74868afe55b10792e55172390.png

JETT'S DESIGN INSPIRATIONS

A LOOK AT JETT GAMEPLAY If you're unfamiliar, perhaps the most efficient way to get you up to speed on what JETT is like to play is to direct you to this three minute gameplay-focused clip from 2021, featuring some creative director commentary from me, attempting a bit of 'videogame trailer voice'. As that clip demonstrates, JETT's gameplay is an unorthodox thing, with chunks of walking around and absorbing moods and narrative concepts, in-between chunky jett-centric gameplay where you're snowboarding around and solving a series of scenarios that involve exploring, inspecting things, poking and prodding at things, then using the jett's tools and applying some problem-solving to survive and persevere. While our 2021 The Far Shore campaign ended up fairly linear and narratively quite dense, perhaps overly so, our follow-up 2023 campaign Given Time swings pretty far in the other direction, offering a free-roaming puzzle-survival-action experience that gets a lot closer to the 'Metroid Prime on a snowboard' vision that propelled us. Here's another clip with commentary that showcases what's on offer in Given Time. As for how JETT's vision took the shape it did, and what we were aspiring for: read on! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/45f62b1b5230376021c14270a09c492655c8b083.png THE 90S 3D MOTION HEYDAY For me, an inspiration for JETT's gameplay is how fun 3D motion can be, outside of the context of controlling a person walking around on-foot. In the 90s, when 3D motion was new and novel, there were so many great videogames with unusual approaches to surfing, flying and racing. I loved Magic Carpet, TIE Fighter, Descent and so on when they emerged into the 90s PC scene. On console I was there to play WipeOut, F-Zero X, Waverace and the various snowboarding and future racing games of the era. In those olden times there was a fair bit of originality and exploration in this genre space, and it felt like there was a decent-sized audience playing them. Then, in the 2000s, as that novelty began to wear off, the audiences seemed to diminished and there was perhaps a bit less going on in that genre-space. The racing, skating and snowboarding games that did emerge weren't taking as many wild swings. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/bfeaac62b4bf29fe0776d0afe395f7e83b986336.png 3D MOTION VIDEOGAMES IN THE 2000s Thatgamecompany's fl0wer had a feel that was an occasional reference point for us on JETT (eg. see 'hopping on ghokebloom'). Also, I should note I've been pretty inspired by many a racing game over the years, notably Motorstorm: Pacific Rift, a game I revere, whose aesthetics and engine cool-down mechanics directly inspired JETT's scramjet stability system. MY FIRST VIDEOGAME INDUSTRY GIG In the mid-2000s I had completed my studies in illustration and 3-D videogame art production, and I took a job at a Japanese videogame studio in downtown Toronto (odd, but true), on a future racing title called Fatal Inertia EX, set in natural landscapes, built using the then-new Unreal Engine 3. I joined that project late, but I ended up chipping in on a variety of elements including skies, lighting, sound, and even trailer capture/editing and pitching on art direction. It was a cool time and an excellent learning opportunity. I met Patrick at Pine Scented at this time, and because we were sometimes tooling around these in-game locations in-editor, we'd experience these rich environments outside the confines of a race, where you're required to careen around in circles. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/bc2974d2b87aef219b33c97593dae1d7eb8ea913.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/bb39a4090172e693b5e93cfb5c31a17e027114c2.png BABY JETT Flash forward a few more years, right after #sworcery in early 2011, Patrick and I reconvened at the Toronto Game Jam to gin something up to scratch a particular videogame design itch. Patrick has a great #JETTdev Twitter thread that begins there. Even after only a couple days of work on the weekend of the jam, we could see there was something here that we were pretty intrigued by. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/ffc0fddfcc84d31c99c1196850e81ddbebf26d2f.gif We had a tone, a style and a feeling of motion that we liked and that we found compelling. We found that we were interested in creating more substantial on this foundation, to layer on mechanics that could interest people for a long period of time, so that others could enjoy the experience we were having just playing around and getting good at zipping and skidding around. THE FAR SHORE'S NARRATIVE CONCEPTS Early on it occurred to us that our design aims would be perhaps best served by narrative concepts that would have us taking our first steps exploring an unfamiliar planet, a planet where we could invent creatures and entities to serve our gameplay vision and have our in-game characters be encountering them for the first time. I started to imagine how this concept might look and feel, and how it might have interesting and meaningful ideas woven in, and I puzzled over how a team of two people might go about building something like this out. In conversation with Patrick, who handled all the technical aspects and co-authored the design with me for years, and we began to carve out prototypes to scope out relevant concepts. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/a72e67ed6b361d5a7355bf84579275cee3c2a0d7.png

THE INFLUENCE OF METROID PRIME, MONSTER HUNTER AND FUMITO UEDA

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/274ccfacfc1d56b5ac5abc06d1a2a59bfa7f775e.png METROID PRIME As for the kinds of videogames we were talking about in those early days, well, we invoked the Metroid Prime series a reference more than once, I can safely say. I love Metroid Prime - what an outstanding collection of moods and seamless vibes! It was so cool to inhabit Samus Aran's attitude, a calm and tenacious problem-solver, while discovering and incrementally disentangling initially puzzling locations and scenarios. When Metroid Prime is in its stride you're purposefully hiking from location to location, fluidly using tools to traverse spaces and overcome obstacles, pausing to better understand some detail, peering at some mystery to uncover what's hidden, gleaning some insight from an onboard computer, and then occasionally you find yourself suddenly spat out into some spectacular trouble when a boss battle erupts around you. There was plenty for us to aspire to there! We were only two people so we had to have a strategy on how we might deliver on some of this with JETT. For example: we opted to put you into the snug space boots of JETT's silent protagonist, Mei, letting you walk around in first person, to imersively inhabit that experience and understand the world from that perspective, but we kept a hard limit on gameplay complexity for these onfoot sections, keeping the focus on mood and narrative. That way we could keep our action and gameplay centered on the jett, a simpler rig that would give us everything we were after. While I love and appreciate the Metroid Prime series, I'll admit that there's not much about the writing in the series that intrigued me, and that's fine, that's not where it's coming from. However, this, too, was an inspiration JETT-wise. I was eager to carve out an appealing science fiction world, and to populate it with characters that players could connect to, who are living an interesting story. My calculation was that connecting with players on these levels could deepen the vibe. I love a lot of where we ended up with JETT's narrative concepts, but I'll admit that in The Far Shore campaign, our focus on story and character sometimes trips up the mood... which is why I'm so thrilled about the Given Time campaign, which is where JETT's Metroid Prime-inspired design really shines, as a tried-and-tested Mei arises from torpor and sets out on a free-roaming adventure in a quiet vibes-heavy world, relying on her tools and her wits to figure things out. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/e3c1bd3a84276eb44f21b916c4236b6c719f9b19.png MONSTER HUNTER Another series that we talked about a fair bit in those early days was Monster Hunter. The Monster Hunter series has you encountering large creatures that you'll end up learning the ways of. You're tasked with getting familiar with the tools, ecosystems and rhythms of the world in order to survive and thrive. There are a ton of doodads and complexity, and plenty of repetition, and some things are fussy and awkward and inscrutable, but there was so much else to be inspired by with this series. There are ways in which Monster Hunter's appeal overlaps with Metroid Prime, but Monster Hunter is a broader and deeper design, where the various elements relate to each other in complex ways, and there's much more variability in how things play out. It can be such a thrill to go out into a large natural landscape, gathering and preparing for what's to come, then seeking out a particular creature, observing its behavior and deciding on an approach, then dealing with that creature in a series of encounters, putting your knowledge and skills into practice, duking it out over a prolonged period of time, often with lulls and breaks in-between altercations. Of course, with Monster Hunter you're constantly slaying these creatures and harvesting their corpses to build new weapons and armor, and while these are core and satisfying aspects of Monster Hunter's design, we actually took pains to avoid relying on these mechanics with JETT. Our interest was in zipping around in the vicinity of large, interesting creatures, getting in and out of trouble with them, using our jett skills and tools to defend or outrun or problem solve while we pursue goals not rooted in belligerence. In order to keep JETT's science fiction tone and concepts intact, and to keep the characters from becoming heels, we found we had to look for the high road and avoid clumsily trampling indigenous flora and fauna underfoot. As for the jett's locomotion and controls, well, they're admittedly a bit unorthodox, and some of the DNA there goes to the Monster Hunter series, which is also an acquired taste for some. For example, in JETT you'll often be 'toggling scramjets on/off', which feels a bit like sheathing and unsheathing a weapon in Monster Hunter. In JETT, with scramjets toggled on you'll zip along at a steady cruising speed, perfect for traversing the world while looking around. Then you'll come across a location of interest and you'll toggle scramjets off, so you can go as slow as you like, letting you use the jett's various tools -- resonator, light, grapple -- to understand and manipulate entities in the world. Then oops, something comes up and it's time to hit the road, so you toggle those scramjets on and get up to speed. It's a mode-switch, or a gear-change, and it's unusual, but just like Monster Hunter's sheathe/unsheathe mechanic, once you've grokked it, it makes a lot of sense and starts to feel pretty cool. THE FAR SHORE FOOTAGE + DEV COMMENTARY Recently Dan and Craig got together to record some dev commentary, to provide a glimpse at scenarios from early in The Far Shore's campaign. The first clip shows how a jett traverses a space -- ideally with scramjets toggled on, while surging and scooping vapor -- and then we get a look at what a jett scout gets up to, discovering and inspecting things while zipping around and taking sweet jumps. This second clip showcases a scenario that closes out The Far Shore's feature-film-length first real act: "I. Deploy". In this scenario, Mei and Isao have survived their first night on the far shore and they proceed to rendezvous with Wu and Vic in the woods of Tsosi Massif, where the appearance of a massive kolos, attended by retinue of hectors, make for a memorable, precarious moment for the scout unit. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/919aa715687f9b559e01e91491dfa7386e143cb9.png THE VIDEOGAMES OF FUMITO UEDA In 2001, Fumito Ueda and SCEJ's Ico was released, and it had a tone all its own, similar only to Eric Chahi's Another World or Heart of Darkness. In some ways it felt like an indie acoustic cover of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarinia of Time, with a plucky young hero saving a princess from a fairy tale castle, but with all the cute kid stuff pulled out. Playing it felt like looking through a window into a world, with living people running about, people with hearts and souls. It's fascinating to think of how Hidetaka Miyazaki, then a 29 year old systems admin at Oracle, was inspired by Ico to pursue a career in videogame development. I can feel some of Ueda's peculiar magic lurking in the corners of Miyazaki's design sensibility, that inscrutable remoteness and austerity that suffuses Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and so on to Elden Ring. It was such a thrill to play Ico, and it was validating in a way. Here was someone else who could see what videogames could be, and they got this made, and it's excellent. Incidentally, the day I played Ico was the day I warmed up to PlayStation, and it has been a thrill to work with the fine folks at that legendary company on JETT. When Shadow of the Colossus hit in 2005 I was living in a place in Toronto with my old pal (and The Long Dark concept artist) Roberto Robert, and we happened to have a projector on-hand, and a slanted roof in our living room, and let me tell you: that was a pretty ideal venue. We were maximally hyped, and Shadow pretty much floored us. So many memorable encounters, such a mood. For Patrick and I, in the early days of JETT, we had the vibe of Fumito Ueda's games in mind thorughout: that forlorn beauty, those feelings of regret and the emotional heft of things, the awe that comes with sighting a colossus, the intrigue that comes from observing an intricate world with it's own inscrutable logic. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/99ae9e39fa2b0bb4280b3645fe98d207a3e7139a.jpg a pic from a 2012 Japan trip Speaking of Ueda, here's a maybe-amusing aside... Around the summer solstice in 2012, I found myself in Japan, alongside #sworcery co-lead designer Kris Piotrowski. We were in town because the excellent people at 8-4 Ltd had prepared a Japanese edition of #sworcery, as well as a star-studded remix album, and they had lined up launch events involving various industry legends. Suda51, who voiced Logfella in the Japanese edition of #sworcery, was the MC of our launch event, which was attended by the likes of Koji Igarashi (Castlevania), Chip Tanaka (Metroid), and many more. Among the many highlights of this too-good-to-be-true trip was a sit-down supper with none other than the great Fumito Ueda, who wore a Delphine Software t-shirt of his own making. It was an excellent time, with Kris and I answering many questions through a translate about how #sworcery came to be and so on, while we peppered him with questions about his career and inspirations. This was 2012, and at that time the status of The Last Guardian was not known. Out of politeness, neither Kris nor I mentioned the project, in case it was a sore spot. However, as we said our farewells, Ueda said 'please look forward to The Last Guardian', and Kris and I responded enthusiastically. Then, as Kris and I awaited our train, we found ourselves reflecting on the passage of time. At that time in 2012 it had been seven years since Ueda's Shadow of the Colossus, and for us young'uns that felt like a lifetime. "Can you imagine working on a game for seven years?" we asked ourselves. "What must that be like?" The joke here is that Kris would go on to put well over seven years into Below, and for me with JETT it looks like I'm clocking in at around ten years total. Alas! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/c5bdaf0e570f4f75698b3b151b4a8bd33f26d02d.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/31ec29b8f615f287600f16c6481a3b7dce82286e.png NEXT POST: HOW JETT'S DESIGN EVOLVED So yep, when we laid the foundation for JETT's grand design in ~2014 we had in mind Metroid Prime's Samus Aran zipping around on a jet ski, inside a Shadow of the Colossus inspired world, scanning things and gathering them, and learning to survive encounters with large, interesting Monster Hunter inspired creatures. However, our feelings on what JETT ought to be continued to evolve as we responded to playtest feedback. As we found our way forward, we found other videogames to refer to, with No Man's Sky and Firewatch coming up fairly often in 2015 and 2016. No Man's Sky's emergence in 2014 and release in 2016 seemed to suggest that JETT find its own lane, and we found ourselves stepping away from a lot of doodads, gathering/crafting and procedurality. Meanwhile, Firewatch's release in 2016 seemed to suggested we take give our story and characters more attention, and so we began to lean in there. More on these topics in a future post, probably! Note from the future: it's here! https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/3642880749849543862 OVER AND OUT, FOR NOW If you read all the way to here then... wow! Hope you enjoyed it, and thanks. To get in the loop with Superbrothers and all things JETT and #sworcery, please like and subscribe and so forth. Hop on the Superbrothers A/V - Enthusiasts newsletter via jett.fyi Thanks for your time and attention, cosmic friends! If you'd like to read up on how sworcery led to JETT, and how JETT's interstellar demo came about, you might enjoy the following post. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/3625990351998747746

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/9a1f734775903b6d0a6061ec403772ca968d88d4.png ]Recently, Superbrothers A/V creative director Craig D. Adams and JETT Squad co-pilot Dan Berry got together to record some dev commentary atop scenarios from early on in JETT's "The Far Shore" campaign. If you tune in you'll be introduced to some of JETT's unique snowboarding-inspired control mechanics, as well as some key characters and a look at the first landmasses encountered by our intrepid aviator-scientist scouts as they take their first steps on the mythic ocean planet of the far shore. Note: If the stream has ended, look to the Superbrothers HQ YouTube channel for the archive and other videos in this Devs Talk Over series. This clip shows how a jett traverses a space -- ideally with scramjets toggled on, while surging and scooping vapor -- and then we get a look at what a jett scout gets up to, discovering and inspecting things while zipping around and taking sweet jumps.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/81298418f12bfa64664537dae04cd8129fe650cc.png Hi there, this is Craig D. Adams of Superbrothers AV, co-creator of #sworcery and JETT. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/f56cf4fc5b73ced5d04a58aeb17b59dbde9c0924.png So, this month I've published a coupla things for #sworcery folks over at the Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP Steam page's news feed. Specifically, this post about the overlaps between #sworcery and JETT... https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/204060/view/3433458944730393702 ...and another post that offers a snapshot of #sworcery creators for fall 2022, before digging into how JETT's interstellar demo came about. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/204060/view/3498763263571476691 Perhaps you caught'em, but It occurred to me I ought to get some of that material on this here JETT Steam page, so we are. Feel free to go read the original posts, or just settle in here and I'll get you caught up. . . . {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/3eaa2684a18305bb7184025f91dee3b4575bd7a6.png LONG AGO... I should perhaps explain that #sworcery refers to the 2011 videogame Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP, originally an iOS release, that then arrived on PC and Steam in 2012. Back in those olden days towards the end of the early indie years, #sworcery emerged and immediately resonated with a broad audience. The experience of making it, and the positive response it received, was a life-changer for me. I'm glad to say the project seems to be pretty warmly remembered even now as a fresh experience with some new concepts, strong audiovisual and aesthetic elements, a unique sensibility, with a narrative rendered in a tone that oscillates between the mythic bombast of Robert E. Howard's Conan and the inane patter of early Twitter. It's funny to think the plot hinged on 'detonating The Megatome' a cursed book that allowed everyone to see everyone else's thoughts, a non-subtle Twitter stand-in that the protagonist, the Scythian, had sworn to destroy. Anyways, that project was built by me at Superbrothers leading the charge on A/V, narrative and concepts, with my old pal maestro Jim Guthrie getting a shot at scoring his first videogame, and the project was made possible by the folks at the studio Capy (Grindstone, Below) who got the project started, kept it going, built it out, made it good, and did a lot else besides. It's a cool videogame, and if you missed it you might want to give it a whirl. I recommend it on iPhone, where the design began, but it's totally fine elsewhere. https://store.steampowered.com/app/204060/Superbrothers_Sword__Sworcery_EP/ THE ROAD TO JETT Right after #sworcery went out in 2011 I started to shift gears professionally and personally, setting out on a path that led to JETT in 2021/2023. In 2011 I pulled up stakes in Toronto, where #sworcery happened and where I had been living for nearly a decade, and soon after I moved to the woods of Quebec, my wife and I began to raise a family, while myself and my pal Patrick at Pine Scented, who lives in Japan, got to work chipping away at JETT, starting in around 2013. JETT kept us busy for long years as it was just the two of us and composer scntfc, and then in the last coupla years we had to spin up a large squad of collaborators and contributors working remotely from across Earth's troubled surface to get JETT done. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8239f57d9a56360f4136f98aad43d5313cb720a6.jpg https://store.steampowered.com/app/1761600/JETT_The_Far_Shore__Given_Time/ {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/570ab460e31116c3f1d9caac50b91ba5e4c2ef93.png #SWORCERY X JETT OVERLAPS JETT's actually a lot like sworcery, despite the surface differences (polygons vs pixels, science fiction vs fantasy, stoic vs irreverent, complex controls vs simple controls). JETT's another unorthodox DIY-feeling effort from a tiny team, with some great music, some deep vibes, plus a smattering of bold choices and distinct ideas that'll sit with you for forever and a day. Here are some specific ways that JETT resonates with sworcery:

• an experience with style, soul and heart
  • because I was on deck on both projects defining narrative, characters, tone, music cues and art direction, as well as co-creating design, you'll find a lot of resonance between the two projects -- they're cut from the same cloth
  • just like in sworcery, in JETT you'll find yourself moving through a lush world in a vibes-heavy adventure, where great music is often front and center
  • in terms of pacing, as you play, occasionally a threat'll pop up and you'll have some action to take care of, and often you'll encounter scenarios that involve a bit of puzzling
  • alongside the bombast, spectacle and puzzling, there are a plenty of quiet intimate moments, as well as a few strange dreams... and even a familiar-feeling nightmare apparition haunting dark corners
• story-wise, some echoes
  • there are some rich themes that are going to resonate with some of you out there
  • gently radical
  • a silent woman with a spooky destiny finds herself on a cosmic adventure and eventually goes up a weird mountain, then, much later on, she goes up the mountain again and di--
• coupla composers in common
  • composer scntfc created the moon grotto music in sworcery, which is a neat cameo in a great Jim Guthrie score
  • composer Jim Guthrie created the interstellar trip song Out Of Our Hands for JETT, a neat cameo in a great scntfc score
• also, a bit of intentional sfx overlap
  • you might notice the 'adventure lead-in' sound is used in both
  • sworcery's 'trigons' make something of an appearance inside JETT's 'phosfiends'
  • sworcery's 'sylvan sprites' aka space babies and JETT's 'brine wisp' sounds are the same - why, you might ask?

Given all of the above resonances and linkages, you may find yourself wondering: do sworcery and JETT take place in the same universe? Are the two projects connected, and if so, how directly are they connected? Devoted JETT-heads may have discerned the truth, but now isn't the time to just spell things out. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/ee589e9a0fc15a674422e2e23918f4f1e85e2bd9.png {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/0f57e311a7ab96f63080c891c08dc49a5641fada.png DEEP DIVE ON JETT'S INTERSTELLAR DEMO JETT co-creator Patrick at Pine Scented and I had a JETT prototype in 2011, but it wasn't until 2013 that we started chipping away at the full concept, just the two of us. That's when the characters, the narrative and JETT's unorthodox gameplay came into focus. Note: If you'd like to see a glimpse of baby JETT from this time, here's Patrick's #jettdev thread on Twitter. By 2015, we had The Far Shore and Given Time campaigns roughly mapped out, but at that time the experience began with Mei and Isao deploying from The Mother Structure to the unfamiliar planet of the far shore. An epic science fiction moment, for sure, but as time went on it began to feel too abrupt. Who are Mei and Isao? Why are they deploying to this planet? What is a jett and how do I fly it? It occurred to me that, before immersing people in this complex unorthodox videogame, we really oughta consider cooking up and bolting on a kickass prologue. The spec was to 1) intrigue and interest the player right from the get-go with an intricate and distinct storyworld 2) put the player on the hook personally and emotionally, and get them to be curious about and care for the people in this society 3) give players a sense of the gee whiz thrill of how it feels at the helm of a jett...then 4) give the player an opportunity to get familiar with the ensemble cast all before 4) melting some minds and taking players across space and 1000 years into the future. Ideally we'd get all that done in a smooth 30 minutes. It was a tall order, particularly for two people, but a few months into 2016 we had it roughly in place and playable. When people played it in mid 2016 we could see it was delivering pretty well, and that was before Jim's Out Of Our Hands song showed up in 2017. Since those olden days the prologue and everything else got a metric ton of production effort, shaping and polish from dozens of people in the JETT Squad era from 2019 to 2021. I'm real proud of how it came together, and I hope it resonates with you. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/112f39eccc5055834c2c0b0a16408a730d3e27a7.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8863bd7596a9b7b070c76bb706e82dc3b59a4fbc.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/1597c7cd5a314a426ea9e9449ff1c79c2442749d.jpg At cosmodrome z-13 you'll meet the characters who make up your scout unit, from the leadership -- Misha, Pasha -- to Jones, jett ace and commander. In the JETT demo you'll get a sense of who they are and what kind of headspace they're in, as they leave everything and everyone behind and embark on a one-way trip across space and 1000 years in the future, in the hope of carving out a future on some faraway world. Here are a couple character drawings I had made back in 2013, including Mei's co-pilot Isao (a young George Takei) and jett ace Jones (what if Grace Jones was Captain Kirk). In the olden times of 2014 to 2016, when it was just Patrick and I, it was up to me to create all the 3D models and pretty much anything else visual. It was a relief when we were able to bring in help, with my old pal Chris Beintema on deck for models and rigs for the characters and creatures in the shipping game. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/97c0597b1fd9419cf766f0956433af45528bb469.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/a4396388bafb00dc53ed36ae98daa9a067564f1e.jpg Eventually, the time comes for Mei to lapse into torpor -- JETT's version of cryosleep -- and for her and her fellow scouts to be put aboard a rocket. As the rocket ignites, we drop the needle on Jim's song "Out Of Our Hands"... and off we go, to dock with The Mother Structure in orbit above, and then set off across the sea of stars, to the far shore. Here's a possibly interesting aside, about the tone of 0.Embark: At TCAF 2015 I crossed paths with Dan Berry and I bought his comic Carry Me, a book about parenting, life and death that stuck with me. Related to Carry Me, in 2015 I was a new parent, my daughter having been born in 2014, and I got to thinking about who I most identified with in JETT's emerging story. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/3c375a37d390f1835db3286613e8646300c1d2b8.jpg The short comic Carry Me by Dan Berry can be read in a handful of minutes at the following internet website. http://www.thingsbydan.co.uk/2017/04/read-carry-me/ Upon reflection, I became aware that the character with whom I resonated most in JETT was the protagonist's father. We meet him once, he apologizes, then wishes Mei well. He is to remain behind, while she sets off to the stars. There's a very specific agony and heartbreak at work here, because a parent knows that, if all goes well, their child will outlive them, and that there will someday be a tearful parting. What's more, parents here on Earth in the 21st century feel an additional weight, a heavy brew of regret and helplessness at the thought of the troubled future our children have been born into. I felt compelled to reckon with these feelings, and bottle some of them up in JETT. Fast forwarding a few years, and Dan Berry found himself in JETT's orbit, climbing aboard the squad that delivered the Given Time expansion. Small world! You can read all about this in our recent JETT squad profile featuring Dan and Richard Flanagan. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1761600/view/3404184263846060375 Speaking of Dan, him and I are starting to broadcast dev commentary streams on the JETT Steam page. Keep an eye out for when our streams are live if you'd like to tune in. https://store.steampowered.com/app/1761600/JETT_The_Far_Shore__Given_Time/ {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/3953379/a601be4704e09fcd2947bab3ec37f57bccb9a385.png I hope you enjoyed the above! To stay in the loop with Superbrothers and all things JETT, please like and subscribe and so forth. Wishlist JETT on Steam and Download Demo - it helps!

• Play the prologue to get warmed up, and ensure your PC rig works.
• Note: We recommend playing on a controller, with headphones!

If you're a streamer or press, and if you'd like to play JETT: The Far Shore + Given Time and help us get the word out, please get in touch!

• We have piping hot preview keys near-at-hand, and we're around to chat.
• Get in touch at [email protected] and/or [email protected].

Hop on the Superbrothers A/V - Enthusiasts newsletter via jett.fyi Give us a follow:

• Twitter (RIP?): @jettxyz @superbrothersHQ @craigdadams
• Instagram: @superbrothers
• Hive (?): @superbrothers

Poke around our websites:

• superbrothersHQ.com
• jett.fyi
• swordandsworcery.com

Thanks for your time and attention, cosmic friends! * Oh, are you still reading? Looking for more? Well now, let's see. Ah, there is this one thing. Here: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8bdc0ce91aa396fc1ed84a8cba9157e0341185a2.gif What's this? Well, it's a little slice of a playable something special related to sworcery that will surface at the appointed time, a few moons hence.

A play through the JETT: The Far Shore demo with Craig D Adams of Superbrothers A/V and Jettsquad copilot Dan Berry. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/efd4dbdef2aae7670662aae08ae33bbbbe54ee76.jpg The stream is now archived over on YouTube;

Hello there. Tsagas scrivener Dustin Harbin here, with a fresh #squadprofile this week, focusing on two all-star JETT contributors. Now that the JETT demo is out in the wyld here on Steam, and with the new Given Time campaign coming in early 2023, it's a great time to talk about "JETT Squad", the people who’ve contributed to this game over the last near-decade of work. They hail from all over the world, syncing up (sometimes groggily) across numerous time zones, via a mix of video calls, Slack threads, and once in a while, even a good ol’ email. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8bf354e8eba9885290938cf217caa5da5cc28d4e.jpg Two of the newest additions to the squad climbed aboard specifically for the Given Time campaign: Richard Flanagan and Dan Berry. One a decorated veteran of the indie games scene in Montreal, and the other a decorated veteran of the indie comics scene in the UK. I would say more, and in fact I do say more, below: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/e8b409e441c078af1e48a0e5849485b5559eb55b.jpg Richard Flanagan has collaborated on a number of games across the indie and AAA games landscape, but he’s probably best known for his game FRACT OSC (2014), which he not only created and designed, but handled all the sound, music systems, animation, UI, typefaces… Yeah, he’s one of those guys. ---

"If you’re in ownership of functioning eyes and ears, then you owe it to yourself to play this game." 9/10 FRACT OSC review on Game Revolution

--- FRACT OSC is a first person musical exploration game where the player is dropped into a forgotten and broken down world built on sound. As the player brings the machinery of the world back on line, they solve musical puzzles that contribute to the rich synthwave soundtrack of the world. The game stealthily teaches players how synthesizers and aspects of electronic music work, and by the end players will have unlocked their own electronic music studio. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/2009d3a60679378a85614432dec941044efe844b.jpg DUSTIN HARBIN: So Richard, how did you end up working on JETT? RICHARD FLANAGAN: Craig and I had been in each other's gamedev orbits for a while, but it wasn't until 2016-ish that we noticed some common inspirations. I think it was around that time that my wife Quynh and I played an early version of JETT, akin to a vertical slice, that captured a lot of what would come to be released eventually. I was immediately smitten by the feeling of the game, as it captures something that (I think) both Craig and I find ourselves craving in locomotion based games; a feeling that captures the vibe of snowboarding. There are plenty of games that try to emulate actual snowboarding, but capturing that mindset of momentum, choice, risk and reward is rare. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/611e8d7c456408d87ca4d6becd8aa0a271554b21.jpg DH: Where does the snowboarding thing come from? Are you a snowboarder yourself? Or do you just find that motion dynamic interesting in games? RF: Snowboarding is a big deal for me and is easily the closest thing to a spiritual practice in my weird little life. For over 25 years it has given me an ever-mutable balance of freedom, escape and focus that I honestly have trouble putting into words; hence why I’ve been on the lookout for examples that capture that same feeling in games, or otherwise. Snowboarding videogames try to simulate aspects of the snowboarding experience in a very literal way, but rarely capture the emotional context of carving a perfect line or threading the needle through a pair of (probably too narrow) snow covered spruce trees. JETT does, and in my (ahem, expert) opinion, is one of the absolute best examples of games that capture that vibe. DH: What was the nature of your work on the new game campaign? RF: I joined the team in December 2021 and was lucky to serve as a sort of design-backstop on the already cohesive and impressive design achievement that was the Given Time campaign. I helped them turn a few screws, provide some external sanity checks, and help shape and tune the systems into something just a bit tighter and more inviting for folks to play within. Aside from design stuff I also got a chance to collaborate on some mograph for the pretty dang cool opening titles of the Given Time campaign with the lovely Dan Berry. Dan is also one of those folks that wears a lot of hats and our skill sets really lined up on the opening of the game while also giving us opportunities to meddle together on a lot of other areas of Given Time. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5a0e9a804942c5d8024b44710d532540ceeb6f8b.jpg DH: The Dan that Richard is referring to is Dan Berry, a cartoonist, educator and podcaster, among numerous other things. Rivers, a book he co-created with David Gaffney, was recently optioned to be adapted into an HBO series. Unlike Richard, who I’ve only met this year (great, would recommend), I’ve known Dan for years, as we’re both cartoonists. DH: Dan, how in the world did you end up working, somewhat centrally, on a giant expansion to an existing game? DB: I first met Craig back in (I think?) 2014, in a bar in Toronto. There’s a long-ish chain of events that stack up to get me there. I’d played and loved Sword & Sworcery when it came out, and was charmed, as we all were, by Jim Guthrie’s soundtrack. When I started the Make It Then Tell Everybody podcast in 2012, I wanted to use one of Jim’s songs as a theme tune and got in touch with him. He kindly said yes, and I eventually ended up making a music video for his song The Rest Is Yet To Come the following year. I was in Toronto in 2014 to exhibit at TCAF, an excellent comics festival and Jim and I arranged to meet up, and it turned out that Superbrothers guy was going to be there too! Anyway, fast forward to 2021 where Craig and I reconnected to chat on the podcast about JETT. It’s a good chat, you should take a listen. After we’d finished recording, we carried on talking and the existence of Given Time was alluded to, and I basically pitched the idea of me helping out and we went from there. https://www.youtube.com/embed/JqHXsZ4L1QU DH: What was the nature of your work? I was honestly surprised to find out how indispensable you quickly became to the project. DB: I’m not sure there’s a short answer to that question. It has been really varied. On the practical side of things, I’ve been cutting trailers, editing audio, contributing some design work, and generally being a spare pair of hands. On the creative side, I’ve been working on narrative pitches, writing and editing dialogue, with some environment work and a little gameplay tuning here and there. I think as well, generally being around as a spare brain to add capacity and a second opinion to maintain focus has been pretty useful. I was really aware that stepping into a project with established systems, style and lore meant that I had to try to work in a way that left as few of my own grubby fingerprints on it as possible. Tuning in to the unique Superbrothers aesthetic and approach and (hopefully) leaving no visible fingerprints has been very satisfying. DH: What’s it been like collaborating with people that are in completely different time zones? DB: Really not all that bad. I’ve been a freelancer for a few years now, so the idea of a regular schedule, or a commute, or lunch at midday is now almost entirely a thing that happens to other people. I’m based in the UK, so perhaps the time difference gave me something of an unfair advantage? As if that 5 hour head start on the day before almost anyone else woke up (apart from Patrick, in Japan of course) gave me a little extra brain-space to get myself in order? Who knows. I can’t really give the time difference much credit though, when the people I was working with made it really easy. Genuinely a delight to get to meet and work with the rest of the squad. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/99dacd7d0fd14e5717252e379f64d17c69ea11ce.jpg DH: The release of Given Time is just a few months away. What can you say about the coming campaign? Is it substantively different? Are there any parts you’re particularly proud of your contribution to? DB: Given Time is a new campaign that asks for a slightly different style of play than The Far Shore, that’s more open and exploratory. I think that the feeling of being alone and having to be self-reliant on a distant planet is greatly magnified here. The parts I’m most pleased with are the subtleties that I think could easily be overlooked at first glance. These are elements that we deliberated over at length–dialogue, environment, music, artwork and more–that hint at greater depth in the story and its resolution. Trying to hand the player a jigsaw puzzle instead of a photograph. DH: It must be hard to build in nuance and subtlety in a game where the player is often having to pull off complicated flying maneuvers while reacting to the environment around them. It seems like the vibe in the new campaign is definitely more solitary and… scary? Is that the right word? How hard was it to balance gameplay and “vibes” while still typing up narrative threads? {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/74ad159826873bb4d13a643cf91431de017ac38e.jpg DB: Yeah, that was at the forefront of my mind. The game has an in-built sorrow underlying it, the characters are running from their destiny and wrestling with the moral implications of their actions. This was a kind of lens that gave focus and flavor to other emotional elements, like dialogue and music. There’s a particular scene I really like later on in the game, where Caro radios in with a brief status update and she’s like “you know what? I’m actually doing okay, I’m kinda alright, feeling pretty positive overall y’know?” And it gives this really neat moment where the facade of their training and the mission and their objectives that they’ve given up so much for fall to one side for a second. I love the depth. Was stuff like that hard? I don’t know about hard work, but it was a lot of work. I remember Craig and I working on that particular bit of dialogue while he was in Canada and I was on a train in the middle of Denmark in the middle of the night with my internet signal dropping in and out. Stuff like that sticks in the mind! --- Thanks very much to Richard and Dan for taking the time to talk with me. Speaking of further discussion, we're also posting short videos, dev thinking, and general vibes over at @jettxyz on Twitter. And of course you can follow Richard, Dan, and myself there as well if you feel so inclined. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/f6236d8d636aaec110d9aa434d54c242ac513070.jpg

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/3b70edacc3706c7f959831889b0d06add15a93c8.png This week, one year ago, JETT lifted off! Since our 2021 campaign “The Far Shore” deployed last fall, we wound down JETT's primary production, scattering the all-star contributors and vendors known as JETT Squad 1.0 to the winds, to lend their talent to other projects. More on them below! Then, some of us took a bit of a breather. It had been a long haul! However, in early 2022, compelled by a new stirring in the hymnwave, production began on the new campaign, “Given Time,” and a coupla new folks climbed aboard to lend a hand. Now here we are in fall 2022, one solar year since JETT's interstellar trip began -- just a few lunar cycles before the JETT tsaga concludes -- and let me tell you: this is a pretty spicy week JETT-wise. Here’s a look at what’s been popping off around here! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8e4f85d21bb59bf49e5de8921331ebcd45fb3a22.png There's now a JETT demo on Steam!

• Embark and traverse a sea of stars for absolutely free on your PC in JETT’s very warmly-received interstellar prologue.
• If you're reading this on Steam itself, chances are you're already aware that there's a playable demo available now. Still for us it's big news-- we’re extremely psyched to be bringing JETT to the vast international audience on Steam in early 2023, alongside Given Time hitting all platforms. It feels as if there are a good number of prospective jett-heads here, and we’re hoping this demo will be a nice little calling card for our project.
• Some of the JETT Squad -- past, present and future -- got together on an internet seance last night, one year since our previous eve-of-JETT seance. We synchronized our datacores, got caught up, communed with the hymnwave, and talked a bit about Given Time. More on squad, seance, and good feelings, below!
• To mark JETT's first birthday on Twitter at @jettxyz we just aired a lightly refreshed edition of our Launch Trailer. This clip features scntfc's warm, elegaic song ‘Jett to Cosmodrome’. Last year we watched this all together as a squad as we premiered it. The clip contains a lot of warm memories of our time together with the scouts.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/7897b2b4ec1b06fa00aeae67c9eee451fb520c6e.jpg

squad talk!

It took a village to actually get the complex, sprawling project JETT from where it was in mid-2019 onto consoles and computers worldwide. That village was a constellation of all-star collaborators, contributors and vendors scattered across Earth's troubled surface, and we refer to it as JETT Squad. They got their shoulders under JETT, helped build it out and sharpen it. Together, we got ‘er done. In fall 2021, as production on “The Far Shore” campaign wound down, the beloved JETT Squad 1.0 — the 2019 to 2021 era — scattered to the wind, to lend their talents to other projects. We’ve kept up with folks here and there, but it sure was nice to get people together and see some faces on last night's seance. Lots of talk about current projects, sci-fi tv, regional accents, mummy babies, banjo plucking, and more. A warm evening with colleagues and friends, and a good refilling of the community cup! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/4f7e0360423678d2e908e0bd9d62038e27bd45c4.png

squad snapshot - fall 2022

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/cb0ecbbd84d500c1ab4d0dbc76f890fab298719e.jpg l-r: Priscilla Snow, Sam Bradley, Gordon McGladdery, Jim Guthrie Some things JETT Squad 1.0 folks have been up to over the last year!

• IMMORTALITY by Sam Barlow and Half Mermaid (Priscilla Snow, audio director)
• ENTERGALACTIC by Kid Cudi and Netflix (Sam Bradley, pre-viz)
• Rogue Legacy 2 by Cellar Door Games (A Shell In The Pit, Gordon McGladdery, audio/music)
• Nobody Saves The World! by DrinkBox Games (Jim Guthrie, music)

Meanwhile, a few JETT Squad 1.0 folks are busy cooking up new videogames, like these!

• Oxenfree II: Lost Signals by Night School Studios / Netflix (scntfc, audio/music) - releasing 2023
• Skin Deep by Blendo Games (Priscilla Snow, music)
• TBD by Furniture & Mattress (Nick Suttner)
• TBD by The Glory Society (Priscilla Snow, music)

new squad folks for 2022

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/8bf354e8eba9885290938cf217caa5da5cc28d4e.jpg Richard Flanagan, Dan Berry Two brand new scouts appearing around the hymnwave at last night’s seance were Richard Flanagan and Dan Berry, two essential additions to the 2022 JETT Squad who saw the new Given Time campaign to the finish line. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5061f4732bc410176bcc2752e977e9ff47481820.png

squad 1.3 roll-call

Speaking of Given Time, you might be wondering how it come about, and what the squad looked like, this time out. In January 2022, a new stirring was detected within the hymnwave, and we were compelled to spin up JETT Squad 1.3, in order to deliver on a very specific vision, a vision that we'll be talking about this fall and winter. This 2022 Squad had a few JETT vets forming the core, with some Squad 1.0 all-stars pitching in.

• old school
  • Co-creators: c/Superbrothers + Patrick/Pine Scented
  • Composer/collaborator: C Andrew Rohrmann/scntc
• squad star
  • Dev powerhouse on design and QA: Zack Wheeler @tankooni
• all-star contributors, 1.0 alum returning:
  • Priscilla Snow @ghoulnoise
  • Sam Bradley @abysmalred
  • Maize Longboat @maizelongboat

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/6f28e4f9c590ee4ffa3d95e149206495aabc2bd5.jpg Zack Wheeler, Maize Longboat new folks adding capacity to the mix in 2022:

• Richard Flanagan aka @phosfiend - direction, design, mograph, many other hats
• Dan Berry aka @thingsbydan - direction, narrative, AV producer, sound

For more about these JETT Squad folks, look out for a limited series of “squad profiles”, on the way this fall/winter season.

• These are some interesting people with interesting jobs, we hope you’ll enjoy getting to know them a little better!
• These profiles will be summarized in the Superbrothers A/V Enthusiasts newsletter, which you can subscribe to on jett.fyi, and appearing in a longer form here on JETT’s Steam news feed.
• These profiles will focus on a few of the people who were key in shaping aspects of this sometimes byzantine, absurdly ambitious and always spicy science fiction videogame project.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/c7e83b4522b86f15e7eb4b0e893506abc7e9b305.jpg autumn in Quebec, Craig Adams (also in Quebec) If you’re looking to get your ear even closer to the ground on Superbrothers comms this fall/winter, look us up at the locations below. the Superbrothers A/V - Enthusiasts newsletter, which you can subscribe to via jett.fyi JETT’s Steam Newsfeed - Wishlist JETT to subscribe Instagram: @superbrothers @hymnwave Twitter: @jettxyz @superbrothersHQ @hymnwave {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42915673/5e1fd351f6b54462a5d3b7952b6dc80e58bb8a7e.jpg

play the opening chapter of JETT: The Far Shore - "0.Embark" on PC as part of the Steam Next Fest! one of 2021's most atmospheric videogames, with an all-new campaign coming in 2023: Given Time Don't believe us? Take Chris Schilling's (EDGE Magazine Editor) word on it: "If you've never played it (or maybe even if you have) there's a demo of @jettxyz on Steam Next Fest. It covers the brilliant opening chapter, which is one of the best bits of the whole game. The launch sequence alone is absolutely spine-tingling stuff." Go interstellar with the original trailer for the game.

JETT’s Steam release is on the horizon and soon it’ll be the tsoultide, but today we’ve got some scorching hot news: BEHOLD! A new one minute A/V trailer that includes a few glimpses of Given Time, the new 2023 campaign, has just debuted at @jettxyz on Twitter. Please go take a look/listen, and don’t hesitate to signal boost if the spirit of the hymnwave compels you. Given Time takes place 3 years after the events of the original campaign's ending. As Mei arises from torpor into a mostly hibernating Ground Control, there are new whispers from the wyld to seek out and unravel, this time, alone. Starting Monday October 3rd, a demo will be available as Steam’s Next Fest kicks off! The demo features JETT: The Far Shore’s critically praised interstellar prologue, known as "0.Embark". See you all on Monday!