Features / gaming
Bristol game designer launches new arcade-style game for Nintendo Switch
A game developer who grew up in Hartcliffe and developed his first game while at St Brendan’s Sixth Form College is releasing a pulsating arcade shooter for the Nintendo Switch.
Ashley Gwinnell’s game, Neon Caves, sees players try to build a high-score by sharpshooting through wave-after-wave of creepy enemies – all while a cave is rapidly crumbling overhead.
Combining a retro gameplay style with super-charged visuals, Neon Caves is another example of the nostalgia-driven resurgence of arcade games on console platforms.
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According to 28-year-old Ashley, who now lives in Whitchurch, Bristol is a brilliant place to work as a games developer. In particular, he enjoys how the game development scene is collaborative rather than competitive.
He regularly attends game jams in the city, where different local developers join forces to build game prototypes. These include the Bristol Global Game Jam, held in January by Bristol Games Hub at Bristol VR Lab.
Neon Caves is a design offshoot of mobile game Toast Time. Both games share core gameplay mechanics and in-game physics, but Neon Caves is better tailored to console play.
Originally released on android micro-console OUYA, Neon Caves’ gameplay mechanics were tinkered with to suit joystick gameplay, and the game’s resolution was upgraded to make sure on-screen action was bursting with bright colours.
The game has already been met by glowing reviews and awards. Gaming website Twinfinite called Neon Caves an “eclectic mix of retro shooter and modern twin-stick shooters”. It was also awarded Game of the Show at Extended Play Festival in 2013.
But not all of Ashley’s creative work has been in game design. He has worked with the BBC Natural History Unit in Bristol to produce a children’s app named Attenborough’s Adventures.
More recently, he was taken on by Aardman as a lead developer to build Sustainable Shaun, an app that encouraged children to build sustainable communities.
Neon Caves is Ashley’s eighth self-published indie game, all of which have a distinctively arcade feel. In the short term, he’s hoping for a successful release of Neon Caves and to build some more mobile titles, with his dream commission designing a coin-up arcade-system go in Kong’s on King Street.
Available for pre-order now, Neon Caves will be available on March 27. Find out more about Neon Caves and Ashley’s indie game company, Force of Habit, at www.forceofhab.it
Read more: Sector spotlight: Gaming
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