About
Website: https://www.extraordinarygames.fun/
Extraordinary Games is an indie studio founded by a group of passionate people about geek culture. They have more than five years of experience working on Unreal Engine, working on multiple personal projects and studio tasks.
They are not working on any parallel projects; we are dedicating all our energy and focus on a game of intellectual property (P.I) at once. We strongly believe that this is essential to create quality games with a certain originality, this way we are all focused on the development of our first great game, Midnight Dreams.
Seeking inspiration, not only in games, but also in movies, TV series, books, music, and other forms of art from pop culture, we wholeheartedly believe that everyone can be Extraordinary and that games can be a powerful form of emotional storytelling and connect people.
They are committed to creating inclusive, diverse, socially responsible material, which represents everyone, regardless of their race, gender, sexual orientation, disorder, or any other characteristic for that matter.
In each element, they add and at each riddle we create, it becomes evident: All of us deserve an authentic place in the games we play. They believe that diversity is the strength that drives our Extraordinary narratives.
Transcript
00:00 SPEAKER_00 Welcome to the Player Engage podcast where we dive into the biggest challenges, technologies, trends, and best practices for creating unforgettable player experiences. Player Engage is brought to you as a collaboration between Keyword Studios and HelpShift. Here is your host, Greg Posner.
00:16 SPEAKER_06 So we are coming to you live from Gamescom where we are with the extraordinary games team who are building up midnight dreams. We’re going to let everyone here introduce themselves so you can understand who we’re talking to.
00:25 SPEAKER_05 Hello, my name is Klaus. I am a game developer about the game The Midnight Dreams. And I think that’s it. Easy. Hello, how are you guys? My name is Rafael. I do the localization of the game in Portuguese and in English.
00:43 SPEAKER_06 Hello everybody. I am Yu Xia. I help the game if there is a lead about Chinese market. Hello guys. My name is Lorena. I am the medical cosuter of the game and the general director. Hello, I am Figgs. And like Klaus, I am a game developer. Great. So we have the whole team here and you’ll see in pictures that everyone’s wearing a lab suit. So I’m curious, if someone wants to be able to explain this, there’s four pink lab suits and one white one. So I told you you’re the boss. But is there a significance behind the lab suit?
01:26 SPEAKER_05 Yes, there is. We are using light lab coats because we are cosplaying our own game. In the game, you’re going to see that when you enter in the game, one of the first shots, one of the first screens, you have a laboratory called Udabye. Udabye stands for Universal Dream Analysis Based on Artificial Intelligence. And we are using these lab coats just to show that we are real doctors, but not showing that we like to do experiment on kids, but we are experimenting on this kid because we are using his dreams to collect data, to sell into the black market, to create new virtual realities for people to live in. Very cool. And I’m looking at the game right now. They’re giving out some keys here at Gamescom at the Community Clubhouse. And this is a game that I guess you want to describe it. You said it’s kind of like a few of the… Okay, very good. So a little about the lore, guys, if you want to know about it. Okay, I talked about the lab called Udabye. Okay, the lore is pretty much like this. We have a boy, his name is Felipe. Felipe is an orphan. He lives in an orphanage. And the orphanage is a shell company controlled by this lab. The lab itself tries to catch image and sound from dreams of kids because kids, they don’t have vices in their dreams. So it’s easier to get images from them. And then you are playing with Felipe and living his vivid dreams. Felipe, he has autism. He has ASD, so autism spectrum disorder. Being an autistic boy, he has hyper focus. So everywhere you go, he looks at the most important places of the game. He focuses his attention to it. Okay, so he has hyper focus. He also has the power to enter in other dreams because we don’t have just one kid being experimented on. So he has the power to enter in different dreams. He also has an astronaut helmet because he likes space. He likes, he wants to be an astronaut one day, you know, but he uses to hide his face because kids with autism, they are more introspective. And the helmet kind protect him from the real world and then he can live on in the world he created for himself. And that’s pretty much it.
04:29 SPEAKER_04 Autism characteristics and then Terrence, in the case of Felipe. In the case of Felipe. Is there any specific reason? Yes, I think this game is something like the inclusive, okay? We would like to have an autism hero here. What I want to say is our main character, Felipe, represents this, how I say that, this niche, okay, represents this niche. And the idea of this is create something inclusive, as I told.
05:28 SPEAKER_05 It’s because the name of the studio, okay, we have a partner studio from France too, like he presented himself, Fakes, from Studio Chloe. And the Extraordinary Game Studio, we believe that everybody can be extraordinary. So it doesn’t matter what kind of disorder do you have. Okay, so everybody can be extraordinary. And that’s why Felipe, it’s extraordinary and everybody can relate to him. In fact, if I can tell you, man, there was a YouTuber who played our game and one of the main comments was a mom who said that she has two daughters with autism. And she cried because she could see her daughters in the game. She said, Oh my God, the character wears like the same bag. Like, and my daughters, they would love to have a hat like that to protect themselves from the real world.
06:28 SPEAKER_06 That’s beautifully said. And I often talk with companies that do sort of content moderation. It’s about including everyone, right? And I think between you see Microsoft comes out with tools for accessibility for players to be able to play, as Sony is doing the same. And I think games like this that can resonate with different types of players that may have autism, right, gives them a character that they can relate to. I think that’s a beautiful thing that you’re doing here. You guys are also out of Brazil. You’re part of the Brazilian gaming market that I feel like is starting to grow. How did you get started? I don’t know if we want to go around one at a time, but kind of what was the reason behind starting Extraordinary Games?
07:01 SPEAKER_04 Extraordinary Games starts with a few people. OK. And we have been doing things in Unreal about three years ago. And I started to make the first build at the Midnight Dreams. In this first build, I found FIX. FIX is our partner in the France. I need to have in this game a camera system like the game Liria Nightmares inside is because the camera is not attached on the player, is attached in the level. And FIX did this great job for us. He makes a lot of cameras in the game and he has his own perspective and point of view. The game is for show for the players. The game is more a cinematic view, OK, because that we started in Brazil, as I told. And we found FIX and we are chosen in about three or four, two months ago in the big festival is an event in Brazil. OK, and we are chosen for show our game in this event. And we have the opportunity during the big festival to bring our gaming from here to Gamescom.
08:35 SPEAKER_03 Yes, FIX, you can talk about how you entered in the game and what did you do and all that. Just introduce yourself, man. Oh, it’s not complicated. Klaus contacted me because he had some problem to install an original system of camera and I helped him in this way. Me, I come from the world of music and cinema, so I am used with all this technology. And I made a proposition to him to install a system of camera, give a more cinematic feeling in the game. And today the result is here in the game. That’s it.
09:19 SPEAKER_06 Well, first, if you want to talk about, I mean, I’m very familiar with the big festival. It’s something I tried to convince my company to send me to. And unfortunately, I didn’t get that one, but maybe next year I’ll be able to go there. But that’s awesome. Here there’s a lot of good indie games are showing off there. And again, the scene in Brazil seems like the place to be right now. What is your, do you have any specific goals while that games come this year?
09:40 SPEAKER_04 Yes, we have. We are an indie studio, an indie Brazilian studio, okay. And we’re looking for publishers who can help us to work with marketing, to like, not move, supporting this game for consoles. We are Xbox partner, okay. We have this game. We are able to sell this game in the Xbox store. But we’re looking for, share this game in others, other platforms as well. But we are very happy to be in this Xbox partner to make this game in the Xbox in the future.
10:28 SPEAKER_06 As an Xbox player, I do hope you bring it to Xbox because this sounds, looks like a type of game that could be nice to just sit down and play on the couch. And again, it looks fantastic and we’ll have pictures up after this, but it’s a fantastic looking game.
10:40 SPEAKER_05 Actually, we talked to a person on Xbox today, you know, and she told us to go there tomorrow at Gamescom and talk to her. You know, I really forgot her name because we talked to a lot of people here today. We are at IDXbox so we can sell our game at Xbox. We are very Xbox fan. You can see I have a Gears of War tattoo here, you know, and we hope to go to Game Pass as well, you know. So when we talk about publisher and all that, if we can have some help from Xbox with that, which will happen tomorrow for sure because our game is good and people are liking it. So probably you will play it, my friend. Don’t worry.
11:21 SPEAKER_04 We have a transmedia experience I can show here for you. I don’t know how you can show for the people as well. I’ll record it so they can see it, but we have a, we have a, I’ll record this. We have a QR code on the screen right now. So if you want to… If you scan this… I don’t know if I could scan it. Okay, okay. What is this transmedia experience? You assess, you debate the laboratory like an internet. Yeah. Okay. And there is a login and a password here and you enter in this. This is my wife Lorena here. This is my family. Little easter egg. Oh, there you go.
12:09 SPEAKER_06 And if you enter in this login and the password, you’re going to access her things in the Udabai laboratory. Interesting. Same password? Yes, the password is here. Oh, there it is. Oh, look at that. Tricky. This shows you how good I am at puzzle games.
12:33 SPEAKER_04 Yes, to 606 as well. It’s our dog. Oh, there we go.
12:39 SPEAKER_06 You’re going to see here, you see all things about the Lorena here. You have the patient’s files. It’s about the Felipe, patient’s exams, emails, and the project examination. He don’t have access to this. This is very cool. So you could kind of have a second screen experience while playing the game. You could also pull it up on your mobile and start doing some side investigation on the side. Yes, yes. You got a game within the game.
13:04 SPEAKER_04 You have an exception. It’s not necessary to play the game, okay. But it’s more about the lore to… We can put a lot of things in this kind of system, like the photos, like the videos, like the audios, things to talk more about what the Udabai laboratory is doing here. What the Udabai laboratory is doing with these kids because this is a case, Felipe, okay. Might be another case. Might be another kids here.
13:37 SPEAKER_06 Sounds like future games. Yes.
13:40 SPEAKER_05 Create the whole world. Yes. There is like… There was a famous Brazilian YouTuber. His name is MaxRM. You know, and while he was playing, he compared this file’s findings, you know, with Resident Evil. Because to know the entire lore of the game, you have to find the skier codes and learn more about what is happening, to know what is the germination project, and to get to know more characters because we don’t have just Lorena’s avatar. We have everybody’s avatar in the game. So you can meet the game’s creators, the game devs, you know, and also learn more from what you’re playing. And maybe, who knows, maybe you are being experimented and you don’t know yet.
14:33 SPEAKER_06 Love it. Again, I can’t explain. It’s such a nice, clean looking game. It looks like it’s, again, I don’t want to say relaxing because it’s not necessarily a relaxing looking game, but it looks like inside but in 3D and more color obviously to it. It looks fantastic, I guess. Is there any final message or anything you want to say to whoever is listening to this about the game? A final message about the game? Putting him on the spot here. Alright, so… Where are we getting it?
15:00 SPEAKER_05 I just hope you guys will put the game on your wishlist. Meet us at the event on Gamescom, okay guys, because we’re going to be there and we have keys to give you so you guys can play the build we have made for you guys to see it, have fun. Okay, so my advice for you is, okay, play using headsets because the music that this French guy did is something awesome, you know. So please people, play the game using a headset. And joysticks.
15:34 SPEAKER_04 Oh, and a joystick as well, okay, because the keyboard won’t help you. You will die all the time. Perfect. Well, I really want to thank the Extraordinary Games team. Oh, more stuff. Go. I have one last thing to say. Now you should play in this part here. It’s something inspirational in Crash Bandicoot. Nice. It’s your time to try here. My turn? Yes, yes. You walk here. If you hold here, you’re gonna sprint and the button A here, you’re gonna jump. Only this. Come from here, come from here. I’m coming towards you, I got you. It’s a little lag because you use the battery, not the… Oh man, you hold. Yes, you hold.
16:20 SPEAKER_06 Nice, you got Raiders of the Lost. You should have jumped there, huh? Yeah. This feels very much like Raiders of the Lost Arc here. I’m excited to play this game. So we can get it now, wishlist it on Steam and grab a key? Yes. Nice. Pretty much. Well, it got you guys into gaming. This is awesome. Whoa. Almost, man. Almost, almost. This is great. So we’ll have information about the team here. Someone’s calling me. I’m in a different country. I don’t know how they’re calling me. But I appreciate you guys stopping by and talking about your game. I’m excited to show everybody the game here. We’ll have information. If you don’t mind, I’ll put pictures up on our blog that we have here. Game is Midnight Dreams. Check it out on Steam in wishlist mode and maybe one day Xbox. Yes. Cool. Thank you so much guys for stopping by today. Thank you.
17:13 SPEAKER_04 Thank you. Thank you.
