Review Fix Exclusive: Inside ‘Backdrafts’

Review Fix chats with Ideal Editions’ Igor Davin, who discusses the developer’s upcoming game, “Backdrafts.” From its development, goals for the future and the company’s transition from board games to mobile games, Davin lets us know what makes the game and Ideal Editions special.

Review Fix: How has it been to make the transition from board games to video games?

Igor Davin: Very simple. Id&aL has published games since 2008. Then we started looking into transferring board games to mobiles. After learning about the conception and designs for mobiles, we thought: “Why not make an original video game?” That is how we went from board games to video games. That said, it is less a transition than an opening as we continue to work in the world of board games. But it is the same purpose: imagining a gameplay that gives pleasure to the players.

Review Fix: What was the inspiration for this game?

Davin: The original idea of the game comes from one of our team members who is a hardcore reader of Fantasy. The series “Age of Fire” by E. E. Knight and “The Rain Wild Chronicles” by Robin Hobb are behind Backdrafts. In both worlds, dragons are a species as advanced, or even more so, than humans.

In Backdrafts, we learn that our dragon has never hurt humans nor any member of his family and the treasure he is keeping was given by the humans years ago. He has never killed nor stolen, and yet greedy humans are after constantly after him. The dragon, the guardian of a treasure, is trapped in this place as he is too young to fly and has no choice but defend himself and the gold.

Review Fix: Can you talk about the gameplay elements at work here?

Davin: Mastering the smartphone and tablet environment, we wanted to create a casual game. We loved the concept of base-defense, but these type of games lacks punch and nervousness. We wanted a game as accessible as a base-defense and as tense as a shoot’em up. Keeping that in mind, the “scoring” has a big place in this game. We did implement “combo” mechanisms and “chain kill.” The more the player takes risks, the more he scores. Finally, the player will always have choices to make while keeping calm under a deluge of fire. Grab gold, slow the enemies, regenerate the fire pool, use special skills.

Review Fix: What has development been like?

Davin: Great, but we don’t sleep as much as we would have liked to. We have limited financial resources, we have no help or grant. We do not work in the best conditions for we have issues with our computers and with our resources. Not to mention the frustration with the failure to implement all that we would like in the game, due to lack of time and money.

However, our team has an average age of 35 years. We knew where we wanted to go, we have 8-15 years of experience in our respective skills and we have already worked together for several years. It’s a pleasure to get up every morning to work on a project like Backdrafts. We live our passion every day and that is why we would not change our situation, despite the difficulties. Today we are about to open Backdrafts for Beta testers to help us refine the game levels and some gameplay issues. We hope to publish the game in September or October.

Review Fix: What games did you play as a kid? How did they influence this one?

Davin: In the team, we have a wide variety of gaming influences. It is quite difficult to provide an exhaustive list of our influences. There are so many good games.

But to name a few:

Cauldron, Lemmings, Day of the Tentacle, Saint Dragon, Barbarian, Mario kart, Bomberman, Double Dragon, Zelda, Civilization, Doom… then Warcraft, Command & Conquer, Might & Magic. Today, we play Heroes of the Storm together, Eve online, Travian, Clash Royal, Overwatch. The specificity of our team is that we are mostly PC and mobile players. The common influence we have is the experience we have earned. Video games have contributed (and continue) to build the adults we are today. So to answer your question, we would say that the main influence is the desire to instill in Backdrafts a memorable gaming experience.

Review Fix: What do you think is the coolest feature in the game?

Davin: The “stone crush” adds an atypical mechanism to the game. In addition to crushing the enemies, it acts as a “taunt” that will temporarily occupy the humans. We believe this is one of the most strategic powers of gameplay.

In a game between base-defense and shoot’em up, it’s very hard to stay alive while doing something else. In Backdrafts that is exactly what we have done by forcing the player to also pay attention to his gold. This means the player must constantly decide if his priority is to protect his gold or his life.
This gives a fairly dynamic gaming experience.

Review Fix: Bottom line, why should someone play this?

Davin: Casual gamers will enjoy going through the levels with regularly renewed experiences (a new game element every three levels or so). We wanted to allow short game experiences, during which players can forget their worries and quickly let off steam. The more picky players will be delighted to detect patterns and turn them to their advantage to unlock the highest scores and achievements.

We have set up many mechanisms that will tickle the scorers but that will most likely make even the most tenacious players repeat certain levels several times.

In all cases, Backdrafts provides a dynamic, rhythmic, and nervous game experience with a soundtrack that follows game situations. The regular arrival of new enemies with different behaviors and characteristics, and new powers to better organize the dragon’s defense will keep players in suspense and wanting to finish the game to see what becomes of the dragon that they have seen grow over the levels.

Review Fix: What are your goals for the game?

Davin: Our goal is to make a quality game that is fun to play and that offers a lot of challenges to those who would try to achieve the highest scores.
Our goal is to see people play and live an enjoyable experience with Backdrafts.

We do not claim that the game will be downloaded hundreds of million times, worldwide.

We just aspire to design a well-made game, which people will have fun playing, and then form the basis of a community of players who will follow our upcoming productions, trusting us. And if Backdrafts managed to pay one or more of us, then it will already be a success for us!

Review Fix: What’s next?

Davin: We have other video game projects underway and we hope to give them life. But the time we spend on these projects depends on the success of Backdrafts.

If the game allows us to pay our team, then we will put 100% of our time into our next projects. Otherwise, we will give a little more time for benefits, before returning to video games.