Review Fix Exclusive: Inside ‘Subaeria’

Review Fix chats with David Fugere-Lamarre, iLLOGIKA CEO & Founder, who discusses the creative process behind his new game, “Subaeria,” which is slated for a release on Steam, Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

About Subaeria:

In Subaeria, players follow Styx, a young girl who’s out for revenge after her family is murdered by the overlord of Subaeria. She must fight her way through droves of murderous robots by pitting them against one another. As she progresses towards her goal of revenge, she’ll explore the underwater city of Subaeria to uncover the mysteries that lie below the depths.


Combining platform and clever puzzle gameplay mechanics with rogue-like elements, Subaeria’s single-player campaign stimulates players to use their logical senses with the help of their drone to defeat a swarm of adversary robots and lead them to destroy each other. Each level gradually increases the puzzle-solving difficulty, enabling power-ups and challenging the strategic thinking needed to control the environment and character abilities to accomplish victory.

Review Fix: How was this game born?

David Fugere-Lamarre: It started when we were around six people in the studio. The game started as a rogue-like prototype, inspired by The Binding Of Isaac, two of our designers were making in their free time. In the meantime, we read about a subsidy for Canadian developers (the Canada Media Fund, known as the CMF). Since we thought the concept of the game interesting, we decided to rework the idea, asked our families to loan us a bit of money and apply. We received the funding and started the production.

Review Fix: What has development been like so far?

Fugere-Lamarre: We spent five years developing Subaeria, going through many iterations and having to balance with other projects we were working on at the same time. We got the game on Steam Early Access in September 2015 and after a few updates, we decided to start working on a port for Xbox One and PS4.  We resumed production in September 2017.

Review Fix: What makes this game special?

Fugere-Lamarre: Subaeria is not only a puzzle game, it’s also an action game without massive weapons to play with! To defeat your enemies, you need to make them destroy each other. So every player needs to use their best weapon: their intelligence! Another aspect making this game special is the randomly generated levels: each time you play there is a new challenge to face.

Review Fix: What games influenced this one the most?

Fugere-Lamarre: The Binding of Isaac was obviously our biggest influence, but we were very influenced by Zelda and Faster Than Light too!

Review Fix: Any fun stories or wild moments during development?

Fugere-Lamarre: After having created the first version of the game, we wanted to showcase it to the media. We decided then to get 9 other indie companies in Montreal, charter a bus and drive to NYC to showcase our games there, and meet with the media. It didn’t really create a lot of noise back then, but it was one of the early indie organization efforts in Montreal and helped create the great ecosystem we now have here.

Review Fix: Do you think preserving older gameplay mechanics in new games is important?

Fugere-Lamarre: Some older game mechanics still work just as well in newer games. This is especially true in rogue-like games where the dungeon exploration part we got from the Zelda series is the most important to reproduce. Those mechanics are now part of the game designer arsenal. The same could be said for any art form, I think.

Review Fix: What’s your favorite memory as a gamer?

Fugere-Lamarre: Mine is the first time I played a Mario game with my young children. Sharing my love of playing games with them and doing something we all enjoy together is one of the best feelings I’ve ever had.

Review Fix: Who will enjoy this game the most?

Fugere-Lamarre: We made the game for everyone, from midcore to hardcore gamers. We think rogue-like fans will enjoy it, but we also hope to attract players new to the genre.

Review Fix: How do you want this game to be remembered?

Fugere-Lamarre: We want this game to be remembered as not only a fresh take on rogue-like games, but also as a showcase of what we bring to the industry as an indie studio.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Fugere-Lamarre: We will keep working on games with our clients and partners as we have been doing but we have set aside a budget for our next original game to start when Subaeria releases. We are planning on a smaller scope this time as we’d like to release games more frequently. There is no shortage of good ideas, we just need to choose the right one.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13821 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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