Making our Dream Train Game! 🚂 A Bumpy Ride, Devlog #1

[@Metallocomotive]

I can say, without a shadow of doubt, going with the cute art style was the correct direction! Sabrina's work on the passengers is pretty understated, as the NPCs in a world can make or break the immersion. So nice work! Jazzpanda's pain is felt. I can't tell them the number of times I ripped my hair out by the roots just trying to wrap my head around coding and asset work... Chin up, bud! Practice makes perfect! Finally, Nathanial (hope I spelled that right), really good work on the locomotive itself! Very cute, but not overly adorable to the point of nausea. I wishlisted the game, and look forward to seeing the final product!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thanks for the support! Be sure to join our Discord for more updates!

[@DuudsCreates]

Very cute art style. One thing I'd say is that since one of the goals of the game is stopping the train to get passengers, you should put a passenger count somewhere on screen. That way the player knows for sure that passengers have stopped boarding the train and can leave the station even without moving the camera, that also gives more importance to the boarding passengers aspect.

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Interesting idea!! In the shop, you'll be shown your passenger capacity, so currently that's how you know how many tickets you can have at a time. Having a counter onscreen is a decent idea, I'll relay that to Josh! Be sure to join the Discord server for more updates, if you haven't already!

[@stellanovaluna]

Hi! I’m friends with Jaspanda’s nephew and after learning that I liked video game devlogs, he showed me this! You guys are so awesome and I can’t wait to see where this game goes as you continue its development! I’m totally subscribing :3

[@joshb2328]

That's so awesome! I hope you like them!! More coming soon 😊

[@stellanovaluna]

@joshb2328 I can’t wait! Sorry for not naming this nephew, but I don’t wanna doxx him or you lol

[@latitudefiction7333]

Move over quirky Earthbound inspired RPGs, the cute Spirit Tracks inspired train game has arrived! Already seeing a lot of potential with what you guys got to show for the game both here and on the steam page. Fantasic choice on the artstyle especially for the trains, perfectly blending that cartoon look with some more accurate locomotive and rolling stock designs is a well appreciated artistic choice. That little blue 4-2-0 steam loco is already a favorite of mine, it's everything I want out of a cartoony classic American steamer and I love it! (Thank you for remembering to couple up and include the tender unlike some games I know, looking at you Sid Meier's Railroads) Already wishlisted on Steam for sure. I have some fond memories of playing LoZ: Spirit Tracks on my DSi as a kid so I'm certainly looking forward to seeing A Bumpy Ride develop and carry on it's legacy. Best of luck to the Dev Team, looking forward to watching your progress working on the railroad and hope to see this train arrive at the station in the near(-ish) future!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Happy to have you on board, be sure to join our Discord if you haven't for more updates between videos!

[@PDawg]

Very adorable! Looking forward to playing the final product 😬

[@Forcemaster2000]

The game looks super cute! You guys (and gal) should be really proud!

[@SiX-Feet]

Are you sure it's y'all's first time making a game!!!? It's sooo good, well done 👍

[@CosmoporiumGames]

We've all worked together previously, with Nathaniel and Sabrynna both working on games, and Nathaniel working with Josh on a myriad of game-like projects. So yes, while this is our first full game as this team of 3, we all have experience working together on similar projects! We've also got 2 other games planned already, this was just the first step into building knowledge together! :)

[@SiX-Feet]

@@CosmoporiumGames I look forward to seeing more so im subscribing!

[@WasatchWind]

Really nice whistle! It is of course one of the most important parts of a train game. 🚂

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thank you!

[@painting4850]

We need to get hyce to add 50 extra whistles to the game

[@michgeeson278]

@@painting4850 heheh, yeah but only with a really low bitrate...

[@supernintenjoe974]

I love the quillable whistle

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thanks!

[@_gamma.]

The game I've wanted for so long, wishlisted! The art style is PERFECT

[@CosmoporiumGames]

So happy to hear that, thank you! Be sure to join our Discord, if you haven't! More day to day stuff can be seen there!

[@JellyScrub]

Wishlisted! Good luck with the development

[@muggyfox1]

I think it's cool to have a dev-log of an indie game that has a team of people. I liked how you guys each gave a little bit about your part. one issue with spirit tracks that i remember was that the time between stations could be viewed as boring because there might not be anything to do between them. So what are you guys going to do for activities while the train is running on a long trek? 🤔

[@CosmoporiumGames]

It makes development a lot more fun, I admit! Great question! We have some things planned for making it interesting, but this is definitely not going to be a high-energy game. We've already done two batches of playtesting (something we'll elaborate on more in the future!) and we found the players enjoyed the relaxing, meditative quality of the train driving. So nothing too high stress :)

[@roxbird20]

Wishlisted. Love the art style. It immediately made me think of Casey Jr from Dumbo and that 90's The Little Engine that Could cartoon. Keep up the good work! With the train game market so saturated with sim type games it's nice to see that not only one but TWO cozy train games are currently in the works (The other being Railway Life). Looking forward to seeing more of both!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thank you so much! We've actually talked with Ollie, the creator of Railway Life, and we're all excited about it too!

[@CathodeRayKobold]

You DEFINITELY need to keep the derailing idea. Struggling to get the fastest time without flying off the tracks is something I can already see being fun as hell.

[@CosmoporiumGames]

The current system has derailing built in, we just have it disabled at the moment. We might consider enabling it for something like a hard mode, in the future!

[@HardiSomal]

WOoOW! Walschaertsbuilds team! I’ll defo be invested in this new game you’re developing! x

[@InvasionAnimation]

Well this is entertaining! I'm subbing, can't wait to see where this goes!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Welcome aboard!

[@Oelo17]

The art style is cute!! Looks like it gonna be a lovely game

[@FuelFire]

Already on my wishlist on steam. That 4-2-0 is so cute.

[@Mark_The_Railfan]

lol imagine a 2-2-0

[@revimfadli4666]

​@@Mark_The_Railfanimagine a 0-2-0

[@alexanderrosulek159]

Blazing

[@ErieRRfan]

​@@revimfadli4666the thing is, a 0-2-0 was actually built

[@mrf5729]

So adorable, can't wait to see more updates !!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

More to come!

[@ArianaTheCutestDoe]

i love it so much i need the game yesterday ;w;

[@wezarr7825]

Son wake up, Mathaniel published a new level on his planet.

[@nathanielmarc]

STOPPP you will make me miss playing LBP with you 😭

[@MashUpGames]

Looks really good, excited to learn more!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thanks so much!

[@KrisTheDev]

Wishlisted! Looks so cute, and love the Spirit Track feel / inspiration!

[@echo_the_developer]

Love seeing other indie devs make beautiful games ❤

[@shauas4224]

My jaw dropped at the end. Im sold at whistle sound, sign me up

[@hamzahgamedev]

These guys just appeared after 7 years and dropped a BANGER OF A GAME. Legends! I am sooo jealous of your artistic skills lol, they are soo GOOOD!! 😍😍 Awesome devlog, I learned a lot and oh yes, congrats in advance for hitting 100k Wishlists 💪

[@BandanRRChannel]

This looks great! Seems like it'll be fun to play. (Also, that Railroads Online clip, lol...)

[@atom-2077]

this looks super promising! I've seen a million devlogs and this is easily in the top 5 of best chances to be a successful game, keep up the great work!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Many thanks, be sure to join the Discord for more updates!

[@coocanoot1]

i’m so excited for this you have no idea

[@joshb2328]

Such a cute art style. I love our little train game 😊

[@therailheader1896]

This looks adorable, are there going to be different locomotives in the game other than the little 4-2-0, like a 2-4-0 similar to Casey Jr, a 4-6-0 identical to 131 from Back to the Future 3, and will there be different jobs like switching aside from pulling passengers and freight?

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Currently, all locomotives in the game are the same wheel arrangement, just with different cosmetic changes. We do have a lot of skins planned, which we'll talk about in a future video! As for alternative jobs, maybe. Passenger & freight assignments are the main gameplay loops at this time, but we may consider adding a separate, smaller switching game-mode that is entirely separate from the main game.

[@dacartrainguy]

It looks soooo promising!! I want to suggest you to increase the number of coaches/wagons to a maximum of 4 instead of the actual 2, so the train will looks a bit more consistent, long and pleasant to look at, without resulting too much "heavy" for the eyes

[@CosmoporiumGames]

When you have a fully upgraded train, you'll have two passenger cars, a gondola, and a caboose! Thanks for the comment!

[@white_star_locomotive5180]

I like this. I wish y’all the best of luck!

[@thekingofchocolate7265]

Lets go im an og! Ill also wishlist today! (you could also make it so if you go to fast i corners you derail or something)

[@phoenixgold9735]

This looks amazing! I can't wait to see more! By the way how hard was it to make the 3D main menu? It looks awesome to see the train passing by on the main screen

[@CosmoporiumGames]

We'll cover it in a future video, but it's basically a giant hemisphere with a scrolling texture and an animated track that follows the surface. The animation loops perfectly, but it's actually the same track doing the animation over and over!

[@Mark_The_Railfan]

So Cool! One thing you should totally add are different locos for the trains, which could be modeled both by the dev team and (at some stage of release) the community.

[@Charlie-wf4er]

personally, I think if that was done it's better to stay on the generic side. maybe compatibility for modding otherwise, something like a 2-4-0 for freight (more driving wheels rather than pony wheels while staying in the same shortened style, but maybe a 2-6-0 instead to be a little larger) is all that really is needed i think it would be better to just customise the loco (or another loco if added) and change out smokestack styles/spark arrestors aswell as liveries rather than a bunch of different loco models

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Current plans are for it to remain the 4-2-0, but changing the spark arrestor style, smokebox length, textures, etc. You'd be surprised how different every engine looks even with the same base model!

[@truckrobo147]

Oh man oh man this looks so fun!

[@rain9359]

WoW, this game looks so cool :)

[@Charlie-wf4er]

This is a very quality game with well thought out styling! my only confusions are the fact mortals are animals, defeating the use of stock cars in this setting (or well, livestock in general) unless there is a lower level of animals? I am just not quite shure how this would be handled. one other thing would be the fact the couplers resemble knuckle couplers despite the era, where link & pin was prominent, but they may also be more difficult to simplify than how the knuckles evidently are, so the decision is understandable if that is the reason. but cheers! I am appalled by how stunningly great the game looks up to this point (and hate to be rude, but im liking these visuals ALOT more than railway life!) 😉

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thanks so much! You're absolutely right, knuckles weren't exactly correct for the period. That said, they read significantly better at a distance, and are easy to stylize into a simple form- so Nathaniel opted to go for that instead. Keen eye, though!

[@andrasszabo8672]

Amazing! Waiting to see more!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thank you!

[@t00nverseYT]

I love the design

[@StaredownGames]

You got the choo but are missing the "chugga" every time the wheel rotates. Neat game!

[@CosmoporiumGames]

We've got plans for that, don't worry! Just working with our sound designer/composer to figure it out.

[@yapyongliang7665]

I like the art style

[@nathanwatson01]

looks really cool!

[@DinoPon3]

First Railway Life. Then this? I'm all for it!

[@GunslingerP]

I would recommend making the small wheels also have a rolling animation, as it currently looks like they are sliding

[@panjul-g9h]

wish everyone of u guys the best! 🙏

[@muggrootbeer]

A cool little idea or minigame is to stamp or otherwise punch a hole in the passengers train ticket, when they get on.

[@markthompson112]

This game looks awesome. I dunno if it's worth a caution but in my experience Alembics are big files and are often very difficult to compress resulting in the game files being bigger than they need to be and needing more ram. I'd recommend dynamic materials and vertex displacement if that becomes an issue (but that can be it's own headache and I'd only recommended if its ever a problem)

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thanks for the heads up! Luckily, it's only the train that uses them, all the characters use normal rigs :)

[@markthompson112]

@@CosmoporiumGames Beautiful, should be a non-issue then! I've wishlisted and can't wait to watch more!

[@andrewsneacker1256]

@@CosmoporiumGames In future you could use shaders for this kind of thing :D

[@dilloncooper3992]

I'm getting Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks vibes from this

[@ErieRRfan]

I love this game, I really want to play it because of that 4-2-0

[@marcinexus]

Oh my god I adored this

[@furrymczplayer18]

It's so adorable, i love it!! I would def buy it if y'all made a console port WAYYYYYYYY off in the future

[@megazord5696]

This looks sick!!!!!

[@jozsef98]

Really cute, I like it a lot

[@emmabradley235]

hell yea! go getem bud :D

[@bargainghost]

Love the concept! How long have y'all been working on the game so far?

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Since January!

[@jintyry]

i think it'd be fun for the locomotive have different configurations, like a traditional 4-4-0 or a 2-4-0..!

[@goldlockrails4388]

i love what you guy’s have done so far! Can’t wait too see how it turn’s out, on a side note why not add some freight too take around & help out the towns?

[@CosmoporiumGames]

😉

[@obvious2886]

Man you guys make game dev look pretty easy lol

[@obvious2886]

Really good job, especially love the customizability in the main menu

[@CosmoporiumGames]

That's the magic of editing, believe me lol

[@jackefsdn]

Awesome work here super excited to see how the game progresses. One thing though, in your logo it looks like mickey mouse on the i. I assume this is meant to be the head of your own animal crossing inspired characters but I would suggest looking at the legal side of stuff to make sure your all ok!

[@weitkemperoliver]

3:41 as a probably certified railfan there certainly does look accurate to trains of the US in the 1840s and 50s (Edit) maybe you can also have other bigger locos as an upgrade maybe

[@Charlie-wf4er]

id say its more 1860s to 70s to be honest with its build style. the wheel config isnt meant to be taken literally id say its the equivalent of a 4-4-0 in this shrunken world

[@weitkemperoliver]

@@Charlie-wf4er 1. If you say so. 2. I meant different types of steam engines not to enlarge the pre-existing one

[@vale_zh]

Very cool style. Maybe add some anti aliasing to the graphics, because even though the style is great, it looks a little blurred/unsharp. Good luck on your journey :)

[@CosmoporiumGames]

We've intentionally removed the anti-aliasing 😅

[@michgeeson278]

this is suspiciously close to 'RailwayLife" although looks a fair bit further on? but hey competition is good and there at the moment there is nothing like this and reminds me of my favorite game as a kid being “plug and play” Tomas and friends ‘right on time’ game, it looks so good and i love the stile - may i suggest researching themepark/ zoo trains like the "C.P Huntington' type or the zamperla 'Rio Grande' train, or Casy Juniour form disneworld and finally the Detrouit zoo train? i think they would suit the vibe you have going on,

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Nathaniel has actually chatted with the Railway Life dev previously, we're both happy for the others' project! It's awesome to have more cozy games entering the train game space :) The engines you listed were definitely considered designing the one seen!

[@alexanubis1]

Alembics Are Nice but be carefull they Can be really heavy the more you have

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Yeah, luckily it's just the train that uses them 😅

[@alexanubis1]

@@CosmoporiumGames but overall really cool work!

[@WuppertalerWanderWade]

I think you're very funny 😅

[@pancake5830]

you could maybe get engine sounds from steam engine simulator, would be neat i think

[@bengames1565]

If you want to change the UNREAL PROJECT NAME then just head to your unreal projects folder and change both the folder and the unreal.exe file of the game! hope this helps :)

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Thanks for the advice! Unfortunately we have some actual code in the project that references the current project name, which we discovered when we did exactly what you described. We know the way we need to name it now, but it involves going through plugin code 😅

[@lucynavt]

i get heavy vibes from zelda spirit tracks

[@TrajectoryT]

I will watch your career with great interest 🍿

[@Muhammed_English314]

There is another cosy train game devlog series on KZbin (I don't remember it).

[@ximiea3778]

The one by MashUp Games?

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Yeah! Ollie's game Railway Life is looking awesome- we're excited to have two non-simulator train driving games coming into the cozy indie scene.

[@Muhammed_English314]

@@ximiea3778 Yep, that's the one!

[@snoodle7472]

need steam engine sound effects and the steam must sync corolate to the sound it makes

[@marcomoutinho.gamedev]

One thing that really triggers me is not pixal art (heavy) UI on a 3d game / no pixel art game

[@CosmoporiumGames]

That's fair! Our game is meant to be giving the feeling of a DS game, though, so pixel art is what our UI will be.

[@pastrapatur1034]

they did dirty to panda

[@CosmoporiumGames]

🐼

[@nithishgamingff6248]

Is this game made fully blueprints code

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Mostly blueprints, yes, though we do have some actual code in the project for very specific things!

[@jessemg95]

chooch

[@juicy-minecraft4059]

wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, trains!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! make it go choo choo and transport coal and other minerals and then yteag!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@nathanielmarc]

We're so cool :D

[@sagelord77]

Of course your name is Nathaniel.

[@CosmoporiumGames]

??? WHAT DOES THIS MEAN

[@TobyOliverHenryFan]

The game is way too American for liking.

[@CosmoporiumGames]

Well, the game is set in 19th century America . . . so . . .

[@michgeeson278]

seems to be the american twin in spirit of 'Railway Life' in development... "you wait forever for one to turn up, and then they all come at once..."

[@retr0bits545]

A 4-2-0? That is not going to be able to pull much IRL… an Aristocraft 4-2-2 still can’t do much.

[@CosmoporiumGames]

While that's true in real life, we're going for more cute vibes with our game, and not really shooting for realism like that. Thanks for the comment!

[@Minidutra]

I don't remember this being a simulator

[@Darkfault]

I see unreal, I upvote

[@Miss-Stephanie-Night]

Omg such cute game !