They say all great adventures begin at a point where we never see them coming, and this is where I begin my tale of Infinitrap, a game I have been a part of for quite some time. For those of you who don’t regularly read my stuff, my name is Alex O’Neil, and I work as a composer under the name of Chan Walrus. One day I was trying to hawk my dreadful music on Reddit, and I had the good fortune to stumble into a gentleman by the name of Yanick Bourbeau. Yanick happened to be developing a computer game with his company Shadebob Games, and he liked the music I had written and asked if I could join his team.
Maddened by thoughts of power and riches, I allied myself with him and his fantastic artist, the mysteriously enigmatic Stefan. What I didn’t know at the time was what I was getting myself into. Infinitrap was more than just a mere game, and these were more than mere developers. I had become part of something scarily brilliant and fantastic, but at the time, I had no idea what it was.
I had signed on as a composer, my mission to write some music for the game and give it a nice cool sound. I really enjoyed working on the music and nailed track after track, mainly thinking in a very 80s style, and they let me do what I wanted, which is rare. Like an aggressive case of the measles, my music grew on the helpless team of Shadebob, and before I knew it, they had become firm friends.
Yanick is an exceptional coder and provides the backbone of the gameplay coding. His work is absolutely wonderful, yet his level of sheer sadism in creating levels a person of my lacklustre skills can barely handle terrifies me. The thing that scares me about it though is the ease at which he can defeat his own levels, and having watched his playthroughs, all I feel is shame at my own gaming inadequacies. Yanick works hard on the game, fixing the bugs where they appear and making the game the exceptional game it is. He has performed some truly amazing feats during his playthroughs, and I am humbled by the fact my inability to play well has made the difficulty curve for the game a lot friendlier for players like myself.
Stefan is the game’s artist, providing some of the best pixel art I have ever seen. His work on Infinitrap is not only incredible in the way it looks, but it also fits seamlessly into the game. Nothing looks out of place and the game has a beautiful retro feel to it, which is one of the main reasons I loved the game when I was originally shown it for the first time. Stefan’s art is beautiful for many reasons, my favourite parts being the gore and gruesome death animations he made for Jack, the game’s unfortunate protagonist.
Both Yanick and Stefan outside of Infinitrap are exceptional human beings. The past couple of years have been some of the hardest of my life and they have been there for me. Through my personal struggles and missing my son, everything I have experienced that has been ultimately horrendous, I have had both of them there to support me. Yanick has helped support my science fiction series and work by being a solid patreon online and Stefan has brought my vision of a book cover to life for my novel. I am so grateful to have these two wonderful human beings in my life! I could not ask for better friends.
My work as a composer has given the game a lot but not only that, they have listened to my ideas and suggestions adding amazing new enemies into the game in the form of my hedgehogs. Hedgehogs are one of my spirit animals, and Stefan produced some amazing artwork to bring them to life. Cute and deadly, they wait for any adventurer in the game we have poured our lifeblood into.
So what is Infinitrap? Ohio Jack (No relation to Indiana Jones or Duncan Idaho) is an adventurer in search of an ancient cup that grants the wielder immortality. He must dice with death minute by minute as he runs through a network of caves perused by killer hedgehogs, zombies, spikes and flames, a potentially future girlfriend and the odd mer-person (no relation to Ariel). Jack must uncover the mystery of the caves, perform several missions I’m not going to spoil and defeat the evil banished within the cup. If he can do it successfully, he will gain something he never could have hoped for… But at what cost?
Infinitrap is the collaboration of three minds, all very different. Myself, Stefan and Yanick are all very different people, all philosophical and insane in our own way. We have different ideologies and backgrounds and are jointed together in the hope we can create something that will make a difference and make players happy. I could not have asked to work with a better team of people or asked for better friends! We hope you will enjoy playing the game as much as Yanick enjoys watching me fail at it.
Just your average space adventurer turned blogger. Prematurely balding. Egad, no! Forsooth!
