On December 27th, 8 DOORS by Rootless Studios surpassed its funding goal of ￦5 million (about $4,000) by 681%, ultimately netting ￦34 million ($28,000) on tumblbug (the Korean equivalent of Kickstarter). I’ve interviewed many indie developers before, but a crowdfunding success of this proportion was quite rare. Perhaps that was why the news was a breath of fresh air.

Inven sat down with Rootless Studios to hear about their upcoming title, how it was on the top 60 of Steam Greenlight within three days among 2,900 other games, and to talk about their ambition to market the game to an international audience.

8 DOORS[official website] is Rootless Studio’s first adventure game based on Korean folklore of Princess Bari. The player takes control of Lily as she travels to afterlife to save her father, who was mistakenly taken away from her. Now, it’s up to Lily to correct the wrong with the help from the grim reaper named Sul. The game is being developed with RPG Maker MV and features timing-based combat, puzzle elements, and multiple endings reflecting player choices. Known for its uniquely eastern aesthetics with a modern touch, 8 DOORS was successfully Greenlit within six days and is scheduled to be released on October 31st, 2017.

Established in 2015, Rootless Studio[Twitter] in an independent game studio based in South Korea. The team is currently comprised of four people: Dubab(programming and head), Dubi(design), MinTucan(art), and Taeyoung Park(marketing). The name comes from forming a team without prior extensive knowledge and foundation about professional game development, while having fresh eyes to bring original ideas.

It’s been about five months since the last interview in July. How have you been?

Dubab: Right after the interview, I had my hands full with developing the game and preparing for crowdfunding. I’ve studied RPG Maker some more to pick up new things for the development, but I’ve mostly focused my time on crowdfunding. Crowdfunding went phenomenally well, perhaps because of the interview, surpassing the initial goal by 681%. I’m still flabbergasted. Thanks to the funding, we’re now trying to add more polish to the game.

I don’t believe I’ve met you two in the last interview. Would you like to tell the readers who you are and what you do?

MinTucan: Hello, I’m Byeonggyu “MinTucan” Min, and I do the art at Rootless Studios. I couldn’t have been at the last interview and only did a written one because I was down in Busan. I’m glad to be here today, though.

Park: I actually joined the team after the last interview. I knew MinTucan before. I guess it’s kind of a mentor-mentee relationship. Anyway, I wasn’t associated with Rootless, but I had heard that they needed someone to handle the marketing side of things and decided to join. Since it’s a very small team of four people, I help with some art on the side on top of my marketing duties. Currently, I’m still getting the hang of things with the art direction by designing items and UI.

If you two already knew each other, did MinTucan reference Park?

MinTucan: I guess you could say that. Since he’s not only good at art but also proficient in English, I thought his skills would help with collecting feedback from English-speaking communities. So I gave him a call, and, fortunately, he said yes without much hesitation.

Congratulations on surpassing your goal on tumblbug by 681%. Was it something you expected?

Dubab: Can I be honest? Truthfully, no one on the team ever expected it. We used to muse over how much funding we’d get, and that figure would be around ￦2 million to ￦4 million ($1600-$3300). No one thought that it would do as well as it did. In hindsight, I think the funding was successful because people favorably read our interviews and many streamers took an interest in the game.

Looking through the contributor list, I was surprised to see that someone donated over ￦
1 million(about $840). Did you know about this?

Dubab: We were as surprised as you were. We wanted to know who gave such a large amount, and it turned out to be a teenage student. I called him up to make sure it wasn’t a mistake, and he said he got permission from his parents to fund the project.

As you can see from our tumblbug page, we promised to create a town based on the ￦1 million backer’s choice of concept. Unfortunately, we couldn’t meet with him to talk things over. For now, we’ll exchange emails to see what he has in mind. Soon, we’ll meet in person to talk about more details.

Have the parents said anything on the matter?

Dubab: They were very supportive about the idea of crowd-funding. On the other hand, I now feel more weight on my shoulders. Since 8 DOORS’s continued development is only possible through the help of everyone who backed the project, I’ll do my best to not let them down.

Why do you think the backers were so interested in the project?

MinTucan: Probably for the same reason I joined Rootless Studios. I was engrossed in the game’s modern take on the afterlife and folklore. I lived very far from the studio, but I immediately accepted the offer. I think the style and art direction resonated with the backers as well.

I heard you guys are setting up a Kickstarter page, too. Do you think the game’s eastern concept will carry over to western audiences?

Dubab: I’m a little concerned. That’s why we plan to approach the game differently from the intro page. With domestic audiences, we pitched the game as something based on traditional folklore and the afterlife. We’re taking a different approach with overseas audience by introducing the game as an adventure. After that, we’ll tell them about the game’s backstory and the general direction.

Park: Luckily, the overseas audience favorably viewed the game’s art design. I think mixing the traditional concept of eastern afterlife with modern amenities like laptops and wifi made it easier for them to digest. It’s also mostly well-received on Steam Greenlight.

MinTucan: To piggyback on that subject, we’re centering the game around the Korean afterlife, while avoiding anything too eastern. You can see our efforts in the traditional grim reaper wearing sweats instead of the typical gat and dopo.

Since the game is heavily influenced by eastern themes, do you think it will do well in Japan?

MinTucan: How do I say this… We felt that the Japanese market is where small development teams can’t easily get into. The communities are usually closed off, and some people react negatively to Korean influence. We determined that it doesn’t make economical sense to bring the game to Japan, so we don’t currently have plans on that front.

Some people are skeptical of the new Kickstarter campaign because they think you’re in it for the money. Any thoughts?

Dubab: I understand the sentiment completely. Please keep in mind that our Kickstarter has more to do with marketing than finance. It’d be awesome if Kickstarter goes well, but, like I said, it’s primarily for advertising the game. Unlike with the domestic market, it’s harder to tell people about the game overseas, so we decided that Kickstarter was the best way to go.

The game is planned to release on Halloween. How’s the development schedule coming along?

Dubab: We still have over ten months, but that’s not a lot. The process isn’t that quick because we keep polishing minor details and iterating on changes. But since we’ve put the demo out, we should probably work on new things rather than mulling over old ones.

Park: I think we’re busiest right now because we have to reflect on the feedback we got from the demo.

MinTucan: The most common feedback I get is that the game doesn’t look like it was made with RPG Maker. As such, we’re going for a level of game quality that’s not been seen with other games. Of course, we’re also having a blast working to bring something that’s never been seen before.

You’ve previously mentioned that 8 DOORS takes cues from the Mother series and Undertale. Is there any pressure to take after those massive hit titles?

Dubab: Sure, it’s a lot of pressure. I’ve seen some blogs saying things like 8 DOORS is one of the most anticipated indie games or it’s a Korean Undertale. For me, it’s all the more reason to create a game that meets or exceeds the expectations of the fans.

MinTucan: It’s off-topic, but I was extremely delighted to know that, according to some international gamers, 8 DOORS reminds them of the Mother series. We took inspiration from the Mother series, and we were happy to know that our intentions were conveyed well.

From my experience with the demo, I found the combat system interesting, since it makes timing important, but it soon got too repetitive. Any thoughts?

Dubab: Games nowadays don’t use this type of combat system. In the beginning, we went with a traditional combat system, in which attacks and skills just happen, but it was too one-dimensional. To break the monotony, the current combat system was born.

And I totally see your point. The current combat system may be a novelty, but it soon gets repetitive and tiring if it’s the same pattern over and over again. Since it’s a demo, we’ll collect feedback and polish the combat.

Park: The demo has only one pattern for combat, so it’ll get boring when it repeatedly does the same thing. By the time the game is released, there will be more diverse patterns to keep you on your toes.

One gripe I had with the demo was that I couldn’t be the first to attack with enemies I encounter. Is this intended?

Dubab: To an extent, yes. We wanted to provide ways to progress through the game by solving puzzles while avoiding combat. There are some parts of the game in which combat is unavoidable, so we’re working to address that.

Speaking of avoiding combat, I found that confronting the Egg Ghost after the Imoogi mini game was quite tough unless you level up first. Any thoughts?

Dubab: We intentionally tuned the difficulty somewhat high. In the mini game, we made touching the blades an instant death, because we didn’t want high level players to just breeze through it. I admit it was quite hard. I thought it was an adequate difficulty but saw other team members struggling with the stage.

Park: I’m the worst player on the team, but I got used to it as I kept playing. I found it delightfully challenging because one mistake could cost your life.

Speaking of being delightfully challenging, save points were also limited, which seems to go against the modern system.

Dubab: Exactly, we intended to go against the modern system by making every save count. If you remember older games, saves were a limited resource, so you have to use them wisely. Seeing a save point during those times was a true blessing.

In recent games, Dark Souls’ bonfires serve a similar purpose. We wanted to recreate the suspense and joy in using save points. Additionally, we tried to maximize combat experience by eliminating a constant saving and loading gimmick.

Besides art, the sound also blends well with the game’s atmosphere. Do you have a separate person working on sound?

Dubab: Not exactly. People sell sound assets on RPG Maker forums, and we select the ones that fit with our game. If there’s a need for rearranging, then we ask the composer to make specific changes.

8 DOORS has been praised for its unique aesthetics. What’s the most important factor in design?

MinTucan: There are three aspects that we focused on when designing characters. First, characters have to be appealing. To accomplish this, we did away with the old, traditional image and went for a more modern look. If you’ve seen Sul, the grim reaper, who wears hoodies, then you’ll know what I mean. Also, we used the color red in at least one part of each character to remind players of the theme of looming death, because the game takes place in the afterlife.

Next is the style. I normally draw characters to be extremely clean, but the characters in 8 DOORS are not drawn that way. They almost looks like someone’s scribbles. People can easily relate to scribbles because most people have scribbled before. We wanted to make the characters accessible by using such a style. Generally round character design also helps in that regard.

Lastly, we wanted to reflect traditional Korean culture. I don’t mean like wearing a gat and dopo, but we tried to bring some slice of modern Korea, like cafes, into the game.

How long does it usually take for you to create characters or environments?

MinTucan: It depends on what I’m working on. Downtown, which was seen at the end of the demo, took a couple weeks because we had many things to consider, such as coming up with a basic concept and placing various NPCs. Nameless Hill, on the other hand, only took about a couple days.

Characters like Lily and Sul were done relatively quickly, despite having to make animations for them. Since the concepts were clear, I think it only took a day to design them. Of course, it took some more time to finalize them, though.

How long does it take to finish the game?

Dubab: We’re thinking 8 to 10 hours. We initially thought the demo would take about 30 to 40 minutes, but it took about an hour from watching playthroughs on Youtube. That makes an hour for each chapter, so the whole game will probably take 8 to 10 hours.

There have been many unfortunate incidents with crowdfunding, which probably stem from the issue that the only avenue of communication is the funding website. How do you plan to keep interacting with backers?

Dubab: Hearing those news, we’ve internally discussed among ourselves on how to effectively communicate with backers and fans. As a result, we decided that an official online board is the best way to do so. On the website, we unveil new information and collect feedback. Since the game was made possible with the help of crowdfunding, we will continue to communicate with the players to not let them down.

There are about ten months before launch. What do you plan to focus on?

Dubab: Probably, development. Since the demo’s release, we’ve been getting lots of feedback. We plan to incorporate them to add polish. We also have to prepare for the Kickstarter campaign coming in the middle of January, as well as an English demo. We’ll be keeping ourselves busy for a while.

Anything we missed that you’d like to say?

Dubab: First of all, happy new years to all those who backed and waited for 8 DOORS. We’ll do our best to create a game that meets your expectations. Ten months isn’t a short time, but I hope you can wait a little longer.