The Big Indie Interviews: Hyena Hon on award-winning competitive game Crush!
pcgamesinsider.bizAt this year's Pocket Gamer Connects Jordan we once again ran our Very Big Indie Pitch competition - a speed-dating style event that we regularly take to shows around the world. It offers developers a chance to get their games in front of expert judges, gain valuable feedback, and maybe even a prize!
For a glimpse of what The Very Big Indie Pitch is all about, here's developer Mostafa Harb of Hyena Hon to talk about Crush! and their experience pitching at the competition.
PCGamesInsider: Tell us a little about yourself and your indie studio. Who's on the team, and what are their inspirations?
Mostafa Harb: Hyena Hon consists of two people, Jawad Karaky and Mostafa Harb (myself). We’re based in Lebanon and we mostly make arcade/party games.
We’re inspired by games with great storytelling - like the Horizon series, anything by Larian Studios, and pre-2015 Ubisoft. We also love flash games from the early internet era, especially ones from Newgrounds.
Tell us about your latest project that you pitched at the competition.
Crush! is a two player competitive party game where both players pilot the same vehicle. It’s a unique concept that started out as a game jam project about a duck and a worm fighting over a spaceship.
It’s gone through many iterations since then as we believed this should be a full-fledged game, and we’re glad we continued putting work on it as almost everyone who tried it at PGC loved it.
How hard is it to survive as an indie developer?
Being an indie developer, especially in Lebanon, can be a bit difficult. You have the usual hardships of being an indie developer which means a delicate balance between following your passion and paying the bills.
Your activities sometimes have to take a backseat to your immediate needs of getting a stable job in order to survive in an increasingly expensive world. You have to scrape for funding wherever and however you can to keep your dream, already battered and disfigured, from dying off completely.
Add to that
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