[Gamterview] "What's important is creative perfection..." Game company "Double Stroke and Lunosoft."

For several years, the indie game industry has been attracting attention in the global game market.

Despite the dominance of large game companies, indie games are growing rapidly, securing a large fan base with originality and creative content. The distribution channels have increased with active support for indie games on major platforms such as Steam, Epic Games Store, Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and PlayStation, and in particular, Steam serves as an important hub for indie games, helping many indie developers introduce games easily.

Among them, Korean indie game companies are attracting attention as they are gaining popularity around the world, and it is significant that those who started with small teams are achieving global success with technology and originality. If indie game companies grow and grow into mid-sized companies, they will create a virtuous cycle of increasing jobs in the game industry and increasing industrial sales.

As such, there are companies that are attracting attention by performing well in the indie game market, which is in an important position in the game industry. They are "Double Stroke" and "Lunosoft," which achieved global results through collaboration with the commercialization and follow-up support project of the "Gyeonggi Global Game Center" operated by "Gyeonggi Province" and "Gyeonggi Content Agency." Representative Hwang Sung-min, who developed the mobile game "Coinmon Defense" that combines puzzles and defense genres, and "Love is" the genre of emotional healing hidden picture search through the illustrator "Pugh" and IP collaboration.I met and talked with Baek Chul-min, the team leader of the company that developed '.

Please introduce the company and IP.

(Double Stroke CEO Hwang Seong-min/hereinafter referred to as 'Hwang CEO') Double Stroke Studio is a game developer that focuses on creative and strategic game development. "Coinmon Defense," which was released this year, is a unique game that combines the puzzle mechanism of the watermelon game and the strategic characteristics of the defense game, and is currently being launched in Korea. Games are available on the Google Play Store, One Store, and Apple App Store, and the game is continuously improving to reflect initial feedback from users. Although it has not produced much results because it has not yet carried out major promotions, it is increasing the completeness of the game based on positive responses and feedback from users, and plans to introduce the game to more users through a full-fledged marketing campaign soon.

(Lunosoft Team Leader Baek Chul-min / Hereinafter 'Team Leader Baek')Lunosoft is a game professional development, distribution, and publishing company that conducts publishing businesses including QA, QC, operation, and game community management, and has recently expanded its business area to the PC platform. In the meantime, various mobile games have been introduced, and with this support project, 'Love is' on Steam, a PC platform.I was able to release a game called '' stably.

How did you apply for commercialization and follow-up support programs?

(Representative Hwang) As a personal developer, I applied because I wanted to supplement the difficult parts with support projects. In particular, I was able to receive great help in areas such as QA, translation, and marketing. As it aims to launch globally, professional translation work and localization were needed, and it was difficult to come up with effective strategies in terms of marketing. In addition, the QA process for improving and stabilizing the overall quality of the game can be solved through support, so I thought it would be a great help in releasing high-quality games.

(Team Baek) I have some experience in launching mobile games, but PC-based steam games have no experience in launching them. So, while looking for helpful information here and there, I applied for a support project at the recommendation of an acquaintance in the game industry. I thought it was a great opportunity to get expert consulting on bugs, compatibility, and stability that can occur differently from mobile when developed as a PC version.

From left, "Lunosoft Team Leader Baek Chul-min" and "Double Stroke CEO Hwang Sung-min."

Where did you get help from the program?

(CEO Hwang) Through business support and consulting, I was able to overcome many difficulties I had as an individual developer. Balance adjustment was very important because each of the 50 kinds of coinmons in "Coinmon Defense" has its own attributes and skills, and the combination allows you to form a deck and develop your strategy. Since each coinmon is designed to create synergy with each other, if the balance is not balanced in the process, the fun of gameplay could be greatly reduced. Balancing all this alone was a very complicated and difficult task, but I was able to get feedback from the professional QA team and adjust it through the business support. This made the combination of attributes and skills more strategically balanced, allowing players to enjoy more in-depth games through various deck configurations.It was possible to focus only on the development of

(Team Baek), so the service was possible according to the target schedule. I think it would have been difficult to meet the schedule if the development and QA had been carried out internally.

What was the most impressive content and application examples of user feedback?

(Representative Hwang) I was able to get a lot of detailed feedback from users at offline events. Even if users did not speak directly, they were able to catch several improvements through their play scenes. There was an event in which one of the three goods was provided when the game was played in the game game audition booth, but among the goods, a simple clerical character was unexpectedly the first to be exhausted. Thanks to this, we learned that users prefer simple and intuitive designs. At that time, the "Coinmon Defense" was under development and was struggling to match design unity due to low overall completeness. This experience allowed me to further clarify the style of the game and the process was greatly influenced by completing the current "Coinmon Defense."

(Team Baek) 'Love is...The game is based on the work of PUUUNG, a globally recognized emotional healing artist. As the recognition is high, more than 7 million followers from various social communities have been interested in the released game, and most fans have left good ratings and reviews to see if it was fruitful for the artist's efforts to capture his emotions as much as possible. Every time I read the review of healing through the game, I was rewarded, and in order to repay the support, the quality of the original and BGM applied to the game was improved, and the completeness was increased.

CEO Hwang Sung-min of Double Stroke, the developer of 'Coinmon Defense'

What is the idea of combining puzzles and Tower Defense?

(Representative Hwang) I was consulting with a fellow developer in my office when I came up with the game idea. At that time, while conceiving various ideas for a new attempt, the keyword "Puzzle + Defense," which combines puzzles and defense, caught my eye. Mudge Defense already existed, but it started from the curiosity of whether there is a genre that combines the recent popular fruit merge and defense mechanism. So, I made and tested the prototype in two days, and through the process, the current 'Coinmon Defense' prototype was born.When I experienced my first prototype
I had a new feeling and got the impression that it was so much fun. I felt like I discovered the possibility of a new genre through this game. When I passed the first round of the Game Audition less than three months after the development, I was convinced that the idea of the game worked properly and gained a lot of confidence.

What are your goals for global expansion?

(Representative Hwang) The goal is to advance to various countries around the world. Casual games are a genre that is not limited to a specific country and is loved around the world, and "Coinmon Defense" is a simple and fun game with just one thumb. Thanks to this accessibility, I think it can appeal to many users in the global market as well. Specifically, Japan, the United States, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia, where the watermelon game was successful, can be cited as countries that want to advance. Users in this country are already familiar with the merge mechanism, so they expect to be able to accept the creative elements of "Coinmon Defense" more easily.

"Love is..." "Lunosoft Team Leader Baek Chulmin."

What is the know-how of successful development through IP and collaboration?

(Team Leader Baek) There is no grand formula for success. Any developer that produces games will do their best to produce and service them. However, in order to increase the completeness of the game, the self-analysis was sufficiently conducted to melt IP well into the game before the game was produced, and close direction discussions were conducted with partners from the initial stage of planning. Thanks to this, the satisfaction of the partner company seems to have been high, and I think the satisfaction of users who already know the IP of the game must have been higher.

What's the emotional point of a game player?

(Team Leader Baek) "Love is..."' The original story of the game has the theme of love. The story begins with the first meeting under the theme of love. The stage was designed and produced so that users could feel like watching a book and a movie while playing games, ranging from original text, sound, and sentences that can be immersed in the story while playing the game.

What is your future direction of development and ambition?

(CEO Hwang) We plan to increase the completeness of 'Coinmon Defense' in the Korean market first and then continue to develop it so that it can achieve results in overseas markets. Based on the feedback and achievements from Korea, the game will be refined to expand to global markets such as Japan, the United States, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia. The goal is to continue to develop fun and creative games not only this game but also in the future. It aims to become a developer that challenges various genres of games and provides users with fresh experiences. We will continue to expand the possibilities of games and present games that are recognized on the global stage.

(Team Baek)Lunosoft is developing a variety of high-quality games. A new game in collaboration with famous webtoon IP will also be introduced soon. In the future, if there is a competent developer who can coexist in relation to the publishing business, I would like to collaborate in various forms and consistently produce and service wonderful games.
Photograph: Shim Kwan-heum (shimgh@ytn.co.kr )