We are incredibly honoured to announce that N++ was given the Special Recognition award at IndieCade 2014! EDIT: check out photos of the award.
The Special Recognition Award goes to N++ – "A true work of art" developed over a decade.
— IndieCade (@IndieCade) October 10, 2014
We are surprised and elated — it’s incredibly gratifying for N++ to be recognized like this. Thank you so much to IndieCade, to the judges, to fans of the series, and to everyone who helped make N++ possible; we’re really happy that there are people other than us that believe in what we’re doing ๐
We’re especially proud that this award recognizes our game as a creative work, and not just well-designed entertainment; we’ve always believed that games are an important medium, and that approaching them as games — as something new and different, without relying on traditions from literature or film — is necessary in order to fully realize their true power and potential. It’s incredibly rewarding to know that we’re not alone in this belief, and moreover, that N++ can be seen as an example of this. That is a huge, huge honour.
This also comes at a great time, as 2014 marks the 10th anniversary of Metanet Software’s official incorporation, and a decade since N was initially made. That’s a lot of history!
Happy 10th Anniversary Metanet Software!
Receiving this award from IndieCade specifically also means a great deal to us. In 2006, N won the Audience Award for Best Game at Slamdance, a predecessor of IndieCade. It was an overwhelmingly surprising and positive moment in our lives, and impacted a lot, including the way we felt about N being a “real” game. It helped us understand that making games was potentially something we could try to actually pursue as a career, since at the time we were still working random day jobs and working on games in the evenings and weekends.
So in a sense, N++ receiving this award means we’ve come full circle, and we have an opportunity to appreciate what it means now — and how we’ve grown and changed over the past ten years.
Way back in 2004, we threw a lot of caution to the wind — we started Metanet Software on a whim and released our first game for free! Although much of our initial confidence can perhaps be attributed to youthful arrogance, and although we’re only now recovering from the imposter syndrome brought on by N’s success and plummeting self esteem due to the failure of Robotology, we’ve managed to pull through a lot over the years. The hardest part has been keeping everything in perspective, and finding the motivation to continue even when it seems there’s no reason to.
We’ve learned a ton, both emotionally and technically over the years. We stopped taking risks for a while (because it’s tougher when you have something to lose), which was detrimental (this line of work is all about risk) but we’re getting to a point where we have enough information to take calculated risks. We started working on N++ hoping to make the best version of the game there could possibly be, but as we’ve continued working on it our vision of what exactly that is has grown immensely. We want to devote all our time and energy to it, and have found new avenues to explore even though we thought we had already previously envisioned everything the N world had to offer. It’s exciting. We’re starting to gain back some belief in our skills because of how well we feel N++ is turning out, and we’re more able to understand why we feel that way and what contributions our own actions and talents and personalities are having.
We’re more fully fleshed out people now than we were when we met. Granted, with more scars and fears and many mistakes made, but we also have a lot more experience and a lot that we can be proud of as well. In many ways, N++ embodies and reflects these ten complex years, and it’s both surprising and heart-warming that others can see value in that too. Whatever happens, we will continue to take some risks, make mistakes, and overall to keep trying.
We make the games we do because some ideas speak to us, and we like to experiment and be creative — it’s a path fraught with peril that frequently doesn’t work out well. Suffice it to say, we’ve had many tough times and now recognize just how lucky we are to be able to do what we love — and even though it’s incredibly difficult, to love what we do.
We have had such a great amount of luck over the years, and have met so many people along the way who believe in us and enjoy what we do — and also who inspire us to keep learning and to keep trying. Whatever success we have had, we could not have gotten to this place without the support and love of our friends, family and fans. Thank you, everyone — here’s to another ten years.
Congratulations. The journey’s just getting started. Ten years is nothing.
Huge congratulations M&R, that is a totally deserved recognition, I wish you the best success with N++ ๐
Thank you both ๐
Congratuations, thats well deserved. I remember having N1.4 competitions with my friends in “Highschool” (Danish version of it), with the winner getting a beer in the fridaybar from the looser. Remember using hours and hours on reaching level 87, just for me to lose my savefile.
N is for sure a game with history for alot of people, now i cant wait for the next chapter; To smack my friends around in pvp (havnt ever tried those game modes!) and to feel the sweet victory when you clear a level that have keept you stuck for days.
Please, let it be released in 2014, we need the perfect Xmas gift!
I just came from IndieCade, and kids *love* playing the game. Multiplayer mode is a fantastic addition (both co-op and screw-over-the-other-players modes). Congrats.
Congratulations on the award M&R and happy tenth birthday!
any chance we can get a release date?
Thanks everyone ๐
We’re hoping we can announce a release date soon, but we *really* don’t want to say anything until we know for sure.
Aaw I missed the anniversary! Well happy belated birthday then, Metanet. I’m glad it’s lasted this long!
Thank you for your timely feedback. its great to see yall are still working hard to get the game to us before the end of the year!
Hello M&R,
I know you are not sure of the release date as of yet, so I won’t ask about that :p but have you any ideas on what the price might be? I just want to make sure I have enough in my wallet for when the game is finally released!
Thanks,
John
We’re not sure about that either, unfortunately. Hopefully we’ll have sorted all that out soon!
You’re saying that since 2013. But I understand what happened.
Just hope you’re considering about a STEAM version of the game. That will make a lot of people happy (and I guess the people at Metanet too ๐
Hey! Happy anniversary and thanks for all your hard work! N really is the game of my life. I’ve spent more time playing N (or N2) than playing all other games combined! (:
Can’t wait for the new version! I’ve missed out on the Xbox, but I’m gonna buy a PS4 on the day N++ comes out!
@asdbsd: thank you! Actually, we have some exciting news for people who are getting N++ but have never played N+, however we can’t say anything quite yet… stay tuned ๐
Congrats guys!
I know you guys aren’t sure about anything in relation to release date/price, which is okay for me, but how close are you guys to being done creating the game, if you aren’t done already? (If I may ask) N++ looks like a masterpiece, and I raise my glass to you guys for all the hard work you’ve been putting into this! ๐
@DoompyPoomp: you’ve inspired us to write a new blog post about the current status of everything.. stay tuned ๐
Look! Here N fans Animations ๐
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO1v3YQVa-E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cfoqx0L-o6I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO1v3YQVa-E
Stop! but Why only on PS4 :(?
Hi guys! I don’t know where to approach you, so I will post this here. Thanks for awesome game, it’s entertaining me since very first version, but I found bug when playing N2 in firefox or downloadable version on Windows 7 – when I’m collecting gold my timer didn’t expand. Also in downloadable version, this error occurs: TypeError: Error #1009: Nie moลผna uzyskaฤ dostฤpu do wลaลciwoลci lub metody dla odniesienia do obiektu null.
at audiovisual::SoundManager/PlaySound_Gold()
at simulation.entities::Entity_Gold/CollideVsCircle_Logical()
at simulation.ninja::Ninja/PostCollision()
at simulation::Simulator/Tick()
at com.metanet::App_MultiPurpose/tickSimulator()
at com.metanet::App_MultiPurpose/tickGameInProgress()
at com.metanet::App_MultiPurpose/tickGame()
at com.metanet::App_MultiPurpose/tick()
at NMediator/handleEnterFrame()
at org.robotlegs.base::EventMap/routeEventToListener()
at MethodInfo-119()
Thanks for looking at this.
@Pootis: that’s been asked and answered a bunch of times on this blog, and also in an email to you the other day! Here’s the answer again: we’re a really tiny team of only 3 people, with very few resources (ie time and money). Nick Suttner from Sony was really really supportive and is a huge reason N++ exists at all. We really want to be able to bring N++ to other systems but we need money to do that — if it does well on PS4, that’s what we hope to do.
[…] the whole, the game is turning out to be exactly what we had hoped it could be, however it’s taken much longer than we anticipated. Sorry about the delay, but […]
@krysztal: thanks, we’ll pass this along to Golden Gear, who will hopefully have time to check it out soon! you can always email us (metanet AT metanetsoftware dot com) if you have more details.