The release of the Ukrainian card RPG/strategy game Menace from the Deep was accompanied by a small scandal, but eventually all the nuances were clarified and it turned out that it is a very good game with original art, interesting gameplay and full Ukrainian voice acting. The game has a Steam rating of 83/100 (699 reviews), has more online fans than Songs Of Silence, and, according to independent resources, has already sold 10-20 thousand copies. That’s pretty good for an indie project. We decided to talk to the game’s developer Artem Bazdyrev about how this project was created, what problems the author solved, how he evaluates the result, and whether he plans to develop the game further.
Oleg Danylov: Good afternoon, Artem. First of all, let me congratulate you on the release and, it seems, on the success. Are you satisfied with how the game is selling and what kind of feedback it is getting? If it’s not a secret, which countries are leading in sales and what share does Ukraine account for?
Artem Bazdyrev: Thank you for the congratulations and for calling me for an interview. I am extremely pleased with the sales, because for a game developed by one person, albeit with the help of my girlfriend, an artist, the result is better than I expected. I’m also generally pleased with the reviews. They are not perfect, because I made some mistakes in the game design, but the assessment of Menace from the Deep is quite good at the moment. Since the release, I’ve been actively supporting the game, fixing bugs, adding new mechanics, and adjusting the balance. Fortunately, the problems that players discuss the most are quite easy to fix. Therefore, the game’s rating on Steam is gradually growing.
As for sales. They are closer to the top mark you mentioned. The leader among the countries where players are most active in purchasing Menace from the Deep is the United States (24%), which is expected. China is in second place (20%), which is also predictable. Although I have been criticized a bit because of sales in China, Chinese players, among others, formed the necessary “core” at the start of sales. Next are Western European countries. Ukraine ranks 10th, with 3% of total sales. Perhaps the small scandal that took place the day after the release affected sales in Ukraine. I accept this and treat it with understanding. Our country is not the largest in terms of population, so 3% is quite a tangible support from our players. After all, a large number of Ukrainian players have purchased the game, not least to support me. And I hope that other Ukrainian indie developers feel this support as well.
Oleg Danylov: In fact, did the Ukrainian dubbing pay off, because it’s not common in indie games, especially in card games? Tell us why you decided to do the full English and Ukrainian dubbing of Menace from the Deep, how much it cost, and what challenges you faced in the process.
Artem Bazdyrev: The second question is about money. In my case, the issues of both voices are not related to payback. I just wanted to make the cutscenes more lively, to convey some of the nuances of certain scenes with the actors’ voices and intonations. I adore Ukrainian voice acting in both movies and games. Of the games I’ve personally played, Ukrainian voice acting was literally in a handful. I can only recall the Metro series, the surzhyk in the classic S.T.A.L.K.E.R., and my brother’s game Timeloop: Sink Again Beach. I’m sure this list is a bit longer, but this is what I’ve played personally(yes, a bit longer, see the Catalog of Ukrainian Localization of Games – ed.)
There were no difficulties with the voice acting at all. For the English version, I looked for actors myself on fiverr.com. All of them turned out to be very nice people, and they fulfilled the order quickly and relatively inexpensively. The English version cost me about $600-700.
As for the Ukrainian version, everything is much more interesting. The dubbing was done by the #SKOROUKINO studio, and I was assisted by a very nice person and professional dubbing actress Kateryna Braikovska, whose voice almost all of your readers have probably heard in movies or TV series. Her studio is located in Kyiv and she works with many other professional dubbing actors. I was present during the dubbing process of both Menace from the Deep and Timeloop: Sink Again Beach. And these were unforgettable moments for me, because the process itself is very interesting and extremely fun.
What surprises me is that the cheapest English-speaking dubbing actors from fiverr.com are more expensive than our professional actors whose voices are known to all Ukrainians. I think this is very unfair. Ukrainian dubbing cost me about $500-600. This is a lot of money for indie developers, but not all games have 20 pages of script and a lot of work for actors. I love to play and hear Ukrainian, so I encourage other indie developers to also order voice acting for our actors. I’ve talked to them a lot and they want to voice over games as well, but in 3 years, apart from me and my brother, they’ve only received one such order.
Oleg Danylov: You stopped working at Superbright in August 2023, and the Menace from the Deep page appeared on Steam in November 2023, so it took a little over a year to develop the game?
Artem Bazdyrev: That’s right. In August, I quit my job at the Polish studio Superbright VR because I was going through an existential, professional, and personal crisis at the same time due to the war. So I decided to take on another project of my own, a big one for me. I thought, “If not now, when?” I started researching the indie market, studying which genres had the most players interested. After about a month of analysis (September 2023), designing the game’s skeleton, and the first attempts to create some of my own, not too difficult to implement, but interesting visual style, I started working on the prototype.
I started a Steam page when I had the opportunity to take at least some screenshots of the prototype. The demo was released in February 2024. Many Ukrainian content creators agreed to play the demo and share their impressions with the community. They gave Menace from the Deep the first impetus for Steam to start noticing the activity around the game. For which I am very grateful to our gaming YouTubers.
The entire development process took 15 months. Very difficult months, because I worked 10-12 hours a day, including weekends. But it was one of the best years of my life because I was doing what I loved, what I had dreamed of since childhood, and I was my own boss.
Oleg Danylov: The credits for Menace from the Deep include you, the background artist, a few testers from friends and colleagues, and… that’s it. Do I understand correctly that you did most of the tasks on this project? You seem to be an artist first and foremost, so you mastered the programming and everything else on your own?
Artem Bazdyrev: I’m going to start from a bit of a distance, if you don’t mind. My career in IT started in 2014 as a programmer. My brother and I started programming back in early 2000. Of course, these were very simple games, like some kind of tamagotchi, or very simple point’n’click quests. But programming is not a new thing for me. In 2017, I got tired of programming because I was working on projects that had nothing to do with game development, and I was drawn to it. That’s why I decided to make a very radical change, which is probably typical for me.
I saved up more money to have something to live on, quit my job, bought a graphics tablet, and started learning to draw at home using YouTube tutorials. After six months of self-study, I was accepted to the Kharkiv Gameloft studio. There I gained more experience in drawing, thanks to my colleagues and especially thanks to my lead (Andriy Chaika). I started learning 3D for myself. And then I felt cramped in mobile gaming, because not all projects have room for artists with ambitions.
That’s when I quit my job at the very beginning of 2020 and started my first big project, Sink Again (not to be confused with my brother’s game). I knew I could design the graphics and program everything myself. I personally really liked the project, but I made every possible mistake so that my game would sink forever on Steam. I recouped the time I spent on the game, but it can’t be called a success.
By the way, at the beginning of the full-scale invasion, I removed the game from Steam as a protest against the fact that Steam cooperates with Russian studios and sells its games in Russia. I don’t regret it, but over time I came to the conclusion that without Steam, indie is almost non-existent, and that continuing to protest is only hurting myself.
In Menace from the Deep, I personally did everything myself, except for the backgrounds in the battle and some backgrounds in Encounters, which were painted by my girlfriend in her spare time. Of course, I didn’t compose any music or voice over anything. I hired specialists for this, they are listed in the credits. But all the work on the code, game design, and most of the graphics work is done by me. And I am proud of it.
Oleg Danylov: Why a card game, why Cthulhu and mysticism? Are you a big fan of Lovecraft?
Artem Bazdyrev: I’m a fan of this setting, but I can’t call myself a fan of Lovecraft, although I’ve listened to many audiobooks by Lovecraft. I can be called a fan of everything related to Lovecraft, everything that is made in the universe of his works. I am also a fan of Halloween and everything related to this holiday. Therefore, I had no questions about the choice of setting.
As for the genre, card games are quite popular, and I chose the genre based on market analysis. Besides, at that time I was a fan of Slay the Spire, so I chose this genre. In general, it’s rare for a developer to work on a project of their favorite genre, because the result of their work should not be a game that they will play themselves, but one that others will admire. Perhaps this is an inappropriate comparison, but the classical paintings of Renaissance artists, which are considered masterpieces, were not painted by artists for their own reasons-they were commissioned and paid for. But that doesn’t make these paintings any less quality or important. In other words, not all paintings that are custom-made are automatically bad, just as games that are developed for the market are not automatically bad and soulless. Of course, I’m not comparing myself to Renaissance painters, this is just an example of how sometimes the work of developers does not fully coincide with their preferences. But in my case, I found the perfect middle ground for myself and therefore enjoyed the process immensely.
Oleg Danylov: The game has been released and seems to be selling well, do you plan to continue developing this universe through DLC, a sequel, or have you not thought that far yet?
Artem Bazdyrev: I really like this question. Although I am a realist, I love to fantasize about what games I will make in the future. During the development of Menace from the Deep, I came up with about 4 or 5 ideas that I want to consider in the future.
As for Menace from the Deep, the most active phase of the game’s support is underway right now. I plan to improve and add a lot of things in the coming months. Since the release(which is only 10 days – ed. note), I have already added 2 new mechanics that are key to the genre, but which I learned about after the first negative reviews on Steam. In the near future (during the winter), I want to make three relatively large updates with new content. I will start working on them when I finish fixing the latest bugs and balance issues.
I don’t plan to make a sequel yet, because the original game was released only a week ago, but next year I want to develop DLC for Menace from the Deep, which will include another playable character and a new act. I’ve had all these ideas written down in the documentation for a long time. But in any case, DLC is a matter of the future, which, sorry for the wording, we still have to live to see. And the only thing I’m fantasizing about right now is taking a break from the year-long development marathon.
Oleg Danylov: The release of Menace from the Deep was accompanied by a small scandal. Tell us about this situation, what happened?
Artem Bazdyrev: I had no doubt that this question would be asked here. But I don’t mind clarifying it again, and maybe adding some new details.
First of all, I support people with an active civic position, and I don’t hold a grudge against those who pointed out my mistakes. The game got into a bundle with a game from Russian developers. These bundles were created by employees of a Chinese publisher that distributes my games in Asia. By the way, I don’t have a publisher in the whole world. That is, I publish myself all over the world, except for Asia.
I was introduced to the CEO of this publishing house by Isaac, a Canadian who owns Crimson Herring Studios, and we met in Germany at Gamescom. Isaac gave me a lot of useful advice during development, and then shared that he had enlisted the support of a Chinese publisher to enter the Asian market. I also used their services to attract more players and to localize the game into Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. I knew that the publisher was planning to make bundles on the day of release, but it never occurred to me that they would make a bundle with a Russian game. When I was informed about this, I immediately contacted the publisher and ordered them to remove the bundle. The publisher was completely understanding and assured me that this would not happen again.
Oleg Danylov: Menace from the Deep was condemned, among other things, because the game was initially sold in Russia, and then you removed it from sale. Now the developer and player communities are divided on this issue. Some believe that you can’t sell anything in Russia. Others, on the contrary, say that receiving money from the Russians is a good opportunity to finance the Ukrainian armed forces with their money. What are your thoughts on this?
Artem Bazdyrev: Regarding sales in Russia. I have already explained in a post on Steam that the game is sold in all countries by default and there are no separate settings to ban the game elsewhere. To ban a game from Steam in a particular country, you need to contact the service’s support and wait a few days for confirmation. I should have done this in advance, but it just slipped my mind because in the last 2-3 months before the release, I had to work even harder than before to meet the schedule.
I don’t like the idea that my game could be entertaining for some Russians at a time when I and other Ukrainians are sitting without electricity and in fear of air raids. But I don’t really understand such a strong negative reaction to the fact that I didn’t ban sales in time. Buying Russian games is definitely bad, because they enrich the aggressor country, but why it doesn’t work in the opposite direction is not entirely clear to me. Because when, for example, China is expanding its products to markets all over the world, or Russia is expanding its games filled with propaganda, no one condemns them in their own country.
We are a democratic and free country, so I don’t want to get into a fight with anyone over this issue. In any case, I have corrected both mistakes and acknowledged them. I can’t stop people from kenseling me and my game for this, but some commenters have gone to personal insults and made up all sorts of nonsense about the game being made with Chinese investments and so on.
Oleg Danylov: You graduated from the Zaporizhzhia Institute of Economics and Information Technologies with a degree in finance, but have been working in the gaming industry since 2017. How did you get into the profession? What courses or online resources helped you master the necessary skills? What advice do you have for those who want to get into game development?
Artem Bazdyrev: I have already touched on this a bit in other questions. Yes, I have a red diploma in business economics and finance. But I never worked in my specialty because I knew since childhood that I would make games. I’m 33 now, and the opportunity to create games on my own hasn’t been around for long. Although game development is fun, it is also quite challenging. It took me years to master my programming and graphics skills. But I am still not an expert or a guru. In my opinion, if any of the readers are planning to start developing games, they should immediately realize that it will take years before your first game, which will at least pay off the time spent on its development, will be released. Because everyone still needs to make all the mistakes personally before everything turns out right.
But the good news is that not everyone can learn to code and draw. No one is born an artist or a programmer, you just have to be prepared for the fact that it will take a long time. And the most important thing is not to give up at the beginning, when it seems that nothing is working at all and that it’s not your thing at all. It was only a few years ago that I realized that making a game is not difficult, it’s difficult to make a game that will allow you to live without a part-time job until the next game comes out.
You can learn to code and draw at home by watching Youtube and using Google, and now ChatGPT. If I did it many years ago, then anyone can do it now, when there is much more information on the Internet and development tools have become easier. Some courses can speed up the process if you have good mentors.
I have one extremely important piece of advice for all aspiring indie developers. In my opinion, programming and graphics are not the most difficult thing, the most difficult thing is to develop a game that not only you personally but also others will want to play, to show it to the world in the most tempting way possible, because the competition is extremely high. Chris Zukowski helped me to deal with this particular issue. I recommend watching all his videos on Youtube if you are not afraid of English, and Chris also has a website with useful information. I don’t want to paraphrase these tips, it’s better to listen to Chris himself, he is an interesting speaker and understands this issue better than anyone else.
Oleg Danylov: You worked in big studios like Gameloft and Superbright, but after two years you left to create your own games. Do you work better alone than in a team, or do you want more freedom and something of your own?
Artem Bazdyrev: I want to correct, Superbright VR is not a very big studio, there were about 20 employees there, and unfortunately, as far as I know, they started having financial difficulties and the studio closed. I like to change my job about once every 2-3 years, because unfortunately in studios you are often tied to one project and after a while you stop enjoying the process. In all the studios where I worked, I had good relationships with my colleagues and every time I was sorry to leave, but I can’t stay on one project for a long time.
I can’t say that I like working alone. On the contrary, I like to work in a team and I love working in an office. There is a pleasant vibe to it for me. It’s much harder to work alone, although it gives you a lot of freedom. I worked on Menace from the Deep solo because my brother and friends, with whom we start joint projects from time to time, were not ready to take the risk and work full-time. It’s just that it’s always a personal state, which also depends on the financial situation, and it rarely coincides with like-minded people.
Oleg Danylov: Your twin brother Pylyp Bazdyrev also develops games. Why don’t you work together, as they say twins have a special bond and understanding?
Artem Bazdyrev: Pylyp and I have started various projects many times, most of which did not reach release because we enjoy the process. We have a good relationship, but we live in different cities, worked in different studios and in different fields. Therefore, it was difficult to synchronize and we have almost no joint projects that have reached release.
I love the passion with which Phil makes his games, and if it weren’t for him, my motivation wouldn’t be as high. He and I are driven by healthy competition, but after the second big project alone, it’s mentally difficult for me to sit down to a new one on my own. So just yesterday I suggested to my brother that we do something big and cool together. But it’s an open question, because he’s working on two of his own projects, and I have to support Menace from the Deep for a long time. But for some reason, I think that the next game I’ll create will be paired with my brother. At least, I hope so.
Oleg Danylov: Finally, a question I ask all Ukrainian developers. Do you think we need more games about Ukraine based on Ukrainian history, Ukrainian narratives, and Ukrainian brands? Do you plan to develop such games?
Artem Bazdyrev: I agree with this statement, and I think there are more and more games like this coming out. But I think it’s more of a question for big studios like 4A Games, GSC Game World, Frogware, etc. because they have a bigger reach. It is difficult even for a relatively successful indie game to reach many players around the world and share our culture with them. Because 99% of indie developers are trying to at least start earning money from their games and not work a full shift at their main job. Therefore, they have to choose more common settings.
Although we have several indie masterpieces on national themes. For example, the extremely fascinating citybuilder The Island. Or Hollow Home, a game about war, which, as far as I know, is still in development, but is winning awards even at European festivals. My friends and I also discussed ideas based on our cultural tradition or related to war. But so far, I have nothing to brag about, except that Menace from the Deep has a Borsch that restores health.
Oleg Danylov: Thank you for your answers, Artem. All the best for improving Menace from the Deep and developing new projects.
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