Backyard Zoo
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backyardzoo.bsky.social
Backyard Zoo
@backyardzoo.bsky.social
Solo indie game dev

Currently working on my first game ‘Mayfly’, an atmospheric quiet horror game set entirely on a narrowboat

Lancashire, UK
🥱😴
November 7, 2025 at 4:49 PM
I think you might have a good point there indeed - thank you

I really hope you like it and I look forward to seeing what you think when Mayfly is released
November 7, 2025 at 4:48 PM
Thank you so much for the feedback. ‘Quiet horror’ is in and of itself a sub-genre of horror (I don’t know til recently) - perhaps it needs to be in quotations to emphasise this point? 🤔

I agree that without this distinction it could sound clumsily worded
November 7, 2025 at 4:10 PM
I get the impression you just want to smash things up (alarm clock, cupboard doors etc) - your live stream is going to be interesting 😆
November 3, 2025 at 7:39 PM
You’re a horror connoisseur now. 😇
November 2, 2025 at 8:18 AM
Thank you ☺️
September 13, 2025 at 8:03 PM
Amazing to hear, thank you
September 13, 2025 at 8:02 PM
Thank you for saying so.

I really hope it can win over non-horror fans like yourself + I’m trying to avoid jump scares and looking to evoke the horror through sound and atmosphere.
September 13, 2025 at 8:02 PM
Thank you for saying so. I agree.

In the first cinematic you exit the bed on that side too so it’s folded over that way.

I feel like you can almost smell the morning dew on that duvet cover. Maybe that’s just me though haha.
September 11, 2025 at 7:42 PM
Thank you for commenting! ☺️

Bit of an education for me I’ve never heard of that game before.

Maybe this will be pocket-sized version (that doesn’t sink) - spoiler alert
September 11, 2025 at 7:39 PM
Consistent feedback from the play tests:

- Event triggers not always clear
- Horror atmosphere could afford to be toned down even more
- Exiting the first puzzle is not as clear as could be

Over the moon with that. A massive thanks to 👉 @mustlovedon.bsky.social 👈 for being awesome too.

#gamedev
September 11, 2025 at 12:14 PM
Mayfly's build size halved - now 190MB. Max amount of tris down from 4.8m (lol) to 400k.

Now runs incredibly smoothly on a potato laptop. 😱

#gamedev #gameoptimisation #unity3d
September 10, 2025 at 12:38 PM
But..but I want my flowers accurate down to the sub-atomic level.

1% of third party assets making up 99.9% of the polys

Moral of the story: if you want a job doing do it yourself. 💪🏻

#gamedev
September 9, 2025 at 7:43 PM