Artists / Creatives

2017.05.26 - PC Gamer - Meet the indie dev who spent two years making a game in youth hostels abroad
- Upon finishing university, Johnson planned to create his own game for resume purposes.
- In 2009, Johnson finished the demo for what was then known as Subvein and invited his buddies from the Soldat community to try it.
- The forums started growing and what had begun as a hobbyist side venture begun dominating Johnson's spare time before long. Work at an online gambling firm served as a means of funding whichever "cool features" he felt like casually implementing week-on-week, and ultimately financed his ventures abroad.
- he'd have his head buried in his laptop for eight hours a day.
- After a while, Johnson decided he'd had enough of the busiest accommodations and moved to a quieter Airbnb-recommended spot in Arequipa, Peru. In Australian dollars it cost nine dollars a night (roughly £5.25/$6.70) to live
- Once he'd visited the most iconic tourist sites nearby, not least Machu Picchu, Johnson was distraction free
- "The entire time I was there was filled with self-doubt. Indie development is not at all a reliable way to make money. These things can take off or not, it's a very fickle and unreliable business—it's a fun one—but a lot of the time I thought about this whole thing being for nothing."