At the end of August, the whole company went on a team-building trip to Hokkaido, enjoying a good break.
When they came back, in the last few days before school started, Ichin finally finished balancing the numbers system for The Binding of Isaac. He even personally handled the small amount of voice acting the game required, pulling in a few coworkers to record the lines.
After testing was complete, he packed everything up and uploaded it to Steam and Epic for review.
As for the Switch version, that would need to come later—it still required some platform-specific adaptation.
Stretching his arms, Ichin let out a deep breath, a smile spreading across his face. "Finally done."
Utaha, lying on the bed playing on the Switch, immediately set the console aside and hurried over to him.
"Ichin, it's really finished?"
"Yep, all done. My efficiency's not bad, huh?"
He spoke with obvious pride.
Even he was surprised by his own speed. Back when he developed Slay the Spire, it had taken nearly three months to complete. But this time, in just a month and a half, he had managed to finish The Binding of Isaac.
Of course, this was only the base game—not including Rebirth or any of the later DLCs. Adding those would take at least another month and a half.
Utaha looked at his smiling face in amazement. "That really is fast. How come this time was so quick?"
"It's mostly the art style," Ichin explained. "This one's pixel art, which I'm way more comfortable with. Unlike Slay the Spire, where I spent ages just drawing characters and monsters. Art was never my strongest suit."
"So that's why."
Her gaze drifted to the already-uploaded game package on his computer. "So when will it release?"
"Let me think…"
Ichin quickly estimated the review times and checked the calendar. "Let's go with September 1st. I'll use these next couple days to double-check everything in case there are tweaks to make."
With that, he opened Bilibili and posted an announcement.
Since the game was finished, it was time to let the players know.
> Hello everyone, we just got back from a company trip, and during my spare time I wrapped up development on a solo project. The game is called The Binding of Isaac—a small pixel-style, top-down shooter. The art is deliberately dark, so those interested can check it out once the Steam and Epic pages go live. I'll also post a short trailer later. It'll release on Steam, Epic, and Switch. The Switch port isn't finished yet, so that version will come a bit later. The PC release is scheduled for September 1st, priced at 35 yuan. Please look forward to it!
Within minutes of posting, discussions exploded.
Most players had already cleared Persona over the summer. Some were replaying it, but many were searching for something new, wondering when the next announcement would drop.
No one expected Ichin to suddenly appear at the end of August with a completely new game—developed solo, no less.
Even if it was "just" a small pixel game, Slay the Spire had been small too—and look how huge that turned out. So curiosity was instantly hooked.
An hour later, Ichin uploaded a short promo video for Isaac.
The trailer showed exactly what he described: dark style, dungeon crawling, top-down pixel shooting. It wasn't a huge project, but the footage was undeniably intriguing.
> The protagonist looks kinda cute at first, but wait—his bullets are TEARS?
> Not only that, but as the video goes on, he just keeps getting uglier!
> True, but the uglier he got, the bigger the bullets became—and the stronger the damage. So it's basically: I got uglier, but I also got stronger?
> Okay, I'm interested now.
> And at that price? Sure, I'll try it. Steam has refunds anyway.
Just like that, discussion and hype spread quickly.
On September 1st, the game officially launched.
Thanks to the fanbase built up from his previous three titles, even this small-scale release shot straight into the top sellers on Steam's China region, and sales in other regions weren't bad either.
Some players held off, waiting for the Switch release since the game looked perfect for handheld mode.
On September 3rd, the Switch version cleared review at lightning speed, and the port was released immediately.
Although Isaac was a solo-developed game, its polish was remarkable. Bugs were rare, and on Switch it ran flawlessly at 60 FPS.
Despite being under a gigabyte in size, the amount of content shocked players.
The collection menu had pages of items marked with question marks, waiting to be unlocked. There were also 10 playable characters—only Isaac available at the start, with the rest requiring unlocks.
After five days on sale, no one on any forum had managed to unlock everything. At best, they had unlocked all the characters, but many items were still hidden.
Replayability was insane. With so many items, every run produced different combinations, leading to wildly different outcomes.
Once streamers picked it up, the hype grew even further.
And at just 35 yuan—barely the price of two cups of milk tea—players had no hesitation trying it out.
At the office, Hazuki looked at the game's Steam page showing a 93% positive rating and sighed in admiration. "As expected of you, Ichin. Even a summer side project reaches this level."
Ichin sipped his coffee and smiled. "It's only because it's a small game. If it were any bigger, I couldn't have done it solo. By the way, Hazuki, your team's development has reached a good stage, right?"
Closing Steam, Hazuki nodded. "That's right. The action system and framework are finished, and we've already designed a good number of stages."
"Perfect. Then let's put up a demo build on Steam."
*
RedX43's Note:
➤ Want More? Get up to +70 Extra Chapters on Patreon!
➤ [email protected]/RedX43
➤ +300 Power Stones = +1 Extra Chapter Drop!
➤ Thanks for the support! 🙌