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”I’m trying to make a feel-good game, with
empathy and a strong friendship between a cat
and a dog, albeit with a noir atmosphere,” Yann
tells us.
Yann doesn’t consider himself a pixel artist (“I’m
trying to improve almost every day,” he says), but
the game’s characters are packed with charm.InteractiveInterface
interesting, at least from my point of view. Then,
I design the interrogations, what players should
learn about it, and imagine how Waffles will find
clues and items in the game. And at this point,
when it feels ready, I create a flow chart with
every possible interaction, and see if it could
work. After that, I finally draw the art and write
the rest of the dialogue.”
Three years in, Yann says the game’s code is
roughly 90 percent complete, and playing the
demo (which you can sample for yourself at
wfmag.cc/waffles), Inspector Waffles certainly
feels polished. The main things left to do, Yann
says, include finishing off some remaining
backgrounds and completing the dialogue, but
he hopes to have the game done by the end
of the year. Fitting Inspector Waffles around
his working life hasn’t always been easy, Yann
admits, but his desire to see the finished game
has kept him motivated. “I’m working on my
games during breaks, evenings, and sometimes
weekends – that’s why Inspector Waffles goes
slowly,” Yann explains. “It’s hard to have two
jobs at the same time, to be honest. I’d love to
become a full indie someday... Inspector Waffles
has been in my life for quite a long time now,
and even if I love working on it, it’s normal to
sometimes feel the need to do something else.
But, at the same time, I can’t wait to see the
full story not only on paper, but also in a
video game, like I started to imagine it three
years ago.”FILM NOIR
Inevitably, Inspector Waffles
leans as heavily on film
and TV as it does on video
games. “Recently, I watched
Mindhunter, and it inspired me
a lot,” Yann says. “Inspector
Waffles’ plot was already
written when I saw it, but the
characters, detectives, and
serial killers are incredibly
well done.”
Back in the realm of games,
Rockstar’s L.A.Noire proved
to be a big inspiration. “The
investigation mechanics, the
atmosphere, the sidekicks... It’s
one of my favourite games ever.
You felt like a real detective,
and that’s what I’m trying to do
with my game.”
The buddy-cop aspect of
Yann’s game, on the other
hand, was drawn from an older
source: eighties thriller, Lethal
Weapon. “I created Waffles and
Spotty, the sniffer dog, as
a comedic duo. Waffles
is smart, sarcastic, and
doesn’t follow the rules.
On the other hand, Spotty
is loyal and naive – he’s a
good boy. They have just
one thing in common:
they both doubt a lot
about how good they are
at work.”When it comes to designing Inspector Waffles’
mysteries, meanwhile, Yann has been careful to
come up with puzzles that don’t leave players
scratching their heads – or worse, infuriated
when they realise how obscure the solution is.
In the game’s first chapter, for example, a
door can be opened by improvising a new
handle from two random yet logical objects –
just the kind of satisfying ‘a-ha’ moment you
need in an adventure game. “I love games like
Monkey Island and Day of the Tentacle – they
have this comedic atmosphere where puzzles
can be very obscure,” Yann says. “And players
are OK with things like washing a dirty car to
make it rain. Inspector Waffles has some comedic
aspects too, but I tried to make this game more
as a detective movie in which you played the
main character. Obscure puzzles won’t fit in it,
so the game isn’t hard if you pay attention to the
dialogue and look closely at the backgrounds.
And for players who like harder challenges, there
will be some story-related secrets to find.”
WAFFLY VERSATILE
As for working out the game’s structure, Yann
says that he starts with the story first, with the
puzzles and other elements springing from
it. “I always start by writing the whole story,
like a movie scenario: a sequence of places to
visit, important dialogue, and the mandatory
objects players will find. It’s vital for me to feel,
before anything else, that the story is good and
In true murder mystery fashion, Inspector
Waffles begins with a dead body and a
rapidly growing list of suspects.