Development History

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See also: Versions

Soon after the completion of Two Brothers, Ackk Studios began work on their second project, which they dubbed "Project Y2K." Unlike their previous venture, the game would feature 3D graphics.

Pre-Prototype (2013)

The game was initially teased on February 3rd, 2013, with a music track of what was to be the main menu theme. The metadata has the games original title, "Project Y2K."

On Dec. 31st, 2013, three "150% in engine" screenshots were shown of the game.

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  Vella and the Killer Golden Jazz Alpaca.

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  The first look at what the battle system would look like. Looks pretty similar to I.V...

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  Alex and some unknown characters. Say hi to Jeffrey in the back!

Prototype Era (2014)

The game was now named YIIK. A prototype was developed between January 1st and March 22nd. It was first initially shown around April 11th, 2014 for PAX East. Taking place on September 3rd, 1999, (according to the Game Over screen), It shows a small scenario where Alex, Panda, Michael, and Vella explore a strange world in search of Soul Survivors. The soul survivors, rather than looking alien in design, were gothic vampires instead. It can be downloaded and played here.

It features the first ever appearance of the Golden Alpaca, with a more murky and threatening appearance.

In an interview with Destructoid, Andrew Allanson gave the premise for the game, explaining that, "Alex is a recent college graduate, he has a liberal arts degree, so he's completely unemployed. He's living in the year 1999, and a girl in his town passes away. There's an elevator that causes her death and there's a lot of mystery around it, but nobody in the town actually seems to care. Alex becomes obsessed with the fact that this girl passed away and he meets other people on the internet who has the same hobby of trying to solve her murder. They eventually realize that this is all connected to the end of the world and the onset of Y2K."

In terms of gameplay, they mention wanting a lot of quicktime events, including a minigame where you play DDR. Andrew also talks about the idea of spells "changing the rules of battle," and having win conditions in battles that aren't the typical "kill all the enemies to win." They also wanted to have a realistic money system, and considered adding minigames where you work a job to get money.

The soundtrack was mentioned to have a target of approximately 50 battle tracks, and that "you'll never hear the same battle track twice." They had also hoped that at least 35% of the music would be performed live.

While interviewers at the time were quick to notice the EarthBound influence, Andrew and Brian Allanson both gave more examples of influences, such as Persona and Haruki Murakami's novels Wild Sheep Chase, Dance Dance Dance, and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Other Unsorted Media

These articles aren't implemented in the main article yet, so you can check them out individually.

April

• ThirdRateMinion's Prototype Walkthrough.
• The main town shown again, with some more muted colors.

May

• Prototype being played with a PS4 controller.

June

• The game has three playable woman characters, with pictures showing Essentia and Vella.
• A reply showing a NPC not found in the final game.
• The inital design for the Factory Hotel, later reused for Easton University.
• First voice actor has been casted.
• "Camera Girl" npc design.
• Frankton Forest.
• Beta Mountain Trail.
• Early Chondra Concept Art.
• More early Chondra Concept Art, interestingly called a "potential party member".
• Better look at the prealpha Factory Hotel exterior
• Two pictures, one is factory hotel and the other is a dead link
• Battle menu gets a revamp.

July

An odd screenshot showing what is apparently a mind dungeon.

• Battle menu is experimented on again.
• Arcade Music is revealed, but dead link.
• Extremely early mind dungeon
• A shot of the factory hotel from down the stairs.
• More factory hotel.
• Thinking of you whenever you are Demo track, dead link.

Pre-Alpha

On August 15th, 2014, full time development began.

2014

Old Frankton

Brigid doing y2k art

"Sequencing music AND making a map! @Vapour_Rumours is a machine!"

Factory Hotel(?)

Old Frankton

Sammy in Factory

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/508014320505331712 Pyramid room

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/509048562194608128 Combat screen showing a weird UI

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/510508426276126720 Goth kids at arcade

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/512649058930798592 Vella Comparison

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/513357283108352000 Sammys Room

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/514114623638110208 devlog annoucenement about portraits

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/514151729299210241 "Steel Mill" (factory hotel)

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/514209083273248768 improved combat menu

https://ackkstudios.tumblr.com/post/98320407302/week-4-andrew-story-update

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/516422947847045120

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/516688982793396224 Vella surprised emote

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/518030738630131712 factory hotel development

https://twitter.com/BrigidAllanson/status/518032390170890240 Character line up

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/518092018195906561 "his camera angle makes y2k feel like grand stream saga"

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/518389789654274048 Strange area which could be factory hotel?

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/518399300691587072 Another strange area

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/519485809985343488 Chondra

https://ackkstudios.tumblr.com/post/99485560032/week6-andrew-devlog-on-the-topic-of-script-writing

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/519880222477664256 Rory added to roster

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/519904413365051393 working on crazy light puzzle

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/520923605165948929 https://gfycat.com/BitterImpassionedGentoopenguin.gif Gameplay GIF

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/521460881910407168 Yuriofwind will play Rory

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/521360985840709632 Y2K gameplay clip, dead link

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/521466442739630080 The character (Vella Wilde) the amazingly funny & dramatic

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/521714596701536256 Essentia on Vita

https://ackkstudios.tumblr.com/post/100159113282/the-colors-i-have-been-working-on-a-few

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/523271302753579008 Town of Frankton music, dead link

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/523279838782971904 https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/523469826816499713 Wilhelm teaser

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/523577297790836737 Story flowchart

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/526034926194667522 Alex at factory hotel elevator

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/528386843516366848 Vella and Rory talking

https://blog.playstation.com/2014/11/10/indie-rpg-y2k-coming-to-ps4-ps-vita/

Working on Y2K at Ackk Studios! - Kirblog 11/18/14 https://youtu.be/UIG4ppV_NBI

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/536653210380173312

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/536925734867324928

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/541106710669053952

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/546383921622298624

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/556530806710358016 Overworld Early

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/557257862272266242 Alex's room

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/565292352953409536 Placeholder logo and banner

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/565916638676262913 Vella at Arcade

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/568858899710939136 Sammy and Alex portrait comparison

PSX 2014 - 0.25.1 - Factory Hotel (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sfwMkD42e0)

2015

YIIK received its first trailer on February 20th, 2015, with an expected release date of the Fourth Quarter of 2015. There would also be ports for the PS Vita and Wii U.

Mar 13, 2015 PAX East 2015 Demo - "GadgetGirl Pre-alpha" - Factory Hotel (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTvTIs8KGQw)

Sep 1, 2015 PAX Prime 2015 Demo - "Black UI" - Wind town (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPX6B8ZKqkI)

Massive changes were made to the UI. Dodge minigame looks like the final, and many of the minigames present in the final version are in here. Shows off a Michael "draw a square" minigame.

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/672448400072302592

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/674657528622526464

Beta

2016

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/700391964873768960

https://twitter.com/AckkStudios/status/720694052245610496

PAX East 2016 Demo - Wind Town (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZTwsoA9JvY)

PAX West 2016 Interview: YIIK - A Postmodern RPG - Episode PRIME - Mt. Town (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7BBMInEOKE)

2017

2017 Playstaion Kiosk Demo - Windtown (SNESMAN99 text changed)

YIIK Demo at PlayStation Experience https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWFa7rY63ro

2018

PAX South 2018 Demo - Appears to just be the final version of Frankton and Factory Hotel https://youtu.be/ju5w-oPXAJ4

2019

PAX EAST 2019 Demo - Cape Juno

On January 17th, 2019, YIIK released.

Trivia

• Humorously, the metadata for "Viewing the Earth from Far Away" erroneously spelled the game's name as "Project YK2."