We Interviewed the Creator of “Tailgate”!

We interviewed Dmytro Yarynych, the developer of Tailgate, a heartfelt adventure where players follow Hyde, a Labrador, on a journey to find his human! Be sure this wishlist this game HERE!

Tell us about your game? 

Tailgate is a third-person narrative adventure. You play as Hyde, a domestic labrador retriever in his later years. After a strange dream (that wasn’t a dream after all) he wakes up and realizes that his Human has disappeared. He’s out to investigate only to discover that the situation is way more serious and unknown mysterious forces are involved. Our protagonist has a lot on his tail — finding his Human (and other Humans too), figuring out the ancient dog prophecy, and everything in between. How? Well, the player is mostly limited to doggo stuff,  but it’s more than enough. The most important tool at Hyde’s disposal is Sniff  Mode. In this mode, the player can see what a dog can see, clues, trails, important items and interactions, etc. Gameplay-wise it is a mix of Witcher sense (or any other similar mechanic, Hearing in TLOU) and an even more common flashlight. Another important part is talking to other animals. Let’s admit, we all would like to be able to do it! To expand the narrative there are also Memories in the form of toy balls, each one you find has a short story of  Hyde’s life attached to it. I’m still working on improving or redesigning some mechanics to make them more ‘doggo’ but also keep them accessible and not annoying. Other than that, there is classic exploration (from a different angle though), a bit of awkward acrobatics and spatial puzzles, natural (well, more or less) mazes to navigate through, edgy barks about different things, and up to 9  locations with different vibes. 

What inspires your work? 

I’d like to say other games. And while it’s true, it’s not the main source of inspiration. The greatest inspiration for an adventure game is actual adventures. Even the smallest ones. With my dog Obi, I’d say every walk is a sort of adventure. 

Animals and nature are a huge source of inspiration. I love talking to stray cats and dogs, and I always think like, what’s their story? How did they end up here? I entertain those thoughts for a while. And a lot of times, they are sad and bitter. 

If we are talking about Tailgate’s main theme — it’s loyalty. Animals, especially dogs are way more loyal to us than we sometimes deserve. I live in Ukraine and Russian invasion of 2022 had a terrible impact on life in general and animals in particular. Thousands of animals died from hunger, fires, and shelling.  Countless endangered species’ fate is unknown (russians hunt in wildlife parks on occupied territories, they’ve set the whole Kinburn spit on fire). A lot of pets lost their families and homes. I wanted to tell a story of a dog left alone, though  I’ve wrapped it in a fantasy setting and a drop of irony, the key idea stands —  dogs would go out of their way to save us if they could. Sometimes it’s just impossible, but that’s why we have fantasy, sci-fi, and games — what if? 

Goals for your game?

My most important goal is to ship the game. To give it the look, the feel, and the gameplay as I imagined, so the players would feel it too. I would say ‘to raise awareness’, but the game would be pretty niche. Ten thousand players would be a pretty good number for an indie title (and there’s still a long way ahead to  achieve this number), but I’m not sure if this is a scale figure to raise awareness for a topic like this. I’d also like to spend a part of the revenue to help shelters,  animals, and people who care about them. 

I’d be lying if I said that I don’t care about money. It’s my hard work, a huge effort, and thousands of hours to make a game with 3-5 hours of playtime. If the game gets me going for another year, I’ll be fine. For two years — I’d call it a success. Frankly, I’m not thinking too much about anything more than that, and as I said, any of it is not guaranteed and requires effort, dedication, and more luck than devs care to admit. I’ll do my best and see what happens. 

Advice to new devs? 

I’m not experienced enough to give advice, but if I could give some to myself a  year ago, here’s what I would say: 

• Do it. You won’t regret it. You will learn an unbelievable amount of skills and will be able to make things you didn’t know you’d be capable of. 
• Don’t rush it. Set a pretty close, reasonably achievable goal and work on it consistently. 3 months is a good planning period. 
• Manage your expectations. It’s not gonna be all bells and whistles. In the early stages, few people would be interested in your game. Face it,  there’s little interesting to it so far. So far! Keep pushing and stay true to yourself. Make a prototype, show it to people, get feedback, don’t get offended or discouraged, and listen. Make it as good as you can.  You will get better at some things, find workarounds, buy assets on sales, and learn a bunch of skills. The game will get better and better. 
• Know your limits. You are not going to make a AAA quality multiplayer hit all by yourself. Those games are made by hundreds of highly skilled expensive professionals FOR A REASON. But you can make a good game. A funny game. A nice game. An interesting game. 
• Take care of your mental and physical health, of your relationships. You will be able to postpone the release day, but you might never have another chance to make that Halloween costume for your kid, eat that pizza on Friday night with your family, or help out that friend in need. I  love games and love working on them, but I would trade any of my all-nighters or deadlines to talk to my father one more time, to see my friend who’s fallen on the frontline a week ago. In other words, don’t burn everything you have to make this game. There’s no rush and you have plenty of time. 
• Have fun. If a task is not clicking, drop it, and do something else. Then get back. Don’t grind like it’s a burden or a curse. The games are supposed to be fun. So how can they be, if no fun was involved in the process? It’s like a chef who hates eating or a race driver who hates cars, right?  

What inspired you to start making games?

For me, games are a form, a vessel. So it’s more about a story I want to tell and a feeling I want to share. It requires the receiver to be deeply and actively involved in it, and I can’t think of a better medium than games. Reading adventure books is wonderful, but what do kids usually do after they’ve finished, dunno, the Treasure Island? They go outside and bury a shoebox with candy and coins in the yard! I want to share my adventures, I want people to see the world as one. Even a ride to the grocery store can be an adventure, and why shouldn’t it be? 

I have been interested in telling stories for a long time, I even have several unfinished and unedited novels and shorter pieces. For some stories or for the scale of them my writing skill was nearly not sufficient. But in telling a story in a wider sense, I thought I was skilled enough at least to try. In simpler words, I’m not good enough to describe beautiful fall landscapes or put sounds of nature into people’s minds, but showing that landscape and choosing or even writing my own music to support the vibe — that I might pull off. 

It’s not my first rodeo in game development. In 2017 I worked on a VR game called Proze as a designer and a writer. I didn’t ship the game though, and left the company for personal reasons. But that experience proved useful in my own project. 

Where can folks support your work? 

The best way to support the game is by dropping wishlist, and Tailgate already  has a Steam page

Also follow me on my socials: Twitter, YouTube, Discord

I also have a ko-fi, I don’t have any active campaigns there, and I still have some savings, but a couple of bucks would never hurt and I’d be able to buy some tutorials, assets, or tools that would definitely improve my process.

–

All Ages of Geek is a fully independent media platform, brought to life and sustained by the dedication of two sisters and the generous support of our community through donations. We’re passionate about creating content that resonates with our audience, and we’re excited to share our latest project with you—an upcoming game developed with our unique vision and creativity. Explore our other content and see how you can support our journey. Your engagement and contributions make a significant difference. Thank you for being part of our story.