Designer Darenn Keller was thrilled to land a position at Ubisoft and work on multiple entries in the Assassin's Creed series as well as Ghost Recon. But around the time COVID hit and his work became more isolated, new creative endeavors began to creep into his mind.
Ready for more creative control, he ended up leaving the studio and gave solo development a try, learning new skills and wearing every hat himself. After a lot of prototyping, he landed on the idea for Dawnfolk, a hard-to-describe mix of survival, puzzle, and city-builder elements that's earned 94% positive user reviews on Steam (and is also on Nintendo Switch). It was no Balatro-sized hit, but Keller tells me Dawnfolk has done well enough to make his indie career livable, which is the dream for most devs, and more than enough for him.
