Hey everyone!
As the community starts to grow it would be great to know who people are and what brings them to Cantata in the first place. So, a thread of introductions!
Just say a little about yourself and what makes you interested in Cantata/what you’re looking forward to. And! If you’ve got a favorite strategy game, let us know!
I’ll start!
I’m Kyle, the lead developer/creative director of Cantata! I’m obviously excited about everything in the game as one of the people making it, but what makes me most excited is seeing how people use the systems of the game to make it their own. I’ve got big modding plans for the game that I’m not quite ready to talk about yet, but I really think the community is going to be able to take this game to some crazy places.
Ad for favorite strategy game, that’s hard to say. Advance Wars is clearly a winner here, but in terms of a game that has stuck with me long after I’ve played it I’d have to say Final Fantasy Tactics Advance.
Just look at that art!
Hey all, Craig here! I’m doing the sound design for Cantata. I live in NYC and my main hobby is eating burgers at Five Guys with Kyle.
I’ve done sound and/or music for a number of video games including Streets of Rogue, Miracle Merchant, and more. Here’s my work: http://www.cb-sound.com/
I’m a big fan of Into the Breach so I’m pumped to be working on this turn-based strategy game!
Hi, my name is Jacob, and I heard about Cantata on Reddit. I am about to finish my programming degree and would love to help out in whatever way I can, be it testing or coding. I really want to get into game design, and as a fan of Advance Wars and FF Tactics Advance, I am really excited for this project.
My favorite strategy game is Advance Wars, but I was always a little disappointed by the unit and CO balance. My brother and I always had to ban CO’s on maps because who wants to fight Javier with 2+ COM towers, or Hachi under any circumstances?
Happy to have you @FlashFire! I think AW is clearly balanced for Campaign only really. Some things, like Eagle in AW1, have CO powers that are totally broken. Take another whole turn?! I think for Cantata the COs are a lot more present in a given match, so ideally tie into the battle more in ways that doesn’t mean their emphasis needs to be all on CO powers for that flavor to come through. I think that outsized burden is definitely what drove AW to places like that. But also, it was fun to totally stomp with Eagle!
Hi, my name is vitaliy, im responsible for this game spritework.
https://www.behance.net/CobraLad
I grew up playing pc isometric games so there wiil be none of those boring sqares, only hip dynamic rombs. My favorite strategy game is Disciples 2, misunderstood and forgotten by unworthy.
Hey everybody,
My name is Royal Teague. I’m a composer & songwriter based out of Atlanta. I’ve written music for a variety of short films, pc & mobile games, along with a catalogue of EPs and singles.
My music is on Apple Music/Spotify/Bandcamp/Soundcl…
Kyle and I met at a chili cook-off event.
Hey gang,
I’m Maren, and I’m working with Kyle on systems and game design as well as balance and nitty-gritty things like that. As you might expect, I have a history with tactics games, from more well-known ones like Advance Wars, FF:T and Fire Emblem to slightly more obscure titles like Langrisser and a game that I’m pretty sure was a bootleg that found its way to a local rec center that called itself “Pike and Shoot”.
I’ve known Kyle for quite a few years now, and we’ve idly designed games on-and-off throughout that time, from concepts, to card games to board games, I’m excited to see where the team and the community take Cantata as it moves into alpha and progresses to release (and beyond)!
It was fun to read everybody’s introductions 
Silicon Zeroes looks really fun @cbstegeman, I have to check it out! This is a talented crew and I can’t wait to see Cantata come together.
I found Cantata by way of the TIGSource forums. Kyle’s devlog had great tips for isometric game coding. I’ve played a lot of Advance Wars and Tiberian Sun, as well as tabletop war games.
I think for Cantata the COs are a lot more present in a given match, so ideally tie into the battle more in ways that doesn’t mean their emphasis needs to be all on CO powers for that flavor to come through.
-@kyle
I guess I should have realized from the demo, but I didn’t realize that “Player Drone” character was actually the CO. Looking forward to see what kind of powers they have (and what we can mod!).
Thanks for the kind words @nDoJoy ! Definitely check out Silicon Zeroes, it’s got great brain-twisting puzzles and I think it deserves more attention. I’m also not the least bit biased about it. 
Hahah, can’t imagine you would be. I had a go at the demo, it was quite fun but I’m so frustrated the conditional component can only output ones, not what you want to set… I’m stuck on the sheep puzzle and I know it’s gonna eat at me 
I did quite like how you kept the long kind of soft electronic patterns in but slipped in some higher wind instrument notes there. Fresh!
Hey! Brought here by the beautiful environment textures and the long list of literary references in that RPS article today.
Final Fantasy Tactics is for sure my favorite strategy game, if it counts as a strategy game, and I’m actually working on an FFT-like right now. I maybe haven’t given FFTA a full chance but feeling encouraged to do so after seeing it dropped here.
Really excited to find this thing. Rare to see such an interesting thing being made in the margins of this genre.
Hey @badru happy to have you! I’ve also come across Tenderfoot Tactics in the past and the game looks incredible! Happy to have other tactics/strategy people around, especially in the indie space! There’s not a lot of us so we’ve got to stick together!
Giving this topic the big ole 2 year bump as we start to get more people coming in here!
For anyone just joining us, we’d love to hear what brought you to the forums, what you’re interested in about Cantata, and what other games you’ve been playing/books you’ve been reading/music you’ve been listening to!
I know that I made the topic but I’ll go again 
I’m Kyle! I’m the project lead for Cantata and work to make sure everyone else on the team is setup and supported to help make the game become a reality! I also did all the initial programming on the game, but recently I’ve put that more in the hands of our first studio hire Rogue, who I suspect will show up here soon enough.
For stuff I’ve been playing/watching/enjoying:
I recently played and loved the demo of Lorn’s Lure:
It’s this very weird/strange game where you’re using climbing pickaxes to move inside the vast unknowable structure. The whole vibe of it is amazing and haunting, and it controls like a dream. If you really liked old school Source Engine jumping puzzle things, this is for you.
For films, I recently watched and enjoyed Mank:
It’s the latest from one of my favorite directors, David Fincher, and stars Gary Oldman as Herman Mankiewicz, the somewhat scorned screenwriter of Citizen Kane. It’s really interesting as a movie sort of “out of time”, in that it’s full of cinematic traditions and styles that modern movies left behind. It would be easy to accuse Fincher of nostalgia, but a lot of his work has always been hyper-modern (like, you know, Fight Club), so bringing that spirit to something old feels really fresh.
Good morning all! I’ve seen Cantata content on the net every so often for a while now and still find myself drawn to this beautiful game.
I’d like to echo OP’s affinity for Advance Wars and FFTA, which were some of my favorite games growing up. I’ve since enjoyed some newer tactics games like Tiny Metal and Wargroove; but those old faves definitely had some magic. Love to solicit recommendations for anything similar.
For stuff I’ve been digging lately; I’ve been glued to Our Band Could Be Your Life, a book about independent rock bands in the 70’s-90’s; listening to The Caretaker and Brian Eno’s ambient work; and watching my girlfriend play skribbl.io. Also been rewatching everything Lynch, which has been especially rewarding.
Welcome! Definitely feel like people coming to Cantata will be lots of old Advance Wars fans so happy to hear you also enjoyed it. In terms of modern stuff it’s really hard to say — Wargroove and Tiny Metal are the obvious responses but imo they are a bit too close to AW and make me just want to go back and play AW again 
And WOW The Caretaker rips, this seems so cool! It reminds me of some of the stuff I read about in Tone Glow, which is this newsletter of experimental music. Will definitely listen more. Also Ambient 2: The Plateaux of Mirror is my JAM. Definitely happy to know we’ve got some ambient/noise fans in here.
I felt the same way about AW! And very cool, I see Tone Glow covered Fred Frith & Ikue Mori - A Mountain Doesn’t Know It’s Tall, another album I’ve been all about lately. Both very inspiring musicians
Hi all! I’m Alec, and I’m working on sound design for Cantata (taking over for Craig and building on his great work, while bobbing and weaving around Royal’s amazing music.)
I grew up playing the Civ series, all those-late 90s RTSs, and–shocker–Advance Wars and FFTA, but Alpha Centauri stuck with me more than anything else. The thought experiments in ethics, growth, violence, etc etc in that game informed a lifelong love of scifi and speculative fiction.
As I’m writing this I’m realizing all I’ve been playing lately is comfort food–Civ 6 with some friends, Breath of the Wild (Master Mode is oddly zen, actually, since you are just constantly avoiding combat) and Spider Solitaire when I can’t sleep. Maybe after enough of that Kyle and Rogue won’t destroy me as bad in NERTS.
I just inhaled Vikingur Olafsson’s “Reflections”, a follow-up to his 2020 album of Debussy and Rameau piano music; this one sprinkles in collabs with living composers and arrangers. Also just got told about Buke and Gase; I guess this is pop music? They literally make their own instruments.
The Caretaker has been a great listen as I’m typing–thanks! I find my attention span challenged by ambient music but obviously appreciate new sonic textures. I’m excited to learn about Tone Glow and would also recommend Steve Smith’s newsletter for new weird shit. It’s very hit or miss for me but the hits hit.
What an interesting group y’all are so far–no surprise there.
Hello, everyone~! My name is Rogue, and I’m a gameplay dev here on Cantata and studio dev with Afterschool! I’m stoked to be here, I cut my teeth on civ as a kid, loved playing it with friends, and got really into board games. My favorite games growing up however were the Jak & Daxter / Ratchet & Clank series. I’m a huge sci fi fan and wanted to be a sci fi novelist growing up. That, or a game developer. Now I get to work on Cantata 
For the past few years I’ve been in the XR community as a dev and installation artist and also hung about the indie games scene in NYC, which is where I met Kyle. Currently I’ve been obsessed with The Shanghai Restoration Project, fermenting anything I can get my hands on, and I just discovered snow 
Can’t wait to meet more of the community!
@audiosprite I also love Brian Eno ! I think a hilarious trend I got into was listening to ambient tracks slowed down 8x, 20x, etc, and I would just listen to those for days on end.
