At The Break Of Dawn is a first person shooter with guns and magic, plus lots of dialogue and a few elements from a few other genres mixed in. It’s a sequel to In The Middle Of The Night (the second game in the Outliers and Outsiders series), starring Magical Girl Gina in her second adventure, one where everything seems to be going wrong. Like the first game, it’s set in late 2020, against the backdrop of the global pandemic, though it was made in 2021.
It’s been (not even) three months since Gina learned she was a magical girl, having gone on a high-intensity adventure after Magical Girl Sakura (yeah, the capitalization feels right) barged into her room in the middle of the night. Since then, they’ve just barely kept in touch. Now, once again, Sakura is asking for her help. This time, the stakes are high, and everything goes wrong. It’s not just Shades that are after magical girls…
Though it was conceived (in broad strokes) shortly after the first game, it took a year to actually get to it. Ultimately, I ended up creating it for Magical Girl Game Jam 4. I had a lot of free time during the jam period, so I was able to put in pretty much a full month of solid effort. I did have to cut a few things to limit scope, some of the gameplay ideas I tried just didn’t work, and the game is still pretty short, but I feel it overall improves upon the first game in every meaningful way.