Steal It
An online team shooter I designed, directed and shipped — live on itch.io for Windows and macOS. Four teams, one glowing core in the middle, and only one way to win: get it home.
Downtown — the core is delivered to the green team's truck
Role
Game Designer · Creative Director · Producer
Tools
Unity 6 · URP · Netcode for GameObjects · Unity Gaming Services · Vivox Voice · itch.io · GitHub
Status
Released
Focus
Game Design · Product & Release · Quality Assurance · Creative Direction · Sound Design
Steal It In Numbers
- 15
- releases in the first 9 days after launch
- 2
- platforms — Windows and macOS (Intel + Apple Silicon)
- 9
- game modes, from heist to Battle Royale
- 3
- maps — The Woods, Downtown, Dusty Desert
- 24
- players per Battle Royale match
- $2.99
- on itch.io — a real, paid product
The Idea
Four teams fight over a single glowing core in the middle of the map. Whoever grabs it becomes everyone's target: they move slower, and every other team wants the core for itself. Only the team that gets it all the way back to its own truck wins the round. Simple to understand in five seconds — and chaotic in the best way once four squads collide.
What's In It
- 01
9 Modes
Classic heist, Sniper Only, Pump Only, Low Gravity, Team Deathmatch, Zone Wars, a rotating playlist, Battle Royale and a free Creative mode.
- 02
Play With Friends
Friends list with online status, invites, a JOIN button, private lobbies with custom teams, voice and text chat — and the group stays together between matches.
- 03
Battle Royale
24 players in one helicopter, parachute drop, loot, a closing storm, knock-downs and revives — online with friends.
- 04
Ranked
8 ranks with 3 steps each. HYRO points for eliminations, delivered cores, survival and wins — with a full rank ladder to aim for.
- 05
Living World
Day and night, rain, thunderstorms, fog, smog and sandstorms, drivable cars, jetpacks and gas stations that blow up.
- 06
Expression
Locker with outfits, wraps, tracers and parachutes, an emote wheel, player cards with stats — and a lobby where your squad stands on stage next to you.
From Prototype To Product
A game that only runs on your own PC isn't a product. Getting Steal It into players' hands meant a store page, a trailer and screenshots, tax forms and payouts, a purchase check for the online features, a website — and then listening to the first players and shipping fixes fast.
The First Two Weeks
- 01
Launch — v1.0
Released on itch.io for $2.99 with store page, trailer and screenshots, embedded on this website.
- 02
Online
Friends lobbies, voice and text chat, friends list, leaderboards — unlocked only for verified buyers (itch.io login or a friend code).
- 03
macOS
A native version for Intel and Apple Silicon, built and signed from a Windows PC — so Mac players are part of the same lobbies.
- 04
One-Click Updates
The game updates itself from inside the menu. No more sending files around — and only real buyers can download it.
- 05
Everything Online
Battle Royale and Creative with friends, joining a running match, cars online, an automatic host handover.
- 06
v1.5.3
The fifteenth release — and still going.
Steal It On YouTube Shorts
- 20
- Shorts recorded, cut and captioned by me
- 11k+
- views across all Shorts
- 7
- Shorts with more than 1,000 views
Shorts I Edited
Nobody finds a new indie game by accident, so I make the moments people share. I record my own matches, find the two seconds worth watching, cut them to a vertical 9:16 format, time every cut to the action and add a caption that hooks in the first second. The best ones are below — press play.
Five Real Stories
- 01
The Fog That Only Vanished In The Shipped Game
Players said the smog and sandstorms felt gone. In the editor everything looked right. I compared screenshots from the finished build with the editor, narrowed it down to the build process — Unity was stripping every fog effect because the maps were saved with fog switched off. One setting fixed it, and every build now checks it automatically.
- 02
“This App Is Damaged” On Mac
The first Mac players couldn't open the game at all. The cause: the Mac app was changed after Unity had signed it. It's now re-signed in the build pipeline, installs itself into the Applications folder, and the README explains the first start in English and German.
- 03
Online Without A Server Budget
Dedicated servers cost money a new game doesn't make yet. Instead, the strongest device in a lobby hosts automatically — and if the host leaves, the group regroups on its own within seconds instead of everyone being kicked.
- 04
Updates Without Sending Files Around
Every update meant zipping and sending a new file. Now the game offers “Update Now” in the menu, downloads only for verified buyers through a short-lived link, swaps its own files and restarts — tested end to end before release.
- 05
Bugs Only Real Players Find
Floating trees in the rain, a core half-buried in the sand, getting into cars you weren't looking at. Each one went from a screenshot to a fix in the next release — usually the same day.
How I Work
I play every build, write down exactly what's wrong — with screenshots and the steps to reproduce it — and decide what matters most. Small updates ship often, every change is backed up with Git, and the people actually playing get a say. For the programming I work with an AI coding partner (Claude by Anthropic): I describe what the game should do, check the result in the game, test it and decide what ships. The idea, the design, the world and every creative decision are mine.
What That Means For A Team
- 01
Ownership
I took a project from an idea to a paid release and kept it running — not just the fun parts.
- 02
Quality Assurance
I find problems, describe them so anyone can reproduce them, and check that the fix really works.
- 03
Communication
Clear bug reports, release notes, bilingual player instructions and a store page that explains the game in seconds.
- 04
Creative Direction
Look, sound and feel — from the HUD layout to every gunshot and the trailer.
- 05
Marketing
Trailer, store page and 20 self-edited YouTube Shorts with more than 11,000 views so far.
- 06
Modern Tools
Unity, Git and GitHub, itch.io, Unity Gaming Services, a Next.js website — and getting real results out of AI tools.
Technology
Unity 6 with the Universal Render Pipeline, Netcode for GameObjects with Unity Relay and Sessions for online play, Vivox for voice chat, Unity Authentication, Friends, Leaderboards, Cloud Save, Cloud Code and Analytics, NavMesh AI for the bots, itch.io with butler for releases and GitHub for backups and updates.
What's Next
More custom-match options, more maps and a Steam release. Steal It keeps evolving — and so does this page.