Aerial_Knight’s Never Yield hits the streets once more with ‘Da Update’
Released last year, Aerial_Knight’s Never Yield is an action-adventure runner game set in a futuristic Detroit that sees the player chased by a faceless authoritarian regime. Escaping by leaping over crashing cars and diving through windows, it’s a stylish and personal game from creator Neil Jones, aka Aerial_Knight, inspired by everything from the creator’s family to Beverly Hills Cop and The Last Dragon.
The game’s biggest patch, ‘Da Update,’ just went live on PC. We talked to Jones about the game and its themes, how they fit his life experience and that of others in the industry, and why, as a black developer, he felt it was necessary to build his own space in the games industry.
“The whole game is a metaphor: trying to escape a situation,” Jones said. “Not holding yourself or someone else in the same situation back. While being supported by your past that can do very little to help you, having no clue what's going to happen next. I think a lot of people can relate to some of, if not all of, these things.”
Never Yield’s protagonist, Wally, never stops running. The player must guide him around obstacles. He ducks past swarms of drones, leaps over vans from the Asset Removal squad, and dives through windows with a few perfectly-timed button stabs. When it was released, Jones started working on bug fixes and the UI, but his work grew into a complete update, touching on and improving every aspect of the game. ‘Da Update’ has new levels, new music, a UI overhaul, trophies and achievements, leaderboards, an endless mode that now complements the story, and more. He went big. He didn’t yield.
He put everything into the game. The main character is based on an uncle of his. “I get a lot of my inspiration from the things I looked up to growing up,” he said. “The character himself is a mixture of my uncle Wallace and Axel Foley. I looked up to my uncle Wallace a lot when I was a kid; he was just a really cool guy. Before he passed away, he got really sick and ended up losing one of his legs, and that was a really big hit to him. I thought naming the character after him and adding some of his features would be a cool way of remembering him.”
If you look closely, the main character of Never Yield has a prosthetic leg.
Further inspiration is layered throughout the soundtrack, a wonderful fusion of beats, jazz, and more from a collaboration between Jones and his long-time friend and composer, Daniel Wilkins. The friendship bore excellent results: “Dan knows me really well and knows what sounds I like,” Jones said. “I like to think what people really hear when they listen to some of these songs is two friends having fun. The song in the final level took us almost three months to make, as it needed to set the mood for the ending and leave room for the lyrics to tell the story of what the characters are going through. That's just a really special song, and it summed up the whole journey that led to finishing the game.”
The sense of pride Jones expresses about releasing Aerial_Knight’s Never Yield (“I put my name in the title for a lot of reasons, one of which was so that people would know that this wasn't made by a big studio or anything like that, but just a person who wanted to make something cool”) is matched by his frustration at having to make his own space within the industry. He spent a decade trying to make it before betting on himself.
“A lot of people don't understand how hard this stuff really is. I know some people won't even try to,” he said. “When starting in games, I didn't know how bad the issues really were. I don't think anyone can really understand how bad it really is till they see it for themselves. It's really easy to look at the few black people who have found a place in games for themselves and say, ‘Why don't the others from that group just do what they did?’.
“I was one of those people that was pretty much rejected by every place I applied to, even though my work was solid. The 10 years I spent chasing a job in the games had me watch as so many black developers I started with, and a lot of which were so much better than me, be forced to give up on their dreams, as working on your portfolio and applying for work non-stop is an unpaid full-time job. A person can only take so much before they give up.
“Most, if not all, the handfuls of black people that've made a space for themselves, all have wild stories about how they've been treated. Outside of these people, there are thousands of black people that have been kept out for so many BS reasons, like what school they went to, where they live, or even the idea that the person might not fit in with all the white people they would have to work with.
“Some people look at the surface level of all this and say, ‘Well, all of those people were just unqualified.’ Which is basically like saying, ‘All the white people were more qualified than all the black people.’ That's why a lot of people use Never Yield as an example, as I was one of those ‘unqualified’ people.
“The games industry sells to black people. They depend on us to buy these games. You would think they would let us help make them.”
Jones believes change can happen, despite the struggle he had others have had.
“A lot of people, even other POC, don't really want to hear about how the industry they love and enjoy might be doing some shady and racist stuff,” he said. “For the people who do care, they can feel kinda helpless like there isn't anything they can do about it. But you can. There are so many black creators out there, and they have cool projects. No one saying you have to go out and buy every game made by a black person, but just give them a chance. If you like it, support it. The more players show that we are interested in not only the games but the people that make them, the more things are likely to change. Things don't change; they remain the same unless you change them.”
“This project is a big part of my life. I started it out of frustration with the games industry and its treatment of anyone who didn't fit the mold. Then continued working on it as a validation that I always belonged in this space. I wanted to show what someone with a different perspective can do with things that already exist and tell a different kind of story with the message that you can be your own biggest obstacle to overcome. Overall, I just wanted to make something fun that anyone could enjoy, and that doesn't stress you out unless you really want it to, and I think a lot of people picked up on that.”
With ‘Da Update’ released, you can support Neil Jones on the Epic Games Store.