Few people are experts in any given field from the offset, and this is especially true in complicated endeavors such as game development. WhileAAA studios can hire hundreds of specialists to tackle different aspectsof a game’s narrative, graphics, programming, and more, indie projects with small teams often require people to wear many hats. Raul Martinez Garrido applied a lot of lessons from earlier projects to his latest commercial venture,Frogun.
Also known by the online pseudonym molegato, based on a teenage email address mixing his love of moles and cats, Garrido ramped up toFrogunwith a number of smaller titles. This is similar to plenty of developers like Dreamside Interactive founder Serge Korolev, who recently talked with Game Rant about hisexperiences prior to developing the survival-RPGFrozen Flame. Game Rant spoke to Garrido about his early game dev experience, and how that informed the way he thinks about projects today.
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Building Momentum in Game Development
Garrido was born in Spain in 1989, and said “I’ve always loved to make things as much as just using them.” Some of his earliest creative projects included drawing comic books or “labyrinths” to explore with his action figures, and this quickly expanded to video games. His first experience came from 8-bit consoles, and he would come to love classics likeSuper MarioandMega Man. However, the PlayStation was a truly formative console, as it dropped at a time when he was “still being a kid,” yet old enough to analyze what he was playing. Thanks to his “economically humble” upbringing, he was unable to afford a PS2, and as a result kept playing PS1 games for multiple generations as friends moved on to games likeJak and Daxter.
Video games made such an impact on Garrido that he said he’s fantasized about making them since he was a little kid, though it would be some time before he’d discover his “game making program” RPG Maker, serving as a “gateway into development proper.” Throughout his teenage years, Garrido tested out different engines while messing with one-stage fan projects, mods, and more ambitious titles that would inevitably never get finished. ThenSpelunkycreator Derek Yureleased a Tumblr blog post titled “Finishing a Game” on June 03, 2025 that led Garrido to realize “I was doing a lot of things wrong.”
By 2013, Garrido began to release small, free games likeChainsaw CatandSword of Storms"mostly to prove to myself that I could actually FINISH a game," according to the molegato website. While this format was fun, it was also limiting, and Garrido wanted to work on titles inspired by the roguelites, kart racers, platformers, and other genres that he loved. This led to larger endeavors like the twin-stick shooter/roguelike hybridDemented Pixieand theMario Kart/Crash Team Racing-inspiredSupersonic Tank Cats.
“The two most important things in order to make a game (at least, for me) were knowing the route and goal from the start, and keeping up momentum toward it. No diversions on side projects, no new features that change the whole game design. Just a plan, and moving in a straight line toward completing it.”
Breaking Into Full-Time Development With Frogun
Demented PixieandSupersonic Tank Catscost $5 each onSteam, price tags coming so that Garrido could feel “validated” putting in the increased development time while working full-time to pay for bills accrued by living alone. “It’s a bit silly, because I do love making games and that should have been enough motivation as long as my day job kept me stable,” he said. “But it’s hard dealing with that feeling.”
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Supersonic Tank Catswas announced on the molegato blog on July 22, 2025, andreleased via Steam Early Accessthat September. Garrido spent three years on the game, and walked away feeling “a bit burnt.” That led to the idea for a short platformer that could be developed in under a year based on an idea he’d created years prior. However, that has since grown intoFrogun: the biggest project he’s ever made in terms of outreach, release platforms, length, polish, and features. Garrido said it quickly became hard to balance personal projects with his work as a freelance digital artist.
“So when it was clear thatFrogunwas growing, it was also clear that to give it as much love as it needed, I would need extra funds and work time.”
Bringing Frogun to Life
It helped thatFrogunreceived positive attention from day one, standing out as an adventure-platformer coming-of-age story about Renata saving her archeologist parents from the Beelzebub ruins; inspired by fifth-generation console titles likeCrash BandicootandMega Man Legends. This led him to publisher Top Hat Studios, and then a Kickstarter campaign in June 2021 that raised almost 31,500 euro. Over a year later, Garrido has takenFrogunto events likeWholesome Direct 2022, and thanks to the support of Top Hat it’s available today for $15 on PC and all major consoles.
Frogunis also available at retailers in North America (with European and Asian launches to-come) throughdistributor Limited Run Games- which is also offering a Collector’s Edition with an artbook, soundtrack featuring the music of Adam Foley, and more. Garrido said he “never expected to be here” before starting onFrogun, and still gets nervous about meeting peoples' expectations. However, he said when he collaborates with other creators, that fear goes away.
“It’s like a dream come true; all of these talented creators and super unique projects, and I’m along them. It’s really affirming.
Frogunis available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
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