<![CDATA[Airtight Alibi Productions - Blog]]>Fri, 05 Jun 2026 10:27:39 -0600Weebly<![CDATA[Creating Amelia's Handwriting]]>Tue, 26 May 2026 16:10:12 GMThttps://www.airtightalibiproductions.com/blog/creating-amelias-handwritingAs we began finalizing the 2D assets for Amelia's scrapbook, we knew we had to pick the right typeface that would embody our main character's personality.

As it turned out, we had the perfect custom handwriting in-house with our very own Annie Schweiger! Having joined the Airtight Alibi Productions team earlier this year, Annie lends her artistic skills in many parts of the project, sketching environment concepts, assisting our graphic design team with custom drawings, and bringing our main characters to life - and now, she's the artist behind Amelia's penmanship, too. However, we needed to call upon the skills of another team member, Julia Holdnack, to pull all the pieces together and deliver a fully functional TTF file. Read on to learn more about Julia's process!
Meet Julia
The developer behind the acclaimed Penelope Pendrick series, Julia Holdnack is also the lead 3D artist for the majority of our game's environments. Before she became a full-time gave dev, Julia was a freelance graphic designer, specializing in font design. When we were looking to develop our very own font, Julia stepped up to lend her expertise!
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Sphinx of Black Quartz and... Neon Carrots?
To begin, Julia requested a high-definition image of several words, phrases, and symbols in Annie's handwriting.

Annie was conscious of keeping each letter separate whenever possible, avoiding the connectivity of cursive so that the font creation process would be much simpler on Julia's end.

For font designers like Julia, creating individual characters is only part of the job. She also needs to look at how the characters interact with each other and what custom kerning she needs to set between unique letter pairs, hence the amusing collection of random words.

​The brown fox and the lazy dog can only jump so far!
Ad Vectoriam!
Next, Julia vectorized each character in Adobe Illustrator and made sizing consistent across the letters.
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At this point in the process, she also needs to adjust the thickness of certain letters if they were scaled up or down a significant amount.
Two to Tango
When using a font that's supposed to mimic the imperfections of the human hand, seeing two identical letters next to each other can break the effect. With that in mind, Julia made a series of alternates based on common letter pairs and duplicate letters. For example, she programmed the font to switch from "mm" to a special single character that illustrates two slightly different "m"s within it.
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She also likes to create custom alternates for frequent pairings like "ch" and "er." These small but significant touches go a long way in preserving a sense of authenticity.
You've Gotta Be Kerning Me!
Using the free program FontForge, Julia imported the letters as an SVG and checked the scale and vertical alignment of each one. Next, they were ready for the unicode system, where it was time to set kerning metrics!
Here's how a sentence looked at this point, before any kerning:
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Since this is a handwriting font, kerning is an easier undertaking because nothing has to be super precise. If the letter spacing is not perfectly exact, it actually looks a lot more natural.

Here's how that same sentence looked after the first pass of kerning:
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Much better! Julia couldn't celebrate for long, though, because at this point the program crashed and the save became corrupted, so she had to redo all that kerning work. The joys of technical work!
Kern! Kern! Kern!
​To everything (kern, kern, kern) there is a space (kern, kern, kern)
And a gap to every pairing of this font face
(The author of this blog post apologizes for these increasingly corny - er, kerny - headings.)
Julia now has to review every single character pairing to further tweak kerning pairs. She's noticed that script fonts like this one tend to need a lot more love with all-caps kerning because the capital spacing is based off of what looks good next to lowercase letters, not other capitals. She did this with numbers as well.
Spot the Difference!
With kerning and special ligatures successfully programmed, here's how a couple different phrases look, before and after:
See You in Silvercrest
That's a wrap! A big thank you to Annie and Julia for their hard work in bringing Amelia to the next level with this custom font face. Every new element we bring to this project makes us more and more excited for our players to experience the completed game someday. Until then, thanks for stopping by!
]]><![CDATA[An Amelia Darnell Update]]>Wed, 15 Apr 2026 21:54:05 GMThttps://www.airtightalibiproductions.com/blog/an-amelia-darnell-updateIt’s been 8 years since the announcement of Amelia Darnell and Airtight Alibi Productions.

In the fast-paced world of game development, that’s a long time. We started with a vision and a lot of heart, and nearly every piece of the project has been built, dismantled, and rebuilt since then. It’s been an evolution, one that taught us something new at every stage and helped us find the dedicated team we have today. We want to be open about that journey, honoring the work that got us here while showing you just how much the game has grown. 
The Evolution of Amelia Darnell
When Amelia Darnell first began, Airtight Alibi Productions was made up of a group of incredibly passionate people inspired by the games they grew up with. It was a shared vision of continuing something that felt like it had been left behind. Unfortunately, passion doesn’t always equate to experience and execution.

​​The truth is, making a game is a lot harder than you’d think. There are countless moving parts, with compounding complexity.
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This left many of you rightly worried about the status of the project, but behind the scenes we’ve been using those years to rework and refine the game. This evolution has allowed the project to mature alongside us, ensuring it meets the standards we hold today. Most importantly, it has finally led us to the dedicated group of people we have now who are ready to bring this vision to the finish.
A Labor of Love
Since its announcement in 2017, this project has passed through many hands. From the original team, only a few people remain. This work requires not only skill but an incredible amount of dedication, as it is a completely volunteer-based project.

​Though it’s taken us years to curate the right group, we are so proud of the team steering this project today. This Airtight Alibi ship sails so much faster with a full crew, and we’re thrilled to finally have the team needed to bring this game to the finish line. ​From directors to leads, artists to programmers, every member of the team brings unique experience and passion to the project.
2026: A New Chapter
​At the start of 2026, our leadership team conducted a thorough internal review. We brought on several new members whose experience and energy are helping us better realize the vision you’ve all been supporting for years. With new leadership, we’ve taken a much closer look at the game, our assets, and everything we’ve built so far.

​We’ve had to make difficult decisions to overhaul parts of the game in order to make it better. This has been both exciting and challenging: we’re now effectively building alongside a rework and adjusting to a new timeline.
Where Are We Now?
As we move through 2026, we are in a phase of intentional growth. Our team is a mix of people who came in with a deep love for point-and-click games and others who are discovering that passion along the way. ​
We’re building this game in the gaps between our daily lives, balancing development with work and family. Quality takes time, and we’re committed to delivering a polished experience, rather than a rushed one.
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Our primary goal right now is a more comprehensive demo, which will be available for you to play before the full release. We are developing new content and reworking earlier assets to ensure a polished and modern experience.

While we are certainly inspired by the iconic Nancy Drew games, we are simultaneously carving out our own identity. We love seeing the genre grow with titles like Alex Hill: Whispers at White Oak Inn and Penelope Pendrick and the Art of Deceit. (Both of which we highly recommend!)
In an effort to further define a tone that is uniquely ours, we’re in the process of updating our official logo with a new silhouette and further refining our branding to better reflect the game as it stands today. These updates and further creative shifts to our main character and narrative direction better align with the project's maturity.
What Creative Shifts?
While Amelia's age was previously ambiguous, she's now definitively in her early to mid 30s. Why?

First, we want to do justice to our voice talent. We’re incredibly lucky to have Lani Minella, whose extensive career spans games and animation. Lani is one of those voices that has truly grown up alongside us, the kind that constantly makes you go, “Wait… I think I know that voice.”

Lani has always been more than just one role. She’s been part of so many worlds we love, often without us even realizing it at the time, with various voices across worlds such as Mass Effect, Soulcaliber, and World of Warcraft. Her voice is woven into so many experiences that shaped us as gamers. And now she’s our Amelia.
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Second, we’re intentionally stepping away from being seen as a direct reflection of the Nancy Drew-style games that originally inspired us. Many other talents and IPs have developed from a similar spark: Alex Hill, Penelope Pendrick, Marcella Moon, Gumshoe Detective Agency, and more. Each has grown and developed their own identity, and while we’re incredibly lucky to have Lani as our lead voice, we hope you see Amelia and our project with a new identity as well. 

What’s always been special about this team is that we didn’t just love those point-and-click games, we grew up with them. And now, we’ve grown up. Amelia reflects that. She allows us to hold onto that sense of nostalgia while also telling a story that feels more aligned with where we, and our audience, are now. 
To Our Community--Thank You.
The support we’ve received as we’ve started sharing more updates and teasers has meant everything. Seeing your excitement and encouragement makes all of this worth it!

We’re still not ready to share a release date, but please know we’re working as hard as we can to create something that feels worthy of Amelia, and of all of you who have stayed with us over the years.

We hope we make you proud.

Love,
The Airtight Alibi Productions Team
]]><![CDATA[Highlighting Other Indie Game Developers!]]>Mon, 19 Aug 2024 20:11:18 GMThttps://www.airtightalibiproductions.com/blog/highlighting-other-indie-game-developersGreetings, savvy sleuths! One thing that we at Airtight Alibi LOVE about our team is that most of us were drawn to this project as community members of HeR Interactive's Nancy Drew PC games.
For those that aren't aware, our game (which you can learn more about here) was inspired by HeR Interactive's games. We loved the style, the charm, and the worlds that HeR created. While the company was taking an excessively long time to release their 33rd installment, our team was formed to make our own game.

As time went on, more and more fans started their own journeys of making games that were inspired by Nancy Drew. Some of these games have been in the works for years! The devotion, creativity, and passion for these projects is so inspiring to our team that we couldn't help but share the amazing work being done by other fellow game developers.

Penelope Pendrick and the Art of Deceit

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This game has been in the works for a decade and is being created solo by Airtight Alibi's very own Julia Holdnack! She is our 3D environment artist and has done some phenomenal work for the game. Her solo project is releasing in 2025 and can be wishlisted on Steam right now!
Steam page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3148060/Penelope_Pendrick_and_the_Art_of_Deceit/
Game trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INKbOnDYOxY
Default Cube Games website: https://defaultcubegames.com/
Default Cube Games Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/juliahdcg/

Alex Hill: Whispers at White Oak Inn

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As another Nancy Drew inspired game, Alex Hill is being created by a solo developer and has been in production for nearly a year. The game can be wishlisted on Steam and also has a playable demo!
Steam page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2859200/Alex_Hill_Whispers_at_White_Oak_Inn/
Alex Hill Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexhillmystery/
Alex Hill website: https://alexhillmystery.com/

Super Spy Academy

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Super Spy Academy has been in development for a few years now and has a planned release year of 2025. This game is another solo-developed project which was inspired by Nancy Drew. You can wishlist this game on Steam right now!
Steam page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1929560/Super_Spy_Academy/​

What Was Found at Ravenhill

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Last but most certainly not least is a point-and-click adventure game called What Was Found at Ravenhill. This game is being developed solely by indie developer Distant Dimensions. His game has been in development for over a year and doesn't yet have a set release window, however he has also developed several games previously which can be accessed via his Substack page.
Substack page: https://distantdimensions.substack.com/​
Distant Dimensions itch.io: https://distant-dimensions.itch.io/
​Distant Dimensions Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/distantdimensions/
The level of quality in the works from these developers cannot be understated. I know I speak on behalf of the rest of our team when I say that these all look excellent and I cannot wait for each one of these to release! Which one of these projects are you most excited about? Are there any other games that we didn't mention that were inspired by HeR Interactive's games? We would love to hear about them!

Sincerely,
🌻Yellow🌻
]]><![CDATA[Behind the Scenes: Dr. Ramirez!]]>Wed, 10 Apr 2024 19:30:30 GMThttps://www.airtightalibiproductions.com/blog/behind-the-scenes-dr-ramirezGreetings savvy sleuths! Welcome back to another look at the inner workings of Amelia Darnell!
We just shared the evolution of one of our characters, Dr. Ramirez, on our social pages (you should follow us, by the way!). We were so excited about her that we had to share more. The artist who brought Dr. Ramirez to life is here to give you an in-depth look at her creative process! Take it away, Shug!
Shug: To create Dr Ramirez' character design, I collaborated with the art team by making a series of quick sketches I thought would suit her based on her role and background.
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Shug: I got clear feedback from several folks on the team, and with it came up with a second round of designs that fit even closer to what everyone had in mind.
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Shug: To me, this process feels like sculpting: starting with a vague block of clay and a loose idea and chiseling it down until it starts to take form, iteration after iteration.
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Shug: Once we had a design we all liked, it was time to add color and she was really starting to come to life!
Shug: More collaboration, then boom! Dr Ramirez joins the cast for Amelia Darnell: Secrets of Silvercrest Village!
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How cool is that?? I absolutely LOVE how Dr. Ramirez turned out, and seeing the creative process outlined like this is SO AWESOME!! What do you think of her? How do you think she plays into the mystery? Stay tuned for more behind-the-scenes tidbits like this!

Sincerely,
Yellow (by Coldplay)
]]><![CDATA[Welcome to the airtight alibi website!]]>Mon, 05 Feb 2024 17:22:43 GMThttps://www.airtightalibiproductions.com/blog/welcome-to-the-airtight-alibi-websiteGreetings, savvy sleuths! I'm very excited to announce the arrival of the official Airtight Alibi website!
This is the best resource for all things surrounding Amelia Darnell and the work being done by the fabulous team here at Airtight Alibi Productions. I encourage you to explore everything on the website as there will be some things you won't want to miss!

This blog will be the source of fun facts, behind the scenes stories and images, and many other cool, fun, and amazing things. To start things off, I want to see if you can figure out what the following letters mean:
CYGVQRSCTSBUSFEPORWSHUC
This might be one of the most difficult things I give to you to decrypt... but we'll see how you do!

Thank you so much for following the game and for checking out our website! We're all very excited about what's to come and can't wait to tease you with so many more fun things!

Sincerley,
Yellow
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