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Steam Greenlight sale takes up to 75 percent off Greenlit games
Happy birthday, Greenlight! To celebrate one year of community-voted games, Steam is giving everyone a present: A super sale on 50 Greenlit games, now through September 2 at 10AM PT. Games on sale include (big breath) La Mulana, Guncraft, Waking Mars, DLC Quest, Divekick, Kentucky Route Zero, Game Dev Tycoon, Incredipede, Primordia, Edge of Space, McPixel, No Time To Explain, Anodyne, Organ Trail, Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, Shelter, Receiver, Surgeon Simulator 2013, Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded, Postal 2 Complete, Evoland, Rogue Legacy, Papers Please and Akaneiro: Demon Hunters. Games range from 10 percent to 75 percent off, so release that breath you're holding, blow out the candles and view the lineup of Greenlight sale games on Steam. Also this weekend, play Natural Selection 2 for free, with the game 75 percent off, or snag Prison Architect for 40 percent off.
Valve: Steam Greenlight a year old, goal is to have 'no bottlenecks'
Valve's populist Greenlight program, which uses the Steam community to select the games available on the digital distribution platform, has aged a tender year. According to Valve, the program has helped double the number of independent games available in the system. "Ultimately our goal is to have no bottlenecks at all between developers and consumers," said Valve head Gabe Newell. "As we move closer to that, launching Greenlight and evolving our backend toolset has helped us increase our publishing throughput, pushing the number of independent titles released in the last twelve months to equal the number of titles published from all other categories combined." Newell expects the indie submissions to grow "dramatically" as the company continues to build upon the service. The program recently passed a mega-round of 100 games, compared to its standard boutique sizes.
Steam Greenlights 100 games: Black Annex, Escape Goat, Reprisal, more
Steam greenlit 100 games today in order to "stress test" its system, and maybe to mess with everyone who thought they'd get smaller batches of Greenlight games more frequently. The mega-round of Greenlight games includes 8BitMMO, A Walk in the Dark, Against the Wall, Black Annex, C-Wars, Delver's Drop, Dino Run SE, Doorways, Escape Goat, Knytt Underground, Mutant Mudds, Paranautical Activity, Ray's the Dead, Reprisal, Shadow of the Eternals, Shantae: Risky's Revenge, Signal Ops and Teslagrad, to name a few (comparatively). "This latest milestone is both a celebration of the progress we've made behind the scenes and a stress test of our systems," Steam writes. "Future batches are not likely to be as large, but if everything goes smoothly we should be able to continue increasing the throughput of games from Greenlight to the Steam store." Read through the hefty list on Steam.
Race the Sun soars to Mac on August 19
Indie dev studio Flippfly's website boasts, "Every game we make is something we've never seen before." And by the looks of the company's upcoming racing / survival game Race the Sun, that promise is being upheld. The game was funded via a Kickstarter campaign and is scheduled to hit Steam on August 19th with full Mac compatibility. In Race the Sun, you pilot a solar-powered airplane as the sun sets in the distance. This, of course, poses a rather large problem, and it's up to you to speed towards the horizon in hopes of keeping your craft airborne. However, the path isn't without obstacles. Since the game's world is endlessly generated, it only ends when the sun finally sets, though you're not likely to make it that far. [via Joystiq]
Race the Sun brightens up PC, Mac, Linux on August 19
Most people will probably have to play Race the Sun over and over again to become proficient at it, so get as early a start as you can: It launches on August 19 for PC, Mac and Linux. In its most basic state, Race the Sun is about "racing a solar-powered craft toward the sunset at breakneck speed," developer Flippfly told us in July – it's a game where players literally try to outpace the sun. But that's not enough. A new mode, Apocalypse, is for the "devoutly masochistic" and it looks like it exists outside the bounds of mere practice. Race the Sun is up on Steam Greenlight, and pre-orders with instant access to the full game, including Apocalypse, are live now on Flippfly. Don't stare at the sun – race it.
Steam gives Satellite Reign, 7 Days to Die and others the Greenlight
The latest round of Steam Greenlight-approved games is headlined by a few Kickstarter successes, perhaps most notably the only-recently-funded Satellite Reign. The Syndicate Wars-inspired real-time strategy title achieved around $611K in backing, and now heads to Valve's portal alongside open-world zombie horror 7 Days to Die and 70s sci-fi god game Maia. 7 Days to Die even-more-recently achieved its Kickstarter goal of $200K and still has six days of its campaign to go, while Maia from indie dev Simon Roth, self-described as Dwarf Fortress meets Dungeon Keeper, was funded on Kickstarter late last year. Other highlights from the round of 15 include The Novelist, in which you play a ghost who observes and shapes the lives of a family, the re-release of 90s horror The 7th Guest, sci-fi janitorial sim (yes really) Viscera Cleanup Detail, and another Kickstarter success in Nekro, which mixes Diablo-style gameplay with the charming art of necromancy. We've got the full list of newly Greenlit games after the break.
Ouya-exclusive Polarity reaches Steam Greenlight, offers Oculus Rift support
BlueButton Games' first-person puzzler Polarity will add a chamber to its labrynth-like vault for the PC with Oculus Rift support if it's voted onto Steam Greenlight, Eurogamer reports. Craig Littler, founder of the one-man studio, claims he "wasn't asking for much" when he tried to negotiate with Ouya, Inc. for the necessary revenue to retain Polarity's Ouya exclusivity. Littler says "they were fairly resistant to change and as such I think there will be plenty of devs who just use them as 'another platform' rather than committing to them exclusively." While Littler knows Polarity isn't a blockbuster, he wants "as many people to play it as possible so I can fund my next project." Polarity follows TowerFall as the next Ouya exclusive to call off its engagement and launch on additional platforms. We noted both as highlights during the Ouya's launch.
American McGee's Grimm darkens Steam's Greenlight
Now that American McGee's Grimm has reached Steam Greenlight, it's seeking community votes in order to rewrite fairy tales into tragedies on Windows and Mac via Steam. Grimm's 23 episodes last a half hour apiece and revolve around twisting iconic fairy tales into bleak, dreary scenarios. Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella and Jack and the Beanstalk are among Grimm's victims. Players spread gloom by moving Grimm around each world, working to reach an acceptable level of grime within the shortest time possible. The Grimm series originally launched for Windows in July 2008.
'NaissanceE' explores a map of the monochromatic
NaissanceE is a first-person puzzle exploration game, built in the Unreal Development Kit and set in a beautiful monochrome world with a heavy emphasis on light and shadow. The baby of developer Limasse Five, It's a project that began in 2006 and is now patiently waiting for votes on Steam Greenlight to push it out this Fall. Limasse Five explains NaissanceE as "a game, a philosophical trip and an artistic experience." Limass Five says the game's main goal is to make players appreciate the "loneliness, the feeling to be lost in a gigantic unknown universe" and expects them to be marveled by the beauty of this black-and-white world. "A world which seems to be alive, leading the player, manipulating him and playing with him for any reason."
Deadly Premonition heads up latest round of Steam Greenlight picks
Director SWERY65's intensely bizarre action-adventure game Deadly Premonition is headed to Steam after earning community approval in the latest round of Steam Greenlight votes. Critics weren't quite sure what to make of Deadly Premonition when it was originally launched in 2010 for the Xbox 360, earning it the dubious distinction of "Most Critically Polarizing Survival Horror Game" in the 2012 Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition. The upcoming Steam release is based on the recent PlayStation 3 port Deadly Premonition: The Director's Cut, which features a redesigned control scheme and a new batch of bonus content. Fourteen games and two software titles were chosen in Steam Greenlight's most recent community vote, including Krillbite Studio's Kickstarter-funded horror game Among the Sleep, 2D fighter parody Divekick, and the free Half-Life: Opposing Force remake Operation Black Mesa. A full list of today's newly-Greenlit games is after the break below.
Kentucky Route Zero half off today and tomorrow on Steam
Deal alert: Cardboard Computer's Greenlight-approved adventure game Kentucky Route Zero is available for 50 percent off of its regular price on Steam through today and tomorrow. Buyers receive instant access to the game's first two acts, along with three additional chapters that are planned for release over the next year. A DRM-free version of Kentucky Route Zero (which includes a Steam key) is also half off this week at the Humble Store.
Deadly Premonition: The Director's Cut heads to Steam Greenlight
Cult favorite Deadly Premonition is one of the biggest names yet on Steam Greenlight, after publisher Rising Star promised an "enhanced" version of the Director's Cut should the eccentric mystery game get voted through. Among the other Director's Cut additions, the PC edition is set to get exclusive DLC. "Rising Star Games is an extremely community-driven publisher and our vocal fans have been calling for a PC version of this game," said Rising Star Games COO Martin Defries, "So using Steam Greenlight gives those fans the chance to make a difference." Developer Access Games first brought the divisive Deadly Premonition to Xbox 360 in 2010, followed by the Director's Cut PS3 version for the west earlier this year. Our coffee forgot to warn us about a possible PC version, didn't it Zach?
Guncraft, Cognition among eight games Greenlit on Steam
Steam Greenlight recently gave the go-ahead for eight games and three pieces of software to begin distribution on Steam. The greenlit games were Guncraft by Exacto Game Studios, Cognition: An Erica Reed Thriller by Phoenix Online Studios, Wild Games Studio's Day One : Garry's Incident, Homesick by Lucky Pause, In Verbis Virtus by Indomitus Games, XGen Studios' Super Motherload, Vector by Nekki and Verdun by Blackmill Games. The apps greenlit this week were Actual Multiple Monitors, FL Studio and Leadwerks 3: Steam Edition.
Edge of Space available now, thanks to Steam Early Access
After getting approved by both Kickstarter and the Steam Greenlight program, the indie sandbox survival game, Edge of Space, is playable by the public, thanks to Steam's Early Access program. The game can now be purchased for an early access price of $11.99, just a few bucks off from the eventual $14.99 launch price. Anyone buying the game for early access will also get a set of "First Responder Armor," with some extra bonuses as you leave your crashed spaceship and attempt to survive in an alien world. This release of the game is still in beta, and the developers promise there may be other early adopter rewards beyond encounters with "genetically-evolved polar bears."
Space sim MOBA GoD Factory: Wingmen aims to make you top gun
GoD Factory: Wingmen is a four-on-four space combat simulator for PC hoping to achieve funding through Kickstarter right now. A Steam Greenlight campaign is also underway. In development at Nine Dot Studios in Quebec, Canda, GoD Factory: Wingmen tasks players with assaulting and destroying the enemy team's carrier ship. It's "essentially a space-sim MOBA," studio founder Guillaume Boucher-Vidal says in the pitch video above, but what sets it apart from other MOBAs is the free space dogfighting and customization options. At the beginning of each match players build their carrier ship from a series of interchangeable parts and as each segment of the carrier ship is destroyed, unique penalties based around that segment are incurred. Oculus Rift is also in the cards, which Nine Dot says is a natural fit for stationary players in a space combat simulation scenario; however, the Kickstarter page notes this feature may not be available right at launch. Right now, the Kickstarter campaign has nine days to go. Currently, GoD: Factory Wingmen is near one-third of its goal on Kickstarter.
Greenlight Supershow live-streams 13 hours of indie hopefuls June 29
The Greenlight Supershow will capture the hottest games on Steam Greenlight for a 13-hour live-stream event on Twitch, starting at 10:30AM on Saturday, June 29. The Supershow showcases more than 25 games, each vying for a spot on Steam via Greenlight, and will include Q&As, giveaways, and sneak peeks at new things. Portions will be co-hosted by YouTubers Jesse Cox (OMGFcata) and Ryan Letourneau (Northernlion), as well as other indie-loving web personalities. The Greenlight Supershow will feature Ray's the Dead, BroForce, Girls Like Robots, Escape Goat, Black Annex, Delver's Drop, Paranautical Activity, McDroid, Dino Run SE, 8BitMMO and Tower of Guns, among others. Check out the entire schedule – including breaks with games that have already been Greenlit – right here. The whole shebang is organized by Alix Stolzer of development duo Robot Loves Kitty, who says the event comes complete with Valve's support. Stolzer's multiplayer roguelike, Legend of Dungeon, was Greenlit in April, and she wants more indies to find the same success on Steam. This weekend, consider ditching those Saturday morning cartoons and checking out the Greenlight Supershow all day long.
Steam Greenlight sneaks out six more games, one more app
Steam let six games and one piece of software through its Greenlight service last week during E3, granting each the ability to be distributed on the platform. The greenlit games were Assetto Corsa by Kunos Simulazioni, DreadOut by Digital Happiness, Benjamin Hill's Ether One, GunZ 2: The Second Duel by MAIET Games, Stonehearth by Radiant Entertainment and Ben Falcone's first-person survival horror game for Oculus Rift, The Forest. Stonehearth, a sandbox strategy game, recently raised $751,920 on Kickstarter. Heaven Benchmark by Unigine was the lone piece of software that community approval last week.
The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Papers, Please
It's not that there are too many indie games; it's that there aren't enough hours in a day to play all of them. The Joystiq Indie Pitch curates the best indies to play now and watch out for in the future. What's your game called and what's it about? The game is called Papers, Please and it follows the daily grind of an immigration inspector working in a fictional communist country in the early 1980s. The gameplay is based around detecting discrepancies in the documents provided by entrants. Using the limited resources provided by the Ministry of Admission, you have to sort spies, terrorists, smugglers and criminals from the flow of hopeful immigrants. What inspired you to make Papers, Please? I was inspired originally by my trips through airport immigration in the last few years. In general I try to keep an eye out for new game ideas and figured that whatever rigamarole the immigration inspector was doing behind their desk might be fun. Once that idea started to grow, I noticed other aspects of the concept that could be fun. Instead of playing the cool spy protagonist that slips through a checkpoint unsuspected, you can be the hard-ass inspector that casts their skeptical eye at every grandmother trodding through. That sort of role reversal sounded fun to me and I thought others might like it, too.
Paranautical Activity allegedly blocked from Steam release due to Greenlight conflict
After securing a publisher for its first-person shooter Paranautical Activity, indie developer Code Avarice claims that it has been blocked from a direct Steam release due to a conflict with a previously launched Steam Greenlight campaign. Code Avarice submitted Paranautical Activity to Steam Greenlight in August last year, and later entered talks with Adult Swim Games to assist with promotion and publishing. Code Avarice's Mike Maulbeck claims that Adult Swim's recent attempt to directly publish the game through Steam was turned down because Valve "didn't want to send the message that indies can seek out publishers to bypass Steam Greenlight." Maulbeck elaborates in the interview above, saying, "We just assumed that we would need Greenlight because everybody has to go through Greenlight now." Maulbeck continues: "Now we're just dead in the water. We've got a Greenlight campaign that we haven't touched in months, and we have to resurrect it from the ashes, because that's our only option at this point. "We can totally back out [of Adult Swim's publishing agreement] now if we want to," Maulbeck said. "We haven't officially decided if we want to go with them, but the fact that we have to get onto Steam [ourselves] is a real bummer." Addressing the situation, Valve's Doug Lombardi told Gamasutra, "We review Greenlight votes, reviews, and a variety of factors in the Greenlight process. However our message to indies regarding publishers is do it for your own reasons, but do not split your royalties with a publisher expecting an automatic 'Yes' on Greenlight."
Pid dev unveils 'early gameplay footage' of wildlife survivor Shelter
At first glance Shelter looks kind of cuddly; you play a badger mother looking after her cubs in some pleasant looking greenery. Pid developer Might & Delight is billing its next game as anything but. As this early footage shows, you'll have to hunt other animals for food, and avoid becoming prey yourself. That inferno at the end isn't too cuddly either. Shelter, announced earlier this year, is still foraging on Steam Greenlight. Might & Delight's plans are to release it into the wilds of PC and Mac towards the end of this summer.
