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The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Jamsouls
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? Our game is called Jamsouls. We took inspiration from the famous tale of Pandora's Box to create crazy battles between naughty evil creatures in a vivid and colourful arena! How have sales and visibility been on XBLIG? Is $1 a good price point for Jamsouls? XBLIG has poor visibility compared to other games featured on the Xbox Marketplace. We feel that the platform is dying slowly, and that Microsoft is not really interested in this indie scene anymore, which is a shame. We chose the price of $1 because we wanted the game to have maximum exposure. The price of 80 points is very reasonable for anyone wanting to try the game out.
Game Dev Tycoon, Bleed, Riot head up batch of six at Steam Greenlight
Steam revealed today that Game Dev Tycoon, Bleed and other standout titles are featured in the latest batch of games to earn community approval and platform distribution rights through Steam Greenlight. Green Heart Games' simulation title Game Dev Tycoon earned a devoted following upon its release last month for its clever in-game approach to anti-piracy protection. Bootdisk Revolution's Bleed, a one-man effort that premiered for Windows and the Xbox Live Indie Games service late last year, combines frantically paced platforming with time-bending, quadruple-jumping gameplay mechanics. Other games to pass through the latest round of Greenlight approvals include ConcernedApe's open-ended RPG Stardew Valley, The Leonard's "playable documentary" Riot, AustinHand's survival horror title The Legend, and Aterdux Entertainment's Kickstarted strategy-RPG Legends of Eisenwald.
A Mystical Land changes name to Villagers & Heroes, adds content
Remember A Mystical Land? Well, forget about it, at least under that name. Mad Otter and Neonga have sent out a press release announcing that the title is now called Villagers & Heroes in an effort to "better match the content and focus of the game." The name change isn't the only change, either, as gameplay has been upgraded by the addition of player-created custom gear, new realms to explore, and new epic bosses. Animal ranching is a thing now, too, so you can raise sheep, chicken, and pigs alongside those crops in your backyard. Additional improvements are planned for future updates, and Villagers & Heroes is also seeking your approval on Steam's Greenlight service. [Source: Neonga press release]
The Forest inspired by Cannibal Holocaust, walking the paid alpha path
Last week, we got our first taste of The Forest, an upcoming first-person survival-horror game for PC and Oculus Rift, set in a mysterious forest where players must scavenge supplies, build and prepare to defend against a nocturnal indigenous society of cannibals. If you read that last sentence aloud in one dizzying breath, then you have a good idea how excited we are for The Forest. But here's the thing: there isn't much information out there. So we contacted developer Ben Falcone for a tour of The Forest.%Gallery-188147%
'The Forest' puts on Oculus Rift, goes exploring
The Forest is a first-person horror game currently in development for the PC and Oculus Rift. After surviving a plane crash at the outset of the game, players must build and thrive in a mysterious forest, scavenging materials throughout the day and defending against an indigenous enemy by night. Developer Ben Falcone promises changing weather and tides that shift with the day/night cycle. Players will have to chop down trees to build and make fires, scavenge food or plant seeds to grow, while traps will be necessary to maintain a safe perimeter and defend the home. On the game's about page, the nocturnal ne'er-do-wells are described as "a clan of genetic mutant enemies that have beliefs, families and morals." The Forest is tentatively scheduled to launch in late 2013, and is now vying for a spot on Steam Greenlight.
Steam Greenlight pulls in 2 million voters, has a chat with its indies
Getting accepted through Steam's community-voting service, Greenlight, is an ongoing, complex project for many indie developers – and for Steam itself. Valve hosted a chat with Greenlight developers this week to discuss concerns, suggestions and propose what Greenlight may look like in the future. Valve is "actively looking into" releasing the Steamworks API so developers can prepare their games prior to being Greenlit, though it has no timeframe to make that public. Currently all games go to the same Greenlight, but Valve said it would discuss the idea of separating the service by "games that are ready to go" and "games that are in development." On May 1, Valve Greenlit a mini batch of games, and this system will most likely be the new standard, the team said: "Unfortunately, we have limited resources at the moment, so we cannot ship every game that we want. We're working toward having an open platform that Gabe has talked about, but we're not there yet."
Cloudbuilt trailer hits full speed
Cloudbuilt, the futuristic platformer from Coilworks, is still in polishing stages, but it looks better every month. The new trailer shows how that fast-paced action plays out at full speed, including blasts from the main character's ray gun. Cloudbuilt is up for a Steam launch on Greenlight.
Stonehearth builds a giant tips bucket on Kickstarter [update: goal met]
Stonehearth, a blocky sandbox strategy game from Radiant Entertainment, has taken to Kickstarter for funding. Set in a fantasy realm, Stonehearth is a Windows PC game in which you nurture the development of a small band of humans. Stonehearth utilizes procedurally generated terrain and dynamic AI encounters to instill variety into each play session. The game's also been built to be highly moddable; it will ship with tools and guides to help people customize just about everything. By the time you're reading this, Stonehearth will in all likelihood have met its goal of $120,000, with 28 days left to go. [Update: Just as we thought, Radiant has met its goal of $120,000.] If $200,000 is raised, Mac and Linux ports will be developed. Meanwhile, you can also vote for Stonehearth on Steam Greenlight.
Steam Greenlight gets a mini round: Edge of Space; Papers, Please
Steam accepted a mini batch of games and software on Greenlight today, picking up four new, community-voted titles to eventually launch on Steam. The three games are Edge of Space, Venetica and Papers, Please, and the software title is Substance Designer 3, a texturing toolset. Edge of Space is a 2D terraforming experiment set on a distant, rogue planet; Venetica is an adventure set in historical Venice and starring Scarlett, the daughter of Death; and Papers, Please is an intense immigration checkpoint simulator. Steam will likely continue Greenlighting games in smaller batches so the entire process can move more quickly, this round's announcement reads. "These titles were selected on the same criteria we have been using in the past: Votes in Greenlight give us a hugely valuable point of data in gauging community interest along with external factors such as press reviews, crowd-funding successes, performance on other platforms, and awards and contests to help form a more complete picture of community interest in each title," the announcement says.
Indie Royale 'Debut 2' bundle features up-and-coming Greenlight games
Continuing its tradition of following a theme for its bundles, the next Indie Royale gathers six up-and-coming Steam Greenlight games for consumption.Croixleur is a hack-and-slash affair from Japanese indie studio Souvenir Circ where players must battle through floors of progressively more difficult enemies; Goodhustle Studios Inc.'s Beast Boxing Turbo has you infiltrating a monster boxing league and punching lots of animals in first-person fashion; Dawnstar is a free-roaming space combat game from Wraith Entertainment where you're charged with bringing order to a sector ravaged by The Future Mob – or becoming the next big crime kingpin yourself; Battlepaths is Key17Games' loot-driven 2D-RPG; Out There Somewhere from Miniboss is a side-scrolling puzzle-platformer; and Diehard Dungeon is a top-down roguelike from Tricktale thrusting players into randomly generated dungeons.Both Beast Boxing Turbo and Out There Somewhere are tossing in their soundtracks for this latest bundle, and naturally each of these games includes a Steam code if they make it through Greenlight. All games in the Debut 2 bundle are for Windows PC, though Beast Boxing Turbo and Dawnstar are also Mac-compatible.
Surgeon Simulator 2013 transplanted to Steam tomorrow
Surgeon Simulator 2013 will be available for download on Steam tomorrow, April 19. It started out as a cheeky (and wince-inducing) game jam project by four developers made in just two days, and was later approved as a full release by Steam's Greenlight program. You can still play the original jam result online for free, but the full release includes more surgery scenarios, including an operation in the back of a moving ambulance. The physics have been improved, too, and the developers say it'll work on Windows, Mac or Linux on day one.Upon its launch on Steam, the game will cost $9.99 - way cheaper and less grueling than years of medical school.
Steam Greenlight round 6: Legend of Dungeon, Shovel Knight, Faceless
Steam Greenlight has let loose the sixth round of community-chosen projects, with 20 new games and two new software titles. Freshly Greenlit games include Legend of Dungeon, the roguelike crawler from husband and wife development duo Robot Loves Kitty, Shovel Knight from Yacht Club Games' successful Kickstarter campaign, and Faceless, the horror game that's been at the top of the Greenlight pile since day one, but ran into legal problems with the Slender Man franchise.Other games include Dreamfall Chapters: The Longest Journey, Agarest: Generations of War, Pinball Arcade, Angry Video Game Nerd Adventures, Death Inc. and more. Check out the entire list below. The two Greenlit software titles are game capture program PlayClaw and strategy planner GamePlan.
Pid dev badgers Steam Greenlight with new game Shelter
Pid developer Might & Delight announced Shelter today, a third-person, single-player PC and Mac game that sees you play as a badger mother protecting your cete of cubs from natural dangers. It's an unexpected turn for the Swedish indie studio and its former Grin members (Bionic Commando, Terminator Salvation), but perhaps it's about time we saw more of the monochrome omnivore in the gaming scene. Might & Delight promises an "emotional" game that won't shirk from the "harsh" realities of nature. "It's our ambition to create an experience of immersion by making you feel exposed and vulnerable in the sometimes unforgiving hands of the wild", said lead level and game designer Andreas Wangler. "We are not saying nature is cruel, however what the mother and her cubs will experience is simply a fact of life. There are no boss fights in this game. No good or evil elements. It's simply about survival and protecting your offspring."Shelter is slated for late summer 2013. In the meantime, Might & Delight has the game up on Greenlight in the hope the community digs it enough to bring it to Steam. %Gallery-185658%
Ghostlight porting Record of Agarest War to PC
European publisher Ghostlight is porting Compile Heart's Xbox/PS3 strategy game Record of Agarest War (known in Europe as Agarest: Generations of War) to PC, and attempting to get the port on Steam via Greenlight. The port is based on the Xbox 360 version, and will use Aksys Games' North American localization.Agarest combines strategy-RPG gameplay with elements of dating simulation games, with a "Soul Breed" system in which you attempt to build a relationship with one of the heroines of each generation, with your relationship resulting in different playable characters in the next generation. This is a slightly awkward time for Ghostlight to announce this port, as well as plans to port other console games to PC, as the company's most recent release, Devil Survivor Overclocked, suffers from game-breaking bugs – and that just went from 3DS to 3DS.
Contrast preview: Shadow puppet theater
Once upon a time there was a young girl with a troubled home life who took solace in the imaginary universe she dreamed up when she was alone. We've heard this story before, told in variant forms by Guillermo del Toro, Lewis Carroll and Zack Snyder, but Compulsion Studios puts a new twist on the tale with Contrast.Didi, an inquisitive 9-year-old living with her mother in a 1920s noir world, manufactures a landscape of shadows populated by her lone, best friend, Dawn. Dawn is a young woman, more mature and powerful than Didi, and has the ability to shift between the real and shadow worlds. In Didi's reality, Dawn can climb shadows as if they were solid ground, allowing her to scale areas unreachable by flesh characters. She interacts with few real-world objects, and people, aside from Didi, are invisible to her -- only their silhouettes exist.Contrast is a puzzle platformer, starring Dawn as she shifts between shade and density, helping Didi as she follows her mother through the dark city streets. The game is infused with jazz and tainted innocence: Didi's mom, the cabaret singer; her dad, absent; and a decrepit circus, just rolling into town.%Gallery-183660%
Divekick takes a leap of faith on Steam Greenlight, due in summer
Divekick, the two-button fighting game from One True Game Studios, is trying its luck on Steam Greenlight with an updated launch window of summer 2013, pushed back from this spring.Divekick was the subject of a successful Kickstarter campaign in July, but Iron Galaxy canceled that fundraising drive once it secured a publishing deal with Street Fighter 3: Online Edition's Iron Galaxy. Perhaps One True Game is hoping to transfer all that unfinished mojo into a Steam launch.One True Game Studios and Iron Galaxy have plans to bring Divekick to PC, PS3 and Vita this summer. Divekick began as a parody but is now a rising name in the fighting game circuit; it'll be at PAX East in booth 899, if you're around and down for some serious kicking action.
Incredipede 1.5 swings onto Steam on March 18 with a sweet sale
Incredipede hits Steam for PC and Mac on Monday with a sale that knocks $5 off the final price, bringing that bad mama down to $10.Steam's Incredipede is what developer Colin Northway calls version 1.5, since it adds a plethora of new features: 60 new levels in "normal" difficulty, two new muscles controlled with the right hand (think QWOP with creatures), and real-world achievements that ask players to go outside and play with bugs. Yes, outside.Incredipede launched via Northway's site on October 25, and while many players enjoyed its wood-cut art style, the gameplay offered a special kind of challenge; the 60 new levels are designed to make the game more accessible. Incredipede has traveled a long, convoluted path to Steam, after Northway initially found fault in Greenlight. Incredipede was later nominated for an IGF award for Excellence in Visual Art, throwing the game on the fast track to Steam distribution. Delve into the details of Incredipede's journey in our recent interview.
Fractured Soul now on Steam Greenlight
Fractured Soul, the delightfully difficult 3DS action game, will soon be available on single screens. Developer Endgame Studios has submitted a PC, Mac, and Linux version to Steam Greenlight, with additions like an optional easy mode, more advanced timers for speedrunning, and video export.Lacking two discrete screens, Fractured Soul's Steam version uses an unusually skewed splitscreen. It's an interesting effect visible in the above trailer.
How indie creature feature Incredipede stumbled onto Steam
In October, Incredipede developer Colin Northway introduced us to the Offspring Fling process of submitting an indie game to Steam:"Apply to Steam, be rejected, release without it, get popular, be noticed by Valve, release on Steam."Steam has since overhauled its submission process with Greenlight, a crowd-sourced method of voting games onto the service. Now from a developer's perspective, the indie submission system needs a related makeover and a new name. We suggest the Incredipede process:"Post on Greenlight, be rejected, release without it, get popular, be noticed by the IGF and through an award nomination get a deal to release on Steam without Greenlight at all, haters."It's a little more complicated and relies on a smidgen more luck, but the Incredipede process is one of many new ways to get an indie game on Steam. No matter the system, the goal remains the same – a Steam launch can propel an indie game from "hobby" to "day job," or change a sales outlook from "disappointing" to "happy.""More and more Steam is the place to be for indie games," Northway tells me. "If I had $15 for every time I heard the comment, 'I would buy this if it was on Steam,' then I'd be much happier with the sales. Which is why I'm really looking forward to the Steam release."Through its own convoluted yet successful process, Incredipede is coming to Steam for PC and Mac on March 18.
Steam Greenlight fifth set is incisive: Surgeon Simulator 2013, Organ Trail
Steam Greenlight gave the go-ahead to 10 new games today, two of which are decidedly dicey – as in, they involve slicing people open and/or their exposed, internal goo. Surgeon Simulator 2013, the 2013 Global Game Jam phenomenon, is now ready for Steam distribution, along with Organ Trail: Director's Cut, the retro zombie survival game from The Men Who Wear Many Hats.Also on tap for a Steam launch is Hunstman: The Orphanage, a creepy survival-horror hit, along with Anodyne, Distance, Evoland, Kingdom Rush, Legends of Dawn, Receiver and War Thunder. Steam also Greenlit two software titles, a painting tool called Black Ink and PC management service Driver Fusion. Check out the details on all the Greenlit goodies here.
