Sunday, May 7, 2017

Whim Independent Studios - Development Log #38

Hey everyone! Happy May! Time for the newest development log!

It has been quite a while since I was able to post a development log for our studio. I kind of wanted to time this post with a reboot overall with my blog. A big shoutout to Deborah Groves who was commissioned to come up with a new tile like background for the blog. I'm going to try and give a public update every month or so going forward. Just as a heads up that we're still working on things and very much alive and existent! Anyway, back on topic, we are back with some really awesome progress since the last post.

Take a look!

GDC 2017

This past March, I flew up to San Francisco and met with Chris Nuño and Jabari Smith who drove from Los Angeles for 2017's Game Developers' Conference. I learned a lot, and found a great list of books to get for the studio development.

L to R  
Christopher Nuno (Composer for our games)
Myself
Jabari Smith (Voice of Mage in Selatria and Casting Director)

There were a lot of really interesting books that I saw in the bookstore at the convention. Just to show a few. I plan on purchasing all of them eventually, but I got a few of them that immediately help the teams make some progress. There are a lot of pictures below but you can click them to see the original sizes if you please.
















Selatria



First and foremost, were able to get a publisher for Selatria: Advent of the Dakk'rian Empire with Aldorlea Games. Under Aldorlea's label, we are able to bring the first three chapters of Selatria to the Steam audience as well as their own website/portal for independently-produced RPGs. After a hilarious (for me at least) three month delay, we were also able to launch Selatria on GameJolt as well. That is four awesome distribution channels to enjoy the game!

While it's not set in stone, we are currently eyeing new distribution channels as well as Twitch streamers, YouTube Let's Players, as well as reviewers. If you're interested in a code, please send me a facebook or twitter message with your site/channel and maybe we can work something out.

Patch 1.21


As of this time, Patch 1.21 is now online (on itch.io, GameJolt, Aldorlea's portal and Steam once it passes publisher verification). It includes several fixes to game content, and we will be adding a visual to check your location on the world.

The new Overworld Map indicator implemented in Patch 1.21

We hope this will make navigating to the Southern Isle for Chapter 3 via ship a lot easier than it has been. We are also making changes to how navigating back from the Overworld from the Southern Isles are navigated.

You can read the patch notes in further details with the patch notes on our website.

New character announcements!




Saewo

Saewo is a new party member that will be joining the cast in Chapter 4 of Selatria. He is a former fighter of the resistance and old friend of Waltear. When the Dakk'rian Empire slaughtered Narrosh, the guardian of Oreya, the soul of Narrosh inhabited a new host in Saewo. The resulting uncontrollable rage of Narrosh's spirit inhabiting Saewo causes him to lose control of his mind and spirit and therefore has taken up recluse in Mount Oreya.


Saewo is portrayed by voiceover actor Ryan Raydarke.




Narrosh

Narrosh is the Fire Dragon that resides within Saewo as well as the guardian of Oreya and the surrounding volcano. After being killed in the battle of Oreya by invading Dakk'rian Forces, the soul of Narrosh inhabited Saewo. When Saewo loses control to Narrosh, he takes over and can use devastating attacks on the enemy at the expense of large amounts of AP.

Narrosh is portrayed by voiceover actor Jalen K. Cassell.

Character Art provided by Deborah Groves and Jennifer Gilliland.

Audition decisions:

We have selected/narrowed down our choices from the last audition session. Please visit our auditions section on our website if you made the cut! We will be sending information about callbacks and confirmed roles and paperwork via email later on Sunday May 7th.


LVL Up Expo 2017

 

We will be attending LVL Up Expo at the Cashman Center in Las Vegas, Nevada on May 13-15! We will be at Booth 181 demonstrating Selatria and ANTics! We will be showing a world first exclusive look at Chapter 4 of Selatria which will be releasing in the future. It's pretty challenging, and we will be giving out special treats and prizes to those who can complete the dungeon.

We will also be selling digital codes and bundles, and Shadoe our sound engineer will be cosplaying as some of the characters at the show giving out cards to check out our booth!

Here's a preview! Shout-out to Deborah Groves for the look of the cards we will be giving out and the design for the digital codes.





Preview shot of the Digital Code cards and postcards we'll be handing out at LVLUpExpo!
Photos courtesy of Paul Vela 
Art by Deborah Groves
We will also be having a world-first demo of Chapter 4 available! Players will be able to explore some of the puzzles in Mount Oreya and attempt to reach Saewo! We will send this Chapter 4 demo as a free download for anyone who has purchased the game on itch.io, GameJolt, or Aldorlea at a future date.

Chapter 4 will include more complex and dynamic dungeons that require more of thinking on your feet. Using some feedback from the forums, we will implement a mechanic that makes it easier after repeated failures for those having extreme difficulty completing it. For advanced players who are able to complete the dungeons at their intended difficulty, they will release bonus treasure at the end of the dungeon.

As for some screenshots! Do note that some content you see here is not final and we might change it before retail release.






 


Get Selatria and ANTics bundled until May 31!

Also to celebrate our attendance at this year's LVLUpExpo, we are digitally selling Selatria and ANTics as a bundle for this month for $5.29! You can purchase it here if you please.

Making of series!

Earlier this year (or maybe it was last year) we recorded a series of interviews with Jabari on how we do business at the studio. I'm very camera shy and awkward, so I feel like I came out as such, but we plan on doing more on the future. We released Episode 1 a few months ago which you can see below.


And as of today, here is Episode 2! Enjoy!





Whim Indie comes to E3 2017!

 

Our studio will be attending our fourth consecutive E3 next month! We are aiming to announce our newest game to coincide with the E3 conference (though not at the conference itself). It's a secret for now, so you'll just have to wait until then!

 

Open Positions/Internships



Last but not least, I'm looking for game designers (specifically battle system programmers) to assist with development of Selatria. We are also looking for artists and a sound effects designer for a soon-to-be announced game that we can't talk about just yet. If this might fit you, feel free to apply at the link below. Do note we commission by the asset.