It's Steam Awards season and Before We Leave needs you!
We're aiming for the "Sit Back and Relax" Award! Think of all the hours that you have spent playing Before We Leave, letting all your worries melt away while nurturing your peeps as they rediscover civilisation!
As you northern hemisphere folks already know, autumn is here! That means two important things are taking place; Before We Leave is participating in the Steam Autumn Sale, and the Steam Award nominations are opening!
Here's a few reasons why we think our cosy city-builder deserves a nomination for the Sit Back and Relax Award:
It's not an antagonistic game - Before We Leave is all about creating a better life for the Peeps, and exploring without a set time limit.
You don't have to be stressed about making the wrong choice - there are no severe punishments for making mistakes on standard difficulty.
Before We Leave's artstyle is humble, rustic, with a generous dash of slick sci-fi to make the game feel cosy but futuristic enough to be exciting!
It has an awesome, relaxing and folksy soundtrack that's great to chill out to. We even won a local award for it here in New Zealand!
Before We Leave can be played entirely with a mouse. Perfect for holding a beverage of choice in one hand while playing.
The Planet Editor mode we added recently lends itself to this category especially - build a perfect planet and forget about any risks!
We've had some heartfelt messages from players all around the world telling us about how Before We Leave has helped them through a tough time in their life. We're incredibly proud and humbled to have made a game that can provide respite like that.
This review from well-played.com.au actually sums our points here really nicely, too - "Aesthetically, the game is nothing short of joyful. The toy-like look of your villagers, their homes and workplaces is adorable. The way they shuffle around at high speeds is delightful and bitter-sweet when they’re sad. There’s such an immense amount of detail everywhere you look too. Whether it’s drawing back to see the polluted clouds of industry lingering above or zooming all the way in to observe Louise go about her day loading a colony ship with potatoes, the attention to the little things is commendable. I’m also especially fond of the use of music. Happy cities will blast uplifting folk bangers from their homes while unhappy ones will be dead silent, with only the clangs and bashes of alienated labour to fill your earholes. The juxtaposition is quite powerful to say the least."
Thanks for reading, and I'll see you all again tomorrow for our fortnightly news update! <3
Emily, Community Manager
Before We Leave in the Steam Autumn Sale!
Hello Peeps!
It's Steam Autumn Sale time which means you can grab your chance to emerge from the bunker and rediscover civilisation for 40% of the normal price!
Rediscover what was lost and nurture your reborn civilisation in Before We Leave, a city building game set in a cozy corner of the universe. Grow, gather and manage resources to help your settlements thrive, and share goods between the hexagonal lands and planets around you. Relax and expand the fabric of your growing societies and create a solar system of happy planets at your own pace. Not everything will go your way, though - use your wits and research solutions to overcome the challenges that your ancestors once faced.
That's not all though! We're also super excited to offer the fantastic 36 track soundtrack with a 25% discount too. The soundtrack was composed and produced by award-winning composer Benedict Nichols. Enjoy a relaxing fusion of music, from gentle guitars that soothe the spirits of your Peeps to the upbeat folk music of your industrious civilization. It's a perfect accompaniment to watching the stars go by!
It’s been a busy three weeks since I last summarised what’s happening with the studio and Before We Leave - it’s a nice change of pace to be writing this for you all ːsteamhappyː
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The next content update - Our next content update (the working title being The Wasteland Update) has most of its major features implemented or underway! We have a fair bit of work left to do on it, and we’re not sure when it will be coming out, but rest assured we’re still working on it! We'll be updating the Beta Branch with a new build in the coming weeks.
Here’s a sneak peek of a building that’s being added called The Nanotech Cache. There’s also other previews of new buildings in the news video linked in this post.
Our YouTube channel - Speaking of videos, we recently reached 400 subscribers on the Balancing Monkey Games YouTube channel! Thank you all so much for your support, I was totally blown away. You’re all wonderful! <3
Secret stuff... - There is so much stuff we can’t talk about right now (sorry!) but if you want to get that (upcoming) information a bit faster, I’d recommend popping over to our Twitter, where you may find those juicy details more frequently.
Hiring - We’re reaching the end of our hiring process, and wow it’s been intense. If you’re one of the people who applied for a role with us - thank you! We received so many amazing applications and it was genuinely difficult to figure out who - and how - we say “no” to all the wonderful folks who sent applications through.
That’s it for the moment folks, I’ll be back in two weeks time with another update for you all.
Thanks for reading!
Emily, Community Manager
Weekly News - 21st October
Happy Friday Peeps! It’s fortnightly news time once again.
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Before We Leave news
Building suggestions We had an impromptu discussion with the BWL Discord community about what new buildings folks would like to see in the game. I’m hoping to preview them sooner rather than later - I think you’ll be pretty happy with what’s coming.
If you want further information on the buildings, check out the latest news video - Sam goes into detail on it around the 17 minute mark. And, if you’re wanting to join in on these discussions when they happen, please join our Discord server!
New update when? We’re still figuring out a date on that. Stay tuned.
A favour to ask... I feel a little ridiculous asking for this favour but… would you mind subscribing to our YouTube channel? There’s some really cool community features and functionality that YouTube gates behind the amount of subscribers a channel has, and we’re trying to grow our subscribers so I can use those features to keep people better informed about what’s going on at the studio and with Before We Leave.
Balancing Monkey Games news
A chat with Managing Director Anna Anna joined us on the Twitch stream this week! She’s such an important foundation of our studio, so if you want to hear more about her work and influence, please give the latest news video a watch.
4 day work weeks As of this week, the studio is moving to a four day working week! Some of you might be familiar with the research coming out worldwide regarding the benefits of a shorter week, and we've decided to give it a go ourselves. This means we won't be around on Mondays (or for many of you, Sunday) so it might take us a little longer to get back to you all regarding bugs, feedback, and other queries. <3
We’re hiring new staff! We’re in the middle of hiring some new people! It’s exciting and a little scary all at once. Our studio recently grew from 4 to 5 people with our awesome new junior producer Sarah, and I can’t wait to see who else comes along too.
That’s all for this week - see you again in a fortnight!
Emily, Community Manager
Weekly News - Our latest roadmap!
Kia ora friends, I’m excited to be unveiling our revised roadmap today!
Our next update which currently has the working title of "Wastlelands" will focus on addressing common feedback; if you want a thorough breakdown of the roadmap from our lead developer/creative director Sam, I’d recommend watching the latest news video linked below.
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If you’d like to discuss it or ask us any questions about it, feel free to comment below - it’s Friday afternoon here in New Zealand now so it’ll take a few days for us to reply, but we absolutely will ːsteamhappyː
Patch 1.0307
We've also launched another patch - you can read the details about it here! This is a smaller patch than usual, but it has some important follow up additions to our Planet Editor update which was released a month ago.
Other than that, we’re busy having lots of meetings about studio operations and who to hire next, as well as prototyping out the next update and combing through feedback from testers.
Anyway, that’s it for now! See you all again in a fortnight <3
Emily, Community Manager
Before We Leave Update 1.0307
Hey peeps!
Thanks for all the feedback and support with Before We Leave. A new patch is now live!
Check out the changelist below for more info..
Update 1.0307 Patch Notes!
New features:
Both in-game and in the Planet Editor, middle click now samples whatever is under the cursor to allow you to place it. Adds a surprising amount of good Quality of Life
When placing Resource Caches and Research piles, you can now choose what they should contain before placing, rather than having to place them then re-select to choose what they contain
Added the Team17 logo to the list of logos that display when the app is started
Bugfixes:
The Planet Editor is no longer affected by any difficulty settings you changes in New Game
Difficulty settings in New Game are correctly applied to any Custom Planets in that game - specifically around amount of resources in Mountains/Rusty Hulk etc
You can now switch the specific model used in Sunken Ruins
Save Game and Steam Workshop thumbnail images are now higher resolution and (more importantly) the correct aspect ratio
Significantly improved the render speed of the Atmosphere
Fixed multiple overlaps and similar issues with translations
Fixed an issue where tooltips near the top-right sometimes go offscreen
Improved how removing land tiles is described in the one-page tutorial for Planet Editor
That wraps up today's patch notes!
Thank you for your patience and stay updated on future updates and patch notes by following our socials!
Kia ora peeps! We've got a few things to cover this fortnight - [previewyoutube="SK4ocGhDloM;full"]
Experimental Beta Branch Patch Notes
Preview of a post-Planet Editor patch New features
Both in-game and in the Planet Editor, middle click now samples whatever is under the cursor to allow you to place it without navigating the bottom-left menu
When placing Resource Caches and Research piles, you can now choose what they should contain before placing, rather than having to place them and re-select to choose what they contain.
Bugfixes
The Planet Editor is no longer affected by any difficulty settings you change in New Game
Difficulty settings in New Game are correctly applied to any Custom Planets in that game - specifically around amount of resources in Mountains/Rusty Hulk etc
You can now switch the specific model used in Sunken Ruins
Save Game and Steam Workshop thumbnail images are now higher resolution and (more importantly) the correct aspect ratio
Significantly improved the render speed of the Atmosphere
Fixed multiple overlaps and similar issues with translations
Fixed an issue where tooltips near the top-right sometimes go off-screen
Improved how removing land tiles is described in the one-page tutorial for Planet Editor
Retrospecting on The Planet Editor
This update was an interesting one; Sam (aka ChiefMonkey) had always intended the Planet Editor to be included in the original launch of Before We Leave, but had to cut it in the interest of focusing on more important features and meeting deadlines. Despite it being partially implemented already, the update still took a surprising amount of work (alongside adding some really nice quality of life features too, which you can read about in the patch notes). We’d originally intended to have it come out in early August to get more content to you all ASAP, but September quickly became a much more viable option. Team17 suggested having a Beta Branch available too, which turned out to be a huge boon - the feedback given to us by you all was crucial!
Finding our Feet Speaking of Team17, the Planet Editor update is the first update we’d worked on and shipped with them, after their new partnership with us back in April. Like in any new relationship, finding normalcy and routine proved to be a bit tricky, but it feels so good to have guidance from a very established company full of experienced and knowledgeable folks.
Ugh, Lockdown New Zealand’s latest lockdown also made getting the update ready a little more challenging - I’m sure everyone reading this will know of that terrible brain fog, apathy and exhaustion that comes with being shut inside, protecting yourself from the giant, lethal pain in the butt that is Covid-19.
But now the update is here! We’re able to relax a little more, and enjoy watching community made custom planets trickle into the Steam Workshop. <3
What’s next? Well, we’ve made some changes in the studio - specifically around how we organise ourselves and plan changes to the game! In game development, this magical thing is called Production. The people that live and breathe this discipline, Producers, are essential for any growing studio, and it’s very nice to have someone in that role now!
As for our next Before We Leave update, this is going to be maddeningly vague for some of you reading this but we actually don’t have anything concrete right now (if you watch our YouTube News videos, like the one linked here, this might sound a little familiar to you). We’ve had many planning meetings and analysed feedback - we’re at a crossroads right now, with many different paths forking away from us. What we do know is that addressing common feedback about Before We Leave being boring and repetitive without negatively affecting what people love about it is key.
I hope to have our revised update Roadmap out in the next couple of weeks - stay tuned for more info!
Ngā mihi nui <3 Emily, Community Manager
Weekly News - Post Planet-Editor launch
Tēnā koutou (greetings to you all)!
This news post is a little late due to our Planet Editor update launch happening last week, but I hope you enjoy reading it nonetheless! [previewyoutube="ZZ-uqLPSsCo;full"] The Planet Editor is here! As many of you already know, the Planet Editor update came out last week. I’ll be playing through your custom planets from Steam Workshop on our Twitch channel this coming Wednesday NZST to celebrate!
We’ve also identified some small issues with the update, such as:
Translation & text errors
Minor UI issues
Weird edge cases in custom planet gameplay
We’ll be releasing a patch to resolve these issues - please stay tuned for more info soon.
Our next roadmap We’re still figuring out what’s next for Before We Leave and our studio, so the latest version of our roadmap isn’t quite ready to go just yet. I’m hoping to have a new version for you all within the next month! That said, if you want a sneak peek at what we’re doing, watch the YouTube video linked in this post.
Fortnightly News Updates Since we’re prepping and planning for our next update, I’ll be posting news updates once a fortnight instead of weekly - so the next update (excluding this one of course!) will be on Friday, the 24th September NZST.
Anyway, that's all for now! Have fun playing the Planet Editor, and I'll be back in a fortnight with more news for you all <3
- Emily, Community Manager
Before We Leave: Planet Editor Update - Live Now!
Hey Peeps! The Planet Editor update is finally here!
You can now craft your own unique planets! Created something wonderful? Be sure to take screenshots and show off your creations - we all can’t wait to see what wonderful planets you create!
Below you can check out all the details of what this update involves - from new features to fixes!
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The Planet Editor
There's a new Planet Editor option in the Main Menu!
On Steam, planets can be shared using Steam Workshop
On Epic Game Store and Steam you can export custom planets as files that can be shared with friends
Main game
New Game dialog in the Main Menu is different to accommodate the Planet Editor’s addition to the game
Achievements are disabled in games with Custom Planets, as it would be too easy to create planets designed to grant many of them straight away
You can Ctrl-Click on a Building button to access a list of upgraded versions of that building, in both Planet Editor and the normal game.
In the Planet Editor you can also use this to choose things like exactly which type of tree you want to place, or to choose between normal or passive Guardians
Technologies have a coloured border according to the highest required technology type, to hopefully help people realise why they haven't unlocked the rest of the tree yet when they need to find another tech type
Large Whales are now more balanced:
The first couple of Large Whale attacks are deliberately not too damaging, to give the player time to adapt
Better balance of Whale attack sizes depending the size of the planet they're eating
If a Whale is already on it's way when you finish the Whale Charmer, the existing whale is updated to be able to complete the game, rather than summoning another separate whale
The attack summary notification notes the requirement for inventing/building Shields to protect against Large Whales
If a Large Whale arrives after you've built the Whale Charmer, but your Shield is still on, the endgame is no longer triggered - as should be expected from the description. But it immediately summons a new Whale, which will turn up more quickly so you don’t need to wait for ages for it
In normal games, you no longer require Road access to construct a Forest
Tweaks
Added more Tips on the Loading Screen
You can now Tab/Shift-Tab between text boxes where it makes sense, both in-game and in the Planet Editor
Added some new tooltips:
Population counter in the left hand side of the Top Bar tells you the Idle Peeps/Empty Slots numbers
Construction Resources next to the Population Counter now tell you how many you're creating/using per minute
Previous/Next island buttons tell you the island you'll change to
Mousing over a building (or construction site) shows you what building it is
Anywhere where a number is being rounded to the nearest thousand, the tooltip should now give the actual value
Buildings that can be constructed by homeless Peeps now indicate this in their building preview card
• Historical Document dialog shows a number for how many you've earned
• In Main Menu, moved Load Game to come just under New Game
Fixes
Changed the look of Rainforest Tiles to be different to Grass tiles, now that it's possible to have both on a single Island
Fixed a bug where colonising a planet with Purple Research on the first island wouldn't unlock all the Guardian-technologies
Added a max range to the Sphinx, just in case someone puts one on a really large island
Fixed an issue where power wasn't flowing through power lines because of a resource cache sitting on a tile border
When a production building is off, smoke turns off too
Tile highlighting is much brighter over ocean tiles now, so it's easier to see valid/invalid placements
Fixed an issue that was trapping a Minotaur if Astrobaleenium turns up right underneath it
Protective Clothing technology now states it gives access to the Protective Elevator too
In the Language Selection dropdown, made the tick larger so it's easier to see which language is selected
Fixed Upgraded Iron Mines so they connect to Power Lines properly
Fixed an issue with unlocked hidden achievements not displaying correctly
Moved the selection ring for Protective Elevator
Fixed the Apocalypse Soon and See Hunter scenarios failing to load
If the Crystal Island spawns in ocean tiles that haven't yet been explored, it now displays correctly
Fixed an issue that was causing the game to stay on the loading screen if the loading process failed - it now goes back to the main menu and displays an error dialog
Updated the road texture under Protective Elevators
Ruined Orchards now have ruined looking trees
Corrected texturing of ruined Marketplaces
Fixed chimney smoke coming out of some buildings with the Filtering upgrade
Fixed animation for felling a tree when the Forest is next to a cliff
Creative Director and Lead Developer of Before We Leave, Sam Barham (perhaps better known as ChiefMonkey) will be broadcasting live here on Steam this Wednesday 5pm EST/2pm PST/10pm BST to show off this awesome new feature, discuss patch notes, and answer your questions!
You can see Sam’s past Steam broadcast over on our YouTube channel here.
