Into the Dark
Countdown to Halloween
Alright, you may have guessed it already - we are talking about this years Halloween event.
We decided to keep last years bonus level "Into the Asylum" in the build. The one from 2014 "Into the Woods" doesn't compile properly anymore, so it won'T be part of that again.
No, you will get something totally new, and yes, it has something to do with
http://www.indiedb.com/games/into-the-ice
In addition to that, the patch is shaping up, solving many problems, but still not all issues with the video playback in some 3rd-party-codec-infected systems.
So, yes, you will get something totally new to play and an update for Into the Dark!
When?
As always, very close to Halloween!
PS:
And we are cooking up something really nasty for Father's Island, too!
http://store.steampowered.com/app/460940
Save on our games & the final patch is coming!
As you might know (or not), we released our next game on Steam, two years after this Ultimate Trash Edition here. It's called "Father's Island", plays i the same expanded universe as Into the Dark and is kinda the bridge between our trashy masterpiece *coughcough* and the sequel "Into the Ice" - despite being something different, gameplay-wise. And we get really GREAT feedback from gamers and press alike:
http://store.steampowered.com/app/460940
To celebrate that, we have decided to lower Into the Dark permanently to $7.99!
And to help you save even more, we created the ULTIMATE CONSPIRACY PACK, allowing you to get a discount of 23% (haha, do you get it?!) on each game of the series. This means, if you are new to the party, you get BOTH games for a whopping $9.99!
http://store.steampowered.com/bundle/869/
That's the cheapest ticket to insanity you will ever get!
But here comes the part of todays extensive announcement that makes us both proud and a little bit sad:
Some of you have already noticed the latest screenshots and asked on Facebook or via email what the fuzz is about - and yes, it is time to confirm it:
We are working on the final patch for Into the Dark!
As promised, Into the Dark gets a major overhaul in the next few weeks. We have collected a total of 208 wishes, change requests and bug reports from you since the last update, and we intend to tackle most of them.
Here is what we can already promise:
ːNaziUfoLeftː Increased stability on all systems
ːNaziUfoLeftː Rock-solid Windows 10 compatibility
ːNaziUfoLeftː All previous halloween bonus games included
(and yes, we will make new ones in the future, too)
ːNaziUfoLeftː All audio and video files remastered
ːNaziUfoLeftː Tweaked Textures & Shaders
ːNaziUfoLeftː 12 new easter eggs and jokes
Here is what we really want to add:
ːNaziUfoRightː PBR-based texture maps for all levels
(right now a test set is present in the first level, the wood wall)
ːNaziUfoRightː New soundtracks for some levels
ːNaziUfoRightː Tweaked weapons behaviour
ːNaziUfoRightː Mitigation of the "damage on loading" bug
ːNaziUfoRightː Fixing of ALL load / save issues and crashes upon dying
Here is what we are fooling around with, not sure if reasonable:
ːjawrightː AAA shader effects
ːjawrightː AAA light effects
ːjawrightː Dynamic Difficulty Level
However, this is also kind of a farewell for us. Not because we abandon support (we would never do that), but because of the fact that this polishing, the asset improvements and the tweaking will take little bit away from the special "Punk as Hell" attitude of the game.
Into the Dark has won us 4 Game of the Year awards, including the "Gamestar Game of the Year 2014 Community Favorite", and around 30 other awards and recommendations. It has brought furious hate-reviews and tremendous praise, V.I.P. invitiations to B-Movie festivals across Europe and actual death threats.
We have been subject to federal investigations because of something we show in this game that shouldn't be available to the public (Don't worry, all went calm and fine, and it's still in there), we have been interviewed by film makers and investigative journalists - hell, we even became targets of certain "political movements".
All that happened because of this game in its rough, ugly, unpolished, "f*** you"-attitude-showing state. Sure, we have patched before!
We fixed major issues, we improved some things we believed we could do better, we swapped posters, added new jokes - but it was still the same game.
And while we will keep all the content there in the final patch, a little bit of this fairy dust will be gone when the sound files don't kill your headphones and the textures won't make your eyes bleed anymore.
So, you should really make one last run through Into the Dark as it is today, before the patch comes.
Which will be roughly by end of July.
All the best and love from Austria / Romania / Russia / USA,
Ivan from Homegrown Games ːcommieː
PS: We promised we would never remove the iconic clipping errors. Rest assured, we won't do that.
PPS: We won't fix my accent, too.
FOR THE GLORY OF SEITAN!
1. Into the Dark will get its FINAL patch this summer. I know, we said several times that the next one will be the last, but once more we discovered some pretty neat options to make the game more awesome, or, to be honest, less ugly. We can´t refuse doing that.
2. Father´s Island, our next game, will be released in May 2016, not sure if it will be an Early Access or Full experience then, however, we have proven now that we keep up doing surgery on the abominations we unleash upon you. You can follow up the development here:
http://www.indiedb.com/games/fathers-island
3. All aboard the pledging train!
10 days left in our KS campaign for Antinomy - please do your part and join the glorious pledgers who have already driven us to 176%!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/586092941/antinomy-0
Support our next game - something COMPLETELY different
In the meantime, I have gathered what is left here in Austria and Romania, working out a nice detour by visiting Fathers Island. In a few months, you can do that, too:
http://www.indiedb.com/games/fathers-island
However, there is ALWAYS our long-term heart project Antinomy, which has been developed further in Unreal 4 tech and already looks quite promising. I simply cannot let go the amazing storyline Ali-Han had written for it, and I cannot let down the amazing team that has formed for creating the game.
Come on, a dev team consisting of Atheissts, Jews, Muslims and Christians developing a game set in a fictional Jerusalem where Jews, Muslims and Christians unite in a joint struggle for a greater good?
This MUST be done! :commie:
We launched another Kickstarter, this time with a more humble goal, and it looks really good that we will make it. Please take your time and read the KS page, and, if you like what you see, join the backers, share the link and spread the word:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/586092941/antinomy-0
And, by the way, we are still supporting Into the Dark. Just saying.
Brace your wallet - Steam X-Mas sale is here!
There won´t be a special X-Mas Edition this year.
Truth is, I suffered from a spinal trauma in October with a minor fracture that seamed to heal well - so good, that I went back onto the American Football field for a match against our next seasons division 3 opponent. Soon afterwards my right leg started to freak out, and it turned out that they had overlooked a disc prolapse in the hospital where my trauma was originally treated.
I spent much of the last weeks at doctors and in hospitals, and I have a microsurgery scheduled for 15th of January.
Of course I hope to get in a shape to pass the physical exam for renewing my Football league license, but at the moment I would be happy just to pass the day without painkiller.*)
And of course this also cuts into my private budget.
So I spend the bucks and the free hours left from my dayjob as Mipumi producer rather on our new game
http://www.indiedb.com/games/fathers-island
instead of creating a christmas version of Into the Dark. I hope you understand that.
However, I have decided to keep the Halloween special edition live here.
This means, you will get during the steam sale the special edition, including the Halloween minigame, for only 2.99!
Buy it for yourself, for your friends, for people you hate - and enjoy the holidays with your family. I wish you all happy Christmas holidays, and, most important, health and joy in 2016! :NaziUfoLeft:
*) Pun intended. If you know on which games I had been working in the past ːsteammockingː
Exploration Sale!
Yes, it is still the special edition including the free Halloween Game you can purchase here.
What´s new?
That it is reduced to 3.49$ !
Grab your copy and dig Into the Dark ! :NaziUfoLeft:
THIS. IS. HALLOWEEN!
The final Halloween Edition is finally live!
Dear masochistic players who still, once again or at last dare to play our supertrashy B-Movie politically subversive masterpiece "Into the Dark"!
As promised, the Halloween Edition has been wrapped up and pushed live some minutes ago.
What should you expect?!
Well, that´s an easy one:
- All the fancy visual improvements to the Original Into the Dark Game
- All the memory optimizations and crash-reductions already present in the prtevious build
- Into the Asylum features now 5 additional enemy types, 2 additional weapons and many more improvements!
- Into the Asylum has been optimized heavily and runs with 250 - 400% more fps than the previous beta!
Enjoy your trash!
Into the Dark: Halloween 2015 Edition is live!
Overhauled main game + free horror shooter game included!
Into the Dark, the ubertrashy Austrian / Czech / Romanian playable B-Movie experience, has an all-new, updated, improved, expanded and - honestly - even worse Halloween Edition live on Steam!
A huge load of work has been spent on a new post-processing pipeline and new segment / environment textures, introducing for the first time PBR materials into a Homegrown Games production.
Here is a detailed changelist:
- 84 new textures, 62 of them PBR materials
- 2 new postprocessing routines
- 1 new puzzle
- 1 new item
- 2 new, really bad jokes
- 1 new propaganda poster
- 1 new voice over recording
- 15% less memory usage
- 47% less crashes compared to previous version
- New free Halloween Minigame "Into the Asylum" (Beta live now, FULL version coming on Halloween night!)
Brace yourself for the Halloween Edition 2015!
Well, yes, we are, but only ingame ːsteammockingː
So, what can you expect for Halloween 2015?
- A new post-processing shader pipeline that gives Into the Dark a look comparable to some state-of-the-art Indie horror games without sacrifying our trashy look
- New textures, memory optimizations, bugfixes - less crashes!
- The Halloween Game 2014 "Into the Woods" will be removed, and an entirely new game will be added to the package. We have casted one of the most talented students from the BFI University Vienna in Media Production to create a vision for a single-level surreal horror experience, and this vision is right now being prototyped and roleld out into a bonus game that will be off course FREE for all ITD players!
So, keep waiting for the last weeks until we release our next special edition, and in the meantime, check out the Kickstarter for Antinomy, a great game by Against All Odds Games that we are proud to be co-developer of:
Antinomy Kickstarter
Brace yourself - the cards have arrived!
While we are working on the next updates requested by our beloved community, you can now go hunting for these beautiful assets:
- Trading Cards, with 55% less nudity compared to our first submission
- Emoticons: Mutant Irwin Jaws, small Nazi UFOs and communist propaganda icons
- three lovely backgrounds for your profile
And dont forget to level your Pete up - from Private Pete to Pete, Sergeant Major of the Army!
(He is not an officer, he works for a living)
Enjoy!