Loco Motive cover
Loco Motive screenshot
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Genre: Point-and-click, Puzzle, Adventure, Indie

Loco Motive

Spring Development Update 🌱
“Hallo Freunde!”

It’s been a busy few months for the Loco Motive team, but we're eager to bring you up to speed on our latest developments! Since our last update, we've been busy recording voice-over dialogue with our cast, forging exciting new partnerships, and approaching a significant milestone: Finalising all the text in the game!

The writing process involved plenty of typing, ruminating and head-scratching but after 70,000 words or so - I'm glad to say we're almost there. As we worked towards this milestone, it enabled us to better explore our options with localisation.

The adventure game community is known for a strong and loyal German following, and Loco Motive has been no exception. With Germany featuring prominently as a top wishlist region, this was an easy decision for us to make:

✨We're delighted to announce that Loco Motive will be launching with German language support!✨

We’ve teamed up with Marcel Weyers to create the German localisation for Loco Motive, who you may be familiar with for their work on Return To Monkey Island, Goodbye Volcano High & Coffee Talk: Episode 2!

Marcel was happy to share a few words about the project:

“Working on Loco Motive has been super fun! There's so much attention to detail in this project, and even though some of the puns were quite tricky to translate, I can't wait for German adventure gamers to be able to play the game and laugh out loud as much as I did!”



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That’s all for now! We're excited to continue sharing updates with you as we reach the final stages of development on the game. We’ll be sharing more progress as we go, but in the meantime, you can follow us for updates on Twitter or join the official Robust Games Discord.

Don’t forget to wishlist Loco Motive for a notification when the full game launches! It’s just one click, but it really helps us out!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1709880/

Winter Development Update & 2023 Recap!
Hello there! It's time for the last Loco Motive blog of the year, so let's get straight to it!

As I write this blog post, we’re winding down development here and preparing to spend some well earned time with our family over the Christmas holidays. It’s a time of reflection, so let’s look at all we’ve achieved, and what’s left to come for us in the new year!

🧭2023 Recap🧭

2023! It’s been a year of highlights, but let’s look at some of our biggest milestones:




But that’s not all! We had time to squeeze in just a few more things before our Christmas break..

🎤 Voice Acting has begun!🎤

Many of the questions we’ve received so far have revolved around voice, and if / when Loco Motive will feature voice acting.

I am pleased to confirm that we've recently begun recording dialogue with a professional voice cast, who we couldn’t be more excited about! These talented voice actors have featured in games such as The Legend Of Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom, Viewfinder, Genshin Impact, Baldur’s Gate III, Starfield and more!

We’ll be announcing the full cast as we record more dialogue and get closer to launch, so keep your eyes peeled for a future announcement. Until then, we'll be keeping you guessing!



⚙️Accessibility Options!⚙️

We wanted Loco Motive to be more accessible and give players more options. We recently spent some time adding accessibility features to the game, including the following:


  • ⏪ Subtitle Speed Settings
  • 🗨️ Subtitle Backing Settings
  • 🗚 Bigger Text Size Settings
  • 📛 Display Speaker Name Option
  • 📑 Dyslexic Friendly Font Option
  • 🎉 Confetti Mode! (Removes Blood!)
  • 🎮 PlayStation Controller Support!


Here are some new screenshots to show some of these options in action!











This isn’t an exhaustive list, but we intend to listen to feedback and work to make the game as accessible as we can for launch!

🛠️Development continues!🛠️

Loco Motive became fully playable from start to finish in late July, and since then we've all been working dilligently to get more of the written dialogue into the game, adding more music and SFX, polishing the visuals and adding more animation! We've also been able to start exploring those bigger features like voice acting and localisation.

We don't want to give too much away just yet, but we thought we could share some brand new animation work from the game for now!



📅Loco Motive launches in 2024📅

As we mentioned earlier this year, Loco Motive will now be launching in 2024 for PC and Nintendo Switch.

There are a number of factors behind the decision, but ultimately we’re a small but ambitious team who needs a little bit of extra development time to deliver the game we set out to make.

We can all agree that delays are annoying, but we strongly believe this extra time will allow Loco Motive to reach its full potential.

Thanks for your understanding and support. We can't wait to share the full Loco Motive adventure with you, it will be worth the wait!



✨Wishlists!✨

A massive shout-out to you all for adding Loco Motive to your wishlists! thanks to your efforts we recently hit our 70,000 wishlist milestone, and are already well on the way to our next goal! Thanks for all your support so far.



We're excited to continue sharing updates with you as we make progress on the game. We’ll be sharing more progress as we go, but in the meantime, you can follow us for updates on Twitter or join the official Robust Games Discord.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1709880/Loco_Motive/

Don’t forget to wishlist Loco Motive for a notification when the full game launches! It’s just one click, but it really helps us out. We also plan to use this data to decide future language support!


🙌Teamwork makes the dream work!🙌

Before we break for Christmas, we just wanted to thank our entire extended team for their hard work in 2023, and for getting us one step closer to bringing the game to launch!

There's still a bit of work ahead of us, but 2024 will be the year of Loco Motive.

We couldn't be prouder of this team, and consider ourselves very lucky to have this level of talent involved.

Have a Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!



Adam & Joseph
Robust Games


AdventureX 2023: A Loco Motive Demo is available on Steam!
Hey there, fellow adventurers!
Are you ready for a wild ride? 🙃
Hop on board the hype train because the Loco Motive Demo is steaming into town: from November 2 to November 9, AdventureX on Steam is your destination for all things narrative-driven games, and a fresh Loco Motive Demo is part of the team!

We also want to take this time to say a huge thank you to everyone who has contributed feedback over the past couple of months, whether through Discord, Steam forums or at our live events. As a result, we’ve been able to make improvements to the gameplay, which we couldn’t have done without you! We'd initially hoped to launch the game in 2023, but we need a little more time to make Loco Motive the best it can be to meet both our own high standards and player expectations! This means we've taken the decision to postpone the release until early next year, but we hope you'll continue to support us while we work to polish up the game.

🧭 What's AdventureX?
Imagine a place where developers and gamers unite, bonded by their passion for narrative games ‒ a gathering of creative minds and enthusiastic players all under one digital roof: that's AdventureX in a nutshell.
We’re thrilled to be part of the event once again this year, bringing you a brand-new demo for Loco Motive!

🔎 What’s in the Demo?
Play as Arthur Ackerman, our intrepid hero (and an official lawyer). He’s about to embark on a one-of-a-kind adventure aboard the Reuss Express, a journey filled with more twists and turns than your aunt's spaghetti bolognese. 🍝 You'll step into the shoes of this blue-jacketed, square-shouldered hero as he investigates the sudden demise of his employer, the esteemed Lady Unterwald.



Meet and greet the colourful characters aboard the Reuss Express, solve item-based puzzles (brace yourself for some serious clicking), and explore the mysteries in this comical adventure. The demo is available in English and takes approximately one hour, depending on how quickly you can crack the puzzles!

If you're up for a complete narrative experience, you can play the demo in Noir Mode and immerse yourself in the detective atmosphere.



Does this murder mystery contain blood? 'Confetti mode' is on by default, but if you're feeling brave, you can switch back to pixelated blood in the settings menu.



The full game will also feature:
  • 3 Playable Characters - Diana, Arthur & Herman
  • A feature-length story
  • Full voice acting
  • Puzzle hint system
  • Full controller support
  • Even more jokes & puzzles


💬 "Where can I share my feedback?"
We would love to hear your thoughts about the demo - what you loved, what didn’t work well for you, or anything you’d like to see more of in the full release! You can either share feedback in the Steam thread or chat with us directly in the Loco Motive official Discord or on Twitter.

🛤️“When will Loco Motive be released?”
We're committed to making Loco Motive the best it can be, and that means taking the time to polish every nut and bolt in the game. We want to ensure our fantastic dev team has a healthy, balanced work pace with zero crunch so they can create a game that's as thrilling as it should be!
With that in mind, we've decided to reschedule the launch to Q1 of 2024. This is something that’s never exciting to share, but this extra time will allow us to fine-tune every aspect of the game, so when it finally arrives, it'll be a fantastic experience for everyone.
Thanks for your understanding and support. We can't wait to share the full Loco Motive adventure with you, and it will be worth the wait!

If you want to support us even more, don’t forget to wishlist Loco Motive for a notification when the full game launches! It’s just one click, but it really helps us out, and we also use this data to decide future language support! :)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1709880/Loco_Motive/

Meet and greet the larger-than-life characters aboard the Reuss Express, solve item-based puzzles, and point and click to your heart’s desire.
Jump aboard and discover where those tracks lead you! 🚂
We hope you have a blast with the demo, and don't forget to wishlist the game not to miss any bit!

— Chucklefish Team & Robust Games

EGX 2023 Recap
Hello there! It's time for another Loco Motive blog, so let's get straight to it!

📣EGX 2023📣

As you may know, earlier this month we took Loco Motive to the UK's biggest gaming exhibition: EGX 2023!

Attendees had the opportunity to play an updated 20-minute demo of the game and meet the developers! We had a very positive reception at the show, and the game was busy for all of the four days - We were very lucky to have various creators and press come by and play the demo!



Rock Paper Shotgun got hands on and it seems we managed to win them over!

"Robust Games have poured a lot of love into making each and every interaction as vibrant and characterful as possible.." "..It's truly lovely stuff, and every moment just oozes with style and slick exaggeration."




Gayming Magazine called Loco Motive their most anticipated game!

"Despite only spending 15-20 minutes with Loco Motive, it quickly stood out as one of the more memorable games at EGX 2023. Its personality is, without a doubt, what makes it shine. It doesn’t just want you to have fun, but walks step-by-step alongside you to capture that spirit itself. All in all, it’s nothing short of a fantastic time. "

We also had the opportunity to take part in a short interview with adventure game aficionado Laura Cress during the show, which you can watch below:



✨Wishlists!✨

A massive shout-out to you all for adding Loco Motive to your wishlists! thanks to your efforts we recently hit our 70,000 wishlist milestone, and are already well on the way to our next goal! If you haven't wishlisted Loco Motive on Steam already, let's make it happen!

We're excited to continue sharing updates with you as we make progress on the game, but that’s all for now! We’ll be sharing more progress as we go, but in the meantime, you can follow us for updates on Twitter or join the official Robust Games Discord.

EGX 2023: Loco Motive Takes Center Stage!
Great news! We're thrilled to announce that Loco Motive will be showcased during EGX 2023 at the ExCeL in London, UK, from October 12th to October 15th.

EGX is the UK's biggest gaming event and we're proud that Loco Motive will be right at the heart of it all!

You’ll find us at the Chucklefish stand in the Rezzed Zone, where you can get your hands on other amazing titles, such as Eastward - Octopia and Wargroove 2!



Meet the team and play the updated demo

Attendees will have the opportunity to play an updated 20-minute demo of the game and meet the developers behind it, where we'll gladly talk your ear off about Loco Motive, the development process, or anything else you might be interested in (within reason!).

Don't miss out! Get your tickets here and we'll see you at EGX 2023!

August Development Update
Hello! It's time for the latest scoop on Loco Motive's development!

The past few months on Loco Motive have been a whirlwind as we steer towards the finish line. Let's dive into everything that's gone on since our last update.

🚂 Major Milestone Reached: Full Playability 🚂

July kicked off with us reaching a major milestone: Loco Motive is now fully playable from start to finish. That's a big deal for our team! The next stretch will focus on getting the dialogue locked, getting the visuals polished, and exploring big features like voice recording and localisation.

We can share more information on that in another update, but for now here's a sneak peek at a new, mysterious location from the game!



🪞Something to reflect on!🪞

We recently implemented another neat visual feature to the game - working mirrors! but that's not all, this amazing tech allows us to add things like shiny floors, wet reflective surfaces and more!



🏆 Critics' Choice Award🏆

Back in June, Loco Motive was nominated for the Indie Cup Critic's Choice Award , with each nominee selected by a panel of critics, games journalists and streamers - including Rock Paper Shotgun, Edge, GamesRadar, TheGamer & More.

We didn't clinch the win in our category, but hey, being nominated was a win in itself! Big thanks to the jury for their feedback. Reading their positive comments gave us a real boost and made us feel like we're on the right track!



🌟 Racing towards 70k Wishlists! 🌟

Since our last wishlist check-in, we're now only a few hundred away from receiving 70,000 wishlists!

A massive shout-out to you all for adding Loco Motive to your wishlists. It's not just a number—it lets Steam know there's interest and excitement around the game, plus, you'll be one of the first to be notified via email when the game launches! If you haven't wishlisted already, what are you waiting for? Let's make it happen!

We're excited to continue sharing updates with you as we make progress on the game, but that’s all for now! We’ll be sharing more progress as we go, but in the meantime, you can follow us for updates on Twitter or join the official Robust Games Discord.

50,000 wishlists!
We're very pleased to announce we've reached a major milestone of 50,000 wishlists! As a small indie team creating our debut game, we never imagined we'd resonate with so many of you!

We'd like to say a huge thanks to those of you who have wishlisted, shared feedback and generally supported us throughout development so far. Can we reach 100,000?

If you haven't wishlisted yet, please click that button!





We're excited to continue sharing updates with you as we make progress on the game, but that’s all for now! We’ll be sharing more progress as we go, but in the meantime, you can follow us for updates on Twitter or join the official Robust Games Discord.

Play the LudoNarraCon Demo!


Hi everyone!
Today marks the start of LudoNarraCon, a digital event to celebrate the finest of narrative games, and we’re excited to be taking part with a playable demo of Loco Motive!
From today (4th May) until Monday (8th May), you’ll be able to play the demo and share your feedback with us!

We’ll have a livestream with developer commentary running on the LudoNarraCon event page today (May 4th) at 11AM PDT / 2PM EST / 7PM BST/ 8PM CET. Set up a reminder here and join us in the chat, where we’ll be answering your questions!

Big thanks to Fellow Traveller for hosting the event and inviting us alongside so many fantastic indie games.

🔎 What’s in the Demo?
The LudoNarraCon demo features a little taster of what’s to come in the full game. You’ll be donning the blue jacket and square-ish shoulders of Arthur Ackerman, as he starts his investigation into the sudden demise of his employer, the esteemed Lady Unterwald.

Meet and greet the larger than life characters aboard the Reuss Express, solve item-based puzzles, and point and click to your heart’s desire. Well, for approximately the hour or so that the demo lasts, depending of course on how quickly you can figure out the puzzles!

If you’re feeling extra suave, you can even play the demo in Noir Mode. 📽️😌



The full game will also feature:

  • 3 Playable Characters - Diana, Arthur & Herman
  • A feature-length story
  • Full voice acting
  • Puzzle hint system
  • Full controller support
  • Even more jokes & puzzles

🔎 Where can I share my feedback?
We would love to hear your thoughts and feelings about the demo - what you loved, what didn’t work so well for you, or anything you’d like to see more of in the full release! You can either share feedback in the Steam forums, or chat with us directly in our official Discord, or on Twitter.

Don’t forget to wishlist Loco Motive for a notification when the full game launches! We’re a small team, so wishlisting the game really helps us out, and we also use this data to decide future language support! :)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1709880/Loco_Motive/

👀 What have we been working on…
Before we go, here’s a little teaser of what we’ve been working on lately…



Enjoy the demo!
-Adam & Joseph, Robust Games

Join us in our first Loco Motive demo livestream!
Grab your ticket ‘cause the livestream is about to start!
We’ll do our very first Livestream of Loco Motive on May 4th at 11AM PDT / 2PM EST / 7PM BST / 8PM CET.

We’ll be playing the game demo, which will be available from May 4th to May 8th, for LudoNarraCon, a digital event to celebrate the finest of narrative games!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1709880/Loco_Motive/

Join us and embark on the Reuss Express to have a little taster of what’s to come in the full game while we answer community questions!
If you can't make it on time, don't worry: we will be looping the stream in our game page, and the demo will be available until May 8th at 10AM PDT / 1PM EST / 6PM BST / 7PM CET.



We'll wait for you there!

-Adam & Joseph, Robust Games

Loco Motive announced for LudoNarraCon 2023!
We're thrilled to announce that Loco Motive has been officially selected to take part in this years LudoNarraCon, with the steam event taking place all week from May 4-8!

LudoNarraCon is a free digital convention hosted on Steam, with a focus on celebrating narrative storytelling in video games.

The Loco Motive demo will be available to play throughout the event, along with other excellent narrative titles, developer panels, exhibitor streams, discounts and more!

We'd like to give a huge shout-out to Fellow Traveller for hosting this event and for their dedication to showcasing and supporting narrative video games, like ours.

To see the full line-up of exciting events and games, click here.




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