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Genre: Adventure, Indie

Project Azriel

VR Version on the Horizon!
We've been doing some behind the scenes work and planning and it looks like we have a VR version of PROJECT AZRIEL on the horizon with additional content (with the update or soon after). Our projected timetable is 6 months. There are still some detials to work out before this path is final but the wind is in our sails at this point so we wanted to share the news with you.

Game Controller Support Added!

We’ve added game controller and remappable button support!



Game Controller Support:


From the Main Menu select Settings>Game Controller to adjust the game input controls. You can choose to enable the Game Controller and then it will detect if a game controller is present. You then can remap most of the buttons to your preference.

Bug Fixes:



  • Drone Link and Bio-Agent Resistance Training activities were not activating under certain circumstances.



Content that we’re currently working on:

  • Cave Scene
  • Foothills Scene
  • Bonus Scene for those that purchased PROJECT AZRIEL at the Walker Stalker convention


Enhancements that we're currently working on:

  • Zombie face animation improvements.
  • Additional interactive props and decal dressing in Scenes 1 and 2.

  • Add settings options in Pause Menu.
  • Main Menu and Pause Menu visual fixes and enhancements


Known issues that we're currently working on:

  • Zombie spawning inhibited in the last mission area in the 2nd scene on rare occasions.


As a general rule... if you run into problems, then please send us the log file and restart the mission. The log file can be found:

Windows 10:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\PROJECT AZRIEL\Project Azriel_Data\output_log.txt

macOS:
/Users//Library/Logs/Unity/Player.log

Please send the log file and any other bug reports to support@projectazriel.com.
You can view Frequently Asked Questions, ask questions, provide feedback and engage in dialogue here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/669700/discussions/


Thanks for your partnership and support.

The PROJECT AZRIEL Team

Game and Input Preference Support Added!

We’ve added game preferences and remappable key support!



Graphics Preferences:


From the Main Menu select Settings>Graphics to enable or disable post-processing camera effects (sepia, bloom, flares, and depth of field) and scene particle effects (clouds, smoke, and steam). Adjusting these settings allows you to adjust the game experience and game performance.

Audio Preferences:


From the Main Menu select Settings>Audio to adjust the audio levels (master, music, effects, ambience, and voice). Adjusting these settings allows you to adjust the game experience to your preference but will not affect game performance.

Input Preferences:


From the Main Menu select Settings>Keyboard to adjust the game keyboard and mouse controls. Adjusting these settings allows you to adjust the game experience to your preference but will not affect game performance. Game controller support is coming soon!

Content that we’re currently working on:

  • Cave Scene
  • Foothills Scene
  • Bonus Scene for those that purchased PROJECT AZRIEL at the Walker Stalker convention


Enhancements that we're currently working on:

  • Zombie face animation improvements.
  • Additional interactive props and decal dressing in Scenes 1 and 2.

  • Add settings options in Pause Menu.
  • Controller Support
  • Main Menu and Pause Menu visual fixes and enhancements


Known issues that we're currently working on:

  • Zombie spawning inhibited in the last mission area in the 2nd scene on rare occasions.


As a general rule... if you run into problems, then please send us the log file and restart the mission. The log file can be found:

Windows 10:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\PROJECT AZRIEL\Project Azriel_Data\output_log.txt

macOS:
/Users//Library/Logs/Unity/Player.log

Please send the log file and any other bug reports to support@projectazriel.com.
You can view Frequently Asked Questions, ask questions, provide feedback and engage in dialogue here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/669700/discussions/


Thanks for your partnership and support.

The PROJECT AZRIEL Team

Update 2017 1214
We uploaded a fix to a bug we thought we squashed until we watched larszua stream PROJECT AZRIEL on Twitch. The video helped us to trouble shoot the problem and solve it. We ran some tests and it appears the problem is no longer present.

This bug could have been very frustrating for those that experienced it and that's why we handled as soon as we could. The bug prevented going into the mini games that diminish your infection and replenish your health and ammo.

We also added a warning for anyone who may try to play the game without doing the training first.

We're working hard on getting Player Preferences and Key Mapping and controller support out soon. So look for those features in our next update.

Bug Fixes:

  • Fixed a bug that sometimes prevented doing Remote Targeting and the Bio-Agent Resistance Training.


Modifications, Additions, and Enhancements:

  • Warning dialogue box that appears for those who try to play the campaign before completing the training.
  • Minor visual improvement to the menu


Content that we’re currently working on:

  • Cave Scene
  • Foothills Scene
  • Bonus Scene for those that purchased PROJECT AZRIEL at the Walker Stalker convention


Enhancements that we're currently working on:

  • Zombie face animation improvements.
  • Additional interactive props and decal dressing in Scenes 1 and 2.
  • Integrate Performance Enhancement into the game startup options.
  • Add settings options in the Main Menu and Pause Menu.
  • Key Mapping and Controller Support
  • Main Menu and Pause Menu visual fixes and enhancements


Known issues that we're currently working on:

  • On rare occasions the game may crash in the second scene on some machines.
  • Zombie spawning inhibited in the last mission area in the 2nd scene on rare occasions.


Thanks for your partnership and support.

The PROJECT AZRIEL Team

How You Can Analyze the Research Behind Brain Training
I’m posting below a section from the book Zombies Can Make You Think Better, How A Game Can Build Your Brain for those of you who want to know more about how to understand experimental and control groups in research studies. It explains why having a matched control group is the best way to test efficacy of interventions. Not all research studies do, but we used a matched control group in our efficacy study that demonstrated far transfer.
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Experimental and Control Versions of the Game



One of the challenges in research is coming up with a good active control condition. An active control group is desired so you can demonstrate that one intervention is better than another, not simply that one intervention is better than nothing. Also, without an active control group, the experimental group may get more attention from the experiment researchers and that attention may influence the results significantly, in which case, you may be proving that the attention matters, not the intervention. So, an active control group is preferred, but it is still tricky. For example, an active control condition in an efficacy study of Project Azriel could be doing crossword puzzles. Both the control and experimental groups would be participating in the intervention, and this is better than a control condition where subjects do nothing except take pre and post tests, but it is not ideal for multiple reasons. First, we want to be able to tell the efficacy of the intervention, in this case the cognitive training activities, in the context of a first-person shooter game. There is a risk that the subjects will guess their group assignment. If that happens, then those playing the game may guess they are the experimental group and, therefore, try harder than those who may guess they are in the control group who do not try as hard. Another problem is that if crosswords are the active control, you may have the problem of apples and oranges. If doing crosswords puzzles, despite popular belief, actually makes you less cognitively healthy, then the game’s impact would be over-presented. That’s why we were really excited about our experimental design. We were able to create a version of the game where the cognitive training activities never got harder. Both the experimental and control participants were required to play the game for the same amount of time. They had an identical experience. But the training activities for the experimental group adaptively became more challenging. This made for a good active control condition.
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Update 2017 1125
It’s been a ride since our release and we’re excited to see where it goes next. We’ve got bug fixes and enhancements ready for you in our latest update along with more content coming around the corner.

We had a ton of people try and buy PROJECT AZRIEL at the Walker Stalker convention in Atlanta at the end of October and we were surprised at how quickly people learned to do the brain training activities in the game. We designed the training in the game to be robust but we didn’t have time for people to go through the training at the convention so we just quickly explained how things work in the game and everyone from avid gamers to occasional gamers picked up on it right away.

We did a raffle for a PROJECT AZRIEL jacket with a custom title for the winner. The winner was Gabriel! Congratulations! We’ll have that jacket made for you soon and of course, we would love to have a pic of you in the jacket.

We got a lot of great feedback on the game at the convention as well. New bugs were found, compliments were given, and we got numerous feature requests. We’ll make a survey and ask for feedback on which feature requests the community would like us to prioritize.

Bug Fixes:

  • Fixed a bug that caused some controls to not function.
  • Fixed a bug that could cause the Hero to float away while the game was paused.
  • Fixed a bug that caused the zombies to fall excessively.
  • Fixed a bug that caused the Hero to randomly teleport.
  • Fixed bugs that caused some visual oddities in the Hero 1st and 3rd person views.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the Hero from reloading.
  • Fixed a bug that removed the HUD overlay images if the game was paused in the second scene.
  • Fixed a bug in the second scene that prevented the Hero from climbing on the roof of the metal and glass warehouse from a ladder.
  • Fixed a bug that sometimes prevented doing Remote Targeting and the Bio-Agent Resistance Training.


Modifications, Additions, and Enhancements:

  • Added the ability to close the Remote Targeting and Bio-Agent Resistance Training reminder overlay screens. Previously the player would have to wait for a countdown before the screen auto-closed.
  • Added missed target feedback to the Bio-Agent Resistance Training.
  • Added and modified zombie animations.
  • Added more attack types for zombies.
  • Added impact tracers to help identify projectile hit locations.
  • Enhanced zombie AI to help improve movement trajectory.
  • Minor optimization enhancements such as modifying or removing some particle systems.
  • Improved the smoothness of jumping.
  • Improved Depth of Field visualization.
  • Updated post-processing effects.
  • Removed the bloom effect from weapons targeting symbols to improve visibility.


Content that we’re currently working on:

  • Cave Scene
  • Foothills Scene
  • Bonus Scene for those that purchased PROJECT AZRIEL at the Walker Stalker convention


Enhancements that we're currently working on:

  • Zombie face animation improvements.
  • Additional interactive props and decal dressing in Scenes 1 and 2.
  • Integrate Performance Enhancement into the game startup options.
  • Add settings options in the Main Menu and Pause Menu.
  • Main Menu and Pause Menu visual fixes and enhancements


Known issues that we're currently working on:

  • On rare occasions the game may crash in the second scene on some machines.
  • Zombie spawning inhibited in the last mission area in the 2nd scene on rare occasions.


Thanks for your partnership and support.

The PROJECT AZRIEL Team

Get Project Azriel Before the Price Increases
If you haven’t gotten your copy of PROJECT AZRIEL yet, then do so soon. We’re raising the price in a few days to coincide with an update with a lot of feature enhancements and bug fixes. We also have a content update coming up just around the corner, so there will be more game levels and more of the story to discover.

Thank you for your partnership and support.

The PROJECT AZRIEL Team

Milestones, Near Term Enhancements, and Known Issues

Milestones


We’ve released PROJECT AZRIEL and the Zombie Smart-Pocalypse is upon us all. We’ve done a lot of tweaking, content curation and creation, and authored a lot of code. To date we have:

  • Worked with the Office of Naval Research for 5 years. Our work included a blinded randomized efficacy study to evaluate the impact of PROJECT AZRIEL on fluid intelligence.
  • Authored 98940 lines of code in C# (Unity).
  • Authored 52548 lines of code total in Scala (server).
  • Competed initial game level design for more than a dozen game scenes.
  • Authored what we hope is a compelling game story with outlines already made for sequels.


Enhancements that we're currently working on:



  • Zombie movement animation improvements.
  • Zombie face animation improvements.
  • Additional interactive props and decal dressing in Scenes 1 and 2.



Known issues that we're currently working on:



  • On rare occasions the game may crash in the second scene on some machines.
  • Zombie spawning inhibited in the last mission area in the 2nd scene on rare occasions.
  • There have been reports of difficulty in engaging in the Remote Targeting activity.


As a general rule... if you run into problems, then please send us the log file and restart the mission. The log file can be found:

Windows 10:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\PROJECT AZRIEL\Project Azriel_Data\output_log.txt

macOS:
/Users//Library/Logs/Unity/Player.log


Thank you for your partnership and support.

The PROJECT AZRIEL Team

Early Access Release Tomorrow October 20th.
Thank you for joining us on this adventure!

Tomorrow we will launch PROJECT AZRIEL Early Access here on Steam. We’re excited and we’ve been working hard to make sure that PROJECT AZRIEL is the least boring brain trainer in the world. We have a ton of improvements planned but the core brain training activities are spot on and will provide rigorous brain training.

The science behind PROJECT AZRIEL is solid. You can read all about it in our companion book Zombies Can Make You Think Better: How a Game Can Change Your Brain. Download it free here: https://www.projectazriel.com/downloadbook20171013

If you’re interested in doing a free IQ pre-test and post-test, then please see instructions on how to do so here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/669700/discussions/5/1484358860943155152/

You can post your results here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/669700/discussions/5/1484358860943155152/

We LOVE constructive feedback and feature requests. We may even have what you’re looking for on our road map. We know that the more input we get from thoughtful players, then the better our brain training game will be. Once you’ve had a chance to play the game for a bit, tell us what you’d like to work better or what features you’d like to see.

You can view Frequently Asked Questions, ask questions, provide feedback and engage in dialogue here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/669700/discussions/

If brain training has been boring you to death, then the solution is here!

Thanks for your partnership and support.