We're excited to release Steamulator this Wed 1/30/19
Are you tired of your favorite Game Storefront letting you down?
Think you can do a better job?
Have we got the game for you!
The legends* that brought you I Can’t Believe It’s Not Gambling present: Steamulator 2019 - Balance players, developers, money, and morality as you curate all your favorite games in this epic storefront challenge.
Curate!
Using an accept or deny mechanic, decide what games to allow into your store. Tired of seeing sequel after sequel? Turn them down! It’s all up to you.
Make Hard Choices!
Should your store support Linux users? What about an automatic curation system? Should your company even bother making their own games anymore? All these tough decisions and more await you.
Evolve!
No industry can stay the same forever. Add and remove storefront features as you are presented with fun and interesting choices.
This game does not qualify you in any way to run a business or a gaming platform. Do not use this in your resume when applying for game curation jobs. We will not be a reference for you.
*According to our friends in Canada who totally exist and are not made up at all
MES Complete Bundle
Announcing the Mutant Entertainment Studios Complete Bundle!
I'm Nick, an artist and producer at Mutant Studios, and I'm here with big news which will result in a long post so here goes!
We've come to the decision to lower the base price of Questr from $14.99 down to $2.99. This is clearly a big drop in price and a big, permanent decision which we did not come to lightly. Therefore we want to be as transparent about it as possible. From feedback we recognize that we missed the mark on this by a lot and we take full responsibility for any feelings this causes, especially for those who already bought the game. Our goal is always to ensure we are providing a quality experience for the price and we think this change will bring Questr closer to that goal.
First of all, we want to explain briefly about why we made the initial price decision. We spent almost a year on Questr and along the way we were committed to making something that was entertaining and had good replay value. As silly as the premise is, a lot went into Questr. From the design to the art to the hundreds of unique interactions - it went through many, many iterations. It was a full time project for the studio that needed to make back what we spent to make it. From the beginning we were aiming for that price point as a goal for how much content we wanted to provide and our evaluation as we got closer to launch was that we would stick with it and see what happened. We let our invested time and cost influence our evaluation of the final product and as a result priced the game too high. We were proud of the game we made and wanted to value our work appropriately. In the spirit of transparency (and as you can guess from this update) we will tell you that it did not go very well. Our best periods of sales have come during extreme discounts, which told us a lot about the price we want to aim for next. We know a lot of people wishlisted our game based on the concept, which is awesome, and we hope this big change encourages some of you to try Questr!
Since Questr's launch we have made an effort to add new mechanics and content to Questr such as the shops and upgrade systems, new stories, and new art but we still don't think it has added enough value to meet that initial price point. Improving the content of our games is important to us, successful or not, and while Questr is a game that we love conceptually we realize that the value of the concept is much lower than we set it at. That being said, we want to be clear that we tremendously value those of you who gave Questr a chance at our initial full price and want to make sure we show that appreciation in some way - it will come in the form of free keys for our upcoming game: ASTRO JOUST The method for this will be determined soon (Steam doesn't really provide us with a way to accurately track who has purchased our games, oddly enough).
So there you have it. We are taking this next Steam Sale as an opportunity to permanently lower the base price of Questr to $2.99. Along with this significant price cut, this update will also include free content in the form of a new map which includes 3 new story paths, bringing the total to 12 story paths. We are also going to update our Steam marketing assets and share a new trailer which we think will better highlight the strengths of our game. We are always looking for ways to improve ourselves as a studio and this has been another lesson in the books for us. Thank you for taking the time to read and we hope this gives you more reason to Swipe Right for Adventure!
- Nick and the MES Team
Questr Content Patch 1
Hey Everyone,
We're hard at work with a few projects here at MES right now. One of which is the first major content patch to Questr. This new patch will include 1 new map. 3 new Story Paths as well as several art updates and a few text updates and grammar fixes. Right now we're aiming for a mid December release.
We've also started the Mutant Entertainment Studios newsletter. You can get the scoop on the latest happenings as well as some exclusive content by signing up: http://eepurl.com/c_uBTT
On a related note we've been having quite a bit of fun recently with a small side project we started after the release of Questr. In case you haven't noticed, we don't take things too seriously around MES, so with all the recent controversy over loot boxes we thought we would have a bit of fun with the idea. You can check out our new side project:
We're very excited to announce that Questr will transition from Early Access to Release on October 27th.
Included in the launch patch is the new Wandering Merchant feature. The Merchant has a random chance of mysteriously appearing on a Story Path with 3 random tickets and/or contracts that change up gameplay. The tickets and contracts offer trade offs to things like number of swipes and starting morale. Tickets are good only for the next quest, while Contracts last the entirety of the Story Path. In our internal testing we've really been enjoying this new feature and we think players will too.
Also included in the launch patch is the new Encounter Profile cards. Each Encounter type will have its own personality trait as well as some likes and dislikes. The traits and likes/dislikes are meant to offer some hints as to which Questr in the party might have an idea on how to deal with that particular Encounter.
We're also happy to announce that Female Questrs are finally included. The female characters are functionally exactly the same as the male characters. While we weren't happy that we had to push their implementation back a bit, since they worked exactly the same, delaying their release allowed our artist time to get to other sorely needed assets such as the new Encounter art without impacting our ability to test the game.
Speaking of art updates, there are also several major art improvements included in the launch patch. Character Portraits received a huge touch up. As well as the Summerland and Desolate Plains maps.
For those that maybe haven't checked in on Questr in a while there are several other major features that have been implemented in the last few weeks that you might not know about:
The Fork in the Road system offers players a choice on Encounter types they will run into next on their current quest.
The Camp Upgrade system has been totally overhauled to allow players to customize their current Story Path run to their own play style.
The Experience system also received an update. There are a few character personalities that are now unlocked upon reaching certain levels.
And in a related feature, the Personalidex offers players some insight into what personalities do/don't get along, after you've uncovered their interactions.
Finally, as always there are tons of minor art improvements, as well as bug fixes sprinkled throughout the game.
Finally we want to take a moment to thank each one of you that have chosen to join us on our quest (see what I did there?) from Early Access to Release. I think its safe to say that the final game would have looked very different without your input and the game is much better off for it.
As always, Thanks for playing!
The Mutant Entertainment Studios Team
Merchant Feature Pushed Back
Hi Everyone,
So the good news is that we've got the majority of the Merchant feature into our internal test build of the game, and so far we all are really enjoying it. The bad news is that there are some balance issues that we need to get sorted out before we would feel comfortable shipping it out as an update. Since that would be the last patch before the final Launch patch we are leaning towards holding the Merchant back for the game full launch.
In related good news, we're also making excellent progress towards the full Questr launch. We will follow up in the next week or so with more detailed plans on all the features and updates that we have slated for launch and post-launch.
As always, thanks for playing!
Jeff
Patch 8.1.5
Hi Everyone,
Another Friday, another Questr patch.
Included in today's patch is a huge upgrade to the swiping mechanic. We took a look at the some of the early closed beta testing feedback and decided it was high time to address one of the core mechanics in the game. Steven did an excellent job of getting the old swiping up and running quickly. The new swiping system feels much more responsive and flexible and we think you all should enjoy it.
Also included in this update, tips will now display on loading screens. We hope this will function as just another gentle reminder about things like personality driven gameplay, super likes, how many swipes you get... and there might be a few jokes in there as well.
That's it for this week. Next week we hope to patch in the Merchant feature, however it's proving to be quite large and a bit complicated. But if things go well we do hope to push it out on the 13th.
As always, thanks for playing!
Jeff
Patch 0.8.1
Hi again everyone,
Patch 0.8.1 goes live in a few hours. This update introduces the new Fork in the Road mechanic. This new feature has a random chance of happening once per quest. When it does trigger you will be presented with an option of going left or right on the path, each of which will give you hints as to the type of Encounter your group will find next. So far in our internal testing we've really been enjoying the shakeup in the gameplay and the amount of agency it encourages.
We've also decided to push the Merchant feature back as the Fork in the Road took us a bit longer to polish than we anticipated.
Other minor updates to trait interaction text and art sprinkled throughout as well.
As always we would love to get your feedback on the new feature. Feel free to use the in game feedback button (Settings->Feedback) or post to the community hub.
