We're back after a month of hard work with a fresh devlog update!
First things first: we're going to make an appearance at Tokyo Game Show 2019 (September 12-15) with a freshly updated demo build.
If you're attending, come by our booth at the Indie Game Area (10-A79) and don't be shy to say hi!
As for the game updates, in August, we've finally finished implementing the main script of the second story chapter (out of four planned).
Spanning several hours of gameplay over a dozen new locations which vary from a huge port city to the insides of a giant tree in a distant mountain forest, and offering tasks from supernatural murder investigation to stealing your own ship, Chapter 2 is Shores Unknown at its most diverse, plot-twisty self.
On gameplay feature side, this month has mercenary contracts and the world map UI, which helps connect the various locations of our world.
Contracts are quick combat-focused quest assignments which take the player party into battle against challenging foes. To support this, we've also made a bunch of improvements to enemy AI, so that no battle is quite the same, and cookie-cutter tank and spank encounters are few and far between.
The work on visuals is also ongoing - check out these new wolves, for example!
Last not least, this Summer, we also participated in GTP Indie Cup - the largest indie game contest in Eastern Europe. Shores Unknown was nominated for five awards and won the prize for best UE4 game!
And that concludes the update. As always, if you like what you see, please consider wishlisting the game on Steam. We also post regular bite-sized updates on our Twitter and Facebook pages, so if one of those is your thing, please feel free to follow us there as well! Remember, your support is very important for us!
Shores Unknown: Devlog #2 (June - July 2019)
Greetings mercenaries!
Ilya from Vallynne here with a fresh update!
In this new devlog, we'd like to share a bunch of cool new things that made it into the game over the past month with you.
But before that, we have an important announcement to make: we decided against publishing the current demo build on Steam at this time. The reason is simple: we're a small team, and making a demo available on a huge site like Steam comes with certain expectations and responsibilities which would mean spending precious time on a branch of content cut from the main game.
For now, we chose to focus on developing the main product and making sure it's as good as it can be.
That said, while a demo build won't be available on Steam, we plan to continue running closed beta tests, so if you'd like to be part of our testing cadre - we'd be delighted to have you! Please join our Discord channel for a chance to participate!
Now, onward to the actual update! At the moment, we're simultaneously working on story chapters 2 & 3 (out of 4 planned) of the game while also polishing the gameplay.
Is it a ghost ship? Trust us when we say its ballista bolts feel material enough.
June, in particular, was heavy on visual upgrades, the first one being our water material. Water takes an important place among the game's themes, so we want to make sure it looks as good as possible while still maintaining the stylized low-poly look. We made some before-after interactive comparisons, too - click on each of the screenshots to open them.
As you might have noticed in the first gif at the top, we also added dynamic rain to the game - with a cool wetness layer to it which affects all the objects. Here's a static shot in HQ:
Now, it wasn't all just environment and visual work this time. One of our design goals is make sure even "trash mob" fights are memorable, fun and decently challenging. So we're also putting in quite a bit of work in creature and encounter design, and that includes new enemy types, AI logic patterns and abilities. Here's a little teaser image:
Big birbs and smol birbs.
And that concludes this update! If you like what you're seeing, please consider wishlisting us on Steam. We also post regular bite-sized updates on our Twitter and Facebook pages, so if one of those is your thing, please feel free to follow us there as well!
And for those of you who have read this far, BONUS ROUND!
We have a question for you, mercenaries.
Does this stern man remind of you anyone? Let us know in the comments!
Welcome to the Shores!
Hi everyone!
This is Ilya from Vallynne with our first devlog post here on Steam. Starting today, I hope to provide regular updates on how the development of Shores Unknown is progressing.
Meet Morten and Ren - the mercenary siblings you play as in our game
May has been a busy but exciting month for our team - first going to Russia to show the game at DevGamm Moscow and discuss it with fellow game industry professionals, and then - last weekend - showcasing Shores Unknown simultaneously at BitSummit 7 Spirits in Kyoto and Dreamhack Dallas.
Shores Unknown booth at BitSummit 7 Spirits
Few things in game development are comparable to seeing people interact with the game we spent years making, and it makes us even happier when the question our players ask after trying the demo is "where do I get this?"
I'm also happy to say that we're pretty close to having the game in a functionally complete state at this point, which means that all the core systems are already implemented, which include:
Combat system
Quest log, tracking and location map
Party and character managers
Character progression system
Inventory and trading
Also dialogues.
This means that our main focus after showing Shores at all these events in May is on content and polish, making sure we deliver an engaging story full of diverse, challenging encounters to our players.
To be sure, even a bear can provide plenty of challenge for a low level party
And speaking of bears: our more immediate goal is to get a playable demo of Shores on Steam, so you all will soon be able to test your mettle against the might of the bear yourselves. If you can find the bear, that is!
In the meantime, check out this great Let's Play of the demo build by Nookrium!
https://youtu.be/vbwRszjAAw4
…in which, Nookrium does not find the bear. But you might.
If you have any questions about Shores or the team developing working on it, we're always here to answer - so don't be shy.
