We are honored and delighted to release a new build of Strangeland with full German and Turkish text throughout. This represents a monumental achievement by volunteers who have both the skill of translation and the broad knowledge needed to capture the game’s many references and allusions. We are immensely grateful to Yerel Çeviri for the Turkish translation and Jonas for the German translation.
I would also like to include a short acknowledgment of what these translations mean to me personally, as well as to James Spanos, our coder.
Strangeland owes a great debt to German culture, not only in its direct references to Wagner’s Ring Cycle and German-Norse mythology generally but also from the spiritual and intellectual impact on me from various works of literature written in German: Schiller’s Don Carlos, Mann’s The Magic Mountain, and Kafka’s entire corpus. The themes of humanism and alienation that run through these works helped shape the philosophical backbone of both Strangeland and Primordia. In my growing up, the wounds of World War II were still raw enough in my parents’ and grandparents’ lives that German works were something of a taboo in my family, and I am grateful to have seen those wounds heal enough that my children and I enjoy the free flow of culture back and forth with Germany.
As for Turkish, I can only say that few countries have taken hold of my soul as Turkey did during the short stay there I had with my wife, many years ago. Strangeland is a palimpsest of meaning on top of meaning, and nowhere has that ever seemed so physically embodied to me as Istanbul: a city rich with life and deep with many cultures. We were welcomed into Turkey with universal hospitality, in every town and city we visited. I close my eyes, and I’m transported back to that magical time. And, of course, no country welcomed our first game, Primordia, with quite such hospitality either: I don’t know how or why, but the game received two glowing reviews in Turkish print magazines and many more online. The Turkish translation also means much to James, the Greek member of our trio. After Primordia was released, James had to serve his mandatory term in the Greek army. But James—like Primordia’s Horatio—is a warrior for peace and friendship, and making this translation succeed was a must for him.
I go on about this because we are obviously in a moment of crisis in the world. Even though our games have a lot to say, we have never tried to make them about “the moment.” That is because in every moment, each of us must struggle to put love before hate, hope before despair, wisdom before folly, and grace before bitterness. In the end, we are small, fragile beings in an ever smaller, ever more fragile world. That world is surrounded by immense darkness and lifelessness, and the work of living is to see the light in each other, so that we do not turn this beautiful miracle of humanity and earth back into void and chaos.
These two translations are a gift to us at Wormwood Studios from generous, volunteer translators. We hope that they are also a gift to many players, so that our little game may provide a little light to others. You have provided much light for us.
Strangeland Nominated for 10 AGS Awards
The nominees for the 2021 Adventure Game Studio (AGS) Awards are in, and Strangeland has taken home 10 nominations, hitting all the major categories!
Best Game Created with AGS
Best Writing
Best Gameplay
Best Background Art
Best Character Art
Best Animation
Best Music & Sound
Best Voice Work
Best Programming
Best Puzzles
It's wonderful to see the whole team's work recognized. In particular, it's unusual and gratifying for an award to single out coding, an honor James Spanos very much deserves. Of course, awards for gameplay, audio, and even art all reflect the quality of the coding, which is critical to creating a smooth gameplay experience and for the audiovisual effects that make Strangeland so unnerving and alive.
If you're interested in casting a vote, you'll need to register at the AGS forums, which can be a tricky process (the most elaborate anti-bot system this side of the Voight-Kampff test), but you can take do so here.
Strangeland Receives SEVEN Nominations for Aggie Awards
We are floored by the nominations Strangeland received for the 2021 Aggie Awards, annually handed out by AdventureGamers.com, which I believe is the longest-running major adventure-game-focused website out there.
Strangeland was nominated for Best Traditional Adventure, Best Gameplay, Best Story, Best Art, Best Writing (Drama), Best Voice Acting, and Best Setting (the category that Primordia won in 2012). We are still awaiting the nominees for Best Adventure. There are many more nominees per category than back when Primordia came out, which may account for the larger number of nominations. Whatever the reason, we're very proud and grateful. In particular, it is nice to see nominations in such a wide variety of categories, recognizing the contributions from the whole team.
Back on Strangeland's release, Adventure Gamers described it thusly:
Strangeland is a surrealist, psychologic horror adventure that feels like it was drawn by H.R. Giger, designed by M.C. Escher, and written by Aeschylus. It’s a polished, well-written, well-acted and intriguing interactive nightmare that is easily worth your time—if you can stomach the unrelenting depressive tone and disturbing imagery.
We liked that so much we used it as one of the pull-quotes for Steam!
All the same, the kudos that matter the most to us come from players, whether reviews here (nearing 450!) or emails, and what is particularly nice about the Aggie awards is that the nominations reflect the community's involvement in the voting.
Finally, while the fez-wearing character is a bit much, it does offer an excuse to announce that Strangeland's Turkish fan translation is now complete and in testing!
Strangeland Named Best Point-and-Click Adventure of 2021
The German indiegame magazine Welcome to Last Week namedStrangeland the year's best point-and-click adventure!
Strangeland is where my dreams come true. Not the dreams where I ride to Hogwarts on a witch's broomstick eating ice cream, but the kind of dreams where I'm confronted with my primal fears, my traumas. I am the stranger in a strange land crouching in the twilight between flesh and machine. ...
Every sentence in Strangeland is in the right place. Playing it is like interpreting a poem. At the same time, it is an ancient image, thickly painted on a canvas, hiding many previous versions. And like a painting, there's more to the pixelated adventure than just looks. The slightly stiff animations are more than offset by the unique organo-mechanical look. Like in a cabinet of curiosities, I don't even know where to look first. The key was attention. Thinking along is rewarded more than in any other adventure. I will meditate on the dialogues many more times and explore the inspirations of Wormwood Studios.
Incidentally, WTLW's mission statement is fantastic, and I only wish I could read German well enough not to have to rely on machine translation:
[T]his indie game magazine is ... called Welcome To Last Week. Because research, intensive work and a sophisticated choice of words just take time. Because chasing after the hottest news is already happening everywhere. Because game journalism can do without rumors, leaks and sensations and deserves intensively researched texts. Because indie games are a wonderful form of expression and art in pop culture. We give them the attention they deserve.
We see ourselves as a culture magazine in the video game sector and not as a pure gaming platform. Barriers should be broken down in our texts. We want to enable everyone interested in art and culture to be able to understand our thoughts and experiences. Where others stop, we dig even deeper. We want to get to the bottom of the various gaming experiences, illuminate interesting topics, go into more detail on things that are easy to overlook or even obvious. We don't write tests according to imposed patterns, because tests are for food processors and vacuum cleaners. We look at the whole work, place it in a cultural, historical, emotional or artistic context and try to understand it. Pick out great idiosyncrasies to show you the cleverness of creative minds. We certainly don't always succeed in this, and by no means every video game experience is suitable for this. Sometimes it's a humorous approach that may reflect what has happened, sometimes it's more emotional. However, we do not claim to just scratch the surface or reproduce text modules.
Naturally, we're biased in favor of anyone who likes Strangeland, but that seems like an excellent approach to writing about games. Such analysis may not offer a quick way to decide whether to buy a game or not, but the writing becomes its own art. As a developer I've learned a lot about how to make games by reading thoughtful dissections of the games that came before ours, and as a player, I've had my experience enriched by reading other's well-written reactions to the games I've loved.
Hopefully with our upcoming German-language translation, we will be able to reach more of WTLW's readership in 2022!
Strangeland Named One of the Top 10 Indie Games of 2021
In another very gracious award, Strangeland was named one of the top indie games of 2021 by Indie Game Reviewer.
Combining a dark carnival atmosphere a la Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes with elements of psychological horror, Strangeland stands out for not holding the player’s hand, narratively speaking; its tale of a mysterious woman trapped by an evil force leaves lots open to interpretation.
Not up for interpretation, however, are the game’s streamlined inventory puzzle design or its cinematic voice-acting, both of which make for a compelling experience that makes this one stand out far and above any other point-and-click adventures we came across this year.
We're honored to appear alongside great games like Inscryption, Wildermyth, and more!
Strangeland on Puzzle Lovers' Top 10 of 2021
We were delighted to see that Strangeland was chosen as one of the ten best puzzle games of 2021 by the Puzzle Lovers steam group (the list is in alphabetical order, confirming that we should have named the game Aadrvarkland), and was in fact the only point-and-click adventure to make the list.
As we talked about in our dev diary "The Power of Puzzles," we have always viewed puzzles as an integral part of adventure games, perhaps the integral part, so it is a real honor to be selected by this group.
Strangeland Nominated for Best Writing in a Game
We were honored to read today that the New York Video Games Critics Circle (say that three times fast!) has nominatedStrangeland for the Herman Melville Award for Best Writing in a Game.
Strangeland's daunting competitors include Psychonauts 2, Persona 5 Strikers, Resident Evil: Village, Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, and more. Never imagined we would be swimming with such whales!
To quote the man for whom the award is named, "I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing."
Strangeland Wins Adventure Game of the Year and Best Screenplay
We recently posted about Strangeland's nomination for various categories in the AGOTY Awards. We are now honored to announce that Strangeland won both Adventure Game of the Year and Best Screenplay! These rewards reflect the immense work of not just the core team, but also the many voice actors who brought the game's story to life and countless testers who helped draw forth what was best in the game and scrape away what did not work. And, of course, without the support of our fans, Strangeland would never have been noticed (or even made). Many thanks to all of you! [previewyoutube="Y_-h3meCiz4;full"]
Strangeland Nominated for Adventure Game of the Year and More
[previewyoutube="vb4tM7hePyo;full"] We were very pleased to see Strangeland was nominated in almost every category of the Adventure Game of the Year Awards: Adventure Game of the Year; Best Puzzles; Best Screenplay; Best Lines of Dialogue; and Best Soundtrack, Sound Effects and Dubbing! (Missed out only on Best Visual Art and Animation.) Hopefully we'll bring home some wins, and see some more nominations in Adventure Gamers' Aggies and Adventure Game Studios' AGS Awards!
Goodbye 2021, Welcome 2022
2021 was a momentous year for Wormwood Studios, with major achievements on Strangeland, Primordia, and Fallen Gods.
Strangeland: Released, Translated, and Ported
In May, we released Strangeland, our long-awaited adventure game follow-up to Primordia. We are grateful for the response so far. Strangeland is an intensely personal game. Using the psychological horror genre, we poured the tragedy, despair, hope, and redemption that we’ve experienced in our own lives into the vessel of a classic point-and-click adventure game. Originally conceived as part of a three-week jam, Strangeland consumed over four years of our lives into a full-length game, which many thousands of people have now played and enjoyed (and a few people have played and disliked!). The connection between players and the game is the most important thing about this work for us, so the reaction we’ve seen has been wonderful.
For the past year, we have been working very closely with a group of volunteer translators to make Strangeland available to non-English speakers. It is an exceedingly tricky game to translate, given the rich allusions, complicated wordplay and puns, and occasional language-based puzzles. Thanks to the hard work of Endre Linea, we were delighted to release the first translation, into Hungarian, just before the end of the year. We expect to release a German translation next, with Spanish and French close behind. Unfortunately, the Chinese, Japanese, Russian, and Polish translations are stalled—but perhaps we will be able to get them started again too in 2022!
Finally, we ported Strangeland to MacOS and Linux... and laid the foundation for some even more significant porting next year. We’ve always wanted to offer native Mac and Linux builds, and we’re glad to be doing so now!
Primordia: Optioned, Translated, and Ported
Rather unexpectedly, a film adaptation of Primordia that once seemed a pipedream appears to be progressing (with sufficient reality that we were paid a non-trivial option-extension fee). We can’t share much publicly about it, and it’s always safest to assume that these things won’t pan out, but it’s a serious team working on the film project. It just speaks to the strength of the community that you alll have built around Primordia that our little old game continues to attract such attention. Next year will mark a decade since our game was released, and we celebrated our 300,000th copy sold this year.
More down to earth, Primordia received an Italian translation this year, courtesy of volunteer translator Marco de Vivo—adding to the existing official French, Spanish, and German translations and unofficial Russian one. As with Strangeland, we have had some false starts into other languages this year (and in years past), but we plan to keep trying to bring Primordia to new languages and new audiences as the years go by. Recently, Russian and Turkish translators approached us, so we’ll see where that goes.
We also achieved our long-running goal of releasing native Linux and MacOS ports of Primordia. As with Strangeland, we made a more significant port this year, too, which we should be able to announce early next year. Needless to say, we’re very excited about it.
Fallen Gods: Significant Further Development
Fallen Gods is now many, many years into development. Its progress is slow, but steady, and has been significant on a number of fronts this year—significant enough that we finally published the game’s Steam page (and we’re grateful for the thousands of wishlist additions that have followed).
Art-wise, we added dozens of new illustrations to the game (every event in the game is accompanied by an illustration), new combat sprites and animations, new character portraits with varying moods, updated mountain and marsh tilesets, and various small visual enhancements across the board. Audio-wise, we added dozens of new voiceovers for events (the first text node in each event is narrated), dozens of new musical sketches, and numerous sound effects.
The most significant advances have been design-wise. Fallen Gods is an open-world, procedurally generated, non-linear, narrative, rogue-lite RPG. While other games (including its forebear, the board game Barbarian Prince) have had many of these features, this is the first game I’ve developed that did not have a predefined structure. One of the greatest challenges has been ensuring that the game still has clear direction, strong pacing, and satisfying progression, along with a high level of challenge. As more of the game came together, we’ve revised a number of systems, including how dungeons are traversed, how information is doled out to the player, and how the economy works. We also introduced some additional victory conditions. I’m relatively confident that the design is now in the “refinement” rather than “reworking” stage, which should help us fill out the rest of the content. We’re hoping to release Fallen Gods in 2022. The major challenge is simply that the older I get, the less time and energy I seem to have, which has slowed the design/writing down.
My hope is that in the next month or so, we will finally be able to share a lengthy gameplay video showing a run through the game. There is still quite a bit of placeholder content, but it will at least be satisfactory proof of life!
Conclusion
As always, we want to end by thanking all of you, who have made our dreams of game development possible. You’re awesome, and we are grateful for your support. We hope that in 2022 we are able to continue sharing our best work with you, continue enhancing our existing games, and continue participating this wonderful community that you’ve helped create. Happy New Year!
