Crashlands alpha trailer

bscotchsam

Wrapped this puppy up this afternoon for our submission to the IGF. Take a looksee.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=490IvRiYriU

CyberKlown28

We want Crashlands, yes we do. We got spirit, how about you?

Duh83

Great video! I didn't get to the tundra but some of that armor and those weapons look bad ass. Spring can't come soon enough

bscotchAdam

I haven't made it to the tundra yet either!!!

bscotchseth

Nobody in the universe has made it to the Tunrda. NOBODY! Well, kinda.

Ulnarevern

Woohoo PC VERSION !!! I'll be able to play at a realist speed.
And you can make it to the tundra easily, by running in a straight line. Surviving it is another problem though.

bscotchseth

True, long as you bring some flooring to make bridges!

CyberKlown28

Will you guys attempt the Steam Greenlight process?

bscotchAdam

Probably!

Ulnarevern

Will you release a non steam version?
I'm not fond of of Steam honnestly.

bscotchAdam

MAYBE. The difficulty is in finding a way to get paid for the work we create. We don't want to do free-to-play on PC, and would rather just have people purchase the game out-right (like how we did with Quadropus). However, the piracy rate is insane on PC (literally 99% of downloads for many games are pirated) and so we need a distribution platform that will limit this. We'll look at the non-steam platforms as well (Desura, etc).

Duh83

I technically made it to the tundra but I didn't do everything in the bawg and only looked around the tundra. Looks great though 

Ulnarevern

I believe that steam is of no use for the games with some visibility. Just take a look at most of the cracks you can find, it replaces a steam ddl and an ini file and it's probably standardized. So that may be efficient only if your game doesn't get known (so nobody will crack it). If you get a correct visibility, one of the cracking team will take some time to crack your game and you'll stay in the 99% piracy rate. It is only my point of view and I wish you the best but I think it is better to warn you And why not making à good old demo version ?

bscotchAdam

Yeah, we know we're going to get screwed either way. But with the Bscotch ID system, since that actively costs us money per user, we can at least verify that a player purchased the game on Steam/Desura before we let them login!

Ulnarevern

This way seems to be the better alternative indeed. In fact forget it, I'll get the game on steam I think. It's just that I want to use it only when I'm "forced" to, and I'm a lone case I think. Plus since it's more likely that you won't release a box version, I won't regret it (I really love my box collection with lovely CDs/DVDs in it! )

bscotchAdam

Nah, I totally get it. Before becoming a developer I was always of the mindset, "But I'll happily pay for it and hate DRM!" So we'll always avoid intrusive DRM, but we also know that while most people say they'll pay for a game, in reality they are more likely to grab it for free if doing so is easy.

Ulnarevern

It's not all about DRM, but about Steam itself in fact (that's why I was talking about being a lone case).
Yup a lot a people will do so, but I was wondering about GoG... (entering theorical discussion) There's piracy on their releases of old games but is it really consequent?

I get your point with steam (and completely respect it) but then I have another question: don't you fear to be buried under a s**tload of random projects and finally not get much visibility?

bscotchAdam

It turns out that being buried on Steam is still gives way more exposure than a lot of other platforms! We will look into others, but the more time we spend porting and debugging for each platform the less time we have to make games, and so it is best for us to pick one platform per device and just go with that. Steam may not even pan out, for all that, since we have to get through the review/greenlight process first.

Ulnarevern

Yeah I know it and that's another problem. But hey, only time will let you know!  

CyberKlown28

How would you guys describe Crashlands?
Don't Starve Meets Quadropus Rampage?

Ulnarevern

@CyberKlown28‌ Awesomeness meets pure BScotch Juice!
From what I know of Don't Starve (a really small knowledge), it may (or may not) be something like that, but WAY, WAY BETTER. And maybe more complete on a few points. In my opinion at least, and with my limited knowledge of Don't Starve. And the fight system is really different of the one in Quadropus: in short each enemy type has a pattern and you fight them with your weapon (by clicking them) and some artifacts that act like weapons (but at distance).

In fact, I must assume I can't really describe it. But it was worth a try (I wanted to write something). In all cases, that was an awesome experience.

bscotchAdam

@CyberKlown28‌ It definitely has a Don't Starve vibe, but only because it is a non-3D crafting/exploration game. Don't starve is much more of a survival game, since you have permadeath and it is extremely challenging to stay alive. In Don't Starve it is really difficult to fend off enemies, and it is extremely expensive to build things. So your time is really spent gathering and trying hard to not die. In Crashlands we want creature battles and building to be a main focus of the game, and so these parts are more interesting, frequent, and have reasonable difficulty.

The final version of Crashlands will be story-driven. The game is functionally complete right now, but has no story elements to speak of. This means that it is much more like Don't Starve and other survival/crafting games right now than it is going to be upon release!

bscotchAdam

@pocketpcandgeek‌ The Early Access Beta isn't very far away, so your impatience need not last too long!

Ulnarevern

@pocketpcandgeek‌ MAN you have no idea how you're lucky not knowing how awesome the alpha already was! Welcome on the forums by the way  

Duh83

I have to fill my time up with other mediocre games until i can play crashlands. Im looking forward to the beta

R4V3N

^ Have been eagerly awaiting this game since it was first announced and it seems the closer it gets to release the more the anticipation builds.

bscotchAdam

We're tackling the iOS ports of our 4 games + BscotchID this week, and we're going to tackle them LIKE MANIACS. We hope to have everything in Apple's court by 1.5 weeks from now, and then it's FULLTIME CRASHLANDS DEV.

@bscotchSam just put up a post recently on how we've changed the recipe system if you haven't seen it, and there are a few more posts in the pipeline.

MeaKitty

Buh! Why isn't it March already?!?!? I'm worse than a junkie without a supply!

Hope CrApple stuff goes quickly though, I know that dealing with them is a pain in the butt. 

bscotchAdam

YES IT IS A PAIN. Seth's screams of frustration can be heard for MILES.

Though one of the biggest problems is that we have to capture screenshots in every resolution that iDevices some in. for iTunes Way back at the first Towelfight launch, that meant replaying the game at each resolution, which is LUNACY. We're trying to come up with a way to change resolution on the fly to satisfy that problem, but it's tricky because of how things are set up.

We also have to deal with the ad and purchasing APIs, which are totally different from Google and for which we haven't solved the BscotchID integration problems yet. My guess is that stuff will turn out to be easy, but who knows?

Ulnarevern

That'll certainly be easy after the first time. For the first time... Let's hope they tried to make their API to be comprehensive.
All my thoughts to @bscotchseth‌ and to you too @bscotchAdam‌ and @BscotchSam! For what you go through to make awesome games for us! And THANK YOU!

bsb333

@bscotchAdam‌ Will there be another trailer before testing starts?