I Was a Teenage Exocolonist News

I Was a Teenage Exocolonist is officially released today! I started development almost exactly five years ago, and wowowow has the game ever grown up since then!

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I'd like to take a moment to thank everyone who supported Exocolonist and helped create it. Artists Meilee Chao, Eduardo Vargas, Sarah Webb, Leanne Roed, Sarah Roland, Diego De la Rocha, and our hundred card artsits for making the game so breathtakingly beautiful. Narrative designer Lindsay Ishihiro for making us laugh, cry, and fall in love with their moving prose. Gord, Em and others from A Shell in the Pit Audio, and all of our incredible musicians, for adding another dimension of wonder and beauty to the game.

Thanks to my husband Colin Northway for helping with tricky algorithms and game balancing, and for a tremendous amount of emotional support, idea-bouncing and code checks over the last five years.

Thanks to our publishers Finji, our QA and porting teams, and a very special thank you virtual hug to our incredible beta testers and all of our fans for your support and encouragement. And to my dad, who has logged hundreds of hours living life after life on the planet Vertumna.

Thank you, friends.



Okay enough mushy stuff, it's release day! Time to get in there and decide what sort of Teenage Exocolonist you'll be.

Vertumna awaits!

- Sarah ːnyaaː

To celebrate the launch of I Was A Teenage Exocolonist, we're streaming the game live to Steam during Indie Arena Booth Online! Swing by all weekend to catch streams from your favorite broadcaster, and be sure to hang out on launch day (Thursday, August 25th) to catch Syafire playing the game all day long!

Featuring artists C418, scntfc, A Shell in the Pit, Jogging House and many more! Our soundtrack blends beautiful acoustic instruments with ambient synth vibes for a style that is uniquely Vertumnan.

For the full artist list and to hear how it all came together, check out my Dev blog post about it.

Whether you're exploring a new planet, testing your mettle in card challenges, or dealing with the awkwardness of growing up while remembering past lives, this is your music.

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The Soundtrack is now available here on Steam. It includes both MP3 and high-quality FLAC audio files, and comes bundled with the official PDF artbook for the game!

So you can feast your eyes and ears while you wait. But it won't be long! Exocolonist is coming out in just a few days on Thursday August 25th!

- Sarah ːnyaaː

On Thursday August 25th at 10am PT we'll finally loose our arrow into the world, piercing the hearts of narrative rpg fans as they live (and re-live) their teenage years on the planet Vertumna.

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Our new launch trailer features beautiful rock-ballad "The Child You Were" by Frances Aravel, and powerful imagery from emotional moments in the game. I'm not crying, you're crying.

Our sound designer Em Halberstadt from A Shell in the Pit Audio created it with help from Emily Liles and friends from Finji.

I'm as nervous as a hopeye about the upcoming launch!! I hope you're excited to play I Was a Teenage Exocolonist soooooooooon.

- Sarah ːnyaaː

Today we're unveiling our beautiful new key art by Meilee Chao. It shows off the more mature side of I Was a Teenage Exocolonist, including older versions of all the teen characters and a mysterious Sol (our name for the player character) looking like some kind of sorcerous card-o-mancer.



Mei's older illustrations will still be in rotation on storefronts, including our beta box art showcasing a younger more innocent Sol in the natural world of Vertumna:



With exactly two weeks until release, we're thinking hard about how best to describe our narrative-rpg-deckbuilder-lifesim to the world. We've posted new screenshots and new text on our store page, and I've been practicing my elevator pitches in press interviews.

With such a unique cross-genre game that is both delicately beautiful and at times filled with viscous angst, it's been a challenge! I wonder if those of you who played the demo will be surprised with where the game goes after the first year? Only two more weeks to find out!

- Sarah ːnyaaː