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Shardpunk: Verminfall Live Dev part 2

Watch and share secrets of the game development in what is the 10th ever episode of Retrovibe's Live Dev - a series of daily streams showing game developers working on their games.

Tune in daily at weekdays @ 10:00 PT / 13:00 ET / 19:00 CET

Shardpunk: Verminfall Live Dev part 1

Watch and share secrets of the game development in what is the fifth ever episode of Retrovibe's Live Dev - a series of daily streams showing game developers working on their games. Tune in daily at weekdays @ 10:00 PT / 13:00 ET / 19:00 CET

Devlog #98: Retrovibe is publishing Shardpunk!

Guys, now I can officially share the news with you: after more than two years of part-time, after-hours hobby development I teamed up with a publisher!

This means that:

a) I am working on the game full-time now,

b) I will be releasing the game as a fully-fledged, correctly marketed commercial product.

You can't imagine how awesome this feels!

Now, first things first.

The publisher I work with is Retrovibe. Shardpunk is one of five games that have been announced, with the others being:

B.I.O.T.A



Janosik 2



The Looter



And, last but not least, Project Warlock 2 (which does not have an official Steam page. Yet.)



As for Shardpunk, the game is scheduled for 2022. I am still changing and tweaking lots of stuff with the game, and that's one of the reasons I am starting weekly streams where I will be talking about the development. If you would like to see how I progressed with the game so far and help me make the game better, do check it out!

I will be streaming on Mondays at 19:00 CET/12:00 PT/14:00 EST, with the first stream going live on 7th of June at https://www.twitch.tv/RetrovibeGames.

My first live stream is on Monday. I'm already nervous 0_o

So yeah, I am looking forward to seeing all of you on the streams.

As for the game development update, there was a lot going on. I am in the middle of revamping the weapon upgrades system, and hopefully I'll be able to talk more about it in two weeks.

In the meantime, here are some in-game gifs. Enjoy!



Devlog #97: Bridge fun

(totally tired today - will try to keep this short)

I believe I did mention previously that the final mission of the first chapter in Shardpunk will be taking place on a bridge. On the contrary to standard missions where your goal is to reach the next shelter, where the player is tasked with surviving for enough turns so that the sewers entrance becomes open:



The vermin keeps on spawning on a constant basis. They can be approaching from both sides.



Now, the biggest problems I had on this level were to make sure that a) it's fun and b) it's not too difficult.

The difficulty issue is a tough thing, and I am aware that I'm still not in point in time to be balancing stuff, especially as I am still tweaking with the weapon upgrades system (which I plan to write about in a separate blog post).

About the "fun" part, I decided to add a twist to the level. I don't want to spoil too much, but escaping will not be as easy as just opening the sewers entrance.



Also, to make sure that the player tries to push their luck, there will be some loot crates placed further away from the exit shaft. It'll be up to the player to decide whether these goodies are worth it.



And what will be in these goody crates? Well, that's a very good question, which I am trying to answer myself as well! I mean currently they hold weapon parts, but I am pretty sure that won't be the case anymore. I will write more about it in my future posts.

Take care, and have a great weekend!




Devlog #96: How to open that goddamn bunker?

As you might already be aware, the goal of the game (well, at least its first chapter) is to reach the only intact bridge in the Capitol in order to get to the northern side of the city, which wasn't hit that hard by the sudden rat vermin attack.

Your characters traverse the city in small chunks, and (in most places) they have the possibility to reach a shelter.



Shelters are used as safe places, where you can rest, upgrade your gear and perform shelter-specific actions.



Until now, there was only one way of opening up the shelter - the player had to use a fusion core (so a fuel-like resource, if compared to, say, Pathway; it's far more than that though, but that's something for another entry) to power it up.



In order to make the game less predictable, I've added two more ways in which the bunker needs to be opened.

Also, I removed all the lock mechanisms from the front of the door. The mechanism is not accessible from the outside, as - obviously - the rats would be trying to destroy it.

And I've added some nice thud sounds and camera shakes to make it meatier:

Obviously you cannot hear the thud sounds. But the screenshakes are there.

One of the new ways of opening up the shelter entrance is using a remote valve. I mean first the player still needs to use a fusion core, but then it becomes clear that it will be more difficult:



Only after the player reaches the valve and opens it, the door is opened.



The last variation is that the door comes with a timer - meaning that after you activate them, you need to wait a number of turns.



The type of door opening is right now randomized for every mission, and the player is not aware of which one is used.

That's it for this entry. I hope you will find these new bunker entrance mechanics fun and challenging!

Take care!