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The Adventure Begins Soon! Meet Norton, Agama, and Squig

Hey everyone,

We’re just a few short days from the launch of Dark Sky on September 24th. You’ve already met Brae and Floxxy, two key members of the party. Now, to introduce some more of the crew you'll be playing with next week: Squig, Norton, and Agama.

[h3]Squig[/h3]
Squig was born on the planet Harth into an average Mollusian family. He was the seventh of fifteen offspring, surrounded by older siblings who were stronger and more confident than he was, and by younger siblings who were cuter, cuddlier, and more charming. Squig often felt like wallpaper; liked but not loved by all his siblings, except one: his little sister Nalla.


When Squig came of age, he made the decision to leave his sister and moved to the Crucean planet of Pelagon where he met his future best friend, Norton. The two moved to Wolf Prime where they began their new life together, ostensibly as friends, but really as brothers. It was a happy time for Squig, who felt like he had finally found his place in the universe–the only drawback was his distance from Nalla, but they maintained contact with each other by sending pre-recorded messages.

In battle, Squig creates shields to provide defensive support to the party. He can summon holographic doubles, Mr. Squiggles, that work as cover and attack enemies. His photon driver also fires concentrated laser shots to dish out respectable damage or flash enemies into blindness.

  • Can apply blind on opponents. (reduces enemy Attack)
  • Can apply burn on opponents. (deals DoT, very effective against shields)
  • Efficient at generating Block for himself and his allies.
  • Can create holographic doubles to cover and attack.

[h3]Norton[/h3]
Nortonus Palinuros, better known as ‘Norton’, was born on the planet Pelagon. To his friends and family, he was the lovable class clown, though his humor and clumsiness hid a deeper insecurity—his fear of rejection. His parents showed him a lot of love and support, but outside the comfort of his home he was often chided by his peers, usually for jokes that didn’t quite land.


Despite his playful exterior, an underlying loneliness lingered within Norton until he met Squig, his future best friend. Their bond grew into a friendship he had never imagined possible. From then on, Norton would do anything for Squig. When it was time for him to leave the nest and get a real job, it just so happened to be at the same time that Squig’s gig on Pelagon was up. The two signed a frontier contract together, heading off to start their new lives on Wolf Prime.

In battle, Norton’s kit revolves around building charges to amp up his abilities. He can consistently deal small amounts of damage through the creation of static clouds while building up power to discharge a massive finisher. He can also fill the role of support by using up his charges to lower the EP cost of party members’ abilities and slowing enemies.

  • Abilities will stack up charge on himself
  • His abilities can be enhanced by building high charge or spending charges
  • Can generate Energy Points
  • Create static fields (enemies on static fields will take damage when attacking or moving)

[h3]Agama[/h3]
Agama, a Rellion, has endured the pain of being orphaned twice. The first time came during a tragic accident when a faulty stabilization array caused the shuttle carrying her family to crash on Wolf Prime. Her last memory of that day is her father placing her into an airdrop crate, followed by the deafening boom of the shuttle slamming into the desert floor. She was later found and taken in by a nomadic tribe known as the Gariba. As a child, she roamed the harsh, endless deserts of Wolf Prime on foot with them, learning their ways.


The second time Agama was orphaned was as an adolescent when the deadliest sandstorm ever measured in the post-settlement period of Wolf Prime wiped out the entire Gariba tribe in just three hours. To survive in the wild alone, Agama had to learn to hunt, defend herself, and navigate using the stars; it was a hard life, but a fulfilling one. Eventually, Agama made her way to the city of Moros, where adjusting to society proved challenging. Her fiery temper made it difficult to forge connections and find her place in the world–until a gravitational anomaly occurred requesting volunteers for a civilian expeditionary force.

In battle, Agama brings some tools of her trade. She can poison enemies or create Poison Clouds with grenades. She has great mobility and can displace enemies to line up combos with her party members or disrupt enemy attacks. She can hit enemies’ weak spots, leaving them Vulnerable. As a tactician, Agama helps by giving more options to players, cycling through the deck to find the best answer to any problem.

  • Poison enemies and create Poison Clouds (deals DoT, bypasses shields)
  • Make enemies Vulnerable (increases damage taken)
  • High mobility across the battlefield.
  • Positioning & displacement abilities
  • Hand sculpting (Draw-Discard- create Temp Cards)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1454960/Dark_Sky/

We can’t wait for you all to meet this wonderful cast of characters and experience this world that the team has been pouring their hearts and souls into. If you haven’t already, consider adding Dark Sky to your wishlist - it helps us out a lot! Also once the game is out honest reviews are one of the most important things in helping the game become more discoverable, so please drop us one! Good luck and enjoy your time on Wolf Prime.

- Dark Sky Team

September 2024 - Game Balance, Localization, and Controller Support

Hey everyone!

We’re thrilled to share that the official release of Dark Sky is just around the corner, launching on September 24th on Steam. It’s been a journey, and we’re so grateful for all the support and feedback we’ve received during development.

As we gear up for release, we wanted to share a few exciting updates around development, localization, controller and Steam deck support, and highlight the new demo and a 5 minute gameplay walkthrough video from our own Felipe Cassina (Lead Designer). Let’s dive in!



[h3]Updates on development[/h3]

As we get into the final weeks before launch, it’s been all about details, game balance and bug fixing. Our team is working hard to squash all the bugs and ensure a smooth launch.

Revive changes

Game balance wise, we received feedback from our weekly playtests that the revive ability felt over-tuned, because it was too easy to stabilize a character after they were revived and in some cases letting a character die to revive them with 10 HP was the optimal play. This also caused healing cards to be less effective, so we’ve now changed revive from healing with 10 HP to healing with 1 HP and getting 4 regen. You end up with pretty much the same HP after the regen is over, but now those first turns where it hasn’t fully kicked in yet require you to play more defensively with the revived character.



This has felt much better as now getting a character down creates more of a strategic choice. We previously had revive set at just at 1 HP without regenerate, but that felt too punishing and could lead to a death spiral - so this has been a good middle ground. Additionally, healing cards become more valuable because they provide a burst of healing that allows the character to get right back in action.

Card range icons

We’ve also added an icon displaying the range on every card. This change makes it easier to build decks and upgrade cards since you don’t have to remember the range of every card by heart. You’ll have all the information you need to think about your tactics and how your build takes into account range, positioning, and team comp.



Outside of development, our team has been busy supporting publishing efforts like refreshing the Steam page assets, feedback on the launch trailer, and preparing our soundtrack/art supporter pack. There’s a lot going on. It’s a very busy and exciting time for the team.

Localization

As we’re so close to launch, we also wanted to shed light into the localization process, as it’s an area that is often not discussed in game development. Localization is important to the team, as a multilingual team, we want as many people as possible to play and experience Dark Sky.

Dark Sky will be localized into:
  • English
  • Chinese (Simplified)
  • German
  • French
  • Russian
  • Spanish (Spain)

To give you a glimpse into the localization process, here’s what Rebecca, the localization producer at our publisher, Midwest Games, had to say:

“Localizing Dark Sky, I’ve been fortunate to work with incredibly talented teams, including Ganymede and our language service provider, Terra Localizations. Ganymede prioritized depth of lore and documented it well, so we just don’t have the challenges you would normally face with deep narratives. In fact, we had almost zero questions from the linguist about backstory and context while doing translations. For a ~50k word game, that’s unreal, and it makes my job so much easier. The focus has instead been on technical aspects of translating the card strings. Terra has done an incredible job of making sure no line has a sloppy translation, even if that means creating unique strings and translating each one so that it works well in each language, rather than plugging in a generic translation that may or may not work well in all occurrences. That’s a lot of work for myself and Terra, but if it means a player in Beijing has a seamless experience playing Dark Sky because our translations make it feel like the game was made in Simplified Chinese, then it’s worth it. That’s always the goal.”



[h3]Steam Deck Playability and Controller Support:[/h3]

TLDR: Dark Sky will have controller support and be playable on Steam Deck at launch; however, Valve’s recent process changes for official Steamdeck certification prevent us from having the Steamdeck status on the store page.

We’ve also been working hard to ensure controller and Steamdeck players have a good experience. Our team has been playing and testing the game on Steamdeck, and it’s been running great. We fixed some Steamdeck specific bugs with the tutorial videos, size of card range icons. Steam recently changed their process to get the official “playable on Steamdeck” tag, so while we can’t get the tag due to that Steam process change, we can say from our experience that it runs well overall.

For controller support, we’ve been working hard to ensure Dark Sky can be enjoyed with a controller. There are still aspects of it that require polish, but even with bugs it’s clear to us that this is a feature that will feel right at home when complete, so we’ll keep putting our best efforts towards delivering this experience.



[h3]New Demo and Walkthrough:
[/h3]
In case you missed it - we recently updated our Demo here on Steam. This demo is very focused on showing off some of the improvements we've made to the combat and the HUD and UI. You can read more about that here.

We also have a nice walkthrough from Felipe showcasing some of the updates, and gameplay combinations you will find in the demo. This is just a small slice of what you’ll get in the full game in just a few weeks.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

That's all for this one - With just a few short weeks before launch we ask that if you haven’t already consider dropping us a wishlist, it's a great way to support us and makes the game more discoverable for new players.

-Team Dark Sky

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1454960/Dark_Sky/

Developer Gameplay Showcase!

Hello everyone!

We just put up a video breakdown of Dark Sky's combat and mechanics! The video was recorded by our Lead Game Designer, Felipe. You can check out the video here on the Steam page, or you can check it out on YouTube!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

We also recently dropped a new demo that has various improvements such as the ability to preview enemy intent, improved combat UI, and new cards! Some of these features are showcased in the gameplay breakdown video as well.

Please consider dropping a wishlist for Dark Sky! It really helps us out especially as we are getting very close to launch. The full game releases on September 24th, and we can't wait for you to experience Dark Sky in full!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1454960/Dark_Sky

-Dark Sky Team

New Dark Sky Demo Out NOW!

Hey all,

In case you missed it - earlier this week we launched a brand new demo of Dark Sky!

This one is very focused on showing off some the improvements we've made to the combat and the HUD and UI. As always we want to hear your feedback so let us know either in our Discord or over on the Steam Community Tab.

  • You can now preview enemy intents to plan out your next move
  • Added more Status Reactions (you can read more about that here)
  • Enemies now have weaknesses and immunities
  • Vastly improved and updated Combat UI
  • Added a few new cards to try out!

So check it out and let us know what you think. We're very excited for you all to experience the full game on September 24th! If you haven't already please consider dropping us a wishlist - it helps a ton!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1454960/Dark_Sky


-Dark Sky Team

Dark Sky Releasing Date Announcement!

Hey everyone,

Today is a big day for all of us at Ganymede Games and Midwest Games! After years of hard work and passion, we’re beyond excited to finally share the world of Wolf Prime and the Dark Sky universe with you. Mark your calendars—on September 24th, the game officially launches!



Here’s a word from Felipe Cassina, our Lead Game Designer on the upcoming release of Dark Sky:
"Two years ago, I joined the team with a goal to create something awesome. Over time, the concept grew and evolved, with each team member adding their touch. I’ve watched Dark Sky come to life, and now it’s nearly complete. Soon, it’ll be in your hands, and I can’t wait to see where you take it!"

Before the launch, don’t forget to check out our latest developer updates. We’ve got some great pieces on our status and reaction systems and introductions to characters like Floxxy and Brae.

If you haven’t yet, please add Dark Sky to your wishlist, it really helps us out. Thanks for the continued support - we’re so thrilled for you to experience the full game next month.

—Dark Sky Team