Above Snakes News

[h2]Howdy and welcome to the first Above Snakes devlog of 2023![/h2]

We're excited to give you a sneak peek of one of the final biomes in our game: an epic, wild Western town called Corpse Creek. Corpse Creek plays a significant part in the story of Above Snakes and is a place you may discover towards the end of the game. We have also implemented horses, made adjustments to the cooking system, and have some other exciting features to showcase this month!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_BI9fL_K_s
[h2]Corpse Creek[/h2]



Corpse Creek is a gigantic Western town and the fateful place where the plague first started. It is largely a ghost town now, as many of those who had survived fled from there. We don't want to give away too much just yet, because we want players to experience the biome for themselves.
Corpse Creek, despite recent events, still has inhabited buildings. However, the streets are littered with debris and the overall environment is eerie and atmospheric. It is sure to be a unique experience for players. We're putting forth a lot of effort into making this biome feel special. We're also adding interesting characters who will have their own stories to share with you. Our hope is that these characters help to add depth to the game. Byrd the bartender, for example, might already be familiar to those in our Community Discord server.

[h2]Horse Riding[/h2]





What kind of Western game would Above Snakes be if there were no horses? You can now find hitching posts with horses in certain places throughout the world that you can use for fast travel. For instance, there is a post located at the trading post, the tribal village in the birch forest, and Corpse Creek.
Using a horse costs carrots, but it's a great way to get around quickly. Carrots can be found in the wild and/or cultivated in your garden plots. Additionally, you can build your own hitching post at your base and own your very own horse!

[h2]Cooking System Improvements[/h2]



We've revamped the cooking system so that you now need to discover recipes before you can cook specific dishes. Discovery works by throwing ingredients together. After you have cooked a meal that results in a certain recipe, the recipe is "discovered" and added to your recipe book. For those of you who like to collect things, there are now books that you can find (or purchase) that teach you the recipes for certain items.



Of course, you can still throw every ingredient together, even if they won’t result in a certain recipe. For those, the sprites are now color-coded and icon-coded depending on the stats they provide. This makes it a lot easier to identify such things on your hot bar. We've also made it so that items that don't "make sense" to be cooked together will now result in inedible meals. For example, if you throw a couple of bones in a bowl, you can’t expect it to be an edible meal.

[h2]Multiple Save Slots[/h2]



There's no longer a need to delete your saved game! We've added the ability to have multiple save slots. You can now have up to 3 saved games at a time with story progression shown for each game.

[h2]Performance Improvements[/h2]

Lastly, we've made some big performance improvements to the game. We've reduced the initial loading time when starting up the game from around 30 seconds to just a couple of seconds! Now, you don't have to worry about the "black screen of death" anymore when starting the game (Beta testers know what I mean). We've also made some improvements to the memory management of the game, which means it now uses a lot less RAM. If you are an Alpha or Beta tester and were not able to run the game, now is a good time to try again. Let us know how it's running!

We hope you're as excited about these updates as we are! I can already tell you that we have a couple big announcements planned for the next few weeks! As always, we're looking for your feedback so please let us know in the comments what you think of Corpse Creek, the new horse riding, and the updated cooking system!

Cheers,
Tobi

Dear community,

We're looking to expand the list of steam achievements and need your help! Have an idea for an achievement that would be fun and challenging? Let us know in the comments below!

Something funny like hitting a rock for so long with an axe that you destroy it?
Something challenging like hitting a lost soul on the head by felling a tree?

We are looking forward to hear your creative ideas!

Cheers,
Tobi

In the spirit of the season, we are excited to announce that we're giving away in total

4 Beta Steam keys, and 4 fan shirts to 4 lucky winners.

If you win one of the beta keys, you can play Above Snakes immediately!

We are giving away 2 of each on Youtube. All you need to be a subscriber of Square Glade Games and comment under this video:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

And we are giving away 2 of each on Twitter:

• This giveaway is free to enter.
  
• The giveaway closes at 5pm CET on December 29th 2022
  
• Winners will be chosen randomly on December 29th about 6pm CET and winners will be announced with a pinned comment under the Youtube video and the Tweet.
  

Happy holidays to everyone and thank you for being such an amazing community.
Tobi

We are happy to announce that the Above Snakes Closed Beta launched today. Everyone who pre-ordered the game at beta tier on Kickstarter back in January / February 2022 is now eligible to play. Alpha and Pre-Alpha backer's games are upgraded to Beta automatically. With that step we are on track with the Kickstarter and release roadmap and happy to fulfill backer's orders.

Read more:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/266687617/lonesome-an-atmospheric-wild-west-mystery-rpg/posts/3689886

We hope you are having a wonderful holiday season and are ready for some exciting news from the world of Above Snakes. Firstly, we are changing our devlog format a little bit. This new format will be a blend of both written information and videos rather than showcasing one big video. In this specific devlog, one of the key features we're developing - base building improvements - gets its own special video. This mix will allow us to go in-depth into one feature per devlog. Let us know if you enjoy this format!

[h2]Base Building Improvements[/h2]
We've made some terrific improvements regarding our base building system, most notably by adding more gameplay value. To do this, we've attached a shelter system to the base fundamentals that provides shelter perks per level. This will encourage deeper gameplay when considering building a better (and stronger) shelter. Keep in mind that this system focuses on the quality of your shelter, not necessarily how grand or big it is.

Shelter perks, for instance, will include fortified walls that provide greater safety from outside elements, better soil for quicker crops, improved crafting stations that will operate more efficiently, and deeper wells which can offer more water.

Watch the video on our improvements to the base building system:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Pssst..for more updates, don't forget to subscribe to our YouTube Channel.

[h2]Merchants & Currency[/h2]


A new currency has been added to the game: coins! Coins can be looted during your ventures and used later on for supplies and trade. We've also added junk items with their sole purpose of being sold to traders along the way. Our goal is to add more Wild West flavor to the game by implementing objects such as horseshoes, a deck of cards, pocket watches, and more! Let us know what you would like to find when looting.

In addition to junk items, we've also added traders to the game. Traders will offer various kinds of goods and are happy to pay for some items you may not necessarily need. Keep in mind that traders may sometimes have discounts or price hikes.

[h2]Conversation Update[/h2]


Conversations with characters are a significant part of Above Snakes. We're proud to have updated the conservation system which will now feature sound mid-conversation. These sounds may reflect items being given to Aiyana or its payment.


Additionally, we've updated nearly every character's portrait! As you can see, we've transitioned from grayscale portraiture to more detailed and colorful depictions of the characters you'll come across in Above Snakes.

[h2]In Other News[/h2]
The Square Glade Games team has determined that running closed tests from time to time is a good way to playtest a game. In addition to gaining priceless feedback, the team can decide if we're on the right track or not. If you would like to be a part of any future closed tests, be sure to sign up on our new company website. If you've already enrolled on our old website, don't worry! We saved your data.

We also were happy to showcase Above Snakes at DevGAMM Game Fest! We even did a short interview which you can watch below.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h2]The Beta Will Release December 16th [/h2]
We couldn’t be happier to announce that we're ready to transition into Beta on December 16th! That means that all of the backers who backed for “Beta Access - 27€” will receive their game key! According to the Kickstarter roadmap, we are well on track with our progress. We're happy that we get to celebrate this important step together! Eligible Kickstarter backers will receive an email containing their game key(s) on December 16th (around 10am PST).

For supporters who have already received a key as a result of Alpha access, start up Above Snakes like normal on Steam and install the update to Beta status on December 16th. We will inform you all in a separate update that the Beta keys have been sent!

We hope that you enjoyed this devlog as much as we have enjoyed implementing all of this new content. We look forward to stepping into Beta together. Thank you to everyone for your support. We can’t wait to see you play the Above Snakes Beta and hear your opinions on it!

Cheers,
Tobi