Garenburg Penitence: The Riflebird News

Hello!

I'm happy to say that the demo for Garenburg Penitence: The Riflebird has now released!

You can go play it now! It includes:

• Four levels, each from a different world
  
• Four difficulty modes
  
• Four gameplay modes, being Classic, GREEN, Wave, and Unwind
  
• Level Editor! This version is lacking some features that will be available in the full version (additional mechanics, visual effects, multiple paths, etc.) but can be used without restriction. Custom sprites for spheres, the player, backgrounds with support for 3 layers, music, and more will be available!
  

You can find more levels for download here. One of which includes a Garenburg Woods-themed level!

In addition, the soundtrack ("Archival Sample") can be found here for download!

Please also check out YASUpochiGuitar, who made the guitar melodies you can hear in Unwind Mode and the File System.

Aside from that... have fun! We'll be participating in Steam Next Fest soon, so stay tuned for that. Cheers!

Hello!

Here's a bit of an update regarding the development of The Riflebird.

The Riflebird will be participating in the Steam Next Festival with a demo available to play! You can learn more about the festival here.

This demo will have a handful of levels and some of the game modes available to try out. The game is still heavily in development, so all feedback from trying the demo will be welcome!

Please be on the look out for the demo, which will be available at some point before June 13th (the start of the festival).


This mode has been added recently. It allows the player to have a more relaxed experience. Instead of having the usual music for each world, it instead has a playlist of guitar tracks that are shuffled through. The music here is made by the talented YASUpochiGuitar! You can find his channel here! You may know him from the game Ib, as he composed various tracks such as Garry's theme, the intro music, and the credits theme.

Music can also be changed to be the regular music which plays in Classic mode, the unique music that plays during modes other than Classic, or any specific guitar track to keep looping.

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That is all for now. Take care, and stay tuned for more news next month with the official demo release!

Hello!

Two things!



This was briefly mentioned in the previous information post as something that could be added later down the line and even after the game launches. Being a spin on marble poppers, map diversity and variety is essential in allowing repayable experiences and there are all sorts of ways a level can be mapped and designed.

So, with that in mind, full custom level support will be available at the game launch as it has now been added and went honestly more smoothly than expected. You will be able to customize level backgrounds, use three different layers for visuals, shaders and effects, different gameplay styles that are in other vanilla levels, custom pathing for the player and the spheres, custom music, custom player/sphere sprites, and more! You will also be able to easily import levels made by other people and play them and use the numerous game modes available with each custom level. While designing the editor, the goal was to give the player plenty of control to get as close as possible to the level of strength as the development tools used to make the game, and it has turned out incredibly well so far.

There are additionally plans to use this level editor for level designing contests! Players will be able to design and enter levels to be potentially added into the game as bonus levels, allowing them to be played by anybody with ease. This will be of course in the distant future, but stay tuned for them!

Additionally, a few levels will be available to showcase the strength of the level editor, including one themed after Garenburg Woods and another after The Möbius Strip.



We now have an official Discord server. Feel free to drop by if you have any questions about the game or want to follow it more closely for sneak peaks, more development updates, and other various announcements. The invite can be found here, or alternatively at the invite code AJbukfAzUk.

Hello!

This is a detailed post about the game in how the gameplay works. It differs from classic marble popper games such as Luxor, Sparkle, Tumblebugs, Zuma, and others. For those who have played other marble poppers, I want to make it clear that the gameplay of Garenburg Penitence is both very similar with many different mechanics for a fresh and unique experience. There are quite a few other points mentioned below that I feel is important to mention as well, so the list below should hopefully answer most questions.

• The player cannot control their movement, but instead movement speed. They will always move on a small loop and have to change their speed accordingly to be more accurate with matching colors.
  
• You do not need to match three colors to destroy spheres; you only need to match two. While that sounds like the game may be easier, or it may remove a lot of strategy, that is most definitely not the case.
  
• Powerups are only in Wave Mode and are gained through accuracy.
  
• You control what colors to fire. There is no RNG involved in choosing colors.
  
• Levels will be cleared after reaching a certain score. You can get higher scores from matching with higher accuracy, although not required (Note: the footage in the trailers is using the old score system that was purely one point per sphere destroyed. This will be different in the full game).
  
• Yes, there are 72 total level maps. Story Mode reuses some levels on higher difficulties for more challenge, but there are 72 unique level designs overall (10 per world + 1 No Mistakes level per world + 1 Multiplayer level per world, with a total of 6 worlds).
  
• There is a story and plot. It is however optional as I know the majority of games similar to this do not focus at all on story. The story is that of the Riflebird, a key character in the history of Garenburg.
  
• While there aren't plans for official mod support, custom levels will be supported either with the release or in an update after the release depending on how difficult it is to implement (game development can be tricky at times). It is planned to include options for level effects, path creation, custom images for the level background and music as an option if all goes well. Please stay tuned for more updates on this part, it would likely be worked on last for this game so that the base game is polished and fun.
  
• Colorblind support will be added either late into development or shortly after release; I need to first research accessibility methods and assess how it will be implemented.
  
• While the previous game, Garenburg Woods, was an RPG Maker 2000 game, this game has no RPG elements. They are two very separate games in terms of the actual gameplay.
  

If there are any questions about anything in specific, feel free to make a thread in the discussions tab or reach out on r/garenburg. Cheers!