Mining Merchant News

[p]Hi everyone![/p]
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[p]Today I have some very exciting news about my next game Mining Merchant: the game is scheduled to release as soon as next quarter on... [/p]
[h3]March 13th, 2026 🎉[/h3]
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[p]👉 To celebrate, please add Mining Merchant to your Steam wishlist to be notified when the game launches:[/p]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3744080/Mining_Merchant/
[h3]Closed Beta[/h3]
[p]I'm currently looking for beta testers to gather feedback and find bugs/issues. In the coming weeks I'll be sharing the game with a very small amount of players, and then gradually opening up the game to more players, with a big beta session in December. If you'd like to get involved, click the big red button below!
Join the Mining Mechs Beta Test![/p]
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[p]Alrighty, that's it for this week. Next week we'll be back with another devlog, so make sure to follow the community hub for more updates![/p]
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Wishlist Mining Merchant Follow the Franchise Page Join the Discord

Hey everyone!

Hope you're all having a great week. In today's devlog I want to talk about the mechs and upgrades in Mining Merchant. Please note that everything shown and mentioned in this post is a work in progress.

👉Before we get into it, don't forget to add the game to your Steam wishlist to be notified when it launches! Helps me out too!
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[h3]Mechs & Companions[/h3]
[p]In Mining Merchant, you unlock mechs and companions. Every mech and companion has a set of unique stats and a unique ability, which gives each mech its own advantages. You can mix and match mechs and companions to create combos that best fit your playstyle or objective![/p]
[p]For example, the G0-l3m mech has an ability where it stomps on the ground, collecting all nearby resources. And there's the 3y3 companion, which has a 10% chance to perform its resource doubling ability while you're mining.[/p]
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[h3]Progression[/h3]
[p]From the start I wanted to think of a new approach to mech progression for Mining Merchant compared to my previous games. You see, in Mining Mechs and Super Mining Mechs progression was quite linear, with each mech / part you unlock having higher stats than the previous one.[/p]
[p]Now, while this gives you a nice sense of progression and feels rewarding, this essentially creates a situation where once you unlock the 'best' mech or parts, there's no reason to ever go back to old parts. And so for the entire end-game you're stuck with the same mechs.[/p]
[p]For Mining Merchant, I wanted to figure out a way to make each mech useful at any point throughout the game. The 'best' mech is no longer the one with the highest stats, but rather the one that's most efficient in your current environment, and fits your current objective.[/p]
[p]Therefore I've separated the mech / companion progression from the character progression. Let's dive into that.[/p]
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[h3]Mechs & Companions[/h3]
[p]Throughout the game, you'll unlock new mechs to purchase. Each mech has a unique set of base stats and a unique active ability. Mech upgrades are primarily focused on improving the active ability, but also slightly improve the base stats.[/p]
[p]Similar to mechs, there's also a number of companions to unlock and purchase. Your companion autonomously follows you, providing you with buffs and they can be upgraded as well.[/p]
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[h3]Character[/h3]
[p]The main stat increases come from your character's stats. Characters earn exp with each tile and resource they mine. The rarer the resource, the more exp. Each level, your character gets a skill point which you can assign to a stat. These bonuses are applied on top of the base stats of any mech you enter![/p]
[p]This way you can choose your mech based on the base stats and abilities that are suitable for your current playstyle, objective or environment, without having to worry about losing progression.[/p]
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[h3]Co-op[/h3]
[p]If you play Mining Merchant in co-op, you'll be running your shop together with your friends. The money you earn is a shared resource, which means that players don't have an individual bank account. Because of this, all purchases are also shared with everyone in the game. If a new mech is purchased, or a companion is upgraded, all players in the game will unlock this.[/p]
[p]Character exp and levels are the opposite, as these are entirely separate to individual players. Your character progress transfers with you to any local or co-op game you join, so you can level up your character with friends and continue progressing in your singleplayer game.[/p]
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[h3]Please wishlist![/h3]
[p]Alright, that's it for this week, I hope you enjoyed this little devlog. Make sure you don’t miss anything by adding the game to your Steam wishlist and following the Mining Merchant Community Hub. Got questions or thoughts? Drop them in the comments below or ping me on Discord![/p]
Wishlist Mining Merchant Follow the Franchise Page Join the Discord

Hey everyone!

In the coming time leading up to release I'll be posting a series of devblogs to spotlight certain elements of my upcoming game Mining Merchant.

I figured for the first post, I’d start with the basics of the game and go over the core gameplay loop. From here on, I’ll cover each element in a dedicated devblog. So with this one, I aim to give you a bit of an overview of the game and what’s to come.

👉Before we get into it, please add the game to your Steam wishlist to be notified when it launches!
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[h3]The basics[/h3]
In Mining Merchant, your uncle’s once-thriving jewelry shop is crumbling, and it’s your job to bring it back to life. The core gameplay loop is like this:
Mining → Crafting → Shopkeeping → Upgrading → Repeat!
All while the story progresses alongside every stage. Let’s go over each part in more detail.

[h3]Mining[/h3]
The day starts when you wake up and hop in your truck to head to a mining location of your choice. Once there, you select your mech and companion bot, and get to mining!

Each mech and companion bot has their own ability.

• Mechs have active abilities like Rock Breaker (which breaks any rock on screen) or Resource Magnet (which instantly collects all resources on screen).
  
• Companion bots have passive abilities like Magnify (10% chance to double collected resources) or Dirtbag (10% chance that collected dirt is destroyed instead of stored).

New in Mining Merchant is a leveling system! You now gain exp as you mine resources, earning skill points with each level-up. These points can be used to improve your mining stats, which apply to any mech you use. So every mech has its own pros and cons throughout the whole game.

[h3]Crafting[/h3]
After extracting resources from underground, you’re ready to craft them into valuable jewelry to sell in your store. The crafting process consists of several stages:

• Smelting: turn raw metals into ingots
  
• Smithing: shape ingots into basic jewelry like rings and bracelets
  
• Gem Setting: add valuable gems to your jewelry pieces
  
• Packaging: polish and package your pieces to increase their value!

[h3]Shopkeeping[/h3]
Once you've mined your resources and crafted them into valuable jewerly, it's time to return to your shop and make some money. Select which jewerly pieces you want to stock up and put on display, clean up, add some decorations and open up shop!

Customers will walk in to see if you've got something on display that they like. This can get hectic! Make sure your displays are stocked, help customers check out before they get impatient, and clean up trash to keep customers happy. Some customers will request custom orders from you and will return the next day to pick it up.

[h3]Upgrades[/h3]
Once we've earned some exp and made some money, it's time to upgrade! There are 4 main upgrade categories:

• The shop: upgrade the shop by adding additional displays, storage racks, trash cans and decorations, or expand your floor space by adding entirely new floors.
  
• The truck: upgrade the crafting stations inside your truck to craft higher quality goods, and improve your truck's drill, dirt capacity and consumables to improve your mining efficiency.
  
• Mechs & Compation Bots: purchase and upgrade mechs and companion bots and acquire perks to improve their stats and abilities.
  
• Your character: your character levels up as you mine, earning you skill points used to improve your mining stats. These stats apply to any mech you enter!

[h3]Story[/h3]
The story of Mining Merchant starts when you get called in to help your uncle in the big city. Your uncle’s once-thriving jewelry shop is crumbling, and he needs your help to bring it back to life.

But as you explore the underground and expand your shop, you quickly realize there's more than meets the eye. Mysterious earthquakes happen every night at midnight, collapsing the tunnels you dug the other day, thus keeping you from reaching new depths. But what's causing this, and why?

[h3]Please wishlist![/h3]
In the coming months, I’ll be writing dedicated devblogs for each of the topics above. Make sure you don’t miss anything by adding the game to your Steam wishlist and following the Mining Merchant Community Hub. Got questions or thoughts? Drop them in the comments below or ping me on Discord!
Wishlist Mining Merchant Follow the Franchise Page Join the Discord