Pixel Noir News

...we entered the "Final Chapter!" Guess what? We are extremely excited to let you all know that the main story has been completely implemented and semi-polished! AND we've already blasted through most of the side-quest implementation work!

::awkward dance party::


This next piece of the puzzle is already 91% finished as we've been working on them since late July. This was the next step after finishing all the main story content. To be this far along is fantastic and could spell out the end of all dev / polish on the game before the end of the year!! We're so close to being finished!! Have a look at our roadmap numbers...



Whats Next?
After implementing side-quests, we will spend the next few months moving through a deep polish phase to ensure the game is bug-free, balanced, and includes the icing on the cake stuff like CRDTech battles, random enemy encounters, dialog edits, treasure drops, more environment interactions, etc.

Little do they know, this "kid" is an expert with knives :O

Breathe, Woof, breeeeathe!

"Never bring a gun to a card battle" - old proverb


We are 89% finished with all remaining audio for the game! However, because we had Kunal helping out with story implementation, this has been on the back-burner for some time. Now with the main story complete, audio will be finished rather soon!

Here's a sample of the recently-created "Parade" BGM that will be used later in the game. For this one, Kunal pulled heavily from his high school marching band roots!

https://soundcloud.com/pixeltonemusic/parade-sample



The next update will be on November 11th! And as always, follow our official Roadmap / Twitter bot, and don't forget to check out Leo's Pixel Noir dev stream on Monday & Friday nights for more granular progress-watching, a little bit of fun and some good music!

//Team SWDTech

[h2]The End is Nigh!!![/h2]
The team has recently finished up Chapter Six and have now moved on to......



::insert gratuitous lens flare::


Like past updates of 100% implementation, completing work on a chapter is the result of a ton of work on nights and weekends which has pushed us to being 84% complete on the development overall! Here's a chart with more details:




[h2]What's Next?[/h2]
Once the final chapter (Chapter 7) is finished, the team will then be moving on to implementing the remaining side quests, enemy encounters, and treasures--among other shady happenings around the city...making this one of the last remaining milestones before Pixel Noir can be totally housecleaned for bugs and polished for maximum enjoyment! After that, porting, localization and launching will all take place. So stay tuned in the coming months and we'll keep you in the know as we cruise towards launch! In the meantime here are some sneak peeks from the past few months of work...



V-Money = Absolute BOSS




Chill out, Woof ::hands Woof a Snickers::




Nice Doggy!


[h2]Backer NPC's![/h2]
Also, we're thrilled to announce that creation tier backer NPC's are now in the game! A boss sprite-sized thank you to everyone that worked with us on the original concept for these. We are excited to let you all loose to go find them!



We even put in the backer originally inspired environments and the NPCs that go with them in these areas of the game:



Tobias totally gives off the "comic book guy" vibes...


[h2]New Tunes![/h2]
Finally, since today's a pretty rad milestone update, here's a sample of the "Junkyard" battle theme. BIG guitar riffs all around \m/

LINK: https://soundcloud.com/pixeltonemusic/junkyard-battle-sample


[h2]In Conclusion...[/h2]
Our next update will drop on Aug 25th. As always, follow our official Roadmap / Twitter bot, and also Leo's Pixel Noir dev stream on Monday & Friday nights for more granular progress-watching, a little bit of fun and some good music!

Much love and thanks as for the support as always, everyone!

//Team SWDTech

Hi everyone! In the midst of the global pandemic, we continue to make great progress on Pixel Noir. We have some great dev news this month, so let's not waste any time and jump right into it!

::coding intesifies::

As we've said in previous updates, one of the biggest challenges over the past few years of development has been the slow and steady implementation of Pixel Noir's expansive environments. Every layer of detail needed to be hand placed while every nook had to be meticulously crafted to keep our Detective from falling off the world. Here are the new areas we put in for the rest of the game (not included in our Early Access). We know these area maps are a tad small but they should give you a sense of what was involved here with all exteriors, interiors and alleyways included in these images.

In Chapter 4 you can check out the modern day version of the Historical District (The game starts started out here but in the past in Chapter 1).

You'll start Chapter 5 by casing the Boardwalk for clues between playing at the arcade and climbing the lighthouse.

The Fish Market is where Pinnacle's citizens buy fish goods. Despite the smell you'll also find the local union hiding a very large secret (see lab).

Downtown is the heart of the city! You'll be able to walk with the coffee drinkers and random hipsters in Chapter 6.

The Sprawls is a ghetto full of cons and ex-cons alike. You'll pass through here in Chapter 6.

Uptown is the most posh and well financed area of Pinnacle city. Lots of rich folks, business types and upscale apartments to deal with in Chapter 7.


Since we've closed up environments, the team has shifted its full focus toward the remaining story implementation. We are planning on finishing up Chapter 6 in mid May then moving onto Chapter 7 (the last chapter of the game!!) and then of course the side quests (we have a ton of side quests, It's about another chapter's worth).




Len has been working like a dog to put interactions and NPCs into the game. Since mid January. He said "We're slowly populating Pinnacle City with it's odd-ball citizens." and that it's looking like we should be finished with those by mid-May as well!

This guy...

In one of our previous Kickstarter updates, we described working on a new Asynchronous Turn-Based Battle System. Well, good news! After much tweaking the updated battle system is working really well and we'll continue to be working this into the final game. Our programmer Leo has been streaming his development of this new battle system as well as other coding sessions of Pixel Noir on his Twitch channel https://www.twitch.tv/leolicos

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Our battle overhaul was created to make everything feel much faster, more tactical and more engaging. Your feedback helped us get to update this key portion of the gameplay experience through the Early Access build's "Feedback" button in the settings menu amongst other DMs and suggestions we've received since last June. We feel we've added some much needed game design polish to our street brawls!

Finally, for our audio sneak peek part of the update, check out a boss track for one of our hidden bosses!

https://soundcloud.com/pixeltonemusic/slime-boss-sample



As always you can keep up with development by checking out our roadmap, following our Twitter devbot, or tuning in for Leo's development streams! next update is on June, 15.

Until then, stay safe out there!

//Team SWDTECH

As of tonight we will have just put out Patch v.200, where we've continued to crush several bugs and added several needed features:

What's New

• Added interior environments to Southside (Residence, Corner Spot and Crawlspace).
  
• Fixed FPS issues resulting in lag in various places mostly when running
  
• Names in lists that go outside the bounds of UI now wrap
  
• Windowed / Fullscreen toggle now available in game Options Menu!
  
• New revised character portraits added! / Adjustments made to UI to accommodate
  
• Bug fix: Rain doesn't go away early when teleporting / added rain effect to alleyway (Ch1)
  
• Bug fix: NPC: Bar Regular's disappearing stool upon interacting (Ch1)
  
• Bug fix: Able to solve Ballad Of Two-Strings case again after save/loading after already solving case (Ch3-4)
  
• Bug fix: Cutscene videos play at full volume despite set audio setting options
  

Known Issues:

• There can be a slight delay when starting the game application.
  
• Under certain circumstances, the Detective's adrenaline gauge won't fill completely in prep for Combo tutorial (Ch3).
  
• After getting the clean trench-coat from the laundry place in Southside if you save/load the item glint returns but you can't get another trench-coat (Ch3-4).
  
• UI_Fullscreen in Options menu in Spanish
  

Sorry for the wait! Here's what we fixed up in patch v.197.

What's New

- Loading times severely cut down!!
- Added MANY new NPCs!!!
- Controller type indication icons added to title screen and main menu.
- Updated Spanish localization!
- Polished various aspects of the UI.
- All UI aspects now sourcing from localization.
- Added Icons to map / mini-map (helping with finding save points / various shops / places to rest...etc.).
- Fixed not being able to see skill slots when in "Plan" mode from Main menu / Skills (Spanish Only).
- Gas N Go Interior in Industrial District is now a shop.
- Added Old Garage interior to Southside.
- Fixed repeating events after save/loading (Ch1).

Known Issues

- Various FPS issues resulting in lag in various places mostly when running.
- There can be a slight delay when starting the game application.
- Cutscene videos play at full volume despite set audio setting options.
- Stool disappearing under Bar Regular when interacting in Memory Bar (Ch1).
- Detective may not be shown on couch asleep before dream sequence (Start of Ch3).
- Sometimes the Detective's adrenaline gauge won't fill completely in prep for Combo tutorial (Ch3).
- Able to solve Ballad Of Two-Strings case again after save/loading after already solving case (Ch3-4).
- After getting the clean trenchcoat from the laundry place in Southside if you save/load the item glint returns but you can't get another trenchcoat (Ch3-4).
- Soft lock may occur at random battle by Stretch's in Southside. (Ch3-4)

Thanks to everybody who gave us bugs to squash!

-Team SWDTech