Mushrooms

New level theme is on the way. As I promised in the newsletter there are two new downloadable levels coming up soon. One in december and one in january. They are not ready yet but at least I can show some screenshots of what one of them will look like. There will be alot of mushrooms as you can see. Working hard to make it all fun and enjoyable :)

Red shrooms
The terrain

Yesterday I released a new version of Mulver (1.06). This version introduces a completely new concept: Downloadable content

Yes, from within the game you can download extra levels from Spelagon web site and play them immediately. No need to install anything, just update and go. Right now there are two levels available using this method but there will be more in the coming months of course.
Right now the interface for downloading is a bit awkward but I will probably polish this during december.
About the levels. Beetles is actually one of the first levels I made but it didnt make it into the game until now. Its huge and you have to collect six different keys before you can reach the exit. Fortress is probaly the most difficult level ever in Mulver. There is really no safe place, just vanishing or turning blocks everywhere. Id say its even more difficult than the Trials level.

Fortress:

One month later, and new plans...

On August 11th I released Mulver and I thought Id share what has happened since then. First of all I have sold a few copies which is great. I wasnt sure anyone would like it that much, it is my first game after all. There have been about 400 full downloads of the Demo from my site and quite a few from others as well (gamershell, filefront etc). Its not possible to leave message on my website (except by posting comments in this blog) so it is kind of hard to know what people are thinking about the game. There has been at least one review which was very negative. On the other hand I got some good feedback and positive comments from a customer in the gamedev.net community. I have also made a couple of new contacts with people in the business which might be useful later on. So its been both good and bad I guess.

I still have a long way to go with the marketing. Releasing new content, contacting reviewers maybe even portals, start affiliating and so on. I have also started planning a new project. Right now it is in the prototyping stage so Im not sure that it will lead to anything. One thing I learned from Mulver is that an exploration heavy game such as Mulver requires too much content when designing levels so the new project will have to do with a much smaller set of models etc, and have a more simple level design. But the game mechanic will be intresting and unique so I think it will all be for the better. And yes this time I will have a real artist do the graphics :)

Mulver released!

Yes, its avaialable for download and/or purchase on the Mulver website. Feels good to be done with this :) I still have to worry about marketing, bug fixes and all that stuff of course but at least the first version is out there.

The Demo has no time limit and 4 levels (and a nag screen).
The Full version has 15 levels and is available for $9.99

Here is the official game trailer btw:

Race level

First half of the month was kind of slow but it has been picking up some lately. I have added a help screen, a background story, rewrote the scoring algorithm, polished the score results presentation in the end of a level and fixed a couple of issues.

Have also made a new level which is the first of its kind both visually and gameplay wise. Its sort of a race level really. You have to hurry because the water level is rising slowly.

Need some more levels and possibly one more enemy type before test phase begins.

See ya!

Progress

Well, long time since last post. There has been at least some progress with Mulver:

• New level concepts with puzzle elements
• corrected a few bugs
• Been working on options screen sort of
• Switched sound system from FMOD to BASS

I have also been thinking about the community aspect. Would be great if people could mod Mulver, make their own levels, upload them and let others play them. Im a little weary of hosting the levels as Lua scripts though because of security issues. What if someone uploads a malicious level that erases the unsuspecting users harddrives or something like that? You could of course try to sandbox the Lua scripts but that will take some development time and will probably be easy to hack around some way. Then I was thinking about having a verification process where you only publish "safe" levels, but that will take alot of admin time instead, arghhh...

On a related note, my three month vacation is coming closer every day now. This means that hopefully I will get a full version of Mulver out this summer !!

Mechanical tropics

Here is a brand new Blender render of a strange level Im working on. It was supposed to be a puzzle level with a mechanical/factory theme, but turns out to be a mix of that and tropical islands inside a huge cave !??

Not sure if I will keep this one, little to weird maybe :)

New animations

After some constructive feedback from the indiegamer.com forums I decided to add animations and create a few for the main character. This video shows most of them as well as new sound and particle effects. Hopefully these changes will make the game more enjoyable.

Mulver v0.82 released

There is a lot of new content in this release so be sure to download from http://www.spelagon.com/mulver/download.html

Changelog

• Three new levels: Easy, Bridges and Fire
• Rewrote life system, you cant lose anymore
• Profile system
• Added a few extra background tracks
• Solved a problem with jumps that would sometimes be too small
• Added a Credits screen
• Increased the font size to make text more readable
• Replaced the text "n/a" with "Score:" in level menu
• More prominent particle effect when grabbing a coin or gem
• Created a base beneath thorns
• Removed shadows from blinking arrows
• Added goal flags above exits
• Increased timer limit on purple gem hidden bonus level
• Mouse look around implemented, will revert back when moving
• Repositioned particle effects on main menu
• Added WASD keys as move controls
• Repositioned unlock message on Classic level
• and much more...

New Mulver release imminent

The next release of Mulver is coming along nicely. Probably sometimes next week. It will actually have three new levels instead of two that I mentioned in a previous post. Intresting how you come up with new ideas continually that you want to test and suddenly you have a new level ready!

Mulver status

Im working on another release of Mulver demo. It will have two new levels, a few extra background tracks. Several bugs have been solved in this version also. Check the changelog for more details once its released.

Here are two new screenshots: