We were invited by Atari to port SAMA to their new console, the Atari VCS.

The VCS runs a Linux OS, so since we already supported Linux all we had to do was a few small adjustments and enable support for the Atari controller.

If you own one of the new Atari units then SAMA should appear in the Store front on the machine and be available for you to buy directly from them.

You can read about SAMA and more about the VCS over on their site

https://atarivcs.medium.com/something-ate-my-alien-invites-you-to-flex-all-of-your-gaming-skills-9e307fbc1793

We hope you are all enjoying our game and hope that bringing it to a console like the Atari VCS will be a great addition to our supported platforms.

DEMO

Looking for something fun to play to take your mind of things? We’re very excited to give you a free demo of our 2D digging and puzzle platformer game “Something Ate My Alien” to try out right now!

Whether you are on Windows, Linux or Mac we got you covered, so if you like a chill game with some action, some puzzles and lots of exploring then give it a try today.

We’ve uploaded the demo to various sites, and you can get it from GameJolt today, with the link below.

Download & Play

We’ve modified the menu screen in the demo so you got easy link access to the Steam store and our Discord server. We’d really appreciate a Wish List add on Steam if you enjoy this demo and would like to play the full game when it is released.

In the demo, you will get to explore a small area of Metis, the first of four planets, and solve 3 of the many puzzle rooms that the full game will contain.

After completing the 3 puzzles you are rewarded with the next level automatic weapon called the ‘Netgun’, so you can go on a blasting spree and hunt more enemies while exploring the rest of the area.

Discord Server

If you fancy chatting with us or talking about the game, then you can also join us on our Discord server with the following link.
https://discord.gg/JuCYqYe

To entice you even further to try out our game, have a look at our latest trailer of the full game below to see what the full version will offer once out in June.

Steam Wish List

We hope you enjoy the demo and find it fun, and we hope it will get you keen on playing the full version of SAMA when it hits the stores in June.

To keep up to date with the full release add it to your Steam wish list today.

General

Well the good news is we’re very near the end of our development. We’ve implemented everything we wanted to, and the game is quite stable. There has been lots of help from our testers and we believe we have a good and solid game.

But the bad news is, we are going to have to delay a bit more. We would have liked to release towards the end of April, but we’ve had a few issues, above the obvious one. Some of the finishing touches took longer than we expected, and also our Steam Wish List numbers aren’t quite as good as we had hoped for, as we haven’t spent as much time on marketing.

With that being said, we’ve re-planned it all, and we are now going to aim for June 2020.

During the time between now and then, we will be concentrating on more polish and bug hunting.

Demo

We are also going to soon release a free ‘demo’ of the game. This will allow anyone to download and play a ‘restricted’ version of the game. The game will be limited to the first 3 puzzles and about 1/4 of the area on the first planet ‘Metis’. Other than that, it will play like the full game, to give you a taster.

Updates & Changes

We entered ‘Beta’ testing a few weeks ago with our testers, and the main difference is that now we will not be adding any major features or changes. Along with bug fixing we will also be balancing play, enemies and other small changes. So far, it’s proving to be stable and have little problems.

Speech

The AI and Pirate now ‘talk’ to you! We thought just the text messages were a bit lifeless, so we gave them voices. Just electronically generated gibberish, but it lifts the experience and makes it feel more personal. This is optional in the settings menu.

World Map

Previously, you automatically teleported down to the last place you were at on a planet. Now, before teleporting, you are presented with a map of the area you have seen so far, teleporters you’ve previously used, and you can select where you teleport to. This makes it easier to move around the planets and find the goodies you’re looking for. It’s basically an expanded version of the Mini Map.

Relics

There are now 4 different relics to find, dotted around the planets. Each having a unique little message to read. Some are not so easy to access as they are sealed behind blocks. A new Achievement is available for collecting all 4.

Controller Support

This was on the list for so long, and we kept putting it off. You can now use a controller to play the game. Fully configurable from the setting screen. There are a few unique features when the controller is plugged in, to help with movement and make it easier to control.

Platforms

We’re currently building Beta version on Windows, Linux and MacOS, so no matter what system you are on we have a version for you! Luckily with Unity it’s very easy to build for different platforms, and we are now using Unity Collaborate and Cloud build which makes it even easier.

Beta Testing

We should be getting the Demo version out soon, but if you just have to try the game, why not sign up to our Beta Testing program and help us find bugs and problems? All you need is a Steam account and click the link below to join in.
http://www.somethingatemyalien.com/forums/Thread-Sign-up-for-Beta-Testing

Steam Wish List

We’re also still busy trying to grow our community and Steam Wishlist. Click the link below to go and add our game to your Wishlist or see some more screen shots and our trailer video.

Alpha Changes

We’ve been busy the last month implementing changes suggested from our Alpha testers.

Inventory

Changes have mostly been around inventory and the pirate list. We realized that the way the pirate ransom list worked was a bit hard to follow and generally was looked at as being a ‘grind’ rather than fun. So we have changed it so that there are no groups and it’s just individual items that are now on the list. This meant we could remove the ransom list screen (no one really went to that screen), and everything is now on the inventory screen. The pirate automatically takes any ransom the player owes him as they teleport back up to the ship.

Upgrades

We’ve also changed how upgrades are acquired. Previously each item had a sell value, and were sold to accrue ‘Units’. Upgrades were obtained with Units. Again, this didn’t seem rewarding, and people just click-click-clicked to sell everything all the time. So, we’ve changed it to be a more ‘crafting’ like process. Items aren’t sold any more, instead they are now used to build upgrades. Each upgrade now has a requirement of items (For example, one of the laser upgrades requires: 5 Grittium, 2 Gumom & 1 Hingle Bingle) that the player needs to find before they can build them. Units have been removed, and now each item has an ‘Energy’ cost along with the item requirements. Energy is found in the worlds in the puzzle chests, and also randomly dropped when enemies are killed.

Tutorial

After watching some of the Alpha players uploaded playthrough videos, we saw that they were not understanding some parts of the game or mechanics. We had little message popups to explain things, but they were either just ignored or closed quickly. So we have introduced a ‘Tutorial’ section (Can be skipped) at the beginning of the game. When a new game is started, the computer AI will talk through the mechanics of the game. The player now gets the chance to actually do the things, in a controlled setting. This way they can directly learn about how to play, what keys do what and how to use items etc. There are 3 main sections to the tutorial, where the player is guided through an easy section at the beginning of the first level.

Metis layout

We have also made the game a little bit more ‘linear’. We have noticed from watching the play throughs, and also comments back to us, that people were feeling ‘lost’. They didn’t really have any direction in where to go, especially at the beginning in Metis. So for Metis, we have made it more linear and it follows a more defined ‘path’. It’s not fully linear, and the player can still mine in any direction and move about freely. It now guides them through the level with more with walls (blocks that can’t be mined) etc. This should help the player in the beginning and not overwhelm them with such wide open areas. The other levels have not changed too much in this regard. Tartarus and Lelantos were previously more guided than Metis anyway, and Aura is still a lot more ‘open’.
Hopefully this will start the player off on a more direct path and help them understand the game better.

Minimap

The minimap has had a bit of an upgrade. Along with other Upgrades you can build, there is now an ‘Item’ scanner. This upgrade allows the minimap to show up to 3 different items, so they can be found easier. It only shows them in areas that have already been seen, but it should help in finding specific items needed for other upgrades. A new button to stop the map following the player helps with navigation. Regarding upgrades, there is also a new scanner for graves, another suit protection for cold, and an extra level for the Lock Jaw device.

Going Forward

So, that was a lot of work in the last month!

We still have lots to do. We want to enhance the enemies AI, enhance and polish the boss scenes and add Steam Achievements. Some other things we are looking at are full controller support, Linux & Mac support and the possibility of localization in other languages.

We had touted that our release date would be Autumn 2019. That would be possible, but we would have to drop quite a few things to get that done. Also, we have been working close to 100 hrs a week for far too long and that has taken a toll on our productivity and life. So we have made the decision to delay the release a bit. Ideally we would probably only need to extend by 2-3 months, but that puts us near Christmas and the winter sales. Generally this seems to be the time when small Indie developers should avoid releasing their games. So, we have to push it out to early 2020.

We feel this is the most ideal solution for making our game the best it can be for our players. We would like the final part of the game to be finished how we want it to be rather than rushing to complete it and it not being the game we hoped for.

Wishlist

We’re also still busy trying to grow our community and Steam Wishlist. Click the link below to go and add our game to your Wishlist or see some more screen shots and our trailer video.

Hopefully all the above will mean we will release a fun and complete game, and we still have fun finishing it

Rob & Kat.

Alpha Testing

It’s been a busy time with our Alpha testers these last few weeks. Lots of feedback and ideas coming in. We’ve just come out with a new update for the Alpha version. This version is including lots of bug fixes and changes from the testers.

One of the larger items in the recent Alpha release is the sound. We hand picked and replaced all sound effects and added many more, and ended up with over 120 new sound effects added, along with 8 tracks for the background music. We decided to pick most sounds from Pond5, as they had the largest and best database of sounds we found.

In Lelantos and Aura we have introduced a new mechanic. ‘Portals’ are devices that transfer the Alien instantly to another location on the planet. On Lelantos the Alien needs to use them to find different areas that can’t reached by mining. On Aura, they are used for portaling into the Puzzle rooms. Once a portal is found, it will be displayed on the mini-map, and each will have a unique number so you can keep track of where they go.

We’ve been playing through the full game now, to try to find how long the game plays for. For us, it takes about 10+ hours to complete, but looking at the Alpha testing data, people are playing it for between 10 -> 20 hours. So it’s looking like it’s easily going to play for 10+ hours.

We are still looking for testers to help us, so if you fancy helping out, follow this link to see what to do: Alpha Signup

Steam

Our Steam / Wish List is doing well, and we are starting to get a nice following on there. We changed our release text to specify ‘Autumn 2019’ as we are now more confident we can achieve this time. The Steam Summer Sale is starting soon, so we are hoping that will bring some extra traffic and adds.

Not seen our Steam page yet? It’s got all the info about SAMA including screenshots and our feature trailer video. Click the link below and check it out. Even give us an add to your Wish List if SAMA looks like it’s for you!

Social Media

Back in May we did our first interview. Indie Ranger asked us if we wanted to do an interview, and we thought that would be a good idea to get out some info about us and the game. It was a bit nerve wracking, since this was our first interview, but it all went well and they did a nice write up about us. If you haven’t yet, go have a read about us.

Click here for the Rob & Kat Interview

We also got our first YouTube streamer, Fred! He is an Alpha tester and has done a few videos about the game and his views on it. With his comical commentary during the game play, it’s a nice start to our You Tube presence. You can find him here: Fred Impossible

Next things

The next phase of Alpha will be introducing some more ideas from the testers. These include modifications to the ‘Somethings’, new upgrades and some changes to the Aura world. Keep tuned to see them soon.
We will continue to interact with our Alpha testers and get as much feed back from them as we can.

Bonus: We also did a quick little ‘fun’ video of some behind-the-scenes development, and how the game looks in the Unity editor with a ‘3D’ look:

Steam

We’ve had a busy few months, but we are now officially on Steam!

Obviously an important place for us to market our game is Steam. Although we are still developing away, it is important for us to get a presence on Steam and start building up a community. A major part of that is getting people signed up to our “Wish List”, so that they can see updates and get notified when the game is ready.

So, if you like the look of our game, click below and add us to your wish list and take a look at our Steam page.

Enhancements

We’ve been adding lots of new effects, sounds and challenges to all the planets. The game is now 100% playable from start to end, but we still have some things to finish off, polish and refine.

We added lots more particle effects and lighting to make the battles stand out, and some other interesting effects including snow storms, earthquakes and a new device on Lelantos that portals the Aliens around.

There are now lots more upgrades that you can give your Aliens to help them out while down on the planets solving puzzles and fighting with the locals. Including a new weapon, the ‘Bomb Launcher’ that allows the Aliens to fire bombs into tight areas to clear out a horde of enemies.

We worked on some colour-blindness settings to help players to be able to identify where the blocks in the puzzles fit into by having symbols representing the colors. This is an option you can turn on in the settings. Also the ability to ‘zoom’ the view in, so you can get a closer look at things.

In conjunction with starting up on Steam, we have also released a new video trailer showing off the current state and game play. This showed off all the aspect of the game, Puzzle Solving, Digging, Collecting and Fighting! We also updated our main logo and you can see that in the thumbnail of the video below.

Alpha Testing

We’ve also started public Alpha testing. So if you fancy trying out our game and give us some feedback on what you think, click the link below to go to the forum post about how you can apply to do some testing.

http://www.somethingatemyalien.com/forums/Thread-Sign-up-for-Alpha-Testing

Last month we joined forces with a company called IndieBros, and they will be helping us with Social Media, Steam and general marketing activities. We felt we needed help in this area to make sure our game is a success when we launch.

Over the next few months we will be keeping in contact with our Alpha testers and once we are happy that nothing major is going to change we will move to Beta testing and then onto a launch.

So still some work to do but the finish line is in sight

.

We’ve been a bit quiet on the social media front for the last few months. Mainly because we’ve been working on bug fixing and internal stuff that didn’t make for great screenshots, so we are going to start posting regularly again now.

The game is in a good shape, and we have recently started a ‘Private’ Alpha stage, where we have given out the game to a select few friends to get some initial feedback from. This went really well and we got some great ideas and things back from them that has helped us tweak and change some aspects of the game.

Hopefully soon we will be moving to a more public Alpha testing stage.

The Alpha testing will be based on the first planet only. The other 3 planets are well on their way to completion, but are not quite ready to be played yet.

We have the ‘ending’ to get into as well.

After we have been in Alpha for some time, and we have the other planets finished, then we will be moving to a Beta stage, which is really exciting. However we want all mechanics and the story-line complete before we get to this stage of testing though.

We’re going to start off with posting a series of images that try to explain what the game is about, like the one above.

We’ve also added an Instagram account now, so if you are on that platform, give us a follow! (RokabiumGames)

Something Ate My Alien

Find the ransom demanded by the pirate.

Tartarus fires