The official sequel to the classic NES Adventure game Shadowgate! Nearly FIVE times bigger than the original, the game includes more rooms, monsters, puzzles, deaths and game endings! It also features a hint system, day/night cycles, achievements, fast travel and 3 side quests based on Deja Vu, Uninvited and Shadowgate VR: The Mines of Mythrok!
Hey everyone, let's look at some of Jeff Canam's...
We've got a good number of awesome monsters in the game. Here are a handful of them!
That's it for now! Onward!
Dave
Hey everyone! Thank you so much for getting the word out and helping us reach Stretch Goal #4 - More Chip Tunes! Orie is gonna be pumped! Now it's on to our 5th Stretch Goal - The BSG Prequel comic and TWO additional comics - the NES walkthrough and Shadowgate Rising! You can read more about them HERE!
In this update, I've asked Jeff Canam from GrahfMetal to talk about his influences, how he approaches pixel art, etc. I have to say he's quite amazing!...
I got into pixel art when I was invited to be a part of a weekend game jam back in 2014 and a team needed an artist, but I only had a laptop with MSPaint (mind blown - Dave) and a mouse, so I tried out pixel art and I fell in love with it. It quickly became apparent that using MSPaint and a mouse made me somewhat of an oddity in the pixel art world, but I rather enjoyed the limitations, so I stuck with it throughout the development of Infested, Spectacle and even most of Beyond Shadowgate. MSPaint’s simplicity and using a mouse to draw methodically, allowed me to form a signature style, which some have called “charmingly crude”, which I rather like.
Part of the reason I love pixel art, especially 8-bit, is because artists were required to create images with several limitations, be they color, size, shape, etc. and to create works of art with said limitations is admirable. I’ve studies how art was made back in the days of C64, NES, Master System, etc. and it just blows my mind. I also love the fact that pixel art, although simple in nature, is complex in execution. When you can change the entire emotional expression of a character sprite with the shifting or removal of just ONE pixel, or when you can add great depth to a monochrome image with simple dithering, than that is something special.
As far as art pertaining to Shadowgate-style games is concerned, I find the best way to approach it is to find a way to update the graphics while maintaining the charm of the original. If I copy the original’s style it’ll feel too sentimental and if I add too much detail it’ll feel too distant. In other words, I’m wearing my rose-tinted glasses, but I also have the privilege to use tools that make things much easier than they were back then…I believe they call that “Retro art” :D
Speaking of limitations, specifically when it comes to Shadowgate, a reason limiting myself works exceptionally well, with this style game, is that less detail is favorable. Interactive elements should stand out and if I were to add too much detail and realism, then the player would be overwhelmed and may very well miss the detail meant to be interacted with. Keeping it simple allows me to direct the player’s eye to the parts of the environment I want them to pay attention to.
I’ve made prototype rooms in my previous games that wound up looking like object-finder games and I’ve had to scrap them because that defeats the purpose of these kinds of games. In fact, I’ve learned a lot about how these games work by not only playing them A LOT, but also by gaining intimate knowledge and respect for the sub-genre by making a couple from scratch.
Shadowgate-style games, and a lot of adventure games in general, are also unique in that they don’t rely on tile sets and standard sprite sizes, like found in typical platformers or RPGs, but rather they rely on an interactive user interface and a view window which displays a screen that is kind of like a tiny little painting. I like to make each and every room relatively unique, so the player can get their bearing much easier and to keep things fresh. Areas of the game obviously maintain similar architecture and color schemes, but I like to mix up the angles and perspectives. This is also done so it doesn’t feel like our protagonist is walking through the halls like a sentry. Different angles and perspectives make it feel more like we’re sneaking through the environments with caution. The biggest challenge, I find, is making the flow of the rooms feel intuitive. Having the rooms feel like they’re connected organically is shockingly challenging when you’re not drawing rooms that share an identical perspective. But challenge aside, it does make things very fun to draw. This project has been an absolute blast to work on.
That's it for now! I'll feature some of Jeff's monsters next!
Dave
p.s. Did Jeff mention that he uses MSPaint? MSPAINT! Amazing.
Hey everyone!
As we zero in on Stretch Goal #4, we thought we would announce our next Stretch Goal at $100k! We're pretty excited about this one as it combines three different things! Read on for the deets!
This digital comic features our Fenling Del Thornburrow! This brand new comic will be a prequel to the Beyond Shadowgate game and will show how our hero went from the relative safety of the Fens to a dungeon cell beneath castle Gwynenthell! The comic will be illustrated by our favorite Shadowgate artist John Watkins Chow!
Not only will you get an all new comic but we will include John's Shadowgate NES Walkthrough Comic in all it's high-def glory! We created this when we put out the Color Gameboy version. Check out the cover and one of the pages below!
Not one comic... not two comics... but THREE digital comics based on the Shadowgate universe! This comic was created for the canceled Shadowgate Rising game for the N64. John outdid himself on this baby and while we've shown it before, we've never released it in such a high resolution! Here's the cover and a page featuring the red-haired sorceress Raven!
There you go! We hope to get to $100k so we can begin work on this. Thanks for your continued support!
Dave
Here's some more info from our friends at GrahfMetal about bringing this game to life from the original design!
I’ve previously written about how authentic Beyond Shadowgate is and how we’re capturing the 8-bit vibe as best we can. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t room to innovate and introduce some fun new ideas to the formula!
When introducing new ideas to the game, we thought of the types of concepts and mechanics that would have still made sense in the era of the original game. Things that could have reasonably shown up in the sequel had it been released on the 8-bit console. The kinds of fun additions that don’t change the whole game, but provide new challenges, conveniences or even new ways of looking at the world.
Let’s look at a few of these new features you can expect in Beyond Shadowgate!
Beyond Shadowgate really delivers and goes well beyond the scope of Shadowgate and explores an entire kingdom. You will find a map and eventually learn a spell that will allow you to fast travel between key areas. This will make back-tracking less tedious and lets the game’s puzzles span the entire world of the game.
Sometimes the Grim Reaper is just a moment away and you’ll have to act quickly to survive. These intense moments are signaled to you when the reaper in the game window comes to life and lets you know that it’s time to act! This is to let you know that if you don’t do anything, you will die! Of course, we will also offer a turn-based option for these time-sensitive puzzles! :)
As an adventure game, Beyond Shadowgate’s gameplay focuses on puzzles and problem solving. Something that compliments this very well is being able to give hints. You will encounter a companion very early in the game: the mysterious wisp. It acts as an interactive hint system that can give you clues with just a click! However, after using some of they’re magical energy to show a hint, it will have to rest for a bit, so you’ll have to wait for your next hint.
Obviously, compared to the original Shadowgate, our sequel doesn't take place over the coarse of a single day. So we needed to be able to show this and introduced a day/night cycle to help show the passage of time!
Shadowgate had very few NPC's (you could count them on one hand!) Beyond Shadowgate, however, has over 20 and many of them are here to help you on your quest! Everything from shopkeepers to barmaids, BSG has you covered!
While Beyond Shadowgate is intended to be a familiar experience for players, we think there’s plenty of new things to make the game fresh and exciting!
Until next time!
Dave
The first part of today's update comes from our friends at GrahfMetal!
Hi and thanks for backing us! I'm going to give you a look into how we’re bringing this sequel to an all-time classic to life! What does it mean to make a “retro” style game today? We get the benefit of using more powerful hardware, tools and techniques, but we have to make sure we don’t lose sight of the charms and limitations of old-school games in the process. We want to make sure Beyond Shadowgate looks and feels like a true sequel to the 8-bit console version of the original Shadowgate.
I’m going to write about the decisions we’ve made, the lines we’ve drawn and the attention to detail that’s going into Beyond Shadowgate.
Outside of the game play, the main thing on our minds is how the game looks. Making Beyond Shadowgate as the sequel to the 8-bit Shadowgate, we are using a pixel art graphic style (which you’ve been seeing a lot of here!) The game runs at a native resolution similar to 8-bit consoles, with extra width to accommodate modern 16:9 screens.
While we’ve kept the pixel aesthetic and resolution true to 8-bit limitations, there is one area where we are pushing beyond: colors. 8-bit consoles were very limited in their color palette and the number of colors that could be drawn on screen at once. With the benefit of modern hardware, we are allowing the pixel art to use as many colors as needed. The palette remains limited, but by the artist’s choice, and not for technical reasons.
Beyond Shadowgate’s world and characters are vibrant & expressive in a true modern take on 8-bit style!
Keeping with the awesome, and delightfully chunky, graphics, the sound of Beyond Shadowgate is equally excellent using chip-tune music and sounds. One of the modern benefits of development is that since we aren’t limited to a specific cartridge limitation, we can have many more sounds and music tracks to fill out the retro-stylized world of the game! Orie is doing a fantastic job and I'm sure you've heard one of his latest pieces from a previous update. No? Here it is then!
We'll talk more about sound and music later, so stay tuned for more updates soon!
What is “Game Feel”? It’s a very tough thing to define and nail down. But Game Feel, as a concept, is what makes a game satisfying to play. It has everything to do with mechanics and presentation. Often, it’s “Game Feel” that determines what your favorite games are.
For Shadowgate, it has to do with its unique presentation elements. It’s the minimal, but impactful, moments of transition. The way the screen blinks black to show something has changed, like a door opening or a creature slithering out of a crevice. It’s the satisfying ‘click’ of collecting an item and adding it to your inventory.
It’s the transitional arrow-wipes that point out the direction of travel. It’s the words of the grim reaper, taunting you with every death and failure.
We wanted to make sure these elements are intact, and are just right. This is how we’re working on making Beyond Shadowgate “feel” right. If you’re a fan of 8-bit Shadowgate, we want you to feel right at home in Beyond Shadowgate.
Did you know that our friends at 317Games created a board game based on Shadowgate? Shadowgate the Living Castle is awesome and is published by Trick or Treat Games! You can pick up a copy here!
However, if you want to try and win a copy, you're in luck! Just click below and learn how!
Until next time!
Dave