Long Hat House

We make games that you would maybe make your granny play someday.

[longhathouse]

Dandara Patch 1.1.4 is out! Rotating the map, dead body location, and more

Added Features:

Added an “Align with Camera” button! Now the map can be rotated in the map screen so the camera's north is also the map's north. So no back and forth between doors to see where you are going anymore.

More details added on the map, to have less useless backtracking in the experience.

Added smarter helpers to jump aim: the game will “know” that you want to go to another platform a little bit better now, even after you’re already locked to another platform.

The Location of Dandara’s active spirit is now disclosed in the map.

On touch mode, you can now change jump/attack swipe sides.

On touch mode, you no longer break the aim so easily by going offshoot to the ground, making for example circular platforms more comfortable.

[iOS/tvOS] iCloud support! Now you can share files between multiple devices!

You can now turn off Vibration.

Level Design:

Triangle shots from Angular Soldiers now deal 2 damage (was 3 damage).

Eldar shots got buffed (1 damage to 2 damage).

Salt ghosts now recover 100% of your health on contact, including your own.

Special Weapons are no longer “super effective” on Bull Soldiers.

Desert of Remembrance’ s Army room can no longer soft lock players.

Slightly added/remove white patches throughout the game!

Bug Fixes:

Completionist achievement now working.

Dandara’s Salt Spirits no longer get stuck in geometry.

[Nintendo Switch] Time does not continue when the game sleeps.

Fixed bug where you can get soft locked after getting killed by Eldar no longer happens.

Fixed bug where you could kill the first form of Eldar if you shot a Skull Shaft that pointed in the same direction as his movement.

Eldar’s corners are no longer weak points.

[longhathouse]

We’ve launched!

Kinda late to do this here, but we’ve had to settle this score! Dandara is live on all stores!

Check it out here for more info!

Available on Nintendo Switch, PC, Xbox One, PS4, Android, iOS and tvOS!

[longhathouse]

Existe disponibilidade de empregos/estágios?

Por enquanto, não!

[longhathouse]

We’re on Nintendo Switch!

Hey, we’ve been missing here on our blog, but we’re still working tirelessly in the game!

Here’s a quick rundown of the latest news: we partnered up with Raw Fury! That’s right, the newest and really cool indie publisher powerhouse is publishing Dandara. Which led it to another pretty awesome thing: alongside mobile, we’re launching on PC and Nintendo Switch!

Check out our newest trailer:

[retronator]

Dandara has the privilege of holding the coveted title of “The very first Switch game played by Retronator”. Yes, I touched the magical controller one day before any of you mortals, having fun at GDC with a gravity-bending metroidvania from studio @longhathouse. 

It’s not as much bending as it is every-wall-clinging gravity, a directionless world as the game calls it. You aim around the level to jump to any valid surface, leading to a very fresh way to navigate around the puzzles and enemies in the game.

Did I mention the game is being published by my favorite pixel art superhouse Raw Fury? Indeed it is, and we can look forward to its release this Summer. 

[longhathouse]

Fantastic preview by Retronator!

[longhathouse]

Hey what about using kelly smiths' art for the banner?

Working on that!

[longhathouse]

We’re finalists in BIG Festival again!

Hooray! A year after we’re finalists in the Brazilian Award category of BIG Festival in 2015 with Magenta Arcade, we’re at it again with Dandara!

BIG Festival is the biggest game awards on all Latin America. Last year, the excellent game This War of Mine made the big prize, and Toren made the Brazilian Award!

So, if you’re in São Paulo from June 28th to July 3rd, come see us just outside Vergueiro station and play some Dandara!

[longhathouse]

Running and gunning.

[longhathouse]

[longhathouse]

The new colors

We did another art overhaul. Yep. Another. In the beginning of the project, we decided on limiting ourselves with a color palette so the pixel art feels more coherent and we felt that’s what most people do. Also, we get to use creativity once the limit barred us which would lead to awesome character design. While that is true, it was our first time making a pallette, so I can say this: it totally sucked.  

Columns would not have consistence in the luminescence, and it was too saturated at times and too unsaturated at other times. There’s actually two pallettes. We decided to make one for the objects and grounds, and another one for props and backgrounds, to actually help us make those stand out. Well, they don’t have any difference at all, so enemies would constantly merge into the background. It was a mess. We felt we needed a better one then. And that’s what we’ve been doing this week. With @pxloto help we could find a new palette, broader with more colors. We made a more exaggerated difference on the background palette as well, so you could always tell what should stay on the background. We greatly diminshed the brightness and saturation and added an amount of blue in the regular palette to make the background palette. Here’s some of the results:

Also, we get a more bizarre, oniric set of colors that does match more with the tone we want to achieve. Begone to the confusing Village of Artists. We felt we needed to make it’s design simpler. It shouldn’t look bad without the city props. One thing we learnt while doing the forest is that a tileset should look good even without any of the props. We’re still on the process of actually making it, but here are some of the improvements:

(You saw the old city on posts before right?)

We are VERY happy with this transition. A little bit too bad we did a trailer before this transition, but still, I’m really glad with the trailer and the reception it made. Oh and a disclaimer: we still have to update the enemies and Dandara herself with the new palette. Which might not even be ready yet. I just wanted to share the progress with you guys.

(Originally posted on our devlog: https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=51336.40 )

[longhathouse]

Reworking the color palette in Dandara!

[longhathouse]

Introducing: Money

So again we showed Dandara in a local event! Got back with a few ideas and clear conclusions of problems we have in both game and level design.

While the problems with the level design are many, we felt we first needed to finish our game design first so we can think with it while making the levels. The main problem we always felt we had: death is not really a penalty. Players would die just to get back to their tents or flags (checkpoints) because that was the faster way. Also, battles had no thrill we always wanted because the player would only lose time on dying.

So yep, we are introducing a resource for Dandara to collect in order for her to lose something when dying. This is greatly inspired by Dark Souls, where battles and decisions are way more emotional. There’s so much at stake at any time: die and you lose all your souls and humanity, but you know you can maybe push ahead.

You can use the money (currently called "Pleas of Salt") to upgrade Dandara at checkpoint tents. Currently, you can find items that maximize your health and “mana” by exploring and solving puzzles. With the shops you will also be able to buy half of them at stores to upgrade your character.

If you’re in need of a cheaper alternative, you can also buy health potions in the tent. Or even trade pleas on the fly for more mana mid-dungeon!

We hope we’re done increasing the scope of the game. We know we will have to balance the amount of pleas each enemy drops and how that relate to something like mana costs. It is a lot of work, but we’re positive that the pros overthrow the cons in this.

Next week if full level design fixes for the first level!

[longhathouse]

Explore a metaphorical gravity-less world soon, in your mobile device! :D

[longhathouse]

Resting may be an option, but beware: enemies respawn if you do. #Screenshotsaturday

[longhathouse]

Yep we have those fancy dialogues. At least some of them.

[longhathouse]

Changes on the Battle System

Battle system changes!  

Gone is the machine-gun like weapon you had, in order to make space for a Charged Shotgun. (She still fires "plasma beams", but you got the idea) Now, you should hold your input for a while before shooting a hand of five shots at the same time.

This leads to:

Better significance in each attack. Now the player really has to commit for an attack, and feels more like actions matter.

More dangerous enemies. For instance, the yellow soldier was pretty defenseless against your barrage of shots.

More careful position and decision. You really need to dance around the enemies to find a perfect position to charge in.

More importance for the secondary shots. Now super extra shots like the missile feels useful to use despite it's ammo cost.

So I guess even in this late game phase we are iterating on the gameplay.

What's more, there is an alpha coming soon, with the entirety of the first level, including the first boss. I hope you all check it out soon, I'll post here and email on the newsletter as soon as we have something.

[longhathouse]

#Screenshotsaturday for today. The colossal bridge has no coming back. 

(The velocity does not represent the in-game one. It is accelerated)