You’ve heard about Courier of the Crypts often on this blog but I wouldn’t hold it against you if you don’t remember it—my posts have been spread out sparsely throughout its epic, 8-years-long development cycle. Funny enough, I never got to write about its release in April this year though, so I’m celebrating the return from my daily-writing hiatus with the well deserved news that yes, young courier has finally reached his final destination.
In a true labor of love, my good friend Primož Vovk took on designing, coding, and drawing the whole game, all the way back in 2011, after he came up with the idea for the 48-hour game development competition Ludum Dare 20 (we’re at LD 45 by now).
The initial premise was simple enough: become a courier who needs to deliver a letter deep into the crypts and do it before your magical torch runs out of its protecting flame.
What happened in the 8 years following was an expansion into a grand puzzle/action adventure full of creepy underground levels, deadly enemies, obstacles, an intriguing storyline, and plenty of (secret) reasons to replay individual stages. I can’t really do it justice with words so I’ll let the trailer speak for itself:
Along the development path, Primož was joined by Zdravko Djordjević on sound and music, and I provided a tiny contribution of mine by drawing the portraits for in-game dialogues.
I still have the last 20% of the story to play through, so I can’t speak of the full experience (despite doing the portraits, the game was as much a mystery to me as anyone else), but what I’ve experienced so far was a very delightful jump back into 80s/90s-era challenging, top-down adventuring.
The game got its v1.1 update recently, which brings difficulty selection if you’re not old-school enough (or too much) for the normal mode, and leaderboards to additionally reward your skills for finding the game’s many secrets and collectibles.
If you’re reading this article on the day of writing, you’re even more in luck. The game is still on its Black Friday sale and will cost you just $13 (Windows only from Steam, Humble, or Itch). Now is the time to get it, but later just as much as your money supports 8 years of dedication to get this wonderful, mostly-solo project into your hands.
