The release of the 2025 Demo (0.3.0) has over 100 different changes that have been added since 2023's 0.2.6! Between its quality of life changes, newly updated music and dialogue, several graphical tweaks, and a huge reduction in file size, Traversal's demo has been brought up to speed with what Traversal's full game will look, feel, and play like. A full list of changes in 0.3.0 can be found both here and packaged with the download.
Download now for free!
Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3334450/Traversal/
GameJolt: https://gamejolt.com/games/traversal/528927
Itch: https://chillincreative.itch.io/traversal
What is Traversal?
Having crash-landed on an island in the Atlantic Ocean, you take the role of Player, a man determined to get back to the mainland for his nephew's sake. While traversing through several islands in this action adventure game, you'll need to help the islanders, solve puzzles and survive to make your way back home.
What's New Since Devlog 2?
Since I published Devlog 2 last year, Traversal has gotten its own Steam page, I updated the game's free demo (available on GameJolt, Itch.io, and Steam), and I've made further internal progress on Traversal's second and third areas.
What's Coming Up Next for Traversal?
Currently in development are two builds: 0.3.2, a minor update to the demo, and 0.4.0, a version of the game that contains two more playable areas in the game, the second and third islands.
Later this month, you can expect to see 0.3.2 release. It's exactly one change away being releasable, I just need to get one external thing in order before I can make that change. Once I've done that, it'll be made public on all three storefronts the demo is currently available on. As for 0.4.0's release, I need to explain something first. Last year, I kept pretty vague how "done" each area was, giving only estimated percentages. This year, I figured I'd give a more complex explanation of each island's progress to give you, if you're curious, a better understanding of what still has to happen internally before you can play Traversal's second and third islands.
Second and Third Island Progress:
Finalizing Dialogue - The final third of the second island and the latter half of the third island have a lot of placeholder dialogue that are due for replacement with dialogue I, for the most part, still need to write. Outside of these cases, there are some older pieces of dialogue written many years ago that need minor edits to bring them up to speed with the current version of the game's story.
Cutscene Implementation - There are missing or broken cutscenes throughout both the second and third islands. Some cutscenes are close to finished, only requiring proper, finalized dialogue. However, some are either missing elements (visuals, movement, sounds, music, etc.) and some are just not yet implemented.
[???] - The [???] sequence in the game's second island still has yet to be implemented, but the third island one is almost entirely finished.
Music - While the soundtrack for the second and third islands are mostly entirely completed, there are maybe three songs I still have yet to make or, at least, finish. (For those curious, the second and third islands, together, currently make up over 20 unique tracks in the game's total soundtrack.)
Sailing - The between-island sailing sequences that stitch the second area to the third area and the third area to the fourth area are still a work-in-progress and still need to be finished. The second-to-third-area Sailing sequence (referred to in-game as Sailing II) is mostly completed while the third-to-fourth-area Sailing sequence (Sailing III) has yet to be implemented. Likely, it will be the final thing I implement for 0.4.0 as I transition from second-and-third island development to the game's fourth area and beyond.
So, When Can You Expect 0.4.0?
I believe that before next year's November 11th, 0.4.0 will be out. Expect it sometime in the summer, perhaps. I do really want people to see more of Traversal and its story and its world, so I'll do my best to adhere to that loose deadline. If it comes out sooner, that'd be great, but it's important to remember that progress is only made on Traversal when I have free time, which I can't be certain I'll have too much of in the start of 2026. Until then, thanks for reading and I'll update you next when 0.3.2 releases.
Despite working on it for over a week, yesterday, I realized that the weird instrument from a soundfont I'm using in a song for my game is the EXACT same one used for the opening of Deltarune's "It's TV Time!". They share the same first note too, but mine's an octave lower.
I'll be updating Traversal's demo on January 1st, 2025!
As mentioned in Traversal's "Devlog 2", this update will be the same length as the 0.2.6 demo, beginning and ending at the same points, but filled to the brim with quality of life changes (through gameplay and the settings), minor story tweaks, and changes to visuals.
Noelle Holiday's name being Noelle is genuinely really funny actually. It's not even subtle: she's Christmas; that's her whole thing. It's like if I put a salesclerk in my game and called him something like Clark. Like, that'd be objectively silly.
Traversal is now on Steam! If you're a Steam user, head over to its store page, and you'll be able to wishlist the game if you'd like, and you can add the 0.2.6 DEMO to your Steam Library.
I'm working on updating the demo soon, and getting Traversal through Steam will ensure you get those updates automatically.
Though, if you prefer GameJolt and Itch.io, don't worry: Traversal's updated demo will appear on there at the same time. However, I currently plan to release the full, purchasable game on Steam with the GameJolt and Itch.io pages solely housing the demo builds.
All of that said, make sure to check out Traversal on Steam.
While traversing through several islands in this action adventure game, you'll need to help the islanders, solve puzzles and survive to make
What is Traversal?
Having crash-landed on an island in the Atlantic Ocean, you take the role of Player, a man determined to get back to the mainland for his nephew's sake. While traversing through several islands in this action adventure game, you'll need to help the islanders, solve puzzles and survive to make your way back home.
Update News:
I've said this on social media already, but I want to get an update out next year, but I haven't said anything past that yet.
My plan is to, first, update Traversal's demo from the current release, 0.2.6, to a newer, higher quality version, 0.3.0. This update will be the same length as the 0.2.6 demo, beginning and ending at the same points, but filled to the brim with quality of life changes (through gameplay and the settings), minor story tweaks, and changes to visuals.
(There are over 100 lines of additions, changes, tweaks, fixes, and removals in the patch notes.)
The second island is, currently, about 90% complete and playable, with the third island being around 50% complete and playable, albeit a lot of the elements of that 50% are placeholder.
Either together or separately, these will release sometime after the 0.3.0 demo comes out. However, this release will be separate from the demo, being released in Early Access.
(I'll speak more about that when the game actually enters Early Access, but I figured I might as well mention this now for anyone curious about what exists past Outline Island, and when and how they'll get to experience that.)
Almost on Steam:
I've been recently working on getting Traversal on Steam. Hopefully, that should come soon, and, when it does, you'll be able to play the classic 0.2.6 demo through your Steam client and you'll be able to add Traversal to your Steam wishlist. When Traversal's 0.3.0 demo releases, it'll be there, on GameJolt, and on Itch.io, however, when the game goes into Early Access, it will do so on Steam.
The Chillin Creative Website:
Chillin Creative has an official website (chillincreative.cc), and, as a result, there's an entire section of the website dedicated to Traversal. There's an archive of every bit of Traversal news that's been posted since 2020. Additionally, if you have an RSS reader, you can add the devlogs as an RSS feed (technically, an Atom feed) to get any new devlogs sent right to your reader.
Conclusion:
Until then, you can play Traversal's 0.2.6 demo on GameJolt and Itch.io. Feel free to check out this devlog on the Chillin Creative website!
While traversing through several islands in this action adventure game, you'll need to help the islanders, solve puzzles and survive to make your way back home.
Check out Traversal's demo!
https://chillincreative.cc/traversal
I've realized that every year since the first one came out, I've found that if a Sonic Movie releases, no Traversal releases happen for that year.
February 14th, 2020 - Sonic the Hedgehog
April 2nd, 2021 - Traversal Demo 0.1
March 30th, 2022 - Sonic the Hedgehog 2
January 3rd, 2023 - Traversal Demo 0.2
December 20th, 2024 - Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (& Knuckles, but that was earlier in the year)
This is kind of me saying I hope to get an update out in 2025, but who knows if that'll work out. In 2020, I did say that Traversal's first demo would release immediately come winter, but it ended up coming out the following spring.
