This year we're humbled and happy to be part of the lineup for Roguelike Celebration! Until October 19, Stone Story RPG will be on sale at a 20% discount.


Though Stone Story RPG isn't a roguelike, it draws from many of its hallmarks. Looking back to the progenitor of the genre, Rogue, our primary inspiration is clear: We love ASCII-art!

Techniques and technology have come a long way from Rogue, the groundbreaking seminal 1980 dungeon crawler. Stone Story RPG sits at the crossroads of new and old, a confluence of retro and modern gaming. Nowhere is this more evident than in the game's animation style.

The stark minimalism of black and white ASCII art strikes just as clearly as when Rogue first released:



In developing Stone Story RPG we wanted to stretch the limits of this style. Using a combination of traditional animation techniques and clever Unity tricks, ASCII art can work just like pixel art!

Much of the process behind ASCII animation is the same as with any other medium:

• Find references
  
• Establish keyframes
  
• Determine length of each animation
  
• Go frame by frame and fill the inbetweens

Letters, numbers, and even Unicode symbols all work together to evoke an ethereal feel, something borne out of the era of DOS computers and floppy disks.



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Still curious about the ASCII animation process and wondering how you can incorporate natural-looking ASCII-art in your own work?

Check out this talk from Stone Story RPG's creator, Gabriel Santos, from Roguelike Celebration 2019!



-SSRPG Team

Guilds of Arinar!

Another battle for Forest's Heart, castle on the first zone of Ayvondil, will take place on Sunday, 17/10/2021.

Only 30 members of each guild will be able to participate in the battle for the Forest's Heart, so don't be late!

Schedule:
US-Sapphire - 20:00 PDT
EU-Emerald - 17:00 CEST
SEA-Pearl - 15:00 CEST
BR-Tourmaline - 02:00 CEST (next day)
RU-Amber - 20:00 CEST
RU-Topaz - 18:00 CEST
RU-Ruby - 19:00 CEST

All guilds of level 3 and higher, get ready!

Hi there! Today I released a new fix to many problems reported by the users! See the full log below:
- Fixed a flying piece of toast on the cafeteria (Thanks to Aleks Puhovs)
- Fixed a fatal crash that happened when trying to open the game (Thanks to GoldeBits)
- Updated Steamworks API and Unity version

If you notice a bug or experience crashes, feel free to report on my twitter: @amarogamedev or through my e-mail: contact@amarostudios.com

Bug Fixes

Hey Flippers!

We launched Luxury DLC two days ago, and since then, we just can't get over your support.
We've worked on this content for so long, and we were so worried you're not going to like it as much as we do, and we couldn't be more wrong. You guys loved it!



It means a ton, so all we wanted to say is thank you! We could continue about our gratitude, but there's just no point in that - we're speechless anyways.

It's completely normal in game dev industry to have some bugs in the game, and it's no different this time. We have nearly 120 testers, but it's nothing compared to millions of players out there - that makes it impossible to predict every bug possible.
We just want you to know that we're working as hard as we can to figure stuff out and fix it immediately - our first hotfix went live just an hour after the release of the Luxury DLC, and we intend to keep this up.

We're not going to rest until the whole thing is just perfect.

All the best,
Frozen District Team

This week I spent a lot of time prototyping and working on the final level. There's not a ton of stuff to show for that yet, but look forward to it soon! That being said, I did also whip up a brand new level.



This level is pretty much exactly what it looks like: A room full of columns that you'll need to jump around and between to get to the goal. I'm pretty happy with it, and I like that the difficulty is pretty much entirely based on how fast you're trying to complete it. It's pretty simple to complete if you go slowly, so I put it relatively early in the level list.

• CONTENT: Added "The Forest" level.
  
• DEV: Various work for the final level
  
• DEV: Various prototyping stuff that hasn't panned out yet.

Quick fix / update to make bombs more visible through clouds

Not that kind, you cheeky rascal. It's the kind of weed that grows in your garden, or on a neglected planet after three months of no major updates. Well, the V1.25 is here.

-Foliage. Planet 50Y-80Y is now the proud owner of vegetation. When you have oxygen pockets you should have some simple life I guess. Foliage isn't toxic (for now) so feel free to sprint through that glowing soy shrub without consequences.

-New sky and lighting. Adds a bit of a slight, but necessary punch to the game's visual style. A view of neighboring planet with its rings can now be enjoyed from the surface of 50Y-80Y.

-UI visual update. Less 2010 and closer to 2021.

-Holographic status on the character. What's the point of a high-tech space suit if the owner can't see if the death is near? Perk status on one hand, and oxygen level on the other.

-New dialogue lines. Just a couple of them, either to replace pointless ones or add a comment about the plant life.

-Jumping into soylakes should now look better with ripples appearing around the character.

-Optimization. UI is much faster now and the performance should be better than 1.24, even with new objects and foliage.

Hi all,

Back from the break now.
Here's a stability patch, fixing less common issues (also fixes that pesky lower height bug).

• Added visual effect for successful penetration.

• Fixed hull lower height not moving at all.
  
• Several behind-the-scenes stability improvements.

• Reduced chance of ammo rack detonation.
  
• Made placement more responsive.
  
• Adjusted lighting on "The Crossroad" scenario.
  
• Lowered maximum suspension damper from 10000 to 2000
  
• Changed default damper and transmission ratios to more reasonable values.

Next up: The external armour rework.

Hello friends.


Moreover, we mentioned earlier that issues regarding Act III were really tricky, required sharp cuts and, simply saying, more time to execute fixing. That was the sole reason for dividing it into two parts.

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More to the point. Today, time has come to announce the release of the second part, hopefully bringing you more good than before. Main focus was obviously on the Act III, however we have some additional patch notes to proclaim, related to the some general issues.

• Fixed several issues regarding Act III
  
  • Blocked the option to switch to a different path mid-quest.
    
  • Fixed many broken dialogues leading to a dead end.
    
  • The ending of the Baron’s path is now fixed.
    
  • Fixed text not fitting in task window for many quests.
    
  • Fixed triggering and the content of the drunk Martyn’s dialogue.
    
  • Fixed multiple ‘Conversation’ buttons present when right-clicked on Ganis.
    
  • Fixed multiple subtasks when partnering up with fractions.
• Fixed the issue of cutscene playback speed relating to in-game speed.
  
• Wells are working properly again for Sandbox and Campaign excluding Act 0.
  
• Fixed an issue where servants weren’t able to pick up dirty mugs and plates from tables.

A note:
Please, be aware that this patch requires you to start a new game or load a save not older than the very end of Act II.
We are aware that some issues mentioned by you are still not fixed, but we wanted to release fixed Act III as soon as possible because it was previously unplayable due to ongoing work on it.

Known issues:

• Seers fraction quest - you have to right-click on Martyn and choose ‘Conversation’ to talk to him and progress.
  
• Dishwashers do not show the number of objects they store.
  
• Well not working in Act 0.
  
• Issue of servers not serving food and drinks still does occasionally happen. During our testing, it happened once per many, many saves.

There’s no need to mention you can bring us your feedback on how the game works for you right now. We know that, even though the game is being fixed pretty often, we can count on you!

Klabater team,