Gameplay Changes:

• Equinox Launcher now sends the Scythe-Head more horizontally on re-launch. This seems a bit too powerful but we will test it out for a while.

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed a bug that could trigger when dying with the Mask of Sharbora, which resulted in a soft-lock.
  
• Localized text is now properly displayed for Reroll keyword tooltip.
  
• Implemented a manual check for the Rekindled Power achievement - should help those who have had issues unlocking this.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the Dust Effigy not to trigger if reloading a save after the room reward was collected.
  
• Fixed a possible crash that could trigger with Shadow Partner
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Divine / Synergy Rarity Frames to display off-center in the Blessing List.
  
• Essence Combo Multiplier now freezes during conversations.
  
• Other minor visual tweaks and fixes.

Fixed a crash that could occur when a puzzle is filled in incorrectly when using the original hint fading method. This bug was introduced in 3.00.00 but escaped my notice.

New costumes

It's the year 1999. Alternative metal band KoRn releases their fourth album, “Issues,” featuring cover art depicting a torn rag doll on it. The album’s last promotional single, “Somebody Someone,” and its music video, released in 2000, features the band performing the song amidst some arthropods, like roaches, a spider, and a fly. Two years later, the band released a DVD compilation of music videos, interviews, and different behind-the-scenes clips. But, the twist was that once you put the disc on the DVD player, you would find yourself immersed in some kind of creepy escape room game, navigating through an apparently abandoned asylum and looking for hidden codes to unlock new videos in different locations.

A rag doll, arthropods, and an abandoned house. Sound familiar?

Well, fast forward to 2006, Mariona, now creative and art director in Mango Protocol, drew inspiration from listening to KoRn during those years to write a short and abstract story. In that story, she introduced a character based on the ragdoll from the "Issues" album cover. The narrative unfolded as the ragdoll explored around a house divided into concentric spaces, looking for insects to deliver to a girl who seemed to be working on some kind of obscure project.


Short storyboard inspired by KoRn's fourth album "Issues", and music video compilation "Deuce".

While originally envisioned as a script for a puppetry-based short film, it wasn't until 2018 that the pieces fell into place. Mariona, along with Javi and Jordi, transformed her earlier ideas into the foundation for the fourth installment of the Psychotic Adventures saga: CLeM, a mystery puzzlevania adventure with a dark twist.

Javi started working on that original abstract story and, knowing Mariona for more than 14 years, distilled all the ideas and thoughts behind it and adapted it into something that could fit better with the team's vision for a narrative-driven puzzle game. Maintaining the dark essence and main elements from Mariona's initial script, he expanded it into a fully realized story that resonated even more personally with her. Meanwhile, Jordi, armed with this narrative blueprint, crafted the gameplay, designing a really wide range of environmental and self-contained puzzles, each intricately linked to the overarching story. Every puzzle is tightly connected with the narrative, so they always feel coherent with the story, the characters, and the world in the game. Mariona, on the other hand, reimagined all the visuals for the story, starting with the player character — the ragdoll. However, as it usually happens when Mariona starts doodling ideas, not many drafts are needed until the team falls in love with one of them.



We always wanted CLeM to be a cute and creepy experience, and Mariona knew that the ragdoll (that we call “the servant”) needed to have the “cute” element, with a tiny body but a big head, and a static but friendly face. Contemplating a few ideas for the inventory system, the concept of a zip on the nape of the servant’s head emerged as a practical solution since all items could be stored inside, which made a lot of sense and simplified the general design of the servant. It also allowed Jordi to add a nice animation to the zip puller while the servant is walking.



Lastly, Mariona still had many options for the eyes, the zip, maybe an eyebrow and some hair, and other details like patches or the actual colours for every part. Greenish, so they look more like a zombie? Brownish, so they somehow resemble the fabric of a potato sack? Well, during the first year of development we called that character “potato”, so you can guess which colours Mariona decided to go with.



And that's how our cute servant ended up looking how they do!



We hope you enjoyed learning about the inspirations and creative process behind the servant. Feel free to share your thoughts here, on our socials, and Discord server. We have some more content like this to show you in future publications so you can know more about the beautiful and twisted world of CLeM. Stay tuned!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1861440/CLeM/

It's the year 1999. Alternative metal band KoRn releases their fourth album, “Issues,” featuring cover art depicting a torn rag doll on it. The album’s last promotional single, “Somebody Someone,” and its music video, released in 2000, features the band performing the song amidst some arthropods, like roaches, a spider, and a fly. Two years later, the band released a DVD compilation of music videos, interviews, and different behind-the-scenes clips. But, the twist was that once you put the disc on the DVD player, you would find yourself immersed in some kind of creepy escape room game, navigating through an apparently abandoned asylum and looking for hidden codes to unlock new videos in different locations.

A rag doll, arthropods, and an abandoned house. Sound familiar?

Well, fast forward to 2006, Mariona, now creative and art director in Mango Protocol, drew inspiration from listening to KoRn during those years to write a short and abstract story. In that story, she introduced a character based on the ragdoll from the "Issues" album cover. The narrative unfolded as the ragdoll explored around a house divided into concentric spaces, looking for insects to deliver to a girl who seemed to be working on some kind of obscure project.


Short storyboard inspired by KoRn's fourth album "Issues", and music video compilation "Deuce".

While originally envisioned as a script for a puppetry-based short film, it wasn't until 2018 that the pieces fell into place. Mariona, along with Javi and Jordi, transformed her earlier ideas into the foundation for the fourth installment of the Psychotic Adventures saga: CLeM, a mystery puzzlevania adventure with a dark twist.

Javi started working on that original abstract story and, knowing Mariona for more than 14 years, distilled all the ideas and thoughts behind it and adapted it into something that could fit better with the team's vision for a narrative-driven puzzle game. Maintaining the dark essence and main elements from Mariona's initial script, he expanded it into a fully realized story that resonated even more personally with her. Meanwhile, Jordi, armed with this narrative blueprint, crafted the gameplay, designing a really wide range of environmental and self-contained puzzles, each intricately linked to the overarching story. Every puzzle is tightly connected with the narrative, so they always feel coherent with the story, the characters, and the world in the game. Mariona, on the other hand, reimagined all the visuals for the story, starting with the player character — the ragdoll. However, as it usually happens when Mariona starts doodling ideas, not many drafts are needed until the team falls in love with one of them.



We always wanted CLeM to be a cute and creepy experience, and Mariona knew that the ragdoll (that we call “the servant”) needed to have the “cute” element, with a tiny body but a big head, and a static but friendly face. Contemplating a few ideas for the inventory system, the concept of a zip on the nape of the servant’s head emerged as a practical solution since all items could be stored inside, which made a lot of sense and simplified the general design of the servant. It also allowed Jordi to add a nice animation to the zip puller while the servant is walking.



Lastly, Mariona still had many options for the eyes, the zip, maybe an eyebrow and some hair, and other details like patches or the actual colours for every part. Greenish, so they look more like a zombie? Brownish, so they somehow resemble the fabric of a potato sack? Well, during the first year of development we called that character “potato”, so you can guess which colours Mariona decided to go with.



And that's how our cute servant ended up looking how they do!



We hope you enjoyed learning about the inspirations and creative process behind the servant. Feel free to share your thoughts here, on our socials, and Discord server. We have some more content like this to show you in future publications so you can know more about the beautiful and twisted world of CLeM. Stay tuned!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1861440/CLeM/

It's the year 1999. Alternative metal band KoRn releases their fourth album, “Issues,” featuring cover art depicting a torn rag doll on it. The album’s last promotional single, “Somebody Someone,” and its music video, released in 2000, features the band performing the song amidst some arthropods, like roaches, a spider, and a fly. Two years later, the band released a DVD compilation of music videos, interviews, and different behind-the-scenes clips. But, the twist was that once you put the disc on the DVD player, you would find yourself immersed in some kind of creepy escape room game, navigating through an apparently abandoned asylum and looking for hidden codes to unlock new videos in different locations.

A rag doll, arthropods, and an abandoned house. Sound familiar?

Well, fast forward to 2006, Mariona, now creative and art director in Mango Protocol, drew inspiration from listening to KoRn during those years to write a short and abstract story. In that story, she introduced a character based on the ragdoll from the "Issues" album cover. The narrative unfolded as the ragdoll explored around a house divided into concentric spaces, looking for insects to deliver to a girl who seemed to be working on some kind of obscure project.


Short storyboard inspired by KoRn's fourth album "Issues", and music video compilation "Deuce".

While originally envisioned as a script for a puppetry-based short film, it wasn't until 2018 that the pieces fell into place. Mariona, along with Javi and Jordi, transformed her earlier ideas into the foundation for the fourth installment of the Psychotic Adventures saga: CLeM, a mystery puzzlevania adventure with a dark twist.

Javi started working on that original abstract story and, knowing Mariona for more than 14 years, distilled all the ideas and thoughts behind it and adapted it into something that could fit better with the team's vision for a narrative-driven puzzle game. Maintaining the dark essence and main elements from Mariona's initial script, he expanded it into a fully realized story that resonated even more personally with her. Meanwhile, Jordi, armed with this narrative blueprint, crafted the gameplay, designing a really wide range of environmental and self-contained puzzles, each intricately linked to the overarching story. Every puzzle is tightly connected with the narrative, so they always feel coherent with the story, the characters, and the world in the game. Mariona, on the other hand, reimagined all the visuals for the story, starting with the player character — the ragdoll. However, as it usually happens when Mariona starts doodling ideas, not many drafts are needed until the team falls in love with one of them.



We always wanted CLeM to be a cute and creepy experience, and Mariona knew that the ragdoll (that we call “the servant”) needed to have the “cute” element, with a tiny body but a big head, and a static but friendly face. Contemplating a few ideas for the inventory system, the concept of a zip on the nape of the servant’s head emerged as a practical solution since all items could be stored inside, which made a lot of sense and simplified the general design of the servant. It also allowed Jordi to add a nice animation to the zip puller while the servant is walking.



Lastly, Mariona still had many options for the eyes, the zip, maybe an eyebrow and some hair, and other details like patches or the actual colours for every part. Greenish, so they look more like a zombie? Brownish, so they somehow resemble the fabric of a potato sack? Well, during the first year of development we called that character “potato”, so you can guess which colours Mariona decided to go with.



And that's how our cute servant ended up looking how they do!



We hope you enjoyed learning about the inspirations and creative process behind the servant. Feel free to share your thoughts here, on our socials, and Discord server. We have some more content like this to show you in future publications so you can know more about the beautiful and twisted world of CLeM. Stay tuned!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1861440/CLeM/

This week, we have another recap diary where The Chinese Room Community Manager Josh Matthews meets Ian Thomas, Sarah Longthorne and Arone Le Bray. In this recap, Sarah recaps parts of her dev diary, and is joined by Ian Thomas and Arone Le Bray to go into more depth on the main character, as well as answering a few fan questions relating to the main character and the dev diary on Narrative Atmosphere and Themes.




Render of female Phyre

Tomorrow, 30th of November, we are revealing the third playable clan, at the PC Gamer Show: Most Wanted, and we’ll be back with a new dev diary in two weeks. This time it will be Andrea Sancio, Associate Technical Director sharing his thoughts on how TCR are working with Unreal 5. After the holidays, we’ll be back with more dev diaries in January.

Hello heroes!

Get ready for the following WEEKEND EVENTS from Friday to Sunday: Exceptional XP Event, Epic Quest Extravaganza & Sands of Time Special.



Moreover, check out the official HELLEVATOR SURVEY: {LINK REMOVED}https://bit.ly/3sW51Bb Please take it by Monday 16 CET and help us improve the game. Thank you!

PET FRIENDS, need winter pets? You can find them from Friday after unlocking them in their habitats!

With the help of recent devlogs and the demo version you’ve already met some of the townsfolk, saw the stud farm, the area around and so much more. 🙂 Therefore today, we’d like to focus on something else. It’s a topic you’ve been asking about a lot but we’ve only given you a positive answer, not any specifics. Today we’ll talk about customization! 🤩



Keep in mind that some of the customization options won’t be available right off the bat, but rather bought or earned with gold or experience points.

We’ve put a lot of effort into giving you the details which will help you to make your playthrough more personalized and it’ll be very nice if you let us know what other elements you’d like to be able to customize! 🐴 We can’t wait to hear your answers.

If you enjoy our work, please consider adding the game to your wishlists on Steam and join our discord community where you can meet developers and other people interested in the game. 👇

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2376970/My_Horse_Bonded_Spirits/


See you soon
My Horse: Bonded Spirits Team

The Turtuon Federation is a lithoid faction unique to Stellaris Nexus and offers a play style that fits neatly into the idea of the smallest empire with the largest reach. Their insular nature means that you pay a higher Support penalty for each planet you control, which if not monitored carefully can cause problems in the early game.



But their unique resource Patriarchs, is automatically converted into the same number of extra Council Votes. This means you've got more power to push through the Titles that benefit you the most and get those all-important Succession Points. You get Patriarchs every time you use the Construction Edict, so the more you build up your planets, the more influence you have on the Galactic Council.

They also get an extra building slot on their planets, and the Edict Insular Growth, which adds another new building slot, and only costs 4 support and 1 Patriarchs.



And last but not least, the Turtuon also get +25% Army Defense, so if anyone wants to try and conquer one of their planets, they need to come prepared.

If you enjoy the idea of sitting in your fortress pulling strings; the leader Statesman has the Edict Electors; which gives you 1 Patriarchs and 6 Materials, building up your Patriarchs quickly, so that you can swing almost any vote in your favor.

But locking down on a few high-value planets, isn't the only way to play with the Turtuon.
If you like a slower pace, but still want to play a more military focused game, you can play as the Nationalist. They get the unique Edict Militia, which gives all the fleets within your empire +1 Ships, and quickly turns you into a force to be reckoned with.



The Turtuon are a slow faction in an otherwise fast-paced game, which can make them complex to play if you're new to Stellaris Nexus, but don't underestimate them, or you might find yourself between a Turtuon and a hard place.

Studio Director Dax spoke to Head of QA Brad who drilled deep into every crevice of the Turtuon, as can be seen in the video below: