Hello everyone, The last patch fixed a bunch of critical errors and made the demo way more playable. Yet there were, of course, still smaller issues that we had on our list or that were found by you guys. So, while we were working on the final product, we put some of the fixes in
Hello everyone,
The last patch fixed a bunch of critical errors and made the demo way more playable. Yet there were, of course, still smaller issues that we had on our list or that were found by you guys. So, while we were working on the final product, we put some of the fixes into the demo. Additionally we made some slight balance changes and implemented some of your ideas:
General
Added 'Automatic Reload' to the settings. Turning this setting off will disable any form of automatic reload. Meaning, that if you shoot your last needle, you will have to reload yourself.
Slightly decreased the vignette post-processing effect in the demo level
Enemies
Increased step height of all enemies, resulting in enemies not getting stuck on small ledges and steps as often anymore.
Explosions now break dung balls from the dung beetle enemy, making it easier to fight the enemy, especially with the pear launcher
Enemies will now try to escape spike pits instead of just standing still and slowly dying
Slightly buffed the 'Grim Keeper' boss
Improved armadillo ghost trails when rolling. This is quite technical, but it basically now consumes less CPU and memory resources.
Fixed a bug where armadillos could get stuck indefinitely while rolling in the boss arena
Fixed a bug where the sand tornado would reappear after clearing the wave in the sandpit arena
Fixed a bug where the music would stop playing after loading a checkpoint
Fixed some smaller lighting issues where some objects would be way too dark or black
Thanks to everyone who actively reached out to us to give us feedback and send in bugs. You are a massive help 🙏
Have fun playing the demo and stay tuned for future updates🌵 - Nils
Hello everyone, I like to present to you the very first public patch for our demo and, therefore, also for our game. A lot of people played the demo at the Gamescom convention and at home. We received a massive amount of feedback, criticism and love. And we are very thankful for
Hello everyone,
I like to present to you the very first public patch for our demo and, therefore, also for our game. A lot of people played the demo at the Gamescom convention and at home. We received a massive amount of feedback, criticism and love. And we are very thankful for that 🙏
We had the opportunity to spectate a bunch of people while they were playing, which gave us a good insight into how newer players manage to traverse through the demo level.
This patch focuses on minor level and visual changes to make the demo less confusing at some places. We also changed a couple of tutorial prompts to hopefully better explain some mechanics.
A couple of people experienced crashes, especially at the later part of the level. And we hopefully managed to fix these crashes - according to internal testers, they no longer experienced any crashes, which is a good sign, especially for me :D
Added a new checkpoint to the hub area
Moved cog wheel in sand pit tunnels away from the door to prevent confusion
Updated the texture of cog wheels
Updated the visuals of crystal doors
The player can now reload while still holding the fire button
Increased range of player melee attack
Increased duration of agility booster
Increased duration of damage booster
Changed some tutorial prompts to explain mechanics better
Fixed a crash caused by enemy pathfinding
Fixed a bug where loading a checkpoint would reset the state of the level and softlock the player
Fixed a spot in the level where the player could walk into a cliff and look through the map
Fixed a spot in the level where the player could get stuck in a pillar and get softlocked
Fixed a couple of occlusion culling errors
Fixed some lighting issues in the level
Fixed color blindness filter dropdown showing a wrongfully selected item
Fixed color blindness filter not working
Fixed display modes not showing in the settings
Fixed localization for "Enemy Hit Flash" in the settings
Again, a big thanks to everyone who played our demo and to the people who actively reached out to us to give us feedback and sending in bugs.
Have fun playing the demo and stay tuned for future updates🌵 - Nils
New Interview Released As the next edition of Gamescom nears in, we're grinding it out. Still, we had some time for a chat with the folks at eSports.ch . We talked about the current state of the game and also gave some insights into our preparations for the big event in August.
New Interview Released
As the next edition of Gamescom nears in, we're grinding it out. Still, we had some time for a chat with the folks at eSports.ch. We talked about the current state of the game and also gave some insights into our preparations for the big event in August.
Preparations Galore Hey folks! While our social channels were active, we’ve been quiet on Steam lately. That’s because we’re gearing up for Gamescom 2024. The event will mark the day we release our new demo, as well as other major announcements regarding CACTUS and the studio. To
Preparations Galore
Hey folks!
While our social channels were active, we’ve been quiet on Steam lately.
That’s because we’re gearing up for Gamescom 2024. The event will mark the day we release our new demo, as well as other major announcements regarding CACTUS and the studio.
To keep you in the loop, here’s a sneak peek at the upcoming Steam Demo and some info drops about our event schedule for the 2nd half of 2024.
Let’s get into it!
🎞️ Subscribe to our YouTube channel for regular video news:
The Steam Demo takes you across a canyon, filled with creatures, treasure and peril. Not to mention a boss fight of considerable dimensions…
Your goal is to cross the canyon by unraveling the secrets of the Oasis at its center. To do so, you'll have to fight hordes, but also use your wits to solve the occasional brain teaser.
The level encompasses both expansive open-air areas as well as intricate indoors, forcing you to adapt to your surroundings.
Crossing the canyon involves traversing vertical spaces, as well as hub-like facilities like the Oasis Temple, cradled by the numerous orange cliffs covering the canyon center.
Key Features
Exclusive, fully playable level
1 year worth of game updates
New physics, scripting & enemy A.I.
Three unlockable skills
6 enemy types & 1 boss fight
3 hidden secrets
On a side note: The playable level is exclusive to the Official Demo and won't be part of the story campaign. Meaning: this is a great (and spoiler-free) deal!
Event Outlook
The next big mark in the calendar are Devcom and Gamescom 2024, taking place on August 19th-20th and August 21st-25th, respectively. And we’ve got a lot planned for this important date.
Most importantly, CACTUS will receive a major update:
The final release date will be reveled.
The Official Demo releases to Steam.
A new trailer will launch online.
Many more surprises!
In addition, Axon Flux will be featured at a total of 3 booths:
Our consumer booth / Entertainment Area @ Home of Indies.
A B2B booth / NRW Indie Showcase @ Devom (we've been selected 👀).
Another B2B booth / SwissGames Pavillion @ Gamescom (selected as well 👀👀).
What's Next?
Once the finishing touches are applied to the new demo, we’ll put it in the hands of our playtesters.
Meanwhile, we’re building story levels and new enemies at full steam, so expect more on these in the next one. Oh, and we also treated the game’s GUI to some love…
We’d love to hear back from you, so check our channels below!
Landing Some Hits Hey folks! As February comes to a close, it’s time for our monthly roundup. This time, we’re coming at you with a much-requested, new player ability, fresh impressions of the 5th story level and a bunch of new enemies. With Speed Design, we also launched a new v
Landing Some Hits
Hey folks!
As February comes to a close, it’s time for our monthly roundup.
This time, we’re coming at you with a much-requested, new player ability, fresh impressions of the 5th story level and a bunch of new enemies. With Speed Design, we also launched a new video format that gives you a relaxing glance behind the scenes.
Oh, and there’s a hidden BONUS FEATURE at the end of this Devlog :]
Here we go!
Progress Report
We've got so much to show this time, that we opted to spread out all the info into several smaller videos that are easier to digest. So keep reading :]
You asked for it, we’ve built it: Player Melee is finally here!
This was one of the most requested features amongst players and in hindsight, it’s obvious why. With fists covered in needles, you naturally want to deal some bloody noses.
So, here we go!
Using melee is a simple and effective way to destroy enemies and objects:
Just hit the punch key and smack right out.
Tap repeatedly for a continuous stream of left and right hooks.
Of course, this ability can be mapped to any key or mouse button in settings, ensuring perfect access in tight situations.
Amidst The Cliffs
Jerry is currently designing the first major temple that players will explore. A sacral architecture hidden in the canyon that aims to evoke a deep dungeon atmosphere.
Take a look at these early blockout shots of Story Level 5:
Filled with destructibles and prolonged battles combat, this level is set to be rich in combat. Particularly, because the Desert Turtle will be introduced here, setting a major gameplay beat.
To loosen up the pace, simple puzzles and pitfalls will diversify gameplay and force you to be vigilant. They also provide your triggerfinger with some well-deserved rest.
Heavyweight Foes
Speaking of big enemies: Pierre, our 3D artist, and Robert, who tackles the last month of his concept art internship, are creating some seriously strong enemies.
Here’s a quick rundown of the two:
Desert Turtle
The Desert Turtle is a ranged enemy that launches homing rocks at you. Keep your distance to avoid its massive stomp attack.
It’s weaknesses are slow movement and the soft spots not protected by the shell. So keep moving and aim precisely to take out the Turtle.
Black Rhino
The Black Rhino is a steamroller-type enemy. When charging at you, it plows through anything in its way, regardless if friend or foe.
Avoid being hit by it’s horn, which deals severe damage and sends you flying high. Instead, try to dodge laterally and keep firing needles to dispose of the Rhino properly.
🐀 We recently added another new enemy. Check it out here:
We told you about the Dung Beetle in the last issue. Now it’s fully implemented and ready to go, so we’ve put together a little showcase for you to watch.
Lastly, we want to give you more glances into development over the coming weeks and months. As a first step, our new Speed Design series shows you how we build levels using relaxing timelapses.
In this first episode, it’s about Hideout, the scene used to create the Melee Showcase video.
🗨️ Tell us your opinion about the new format, so we can improve:
For too long, CACTUS lacked a properly staged player death sequence. This ends now!
If you die, you’ll now see a ragdoll Cactus being knocked across the scene, bouncing into objects while the camera follows and zooms along. Hopefully, this will numben the pain of failure a bit.
What's Next?
The coming month will be a hardening phase, where we beef up the first five levels and make them available to testers. Meanwhile, our artist will create even more enemies for our coder to implement.
We’ll also release news about industry events in 2024 soon. After all, putting the new stuff into your hands and receiving feedback is not only vital, but also good fun.
New Video Released The sad truth is that CACTUS lacked a properly staged player death sequence for too long. So we opted to change this and introduce you to it by staging a CACTUS vs. LIZARD battle! Previously, the fail screen immediately appeared upon death (which was a bit of a
The sad truth is that CACTUS lacked a properly staged player death sequence for too long.
So we opted to change this and introduce you to it by staging a CACTUS vs. LIZARD battle!
Previously, the fail screen immediately appeared upon death (which was a bit of a bore). The new death camera now follows and zooms along, as the ragdoll body of the CACTUS bounces across the scene, hitting various objects in painfully smackish ways.
One can only hope, that this ordeal numbens your pain of failure a bit.
New Video Released Due to popular request from you, we've now implemented a player melee attack ! No longer will you have to run away from pushy enemies, instead you just smack their faces and move along. It's also good fun to catch attacking Kangaroo Rats in mid-air :] See all o
Due to popular request from you, we've now implemented a player melee attack!
No longer will you have to run away from pushy enemies, instead you just smack their faces and move along. It's also good fun to catch attacking Kangaroo Rats in mid-air :]
See all of it in the video above and please tell us your feedback in the comments.
📖 Want to see how this showcase scene was built? Check this!
New Video Released We're starting a new behind-the-scenes video format called Speed Design! This series gives you a glimpse at development through entertaining timelapses showing the creation and setup of level architecture, lighting, effects and gameplay logic. In this first iss
We're starting a new behind-the-scenes video format called Speed Design!
This series gives you a glimpse at development through entertaining timelapses showing the creation and setup of level architecture, lighting, effects and gameplay logic.
In this first issue, we'll have a look at Hideout, a small scene we'll use to showcase a secret, upcoming player ability. But don't worry: the video won't spoil the surprise, as it only includes level construction, but no gameplay :]
📖 Check out our latest Devlog to learn more about development:
New Video Released This showcases introduces the Dung Beetle, covering: Intro teaser Description by the devs An intense combat demo 🎞️ Be sure to also check out our latest Progress Report: Watch Report Get In Touch Social Media : Twitter | Instagram | | TikTok | Threads | Facebo
A New Journey Ahead Hey folks! The whole team at Axon Flux wishes you a great start into 2024! As the team is rocking the lab again, we are planning our roadmap for the year, scheduling events, doubling down on video content and, of course, crushing through fresh levels, enemies
A New Journey Ahead
Hey folks!
The whole team at Axon Flux wishes you a great start into 2024!
As the team is rocking the lab again, we are planning our roadmap for the year, scheduling events, doubling down on video content and, of course, crushing through fresh levels, enemies and some cool features. Amongst these are a bunch of shiny new crystals that loosen up combat with some puzzles.
Apart from playing the demo or becoming a tester, creating videos is the best and closest way to convey game feel. So starting today, we’ll make our Progress Report videos a monthly format that also serves as an appetizer for each new devlog.
In addition, we’ll also create short Enemy Showcase videos for each new foe we add to the game. And of course, you can submit questions to the team via our Discord server, which will then be incorporated into the next issue of our Axon Questions format. So feel free to grill us to your likings.
🎞️ Never miss a video by subscribing to our YouTube channel:
Our game designer Jeremy is currently blocking out the fourth story level. This stage takes place in a jungle canyon, characterized by rocky cliffs, lush plants and a sparkling river.
Given, it takes some imagination to envision these elements when seeing the blockout images, but rest assured, that he’ll turn it into something neat. After all, the goal is to loosen up the orangish desert setting and provide visual variety in each level.
💡 Check our previous devlog to learn about the first story levels:
We’re hustling hard to introduce new enemies. Nils, our coder, has just finished implementing the Dung Beetle into the game.
This foe digs out of the ground at random locations and launches giant balls of disgusting dung at you. When encountered in groups, the dung beetle has the potential to turn the arena into a literal pinball machine of sh*t.
Luckily, it’s dung ball is faction-agnostic, which means it plows through enemy hordes just like it steamrolls the poor Cactus. In other words: chaos is pre-programmed.
Together with the Kangaroo Rat, Desert Turtle, Pondicherry Vulture and Stone Head, you can expect more dynamic, demanding combat situations in upcoming versions.
We’ve been pondering the question of making explosive needles suitable for puzzle gameplay for quite a while now. The answer came with the introduction of a new destructible object called Crystals.
These crystals are linked to objects, such as gates, which they trigger upon destruction. The trick is, that crystals only break when destroyed simultaneously, forcing the player to tag multiple crystals with needles and blow them up at the same time.
This will allow for some nice observe-and-search puzzles throughout levels, without dilluting the clear shooter DNA of the game. Meaning: these are brain teasers, not brain melters.
What's Next?
There’s still a lot to do!
In the next issue, we’ll update you on the next levels, the implementation of the mighty Desert Turtle enemy and a - currently top secret - new player ability that many of you have requested at events and playtests.
So stay tuned and blast through the first weeks of this new year!
New Video Released The first issue of 2024 covers: First trip to the dunes 2 new story levels 3 fresh enemies 1 automated killing device 📕 Next Devlog coming this Friday: Read Devlogs Get In Touch Social Media : Twitter | Instagram | | TikTok | Threads | Facebook For Players : G
Back To The Grind Our event-a-thon is over! (for now) After Gamescom, IFA, Hero Fest, Games Ground, Unite 23, Gamesweek and many stops in between, the team is back in the lab. But before 2023 comes to a close, we are putting our feet on the gas once more, creating story levels, a
Back To The Grind
Our event-a-thon is over! (for now)
After Gamescom, IFA, Hero Fest, Games Ground, Unite 23, Gamesweek and many stops in between, the team is back in the lab. But before 2023 comes to a close, we are putting our feet on the gas once more, creating story levels, adding new enemies, implementing vicious hazards and boosting our 2D art prowess with an exciting new internship.
⭐ Lastly, we also have a little Christmas surprise for you :]
There’s a lot to talk about, so let’s get down to it!
Say Hi To Robert
In the coming two months, our new intern Robert will create concept art for CACTUS. Since he studied at Games Academy with the founding team of Axon Flux, this reunion feels like a throwback to cherished times.
Robert comes from a tech art background, but recently committed himself to drawing rather than coding. This is a challenge in its own right, but having previously developed two games together, we are highly confident about the cooperation.
👉 If you’re interested in these games, you can get them for free:
As a first task, Robert is sketching out the Desert Turtle. This giant enemy catapults rocks from its back and stomps onto the ground, flattening anything underneath its weight. Of course, it already looks massive on the concept piece above, however, this will be outmatched by standing in front one of these in-game.
The goal is clear: CACTUS should feature 14 story levels, totalling in 5-6h of gameplay on a first run.
Achieving this is Jeremy’s task. Recently, he just finished the blockouts of levels 2 and 3, which will throw you into tense combat situations while exploring ancient ruins and vast, open dunes.
Pulling this off required mastery of our terrain tools, particularly regarding natural looking sandscapes. But it also exposed him to seemingly profane questions like “How to guide players in an open space?” and “What happens, should they venture off in the wrong direction?”.
Solving these issues calls for clear thought and careful consideration. Nonetheless, the shootouts amidst the wavy sand already provide a different experience than indoor combat and it’s good fun.
There is still a lot of work to do on this front, but we hope to put these levels into the hands of our community testers early next year.
🥼 Want to be first to test these new levels? Just hit us up:
Up to now, lizards were the only type of enemy you would encounter in CACTUS. But this is about to change as we’re integrating four new foes, all of which bring unique characteristics to the table.
Let’s have a brief look at each one of them:
Pondicherry Vulture
The vulture is our first airborne enemy. It is a ranged enemy that launches sharp feathers at you from afar. Given that it swarms the sky, this bird adds a dangerous vertical dimension to combat.
Kangaroo Rat
This little fellow hunts in groups, forcing you to watch your back. Since the rat has limited movement and can only rotate between jumps, it can be outmaneuvered quite easily though.
🔥 Want to see the raving rodent it in action? Watch this:
As the name implies, this big beetle rolls enormous dung balls at you, turning the battlefield into a pinball-like shitshow. Luckily, the poop steamrolls not only you, but also your enemies.
Stone Head
This one is less of an enemy than an environmental hazard. Once its eyes glow up, the Stone Head launches darts in regular intervals. You’re only hope is evade quickly or find a pressure plate to turn it off.
One Last Trip
Of course, we don’t want to finish this devlog without showing you some impressions of our concluding trip to Berlin and Amsterdam, encompassing the Games Ground and Unite 23 events.
In particular, we want to give a big shout to the team behind Games Ground, as this was the first edition of their new event. Not only did it exude the charm of a true indie game show, but also bolstered great talks, matchmaking sessions and an afterparty that was as Berlin as it gets.
Lastly, the team sat down to quickly answer a set of totally serious questions about the development of CACTUS and their personal lives. So hit that play button and enjoy!
What's Next?
Until Christmas, the team will finish any level greyboxes started, implement most of the enemies showcased today and prepare our agenda for next year. After that, it’s time to wind down and decimate the piles of shame we all accumulated on Steam.
In that spirit: Enjoy holiday season and see you in 2024!
To New Horizons Hey folks! Time seems to be flying lately! Against the background of a tumultuous year in the games industry and our autumn event-a-thon, we’re still diligently working on CACTUS. As a matter of fact, the game has recently entered the production phase, meaning we’
To New Horizons
Hey folks!
Time seems to be flying lately! Against the background of a tumultuous year in the games industry and our autumn event-a-thon, we’re still diligently working on CACTUS. As a matter of fact, the game has recently entered the production phase, meaning we’re finally building the actual story levels you’ll get to play once the full thing releases to the public.
Time to clarify some things and update you on our progress.
Let’s go!
Fresh Story Levels
Our designer Jeremy stepped his foot on the gas regarding story levels. After all, the goal is clear: Design and create the complete story campaign as completable greybox levels. This ensures that each of them can be playtested and iterated on as fast as possible, enabling Pierre to apply his artist magic to them.
The first level, called “Oasis” just reached this state, delivering a rudimentary proof of fun already. For this, Jeremy had to solve three major issues:
The level serves as the story introduction, so he had to clearly envision and leave space for narrative sequences, such as cutscenes.
Besides that, it’s also the tutorial of the game, teaching essential mechanics to players.
Lastly, the level is our first outdoor-first area, meaning Jeremy had to freshen up his terrain building skills.
It goes without saying that there is still a lot of work to do here. Nonetheless, sticking to simplicity is key when designing early versions of levels, so expect further updates in the near future.
Time For Heroes
Talking about our event-a-thon: Earlier this month, we had the opportunity to exhibit CACTUS at HeroFest in Berne and made some astonishing discoveries.
First of all, the reception was exceptionally good and the booth was occupied at all times. Secondly, the game seemed to attract people of all ages, both from the Fortnite generation, as well as veteran players that grew up with Wolf 3D and Doom. And lastly, particularly with regards to kids, the cactus appealed to both boys and girls equally, which led to the fun sight of families clustered around an FPS booth.
And of course, we won’t stop there. The next chance to meet us and play the game will be at Berlin Games Ground, starting on November 9th.
It goes without saying that Unity caused quite a ruckus over the past weeks. Just like any indie developer, we’ve pondered the question of switching our engine and ran tests with competitive products.
Ultimately, we’ve decided against a switch. Mainly because the cost of doing so mid-project would be higher than sticking to Unity. However, we have gotten involved in some open source projects and will evaluate creating our own engine fork, once we start planning out the successor.
So for now, we’ll bite the bullet and stay focused on delivering the game to you.
What's Next?
Besides preparing for Berlin Games Ground, our main focus will be creating more story levels as fast as possible. Meanwhile, Pierre is crafting fresh new enemies which you’ll soon get to see and our coder Nils is ramping up our custom A.I. systems to make said enemies more interesting and smart.
So I think it’s fair to say, that you should expect exciting new things in the near future.
After The Storm Hey folks! After a formidable event-a-thon, covering gamescom and IFA Berlin, we’re back in the lab. Although some of us caught a cold, we’re in good spirits to push CACTUS to the next level, meaning: it’s time to kick off the production phase and reach “content c
After The Storm
Hey folks!
After a formidable event-a-thon, covering gamescom and IFA Berlin, we’re back in the lab. Although some of us caught a cold, we’re in good spirits to push CACTUS to the next level, meaning: it’s time to kick off the production phase and reach “content complete” status (Beta) by Mid 2024.
Even though our excessive event hopping might imply that the game hasn’t received much attention lately, nothing could be further from the truth. As a matter of fact, we’ve made significant changes to the core loop, introducing a revamped active reload and heat system that encourages ability usage much more strongly.
In addition, our next demo will be completed soon. It will showcase the capabilities of our custom Axon Toolkit with regards to dynamic level architecture and sophisticated event scripting.
Let’s have a look at each one of these.
New Heat System
Previously, you would consume frenzy to trigger abilities. However, since the maximum frenzy cap was at three points, players only used abilities sparingly.
With the new Heat System, you can aggreggate more action points and even increase the maximum cap by finding certain upgrade items. This allows you to use certain abilities multiple times, such as triggering multiple blast shots in a row, turning the ability into the corridor sweeper it always should have been.
Manual Reload
Now this might come as a surprise: We’ve given up on automatic reloading. Instead, you can now initiate reloading using “R” (or any keybind of your choice), which gives a lot more control over detonations and ammo. And with the new heat system, spamming remains impossible.
What’s more, it allows us to design more interesting puzzles, such as tagging an explosive plant with a needle and detonating it to crush a wall.
Revamped GUI
While updating the heat system, we also took some time to update the corresponding GUI. Most visibly, there is a lot more color in use and states are better indicated. However, these changes really shine when seen in live motion.
New Demo
To showcase our custom toolkit, we’ve built a new demo for potential business partners. We also consider releasing it to our community sometime in the future. For now, we’ll provide you with some scenes that show, what you can expect from the final game.
Event Roundup
Apart from gamescom, we’ve also participated at IFA Berlin, including a keynote on CACTUS and the current state of the indie games scene. Of course, we also met fellow devs, friends and new faces, as well as big surprises such as the slick LVL venue, where we had a CACTUS booth.
So here are some impressions from our travels:
What’s Next?
Our next goal is to wrap up the demo and, by that, start the actual production phase of CACTUS. By that, we mean building the actual story levels that will make up the game you’ll get to play. So expect to hear more about this process over the coming weeks.
Getting Ready for the Show Hey everyone! Only three weeks until gamescom 2023, the biggest gaming expo worldwide. As previously stated, we’ve got two main goals there: find a publisher and meet new players. That’s why we’ve focused our attention on getting our marketing up to spe
Getting Ready for the Show
Hey everyone!
Only three weeks until gamescom 2023, the biggest gaming expo worldwide.
As previously stated, we’ve got two main goals there: find a publisher and meet new players. That’s why we’ve focused our attention on getting our marketing up to speed. As a result, we now have a new gameplay trailer, landing page and (obviously) we are on Steam now.
Meanwhile, Jeremy has run a user test during last weeks edition of the Swiss Game Hub monthly playtesting event, while Pierre is working on some fresh new enemies. You’ll get a sneak peek of them as well.
The trailer highlights gameplay scenes and showcases player abilities, while also sprinkling little hints about the lore of the game universe. Luckily, we’ve received help from a community member with cutting, so thanks a lot once more. Also, our composer Alex has produced the music specifically for this video.
After testing the game for almost one year on our itch.io account and together with our Discord community, we're now focusing Steam as our main channel. As part of this effort, the game can now be wishlisted. You can also request access to playtesting there.
Fresh Landing Page
To bundle all the information on the game in one single place, independent of platform, we’ve set up a dedicated website for CACTUS. It’s the best way to get a quick overview, see the trailer, check devlogs, find our social channels, add the game to your wishlist and share it with friends.
Playtesting Event
Last week, Swiss Game Hub hosted their monthly playtesting event. This is a showcase, where in-house and external devs bring in their games for guests to play. We were actually surprised, how many people played through the whole demo, as it’s quite long for the setting of a public event.
Either way, it was good fun and we’ll participate in the next edition as well. So feel free to drop in if you’re nearby.
Our artist Pierre is preparing the next enemies in line. For one, there’s the kangaroo rat, a trash mob that will attack in large quantities. It has a simple, predictable attack pattern.
Secondly, there’s the pondicherry vulture, which is still early in development. This will be our first airborne enemy, so implementing it will require some A.I. wizardry, as we currently only support terrestrial navigation.
What's Next?
There’s still a lot to do before we’re fully ready. Nonetheless, we’re looking forward to the event. After all, the reason why we’re doing this is to introduce CACTUS to as many new faces as possible and see what opportunities arise and where we can take the game. So come say hi in Cologne and let’s have a chat!
Launching Our Community Hey folks! We're building CACTUS, a fast-paced, unconventional FPS with a small team of dedicated indie developers. Starting today, we'll document our development process here on Steam. Time to tell you everything about it! You Are The Weapon Fight to save
Launching Our Community
Hey folks!
We're building CACTUS, a fast-paced, unconventional FPS with a small team of dedicated indie developers. Starting today, we'll document our development process here on Steam.
Fight to save your planet in this fast-paced single player FPS. Shoot explosive needles from your spiky body to wipe enemy hordes with timed detonations, explore the desert, solve puzzles, find artifacts, unlock special skills and battle against the horde.
A New Take On The Genre
This is a first-person shooter with abilities instead of guns.
There's infinite ammo, but reloading is a mini game. You're outnumbered, but your needles are explosive. It's fast like the classics, but will test your wits. Besides that, you're up against a planet full of aggressive creatures, lead by the ultimate overlord - the sun itself.
With CACTUS, we aim to fuse the best bits of retro shooter games with a modern, cartoony look and unite different generations of FPS fans.
🕹️ Check the official CACTUS site to learn more about the game:
We are Axon Flux, a Swiss indie game studio based in Zürich. The company was founded by two former co-workers that got to know each other during their studies at Games Academy in Berlin.
Our goal is to bring accomplishment to players by designing shorter, but more exciting games that value their time and money.
In other words: Exciting moment-to-moment gameplay instead of stretched-out slump.
🏢 If you want to know more about us, hit this button:
Starting now, we'll keep you up to speed through our community hub. To kick it off, we'll release edition #13 of our devlog series later today, here on Steam.
👥 We also invite all of you to join our Discord server. You can reach all the devs there and participate in development. It's also where our community testers report their feedback.
The big goal is to finish our schedule for gamescom and succeed with finding a publisher for CACTUS.
Meanwhile, the game is receiving lots of refinements, as we've recently implemeted a new set of tools that allow us to create highly dynamic gameplay situations. But more on that in another episode.
