Five years ago, our development team launched Gremlins, Inc. on Steam in Early Access.
Since then, we released over 100 game updates that introduced new content and new features, as well as balanced the existing mechanics, and it seems like you guys have appreciated it: Gremlins, Inc. is now owned by over 700.000 players on Steam, and a thriving player community that we love dearly.
When we designed and developed the game in 2014-2015, we were rather naive. Thankfully, with the feedback from the community and through constant game updates, we were able to wisen up along the way, improving the game based on what players enjoyed the most. And you’ll be happy to know that the whole of this year we were working on the tools that will allow us to improve the game further, and in a much more radical way than before!
Some surprises that we discovered in the last 5 years:
- Less than 20% of Gremlins, Inc.'s audience speaks English as their native language; most players speak the other 12 languages that the game supports (from Japanese to French). We grew up thinking that English language and American market are responsible for the success of any game, but this does not apply to our case!
- 50% of all sessions played in Gremlins, Inc. are played in single-player mode. When we released the game in 2015, it didn’t even have single-player mode! But once we realised that this is what players want, we rolled it out – and it’s been in much demand. Today we make two big steps forward with this mode (details below).
- Goodwill can move mountains. Like many young developers, we weren’t very flexible at the beginning, and the more people criticised our decisions, the harder we stuck to them. But then, an amazing thing happened: a friendly community of players from Japan, Russia, China and other countries sprang up, and asked for the same things… nicely! So instead of explaining how “this cannot be done!”, we started looking for solutions, and found a way to make almost everything happen.
And now let’s go over the major changes that come with today’s Autumn Update as well as with the new DLC “Agents of Chaos”:
SPECIAL 5TH ANNIVERSARY CONTENT
As always, we see the game’s birthday as a chance to give you something back!
- To celebrate the 5th anniversary of Gremlins, Inc. on Steam, we commissioned a new original music track from A.Fruit which sends you back in time to the earlier days of the game. “Nostalgic tune” will be available to everyone in the game for the next two weeks, at which point it will transition to an item that you can get for free from the in-game chests.
- We also asked our artists, Monika and Rita, to create a new main menu background that features some of the favourite gremlin items from the cards in the deck. Everyone will see this background in the game for the next two weeks, and then it also becomes a free drop. See if you can spot every object in this background, and identify the card that it comes from!
BOTS 2.0
It’s no secret that AI bots occasionally made some unexpected moves in the game. We finally got around to updating their logic, and correcting a bunch of mistakes that they typically made in complicated situations!
- the bots are now generally smarter – beware!
- bots no longer discard their starting hand at the start of the session
- bots are now much more careful when choosing Misfortunes: they will choose the worst possible Misfortune for their opponent, and the best possible for themselves
- bots now better understand the rules of different spots and locations: for example, if they have money to spend, they will pay to increase their chances of success on Tribune, and they will generally stop entering locations where they cannot achieve any meaningful result
- when bots plan their way around the playing field, they now take into consideration whether or not there’s a Misfortune spot on the way; moreover, if the session is played with open Misfortunes, then the bots will actually consider the Misfortune that’s expected to happen to them along the way
- bots are now more conscious of their income, and will try to match the income of other players by investing more aggressively at the Bank
- most importantly, bots are now much better at judging the other players and identifying the most dangerous opponents!
We hope that you will enjoy Bots 2.0 in single-player challenges as well as in your multiplayer sessions where these bots will now replace human players that dropped out.
RANKED LADDER 2.0
During the last 2 months, we discussed with the community the change in how rating points are calculated in all ranked sessions (details). As the result of a very constructive discussion, we agreed that for all duel sessions the old rules will remain in force; while for sessions with 3 or more players, the new rules come into force from November 1, 2020.
MODDING TOOLS & UPDATED CARD DESCRIPTIONS
We continue to work on the advanced modding tools that will allow everyone to change not only the values and the effects of the cards, but also values and effects of characters, spots and location, and we’ve made great progress on this direction. The tools are already working properly here at the studio and we need just a bit more time to translate them and prepare them for the public release. This will allow the community to create such custom sessions as we’ve never seen before!
As a part of the preparation work, we’ve re-written a lot of card descriptions, because they must now be flexible enough to allow modifications. For example, a description that said “Skip your next turn” becomes “Skip turns: {X}”, because through the modding tools you will soon be able to set it to skipping 2, 3 or more turns, if you wish – and so on, across the whole deck. Don’t be alerted when you spot these changes, and please let us know on the Discord server if you find some mistakes!
NEW CARDS
“Honorary escort” and “Dice-roller” are now in the game!
“Honorary escort”
Location: Police spot
Cost: $150
Move points: 4
Type: Secret
Get: ːmaliceː +1
Special rule:
Choose an opponent. Teleport to their spot or location.
“Dice-roller”
Location: Gamble spot
Cost: $50
Move points: 3
Type: Normal
Special rule:
Roll the dice. Get $100 for each card in your hand that has the same number of move points as the number on the dice.
CHANGES IN SPECIAL CHARACTER ABILITIES
After long community discussions, the Banker gets a whole new set of abilities:
Personal cashback
When you spend $ to play a card, you immediately get back 20% of the amount paid.
Instant dividends
When you use the Bank to increase income, you immediately get back 100% of the amount paid.
Money makes money
When your income is increased through any means, it additionally increases by 3.
Sale of shares
When you land on a Bribe spot, you can sell 10 income for $100 (income that you receive due to active permanent cards cannot be sold). If you do that, you don't pay the bribe.
These new abilities are significantly more flexible, and will allow us to fine-tune them further once we see the statistics of how this character is used after the change. These abilities also allow players more freedom when playing for the Banker as this character’s income is now no longer so much tied to the specific spot of Income and the specific location of the Bank.
CHANGES IN CARDS
False Testimony
The effect of this card got somewhat weaker. The player of your choice no longer loses money and will be arrested only if their ːmaliceː is higher than yours.
Demon’stration
The effect of this card now scales with the number of players in the session, which makes the card more versatile and balanced for the specific session where it’s used.
Devil’s Due
With the change, this card gets the flexibility that was requested by the community for a long time. Now you choose the specific resources that the player of your choice loses, so you can use this card to achieve different goals depending on the context.
The Common Fund
This change is not as significant as the other changes above and just harmonises the mechanics. Now the money is issued at the start of each player’s turn, rather than at the start of the round.
AGENTS OF CHAOS
We haven’t released a new DLC since 2017, but with the 5th anniversary of the game coming up – and with the major progress that we achieved with the modding tools and with the updated AI bots, – we finally were able to do something experimental: “Agents of Chaos” brings you a new single-player campaign that contains 12 duels with modified decks and cards as well as with modified playing field rules. Previously, such a thing was simply impossible to dream of!
In addition to the campaign, this DLC also gives you the following unique items:
- 12 new character portraits and player tokens of gremlins transformed into Agents of Chaos
- “Trail of Chaos“, probably the most dangerous token trail in the game
- “The Governor of Chaos“, a Governor frame that inspires both fear and respect
- “Touch of Chaos“, a unique emoticon that illustrates the transformation of a regular gremlin into something more sinister!
- “Gates of Chaos“, a new original main menu background
- “The Beat of Chaos“, a new original music track that packs as much of a punch as all the other tracks combined!
- “Agent of Chaos“, a medal for player profile that is yours to keep to scare away potential trouble-makers.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1438000/Gremlins_Inc__Agents_of_Chaos/
If you enjoy Gremlins, Inc., you can support our further development efforts by purchasing this DLC – we rely on the sales to continue updating the game with new features and new content!
WHAT’S NEXT?
Over the coming months, we’re going to be busy with a number of things:
- preparing the modding tools for release to the community: it’s a big task, but we’re going to get it done, so that you can try to bend the mechanics of Gremlins, Inc. whichever way you want!
- creating two new cards for the Winter Update. If you have some ideas, please share on the game’s official Discord server!
- prototyping a possible new DLC tentatively set for February 2021, which may transport gremlins into… cyberpunk Japan! We’re still exploring the possibility: think of aesthetics of Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Yokohama and Kobe, think about Japanese heavy metal, neon signs, and an ambience straight from AKIRA… done in close coordination with the Japanese community of the game. Would this be something up your valley? Please let us know in the comments!!
With this, we wish you and your families to stay safe, and to join us in celebrating 5 years of Gremlins, Inc. on Steam – here’s to 100 more game updates, and here’s to reaching 1 million players one day, and here’s to 5 more years on the platform!
With thanks and lots of love from Vilnius Old Town,
The development team of Charlie Oscar