Howdy folks, welcome to our last update for 2016! It's been a crazy year for us and we'd thought we'll take a look back on how far BUCK has actually come since our Kickstarter Launch on June 23rd.
June 23rd - July 23rd 2016 | BUCK returns to Kickstarter!
After a long and arduous journey to keep BUCK alive after our first Kickstarter attempt in 2014, we managed to hold it all together and re-launch our Kickstarter campaign with a playable demo! The demo launched with the level of Oldtown and absolutely no melee combat. We've managed to add the first iteration of the melee combat system during the actual Kickstarter, which was quite challenging, to say the least. And thanks to all of you guys, we made it this time! ♥
July 23rd - August 23rd | BUCK debut appearance in gaming conventions
Taking a short break after an intense month on Kickstarter, we found ourselves being invited to local gaming industry events. We've met a lot of new fans, players and other indie developers who've heard of the Kickstarter and were eager to give BUCK a shot. The experience of hosting a booth in gaming conventions was very important for us since we've got some big and popular conventions to attend in 2017 (More on that in our next update).
August 23rd - September 26th | Kickstarter Early Access Build goes live!
All of the backers who chose to receive the Early Access build for BUCK got their game keys! Your feedback on our forums was and still is fantastic. We try to improve the game in every update we deploy and we couldn't have possibly done it without you!
This build added two completely new areas (Junkyard and Gutless Gulch) with a new mission to set out and find the illusive Nibbler the savager.
We've tested the combat items feature alongside a new UI for the Fast-Travel system. All the new additions can be seen in our short video overview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pR6xV7gw74A
September 26th - October 24th | Even more game updates and conventions
As development continued we've started adding some of your pets into the game! Making these is perhaps one of the most rewarding things we got to do as designers. Taking you pets personality and trying to adapt it into a single character is extremely challenging, but it's also really fun.
Alongside backer pets making the way into the game we've also added Elevators and Switches to our existing levels, a feature we plan to rely on much more in newer levels.
We've also participated in Microsoft's own local gaming conference called "GameIN" Where thousand of players came to play the latest games and experience a multitude of Indie titles, with BUCK garnering lots of attention and positive feedback.
We've also started working on the new Town Hub level called Deadwood.
October 24th - November 30th | Early Access updates, backer pets and pre-orders
We deployed the second major update to the Kickstarter Early Access build and added a ton of new UI features, game balance tweaks and even more backer pets.
All in-game interactions used a text UI that was completely replaced with icons:
We've also added the initiate test of the Weapon Locker System hat will allow the player to manage his weapon slots when additional weapons are introduced in 2017:
November 30th - December 31 | Shop functionality
Due to some delays that arose from our previous build, adding the shop into the game took longer than expected. The good news is that we'll have it in-game by the end of this week.
We're also working on a new trailer and additional cinematics to release with our Steam Early Access launch:
2017 is going to be a big year for BUCK. We plan to reach Steam Early Access near the end of February. By then we're hoping to have the weapon customization and crafting systems up and running. We'll roll out one last Kickstarter Early Access update with these systems to get your feedback on them before BUCK is finally made playable for everybody on Steam.
2016 was one heck of a ride and 2017 is shaping up to be one amazing year for us. We couldn't have done it without you! Thank you for supporting our dream and for helping BUCK make it so far into it's development.
Sincerely,
Gal, Amir, Adi and Bucky.