Orion Trail

Great news! Orion Trail received an Honorable Mention in Excellence in Narrative by the Independent Games Festival. We’re so tickled by this award, we could do a dance.

If you’ve always wanted the experience of sitting in the captain’s chair of an intergalactic space ship, then your wait is over! You can now experience Orion Trail in virtual reality on the Samsung Gear VR. Players will experience the same core gameplay found in the original version, but the game’s interface and characters have been adapted for a VR environment. Orion Trail VR is available on the Oculus Store.

A few names did slip through, so we’ve been fixing those as we find ‘em.

If you backed us during the campaign, contact us on Kickstarter.

(This was cross-posted from our Kickstarter page)

Exciting news, space-friends. Things are heating up in the cold vacuum of space. Have I used that one before? Probably. I don’t care, I’m super pumped to let you in on the latest developments for Orion Trail.

Orion Trail leaves Early Access on October 12th!

Warpin’ Weasels! It’s happening!

It feels like only yesterday that we were a prototype on Steam Greenlight. I guess time really does fly when you’re hurtling through space at the speed of light. Or something.

We’ve been in Early Access for about two months now and have received some great feedback for how to improve the game. Having acted on (and continuing to act on) that feedback, we’re confident that releasing the game to the greater public is the next step for us.

Here’s a breakdown of what this means:

On October 12th, we’ll be leaving Steam Early Access. All Early Access keys (activated or not) will still work and give you a full copy of the game.

People who have been waiting for their DRM-free copy of the game will get their first for-real build. This will likely be through the Humble Store, but we’ll let you know.

Just because we’re launching doesn’t mean we will stop supporting the game. We’ll be adding new (free) content to the game, fixing bugs, and still responding to feedback for at least a month after our official launch.

… But what about Hunting / [other cool feature]?

When we were preparing for the Kickstarter, Hunting was one part of the game that we refused to cut, until it became obvious to us that the money needed with the Hunting mini-game wasn’t going to be realistic to ask for.

So, we were forced to make a tough choice: do we risk the project not getting funded, or do we feel confident enough that the game can be strong enough on its own without shooting at space buffalo? Ultimately, after a lot of discussion, we believed that the game has enough to bring to the table without it, even though it could compromise what it means to be a “trail” game.

We hear your desire for skill-based mini-games, and believe us, we want them, too. If we get enough interest in the game after launch, we’ll be looking for ways to try and make features like hunting a reality. So, tell your friends about our impending launch and help us get there! Those space jackalopes aren’t going to phaser themselves.

Keep letting us know what you like and don’t like about the game. We’re listening, and want to make it better!

The T-Shirts have arrived!

Seriously! They’re here!

It’s been a long time coming, but they’ve all arrived in the studio late last week, and we’re getting ready for a big packin’ party here at the studio. We’ll let you know when they’re in the mail!

Upcoming Build: Trading Posts

Mike hinted at this a few weeks ago, but this next build will have the first incarnation of Trading Posts appearing in our Starmaps! The structure is similar to an Away Mission, and you’ll be able to trade your less-needed resources for stuff that you’re running out of. Plus, they look super cool on the Starmap.

Stream Tomorrow (9/25/15) at 2:30PM!

Tomorrow is Friday, which means it’s time for another stream! Tune in and check out a preview of the next build on our Twitch Channel. It’ll be funzies.

Whew. That was exhausting. That's all for this update.

Keep on keepin' on, space pals. We'll be in touch very soon.

Why hello there. Long time no blog.

We’ve been continuing to plug away at the game over the past week, workin’ on adding new content, polishing up the UI, transitions, and adding some fun flair to the Star Map.

Oh,  also, we’ve enabled Steam Cloud support for your save data, which’ll make switching between machines that much easier.

In other news, we’ve been keeping a keen eye on balance. Specifically, we’re hoping to give you guys more of a reason to pick options that aren’t necessarily your best stat. Our first attempt at this was restricting your choices based on which resources you do or don’t have, but I think we can do better.

In many cases, there are encounters where options will give you rewards based on the options you pick. However, we’re not showing you what said rewards are. So, we’re planning to add a little bit to the UI to call the rewards for each option you can pick.

However, we’re keenly aware that we don’t want to flood the UI with too much information, so we’re treading very lightly. Expect to see these changes either in the next update, or the one following it, along with some cool additions of content. Mike talked about trading posts, and they’re just about ready to be added in the coming weeks!

That’s all for this time!

We hear you! Sometimes it really seems that way doesn’t it? That’s kind of the problem with random things. They’re just so... well.. random!

We’ve heard from lots of you who are looking for a few opportunities along the trail to make some strategic choices and to briefly escape the whims of the probability drive. We’re working on some systems that will do just that. We want to give our intrepid captains a chance to flex their intrepid brains and manage some of those precious resources themselves.

We’re playing around with some way to incorporate trading posts and rest stops along the way. The idea here is that it will allow you to spend some of one resource that you’ve got in surplus to get one you’re low on. Now we’re not going to promise you that you’re going to find traders that have what you want. You’re going to have to have a little luck and a little skill in order to get, recognize, and act on a good deal when you see one.

Hey, OT community!  New Space Writer, here!

I'm WAY excited to have just been assigned to work on Orion Trail. I love this project, I personally backed it, and I love warp weasels even though I'm allergic to them (*sneeze*). 

Prior to Orion Trail I did narrative design for PlayForward: Elm City Stories, combat dialogue for Tunnel Tail, narrative and other design for Lionel Battle Train, I composed the menu music for GumTrix, and I just wrapped two years providing content for our Lexica project, which includes The World of Lexica: Unbound and The World of Lexica: Seeker.  

Orion Trail will be an adjustment, because sometimes I'm asked to "dial down the silly." Here's a game where the directive is "be silly." I'm not really seeing a downside here. I have something "meteor" to sink my proverbial teeth into. (Hey. I'm easing into it, okay?)

I want to thank Orion Trail for adding me to the project because I'm famous in the studio for barfing when I use a VR headset. I wish I were kidding. Whenever one of our VR projects needs to make sure it can withstand motion sickness, they call in the Puke Tester. That's me. I've learned to only schedule those meetings before lunch. Being on Orion Trail means less time Puke Testing, so thanks, you guys! But, I digress. 

My assignment here is to write fun missions for you folks, whether you backed our Kickstarter (thank you!) or whether you are coming to the game for the first time after release. If my narrative lunacy makes any of you smile, I'll consider that a job well done. It's why I'm in this crazy business. Thanks for playing, and see you in spaaaaaaaaace!

~Heidi (DeathBow)

So, we’re out there in Early Access right now and something has become clear to us from watching let’s plays and twitch streams and just reading forum posts and comments. There are not enough burgers in space!

We accidentally created a situation where food was the scarcest thing in our game. This caused our players to have to choose only encounters that gave food rewards if they wanted to stay alive. Not only does that make the choice less interesting, it also limits the encounters that a player will see quite a bit.

In our next build, we’re reducing the amount of food that is consumed during travel. We’re also adding randomly occurring events (“your ox has dysentery”, that kind of thing) that can reward (or punish) you as you travel between planets. Our hope is that this will let you explore the planets that are interesting to you without worrying about starving all the time.

via GIPHY

Greeting Orioneers! 

You probably already know this, but in case you don’t... well... you soon will! We have released Orion trail on Steam Early Access slightly ahead of schedule.

Our intrepid Kickstarter backers are already venturing forth into our (partially complete) space adventure and we’re getting lots of great notes from them. We’ll pushing an update to deal with some of the balance issues that have come light very soon.

This is a very exciting time for us here on team Orion Trail. We’ve been working hard getting this game together for months now and it’s hard to overstate the joy of sharing it with people. The feedback we get in Early Access will be critical in helping the game reach its final released form. If your playing it already, thanks! If you playing it AND talking to us about it.. double thanks!

If you want to help us shape the game, jump in now. We can’t wait to hear from you.

Absolutely! We’d love it if you did. 

As Orion Trail is speedily coming to its developmental conclusion, my time at Schell Games is also reaching a close. As a relatively new face to the game design and development scene, it was an incredible experience working as close as I did with the Orion Trail team. They were always quick to help with any problem that I might have had, which made collaboration run seamlessly.

My time spent with Orion Trail gave me a far greater appreciation for the detail-driven nature of game development. Every facet of a game, regardless of how seemingly small it may be, affects how people perceive and ultimately enjoy the game. The alterations of the finish screen and results spinner led me to the realization that the driving force behind an intuitive game is the hours spent fine tuning and reviewing its particular details.

Also, the creation of Orion Trail from start to finish was much more collaborative that I had originally anticipated. It is astounding that the many individual aspects of the game that are being worked on at once complement each other as well as they do when put together. At any given time in development, there could be animations being produced, art being developed, the mechanics of an encounter being reviewed, while the producer pieces everything together and keeps the team on track. Every member of the team works at such a high level in their respective fields yet are approachable and especially passionate about everything that they do. The only thing greater in numbers than the hours spent on Orion Trail was the number of smiles on the face of everyone involved on the project.

What is left to do for the game includes distributing the soundtrack, ironing out all of the last minute development particulars, and setting up the purchase page on Steam. With the majority of the actual game development behind us, all that is left is to promote and enjoy what has been an exceptionally fun game to see progress and flourish. Although this may mark the end of voyage with the Orion Trail team, I can’t wait to get my hands on the finished game, which should provide me with entertainment for plenty of time to come.

Every year, a week of the summer at Schell Games is declared Jam Week, where everyone here is given the chance to form teams and work on a new project or program that they otherwise wouldn’t. In fact, Orion Trail was a product of Jam Week last year, and was so exciting that Schell Games decided to help fund and promote the project. This year during Jam Week, a few members of the Orion Trail team decided that they would spend this week adding some features to the game that couldn’t be fit into the regular development schedule.  

(Pictured Above: Galaxy Map)

The biggest addition to Orion Trail was the Galaxy Map, which rewards players who complete the game multiple times. With this exciting new feature, players now have to conquer a plethora of missions of varying difficulty. In your campaign across the universe, your goal is now to complete each mission which will unlock the next mission on the map.

(Pictured Above: Demo Mission Select Screen)

In the demo version, you only had the choice of several limited missions with seemingly no relation. In the updated version, it is clear that each successive mission is essential to your overall quest. The end goal is to have a series of progressively more difficult missions, each with mission specific encounters. With development of this feature completed, the playable universe will be vastly increased in scale and in diversity of content.

So you’ve done it! You have overcome all of the treacherous obstacles that the Orion Trail has thrown your way while keeping your ship, crew, and other resources on point. But exactly how well did you do? This past week, the Orion Trail finish screen was optimized to be far more simple and readable.    

The demo version of the finish screen was numerically driven, in a similar manner to the original spinner. In the earliest end screen, players’ scores were calculated using their remaining stats and resources, which would combine into a seemingly meaningless numeric sum. As development progressed, it became evident that players needed a finish screen that better reflected each individual journey on the Orion Trail.

(Pictured: Demo Finish Screen)

The new finish screen implements a more imaginative reward system, by replacing the total score with a title. Not only does this new screen provide you with a ranking, but it gives you an itemized report of everything you completed along the way including space encounters, events, away missions, and graves. Additionally, in the memory of the brave redshirts lost in your interstellar quest for greatness, players are provided with a list of “Orbituaries.” This new system allows for a clearer understanding of your results, and makes comparing performances much more straightforward.

(Pictured: New Finish Screen)