Announcing the first game from Studio Umai! Play as a horse searching for their missing herd while a wild beast is on the loose.
Coming soon on Steam for PC and Mac.
I've updated the Resolute Bay Demo with some major changes to encounters and behaviours, and knocked off a few bugs in the process. Check it out!
The Resolute Bay demo is live in the Women's Day Sale event on Steam!
Try out the first 30 minutes of Resolute Bay on Steam 🥳!
Encounters in Resolute Bay are based on natural responses animals have to threats and danger. Here, I'm going to dig into the Fight-Flight-Freeze state mechanics.
A Resolute Bay travels to Resolute Bay in Resolute Bay.
## Encounters
### Behaviour Types
Behaviours now have their own types separate from the Fight/Flight/Freeze state you’re in. The new types are:
* **Neutral** - a standard behaviour that has no state affinities
* **Fearful** - works well against opponents in Flight
* **Aloof** - works well against opponents in Fight
* **Dominant** - works well against opponents in Fight or Flight
* **Confident** - the only type that has an advantage against opponents in Freeze!
### Learning Behaviours
After each encounter you’ll now learn all of the abilities your opponent used, not just a random one.
### Character Designs
I’ve redesigned all of the characters to have their own logic for what moves they’ll use in an encounter. This makes each encounter more like a mini puzzle to work out how to get opponents to use certain behaviours (so you can in turn learn them!).
### Player Attributes
After levelling up you can now assign points to the attributes you want to upgrade (Bravery, Resilience and Agility).
## Menu redesign
The menus have had a bit of an overhaul along the way, so it’s easier to see which characters you’ve encountered and how many of their behaviours you’ve learned. It should also be easier to find the behaviours you want in an encounter.
Mouse and keyboard support is also massively improved, with all menus now supporting keyboard navigation!
## Bug fixes
* Fixed issues where you could load out of bounds into a level
* Fixed crashing issues
* Fixed bug in applying user settings
* * *
If you want to try out the new updates, head over to the demo on Steam:
Play the Demo
Start your journey as the Resolute Bay with a free demo of the game, out now on Steam!
Play the Demo
The demo lasts around 30 minutes, and covers the beginning of the full game. Start searching for your herd, find new companions, learn new moves and maybe make some enemies along the way!
If you've finished the demo and want more Resolute Bay content before the game releases, sign up to the newsletter to access exclusive behind-the-scenes posts about the game's development.
## Behind the Scenes
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I'm thrilled to share that Resolute Bay is taking part in the Women's Day Sale event on Steam this week.
For those new to the game: Resolute Bay is a hand-drawn RPG where you play as a horse searching for your lost herd. You'll explore mountains, forests and plains, learn over 80 behaviours to use in turn-based encounters built around Fight, Flight and Freeze responses, make new friends, and hopefully find time to roll in the mud along the way! The demo covers the first 30-60 minutes of the game and is completely free to download on Steam.
Play the Demo
I'm so glad to be part of this event and have the opportunity to introduce Resolute Bay to players who might not have come across it yet, and to celebrate other women-led game development studios. Even if Resolute Bay isn't your thing, please go take a look at all the other games taking part in the event!
If you try the demo and enjoy it, the single most helpful thing you can do is add the game to your Steam wishlist. It's free, it takes seconds, and for an independent developer it has a real, tangible impact on how Steam treats the game at launch. Thanks!
Wishlist Resolute Bay
In Resolute Bay, characters will always be in a Fight, Flight or Freeze response state during an encounter. These states change how a character behaves during the encounter. In particular:
1. by changing the character's **underlying stats**(Bravery, Resilience and Agility)
2. by changing the character's **weaknesses and resistances** to different types of behaviours
3. by changing the **behaviours** the character is able to use
Fight, Flight and Freeze responses affect how a character behaves during an encounter
In general, the **Fight** state pushes a character towards **going on the offensive** while **Freeze** can be useful when you want to take a more **defensive approach**. **Flight** sits somewhere in between, giving characters a **turn order advantage** and access to **more technical behaviours**.
Bears tend to adopt a Fight response, but what happens when you put them into a Flight state...?
Like in real life, animals in Resolute Bay have a natural tendency towards one of the three response states. For example, bears default to a Fight response. However, an animal's state can change as an encounter plays out, such as in response to how much Resolve they have compared to their opponent.
As you progress in the game, you'll learn behaviours that can change states - you might even find yourself using all three within the same encounter!
> **So, are you team Fight, Flight or Freeze? Play the Resolute Bay demo to try all the states!**
Play the Demo
You can read more about Resolute Bay and its development here. Please consider adding the game to your wishlist on Steam if you are interested in playing when it releases!
Wishlist Resolute Bay on Steam!
Surprisingly (or perhaps not), coming up with a game name is quite tough.
My criteria:
* Something memorable
* Easy to pronounce
* Not too similar to an existing game
* Ideally have a subtle horse connection
I went back and forth on it for a long time before settling on something so I could get on with putting the Steam page up. _Cue not so subtle_ wishlist now_plea 🙏!_
So why Resolute Bay?
For the horsey folks, a Bay looks something like this:
Photo by Elisa Pitkänen / Unsplash
For everyone else, this is probably what comes to mind:
Photo by Iswanto Arif / Unsplash
No, not Bae...
One of the main game mechanics revolves around maintaining your resolve while depleting your opponent's until they back down. Kind of like health in most other games. So to win, our Bay needs to stay Resolute 💪.
A Resolute Bay fending off a Black Bear
And why is our Resolute Bay fending off bears...? To solve the mystery of their disappearing herd, who happened to last be seen at Resolute Bay.
A Resolute Bay gazing longingly across Resolute Bay
_Turns out Resolute Bay is also a real place, all the way up in the north of Canada:_
And so we have our Resolute Bay who's travelling to Resolute Bay in Resolute Bay.
## More behind the scenes content?
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