Below the Stone - A Pixelart Caving Roguelike about Dwarves
Created by Strollart Studios
A hand-drawn pixel art roguelike about dwarves, mining, and resource gathering.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Below the Stone public demo available!
10 months ago
– Wed, Jul 19, 2023 at 12:35:38 PM
It's finally here!
Glorious bearded brothers, and mining Ms. , and all the dwarves in-between -- You heard that right! Below the Stone's demo is now available on Steam and GOG! We're all very proud to reveal the game to you guys and to hear what everyone here thinks of what we put together. We plan on releasing Early Access sometime in the near future, and getting rewards sent out at the same time as Early Access.
You've all been incredibly loyal fans to what this vision of a game is. We want to thank each and every one of you for being patient with us, and giving us the time to work on this for you guys.
Let us know what you think, and please report any bugs or issues on our Discord Page. I'll be keeping this post short and sweet so you can waste less time reading me, and more time enjoying the game we made for you! Thank you for the bottom of my heart for sticking with us. I say it time and time again, but all our supporters here are truly the moral support that keeps this team going.
Something big on the horizon
11 months ago
– Sat, May 27, 2023 at 08:53:19 AM
The team has been hard at work on a demo.
First appearances are important for a game like ours, and we've been hard at work on perfecting the image of our demo coming in the next few months.
Many new things have been added, improved, and polished in an effort to make Below the Stone the kind of game we'd want our younger selves to enjoy.
We've been putting something very special together for everyone here and across the internet. We're going to be giving a few lucky individuals a sneak-peek preview of Below the Stone before we release the official demo on Steam!
If you'd like to take part in this, please fill out the form below. By signing this, you have a chance to be randomly selected to take part in a Discord call. In this call, we will be taking careful notes while you play an early, pre-launch version of the game. All input is appreciated and welcomed, as it helps us improve the game even more.
All we need is name, email, and discord tag. Additional comments improves changes on selection
Below the Stone is being invited to The Greater Philadelphia Expo Center once again to meet old and new fans, and show an early demo of the game. We plan on having the entire Below the Stone team there this time -- So this will be a once in a lifetime chance to meet the entire team together. We will also be hosting a panel to speak about what we learned when joining the game industry, and our advice on what helped us make it to where we are today.
Thank you for all of your support, I will be closing this update with pictures from TooManyGames 2022. Please remember to sign up, and keep your eyes peeled for updates on our Discord.
Day 1 at TMG
Always nice having celebrities drop by
Day 2 at TMG
People seem to dig this little dwarf game!
Day 3: We won top 3 indie games at the show!
Below the Stone Dworf ⛏️ next to The Newton Mystery Kitty 🐈
Closing: Us with the devs of The Newton Mystery -- We won third and second place at the show!
Thank you, and hope you're diggin' everything this indie team is putting together.
Below the Stone - Locking in Addresses soon!
about 1 year ago
– Mon, Apr 03, 2023 at 11:27:08 PM
Locking in Addresses sometime in the near future.
Hey guys!
I wanted to send out a quick update regarding our Kickstarter rewards. Much of what we're sending out has been created already, but we still have a few custom-made items that are being produced as we speak. Some of these include the music CD, Artbook, and the physical copy of the game which will be stored on a custom-made USB.
The artbook will contain several sections, including a Forward written by myself as the lead artist, early concept art, illustrations, characters and creatures, environments, conventions + photos, and credits to all our amazing kickstarter supporters!
Here are a couple early pages.
More will come soon, and a digital artbook will also be created for you guys to enjoy as you wait for the physical copies to ship out! We want to ship these items out when Below the Stone enters Early Access, which the date is still pending, with an intent to announce this alongside a new trailer which will be coming out! We also aim to have a public demo very soon on Steam for everyone to play.
Keep your inbox open for the news! We want it to be a surprise.
I hope you all look forward to it, and what we're creating for you guys~.
Thank you for everything you've done for myself and the Strollart Team. Your amazing pledges to our project has made what we are doing now possible.
- Mike @ Strollart; Below the Stone
Kickstarter Devlog 11: UI updates and preparing for Demo!
about 1 year ago
– Tue, Feb 21, 2023 at 09:42:30 AM
BACKERS: Locking in orders on Backerkit & Kickstarter!
We plan on locking all orders sometime at the beginning of March. 95% of our supporters have filled our Backerkit Survey -- Make sure to check your email, and update any information such as shipping location if you had moved recently!
(2-4minute read)
Art updates:
Inspired by Studio Ghibli
Dust sprites will be a passive creature you find in the darkness of the caverns. They are curious creatures which may follow you around, and if harmed, poof into a cloud of obscuring dust. They may also take an arrow for you if you are nice to them!
Purple mushroom men are another friendly face you can find in the shallow layers of the caves. They are friendly creatures which offer a source of light outside of your regular light sources you make yourself! This is an effort on our part to make sure even if a player enters the caves unprepared, there is some level of back up!
We're doing more and more work with the biomes we currently have, making sure they are polished for both the demo and Early Access!
PRIVATE DEMO!
We plan on having a closed demo for all our Tester supporters! We've done several demos before which you have received in your emails, but this is going to be a limited time opportunity for us to receive your input directly. Please fill in the information below if you'd like to take part in a 1-on-1 test with one of the lead developers to get your input on the game before its release.
By signing this, you have a chance to be randomly selected to take part in a Discord call. In this call, we will be taking careful notes while you play an early, pre-launch version of the game. All input is appreciated and welcomed. https://forms.gle/gCNzh8oF5yKZEPsMA
JUNE PUBLIC DEMO!
Later, we want to do a Public demo this year in June, followed by our Early Access release in ~July!
Public Demo plans:
- Streamline UI (in progress)
- Add all Layer 1 biomes (in progress)
- Dungeon structure gen additions (in progress)
- Dialogue and tutorial reworks to guide new players
- Final enemy additions
Interface updates:
We recently welcomed a new developer on Below the Stone, Dean, who has helped us immensely on the new crafting UI. After many of you had suggested we update the blacksmith crafting design, we put together a list of our top suggestions --
- Crafting multiple items at a time
- "Search"/Filter functions
- Crafting tabs
- "Craft max" button
- Conveniently show how many items you have
- Show how many of an item is needed to craft a batch.
For weeks we spoke about the design and how it could be done, and Dean made it happen. This is a preview of what we got!
We also made sure to update the Journal, an important feature in Below the Stone for players to record their progress and creatures they have encountered thus far! Player statistics will also be stored here.
As you can see, the "bat" is the reason game development is never easy.
Reward updates:
Sticker set that will be coming to you guys in the mail and in your Big Boxes!
Featuring @DIGGYVT's artwork! I wanted to make these stickers extra special and feature original new artwork professionally done by a special person in our community, so who better than DiggyVT!
We still have several more things to order, which are being planned and put together as we write this! Last on the list to create are the following:
Physical copy of the game: A physical edition of the game stored on a custom BtS USB!
Shirts: Will be ordered next.
Instruction booklets/pages for physical game: Will be written and produced this year.
Art book: I will be titling: "Below the Stone, Alpha Art Edition" Which will describe some of the tales of development, and showing the evolution of the art of the game.
Closing:
Despite the short time span, there is still quite a lot our little team needs to accomplish to get ready for our demo and Early Access, so Please join us on Discord and Twitter if you have any suggestions or simply want to follow our development as we go into release.
Again, thank you all for your amazing support.
- Mike @ Strollart; Below the Stone
Kickstarter Devlog 10: The year 2023 -- The year of Below the Stone
over 1 year ago
– Sun, Jan 08, 2023 at 03:18:13 AM
This year we plan on making Below the Stone the game that thousands will dig their time into.
(3-5 minute read)
Below the Stone is on track to release THIS YEAR! Yes I said it -- THIS YEAR. To be saying that is both exciting and surreal. To imagine we would be putting all our work out there for the world to enjoy is a monuments accomplishment that we couldn't do without our fans and supporters here on Kickstarter & Patreon. Without any further delay, here is just some of the things we have been working on to prepare for launch.
General updates:
We recently had roughly a dozen playtesters try Below the Stone to assure we're on the right path to making sure the game will be as fun as possible for when we plan on releasing. We had a few bugs and gameplay improvement issues, but mainly, testers had a huge amount of fun, and we hope to make it even more fun and long lasting for when it finally gets into our fan's hands.
We also recently added new mission types (kill quests), generation adjustments, several new enemies, and a ton of general game improvements.
Early look at 'Biome rings" generating from the center, where players spawn, to the ends.
Along with all this, the Cave Troll is finally in the game, but in an early state. We will be adding a boss room to dungeons to allow for the cave troll to have a more 'full' boss fight experience we plan on giving him. He will be voiced by the amazing memester Kyle Blessious, a hugely talented voice actor with years of experience in entertainment online and on radio -- More to come on this!
Art updates:
The art must flow! Below the Stone is a game about variety, so we need to make sure we keep pumping out more and more enemies to oppose novice dwarven explorers down in the undergrounds! Here is just a few new creatures, with many more in the works!
Human skeleton warrior. More on this soon!
Mimics are planned to be one of the next creatures our new team member, Eric, will be working on. These chests like to get their jaws on both treasure, and treasure seeking dwarves! Their fast movement will be the bane of many adventurers. One will need to be very careful how they deal with them, particularly with other enemies about.
Stone golem has had a new animation added for when he attacks. Pixel amazingness by our new artist, Matt! He will be crashing the ceiling down with his new 'ground pound' ability. Watch out for falling rocks!
Many testers and people who played the Below the Stone demo said they loved exploring the small 'mini-dungeons' that were placed around the caves. With this in mind, I had put together plans for a potential feature that could be coming to a caving roguelike near you -- The Crypt/Catacomb.
In the current version of the game, these structures that spawn are usually 1-3 rooms, nothing much to explore, but expanding on their idea and adding theming would be to make the structures something more to adventure through, with hallways and many rooms with treasure and tombs to disturb and find!
Plans for 2023:
We plan on making 2023 the release year of Below the Stone, where we will finally publicly release the game to the world! In 2022, Below the Stone was introduced to literally millions at events like PAX, OTK Expo, and more, so we have a lot to live up to. We want to make sure the game is not only fun, but in a state where people can spend hours a day playing, and still have more to go -- which can be difficult to balance sometimes when the mid-game and end-game content is still in the works.
We'd want to release the game in such a way that at least 2 Floors of the caverns are available at Early Access launch. This is to make sure we have as much content for players to explore, while also giving us time as developers to make sure the additional floors we add will be just as fun and thrilling!
Updates on rewards:
Big box art by our original animation artist, Kevin!
Nearly done the Kickstarter Box art -- This piece was VERY inspired by the art from Apogee and the amazing artist Vanette, but we wanted to make the art similar in the theme, but with a distinct style that felt like a call-back to the original Kickstarter animation art... Our original artist did this new piece because he wanted to improve the art he originally created. There's still quite a bit of work to be done, so please make any recommendations in the comments, as we want this to be the best box we can make for those who are getting it!
Early designing phase of the physical Below the Stone game USB.
As you are reading this, I am working on the many rewards you guys have been waiting so long for! Some of these things include:
Physical copy of the game: A physical edition of the game stored on a custom BtS USB!
Sticker set: Art will be done by DiggyVT!
Shirts: Will be ordered this year.
Instruction booklets/pages for physical game: Will be written and produced this year.
Art book: I will be titling: "Below the Stone, Alpha Art Edition" Which will describe some of the tales of development, and showing the evolution of the art of the game.
Closing:
As always I want to close this 10th devlog by saying thank you to all our fans who made this happen. It really is thanks to all of you out there who made this project a reality by sharing it and supporting our development. Please join us on Discord and Twitter to continue following our development as we go along and get closer to release!
As always thank you and I hope to hear from you guys soon!
