Ahoy there, I’m proud to announce that Galcon Legends has arrived for PC / Mac / Linux!

Check it out! Tell your friends! And try and collect all the trading cards and badges (on Steam)! If you want to help spread the game more, also leave a review on the Steam Page and post on the Steam Community pages too.

A huge thanks again goes out to all the Kickstarter backers who helped make this happen and test it out. And a big thank you to Evan Sparano for helping recreate this game from the PurpleZGalcon videos. Also a big thanks to Joshua Laya for creating the sound track, Tim Inge for the banjo track, and Matt Kohr for the art!

Thanks!!
-Phil

P.S. If you are a backer and haven’t played it yet, you actually already own it! Go here to get your Steam code. Also, this ISN’T Galcon 2 … that’s coming … eventually!

Ahoy there! There’s a new Galcon Legends update available on Steam! If you haven’t checked it out yet, go and get your Steam key. The update makes the win condition require that you have 50% more ships than the bot, and it revises the scoring system to something that might work a bit better. I’ve had to reset the leaderboards and your progress for this to work. As always, I love getting feedback in the forums!

Anyway, a big Merry Christmas to you all! Thanks so much for being amazing backers this year! I’m very excited for next year and what will happen next with Galcon 2!

-Phil

P.S. I’ve made a few retro-style games in the past few months. Check out Turkey Tomahawk Turbo and Capricornicus!

Hi there! We’ve finally got most of the box sets shipped out! So be looking for yours in the mail soon! It’s got some nifty surprises in it, so I’m not going to post any more pictures of it for a few weeks until most people have gotten theirs!

I have, however, uploaded the game goodies including the soundtrack to the website, so you can get those now if you want! Anyone in the $20 or higher tiers gets access to the soundtrack, and anyone in the $100+ tiers gets a few extra things!

In other news, Galcon Legends is now in beta on Steam! You can get your beta key here for Windows, Mac, or Linux. Please leave feedback in the forums, it’s getting near release for this!

-Phil

Hey, beta23 is available to backers for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. iOS builds coming via TestFlight shortly.

I’m VERY excited to announce that we’ve FINALLY gotten ALL the stuff in to begin shipping for all the $100+ tiers! I’ll be sending out surveys via Kickstarter shortly to get your current shipping information so we can get these to you ASAP! Here’s a pic of the mess in our house right now!

And a closeup of the boxes! I can’t for you to see these in person!

I’ve done a HUGE overhaul of how chat works, so it should be much slicker on iOS / Android. The interface now lets you hide chat completely, which is especially useful for phones. I’ve worked on the keyboard appear / disappear stuff, so it should be a better experience on mobile devices. The changes should also make it work better on the desktop too – less interference with box selection. I’ve also overhauled how number keys are handled so that percentage changes are registered more readily. I hope this fixes many of the things people have complained about with the chat system.

I’ve also done a major cleanup on the game settings / options. This resulted in a ton of changes to the user interface code, which I think makes the game work much more consistently given the various options. It’s pretty hard to make the game work when there are some 24 different combinations of how players might select the options to work together.

I’ve also done a fair amount of performance work on the game, so it should actually run more smoothly, especially on mobile devices. I’m now downscaling for phones so that much less memory is used and I made a few other tweaks to increase performance. I’ve also re-worked how the timer tracks frame changes in the game, so there should be less of a stuttering feel when a frame is skipped or delayed.

On the miscellaneous department, I’ve also done some heavy re-working of the touch detection code, so fast swipes should be detected more accurately on mobile devices as well as on the desktop. I’ve also cleaned up the audio engine, so there are now cross-fades between tracks and smooth volume adjustments. I’ve also done a small mountain of fixes to the servers. The lobby should be much less buggy than the last update.

For everyone curious about the progress of Galcon Legends, the game is nearly 100% complete. I was hoping to release it before the holiday season, but I ran out of time. So I’m going to have to put the release off until after the holidays. I did a ton of work on polishing little details in this game, which resulted in many of the improvements you’re seeing listed for Galcon 2 above.

I’ll be hanging out on the servers for a while – so let’s play for a bit!

Thanks!
-Phil

Ahoy there, beta22 has arrived! Check it out for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. (iOS TestFlight on the way …)

This build doesn’t have any gameplay changes. What it does have is a whole new audio system on ALL platforms. It also has a completely new backend for iOS and Android. Both, I hope, will work better than before. Please tell me how it goes in the forums.

BUG NOTICE: It appears you can’t chat unless you press the “Chat button” on desktop computers. Will fix for next beta. Yuck!

On the Kickstarter rewards front, some serious progress is being made. In just the past two weeks we’ve gotten in marble bags, ordered more marbles, ordered the manuals, approved the manual proof, ordered boxes from another company, shipped box sleeves to said company, and gotten in boxes full of shipping materials and more boxes. I think once everything is here and we’re about to do the box stuff, I’ll take a big photo of all this junk in a pile! So – thanks again for waiting on all this – I’m pretty sure you’re gonna like the final product.

Thanks!
-Phil

P.S. I’ll be online for a short time today if you want to play!

Ahoy there, beta20 has arrived! Backers can check it out for Windows, Mac, Linux, or Android. (Testflight on the way…)

This update just fixed a bunch of bugs, and adds colorblind support. It also removed Galcon Legends from Galcon 2. (I hope to get a release candidate build of Galcon Legends out for you to test on Steam very soon!)

To modders, I’ve changed most 0/1 style bools over to true/false style bools to make things work better with Lua.

Also, check out a video of what happened when I first enabled colorblind mode in Galcon 2.

Please post your feedback on the forums!

Thanks!
-Phil

P.S. I’ll be online for a while to play the game, talk about Galcon 2, etc!

Ahoy there! beta20 is ready for backers to check out for Windows, Mac, Linux and Android. (TestFlight / iOS coming shortly.) I’ll be online for the next hour or so, so stop in and say hi!

The game itself got an internal upgrade as I migrated from SDL to SDL2, the main value of that is making full-screen work on retina display Macs. Everything else should be pretty much the same. I’ve also done a bunch of bug fixes and tweaks on the UI, so playing should work even better than before. These changes will improve play on touch and mouse control.

Galcon Legends got a bit of an overhaul with some new music, graphic improvements, and bot AI improvements! I’m hoping to release Galcon Legends to the public pretty soon, so do check it out and give feedback on the forums.

Modders rejoice! I’ve *finally* gotten around to fixing up mod_client and mod_server. You can customize those mods to make your own Galcon modes to test them out. Keep in mind we also have documentation on much of the Galcon 2 API for your reference here!

The Galaxy Map has gotten a nice new feature – stars with active players are highlighted so it’s even easier to find people online.

Also, I’ve gotten a few inquiries about the rewards. So let me fill you in:

– Post-Kickstarter PayPal backers will be getting their rewards last. KS people get ‘em first. (So if you backed late, you have to wait … it’s just kinda fair and it makes logistics easier for us.)

– $100+ tiers are on hold while we get the box set sorted out. We’ve had some trouble with the box, currently the wraps for the box are at the box company, who seems to not be willing to do the project, so we’re trying to get those returned so we can get the boxes produced by another company and then wrapped by someone else. A bit of crazy We’re really hoping we’ll get it sorted out soon.

– I’d love to send out stuff earlier (like the poster / magnet set) but unfortunately shipping costs are crazy, so it would cut into the money which is saved for the in-game art. Also, the way KS works, we can only request your address once, and mark things as shipped once, so that would make a bit of logistical mess too.

Once we have the box in hand, it’ll all be getting shipped out pretty quickly. But, yeah, it’s being delayed. Sorry about that! Thanks for your patience and all that.

-Phil

Ahoy there! A new update is ready for Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, and TestFlight.

The main feature of this is a new beta of Galcon Legends is included right with Galcon 2. (This will not be part of the final Galcon 2 release, but it’s the easiest way for me to get it out to you for testing!) Just sign in and click on the LEGENDS tab at the bottom of the screen.

I really want feedback on this game, as I’m going to try and release Galcon Legends during October, so please tell me what you think on the forums! This update of Legends also includes the excellent new soundtrack created by Joshua Laya. (Note: music not available on iOS or Android builds yet.)

Lastly, I’ve done a bunch of the bug fixes found in beta18. For the sake of making this post look longer, here’s the complete list:

= 10/1/2013 =
– ios: on portrait modes (ipod touch), the zoom mode goes on even when it shouldn’t (problem does not exist in landscape)
– ios: can’t slide percentages.
– mods: include Galcon Legends OR remove the Legends button from the mods screen.

= 9/30/2013 =
– legends: add music
– mods: upgrade frustration mod
– api: winning a bet loses your coins. (so a bet of 50 against 1 person loses you 150 instead of gaining you 50)
– galaxy: not always tracking rank / location of players properly.
– lobby: when joining a server, you aren’t always changed to the correct class.
– galaxy: joining a server doesn’t always get you into the correct server. (probably due to running out of servers? so maybe fixed?)
– galaxy: have button to dismiss user list
– galaxy: have user list say what server they are on right now.
– lobby: if in settings, anytime anyone types anything in chat, it drops you back to the lobby out of settings.
– galcon_util: game will end even if it’s a single player game (to avoid hanging servers.)
– lobby.lua: now you can’t start a game if there are 0 /play people
– clients.lua: added /debug command to inspect server variables.

= 9/26/2013 = (fixing on server)
– bets: betting winning crashes server.
– server: music not resetting for client when i rejoin a server.
– galaxy: user totals not correct on map
– galaxy: map should indicate where users are playing.
– galaxy: going to a server doesn’t always put you in the proper server

Have fun!
-Phil

P.S. I’ll be online for about an hour, so sign onto the Galaxy Map and say hi!

Ahoy there! It’s been a while, thanks for waiting around! The summer has been very busy with Nan and I participating in our first goat shows, as well as hosting an indie game developer mini-conference on Lake Powell.

But between all that, I’ve managed to get a ton of stuff overhauled for beta18! You can download it for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. (TestFlight for iOS will be mailed out shortly.)

So here’s the breakdown of what we’ve got! The most “in your face” change is the overhaul of the Galaxy Map. It now has a few constellations and each star has a slightly different game type with it. In theory, you can now play some 2v2 and donut shaped games!

Next up, the rankings got a major overhaul. I’ve only tested them a little bit, but now you should be able to rank up your flag, gain extra stars (by earning points on various stars), and get wings by winning in tournaments (right now: betting.) I reduced the number of ranking flags down to one flag for the whole game, as I think that makes things easier to understand, and it makes it so unlike previous Galcons where some flags were impossible to rank up, this one should be.

Next, I did some major work on the user interface stuff. For a long time I’ve disliked the pan + zoom features in Galcon 2, so Nan suggested I change it to a mini-map type thing. Which really changes how it works, but I think it works much better. Be sure to give Esparano’s Frustration mod a play with it and tell me what you think.

Lastly, I did even MORE work on the user interface. iOS players should be able to use multi-touch finally! I also got sick of the ludicrous number of options in the settings page. I wasn’t able to even be sure what some of the options meant after a while and it was beginning to break the UI code by having too many options. (It was possible to set up the game so it just plain didn’t work.) Anyway, I reset everyone’s settings and have a new set of them to mess with.

Thanks everyone for your feedback! Be sure to stop by the forums and tell me what you think of all the new stuff, I need your feedback to make this game the best it can be!

-Phil

P.S. Pop onto the servers right now, I’ll be playing for the next hourish and getting bug reports / feedback there too!

I’m thrilled to announce the return of the Instant Action Galcon campaign as Galcon Legends!

This is going to be sold as a paid game separate from Galcon 2. It will be sold on iPad, Windows/Mac/Linux, probably Android too. But backers of Galcon 2 will get it as a bonus game because it was built as a direct result of the Kickstarter and your pledges. So yes, that means TWO Galcon games are coming now! The “Galcon 2″ F2P MMO and “Galcon Legends”!!

How it all happened: I never planned on having modding in Galcon 2, but the backers asked for it. As a result, a few modders began working on Galcon 2 mods. I got in touch with Evan “esparano” Sparano, to ask if he wanted to work with me on more Galcon 2 modding projects. So Evan spent the summer using the original artwork and watching YouTube videos of the campaign to re-create it using the Galcon 2 engine!

Backers can try out the Galcon Legends beta, by following these steps:

1. Download the latest Galcon 2 for Windows/Mac/Linux from here.
2. Download the Galcon Legends beta from here.
3. Unzip GalconLegends.zip to your computer
4. In Galcon 2, under Mods, enter “path/to/folder/GalconLegends/GalconLegends.lua”
5. Press Play and have fun!!
6. Go to the Galcon 2 forums and leave some feedback!

And now in other news …

The Galcon 2 Party was incredibly fun! Nan and I were there as well as Tim (composer for the previous Galcon games.) Two other brave players made the trek out to Colorado to join in the festivities! Here’s some of the highlights of the day:

Tim and I set up the breakfast table, complete with the day’s program and name plates. It was most elegant.

After breakfast it was time to meet the Galcon Goats! Everyone pet Cuzco and got to meet Lilly and Nibbles (who were in some of our Kickstarter videos.) Lilly and Nibbles also had kids who were quite friendly with crowd.

After that we hit up the natural water slides near San Isabel. The hike was great and the water was perfect!

Following lunch we took some time to tour Bishop’s Castle. It is incredible.

When we got back to the Galcon HQ, we took a break for a while. But before dinner we still packed in a couple intense games of croquet. It’s a lot like Galcon. There is only one winner.

Nan made an awesome Galcon cake for the party. It was delicious chocolate!

To wrap up the evening, I launched beta17 and we played until we dropped! It was a great party!

One player stayed over night and got in a personal ride on the Galconicorn the next morning. Good times!

Thanks again to everyone who backed Galcon 2!

-Phil