Bringing Auro (PC/Linux/OSX/Android/iOS) to the next level with a story-driven campaign mode, new spells, new monsters, and much more!
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Bringing Auro (PC/Linux/OSX/Android/iOS) to the next level with a story-driven campaign mode, new spells, new monsters, and much more!
About this project
You can now vote for Auro on Steam Greenlight!
Hi there! We're Dinofarm Games, the creators of 100 Rogues and Auro: A Monster-Bumping Adventure.
For those who don't know what Auro is, it's a turn-based tactics game like no other! You play as the young prince Auro, traversing randomly generated dungeons and bumping monsters into the water to score points. Using magical spells and cunning tactical maneuvers, you must score enough points to reach the goal before you run out of Barrier and your mission ends!
It's endlessly replayable, quick and to the point, yet still very deep. Check out this highlights reel of a Twitch player streaming Auro to find out why people are so excited.
This is really only the beginning for Auro, however. Now, we're ready to take our game to the next level.
Introducing The Auro Quest Expansion, a huge content update for all versions of Auro: A Monster Bumping Adventure.
Wanna learn more about Auro? Watch this video tutorial!
** UPDATE **
We're working on Quest Mode *right now*, at least I am - I'm programming the very beginnings of the new mode. It's going to be really exciting. Check out this short video to see how it's coming.
Screenshots!
While Auro is elegant, dynamic, and overall just a blast to play, there's so much about the places, the story, and the characters of that world that we wanted to express that simply didn't have a place in Play Mode. For that reason, the centerpiece of this expansion is a new story/exploration-based gameplay mode called Quest Mode.
Here's a quick run-down of what we intend to do. Read further below for more in-depth details.
- Quest Mode - Quest Mode is kind of like an "Auro RPG", wherein you can explore the underworld, find hidden treasures, learn about character backstories, uncover secrets, and much more - all while embracing what's great about Auro's core gameplay.
- New monsters! - We've got at least two new and exciting monsters we want to add to the game for Play Mode, and potentially a few more for Quest Mode too.
- New spells! - We also want to expand the player's arsenal in both modes. And for Quest Mode, we plan to add a whole bunch of zany, powerful spells.
- Monster Upgrade - The monsters in Auro are varied and interesting, but we have a few big upgrade/overhauls for a few of the monsters that we'd love to do.
- Other Goodies - There's a ton of stuff we've always wanted to do for Auro but just haven't had the time or resources. Stuff like leaderboards, social features, unlockables, playable characters, and way more.
Quest mode is a non-linear, larger-scale single player mode that allows players to explore the world, story, and lore of Auro. If you've played games like FTL or Desktop Dungeons, the overmaps of those games might give you some idea of what we're planning to do here.
The crux of the new mode is takes place on an overmap that looks a little bit like the following mockup:
This mode adds a bunch of new RPG mechanics. Throughout the game, you can increase Auro's number of spell slots, candy slots, max gold and max Barrier.
There's also a new Item system. Items give you new special abilities, like the ability to walk on water, immunity from a certain monster's attacks, or -1 to all Fire cooldowns, for example. There are even rare items that you can find that have crazy effects, like spawning a friendly Jelly or allowing you to walk on water!
Each of the circles on the above picture represents a new location, and it takes time to get from one location to another. When you reach one, you discover new locations nearby. Ultimately, you're trying to reach the evil prince Argo's lair so that you can have a final dramatic battle with him.
If you've played Auro's Play Mode, you probably have wanted to wring Argo's neck a few times. Now's your chance!
Each location has something different to discover, and it's randomly generated every time you play. Many are little random Auro stages, full of monsters to kill, which gains you gold. Sometimes it's a crazy JELLIES-ONLY level - a JELLYHOUSE, if you will! Or sometimes it's a lair full of charging Troggles, and the ground is covered in slippery floe... hopefully there won't be any Troggle-on-Troggle violence on this day!
Some are item shops, and some are story events. One cool thing that we're doing is that each play through, you'll learn a little bit more about the backstory and this world we've been creating all this time.
Overall, it adds a "longer-arc" strategy layer to the game that really isn't there so much for the pure-tactical battle that is Play Mode.
Now's a good time to remind you not to worry: we won't do any shady IAP stuff like allowing you to buy in-game items with real money! That's not how Dinofarm Games operates!
In addition to Quest Mode, we want to make a number of improvements to Play Mode and the base game generally.
New Monsters - We haven't decided on all of the details yet, but we definitely want to add more monster variety to the game, particularly in the late-game monsters. Monsters like the Jelly and the Troggle are really fun to fight against, because of how much interaction they allow. Seeing a Jelly doesn't only threaten you, it also can be used as a weapon or as a means of escape. We want more monsters that allow the player to use monsters in more interesting ways. As a hypothetical example, we're playing with the idea of a monster that lays down "tracks" as they move (picture little "train tracks", kinda). If a monster walks onto one of these tracks, they slide all the way down to the end of the track.
New Spells - The spells we have in Play Mode took us a really long time to get right. Every spell that you see in the game now represents several dozen other spells and iterations that we tried beforehand. Some of those spells were really cool, but we just didn't have the time or resources to make them come together and be balanced enough for the super-competitive and tight Play Mode. We hope to dive back into some of those old spells as well as create new ones. How about some Earth-themed spells that transmute tiles into pillars, pillars into water, and water into tiles? Or how about summoning an avatar that does everything you do for a few turns? The possibilities are endless and we're pretty excited about it.
Monster Upgrade - Many of our monsters were designed two or three years ago. At that time, we didn't really even have a full understanding of what the game would be like, and so we certainly didn't know what would make an ideal monster.
An example I'll give you is the Lich. While he's certainly an effective late-game challenge, the fact is that right now, he's a little on the flat side. There's not much you can do with him - it's really just, kill him as quickly as you possibly can, no questions asked. We have an idea for a replacement monster that would move you in a direction as he attacked you, allowing you to gain some utility out of his ability. That's just one example though - there's a number of monsters that we want to give a general visual and gameplay upgrade. Between this and the new spells, Auro's going to be a vastly more interesting game than it already is.
Other Goodies - There's so much that we wanted to do for the original version of Auro that we didn't have the time or resources to do. Leaderboards, achievements, social features, better tutorial features, and a ton of other tiny details. Maybe a replay feature? Perhaps more metrics and other gameplay statistics. How many games do you win when you get the Abomination ultimate versus when you get Blast?
If we reach the $45k mark, we can add a bunch of fun bonus minigames to Quest Mode - fun little gambling games, memory games, and other similar little bonus games where you can win rare magic items.
In addition to this, a this funding level we'll also add "multiple login" functionality, allowing players to create multiple accounts for Play Mode. This will allow you to have a "playing on the bus" account and a "playing for serious" account, which many players have requested.
Imagine some nice outdoor settings such as a forest, or perhaps a swamp. If we have more money, we'd love to put that into giving Auro some more environmental variety.
We'd love to create a secret boss monster with some cool custom animations and stuff like that, not to mention a story/thematic tie-in. Maybe defeating this secret boss monster even gets you access to some super secret special item or spell! For this much, we can do something along those lines.
If we hit this goal, we can afford to make Experiments Mode. This mode takes place in Qullish's Magic Lab, and it has two primary features. One is, you can play a set of pre-made puzzle stages designed by us. It also, however, allows players to not only make their own puzzles, but to really take Auro apart. You can build your own levels, create Play Mode parameters, manually select spells, and much, much more. Experiments Mode is kinda like the Garry's Mod of Auro!
Here's another way you can support The Auro Quest Kickstarter (without even spending a dime) by following us on social media or making us fan art! Here's some links - subscribe, follow and share these links
Our Twitter page - https://twitter.com/dinofarmgames
Our Facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/DinofarmGames
Our Tumblr page - http://dinofarmgames.tumblr.com/
Our YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/user/DinofarmGames
If you submit fan art, make sure to use the hashtag #aurokickstarter so that we're able find it!
By reaching certain point thresholds, the Quest Expansion becomes ever more awesome! See the following chart to see the rewards.
So share, like, retweet, post and tell some friends. Every little bit helps!
Of course we love Auro. But what do other people think of it? We're incredibly pleased to report that Auro is one of the best-reviewed games out there. On Metacritic, it's currently (at the time of this writing) ranked as 5th best of 2015 on iOS! Here's a few excerpts from reviews.
"Auro is one of the rare games in this genre that should please both beginners and experts alike."
- TouchArcade
"It wants you to have a good time. It wants you to see how clever it is, and to show you how clever you are."
- Pocket Tactics
"Dear Dinofarm Games, you’ve actually earned my respect as a hardened gamer that generally despises the iOS market. Dinofarm Games ethics on their website also tells all and, from what I played in this game, they’re all true."
- Operation Rainfall
If you have any questions, you can message us here on Kickstarter. Or you can email us at info@dinofarmgames.com.
You can also discuss the game and witness some of what goes on behind the scenes over at the Dinofarm Games Forums.
Thanks for reading, and we hope you see the potential in what we're proposing.
Risks and challenges
Game development is tricky business. We're getting better at it all the time, but you never know what might come up. Something that *should* take a day sometimes ends up taking a week. We've been involved in game development for long enough to know that by now, for sure.
I think we've shown the world, though, that Dinofarm Games doesn't give up in the face of hardship. You may not know this, but this is actually Auro's *third* Kickstarter campaign - the first one happened in 2011, and it actually failed to meet its goal.
We weren't deterred, though. We gave the Auro character a complete redesign, and shot a whole new video, and tried again, and the second time, it was a success!
In other words, while there will be challenges, you can rest assured that we aren't giving up on Auro. Despite our attempts to plan everything ahead as best we can, despite that, things are going to come up - they always do. And when they do, we will overcome them. We love Auro, and unless we're all killed in a tragic boating accident, there's no way we're not gonna make this project happen.
Learn about accountability on KickstarterFAQ
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In the mobile version, the Quest Mode expansion will likely be an in-app purchase. The PC version, on the other hand, will cost more and include the Quest Mode expansion out of the box.
The PC version, which there is already an alpha build for, will be in a widescreen format, not portrait, with its own new HUD and hotkey support and a few other things like that. Other than those, though, it should be identical to the mobile version.
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YOU DECIDE! We are currently on Greenlight, and if enough people want it, then yes - it will be on Steam!
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The OSX/Linux versions will be the same as the PC version. If you want a copy for those platforms, choose the PC reward, and just let us know that you'd prefer OSX/Linux and we'll make that happen. It might be a little longer of a wait than the PC version, though.
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We have a beta version available now, but the release version will be available this summer.
Rewards
Funding period
- (30 days)