Hey loyal Blurstizens! It’s been a few weeks since we last updated you on our progress with Off-Road Velociraptor Safari HD. We’ve been hard at work rebuilding much of the original game to eventually expand on it and add more Raptor goodness. Today we’re happy to give out our first official development build of Raptor Safari HD for people that have it pre-ordered. Those of you that have pre-ordered should be able to download the dev build from your profile page right now! If you haven’t pre-ordered Raptor Safari HD yet, it’s not too late to do so. Head over to the Raptor Safari website and pre-order your copy now! You’ll have access to the new development build as soon as you pre-order.

Much has been changed and updated in this build. We’ll always keep you up-to-date with the latest build changes on the Raptor Safari website, but here’s a few changes I’d like to highlight.

New Tuning

Though not finalized yet, Matthew has spent a better part of a month solely on retuning the driving mechanic. We’ve been taking in loads of feedback about how the driving feels and have now applied it to the vehicle physics model. Arguably the most notable of the tuning changes is that the xbox 360 controller is now supported on Windows and Mac. As another plus, Windows users will have some nice vibration feedback when using the 360 controllers. Feel the jolt of every Stunt Jump landing and every Raptor Roadkill!

New Art

Ben has been hard at work upgrading all of the original game’s assets to push the game into the Next-Gen category. You’ll notice the world is much more dense with vegetation and obstacles, most of which have been upgraded with normal maps, higher resolution textures, higher polygon models, and more. There’s still much work to be done, but what’s done now should give you all an idea of what’s yet to come.

New Effects/Graphics

You’ll notice some new effects and graphics popping into this build. We’ve implemented some Post Processing techniques we’ve used in past games like Jetpack Brontosaurus and Blush along with some other effects you’ve never seen before in our Blurst games. In the Facebook version we showed off the beginnings of real-time dynamic shadows. Now the shadows are higher quality and work on more objects in the world (for those of you with machines that can handle it). We’ve also thrown in anti-aliasing for the Danny Bs among you.

Let us know what you think! If you find any bugs/issues, have any suggestions, or just want to tell us how awesome Raptor Safari is head over to our support page and let us know! Be sure to follow us on Twitter and be a fan on Facebook to stay up-to-date with everything that’s happening in Raptor Safari HD.

And here’s a teaser of what’s to come later in the year! Yet another awesome piece by our concept artist Justin Messner.

We’ve been hard at work on the new Off-Road Velociraptor Safari HD version! It’s been awhile since we posted at the blog, so here’s a quick overview of what’s been happening (by the way, the best way to keep up with Raptor Safari news is via our Facebook page or Twitter account):

The new Off-Road Velociraptor Safari HD website has embedded Facebook and Twitter widgets, so you can easily follow us there, or simply visit the page for the latest information.  We’ll be adding new content to the site over time, so make sure you check it often!

Pre-Ordering

You can also pre-order Raptor Safari HD for early-bird price of $14.99.  If you have already purchased Raptor Safari or the Blurst Bundle Pack, there is nothing more you need to do–the HD version will automatically appear in your Blurst profile.  Thanks for believing in us!

Pre-orders will get:

• Early access to development builds (first build this month).
• Insider communication with the development team (give us your feedback)!
• That warm, fuzzy feeling knowing you’re supporting independent development

We’re working out some other special surprises for pre-orders, too, so stay tuned!

New Dinosaurs!

You may have noticed that we’ve been posting a bunch of new dinosaur screenshots in the last week.  This is all thanks to our good friend Andy Schatz at Pocketwatch Games.  Andy is now working full-time on his IGF-nominated game, Monaco.  Savvy dinosaur fans may remember that he was working on Venture Dinosauria, an ecosystem game all about these great thunder lizards.

Andy will return to Dinosauria at some point, but in the meantime we’ve worked out an exclusive licensing deal to the Dinosauria models.  We have unfettered access to the source files, so we’ll be changing them up a bit to meet our needs, but you’ll start seeing these gorgeous beasts appearing in Raptor Safari development builds very soon!

Because Andy is both a hero and a gentleman, you can use coupon code “Schatz Special” for 20% off your Raptor Safari HD pre-order.  Limited uses, so hop to it!

The new Facebook version of Off-Road Velociraptor Safari isn’t the only thing we’ve been working on at Flashbang. Most of our energy is being spent on the next version of the game, Raptor Safari 64. This new version will ultimately be a thing of perfect HD beauty. Here’s what we’re going for (as painted by the excellent Justin Messner of Time Donkey story card fame):

Right now we’re planning a late 2010 release. Current Raptor Safari owners will get exclusive access to development builds of the game, as well as the final PC/Mac release (think of it as pre-ordering). If you’d like to get it on that make sure you take advantage of our 2-for-1 Raptor Safari holiday special!

We just launched a version of Off-Road Velociraptor Safari on Facebook. Check it out:

It’s not an exact copy of the version here on Blurst. Here’s what’s different:

1. Shorter time (2 minutes).
2. Facebook leaderboard. Compete with your friends!
3. Score-based trophies. Brag on your wall!
4. Some new things from Raptor Safari 64 (shadows!)

We still have a few tweaks and changes that we’ll be rolling out this week. Primarily we’ll be rebalancing the scoring a bit to accommodate shorter play time and to reward combos more heavily. These updates will happen automatically.

For now, go play and let us know what you think! The best way to leave feedback is to become a fan of the game and post something to our wall. Make sure you become a fan of Blurst, too! You can spread the word by bragging about trophies or by directly inviting friends.

It’s that time of the year: The time when companies desperately make one final grab at Q4 profits under the guise of consumer-friendly holiday deals! At Blurst, we don’t even know what “Q4″ means, but we’re happy to set up a great 2-for-1 Raptor Safari deal! Starting today until the January 1st, 2010, receive a free Off-Road Velociraptor Safari gift code with any purchase from the Blurst store!

So how you can take part in this Christmas miracle?

Here’s how it works:

1. Buy something from the Blurst store.
2. Get an extra Raptor Safari code, free!
3. Paste this code to a loved one.
4. Enjoy the holiday spirit.

Both you and your loved one will enjoy:

1. The downloadable version of Off-Road Velociraptor Safari.
2. Early access to its amazing HD sequel, Raptor Safari 64.
3. The satisfaction of a job well done.

Act now!

Good day, Internets!

It’s been awhile since we chatted (by the way, the best way to keep up with us is via our Facebook fan page). After we stopped our 8-week cycle we decided we should take a week or two off before we really got back into the saddle. As of last Wednesday, it’s saddlin’ time!

We have now entered full production on a new version of Off-Road Velociraptor Safari, which we’re internally calling Raptor Safari 64 (you can thank Colin Northway for that one). We don’t have an exact development schedule, yet, but it’ll be much longer than any of our Blurst projects. Right now we’re loosely targeting a fall 2010 release, scoped to be worth $15 or $20 of your hard-earned money.

So what are we up to?

Business Development

I’ll be honest: It’s strange to go from our own Blurst.com world, where we have zero gatekeepers between our work as ideas and our work as something you guys can actually play, back into the “real” world, where you have to communicate unimplemented ideas to others and convince them you have savvy and merit and stability and all that. A larger version of Raptor Safari is a great fit for mainstream platforms, like say console downloadable, so we’ve initiated contact with the proper authorities to make this happen.

Fortunately, we have been around for over 6 years, and I’ve been a logistics dude/co-chair at the Independent Games Festival for three years running; we do have some credibility! Still, “biz dev” is something we’ve deliberately avoided, and it’s a little uncomfortable to get back into it (like a pair of dress shoes you only wear once every three years when some relative you’ve never met gets married, and at first the shoes seem really fancy and you’re hopeful the ladies might even notice but after a few hours your feet just hurt and all you want to do is go home and watch Alf edits on YouTube).

By the way, when it comes to objectively measuring Raptor Safari’s reception, things like this really blow my mind:

Results 1 – 10 of about 1,150,000 for “off-road velociraptor safari”. (0.09 seconds)

That’s a phrase search, people! 1.1 million instances of those words in exactly that order! That was literally zero results before we launched ORVS, almost two years ago…

Game Development

The first phase of the new version’s development is to redo much of what we have already. Raptor Safari is one of our oldest Unity projects–primarily developed during the Unity 2.0 alpha, for any of you Unity nerds–and there are a lot of things we want to do to its foundation before we start adding new rooms to the house.

Our plan of attack is to first improve the production quality without increasing game scope. This means we’re now creating a nicer-looking, faster-running, better-coded version of the original game. Once we have this high water mark set, and a stable base to build on, we’ll begin pushing laterally to increase the scope, with new environments, new dinosaurs, and more things to do.

Of course, a small number of features will naturally fall out of systems as we rewrite them. Here’s the first tiny new feature to make an appearance–raptors will desperately try to fly if they find themselves in midair:

Early Access to Raptor Safari 64

Development builds of the game will be made available to players who bought the original game. We may need to cut off new users at some point, depending on our negotiations with console manufacturers; the only way to make sure you can play the new Raptor Safari during its development is to buy the game today. You can pick up at a copy over at the Blurst store, in either standalone or bundle pack flavors.

We don’t have any dates to share on when these first builds will be appearing, yet, but we’ll be wanting to get these out as soon as possible to begin testing performance/hardware compatibility. It may be a very merry Christmas!

More Stuff!

We have a few more things up our sleeve to talk about, including how our Blurst developer call for submissions is going, games on Facebook, and even a new company altogether somewhere in there. Stay tuned for more!

You should become a Facebook fan or follow us on Twitter to stay in the loop!

Let’s face it; there’s nothing you want more in the whole world than Time Donkey Wallpapers. So here they are, courtesy of your jovial Uncle Blurst.

The Day of Donkey is upon us!  (Head to our Facebook page for the rest of the story).

Our latest 8-week game, Time Donkey, is now available. BAM!

And, holy crap, this is our 9th game released on Blurst. Woah.

Go Play Time Donkey! See you guys on the leaderboards.

How does a donkey earning minimum wage find himself trapped in the very fabric of time itself, doomed to relive the same 30 seconds again and again?  We’ll be posting the Story of the Time Donkey, one image per day, to our Facebook account.

Head on over there–you should become a fan anyway–and check out the  story!  We’ll keep posting them up until launch day on Tuesday.  It’s a thrilling adventure!

This is what happens when you have amazing people help you with your amazing projects. One Mr. Cory Robinson, a local game artist, good personal friend of ours, and all-around-super-talented-guy helped us out with some illustration work. In order to make the Time Donkey menu scene come to life I needed some promotional nonsense (product photos, discount alerts, beverage list) to surround the functional menu elements (game logo, the “play game” button, the “change username” button) and Cory delivered. While it ended up completely appropriate in the context of the title scene you don’t see it very well when it’s all said and done so here it is in detail.

Keep in mind that when I tasked him with this my instructions were very vague; crappy fast food menu with ridiculous products on it. He reached into the swirling neon vortex of his brain and created all of these products and their names, going off of Flashbang’s “Num Nums Raptor Taco” inside joke from back in the day and nothing else. When we looked at it for the first time we all cried from the laughter, and also from Matthew hitting us with a car antenna. Enjoy!