LUNA The Shadow Dust news & patch notes

Event Information

LUNA The Shadow Dust is part of the AdventureX Sale from Nov. 2 - Nov. 8. We'll run multiple events and announce them here. Apologies if you see several announcements.

Dev insights & gameplay

We introduce the team and talk about the inspiration and ideas behind LUNA The Shadow Dust. We show concept art and some gameplay. A lot of behind the scenes content is waiting for you.

About LUNA The Shadow Dust

LUNA The Shadow Dust is a fully hand-animated Point&Click puzzle adventure, brought to life through wordless storytelling, beautiful cinematics and a breathtaking original soundtrack. Watch the broadcast on the store page

Interviewees -

Lantern Studio: LUNA The Shadow Dust George Eastmead - Community Manager Mojiken Studio: When The Past Was Around Brigitta Rena - Illustrator and Developer

What is your game about, and what does the player do in the game?

LUNA The Shadow Dust LUNA The Shadow Dust is a hand-drawn point and click puzzle adventure game. Players control both characters to journey through a magical tower in search of the mysteries of old. Gameplay is joined together with a series of hand-animated wordless soundtracks in an emotional story with an original orchestral soundtrack. When The Past Was Around When the Past was Around tells the story of Eda, a girl who lost her way in the journey to achieve her dreams. Until she met The Owl. From this game, we could see how Eda found love and spark in her dream with Owl’s help, but after a brief time, Eda realized that Owl will not be there with her for long. It’s a bittersweet story about love, moving on, and letting go. The game is a simple point-and-click puzzle game with beautiful hand-drawn art and classic music. A short silent narrative experience that can be finished in less than 2 hours.

What inspired the development of your game?

LUNA The Shadow Dust Classic adventure games such as The Neverhood and Machinarium inspired the gameplay of LUNA The Shadow Dust. Thematically, the magical worlds of Ursula LeGuin novels and rich animation style of Studio Ghibli all played a huge part in the formation of the game. When The Past Was Around When the Past was Around is a work of fiction. At first, I’m not sure what kind of story happened between Eda and Owl. All I know is I want to make a bitter-sweet story. So, we discussed it with everyone's life experience in the studio, and the result is what you can see in the game! Even though it is a work of fiction, somehow we put little details like Eda & Owl's favorite drinks, date spots, etc. from our own romance experience. What we’ve done with our partner, and how it feels to lose someone so dear to you. Other than that, I take inspiration from many things I like, from games like Florence and Rusty Lake, from illustrator works like Puuung, Maori Sakai, and Yuko Higuchi, and from comic books like The Ancient Magus Bride and The Girl From The Other Side.

The Tales from the East bundle celebrates Asian game development. How did your team form?

LUNA The Shadow Dust Lantern Studio is a four-person all-Chinese game dev team, with two of the group based in London and Toronto, respectively. Beidi Guo, the art director behind the game; met Fox, the project manager, back in high school and together formed the rest of the team bringing in Wang Qian, the composer and Wang Guan, the programmer who was previously working with Ubisoft at the time. When The Past Was Around It started in 2013 when a group of college friends from Indonesia decided to make their own game development studio. All of us majored in visual design so we had zero experience with game development, especially programming. So, we made our own internal game jam named Mojiken Camp to learn anything we needed to know from programming to marketing. This Mojiken Camp soon became something that we routinely do every two years. Fast forward into 2019, we invited our audience to decide our next Mojiken Camp theme. The selected theme was “Future Memories”, and we formed small teams of 3-5 people to make small demos from this theme, one of the demos was “When the Past was Around”.

What themes or tropes from Asian culture are present in the game?

LUNA The Shadow Dust The inspirations from Studio Ghibli animation are clearly apparent to most players of LUNA The Shadow Dust. Where many Asian productions present a balance between light and dark as a conflict between good and evil, LUNA looks to show this eternal struggle as a necessary conflict that helps form the intricacies of the world. When The Past Was Around We try our best to capture the modern culture and everyday life atmosphere in Indonesia nowadays. We made it kind of subtle, so players from wherever they live can still grasp the concept and relate to the story. For some examples, we show the concept of a Kost, a long-term rented room that is usually found in Indonesia. We also showed some props and furniture that are familiar to Indonesian people like the shape of our post box, classic naco window, enamel mug, in both Eda and Owl fashion (my favorite was Eda’s white kebaya), and many other little details. This was inspired by how I love Japanese culture from furniture, tableware, to fashion. The aesthetic is in the little details so I want to show these details but in the Indonesian version.

What is unique about your game that differentiates it from similar other titles?

LUNA The Shadow Dust Unlike many point and click games, LUNA avoids an inventory system and never forces you to backtrack from your location to solve a puzzle. The wordless narrative pushes the story forward and makes the game accessible to all cultures and languages. When The Past Was Around While there’s nothing unique in terms of theme and mechanics, When the Past was Around is something very precious and personal to us. The story of When the Past was Around was inspired by our story; Brigitta Rena the art director and Elwin the technical artist. Of course, with a tweak here and there. I think that this personal touch is what makes the game special and has a value of its own. We also try our best to make this game without any dialogue. So the story is told with character gestures, environmental storytelling, and music. I hope that with this, people can interpret the story of When the Past was Around freely depending on their experience in relationship and life. Play Tales from the East bundle https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/18778/Tales_From_The_East_Bundle/

Hello to our lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust supporters, It’s been almost a year since LUNA launched! Today, we’d like to share what we’ve learned during the game’s development and tell you about our biggest successes (and failures). If you are planning to make a game yourself, we think you’ll find our experiences helpful!

The Backstage Experience

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/734f723fc4260661c386150a221b8bc3fb8c341d.jpg Many of you might know that after the game was released, we produced high-quality merch (pins, posters, postcards) as a way of breathing new life into our characters. We also ran another KS campaign to make our physical LUNA artbook a reality. We’re so thankful that our book and OST have received such great feedback. LUNA just feels so much more alive now. It’s hard work, and the costs are high, but because we’ve also been inspired by many other great art books and albums in the past, it only felt right to contribute back to the community.

Visit our Merch Shop HERE!

Our Successes (and lessons learned)

Over the last year, we’ve earned the community’s recognition and have received many awards and nominations as a result. It really is the best feeling knowing that your hard work has paid off! (oﾟvﾟ)ノ {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/c4466ed4f55854a10caa50da4cd45334971759a6.jpg We still consider the release of the game to be our biggest success. The harsh reality is that many games—not only indie titles but some big IPs—never see the light of day for various reasons. To see LUNA finally out there is a blessing in and of itself, and we’re even more thankful that the global pandemic did not directly impact our release. It’s no secret, however, that we—and the game industry as a whole—have been affected by the newly-imposed travel restrictions. None of us were able to attend conventions, talks, and festivals. We miss meeting people face to face, and we sincerely hope that life will get back to normal as soon as possible! Now, it’s time to shed some light on what didn’t go exactly as planned. Our ambition was to use LUNA’s fully hand-drawn yet content-heavy cinematics to tell our story in a unique way. However, players often felt that the story was a little ambiguous, and during cutscenes, some grew impatient. The slow walking pace might have also affected players' mood as they solved puzzles. We also received some criticism regarding the difficulty of our puzzles. Some thought they were too hard; others found them too easy or repetitive. Obviously, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution to these problems, but we agreed that the gaming experience could be improved for the better. This is why our team decided to redesign one of the most criticized puzzles, improving the characters’ walking pace (without compromising the game’s feel) and optimizing repetitive routes between puzzle-solving sessions. “But the game’s already been out for a year; isn’t it a bit too late to apply such changes?” some might ask. Well, these optimizations are not bug-related, so there’s no need to rush. We’d rather take the time to decide whether they’re really worth changing from a game design perspective. And as most of you already know, indie games need time to grow; it takes time to assess feedback and see how other players react to the same design choices. All these changes will be available to experience in the next major update. It’s rare for an indie title to blow up overnight, but we’re confident that more and more people in the future will slowly get to know LUNA and that our community will keep growing. With that in mind, the game should always be as polished as possible.

Slow Growth

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/e9cb7e3d023f89e9662a23ffa2263c526f84ce2b.gif The press often offers indie games publicity for the first 3 months or so after release, but after that, many small games vanish from the radar as new titles emerge. Getting to our players is a slow process, but that doesn't mean we just sit and wait for LUNA to magically grow on its own. Over the past year, with help from both of our publishers, we’ve continuously tried to expose more people to the game. We attended Steam’s virtual festivals and ported the game to various platforms. Our next goal is to bring LUNA to mobile for Android and iOS—spoiler alert: We’re almost there! As a team with no other investments, we’ve still not broken even one year after LUNA’s release. But we're getting there. Your ratings, merch purchases, recommendations, and reviews all help keep the dream alive. Making and releasing indie games is not a sprint; it’s a marathon. It’s an uphill battle, but as we’re slowly heading toward our goal, we hope LUNA’s success will help us create more awesome games in the future. Thank you for all your support. (●ˇ∀ˇ●) Yours, The LUNA Dev Team

Cute Sidekicks Bundle

In LUNA The Shadow Dust our protagonist is assisted by an adorable cat-like creature. Switch between the two companions to solve puzzles. Despite living in the 50th century, Henry (Mutropolis) is old-fashioned and prefers a good old trowel for his archaeological adventures. MAX, his cute robot sidekick, prefers a more modern approach. So, it comes in handy that players can control MAX every now and then to get the job done! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33051363/56e7dc233f128f43a7d4a4a598f4fa6b02bef6a4.png Buy the bundle here: https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/18955/Cute_Sidekicks_Bundle/

Mutropolis has launched

MUTROPOLIS is a lovely sci-fi adventure set on the abandoned Planet Earth. Play as Henry Dijon (hero, nerd, detective) in search of a legendary lost city. Uncover weird ancient artifacts. And PLEASE don’t get obliterated by an ageless evil. You’ve been warned. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33051363/933bf921bfb0b6e851fb1db82b9669b8d88e6875.jpg After five years of hard work by Bea and Pablo (Pirita Studio, Madrid) the new mystery point & click adventure Mutropolis finally has launched. Here are some reactions by the press the product has received:

• one of the best adventure games that have appeared in recent years - 100/100 itc.ua, Yuri Melkov
• An enjoyable adventure and a first class debut for Pirita Studio - 85/100 ragequit.gr, George Dembegiotis
• Exciting detective story with great characters and lots of love for archaeology. - 75/100 4players.de, Maja Verfondern
• Mutropolis is an absolute recommendation for any point-and-click lover. - 8/10 indieplanet.de, Christina Knauf
• interesting puzzles, good humor and a good audio/visual setting 9/10 forum.przygodomania.pl, Urszula Kuchmistrz
• a good choice for all fans of point-and-click and logic games 92/100 omegascopio.com.br, Julia Barcelos

Event Information

We're digitally exhibiting at the Big Adventure Event #theBEA from January 21st - January 25th. We'll run multiple streams and announce them here. Apologies if you see several announcements.

Dev insights & gameplay

We introduce the team and talk about the inspiration and ideas behind LUNA The Shadow Dust. We show concept art and some gameplay. A lot of behind the scenes content is waiting for you.

About LUNA The Shadow Dust

LUNA The Shadow Dust is a fully hand-animated Point&Click puzzle adventure, brought to life through wordless storytelling, beautiful cinematics and a breathtaking original soundtrack. Watch the broadcast on the store page

Hello, all the lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust supporters,

Great news! The LUNA Artbook we've been talked about forever is finally happening! We’ve just launched a Kickstarter Campaign today in order to bring this hardcover artbook to more people!

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/2e569e18d89cabbeb3fc945739f917c3119d5e29.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/e77f8a86273f42d2a1fe865644de89631b448daf.jpg

About the Art Book

✨ 158 pages full-color Laminated hardcover print 📕 An extra 30 pages of content over the digital version 🖋️ Limited Signed copy and more goodies exclusive to Kickstarter backer Our Early Bird Tier & Collector Tier has limited numbers and it's going fast! Get it while still available! 👇

Click HERE to Support Us!

Since the completion of LUNA, we immediately decided to devote ourselves to the artbook’s creation. Although it was the first book-design project for us, we wanted to do it as professionally as possible. Just as we learned much during the game development, we wouldn’t be able to gain an understanding of bookmaking without taking on this task directly. Luckily, with all the generous help from friends and family, and after almost half a year, the team was proud of the final result. LUNA The Shadow Dust - The Artbook is like being backstage of the game - or as we see it, a visual record of the journey from the beginning towards the end. As the game itself does not contain any dialogue, players are given the freedom to enjoy, fantasize, and wonder about the world of LUNA. In presenting the hardcover copy of the artbook, we hope it will bring further delight and a deeper understanding for you when playing our game. Furthermore, we’d love to share the wonderful game making experience with many more out there. Last but not least, we would not be surprised if one day, the seed of an idea for another game or creative project from us emerges from this book, just like how LUNA The Shadow Dust was inspired and born.

This book is made for you.

If you enjoy the game, please support us to bring it to more people! Thank you!╰(*°▽°*)╯ Hoping to bring you all more news soon! Take care and with love, Lantern Studio Team

Hello, all the lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust supporters, It has been a while since our last update, and today we have some exciting news to share with you all!

TOMMI Award 2020

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/82ce73e5ad1fb2b83066721fbff5ad698d90c041.png We’re happy to tell everyone that LUNA The Shadow Dust is shortlisted as a nominee for the Germany TOMMI 2020 children's game award in the PC Games category! "The game, which is co-financed by a crowdfunding campaign, is visually different from the others: Behind the drawing of the characters and the animations is real craftsmanship. And that creates a very special, dense, almost poetic atmosphere. Another special feature of this game is that it does completely without dialogues. In fact, the puzzles are not easy, and that's good too - because once you've immersed yourself in the world of Luna, you don't want to come back so quickly. From 10 years and up” ---------- review quote from the jury expert For us, it is so wonderful to see that LUNA has also been recognized by the culture industry as a game that can bring joy to not only adult players but also the younger audience. In fact, since the game launch, we’ve received many messages from parents all over the world, telling us that they had a wonderful family gaming experience with their little ones. It’s very rewarding to know our game is able to cross the language boundaries and reach more players as we hoped so. The Award ceremony will be live in German children's television channel KiKa on October 17th, 17:00. We’re excited to hear more in the month to come!

Merch Shop is now open!

We asked YOU what merch you wanted to see and we are so proud to finally have it ready for you!! Now we have some beautiful quality Merch of LUNA available in our ONLINE SHOP! The numbers are limited, so get them when the stock lasts!! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/c36d49e869276f1ebaa5e0cbf32bba98ebead159.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/c99052a01c347c51e093f118e4a958e8c6530610.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/0d004a4de94d28791b681f0d29d9009917f22717.jpg Hoping to bring you all more news soon! Take care and with love, Lantern Studio Team

Hello, lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust players You’ve been asking about Steam trading cards for a while - here’s the news you’ve been waiting for!

Trading cards

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/72cb51bc353586db95beb8d0443eb33b01eeb112.jpg Our artist Beidi has spent a lot of time creating some really nice artwork for cards, badges, emoticons, and backgrounds. These are available now and will drop when you play the game. If you're into collecting Steam trading cards, there's now a great reason to replay the game if you have finished it already!

LUNA on the Nintendo Switch

Unlike many action-based games, point and click titles require changes more focused on redesigning interactions, when porting to a new platform. These changes can even conflict with a lot of mechanisms within the game, for example, the ‘hover mouse over an object to get a hint icon’ feature. We have to re-imagine the experience of playing LUNA from a new perspective in order to find the best way to keep the fundamental point and click feeling, while boosting the mobility of our characters on new hardware. Players should feel that there's tangible feedback in their movements when using the controller. Now that the control design is more or less done, we're starting together with our publisher to test and debug the full Switch version!

Mini Interviews

There are so many behind-the-scenes stories we'd like to share with our players. As a result, we've made them into a series of mini-interviews. You can watch all of them on our Youtube channel. For example, here's Composer, Susie Wang, explains how she approached composing for LUNA The Shadow Dust and matching the mood to that of the story and the wider world. Hopefully to bring more news to you all soon! Take care and with love, Lantern Studio Team

Hello, lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust players, At a strange time like this, we hope all of you are well. Much the same as everyone across the world, all the members of Lantern Studio are more or less forced to work from home under each country’s individual quarantine regulations. It is a hard time for all of us, so many things have been unexpectedly affected but we're still trying our best to keep up our spirits - to work, relax and take care of our family members as best we can. There hasn't been a time in memory in which ALL of us are in such a crisis together, and the only way to get through it is to both help each other and look after ourselves. It is an extremely difficult time for any small studio like us, so we sincerely thank everyone who has purchased our game (and other indie games) or supported us (and other indie teams) in any way! Despite all the doom and gloom, there are still some bright spots in our life. Let’s share some of the news about the LUNA tasks we’ve been working on over these recent days in quarantine!

Switch version

It occurs to us sometimes that when we first started working on LUNA, back in 2015, the Nintendo Switch didn't even exist. Since then, it has become one of the most popular gaming platforms across the globe - how fast the world changes! We are now working very hard on porting LUNA to the Switch, designing some new mechanisms that allow for a mouse-based point and click game to run smoothly and intuitively on both a touch and controller-based gaming device. Not all of us have the dev kit for the Switch yet, so testing out the game on our PS and Xbox controllers has sometimes been a bit challenging too. There are occasional visual clues and tutorial animations that will require a redesign, but we’re ultimately excited to see our little game getting shaped up for Switch in the near future!

Merchandise

After factories across the world went silent, we had some doubts about the timescale within which we could bring LUNA merch to the table. Now that some factories are back open, we have been able to receive the very first of our LUNA merchandise prototypes! Based on everyone’s feedback (thank-you!), the pin set, postcards and the poster are the first batches of items we will put into production. More will come in the future! This week, we’re really excited to be finally able to show off these lovely items for the first time! ✧*｡٩(ˊωˋ*)و✧*｡ {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/b77c3d22fc8d4dfccdb448037ca67b04e81c4d2c.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/3dc67be46044ae6772f64492be369ed91df4c022.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/f5b80ef0b18648b5cd643dd408e2d743a306cfd0.jpg Due to the global quarantine situation, the postage and delivery services are however still unfortunately also highly affected and we don’t know exactly when we will be receiving these items, but we’re still excited to share some of the pictures with you all. Once the restrictions are let off a bit, we will be able to sell these products to everyone worldwide. We promise we will update everyone about this!

Everyone’s feedback is important to us

We read everyone’s feedback and we can’t express how much we appreciate it, regardless of whether the comments are long or short, positive or negative. The game has connected us with people all over the world in an unexpected way. We have watched people discussing the lore in all kinds of languages we don’t even speak, parents playing LUNA with their kids and couples trying to solve puzzles together. Through it all, people have both shed tears and laughed out loud at the points where we expected the story might impact them. We have received detailed articles, review videos, podcast interview invitations and amazing fan art! Thank you for sharing these with us. We might not be able to reply to every post or comment but we can tell you we read them all and cherish them deeply. We’re also really touched by the criticism. Sometimes it can seem a bit harsh in the beginning but it really reminds us that there are so many things to learn in game design. While doing our normal debugging, we’re still trying to optimize some of the key shortages in LUNA that some players have pointed out, like character movement speed, some repetitive puzzles that were not challenging enough and those over-complicated game design elements which might have left some players feeling frustrated or that the challenge was unfair. If you have played our game but haven’t left us any comments, we would really appreciate it if you were to do so, it not only helps us polish the game but also helps other players discover LUNA on Steam and other various platforms. You can write a review on Steam, or send us your feedback on Twitter or Discord. Last but not least, we want everyone to stay safe, keep up the spirit and carry on! Take care and with love, Lantern Studio Team

Hello, Lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust Players, It has been almost one month since the launch of LUNA. After another 2 weeks of collecting feedback, we immediately started work on a new patch to address any further issues. We hope that after each patch, the number of bugs can be reduced and the gameplay experience will be even smoother! So here are the issues we fixed in this updated build:

Gameplay / functional improvements:

-Added “skip” option for all cutscenes, including the game credits that have played before -Improved interactions across a few levels (The Clock Tower / The Kitchen)

Bug fixes (in various levels):

-Audio bug when skipping cutscenes -SFX bugs (Game Menu / The Garden) -Character positional glitch / Character freezing during gameplay (The Library) -Fixed the issue in which in certain situations, players may not be able to get the Time Travel Paradox achievement.

Original Soundtrack:

We updated the soundtrack album and now players can also download tracks in FLAC format. At the same time, you may also own the MP3 versions.

Digital Artbook:

We’ve uploaded the Traditional Chinese version. We are grateful for all the feedback provided to us and please let us know if you find any other issues. For general bug reports please comment HERE. Thank you again for purchasing and supporting our game! ヾ(≧▽≦*)o Lantern Studio

Hello, Lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust Players, First of all thank you to everyone who played our game so far, within the first week of launch, we were overwhelmed by the number of the feedback and comments we received from the community. All these valuable feedback and criticisms are read by us and will be helping us to improve the quality of the game. Therefore we sincerely thank you for taking your time writing to us. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/18d887a3f99af6fff7fb70166b95c6d7fe05c2b9.png So here are the issues we fixed in this updated build:

Gameplay / visual / function related improvement:

- Added a “skip” button for any cut scene that has played before - Fixed some display issue that caused by large graphic assets - Fine tuned some cut scene details

Bug fix ( in different levels)

- Character floating or disappearing / Camera movement glitches (Garden) - Character’s interaction bugs when encountering shadows (Specimen Room) - Character position shift / Camera movement glitches / Mouse cursor display error (Master room) - SFX bugs (Top of the tower) - Typo fix (Credits)

Steam Achievement

- Fixed the bug of not being able to achieve the Bee Keeper Achievement - Improved the description of the Master Chef Achievement After updating the game the issues above should be fixed, however, if you encounter any new bugs that weren't on this list, please comment under the post which we pinned in our Steam community channel. We will fix them in the following updates. Thank you! Lantern Studio Team

Hi there, We are happy to tell you that after developing for 4 years, LUNA The Shadow Dust, a fully hand-animated Point&Click puzzle adventure is now OUT! And in the first week, please enjoy your 10% off discount! And hope you will like it! https://store.steampowered.com/app/465100/LUNA_The_Shadow_Dust/

Traditional frame by frame character animation

12 frames per second, 3 layers per frame. Over 250 animations and 20 minutes of cinematics. A nostalgic and time-consuming process - but really worth the challenge for a small indie team of four.

Single player mode with dual character control

Solve puzzles from different perspectives. Discover a story of true courage with two playable characters drawn together through an inseparable bond.

Think outside of the box

Spark your imagination and solve a wide variety of puzzles, presented in gorgeous hand-drawn environments. Puzzles work standalone, requiring no 'hidden items' or player backtracking.

LESS reading, MORE cinematics

We replaced a dialogue system with a series of beautifully hand-animated cinematics telling a mysterious story.

Engaging Original Soundtrack

Our composer created an original soundtrack, designed to immerse the player in the emotional highs and lows of the story, kindling goose-bumps along the journey. Hope you will like it! And please share this news to your friends! So that more people would know our game! And thanks very much!!!

Hello, lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust supporters!

We made it!! LUNA The Shadow Dust is OUT!

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/61a324c8ededbf626b1cba21a5fc14273b2d2105.jpg After a long four-year journey, exceeding our wildest expectations and imaginations, we're finally here! Delivering the game is the final step along this amazing journey, but that journey itself has been truly unbelievable. During these last four years, we have learned so much more than any other project could have taught us, accomplishing the things we thought only the professionals knew how. Many of the members of our communities have become our dear friends along the way. We know we say thank-you a lot, but truly, without you guys, none of this could have happened! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/b26a44ee35a8080e28f21ef3b3aa4c322470cc97.gif

Now we have just a few final favours to ask:

• It would really mean a lot to us if you can write a review or rate the game. Your critiques can help other players to find LUNA among the vast sea of games!

• Please keep spreading the word for us! What a cool thing to tell people that you’re part of the force that made this game possible!!?

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/081b47412536d1fc58a610869d554b7d1be1ce3c.gif Here we’ve got tons of GIFs to use! https://giphy.com/channel/LanternStudio And official screenshots on IMGUR https://imgur.com/user/LanternStudioGames We’ve uploaded a lot of behind-the-scenes development interviews on our YouTube channel too! And in case you haven't seen our launch trailer, check it out here: This will certainly not be the last update, we’ll still have a lot of work to do after the launch! We will keep everyone posted as there will be more exciting news coming along like our merchandise and other fun stuff! But for now, please celebrate and enjoy this wonderful moment with us together.

We made it!!! Yeahhhhh!! o(*≧▽≦)ツ

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/c2cd9ce7aab46b198fea55123c0297535b55ee36.jpg With all the love from our heart Beidi, Qian, Guan and Fox

Hello, lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust supporters! Happy New Year, everyone! 🎉 Here we come, at last, to 2020. The year we finally get to launch LUNA The Shadow Dust! Today, we have the most exciting announcement to make:

The launch date is confirmed!

LUNA The Shadow Dust will be out on Steam on February the 13th!

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/104a352673f224a30d5e28b33718b5f41f3fd956.jpg

We’ve got a brand new trailer for you, too, with never-before-seen footage! Check it out!

The following month will be the most challenging for us, aside from our testing period.

We sincerely ask for your help in spreading the word.

If you know of any streamers or YouTubers who dig puzzle adventure games, please tell them about us! If you, or someone you know, is working in the press, please get in touch for preview keys or interviews with our team.🙆‍♀️🙆‍♂️📢🌙🎮 Email is the most direct way of contacting us: [email protected] You can find our presskit on our website: https://www.lantern-studio.com/presskit Also you can reach us through all these platform: Facebook：https://www.facebook.com/lanternstudiogames Twitter： https://twitter.com/LanternStudio_ Youtube： https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8NEGsIu4XPotERaZflef8A Instagram： https://www.instagram.com/lanternstudiogames/ Discord ： https://discordapp.com/invite/y3k58JE Reddit：https://www.reddit.com/user/LanternStudioGames/ We’ve worked so hard until now and it's finally our chance to unveil LUNA The Shadow Dust to the world! We sincerely hope our game can be played and shared across the world, bring a smile to someone's face. See you all on February the 13th! ━━━━━━━━=≡Σ((( つ•̀ω•́)つ with Love X Lantern Studio Team

Hello, Lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust Supporters! Less than 3 months to go until the release! Isn’t it exciting!? We promised we would be updating more frequently now, so here’s our Holiday Season update!

Merchandise

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/caaceff9c9b7b06687c6b04b974ba9be4fac60f8.jpg We’d love to hear your thoughts on what merchandise we should consider! We have already begun working on some of them, for example; the postcard set, designs for emblem pins and the hardcover art book! Despite this, please vote with your heart. What would you like to see? Here’s the questionnaire link, please tell us what you think and what other merchandise you’d like to have? ヽ(●´∀`●)ﾉ

👉❤ https://forms.gle/pdR1zC5aXYa7eJzq7 ❤

Additional Content and Deluxe Version

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/ae1a2c070bd73effc645afb2aa8350437679d741.jpg During the past few weeks, while continuing to work on polishing the final game build, we have also been finalizing some additional content which will complement the game. In February, not only we will release LUNA itself, but also a Deluxe Version including the game, the digital version of the artbook, and the original soundtrack album. You can also purchase them separately. The Digital Art Book A massive 124-page PDF, the digital artbook includes both the full-color HD original game artwork and the artist’s hand-drawn sketches. It is like going ‘backstage’ with the game and serves as a visual record of our journey from the very beginning towards release. We hope leafing through the design notes, concept art and drawings within the book will bring you more delight and understanding about the world of LUNA. We will also produce a limited physical hardcover art book to grace your coffee tables, which is included in some KS reward tiers. The physical artbook contains an additional 32 high-grade printed pages of exclusive content over the digital version and features some of our most secret game production content, unavailable anywhere else! We will make this available for sale separately at a later date. Original Game Soundtrack Without any dialogue, the music in LUNA plays a crucial role in the game’s storytelling. Designed to immerse the player in the emotional highs and lows of the adventure, the LUNA OST kindles goose-bumps along the journey. Inspired by the music from games like Journey and Ori and the Blind Forest, this album features 34 tracks with over 80 minutes of original music by composer, Wang Qian.

Kickstarters Exclusive Contribution Page

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/a123ca3e8af4ae347519220ebd313b6522eb53f1.png We have completed a special page dedicated to everyone who helped us throughout this journey. Your names will forever be shining on our website (as long as the internet exists)! You helped a small team achieve their ambitious dream with the most important first push. We can’t thank you enough!

👉❤ https://www.lantern-studio.com/backerlist ❤

Last but not least, Beidi made a short Holiday greeting video, we wish you all a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year! 2020 is gonna be AMAZING!! With lots of love, Lantern Studio Team

Hello, Lovely LUNA The Shadow Dust Supporters!

It’s update time! So much has been going on over the past few months, we really appreciate everyone's incredible patience (all these years). Thanks for sticking with us! Now that the dust has finally settled, we’ve got some very exciting news we’d like to share with y’all.

February is a Real Month

February is real. Yes it is. February is a real solid month on the 2020 calendar which is less than 4 months away from now.

And most importantly - it’s the month we can finally confirm for the release of LUNA The Shadow Dust!! ╰(*°▽°*)╯

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/603c1dfa12955286b8835d6a649ea6f98936c726.jpg We were really disappointed to miss our previous release forecast (this Winter), and firstly, it’s important to apologise for the delay here. We know you are eager to play LUNA! Sorry! We wanted to share the full story behind the delay, and the real struggles that faced our small indie team in the wide world of game development. Hopefully, our supporters can understand the difficult situations detailed below. Thankfully, it’s now coming to an end and we can finally feel a bit more relaxed, free to share these stories with you.

Challenge One: The Unexpected

We never thought this would become a serious issue, but it did. During September, the collaboration with our previous sound FX co-worker suddenly ended. We’re not going to go into the details, but the fact that we were now suddenly lacking 50% of the required cutscene sounds at the very end of development, put us in a sticky situation. Do we have the time and money to try and find someone to create that 50%? we asked ourselves, Or should we try free SFX libraries so at least there will be something in those scenes?? Either seemed like a grim solution. It would be a shame to compromise on the quality of the sound FX, so we decided to find a new sound professional instead of using free resources. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/5822c88e41605a826a0c56dfea22210efd3bb9b4.png FatBard, a two-man audio team from St.Louis, Missouri, came to the rescue. We’re so thankful for Zach and Partick's quick production speed and professional work which really helped us against the clock, with no time to spare! We’re also super thankful to Fred, our composer Susie's husband, who helped us financially when the SFX budget was next to nothing. With the determination and the hard work of everyone on the team, we managed to produce a full set of SFX created for LUNA by October, with no compromise in quality.

Challenge Two: The Narrow Release Window

When a game developer or publisher looks at the calendar, debating the best time to release their game, there are usually only a few months to consider - especially if you’re an indie team. One of the key survival (not even ‘big sell’) rules for an indie launch is simply, “do not clash with AAAs titles”. Secondly, landing in a key sales season would also be a bad option, and there are many! From Winter sales to Summer sales, the calendar is dotted with distracting discounts for every public holiday and festival. Thirdly, as a small team, we really need word of mouth. From the media, press and our fans, it’s vital that the news spreads as far as it can, given our limited resources. This means we also need to consider launching the game when people are not on holiday. If you’re still with me, then you’ll notice the window of opportunity has been getting narrower and narrower. Lastly, and most importantly, we have to consider the quality of the latest build. We cannot and will not rush out a game that may still have bugs. We are determined to deliver the best experience to people. As a result, if we miss one release window, we will have to wait until the next one.

Challenge Three: The Global Release

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/32664434/1f115386a3cce9c681dd5719d0e54a456ffc772d.png As you may know, Lantern Studio is an all-Chinese dev team, with members scattered across three continents. Since our initial Kickstarter campaign, our global support has been matched with high expectations and support from our Chinese fans. Throughout this whole process, we’ve been really keen to bring LUNA to both the Western audience and our Chinese fans at the same time. During recent years, however, publishing games in China has become increasingly challenging due to drastic rules surrounding game development. All game studios need to apply for official licenses. Considering the sheer number of game companies/studios across China (and the world), the queue is enormously long. Trying to get ahead of the curve, we started the relevant procedures almost a year ago, with the help of our Chinese publisher, Coconut Island. It took us a lot of time to prepare the game for review while simultaneously managing development. Nearly eight months later, with a number of modifications and a lot of back-and-forth, we finally have the document that allows us to publish LUNA in China! All this time, we’ve been facing one of the toughest decisions of the project: Should we wait - with no update on the licence’s progress and no more budget left to burn - or should we release LUNA globally, with China to follow at a later date? It killed us to think that as a Chinese team, we couldn’t release LUNA in China at the same time as the rest of the world. There was a point at which we felt so hopeless about the situation, the spirit of the team dropped to an all-time low. Now with the biggest unknown out of the way, we can’t help but feel the enormous relief that we no longer need to make this tough decision. Combining all of these challenges together, we’ve been able to mark a clear time for launch. Unfortunately, this has pushed us into 2020. February will be the earliest available window. We sincerely apologize for the long wait, but it is now over - for us as well. For the exact launch day, we will announce once we are 100% ready, and it will come very soon. ;)

How’s The Game Going BTW? xD

All milestones for development have been met!!!

• Heading towards the release, we’re continually testing and fine-tuning tiny details. Most players might miss these, but we believe some eagle-eyed players will spot them. So for those gamers, we will not let you down!

• With some black magic, we also managed to shrink down the game build size from 1GB to 500MB without losing quality. Meanwhile, we’re working on making sure all PC/Mac/Linux and DRM-free builds are compatible with the platforms.

Marketing materials, a brand new trailer, and merchandise have now become our next priorities. Hopefully, we can have some of these goodies ready when LUNA launches!

Last but not least, we would sincerely like to ask everyone a big favor...

Please help us spread the word - tell your friends, family and the neighbor’s pet that LUNA is gonna be out in February 2020. We’ve put everything we have into this game and we’d really like it to reach gamers who will enjoy playing it! This is something we can’t do just by ourselves, but with your help, we can. We can’t thank you guys enough. That’s all for now, we will be back with a new update very soon, before the end of the year! ━━━━=≡Σ((( つ•̀ω•́)つ with Love X Lantern Studio Team

The heat wave has finally passed in the UK; are you feeling cool or still boiling?! Put on your sunglasses and dive into the pool! Here comes our August dev update! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/2b9b053b53c85ae6b4c114dcc3b145b949583cf0.gif

First of all, LUNA is going to Gamescom and PAX West!

Thanks to our convenient remote team structure, we’re able to attend both of these super-big game conventions this month! Beidi, our Art Director will be going to Cologne, Germany for Gamescom and Susie, our composer, will bring LUNA with her to PAX West in Seattle. Come and say hello if you are attending any of the events; we’d love to chat with you and share the latest news and our inside story!╰(*°▽°*)╯ https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/49ab76f048ffebfff0aa93d01a9d7a985ff390ae.png

How’s the game going?

We can now confidently say that we are 99.99999% of the way to reaching our biggest milestone yet! All sound FX for the gameplay have been completed and the cinematic sound effects will also be finished within the month. The game is almost ready. Hurrah!! No more extra graphics nor gameplay changes are needed and we are starting to push towards the testing stage. This month, we’re going to start a full-length internal test and debug round, firstly within the team. With the help of our publishers, we will then invite professional QA to help us with the formal bug reporting. Once we have the full build ready, we will need to test the SDK the game platform to make sure our players can download a playable build with all the achievement features.

What else are we working on at the moment?

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/0085988d5b1ae39e1550cb581188e2324a79ea81.jpg We’re working on the design of the hardcover copy of the upcoming official artbook. Some of our Kickstater backers will receive it as part of their chosen reward level and it will later be available for everyone to purchase as well. The hardcover book will be jam-packed with visuals and more on the background story of how the game was conceived and developed. Although we may release a digital version of the book at a later time, the physical book will showcase a tonne of exclusive content ONLY in the hardcover version! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/702ea6585d9a953812de2ba2ea6a36789262a300.png This little bundle of fluff has almost become LUNA's unofficial mascot. We're definitely looking into the possibility of making merchandise of them as well. We will keep everyone updated! Go on, give us your own nickname for this furball?

Health issue

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/f54d37c97919be060b22daee5d5514720713b79b.jpg After almost three years of high-intensity workload and pressure, from early in the year it was clear that some of our team members’ health issues had started to become a cause for concern. A healthy body and mental state are always the foundation behind any work and unfortunately, we are no longer at the prime age to recover from a few sleepless nights and still be able to work at full strength. We knew from the beginning that health issues can be quite common among indie developers. Without health benefits, regular exercise and a very tight budget, health issues are easily ignored. Once health problems like constant tiredness or back pain begin to show, it is hard to recover. As a result, after doctor’s advice, we gave some of our team members a one month (July) break from game development and went for necessary treatment and rest. Now in August, we have resumed our normal workload but have consciously decided to take things a bit slower than before. In order to avoid a delay, we’re also trying to optimize our workload more efficiently than before, so we can deliver LUNA on schedule. (oﾟvﾟ)ノ

Last but not least, check out our brand new interview series on our YouTube Channel!

It’s really our pleasure to share this ‘behind the scenes’ development story with you. We’re getting closer and closer to the final goal and we really couldn't achieve this much without you guys! Thank you all for supporting us all the time! Until next time, peace out!

What's a Moon Guardian? Part human, part spirit, the Moon Guardians are charged with maintaining the balance of energy across the World. As civilization enters a new era, a new Moon Guardian takes on the role they were born to fill. Become a Moon Guardian and gain inside information into the development of LUNA The Shadow Dust and help shape its development, in exchange for helping us grow the community and spread the word about the game! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/d87f68d5803a9ab516c3257f190b6595c19910dc.jpg What do you get?

• Inside information into the development of the game (requires signed NDA).
• Help us polish the final elements of the game - get access to the latest build for free, and help us fine-tune any final elements.
• Included in the game's credits - for your hard work, we will immortalise you in the credits of LUNA The Shadow Dust.

What do you have to do? There are only EIGHT spaces available for LUNA Moon Guardians. Once they are filled, that's all. This is a very important position and we expect you to treat it with the utmost care. You will be expected to help us with the following:

• Help us moderate the online community for LUNA.
• Help spread the word about LUNA - an existing strong social media presence is a huge bonus!
• Help us create content with which to promote the game!

We'll be picking our Guardians within a week, so apply now! Link to Apply: https://forms.gle/wZKdLToXu5aK8N2K8

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/6ae5208d4c51e995503bc57883e3b7c0a2b7ed4a.gif Toot Toot! Here comes our June dev update! (ˊ•͈ ꇴ •͈ˋ) We hope you guys have enjoyed our new demo, we’ve had such positive feedback from all. Thank you to everyone who helped us share the news through social media. Based on all the data we collected in our survey, we can pinpoint some specific issues and try to refine them before the official release! Now let's see what we have been working on recently:

Game System Feature Optimization

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/20d62820b43a9fb3326e28dbb7569d1e0bd1d8ef.png Now that the overall game design has been completed, we’ve been working on optimizing communication for system related functions: saving, loading, skipping cutscenes etc. They might not seem to be important elements, but as LUNA The Shadow Dust won’t contain any text, including menus, we really need to make sure players can understand how to use these UI features. Testing resolution/full-screen display will also require us to try multiple OS systems and different kinds of computers. Depending on each hardware variation, diagnosing problems could be tricky too. We’ve also designed a feature for players to be able to rewatch all the cutscenes from the menu page. If some of them remain locked when you finish the whole game, what could it mean? A second storyline? A hidden location? Okay, I've already said too much….

Sound Design

We’ve had great progress on the sound design! Some of the cinematic sound Fx is still under mixing but we’ve more-or-less completed all the sound design tasks for the game! We'll continue to optimize the sound experience, like introducing 3d sound mixing so the sound source will appear near or far, depending on how you control the characters. Meanwhile, we’ve already started on sound debugging! What? Sound fx has its own bugs? Sadly the answer is: yes. Sound effects can be triggered in different ways and are all programmed closely to various game actions and events. We don’t want our players to hear a high pitched honk from another level when they are enjoying a quiet moment during, do we? That’s one corner we also will not cut!

Steam Language

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/0eb90f266ee2da28518dcef2fb75f391b3e03b57.png Although LUNA as a game does not require localization, the marketing materials indeed have to be translated in order to reach as many potential players as possible. We’ve now localized our Steam page into 27 different languages (Which is every language on Steam!) It feels really great to start to see game broadcasters from all over the world introduce LUNA in different languages. Knowing more and more people are discovering LUNA gives us a very warm feeling.

Last but not least, join our Discord server!

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/304f6d19b495e1bf51d1f9e153c017c1fd200d03.jpg Lantern Studio now has its own Discord server! If, aside from these dev updates, you’re still eager to know more the game and our team behind the scenes, the development story, or looking to hang out with folks who also love puzzle adventure games - our new Discord channel is the new place to be! Each Friday we will post a new micro-update on the server in the #announcements channel, just showcasing what’s been happening every week! From next month we will be finishing off our game development and go full-on hardcore with testing and debugging. We will also work on the digital/hard copy art book of LUNA The Shadow Dust and continue composing the original soundtrack album. We’ve still got plenty of work to do but the finish line is almost within reach! :) Until next time, peace out! ━━━━=≡Σ((( つ•̀ω•́)つ Best, Lantern Studio Team

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/2b59dd8e53c1a8cdb382b6acb706873a2ba9e9ea.jpg Here comes the news you’ve been waiting for! We’re super-thrilled to announce that our new demo for LUNA The Shadow Dust is now available on our Steam Page from 6th May, for PC and Mac. The new demo includes a bunch more puzzles, polished animations and new sections from the original soundtrack, with about 15-30m of gameplay. Feel free to share screenshots or GIFs online and spread the word! (Please don’t spoil the puzzles for other players of course! ) We sincerely hope that you enjoy the demo and thank-you again for the support! It’s really valuable having your feedback on the game; your comments, support and love ♥ have helped us shape LUNA into the game we will be proud to release, later this Summer. At the end of the demo is a short survey (ten questions). If you have an additional 5 minutes, we would love to hear what you think. If you miss it, please click here! Or you can buzz us on social media :)

Here comes the development update that you’ve been waiting for. We know it has been a while since we posted anything here, we do apologize for the delay! We’re full speed working on the game and the upcoming brand new demo, so let’s start the update with this exciting news!

New Demo coming soon!

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/b7244bc15d0ee2b90589c033855d95bc5ae81843.png Since the release of the Kickstarter backer early bird alpha test, we’ve received a lot of very positive and valuable feedback. We were then able to improve our build based on this valuable insight. In order to reveal a little more about the world of LUNA, we've decided that before the official launch, we will present a brand new demo, featuring two new levels with four new locations. We hope this will give our players a good peek into the LUNA world. Also, this time, you will be able to fully experience our dual character control feature! So stay in touch and sign up to our NEWSLETTER HEREto be among the first to click the link and gain access!

Also... New Trailer coming soon!

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/63cda812362f2e29cafd7bd1312daae439b08d33.jpg With more new footage to play around with, we’re now not only able to update our full-length trailer but also to make a different one focusing on gameplay! It is also high-time for us to work on the marketing side. With the professional help of both our Publisher and Marketing Consultant, we'd like to come up with the best phrase for LUNA to stand out from the crowd. What's your favourite element in LUNA and what will be the part that most excites you? Leave a comment below and let us know!

Game production progress

Now, let’s see what has been achieved on the remaining game production work. During the past few months, we finally reached our 3rd milestone! Now ALL the cinematic animations are completed with music! Along with the progression of the story, players will be presented with 6 visually stunning wordless cinematics, adding up to a total of 20+ min long 2D hand-drawn animations to experience! This is something we truly believe to be special about LUNA, it is not easy to complete such a quantity of cinematics with just one artist and one music composer, but we did it! Moreover, the team had been working on this game for a long time, even though when we first watched the full animation, we all still can’t help but felt deeply touched by the stories of these two beloved characters in LUNA. We sincerely hope that we can share this warm feeling with you in the final game.

Final polish and auxiliary system optimization

Now, as we are reaching the end of the production, it’s time to focus on the final touches within the limited time available to reach as closely to the to the perfect standard we hope to achieve. We’ve been also working on stuff like level load times, progress saving, menu and interface etc., improving the recognition level of all the interface button/icons. We’ve been testing all these system-related features, hoping these basic functions do not interfere with, but aid players’ in-game experience. Meanwhile, sound design is still in process. It's halfway through and goes hand-in-hand with music optimization. We want to make sure that all the animation, SFX and music work in a harmonious way. Therefore we strongly suggest playing the demo (and the final game) with your best audio system or headphones! Last but not least, we‘ve started the most crucial step before the game’s release: debugging! The progress is painful but necessary. Sometimes we do find some amazing and funny bugs, but even though we love them very much, we’ll make sure you'll never bump into these bad boys! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/ffb1b4e385a8afd90bff5b1a59f45c96b1caff52.png Some bug collections. The Tai-Chi Boy and Teleport beast! When the build comes to a stable stage, we will most likely to have a limited number of keys for the public beta testing. If you’d like to be part of this, we will send out the beta sign up via our NEWSLETTER, please subscribe!

Game Exhibitions

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/4f94ed6199126db2a1fc16c55efebfd48a66cd3f.png After last month’s trip back from GDC in San Francisco, we will be at the London EGX Rezzed 2019 at the Tobacco Dock from 4th- 6th in April! Come and see us, chat with the devs and play the LUNA EGX exclusive Demo! You can also purchase LUNA posters/postcards directly on that day and maybe ask Betty to draw you something :) In the near future we are also going to Fusion G -Core exhibition in China on May 2019, and Gamescom in Germany later in the year! We know we’ve said this countless times, but still now when the game is so, so close to being delivered, we look back on our first post. It really feels like an incredible journey. We are aiming to complete the sound FX and major debugging within the 2nd quarter, preparing the soundtrack and artbook material we promised our backers and complete the Steam page related jobs (achievement design etc). We should be able to update more frequently at this point, as the heaviest production work will be close to the end. We will be more actively involved in our Steam community discussion, social media events and much more! Follow us on all our social media account below! TWITTER / FACEBOOK / INSTAGRAM / YOUTUBE Thank you all for being so patient and supportive, it's getting very exciting! Let us know us your crazy ideas to tell more people about LUNA; shouting "LUNA" in the neighbourhood 10 times a day? Hiring a celebrity cat on Instagram to hold our advertisement? Contacting NASA to spread the word in the skies? We’d love to be inspired! Until next time, peace out!

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/2a75482e69aee9aca0090d038ab503624dfc2887.png When I was young, I read the story about John Dalton who described his own color blindness in 1794. In common with his brother, he confused scarlet with green and pink with blue. This story has always fascinated me, because with ‘normal’ vision, it’s hard to unsee the color you’ve seen or simply imagine seeing the world through a completely different color palette. And I’ve often wondered how can I ever be sure that the color “yellow” I see, is the same “yellow” as everybody else’s. My childhood wonder had quickly been forgotten until many years later, when we started working on LUNA. After sending out an alpha demo to players, we suddenly realized there was a particular level in the game, in which a small group of people become seriously stuck where most other players usually wouldn’t. In the puzzle, players are required to pick one particular color (the correct answer) among six different colors. To my eyes, these six colors were distinctively different from one another, however I later on found out that not everyone agreed with me. Finally I came to realize that the players who had difficulty completing this puzzle simply did not see the same color as me, either aware or unaware of their color weakness. Working as an illustrator for many years, I am so used to selecting various shades of similar colors just to make a drawing perfect to my eyes. I will easily get frustrated when prints come out just a bit darker or bluer. I actually never really truly realized how different the experience can be between people with normal vision and those with limited color recognition. Until now! To inform my actions, I did a bit of research about the different types of colorblindness, really wanting to find a solution to a color themed puzzle that everyone could play without struggling. From the research, I learned there are commonly three main different types of colorblindness. Each of them has a restricted color vision within certain range of colors. Some are not sensitive to blue and green, others find it hard to differentiate from red and purple (see image below). https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/1851d6289aad7be86c6f62cad8903fbdff1ed085.jpg I realized that almost all sufferers experience issues with the color green. This was the problem with our level in LUNA, a lot of greenish colors were associated with the color picking step. If we wanted our players to be able to pick a green tone color as the correct answer to complete the puzzle, deuteranope and protanope groups of players would have difficulty figuring out the right answer. To their eye, there were other colors that appeared to be the same (see example below). https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/6465e8c727780390acec4f0afc3ce523281ccbe3.png Now we knew what the problem was, the next step was to redesign the colors for this puzzle. But the challenge, even now we were aware of the situation, was that there would still be no way for us to know which group of colorblind players would be playing this game. As all are sensitive to different rage of colors, simply changing from one color to another might just cause the problem for another group. We needed something for everyone. First of all, we decided to avoid putting any green tones together in the design, as all three groups of colorblind people would have issues here. Secondly, we tried to avoid primary reds and greens in the same group, next to each other, as they often appear to be very similar as well. To help colorblind players, we added a bluish tint on the original design. By doing this, it knocks them into a different color range . Now, after the changes, players can distinctively tell the difference from A and B. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/968599c4cfb29f5915d63f71eb378fcc1788c4ad.png Last step, we re-designed the choices pool. From the previous six color choices we had before, three of them appeared very similar for colorblind players. Instead of changing the red color we wanted to use for the correct answer, we changed the other five, to make sure that all the other choices can still appear varied enough for colorblind players to distinguish within the range they can see. Although the final colors lose some of their original color tone, the answer color now looks different from the rest of other choices, and can be picked out more easily. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/b36ff8d096c27a1868b54b297676b21dd0c4cfe9.png That’s how we attempted a more color-friendly redesign! We still have to test it with players to see if it actually works as intended, and also how much it might affect the original puzzle difficulty. We hope this will make everyone’s gaming experience more enjoyable. It was a very valuable lesson we learned from the feedback we received from our recent exhibitions and shows. You guys are helping us make the game better and better.

Hello LUNA supporters! Happy New Year Everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful Holiday Season, relaxed and well fed, and now fully boosted to welcome wonderful adventures in the brand new 2019! We can’t believe time passes so quickly - this year will be one of the most important for LUNA, because we are aiming complete production and deliver our final release!

Game production and level gameplay optimization

Right now, these pieces of work are all going ahead together. While Betty works on the last few bits of animation and UI design, Susie is beginning the musical composition for our cutscenes. Fox and Guan, meanwhile, are full on with coding and optimization. Aside from all this, we are also continuing to work on our own real-time gameplay tests for LUNA, before moving towards external QA. In a nutshell, we will play the completed 25-level game ourselves from beginning to end countless times, to ensure it is smooth and well balanced. Gameplay testing is vitally important. Over the past few months of initial proofing, we received a great deal of important pieces of feedback. As a result, we rearranged some of the levels to make sure that the puzzle order is nicely structured. Our original design might have looked good to our eyes, but at the end of day your enjoyment of LUNA is the most important aim for us. Third-party viewpoints are incredibly valuable! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/a1a1d9155c18ac85462cd550dfd2a67aa2807868.pngSome screenshot from the cutscenes animations https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/6f1bbf5e3523f7ab2a0503672d11d22be0bdb5ce.pngSusie’s working progress for one of the animation cutscenes

Player friendly hint and guide

We have thought a lot about how to apply a hint system in LUNA. Different games do this in various ways, so there is really no golden rule here. We don’t wanna take away the challenge and fun for puzzle lovers, but at the same time, we have to consider what will happen if players actually do get stuck. The trend nowadays for many games is to rely on a step by step guide, which some say is helpful for players to understand quickly, but in our opinion, sometimes it dulls the experience of the game itself. LUNA’s fundamental core is point and click gameplay. The player explores their environment with the cursor. Above all, we really need to make sure when player focuses on an interactive area, they receive clear feedback that points towards the result, a direction or a solution. One of the key reasons we all love indie games is the freedom to break away from standard game industry design rules - if rules make our game less fun, why should we follow it. In response to this, we’ve improved some of the mouse functionality and the appearance of interactive objects, so that the player doesn’t feel like they are just hunting for pixels! We’ve also designed a new loading UI/system to help people find their location inside the game better. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/45018a435c8f6e45a4be393085a7a054967c553f.pngThe improved cursor designs (arrow/hand/feet) for a clearer interactive experience in the game. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/30c6d21777d56b405abb1daee2fcd1392c328098.pngNew loading screen, also serve the purpose as an in-game map, level selection page

Colorblind friendly optimization

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/2a75482e69aee9aca0090d038ab503624dfc2887.png In testing, we learned a very important lesson when we realized that one of our levels might appear to be particularly difficult for colorblind players or those with similar visual impairments. During the past few weeks, we redesigned some parts of the offending level to allow all players to see it clearly. We also wrote a devlog about it, explaining how we attempted a more color-friendly redesign! We’re now testing this level again with players who might have found it confusing before. If you’d like to volunteer to help with this, please contact us - it will be very much appreciated!

Next few weeks plan

Professional QA will be invited to help us debug, meanwhile we are working on ways to size down LUNA for final distribution. Last but not least, visual effects will help create an even better atmosphere for the game. How can magic be magic without pretty particle effects! *Lumos Maxima!* By end of January, we’re aiming to finish all the cinematics and in-game animations. So the third milestone will hopefully soon be reached. A new demo will be released soon in the first Quarter of the year, available for everyone to play. So that’s all for this update, LUNA will be waiting for everyone very soon in 2019! See you guys very soon with more news! -Lantern Studio Team

Hello LUNA supporters, How are you guys? It's Beidi here! With the leaves slowing turning to yellow, we thought it was about time to give you guys another update on LUNA! Can’t believe these two months have flown by like an arrow. We’re heading closer and closer towards our production deadline. The past few weeks have been intensely busy for us (as usual) so let’s see what we have accomplished so far. Optimization of the Walking System We’ve been focused on optimizing the walking and interaction system recently and have upgraded it to a better, smoother one with some improved new animation sets. Instead of doing it the most common way, by moving a flat character walking animation between two spots, which usually might appear like sliding/floating on the floor while moving, we have built our walking system with a more realistic, handcraft look. We added more frames between the idle post and the walking cycle to give it a nice transition. With the variation of 8 different set of walking animations, our character is now able to stop on a very specific spot to interact with an object, each step firmly on the ground without sliding when walking. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/edc3d615ea5e327e3934ca291e7895c47ce62afe.gifhttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/8284ffe0abf315457649d420cc814744445a6402.gifhttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/545c003d06f3f4e8879f0e9c170968c4428a0ab5.gifhttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/f3298eaea985dae287573d56c476718834912649.gif The demonstration of the new walking system We wrote a dev log about this issue, if you’re interested in the details you can read it here from our website. Cinematic production Knowing the storytelling will largely rely on the cinematics, we’ve been working on the story for a long time before finalizing our storyboard. Even so, there're still many details, the motion design of each scene that needs to be done along with the animation. Background - draft animation - line drawing - clean up - coloring. This was and still is the ONLY way for traditional 2D animation nowadays. The magic button I am ever longing for to automatically create the in-between frames still waits to be invented. Until then, keep calm and keep animating. We have in total about 15-20 min footage of hand-drawn animation in LUNA. Now we've done half of it, basically, 5-10 sec per day is our aim. Our plan is still to finish all the animation before the end of this year. It is a very tight schedule but we intend to keep up the pace! We’re really excited about it and can’t wait to have them all in the game as a whole. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/9a539b399a804e08c815e7ae52e432c9b9151cf3.gifhttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/f5a263a7de003c16c02532872491b407b0bd1a5c.gifhttps://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/25cbc24b052ba5f8b7b387b020255526d6e439c6.gif Here are some sneak-peek footages of the animation we’ve done so far Music and sound Fx https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/edee5825ebc02b5dc95f757e1ab3bbcf6f820fc9.jpg This is the desk where LUNA's music is born Two-thirds of the levels now have music. We have to tell you, the music adds so much more emotion immediately felt when you play the game. It makes a huge difference. Instead of each room having an individual background track, our music composer Wang Qian took a broader approach. Each character/chapter has its own melody, each with a distinctive emotional tune. By changing the instruments, key, or tempo, we apply subtle variations that blend nicely with each level or cinematic music track. So the overall album of the soundtrack of LUNA will sound more like one big complete work. It’s not always a straightforward production process on the music side. Music is such an abstract form of art that within the team we had many differences along the way, sometimes even arguments! But the final result you’ll hear in LUNA is the best that came out of us. You can listen it here and here Adventure X and Weplay 2018 https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/ea935866e5b9ee334cfea1e0eafa4e49e4be71e6.png As some of you might know already, we will be attending this year’s Adventure X in London on Nov 9-10th. The game conference will be held at one of my favorite places in London, the British Library! If you already bought tickets, please do come and say hi, ask us questions or just chat! For those who can’t be there in person, please follow our Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, we will have the live updates during that weekend to make sure we share our moments with you all! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/948b31bf46af15b3c8114fc259bd70e3c82d1cc7.jpg Players will also be able to try out LUNA at Weplay 2018 in Shanghai on Nov 3-4th. Some of our team members in China might be there to greet you too! Next few weeks’ plans: From now until the end of this year we will be aiming to complete 90% of the animation (if everything goes super smoothly, we might even finish all of them, fingers crossed!), then complete three quarters of the music and soundtrack. Meanwhile, we will continue to have industry internal gameplay testing and debugging. We’re also about to start preparing the marketing and publishing / legal business. So that’s all for this update, See you guys very soon with more news! Best Lantern Studio Team

Hello everyone!

We plan to post dev update here every two months. It’s Beidi here, artist from Lantern Studio, hope you guys are well? Please read it while all the text is still in shape. With the heatwave still lingering around Europe and most of UK, we can’t guarantee this post won’t melt before it reaches all our lovely backers! With the great help of good old electric fans, (I’ve got two working 24/7 - one pointed at the laptop the other pointed at me) LUNA’s development is moving forward at a good speed. We’ve accomplished a lot of work in the past month, now let’s break it down in details. First of all, we’re really happy to announce in this update that : We reached our 2nd Milestone! ALL the level design and background art for each level have now been completed! This is a great accomplishment in our development, it means no more temporary mock-up blocks or shapes lurking around in the game anymore, and for the first time in the last two years of development, we get to looking at LUNA in the way we imagined it should look like. In HD quality and vivid color! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/99ad91fe1d32161d8962e015f9af73de9a8897ad.png The other reason why hitting this milestone is so significant for us is, now that all the gameplay related objects have locked on their final position, we can then kick off the task of precisely tweaking all the animations/interactive movement for each level. Here’s one example of an animation - before we decided on the best position for the stool and the table in the house, the mouse move distance couldn’t be finalized. But now we can push with these types of jobs. Below is the final version for this small animation. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/43c3cb043cb5353b316f65902943159850e6e151.gif Because we can now truly visually experience the game in the same way that all players will experience it, we can also start working on adjusting the storytelling part of the game design. Between animations and cut scenes, there will usually be a transition period. It might seem like just a simple fading in or out or 1-2 short pause, but in order to give the best storytelling result, we need to treat this timing as an “editing job” like in a post-production movie. eg. Inside a dark room, do we want the players to feel excited or a bit uneasy? According to that, should we then increase or decrease the time they remain inside the darkness? Many of these nano-adjustment might seem unimportant in a puzzle game, but subconsciously, what we see and hear for a split sec will influence our emotion at different gaming stages. We could only start to play around these adjustments once we got the final artworks and animation in place. Last but not least, this is also extremely important to our Musician, Wang Qian and Sound artist, Mr.F - by looking at each level in full detail then they give the best SFX designed for LUNA. Here is another music demo piece from LUNA. https://soundcloud.com/elecorgan/luna-musicroom-melodydemo

Next (few) months’ plans:

The next milestone we are heading towards is to build a complete beta demo. We will be aiming at two major tasks in the next few following months. 1) level gameplay optimization. From all the exhibition experiences and a few private playtest results, we already gathered quite a lot of valuable feedback. That includes major bug reports/fixes and user experience improvements, so the characters can walk, climb, perform the way players think they should. Anything that’s confusing or leads players in the wrong direction will have to be taken out. This part usually takes a quite bit of back and forth, testing to get a perfect balance. 2) Cinematic production. All cinematics need to transform from storyboard mockups to animated scenes with music. There’s really no shortcut for that, I just need to put my head down and start to draw. We’re planning to complete at least 80% of them by when we have our level optimization done. So when we send a demo for the formal playtest by professional QC and QA ppl, they should be able to have a very complete experience of LUNA. https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/1eeaa5897a773cbf592d1e17b4877eb20a45aa70.jpg

Steam Community / Newsletter / more social media platforms are now available!

We can’t leave our marketing side-quest neglected. A huge thanks to everyone who has been spreading the word for us and please continue to do so if you can! Now, you can not only follow us on Twitter https://twitter.com/LanternStudio_ and Facebook https://facebook.com/lanternstudiogames , we’re also on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/lanternstudiogames/ and Tumblr https://lanternstudiogames.tumblr.com/ ! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/61b478a2f122cec316db287454583f5a2818cce0.png We’ve also set up a Lantern Studio Newsletter https://lantern-studio.us19.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=1dda2d27b30a62fb46f3bdcd7&id=a466810fde , just choose your favorite media, we will make sure to update on all these platforms with our latest news! Sign up now and you’ll get some exclusive desktop/phone wallpapers to say thanks! https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/f6b78c52e11a326924d3bc90f72bb98bfa32592f.jpg So that’s all for this update this time, we’re getting there slowly but steadily! See you guys very soon with more news! Best, Beidi + Lantern Studio Team

https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/32664434/4816713a35ce0b45d7469cbbab18cf3cf47aa116.jpg Subscribe to our all-new newsletter to be the first to hear development news from LUNA - The Shadow Dust. Sign up now and you’ll get some exclusive desktop/phone wallpapers to say thanks! https://lantern-studio.us19.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=1dda2d27b30a62fb46f3bdcd7&id=a466810fde RT appreciated, thank you! 😊