2024 has been a big year for Auroch Digital, we’ve had lows, but also highs with a new Studio Director, game launches, announcements, and community activities!
We are a talented group of professionals who absolutely love what we do, and we really love games! We decided the end of the year was a good time to look back and reflect on all of the exciting and positive things that have happened this year.
Read MoreFirst off a big Merry Christmas to everyone from all of us here at Auroch Digital. We’ve had a bumper 2018 and there has been a world of stuff that has gone on here so we thought we’d give you a quick rundown on what you may have missed…
January - A month of us talking to the world! Nina Adams spoke at PC Connect about the how we translated Ogre from a tabletop game into a digital game, while Peter Willington was on a Digital Discovery Track panel talking indie publishing. In the same month Tomas Rawlings spoke at Gamesforum discussing what happens when games intersect with the real world. We were also a part of the Global Games Jam in Bristol too.
February - We made a big announcement and launched our third Kickstarter campaign for Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics (A!CT) which was successfully funded and reached four of its stretch goals! We also went down to City of Games to show off the paper and pen prototype of the game. for the eagle eyed amongst you… there might be another good reason to click the follow button on our Kickstarter page for January 2019 👉 *HEAVY WINK* 👈
March - We started the month off right by completing the Kickstarter campaign for A!CT and getting a whopping 218% funding from your awesome people. It also coincided with our announcement of the PS4, Xbox One and Switch versions too. Tomas also wrote about why Dune II: The Battle for Arrakis is a seminal real-time strategy game with a massively influence today.
April - A!CT became the obsession for the studio and as we all got fitted for new robes and cultist gowns, we decided to give the website a much needed face lift. You are looking at it now - ain’t it pretty?
May - Due to the overwhelming success of the A!CT Kickstarter we launched the project on PledgeManager letting those who missed out a chance to back the game too.
*insert Thus Spake Zarathustra music* We announced the super awesome mission control, rocket building and space management strategy game… Mars Horizon. With some support from the guys at the UK Space Agency the game looks at the reality of space exploration and trying to land the first manned mission to Mars. We did a Podcast series about it too… have a listen!
June - We carried on with A!CT and Mars Horizon got a spot in the BBC’s Sky at Night Magazine, while Tomas Rawlings got a nomination for the Lifetime Achievement Award category at the 2018 SPARKies tech and digital awards.
July - Ogre players stretched their creative muscles in the screenshot submission contest for Ogre to celebrate Origins Game Fair 2018. There were some incredible entries, including the winning entry, of a recreation of Coronado Island for their Invasion of San Diego scenario!
We also appeared at Develop, with Tomas talking about the “Steampocalypse” and Nina talking about the benefits of working for an Indie company.
August - A!CT started taking shape and we had some really cool pre-alpha shots to show and a very early look at the game on Steam with Lead Designer Adam Carter-Groves. We also completed the trifecta of promotion with the launch of the A!CT podcast series.
We also had some lovely journo folks down to have a go on a few of our games including… the long sort after Dark Future: Blood Red States.
September - We said goodbye to our old Community Manager Jake and said hello to our new Marketing and Community Manager Matt in what can only be described as a seismic monumental moment for the company. (Take one guess who is writing this article…🙄)
However the big news from from September was...
Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui mglw'nfah Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn! Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui mglw'nfah Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn! Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics came out on steam by the way this month. Ph'nglui mglw'nfah Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn! Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui mglw'nfah Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn! Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui mglw'nfah Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!
October - We asked you for your thoughts on a brand new project we are working on, currently called “Project War Strider”. We wanted to talk to you about robots, what are the coolest robots, what settings should robots be in and how your robots should move.
In amazing news, we had over 450 of you reply so a massive, massive thank you for that. If you want to stay in the loop, make sure you’re signed up to our newsletter and keep an eye on the blog as we will talk more about the results soon.
In sad news, no one really wanted a 1950s robot detective game #heartbreak
November - We launched our brand new podcast series where Matt Davies and Matthew Walker interview some key people at the studio on the ins and outs of video game development. As well as ramble on about chocolate bars and Civilization. You can grab Episode 1, Episode 2 and Episode 3 now (there will also be some special episodes for Christmas so don’t forget to subscribe!). Also an interesting look at our Twitter data told us that 99% of our fans are dog lovers - so that’s a thing.
December - ...and here we are! December 2018. A whole year done and dusted! Again as we said before a massive thank you to everyone who has supported us and followed our stuff throughout the year. If you’ve bought one of our games in a sale - thank you. If you’ve listened to a podcast - thank you. If you’ve liked or shared a post of our - thank you.
2019 is sure to be another bumper year and we are really excited to be releasing A!CT on the Switch, Dark Future: Blood Red States and Mars Horizon - as well as another exciting project (all will be revealed soon)
Till next time!
So guess what? We are having a sale.
It’s not just any sale though… it’s on absolutely everything we have got!
With Christmas around the corner we know now is the time to start thinking of friends and family and what on earth to buy them… well for that special geek in your life we have some amazing deals on offer for you.
We’ve collected all them for you in one handy place. 👇 👇
It’s been one heck of a busy month for us! Where to begin...?
The release of Ogre went rather well. Most importantly, the team launched a solid game and then immediately began improving the experience based on user feedback. We always wanted to be completely transparent with the community of loyal fans Ogre has, so you can see the regularly updated patch notes here, which documents feature requests we’ve implemented, bugs squashed, and quality of life improvements made. Ogre is currently enjoying a 'Positive' review rating on Steam, which we’re thrilled with.
Steam, Humble, Green Man Gaming, and Gamersgate all supported the game, featuring Ogre on their front pages and social media channels. The title got into the New and Trending and Popular New Releases sections of Steam too which, again, was a fantastic result.
Press reception was largely positive from a good deal of outlets, with a smattering of mixed opinions too, which we pretty much expected. It was wonderful seeing screenshots and video of the game being featured on sites like Rock, Paper, Shotgun, PC Gamer, PCGamesInsider.biz, Bell of Lost Souls, and GamesRadar. We were also delighted to read that the original artist of Ogre - the mighty Winchell Chung - was a fan of how the game turned out.
More generally at the studio, though no doubt thanks in part to our work on Ogre, we’ve been talking with B2B outlets about how we convert tabletop experiences into digital ones, and the process of making games in general.
You can see these interviews on leading publication Gamasutra, non-profit industry champion Creative England, and brilliantly supportive local outlet Bristol 24/7.
And as if we needed an excuse to talk more, we can confirm that we’ll be speaking at international games conference Games Forum 2018, which we’ll share more details about in the coming months.
Though it’s probably slightly too early for most to be thinking about mince pies and crackers, we’ve been hard at work creating a series of Cthulhu Christmas Cards, which we’ve just launched the crowdfunding campaign for on Kickstarter.
There’s loads of details about what they are, why we’re doing them, and so on on the Kickstarter page, but one neat thing some people have missed is that, since we’re games designers at heart, we’ve hidden a puzzle that runs through all six designs that come in the box.
If you’re a fan of all things Eldritch, it’s definitely worth a look and, hey, maybe you should follow us on Twitter and Facebook too, because who knows what other horrors we may have in-store in the near future…?
Producer Peter Willington appears on Pete CB's Futures and Skills Podcast, talking about the future of gaming!
Read MoreAuroch Digital is a Bristol-based independent video games development studio and consultancy, known for our high-quality, faithful board game IP adaptations including Ogre, Dark Future and Chainsaw Warrior.
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