Devlog #1 - The Dark Mine: A Journey with TORCER

Introduction

Welcome to our very first devlog for "The Dark Mine," an exciting mobile game where you'll guide Torcer, a determined robot, through challenging levels filled with lightbulbs, gravity-shifting puzzles, and an array of mechanics to explore. This devlog is for mobile gamers, game developers, and anyone intrigued by a unique blend of puzzles and platforming in a dark, mysterious world.

Concept and Inspiration

"The Dark Mine" is a captivating mobile game that merges elements of platforming and puzzle-solving. The game's central character, Torcer, embarks on a quest to collect lightbulbs and navigate a dark mine. Drawing inspiration from classic platformers and modern mobile gaming experiences, we aim to create a game that is not only enjoyable but also challenging and mentally stimulating.

Gameplay Mechanics

In "The Dark Mine," you control Torcer using a joystick on your mobile device (TORCER will look in the direction of the joystick so you can see). The objective in each level is to collect lightbulbs, but it's not as simple as it sounds. Here's where the fun begins:

1. Collecting Lightbulbs: Torcer must collect lightbulbs scattered throughout each level. These bulbs bring a little light to the darkness.
2. Gravity-Shifting: The game introduces a unique mechanic - you can manipulate the gravity of objects by swiping up or down on the screen. This adds depth to the gameplay, allowing you to navigate obstacles and solve puzzles creatively.
3. Timer Challenge: Each lightbulb has a timer. When the timer runs out, one of the lightbulbs gets destroyed, adding a layer of urgency and strategy to the game. You'll always see one lightbulb at a time, keeping you on your toes.

Progression and Complexity

As you delve deeper into the dark mine, the challenges become increasingly complex. New mechanics and obstacles are introduced, ensuring that the gameplay stays fresh and engaging. From moving platforms and lasers to intricate puzzles, "The Dark Mine" promises a variety of challenges to test your skills.

For Mobile Gamers

If you enjoy mobile games that blend action, puzzles, and strategy, "The Dark Mine" offers an exciting adventure right at your fingertips. Its intuitive controls and progressive difficulty curve make it accessible to gamers of all skill levels.

For Game Developers

For fellow game developers, "The Dark Mine" showcases the potential of mobile gaming. We have worked tirelessly to create a seamless and immersive experience, from character animation to level design. If you are a game developer and want to support another developer consider leaving a comment on this devlog, read the coming devlogs and add the game to your collection.

Coming Soon

This is just the beginning, and we can't wait to share more about our development process and the exciting features we have in store. Stay tuned for the pre-alpha release and be part of the adventure. The next Devlog is going to be about the tutorial of the game. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow or leave a comment but we are different.

Devlog #2 - The Dark Mine: Tutorial

Introduction

Todays devlog is about one of the most important aspects of puzzle games, the tutorial. We previously tested the game and the tutorial was very hard which was not ideal so we had to rework it. What is so special about the tutorial of "The Dark Mine" is that it adapts to the players learning type. The player is asked how they learn best for now the options are auditive and visual. If the player chooses auditive there will be a narrator telling you what to do. If you selected visual there will be a video for each stage showing you what to do. It's a different approach to normal tutorials and we hope to innovate them.

Stages

The tutorial is split into stages as follows:

Stage 1: there is a lightbulb and TORCER nothing else.

Stage 2: A Box gets spawned over the player. It falls down and now you have to collect the lightbulb with the box by pushing it

Stage 3: You learn to swipe up or down on the right side of the screen to switch the gravity of objects but not TORCER.

Stage 4: A timer gets introduced. Every lightbulb has a timer which when it runs out destroys the lightbulb. The first and second lightbulb cannot be reached so the timer runs out and the player learns that the timer is associated with the lightbulbs. The third lightbulb however is reachable. When the player collects it the tutorial is finished.

Conclusion

Making the tutorial was really hard the first version of our tutorial didn't work at all for play testers but we hope we did a good job with this version. Let us now what you think and leave suggestions. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow, leave a comment or read our last devlogs but we are different if you haven't noticed yet.

Devlog #3 - The Dark Mine: Level Design

Introduction

Welcome back to our third and last devlog. Just kidding but now we have your attention don't we. In todays devlog we will show you the level design of our game. We  really took our time for the levels as the players will spend most of the time playing them. So grab yourself a nice cup of yorkshire tea and enjoy this weeks devlog.

Quick Recap of the Mechanics

For those of you who haven't read our last devlogs first of all shame on you and second of all here's a quick recap: Every level is bound by the walls and there is one lightbulb to collect. If you do so either ba touching the lightbulb with an object or TORCER (the player) a second lightbulb pops up and that repeats for another lightbulb making the goal: Collect all lightbulbs. But theres a timer for every lightbulb which destroys the lightbulb when it runs out. The main mechanic is the ability to switch the gravity of movable objects, TORCER is not affected by it which requires you to solve levels using puzzle solving skills.

Level Progression

As you might have guessed we don't want to spoil all the levels but we are going to tell you the basic structures and ideas. Every level looks like this you may remember it from the tutorial. there will obviously be different objects for each level. We are going to show you some levels here, don't worry there will still be many unexpected puzzles to solve even if you read this.

This is level one. This level expands on the tutorial as you only have a box and TORCER


Level 4: In this level a new object is introduced, the jump pads. Very self explanitory, they fling you along with all movable objects in the air.

Level 7: A button, a breakable and a box wall is all you have. Try figuring this one out for yourself and write in the comments how you would solve this.

now the 10th Level is special. Every 10th level is special actually. Why? because these levels are the hardest ones, they build on what you learned but always have an unexpected twist. But you need to play the demo when it comes out to see it for yourself.

What's more to come

Now that you know how our levels work and maybe have seen a few examples if you were brave enough to click on the spoiler warning, you might ask yourself what's more to come. Take a look at these objects

What do you think these objects do? Are they dangerous or do they help? Do they affect TORCER or other movable objects? Or are they just asthetic? Who knows. Tip: The right one does more than just sit there so write in the comments what you think those objects do.

Conclusion

This devlog revolved around the level design and it was arguably the hardest one to write for us because we can't spoil the content as it will have 20 levels on release so showing off 5 levels is already showing off 25% off the games levels. Anyways we hope you liked this devlog inspite of the lack of content. The next Devlog is going to be: The Level Select. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow leave a comment or read our last devlogs or add "The Dark Mine" to your collection but we are different.

Announcement

Before we start we have an announcement to make: We now have a discord🎉🎉🎉

https://discord.gg/94EZQnWQ

join it now and you'll get exclusive content of our game! Now let's get into this weeks devlog. Oh and if you like how our discord server is set up and want a tutorial on how to do that leave a like and we'll consider it.

Devlog #4 - The Dark Mine: Level Select

Introduction

Welcome to our 4th devlog. This one is about the level select. And before you get distracted by some other media the level select of our game isn't UI. Got your attention now? no? Ok wait theres more but you'll have to read the devlog for that.

A different kind of level select

As mentioned our level select doesn't consist of UI. Why? Because. Ou level select is inspired by Rayman Legends, if anyone still knows this game write it in the comments. In Rayman Legends you walk through a hall to select different worlds in which the levels are located. you select them by walking over a wood mount with a picture of the world or level and pressing a button on your controller. We don't use wood mounts or controllers nor do we have a guy without legs or arms as a player character but we have doors!

Doors

Who knows if there are more doors or wheels but we know that doors are better symbols for entering things than wheels (or are they?). Take a look at this image

This is the level select. You might already understand the concept here but we are going to explain it anyway. You see the doors are like the wood mounts in Raymond Legends. You walk over the doors and can now choose to play that level. There are no worlds in our game so no need for multiple doorways with multiple doors. This is how one would do it

Is there anything more to this than doors? Well just keep reading because there is a major problem with a physical level select.

Problems

Imagine this: You want to play level 20. What do you do? You walk about 500 kilometers to get to that door only to change your opinion that you now want to play level 3. What we mean is that the more levels we make the longer players have to walk to the doors which is everything else than convenient. So here's our solution: An Elevator. There will be a wall so you will never have to walk more than 10 levels to the right as you can see here

Every 10 levels the levels will go to a floor below you. But you only can go down if you completed all levels of the previous floors (at least 1 lightbulb in every level). Look

And as you can see that's what the elevator is used for. So what do you think did this solve the problem or would you still be bored walking from left to right and up and down to get to levels?

Conclusion

The level select is a part of the game now (kind of literally) and it was really fun working on the level select. The next devlog is going to be exciting: The Shop. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow leave a comment or read our last devlogs or add "The Dark Mine" to your collection but we are different.

Devlog #5 - The Dark Mine: A Unique Shop

Introduction

The Shop is a very important aspect in game developement. For us especially because we've decided that we have enough of ads in games so our revenue of the game will only be made with the shop. So naturally we also decided to make a completely different shop model to all the other mobile games. We don't sell you skins, cosmetics or powerups, we sell gamemodes. Now that might tell you nothing but let us try to explain.

Concept for the Shop (in the gold circles there should be the matching icon in it and a looping icon should be engraved in the wood)

A Different Kind of Shop

Modes are a game-changer. Literally. These unique gameplay modifiers completely transform the way you experience "The Dark Mine." Think of them as alternate realities within the game, each offering a fresh and exciting perspective. So when you buy a mode you can experience the levels you already played from a completely different perspective. But there are three categories to these modes.

Mode Categories

To make navigation easier, we've categorized modes into three distinct groups based on their compatibility with existing levels:

1. All Levels: These modes seamlessly integrate into every level, offering a fresh perspective on the entire game.
2. Some Levels: Some modes may not fit into every level, but they bring a twist to specific sections, keeping the experience diverse.
3. New Levels: For those modes that are so unique they require entirely new levels to explore, we've got you covered. Expect a fresh set of challenges and surprises.

Furthermore the modes can be split into even more categories:

• Challenge Modes: This type of mode provides a challenge for the player
• Mechanic Modes: The modes change a mechanic or create a new one
• Identity Modes: You don't play as TORCER but as something else.

Sneak Peak of The Modes

• TORCER at Ceiling: Instead of the player being on the floor you are now at the ceiling and have to solve the puzzles from a different perspective so you have to rethink every level you've played. This mode is used for almost all levels and changes a mechanic so its mode type is "mechanic" and its mode category is "some levels".
  

• Infinite Mode: It's all in the name. You've got infinite lightbulbs to collect instead of the usual three, and the level only ends when you miss one. But here's the kicker – we've thrown random objects into each room, so you'll never play the same level twice. (type: mechanic, category: all levels or new levels we haven't decided yet.
  
  As you can see the lightbulbs are currently not counted because it's still WIP

• Lightbulb Mode: You are the lightbulb and have to get to an object or TORCER. This leads to some interesting gameplay as you have to rethink the levels to not get TORCER or an object somewhere useful but the lightbulb. (type: identity, category: some levels)
  

• Double Level Mode: Now, here's a mode we're keeping a bit mysterious. Because we love mysteries. Instead, we'll leave it to your imagination. Speculate in the comments let's see who will get it first, it shouldn't take long should it? Oh right we don't have any actual readers at this point. Oh well then no one will be able to comment right? Right?

Conclusion

The shop of our game is completely different from anything the game industry (especailly mobile games) has seen. We hope more people use a creative approach to the shops of games. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow leave a comment or read our last devlogs but we are different if you haven't noticed yet. But we are going to ask you to join our discord https://discord.gg/94EZQnWQ

Devlog #6 - The Dark Mine: Marketing

Introduction

In todays devlog we are goig to talk about maketing. It's the hardest part of the game for us, not the graphic design, programming, bainstorming, none of that is as hard as marketing. If you are currently in the marketing phase too or just like our game just keep on reading as this is one of the more informative and long devlogs so far. That is also why throughout this level we'll just show you some Images of our game (mostly unrelated to the text). And as always enjoy this weeks devlog.

The Plan

So before doing anything complex we need a plan which we split into three phases:

1. Pre launch
2. Launch
3. Post launch

Simple enough. Our plan is obviously way more complex than that so let us break it down for you, we won't spoil everything though.

Phase 1

Phase 1 mainly consists of starting a community. First is social media: We use itch and discord and maybe something else in the future. It is important to have one main platform where your community gathers. For us that is discord. Now that we now where to grow a community we need to actually start growing it almost like a plant. It needs to be watered regularly and if you do it long enough you'll have a tree just ike in our discord. But to grow this little plant even more we will reach out to game reviewers and ask them politely to review our game, so we made an email template which we will use when needed. Before we get into how to write a good email here's a quick screenshot

(Level 18 Preview)

Now take a look at this:

• Write a catching headline. Think like a reviewer, what do they look for? Why should they review YOUR game? If you were to write an article about your game what would your headline be? Use that as your subject line.
• Make the email personal, if you find out their name and what they like (maybe from a portfolio you've read) you should make the email personal. If you can't find anything about them it's also fine to just use an email template.
• Make the email look good. Make it formatted well and don't do too much, distracting them from your main point, which is getting your game reviewed so keep that in mind when writing the email template.
• Make the journalists job as easy as possible. If you give them 5 links to social media one for your website and one fo your discord and then ask them to review your game without providing easy to find media they will probably not review it. So for instance only link them your website where you'll have all the details they need, like a press kit where all screenshots, videos etc. are located.

If you don't know many reviewers there are lists of hundreds of reviewers online, but you should choose one that fits your audience. Knowing your audience is one of the key parts when growing your little plant. Quick screenshot time:

(Infinite Mode concept art)

Now it gets interesting. We currently have a community of about 40 members, how would one go about growing a whole community out of that, we barely have a sappling we need to grow. So naturally we made a absolutely fool proof plan for that too! Don't believe us? Well mathematically speaking you know every person on earth by about 6 - 7 layers of people that know people and so on (6 degrees of seperation sometimes known as 7 degrees of seperation). That means if you know a person that knows a person that knows a person and so on 6-7 times you probably know Elon Musk. Anyways, the point is if you, yes you, were to tell someone about our game and tell those people to tell their friends about the game this would result in exponential growth. So go on dear reader make our game known to every human on earth. Ok that was so much text so let's do a speedrun

(Level 9 preview)

Phase 2

Basically phase 2 consists of maintaining the community and growing it further by reaching out to influencers and other reviewers using past reviews as a resume. Also if we were to make money in phase 1 we would use it now for ads. In this phase we also want to soft launch a game, that means launch the game to a restricted audience for alpha testing. That would happen in the discord server.

Phase 3

More reviews, more influencers, more 7 degrees of seperation and maintanence of the community.

Conclusion

Wow this was a long one but we really hope this helps some developers to start a community if you have questions or similar join our discord. We didn't even have time to talk about everything so if you want a marketing part 2 devlog let us know by commenting. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far that's actually crazy so thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow leave a comment or read our last devlogs but we are different if you haven't noticed yet.

Devlog #7 - The Dark Mine: New Years Update

Introduction

It's the 1st of january and we didn't upload a devlog for 36 days so here goes a new years devlog. This one is about scope creep, level design updates and tutorial updates as well as shop and gamemode updates. But first of all, the year is over! Sooo let's do a quick recap of what we managed to do this year.  As always enjoy the devlog.

Recap

We made very big progress on the game. Many of you don't know this but we actually started making the game at the end of 2021. It was not how we invisioned it however, which is why we started over. New graphics, new codebase, new UI almost everything improved and that's how 2023 basically started. Fun fact: The game originally was supposed to be named Light It Up but as a game with that name already existed we had to change it and came up with The Dark Mine. Also there was a main menu. You know what just look at these images

Old Level Select

New Level Select

Old Main Menu (there is no main menu anymore)

Old Level Layout

New Level Layout

Let us know what you think about the improvements.

The reason why it took us so long to make The Dark Mine is that we made many pauses throughout development, sometimes 1 week sometimes 3 months because we worked on the game when we had time. In September 2023 we started to make these devlogs. So everything you have seen so far in the last devlogs is what we managed to do in 2023 (mostly). But of course there were many many problems we had that we haven't talked about yet, some are old some only a week old.

Level Design

We had 18 levels done when we noticed they weren't actually fun. To explain why we need to discuss a little bit of theory about puzzle games. There are different types of puzzles:

Logic puzzles (among us crewmate tasks, often grid based), Word Puzzles (Wordle or Sudoku), Mechanical Puzzles (Rubiks Cube, Mazes, Chess) and Meta puzzles (many puzzles form a big metapuzzle) to name a few relevant ones. But what category would our game fit in? Well The Dark Mine is a physics based puzzle game which makes it a mechanical puzzle. To understand what makes a mechanical puzzle fun though we could look at what makes our current levels boring and take inspiration from other mechanical puzzle games. First of all every level seemed like an introduction to a new mechanic but none of the levels built upon that. Secondly none of the levels had a high difficulty and taking a general look at all levels they definitely didn't have a difficulty curve. And last but not least the actual purpose of a puzzle game, having an "Aha" moment that is, wasn't fullfilled after all. Take a look at this level

You have to shrink yourself to get under the rocks and then go on the Jump Pad to jump really high. Very simple but also very boring and a puzzle element is completely missing. Same goes for EVERY other level we had so far.

So we started over, thinking about every level considering the objects contained in it (box, button, planks, ...), the main mechanic you have to use to solve the level and ultimately have this "Aha" moment. With this in mind we were able to make more difficult levels so the first problem was solved. If you want to see these levels you'll have to wait for another devlog...

Scope Creep

We thought of making 20 levels and many gamemodes that could ALL apply to EVERY level (more on gamemodes here). As you might've guessed that idea was a bit optimistic and realistically completely unrealistic. But to begin with we started completely ignoring every problem regarding this and made useless levels and gamemodes anyways. I know genius. After realizing this mistake though we settled on making only 3 gamemodes and redisign the levels without trying to do too much at once. And The gamemodes would not need to apply to all levels just if it happened else they only had to apply to some or new levels. Another one solved! Next.

Shop

Here's a little reminder of what the shop looks like currently

After looking at the shop you might think: "That looks decent." NO! We didn't like the look and we wanted the shop to be more special so we decided to change it up a bit but this devlog is already quite long again so we'll share that in the next one...

Conclusion

So as you can see we changed the game quite a bit and overhauled every aspect of The Dark Mine. We hope you liked this devlog and some old images. We have done so much in 2023 and started growing a community on discord and twitter so if you want to GET THE GAME FIRST you should join the discord. As we are already pretty far in development we are certain The Dark Mine will release 2024. Next devlog is going to be about the Shop once again and maybe the gamemodes. That's it for this devlog if you made it this far that's actually crazy so thank you. Now at this point we would tell you to follow leave a comment or read our last devlogs but we are different if you haven't noticed yet.

Devlog #8 - The Dark Mine: New New New

Introduction

Wow its been a while... But WE ARE BACK! Welcome to the 8th devlog of The Dark Mine and let me tell you there is sooo much new stuff to show! This devlog is completely dedicated to showing off these new things so sit back and just enjoy this one.

Settings

First things first I made a few changes to the Settings. Before it looked like this:

The settings are listed in a window and you can check the corresponding boxes to activate or deactivate a setting. Sounds good right? Wrong! You know what's better than having boring settings in one window? Having settings split up in multiple ones! So this is what it looks like now:

(WIP)
As you can see having a tab system makes this far superior☕. The settings are more organized and animations are better than no animations.

New Gamemodes

You might have Lightbulb Mode, Torcer At Ceiling Mode or Infinite Mode in mind when I talk about gamemodes but no they are gone now. Well TAC Mode stayed but drama is good i've heard. So why did I decide to remove Infinite and Lightbulb Mode? They sucked. But don't let me explain it let me show you

Have you managed to stay entertained or did you just scroll down here? See it's just not fun. But what about Lightbulb Mode? Maybe it's more fun? Well you might remember this mode as you being the lightbulb instead of TORCER which at first glance sounds pretty cool and you can even fly around levels!

But that is also the problem. The levels are made for TORCER but he doesn't fly so the puzzles are made with a "How do you even get there" mindset. In one level there is a trick to push a box on a ledge making it possible to get up on a platform. Now imagine this with lightbulb mode. You could just fly up there and that's it. So to summarize: Lightbulb mode didn't make it because it was too OP and I didn't find a way to get around this issue.

But now to the title of this heading: There are some new gamemodes in place of the old ones, namely Twin Mode and Ghost Mode. In twin mode there is an Anti-TORCER that you can't touch so you have to find a way around it. Because there is a counter part to TORCER now he always moves in the opposite direction as TORCER. Also there is this really cool effect when they get near each other:

Level 1 now becomes the introduction to this new mode as you have to walk all the way to the right with TORCER to prevent touching his anti part.
Another new mode is Ghost Mode. In this mode you experience a completely new world in every level. There are ghost objects which are only visible in the light cone of the flashlight. TORCER can never interact with ghost objects because his flashlight is in front of him but every other object can. So now you have to figure out where to shine your light and how to position other objects to interact correctly with ghost objects making every move count. Unfortunately this gamemode is still a work in progress so if you want to see some actual footage of it you'll have to wait or join the discord. But here is a first preview:

New Mechanic

When I said theres new stuff I meant it. Yes there is a completely new mechanic. But as always let me just show you:

When TORCER stands on a movable object and you switch the gravity the object will lift you up into the air. This mechanic makes puzzles so much more dynamic and I think it adds a unique touch to the game.

New Levels

I have talked about it before in the last devlog. The old levels weren't fun so I redid most of them only leaving in 3 of the 18 levels we had before... Throughout this devlog you have already seen one new level and you will see more so here is one more level you haven't seen yet (even if it is incomplete):

New Tutorial

Lastly there is one more thing new to The Dark Mine. And it is the tutorial. To be fair it is not completely new, I have kept the footage of Devlog 2 but there is no cursor actually moving TORCER. As a reminder this is one stage of the old tutorial where a fake TORCER showed you what to do (video not completely accurate to the invisioned gameplay):

This is the new tutorial (same stage):

The button on the bottom right brings up a sign that shows you what to do using the same footage as in the old tutorial. Along with that there is now a skip button on the upper right under the pause button which was much needed. Everything else remained the same in the tutorial.

Conclusion

And this is it! Now you know what is new in the game and I hope you liked this devlog. If you made it this far thank you. At this point others would tell you to follow the development further or read our last devlogs or join some kind of discord you don't even know about but in reality it is the best server where you get the best game for free, you know exactly what discord server I am referring to. Ok now go do something useful for humanity, bye.