The folks who've brought you all those cute animal parent games: Shelter, Shelter 2, Paws, Meadow and the lot, revealed last year that they have something new in the works (aside from the planned Shelter 3). Might and Delight's "tiny MORPG" is called Book Of Travels and is planned as a "unique social roleplaying experience" somewhat in the vein of the studio's multiplayer experiments in Meadow. After being successfully crowdfunded, they are looking forward to beta testing starting this summer and an early access release for the autumn.
]]>Announcing a new game on April 1st seems like a foolish prospect to me, but Might And Delight reckon that now is the best time to unveil Shelter 3 to the world, due for release in 2020. While the first two games focused on the fragility of life as a badger and lynx respectively, this time the player has a big role to play - an elephant. You'll be leading their herd through the jungle and across the plains, and protecting the young from predators. It's also a look at a more social breed of animal, with the previous two games being solitary, tense stories. Below, the announcement trailer.
]]>Utomik! Sounds like a stiff drink, but no. Utomik is a subscription-based games service that launched yesterday, angling to be ‘Netflix for games’ (sound familiar?) It’s currently offering a library of approximately 750 games for either $7 or $10 per month, depending on whether you want to share the account with your little sister or not. I signed up and took a stroll through its library, fingering a few tomes here and there. And while it was fast and performed well, there wasn’t a lot I wanted to play. It’s less Netflix for games and more “Spotify for older games you already own or don’t want”.
]]>Shelter and its sequel starred animal mothers on serious missions, trying to escort their children to safety through hostile lands. They're lovely-looking games but, y'know, a bit grim. Meadow [official site], the latest game from creators Might and Delight, takes those adorable animals into a safer, sillier space. It's a multiplayer sandbox where everyone just larks about. It sounds a lot like Tale of Tales's magical deer playground The Endless Forest, though with new animals taking the fun to the skies and waters. If you fancy seeing what animal parents get up to after their kids leave home (or get eaten by eagles), it's only £2.
]]>I enjoy cuteness tinged with tragedy, but there is a certain line past which I feel the need to be mean and cynical to balance things up a bit. I mean, if you're going to be tugging at my heart strings and squeezing my eyes for some juice, at least be decent about it.
Paws [official site], a standalone spinoff from Shelter 2, came out today, together with an "interactive book" called "The Lonesome Fog." You will never believe how many lynx cubs die a tragic, painful death in this new story trailer!
]]>The Shelter games by Might and Delight have always looked gorgeous, but the prospect of me mothering idiot babies - even baby animals - sounds more like the pitch for a dire family movie than a plan for a pleasant afternoon. But I do adore that art! So I'm certainly interested in the Shelter 2 spin-off they announced today, an "adventure platformer" named Paws [Steam page]. Rather than care for a wee lynx, you play as one trying to find its way home. Have a look in this trailer:
]]>My nurturing instincts stretch only as far as buying a doughnut for Cara when I fetch my morning coffee, so Shelter 2 [official site] is perhaps not the game for me (Pip also struggled). However, Might & Delight's game about a lynx caring for her cubs is awfully pretty, and its new DLC may lure me in to gawp at rock formations and aurora borealis.
Named Mountains, because it adds mountains, the DLC launched this week. It's on Steam and GOG and whatnot for £4.
]]>Shelter 2 [official site] is Might & Delight's sequel to 2013's badger cub parenting game, Shelter. You play a mother lynx raising a brood of four cubs to adulthood, keeping them safe and fed while roaming the wilderness in search of glowing doodads. Here's wot I think.
]]>"Pip, I don't want to stereotype, but a trailer titled 'Cuteness in Shelter 2' seems right up your street," said Alice, stereotyping furiously.
Thing is, this is a stereo-typo because I am not there for anything cute or parental. I'm interested in Shelter 2 [official site] because I want to defeat my cubs and to see how the savage indifference of nature manifests. Further reading of this news story will contain spoilers for Shelter...
]]>Perhaps I'm not the best person to be talking to you about Shelter 2. The original Shelter revealed a fundamental non-maternal aspect to my character and saw me pleading with an eagle for it to "TAKE MY CHILDREN INSTEAD". Alas, the more compassionate people of the team are absent and so you will just have to make the best of it.
What you'll find after the cut are two whole minutes of footage showing you Might and Delight's take on being a mother lynx. In terms of art style and charm it's much the same as its predecessor although, given you're now further up the food chain, there's more in the way of killing.
]]>Shelter 2, the sequel to the badger cuddling loveliness from last year, has now been officially delayed until the first quarter of 2015. The developers, Might And Delight, report that their family of lynxes are proving trickier to craft than they'd imagined.
]]>From a certain perspective, Shelter's badger kits were a resource one could strategically burn to skip a difficult situation. A small supply of hearts, continues, bullets, or smartbombs one shouldn't waste but can afford to lose a few of. I'm glad Cara is in the USA right now or she'd ruddy well throttle me, and I suspect John might call me a monster too. Those badgers were their babies. They cared for them and feared for them and mourned them. Now Shelter 2 has new tricks up its sleeve to foster even more familial fondness, developers Might and Delight have revealed.
]]>I thought Shelter was a frustrating experience about shepherding an idiot brood of badgers through bad pathfinding and poorly signposted objectives. It's wholly possible that you're a far better person than I, and you saw in it the same touching story of parenthood as Cara and John. If so, prepare to get broody: developers Might And Delight have announced Shelter 2.
Even I have to admit it looks very pretty. Extremely teasery trailer below.
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