YotesGames

Mid June Progress Report (Let's Get These Ponies in a Row)

Things are finally back to normal here at Yotes Games as of last weekend, and the team is back to whipping these pixel horses into shape! Unfortunately there's not much to show visually this time around since it's mostly been paperwork, code, and business conversations getting done lately. 

We planned on stalling things out with a video release yesterday to go alongside the Summer Games Fest but we couldn't make progress on the editing since the last Progress Report.

Sorry to say it, but there's no DevLog this week, making us cross into 3 months late territory with that.

A COVID scare situation has put a little pause on @Confident_Cow's progress with the DevLog, and health & safety of team members comes first, so it's getting pushed back another couple weeks. It'll be worth the wait though.

In  addition to that we're currently in the planning stages of a bunch of new content and reworking some video ideas to be as quick & easy to edit as possible, so we can have much faster turnarounds with these releases. (Our YouTube channel can't grow if we don't post anything, right?)

Most of the design work lately has been on getting our Task List on ClickUp organized so we can start making more accurate predictions for how long things take to get done. Proper project management is going to be the core thing that makes this fledgling Game Studio work in the long run, so it's important to get it right and not just fly by the seat of our pants and never end up reaching launch day this decade.

And once we have every last thing we need to develop written down, explained in detail, and timestamped, all that'll be left to do is just execute. One day at a time and barring any setbacks (already accounted for with rounded up estimations) we'll have this game out within a highly accurate timeframe. Even if it's not by the end of 2022 like we wanted. (In fact we've heard from other creators that Kickstarter games often take a year and a half longer to come out than expected due to any number of complications.)

So it's not all sorted out yet, but we're getting close. As of today, it's time to carefully review the current list of tasks in each milestone and make sure we aren't forgetting something that needs to be made in order to make it work. Nothing's too small to note, especially since there's often small things that seem to be negligible that end up eating 3 entire workdays!

But as for what we've been up to since the last report:

• Psy is back from vacation and programming his tail-off!
• We've unlocked YouTube Community features after reaching 500 subscribers.
• There's new visuals planned for when you level up in the overworld.
• Everypony, Everybody, and Everything in the Overworld now cast a shadow.
• Plans for different kinds of Wild Encounter behaviors & walk patterns.
• Discussed adding a new musician to the team.
• Commissioned Promotional Artwork of Ponatina by SugarMorning 
• Carefully studying the success of Them's Fightin' Herds and Maretime Bay Adventure (trending games with pretty much the same niche audience as Battle Gem Ponies).
• Interactions with the Healing House NPC that can revive your pony and let us print custom messages across a blacked out screen.
• Your pony can now carryover maladies like Poison into the overworld and take damage while looking sickly and sharing unique dialogue about how unwell she's feeling.
• Overworld characters can now hop whenever we want them to.
• We attempted to rename certain classes but decided to keep what we have for now.
• Changed the way many moves worked (streamlining combat mechanics and side effects).
• Fixed menu scroll list glitches.
• Redesigned the Ponipedia Menu.
• Got some new music drafts for the OST.
• Revised Camera controls for the future Cutscene System.
• New Pinto Demo Expansion Plans to test new mechanics.
• Streamlined the Overworld UI to use less buttons.
• Tilemaps for the full game have been sorted into more manageable groups.
• We can now remotely control an overworld character's mood or walking style and they'll automatically update all their animations to match.
• We can also now track player steps in the overworld and do different things with that data (like cure maladies after 30 steps).
• Certain time-consuming marketing plans and Operation: "Daily YouTube Content" have been pushed back to post-BGP mobile launch as to not distract us from development any further.
• Experimented with fun new ways to animate text in-game.
• Cut down on the number of minigames in the mobile release so we can focus more on developing the core game loop.
• Several other ideas have been backlogged or pushed into being DX Edition features in order to get the mobile release out sooner.
• Nearly every task left to do in order to launch the complete game has been plotted out.
• Began gathering time estimates on an individual dev basis instead of a cumulative manhour total to get more accurate milestone time estimations.

And on top of all that, there's been a complete overhaul in the way we have ClickUp Tasks Structured, so now the layout is focused around everything we need to do on a per-milestone basis instead of a per-development category basis.

We're gonna knock this project out. One way or another. And making the light at the end of the tunnel less foggy is going to boost our drive a lot. Looking forward to the many back-to-back demos to come, and all the hype that comes with fleshing out the story mode dropping chapter after chapter.

- Thanks for (patiently) following the development of Battle Gem Ponies!

Late May Progress Report (DevLog Delay, Development Continues)

Some family situations involving visiting parents, an overseas wedding, and other irl distractions for different team members at different times have cut into BGP time quite a bit this month. So things are a little delayed, but still moving. Because there's always at least one of us chipping away at this project around the clock.

We intended to have the long overdue DevLog out by now, but it's a juicy 22 minute long event that's gonna need some fancier editing to make that information dump more entertaining to watch. (It's a lecture as long as a TV episode!) So we're giving that 2 more weeks to breathe, allowing @Confident_Cow to work his magic.

To avoid this kind of holdup in the future, we'll be looking into doing more bite-sized devlogs, crunching things down to just the big picture stuff all within 6 minutes. (Less editing, less talking, more amazing progress to see.)

But in terms of what got done lately:

• State Descriptions you can see in Battle by clicking on little Orb Icons
• See descriptions for active Weather & Maladies too
• A more organized and detailed Task List (that makes the project feel less overwhelming and each goal more focused)
• Detailed plans for upcoming features in the June Ultra Demo
• Fleshed out Minigame ideas
• Plans to make individual NPC encounters and battles unique
• Commissioned Artwork for a BGP promotion
• Resolved some scary Tax issues
• Gave the Ponipedia Menu a makeover
• A functional Healing Sequence with the Nurse NPC in the Rest House
• Polished Threat Meter graphics
• Created more tools for testing specific battle scenarios
• Reworked entire Battle Mechanics, ending up with about 75 configurable States (instead of a nebulous couple hundred) 
• Streamlined File Deletion process
• Implemented a dynamic Level Cap
• Displaying chosen Item Loadout in VS Match Party Select screen
• Polished Battle HUD some more
• Fixed some typos in the Battle Banner text bar

So we're still knocking things out day-by-day. And soon as the calendar turns to June, the BGP team oughta be back in full-force! Hope you look forward to what we'll have done in 2 weeks time.

- Thanks for following the development of Battle Gem Ponies!  

Mid May Progress Report (Leaps and Bounds in Quality!)

This game just gets cooler by the day! We're more jazzed up to work on this than ever now that we're working on things that can be seen and played with on real devices instead of just test scenes, spreadsheets, and whiteboard doodles.

Every Saturday the team gets together and we basically game jam out a bunch of small tasks all in one night, so those tend to be the most satisfying workdays.

And there are so many little improvements to talk about, that perhaps it's best to let the game speak for itself when the next demo drops less than a month from now...

Here's a shortlist of what we've done lately:
- Recorded and Prepped a New DevLog Video (Coming Soon to our YT Channel)
- Added a Virtual Joystick Option to the Mobile HUD
- Mockups and First Drafts for the More Details Menu and Ponipedia Category Expansions
- Dynamic Music Player for Mid-Level Song Changes & Intro/Loop Playbacks
- Orb Icons for all the Statuses in Battle
- An Arena Select Screen
- Complete Healing Item Functionality
- Reworked Grid-Based Walking System for Better Game Feel
- Pony Radar System for Tracking Down New Wild Species
- A Threat Level Meter for Measuring Wild Pony's Strength & Capture Difficulty
- New UI for Tracking Wild Ponies' Captured Status
- Multicolored Slideout Labels for When Battle Effects Get Triggered
- Fixed Overworld Inventory & Item Pickup Bugs
- Signed Up for the OTK Games Expo
- Reserved a Vendor Booth at Everfree Northwest
- Polished Ultra Pony Transformations & UI
- Polished the Move Select UI to Make Move Properties More Clear
- Fleshed Out Some Story Ideas & Lore
- Polished Overworld Pause Menu for Better Flow
- Came Up with Nicknames for Each Pony Color Palette
- Experimented with Controller Support
- And Prettied Up the Title Screen Just a Bit

A pretty productive month so far. You can catch a bunch of what else we did in April when the DevLog's finally out!  Hope you look forward to our next big demo, the Ultra Update some time early next month.

- Thanks for checking out the development of Battle Gem Ponies!

We'll Be Vending at Everfree Northwest 2022!!

Just got the news that BGP will be vending once again at Everfree Northwest!

We're bringing back the demo booth in full-force with a much more polished build to show just how far we've come in the past year!

https://everfreenw.com/

We're so, so HYPED to see people's reaction to our Fall 2022 demo IN-PERSON!

Looking forward to seeing some of you there!

Late April Progress Report (Rapidly Adding Features!)

We implemented 3 major core features within the last 2 weeks! 

We've got leveling up animations, the Paper Mario style upgrade select, and an intuitive way to customize these new stats in VS Mode.

We've also got pony capture mechanics!

(took us long enough to get monster capturing in our monster catching game 😅)

And we have Ultra Form ponies up and going in an unpolished state.

Things are looking good on all fronts as we race towards getting the next big demo out by the end of May. And we're keeping tabs on the huge list of newfound bugs to address as well.

The team is delighted and inspired by every single Let's Play and BGP Stream we come across, so keep that good stuff coming!

And thanks for following the development of Battle Gem Ponies!

Pinto Isle Overworld Demo Available Now for Patrons!

The Battle Gem Ponies Revamped Overworld Gameplay Demo is FINALLY here!

We want to thank all our supporters for the immense patience that's been afforded to the Yotes Games Dev Team. We've finally reached that precious milestone where entire features are each being added and polished within a week so things are getting much spicier as far as stuff we can show off and let people play!

Game's still on track for a late 2022 release, and you can expect the next open public demo to be out in time for the Everfree Northwest convention (Aug 26th).

The Pinto Overworld Demo is Here!

Backers, rejoice!

The overworld demo is finally here for you all to enjoy! Feel free to play it, tell us what you think, or even stream it on Twitch and YouTube. At this point, more than anything, we want to know what you think of the improvements so far. This here is the foundational overworld we will be building the rest of the game off of after all.

You can find download links to Play over here: New BGP Overworld Demo!

(Password: THNX414&P)

It's open to anyone who's backed us Kickstarter and anyone joining our Patreon.

Below is a breakdown of new features you'll find in this demo as well as the next set of mechanics we're starting on.

This Demo: 

• Overworld Exploration  
• Surfing  
• Item Collection 
• Your Pony Reacting to the Environment
• Wild Battles  
• Tamer Battles  
• Earn Experience Points & Money  
• Level Up and Learn New Moves (up to Lv 50!)  
• Fancy Route Display Cards  
• New Pixelated Font  
• Branching Dialogue System  
• Inventory System  
• And Petting Your Pony!

Next Demo: 

• Level Up Choice (HP/GP/BV boost)  
• Catching Ponies  
• Cutscene System  
• Ultra Forms (Boss Fight vs Ultra Vinerva)  
• Alpha Pony Encounter (vs Rainbryte)  
• Elemental Meteorite Collecting  
• AI Pathfinding  
• Evened Out Audio Levels (for Sound Effects & Music)
• Notifications  
• Dynamic Text Printing Controls (Rhythmic Speech)  
• In-Battle Dialogue  
• Rest House  
• Teleporting  
• Travel Moves (Cut/Burn/Zap, Smash)  
• KO'd Tamer Ponies Shown in Overworld  
• Arena Select Menu  
• Plus Full Controller Support

We apologize for the long wait. Game development always presents new micro-challenges every day and we're taking them on one at a time. But it's all adding up to something special. We're still on track for a 2022 release, but it's already looking a lot more like a Fall launch than a Summer one.

Anybody at the Generosity tier and above can see our Daily Reports on Discord and see the things we knock out on a daily basis, but for the sake of transparency, we will now include mini-progress newsletters for all backers to see every couple of weeks going forward. (Even if the news isn't always as exciting as adding shiny features.)

Thanks for sticking around, and enjoy the demo!

New Demo Coming VERY Soon...

The Yotes Team has been hard at work pulling 10 to 16 hour work sessions daily since the start of March to get this Overworld foundation up and running. (Our lead programmer Psyaryu especially, since he's in charge of resolving most of the bugs we find.) 💻

Last night we finally got to a point where all the features we promised back in January were implemented and everything seemed ready to go. But after running our computers overnight to get the builds rendered out in uploadable form, we woke up to a list of new issues that really sour the experience. A super downer after making you guys wait so long. ⌛

So instead of making a lackluster first impression, we're taking just a little more time to clean things up and get you the shiny and fun overworld you backers deserve! 🌟

We want to thank every one of you for being so patient, nobody wants this game out there more badly than the dev team, and we can't wait to start seeing your reactions to the fruits of our labor here. 🍓

So expect a brand new playable build within the next 24 hours! 

- From Tony Yotes, on behalf of the Yotes Games team 🎮

February Progress Report (Backer Demo Finishing Touches)

A new backer demo will arrive next week!

We're putting the finishing touches on all the foundational overworld features developed so far. With the intent to deliver all the things promised back when the Kickstarter was wrapping up.

Features such as:

Even with all that, there's still much to do before releasing the next big open public demo. There's entire mechanics missing like Catching Wild Ponies and Activating Ultra Forms as well as plenty of Quality of Life UI Improvements. We're aiming for April to get all that done and polished to the state where we wouldn't mind a Streamer putting this game in front of new eyeballs.

Things are mechanically sound, and currently our engine tools are at a point where we can do just about anything we'd want in an RPG like this. However, there's still visual cleanup to be done and some bugs to squash.

Mainly this stuff here: (from our Dev Discord)

But we're giving it 'til the 28th and just pushing what we've got to a new build so you guys can finally play around with the BGP Overworld, completely rebuilt from scratch!

Hope you all look forward to getting your hands on this as much as we're looking forward to using these tools to make the full game. 🎮

January Progress Report (Some Cleanup Required)

We've been working especially hard on a level editor tool (any of you with access to our Daily Neigh posts can see we've been chipping away at this for a long while now) and getting things to a point where we can smoothly, quickly get things placed where we want them and customized to exact specification. 

Hard part is making it not just work, but also be clean enough to comb through for bugs. It needs to be foolproof or we'll be spending way too much time not able to identify where a problem is coming from or worse yet, having to change hundreds (even thousands) of objects separately because of a minor error that affected one thing and got copy/pasted into a bunch of others. No bueno.

So right now we're getting this stuff up to snuff by building (and re-building) the Demo Island back from the 2017/2018 build way back pre-calamity. Each time is a smoother experience than the last and it'll lead to us being able to make the hundreds of maps needed for the final game. All built on a solid foundation with efficient debugging in mind.

We hope you look forward to playing it, and we hope to have it in your hands by the first week of February.

(And proper thanks to Avaxian for making today's header image. Very tasteful, topical, and terribly true to life.)

BGP Devlog #4 (Hotfix TARTARUS!)

New Devlog Hotfix TARTARUS! is now on YouTube, check it out!

After chipping away at development tools and setup behind the scenes, the Yotes Games team is back with an (admittedly late) update on what we've been up to! 

In short, things like new scenery, a debugged overworld, and more videos breaking down specific mechanics can be expected as we charge full-speed ahead into the next year.

The team is thankful for how far we've been able to get this year with the help of the Kickstarter, and we're looking forward to fulfilling the promise of a truly awesome video game experience!

December Progress Report (Tools & Foundations)

To get the overworld stuff working we've been chipping away at some Unity editor scripts to make setting up the game objects you interact with a lot more streamlined than before. 

Default settings that can fill themselves in to save time, foolproof settings so we can't enter data that'll lead to bugs, and Dropdown Box/Drag n' Drop entry fields wherever we can to make certain we can see how each and every piece of the game is connected from a distance and at a glance.

Here's a little look at the kind of tools we're building:

We plan on releasing detailed videos on all this stuff once it's finalized and we're using it all to build the maps for the full game, and not just this demo "test island" area we're calling Pinto Island.

Development is moving along smoothly and we're looking forward to working out any kinks that come along while recreating the overworld mechanics from the 2018 demo! (Always easier the second time around, right?)

Looks like we won't be able to meet our internal goal of having Pinto Island done by Christmas, but we can still keep up with the goal of going into the New Year with the creation of development tools completed and our production pipeline all figured out (and battle-tested) so we can start crafting the world of Battle Gem Ponies that everyone will get to play in by Summer/Fall 2022.

We'll keep chugging along to make it happen. Thanks for checking in and following the development of Battle Gem Ponies!

And Happy Holidays to all you backers that gave Yotes Games the gift of freedom to pursue our gamedev dreams... 🎁💗

November Progress Report (Leveling Up All Over)

After TONS of revisions, I think we're finally getting the hang of this video production thing. And once we start a pipeline churning those things out we can keep you guys informed on what's going on in a more visually interesting way. (cuz who has time to read, right?)

(I'm telling ya, we're going next level with the effects in these videos. 👀)

You can watch our latest creation in the post that went up just this morning, but you can also sub us to see when the full devlog for the month comes out.

Things got a little sidetracked this month with multiple friends and family members having weddings taking BGP devs out of town week-to-week and of course there's another travel-heavy holiday coming up next week as well. But despite it all we're still knocking things off the To-Do list and inching ever closer to finally releasing that new Overworld demo.

Just last night we reviewed the tools we'll be using to create the world and noted aspects that need to be revised. Still aiming for an up-to-snuff playable version to be released before New Years, so do look forward to playing that!

Making Our Own RPG Combat Formula | Breakdown

See what's up with the numbers behind our Combat System in our new Breakdown series video! ⭐

October Progress Report (Surveying & Planning)

Surveys & Paperwork

A lot of dev time has been spent on the paperwork side of things this month. Especially when it comes to charting out who gets what rewards and marking down customization answers from the surveys.

Heck, even making the surveys took longer than expected. On the Kickstarter side of things we literally had to recreate each question and selectable option for every reward tier then do it all again for the ones with Add-Ons enabled. After that there was time spent looking around for alternative survey tools on the web. Best free option for what we needed was Google Forms, but even those lacked some of the flexibility we needed, but we made it work well enough.

Menu Resizing

We're also making adjustments to the game's UI to account for all the crazy screen resolutions that are out there. From folding phones much more square-like or skinnier (when folded) than expected, to a number of legacy devices still capable of running this decade's software that we need to account for. 

We've been building anchors into the game's menus to try to make it look good no matter what you play it on. And next we'll need to do the same for Portrait orientations. So we look forward to sharing screenshots of all that when it's ready.

New Demos

Something that's ready right now however is the newest public build, the Combat Overhaul which finally came out so everyone can play using the new calculations formula we're going with that leads to the game feeling more balanced and fun, with less of those unwinnable matchup scenarios we've seen people get stuck in. These demos can now be found on both GameJolt and Itch.io.

YouTube

With that all settled, there's still accounting work to be done (quarterly tax estimates and all that wrapped up this past weekend) and we've been making detailed plans for how to evolve the Yotes Games YouTube channel over the coming year. 

Our sights are set on making templates to produce quality content in bulk and release them periodically so the algorithm considers our channel an active and growing one. We'll have a variety of things to share like breakdowns of major mechanics and ideas, our monthly devlogs, YouTube shorts featuring select bits of gameplay with some comedy thrown in, some soundtrack drops, character spotlights, making of mini-docs, gameplay previews, demo trailers, and more.

Stepping our YouTube game up has been on the To-Do list for far too long and we're excited to show you what we've been chipping away at each and every Wednesday & Friday during our team meetings.

BGP Patreon Rewards Survey!! 💎

Thanks for all the patience you guys. Getting all the backer rewards sorted has been eating up a lot of dev time this past month, but it's nothing we weren't prepared to take on. Now all that's left is to gather a few answers to questions we've been meaning to ask you.

Fill this out at your earliest convenience and we can get the ball rolling on all that reward stuff! (If you backed us on Kickstarter, you will have gotten a more detailed version of this questionnaire by now, so there's no need to answer again.)

Click here or on the link above to be taken to the Survey Doc! 

~ If anything funky is going on with the survey form, just let us know and we'll fix it ASAP. ⭐~

BGP Devlog #3 (Combat Update & Crowdfunding Surveys)

Progress we've made since the Kickstarter ended!

Glad to have this huge game feel update out into the world, and looking forward to something even more awesome next month.

BGP October Update: New Combat Overhaul Demo on GameJolt!

BGP demos just got a second home over on GameJolt! Give it a look, play the newest build, and maybe even join our little community forming over there.

And if you wanna see what's new, just check out the patch notes on the latest build below!

-----------------------------------------------

BGP PATCH NOTES (Oct. 1 2021):

The Big News

• Battle Calculator Overhaul!
• (Much more reasonable damage outputs in battle.)
• Settings Button Added to Title Screen
• Glitchy Menus Touched Up
• Weather Effects now Work Properly
• 2-Turn Moves can Account for Weirdness
• Equips Work When You Expect Them To
• Random VS Match Team Loadout Bugs are Squashed!
• More Gem Power for Everypony!
• Troublesome Moves are Debugged!

The Specifics

• Switched to a Division-based damage algorithm.
• Balanced stats using Ponatina as the base character dealing ideal percentages of damage with each move. (No more dealing 1% average damage to Furum & Poni-Bot anymore!)
• Altered the way stats change on level up to scale logarithmically.
• Made GP stat more plentiful.
• The Game Boot-Up Loading Screen is now centered and readable.
• Volume Settings have been added to the title screen and rebalanced on our end to sound reasonable.
• The Change Moves screen no longer opens or reloads with the wrong pony's info on display.
• In battle, exiting the FIGHT! button's move select HUD no longer continues to display a 'swap-to pony' if you were checking out a party member's moveset while they weren't actually on the field.
• Pony Equips now activate at the start of the very first turn instead of after.
• Issue where jumping into a Random Match right after boot-up forgets to load pony abilities has been fixed.
• Item or Ability induced weather conditions now carry on continuously instead of stopping only to trigger the effect and begin again.
• Weather bonus effects now kick-in whenever a pony enters the field instead of only being applied once when the weather first activates.
• The moves Hex, Endure, Inner Power, Hex Powder, Night Fright, Cheap Shot, and Swarm Shield work properly now.
• Outrage Aggro State now lasts 2-3 turns instead of 1.
• Counter/Endure/Reflect/Bide now deflect all hits of a Multi-Hit attack.
• 2-Turn Moves can now be configured to have different priorities on each phase.
• 2-Turn Moves no longer ignore being put to Sleep.
• Interrupted airborne state no longer continues the feather drop animation.
• Edge cases involving 2-Turn moves and triggered abilities/equips/matchups/side effects have been tested and accounted for.
• We now have the ability to clamp stat stages however we want instead of having -3 to +3 stat buffs hardcoded.
• Status moves now take the target pony's class matchup into account.
• Tutor slot moves can now be hidden if your GP is too low to use that attack.
• Removed Nullified Ability Labels that mysteriously appeared in battle.
• Devil Shot & Torment had their POW formulas adjusted to deal worthwhile damage.
• Leech moves now restore the proper amount of the attacker's HP.
• The pony-form lock state now actually prevents swapping out.
• Mauss' Thirsty ability now absorbs Whirlpool traps.
• Furum's Compensate ability no longer stacks and can activate on swap-in.
• The Rainbow Rock item has been nerfed to give the user less speed.
• Rainbryte can no longer use the Silver Scales attack (it's side effect along with her Ability was just too OP!)

Here's a Nice, Shorter Version of the Kickstarter Livestream

In case 75 minutes is a bit much and you just want the news and celebration! 🎊

New Build! (The Everfree Patch Notes)

Got a fresh new demo up, with a smotherin' of Bug Fixes for ya! 
Every glitch and error we could find since vending at Everfree Northwest.

And you can Play It Here! 

BGP PATCH NOTES (Sept. 5th 2021):

The Big News

• Passive Pony Abilities & Equips Now Work as Intended
• Menu Issues, Resolved!
• Glitchy Moves, Fixed!
• Typos, Corrected!
• Particle Effects, Adjusted!
• Background Tinting Animations, Restored!
• Shield Moves Actually Shield You!
• Attack Info is Displayed Correctly!
• Unimplemented Moves that Should Be Hidden, Now Are
• Buffs & Debuffs Go Up & Down Properly
• Pegasi Should Now Fear Flying Rocks
• The Endure Mechanic Works
• Devil Shot Deals Actual Damage Now
• The Hidden Spire Trap Activates on Forced Swap-Outs
• 2-Turn Moves Now Show Relevant Info in Menus
• 2-Turn Moves Don't Trigger Enemy's  Impact Side-Effects until they Actually Land
• Made Things More Clear When You're Running Low on Gem Power
• The Badly Poisoned Malady Now Deals Appropriate Damage
• Malady Afflicted Debuffs are No Longer Permanent

The Specifics

• Air ponies can now be hurt by Earth attacks while Burrowed underground
• Ponies hiding Underground or In the Sky can no longer force the enemy's self-targeted attacks to miss
• Pony nicknames won't disappear when you return to Team Select after a battle with custom nicknames
• Move animations that can change the background color now work as expected
• Barrier's reduced Damage Calculation now works
• When restoring HP with a leeching move, the camera will always make sure the healed pony is shown along with the healing text
• Sleep Dust will tell the player when it fails
• Moves not implemented yet have been removed
• Stats Screen won't wig out in the middle of battle when a barely noticeable  "null animation" issue comes up (the null animation issue was resolved too)
• 2-Turn Moves display the proper POW number in menus
• 2-Turn Moves exist as 2 different attacks behind the scenes now So we can have unique effects for Turn 1 and Turn 2 that won't get mixed up as easily
• Moves with POW that "varies" show up as "--" instead of "0"
• Sleep Malady can last more than 2 turns
• Change Moves screen used to sometimes show the wrong pony's info. Now it double checks for the most recently highlighted pony
• When rapidly pressing buttons, the game can trip up. We addressed this on nearly every screen in the game
• When out of GP and forced into "Tackle Mode", unusable moves get removed from play
• We can finely control where we clamp the Stat Stage Buffs. (currently set on a -3 to 3 scale instead of the initial -6 to 6)
• Speedster passive ability now works
• Poni-Bot's Battery Doesn't absorb enemies' self-targeted moves
• Thestra's ability activates every 3 turns she's on the field, instead of every 3 turns period
• Life Drain particle effect animation flows in the correct direction now
• Death Glare consistently lowers the same stats each time
• Rock Toss & Rock Riot now harm Air ponies just like the description says
• Star Spurs Equip now works as described
• Hidden Spire hurts ponies that are swapped in after a KO
• Fixed Ember Tornado trap animation
• Yawn no longer resets itself
• Gigazorb now works when used by or used on Mauss
• Bide will only deal damage when the user actually takes damage, not when the opponent uses a move that could/will eventually deal damage
• Venom is now guaranteed to apply Poison
• Devil Shot now makes its POW 1/2 of the user's EATK stat
• The UI will show you when Buffs & Debuffs are applied, right when they happen
• Getting a 9+ Combo on a Multi-Hit Move no longer causes the Hit Counter to stay onscreen
• Exiting Battle now Resets Bonus Value assignments and Toggling "Disable BVs" button won't erase what you assigned them to
• Mini Pony Sprites Animate properly in their little boxes across all menus
  
  Now, if anybody comes across more weird issues like these, just hit us up on Discord and we'll get those pesky bugs squashed!

Kickstarter: COMPLETE! 🎊🥳

The Battle Gem Ponies Kickstarter has ended with 414 Backers that pledged $34,695.50!!

We couldn't be any happier with how this turned out. Flew past every Launch Day Stretch Goal with an extra month's budget to spare! It's all an indie team could ever want.

Thank you. Thank everyone who pledged, followed, shared, liked, or anything to support us and show that we aren't just shouting into the void hoping someone out there cares. This campaign proved to us this game has an audience. And now we have names and faces for the people we're building this for.

We won't let you down.

Battle Gem Ponies Devlog #2 (Kickstarter FINALE!!)

The Yotes Games Team will be hosting a livestream on our YouTube channel today to celebrate and countdown the final hour of the Kickstarter Campaign!

Kickstarter's timer is counting down the minutes, and we're bouncing off the walls with excitement and gratitude!

Come join us for chit-chat, cheering, Q&A, crowdfunding reflection, and development news. We'll be streaming from 5pm to 6:15pm EST, so hopefully everyone can stop by and say "sup"!

Battle Gem Ponies (June/July DevLog): Pre-Kickstarter Madness

The long overdue June/July Devlog is here! (And in video form!)

From now on we'll be doing these instead of the usual monthly writeups on the Yotes Games blog since its more fun & easy to watch/listen than navigate to a particular website and read. So subscribing to our YouTube channel will keep you up to speed on everything!

Plus you get to hear all our voices on this rotating cast of devs in these short podcast style updates.

BGP is Fully Funded on Kickstarter!

Sweet relief!

We made it out alive after all! $25K was definitely a big ask for an unfinished & unknown indie game but after tons of work put in by the entire Yotes Games team and efforts to spread the word through our little community, BGP is set for another year!

One last year to get the game out on digital stores so everyone can play it start to finish!

HUGE thanks to all you Patrons for holding down the fort for so long, allowing us to get to this point where we can thrive as a seedling studio and grow into the shoes of making a massive (at least to us) RPG project like this.

Just a few days left on the Kickstarter, then we get started on a whole new set of tasks, namely accounting & paperwork for the final crowdfunding tally!

Now, there's still room for things to go wrong in this final week on Kickstarter (mass pledge cancellations, troll donors, declined cards, etc.), but we're feeling pretty confident, safe, & sound at the moment.

Looking forward to the things in store for September!

And if you're curious about the current count or any crossed stretch goals, feel free to check out the Kickstarter Campaign

August Progress Report ($20K funded already!?)

This progress report is a super late one, but also pretty short & simple.

This entire month has been focused around getting this game in front of as many brony eyeballs as possible and it's been working out pretty well, all things considered.

We're posting everywhere daily, interacting with the small community we're forming on different social media pages, posting art of the characters wherever we can, and running ads on a strict "please don't max out this credit card before the end of the month" budget.

Getting featured on major YouTube channels is proving more difficult than expected, but we have some pretty strong numbers as far as industry standard conversion rates go.

Over 10% of the people who see the social media ads actually click on the Kickstarter link, and of those clickthrough people, just under 10% of those end up pledging something. (For comparison, one should expect something like 2% on each of those for an average-looking product that nobody's heard of.)

Likely helped out by the fact we're serving a niche group. But even non-brony folks find appeal in the sheer quality of the game. (And this video here is a prime example of that.)

We're at the final countdown now! 9 Days left to go...

The odds seem to be in our favor, but we'll keep pushing hard and knocking on people's inboxes just in case. And maybe once this is all over, we'll have a little bit of verification/certification/notability/status/clout behind us that'll put on on a few radars.

Not just some pony fan game, but that pony indie game that got funded on Kickstarter. 

And it's all been made possible because Patrons like you kept it alive at its darkest hours.
So we can't thank you enough. But we'll try anyway by making the best game possible.

Battle Gem Ponies is LIVE on KICKSTARTER!!

Hopefully anyone who's been keeping an eye on BGP's development will want to give it a looksee. We're offering all kinds of rewards like getting your own pony drawn, creating a canon character, and all kinds of other stuff only the earliest of you Patrons ever got! (But at a very marked up price)

And this crowdfunding campaign comes with a New Free Demo too, so pretty sweet deal for everypony all around.

Check Us Out on Kickstarter

or

Download the Newest Demo

The reason we're doing this btw, is to fund the next year of development. Patreon has been helpful in fighting off some of the monthly business expenses for running a games studio, but savings accounts are starting to run dry and the game is still months away from being in so much as a completed Alpha state.

If this Kickstarter fails, we'll need to regroup as a team and figure out a longer-term strategy that likely involves working on BGP on a part-time basis over the next few years. (And we'd really rather not do that.)

But enough of that Bad Timeline. We're rooting for the Happy Ending here! Over a thousand bucks were thrown into digital ads. All our social media pages are more active than ever. And we're going to Everfree Northwest next week to promote the game at a Vendor Hall booth! 

This game is awesome as heck. It's sure to draw in enough attention (but still, every Share helps). We're looking forward to seeing how this month concludes...

Thanks for following the development of Battle Gem Ponies, btw. One of the best parts of making this game is knowing we won't be the only ones who get to play it. ❤️

Kickstarter in 2 Weeks! (Everything on the Line!)

The excitement is boiling over here at Yotes Games! The Kickstarter Preview is up and there's no going back now! In exactly 7 days we lock-in the numbers and content, submit for final review, then go nuts trying to get as many backers as possible within 30 days.

And we certainly hope you'll be one of them!

July Progress Report (Spreadin' the Word!)

The Kickstarter is coming up in a couple weeks, and to ensure it's success we've been working hard slapping images of the Battle Gem Ponies up all over social media (in hopefully the least annoying way possible) to get some "Whoa, what's that from?" reactions that lead to an occasional new follower. 

The plan is to have them added to image boards like Derpibooru, Twitter, Instagram, & DeviantArt on a daily basis, and on places around Reddit, Facebook, & Discord on a weekly basis until ALL the non-legendary ponies get posted. So far it's been the most growth we've seen since the 2017 demo dropped.

Research is being done behind the scenes on ideal Kickstarter Add-On prices, shipping expenses, and concise descriptions. We've even recorded a first draft for our Kickstarter Video (which still needs some revisions over the next couple weeks) and we have plans for a new style of DevLogs to come out in video form by the end of this month. (Anyone familiar with TBBBAP might enjoy what we'll be trying to do with that.)

---

It's all big & busy stuff we're up to, trying to set the stage for our first ever Kickstarter. If all goes wrong, it'll mean major setbacks timeline-wise as we have to go job hunting for a couple months and then put BGP on the backburner as a side hustle until we get back to a comfortable financial standpoint to then try full-time again.

But hey, it probably won't come to that. We're slowly gaining followers, there's YouTubers out there (who probably has our emails & messages in their auto-spam folders) that'd love to play this game, we have a $1.5K social media ad budget for the Kickstarter campaign, and over 550 people who've downloaded the Combat Demo.

And even after all that, there's Everfree Northwest! We'll be live in-person at a convention that held a consistent near 2K attendance year-after-year with our recently confirmed Vendor Hall booth demoing the game! We plan to have a computer up displaying our Kickstarter page and encouraging on-the-spot donations (as well as recovering travel costs through merch sales).

This could work! It's exciting, stressful, and nebulous all at the same time. But overall, the vibes are positive. We got this. And a huge part of that confidence comes from knowing how long you guys have been backing us. This project could really become something. And it's worth every dollar risked to see it through. 

June Progress Report (A Demo Out in the Wild!)

The demo has finally been set loose and it's up to us to steer it towards popularity! We managed to get over ten thousand players before, we can do it again!

400+ downloads so far, and counting!

Social media game has stepped up, there's even an official Yotes Games Instagram account now. And a subreddit. Actually two, r/YotesGames and r/BattleGemPonies. 

You can find us all over the web with one simple link: linktr.ee/YotesGames 

The mission now is to make this game look as good as possible between now and August while the overworld features get re-implemented. The pressure is on to have a Kickstarter worthy demo!

We'll be reaching out to YouTubers and any brony that might be up for playing something like this. If you have a channel too, feel free to post a gameplay video! The team loves watching em during our weekly in-person meets.

The Battle Gem Ponies Combat Demo is Here!!

If you aren't incredibly hyped right now, you really should be. This is a monumental occasion after all! After YEARS of behind-the-scenes struggle, TENS of THOUSANDS of dollars drained from life savings, MONTHS of delays, and an incomprehensible amount of time sitting in front of computers yelling "WHHHYYYYY"... Yotes Games is proud to present...

The Battle Gem Ponies Combat Demo

​Our first public upload in 3 or 4 years after starting this entire project over after tragically losing every project file for the 2017 build. Since then this game has gone from a solo-indie project to a team-powered labor of love and it's looking all the better for it!

We truly cannot wait to hear what you think of this battle system we're creating.

Go ahead and give it a try!

(It's playable on Android, Windows, Mac, and even Linux)

Bugs are being noted as we march toward our Kickstarter in August​. We'll be diving headfirst into remaking overworld gameplay for the next couple months, so your feedback on this half of the game will fuel us til then. Feel free to share BGP around with anyone you know that could be into this sorta thing. It's the start of something very fun over here...

More updates to come!