DREAD X COLLECTION 2 – The Devs and Details
A little over a month ago on May 26th, we had the honor of launching our very first video game: Dread X Collection. We created the project based on the idea that you can make something fresh and interesting without a billion-dollar budget and months of crunch. I was nervous. I’ve heard horror stories about indie development. Missed release windows, horrible business dealings, dishonest partners, etc. None of those stories could be further from the experience of working on the Dread X Collection. I was blown away by the level of quality, professionalism, and overall excitement of every member of the team. So much so that as soon as we finished the first, Every step of the process—from gathering the team, laying out the plan, producing the collection, to clicking the release button—was a dream come true. What was even better was the audience’s reaction. Watching streamers play it and having new fans reach out was incredible, and gave me a whole new love for this industry. So when it came time to take stock of our experience and plan path forward, the answer was obvious. Let’s take what we learned from the first, and come back with someone even better.
I won’t bore you with any more self-indulgent sentimentality. I’ll thank all of our fans by getting to the juicy details you’re all here for. What’s up with Dread X Collection Volume 2? Well, here’s the brass tacks:
- 12 Developers instead of 10
- 10 days instead of 7
- New theme is LOVECRAFTING
- Releasing in early August for PC
So first and foremost, Lovecrafting? What does that mean!? Is it crafting your own Lovecraft world? Is it a survival game with Cthulhu monsters? Are you crafting love in the time of monsters? Who knows. It’s just a prompt. It’s up to the devs to make it make sense.
The biggest problem we ran into the first time around was the devs just needing a couple extra days to add stuff like keybinding, resolution options, and other accessibility options. With the extra time being allotted for Volume 2, this should allow us include these features we didn’t have the budget for the first time around. Also, more days=cooler games. And who doesn’t want even cooler games? Oh, and speaking of cooler games… the faces have changed up a bit. Here’s who we got and what they’re making, in no particular order:
David Szymanski – Squirrel Stapler
A lonley man in the remote Appalachian Mountains keeps the desecrated corpse of his true love mounted on a wooden stand. One day he notices that the rotting flesh is less aesthetically pleasing than it once was, and decides to remedy this by hunting squirrels to staple to the corpse to cover it. Over the course of several hunts, strange creatures begin to hunt him back, and the corpse starts showing signs that it might not be as dead as originally thought.
Wither Studios – Touched by an Outer God
The world has been devastated by monsters, called The Growth. Three years after the invasion, we find Melissa and her father, Butch, struggling to survive. The Growth attack their campsite and the two of them are separated. As Melissa searches for her father, she is attacked by a creature of the Growth unlike anything she has seen before! Melissa will never be the same again but she survived the encounter and is determined to find Butch. Play as Melissa in this FPS as she fights her way through hordes of monsters. A hunger is growing in her and she begins eating pieces of dead monsters. Collect their parts to craft new upgrades in the form of body mutations. You can upgrade your melee arm, your projectile arm or your body (health, armor, etc).
Bathysfear Labs – The Diving Bell
After a mistake that cost the lives of their crew, the player finds themself stranded in an untethered deep sea research lab, at the edge of a drop off, clinging to life and the pursuit of science through faulty machinery, strange happenings, and the horrors of isolation. The player will be forced to face the apparitions of their dead crew, as well as the horror lurking below the cliff.
Players will have to survive a number of days in the wreckage of their deep sea research lab, with each day’s goal being the completion of a log of the days occurrences. Preventing the player from completing this goal will be a number of scripted machine failures, and other mechanical issues around the ship which will in some way hinder the player. The days will become progressively more difficult as new challenges and sections of the ship are opened up to increase the severity of the challenge.
Scythe Dev Team – To The End Of Days
You’re on business in a coastal city when news hits that efforts to stop a catastrophic comet collision have failed. So in the sky looms this big comet, getting bigger and bigger a la Majora’s Mask, as you travel across the country in hopes of reaching your family on the other side. You’ll have to collect food, gas, and weapons while maintaining your vehicle. There is a doomsday cult who hunt down and purge all “non-believers.” Once the comet hits, the difficulty will dramatically spike.
Mahelyk – The Toy Shop
You play as a the newest toy in the Shop Keeper’s collection. Chat with other toys, hop around, collect candy. Just don’t hang out with those mean ol’ Rejected. Can you make it all the way to the fabled City of Toys? Nothing scary about that! Oh, what’s this gun for? Don’t you worry about that…
Torple Dook – Undiscovered
You control an archaeologist couple who arrive at a newly discovered ancient burial tomb somewhere in South America. They descend into the dark ruins, explore, solve puzzles, and find clues as to the mystery behind the tomb and what happened there. Eventually the player encounters undead Spanish conquistadors and must run from and avoid them as they stalk the ancient halls.
John Szymanski – Charlotte’s Exile
Charlotte is gone, and all that remains of her is a note stating “I will have been banished to the ancient realm. It is for the best.” Knowing you have only one chance to bring her back, you travel to the Great Library to use the old manuscripts held there to decode the ancient alphabet and garner the intelligence you need to revive her. As you piece the alphabet together bit by bit, you hear sounds of a being walking towards you. . . has something come to stop your endeavour? Perhaps. . . bringing her back is the wrong thing to do?
Secret Cow Level – Another Late Night
In the year 2020 there was a game called The Dread X Collection: Volume II which allegedly led to the death of one developer and several people who played the game. We’re going to try and investigate what happened. Read the article about the deaths of the players/developers and make your own conclusions. As long as you’re a relatively sane person, nothing weird or scary will happen.
Vidas Games – Arcadletra
When the owner of an arcade/video rental store opens an unknown package, he discovers a mysterious hole leading to another world. Stricken with curiosity, the owner begins by feeding a camera through to discover what may be on the other side. What he finds after its return is both shocking and interesting. Determined to know more, various electronics are fed through resulting in the discovery of a woman trapped in this other dimension. Using these electronics to communicate, you soon learn she’s not the only one looking to make contact…
Akabaka – SUCKER FOR LOVE
The main character, obsessed with occult rituals, has finally obtained the last thing he needs to summon the eldritch horror that has been haunting his dreams; a strange, bright-pink Necronomicon. He performs the only ritual that doesn’t appear to be insane ramblings, and inadvertently summons Ln’eta, a cute cthulhu-like girl. She agrees to a kiss, on the condition that the main character performs a few rituals from the book for her first. Looking back at the Necronomicon… all of the other pages suddenly make sense?
Panstasz – THE THING IN THE LAKE
A man reminiscing his past gets caught in a string of mysterious murders at an abandoned summer camp in eastern Poland. Every macabre clue he finds points towards the murky depths of the lake and the thing hiding there. A top-down adventure game inspired by classic Atari titles has the player explore the camp while avoiding the masked killer and solving puzzles that require crafting and assembling certain tools.
Daniel Mullins – SOLIPSIS
Ever since you were a child, you’ve had nightmares of faces on the mood. But those were nightmares… right? Play as an astronaut during a routine mission to find thermal pockets on the moon. Using your handy Gravimeter, detect geological features far beneath the surface. As the results come back increasingly abnormal, do your best to rationalize away the fear.
As a bonus, we also got the exceptional Lovely Hellplace working on the launcher. Additional asset work done by Akuma Kira. The snazzy new key art and logo are the works of Cleveland Mosher of CTM Design Studio. You can expect the Dread X Collection Volume 2 to drop on Steam and Itch in early August.
This round of the Dread X Collection also marks the launch of our new community Discord! Thanks to the newest member of the Dread Executive Management Grand Decision Making Buerea, StarlightSkyes, we’re working to build a community for horror fans of all persuasions. The DreadXP discord is a place for positivity, where fans and creators come together to share in the love of all things spooky. You can hop into the discussion by clicking the link here (and accepting the rules)!
Don’t forget to also follow us on Twitter for even more updates from the devs in the weeks to come. Every Wednesday and Saturday will be full of new screenshots and content from the developers, so click here and follow us to stay up to date!
