Proteus Message Board

Hey everyone! Rob here from Curve Studios. We’re probably one of the most active indie studios on PlayStation right now — we released five indie titles for PS3 and four titles for Vita in 2013, and we’ve got at least four more coming this year that we’ll be announcing very soon.

We’ve been thinking about making a bundle of our games for a while, and we’re happy to announce that you’ll be able to pick up four of our best titles from 2013 in a single, happy package right now.

These games would cost over $45 if you purchased them individually, but we’re launching the bundle for the first two weeks at only $14.99, with a further discount for PlayStation Plus members, which means Plus subscribers only pay $13.49 for the following games:

• Lone Survivor (Survival Horror)
• Thomas Was Alone (Puzzle Platformer)
• Proteus (Exploration)
• Stealth Inc: A Clone in the Dark (Action Platformer)

That’s four titles for the regular price of one — way better than buy one, get one free — and did we mention all of these games are cross buy enabled? No, we did not! But they are, so you can swap between the PS3 and PS Vita versions to your heart’s content.

We’ve worked on some very unique games in 2013, from Mike Bithell’s BAFTA award-winning puzzle game, Thomas Was Alone, to our very own fast-paced stealth platformer, Stealth Inc: A Clone in the Dark. We haven’t stuck to a single genre or style, and that’s helped make this bundle become a really interesting mix of different games and a great example of what indie gaming can bring to platforms like Vita.

You could think of it as an indie selection pack, or perhaps like a selection of starters at a restaurant. Or a cheeseboard. We don’t mind.

We humbly (Ahem!) believe we’ve brought some of the best indie gaming talent to Vita and PS3, working with great developers like Ed Key and Jasper Byrne. We always try to add something new to every release to make sure our PlayStation versions are the absolute best way to play these games.

We’ve been very happy with the outcome, too — both by the glowing reviews of our games in the press and the excellent feedback we’ve had from the PlayStation community in the last year. If you missed these titles the first time around, or want to check out a wide range of different indie titles without risking your bank balance, this is the bundle for you.

Indie developer Ed Key has released a free update for the PC version of his meditative exploration-based adventure game Proteus, adding in content previously exclusive to its PlayStation 3 and PS Vita ports.

The PC version of Proteus now includes the PSN version's "Wild Islands" feature, which introduces a series of unique graphical flourishes throughout the game's randomly-generated terrain. The feature is unlocked after playing through the game once, and players can adjust the frequency of these new effects or disable them entirely.

Version 1.2 of Proteus also boasts a steadier framerate and improved audio mixing, among other tweaks and bugfixes listed here.

Hi, Rob from Curve Studios here! We’re proud to announce that Proteus launches today for PS3 and PS Vita on PlayStation Store. Proteus has cross buy functionality, and will be available for $13.99.

Proteus was designed by Ed Key and David Kanaga, and was released in 2011 on PC. It’s a game all about exploring a dreamlike, island world. Proteus’ music and sounds change depending on where you move, creating a different journey each time you play.

We’ve been working on Proteus all summer, and after launching three other PlayStation games this year at Curve, you might not be surprised to learn our version of Proteus has a few additional features that are exclusive to the PlayStation versions of the game.

On the Vita version, Proteus can generate an island based on your geographical location, and on the PS3 version, you can generate islands based on the current date.

Islands generated in this fashion will be the same for anyone in the same location or on the same day, and will also be more “wild” than regular islands in the game, featuring various twists on the original’s islands, as well as shifting, surreal color palettes.

Players can also use the back touch screen on Vita to gently affect the world around them, changing the island in subtle ways and remixing the colors of the world.

Proteus is a very unique experience, so if you have any questions about how the game works, I’ll be on hand below to try and answer them.

The troublesome burden of being an IP rights holder is starting to get to Square-Enix, who just can’t take it anymore. The publisher has announced the Collective, a sort of combination of Steam Greenlight and crowd-funding that’ll enable game devs to pitch ideas to the company. If, after 28 days, the game has gained enough support from the people then they’ll allow you to take the pitch to IndieGogo. Now you’re probably thinking that people can do that anyway so what the hell, Square-Enix? They can, that’s true. But Square are doing this so devs can pitch to work with “older Eidos IPs”.(more…)

You drift towards a pastel island where everything sings as you pass.
The sky begins to darken and something in the distance catches your eye…

I’m Ed Key, one of the developers of Proteus along with composer David Kanaga. Proteus came out for the PC and Mac in January 2013 and had a fantastic reception from Edge, Eurogamer, IGN and many more. For something that started out as a weird experimental project between me and David, this was pretty mind-blowing, and it’s even crazier to now have the chance to bring it to PS3 and PS Vita with some brand new features that take advantage of Sony’s hardware.

Proteus is something like a constantly-remixing ambient album in the form of an immersive island world. It’s all about a particular feeling of wandering through nature alone, taking it in and getting pleasantly lost. Maybe it’s a little bit about magic and mortality too. Don’t expect tasks and scores and checklists – perhaps Proteus lurks somewhere on the shady fringes of what it means to be a game.

With the PS Vita and PS3 versions, we’ve been adding new ways to engage with – and remix – the world. Previously, all Proteus islands were purely random, but on Vita, you can now choose to generate an island based on your current geographical location and on both platforms you can generate an island for the current date.

Both features have a chance of generating an especially “wild” island with various tweaks and twists. The island at my house, for example, has weird purple sea, green sky in the evening and some pleasant (but still very purple) inland lakes.

We’ve also added a way for users to interact with the environment using the back touch screen — we’ll be talking more about this closer to release.

Curve are doing a fantastic job on the port, adding a lot of love and polish along the way. Playing it on PS Vita’s bright OLED screen is so nice, as is the experience of playing it a on big television through PS3. We’ve had a very positive response to the PlayStation version from people I’ve shown it to, and I’m happy to quote a friend here and say that it’s the best version of Proteus there’s ever been.

The team here at Curve takes great pleasure in announcing that Ed Key and David Kanaga’s award winning PC indie game, Proteus, will be arriving on both PlayStation 3 and PS Vita this autumn.

A lot of games get called ‘unique’, but we think there’s honestly nothing quite like Proteus. It’s a game all about exploration, mystery, color and sound. Played in first person and set on an uninhabited island, it’s all about getting immersed in a dreamlike world.

Everything in Proteus is procedurally generated, which means the game is different each time you play. The game plays through all four seasons before the end, and it’s nearly impossible to see everything in the game with one play through.

The music and sounds in the game are what really make it special though, and everything you encounter as you explore has its own musical signature, so just like the island, the music changes depending on where you choose to go.

Here at Curve we’ve been working with Ed to make the PS Vita and PS3 versions even better than the original, and over the next few months we’re going to have more information on how we’re using the power of PS3 and PS Vita to bring the absolute best Proteus experience to you guys.

We’ve already had Proteus up on the big screens here in the office, and it’s looking like nothing PlayStation has ever seen before, so if you’re into games that try something a little different, keep an eye on us over the coming months!

For now though, we can tell you that Proteus will be a Cross Buy game, and game designer Ed Key will be available in the comments to answer any questions you might have about the game.

Proteus is a warm, soothing bubble bath for the soul. The lo-fi first-person explorer lets players loose on an island that’s one part rainbow dreamscape and another chirpy chiptune music maze. Basically, it’s what I imagine nature lovers believe the outdoors to be, even though every real-life forest, hill, and tree is actually made entirely out of spiders. And yet, for all of Proteus’ high-minded inventiveness, it certainly didn’t start out that way. Creator Ed Key had to learn some very important lessons about, er, not being Skyrim before his first independently developed game traded bullets for butterflies, and – despite Proteus pulling in a fair deal of money – he’s trying very hard to keep them in mind for his next game.

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The Humble Indie Bundle 8 launched today, offering up downloadable Windows, Mac, and Linux versions of Thomas Was Alone, Awesomenauts, Little Inferno, Dear Esther, and Capsized as part of its pay-what-you-want base package.

Buyers who beat the average purchase price (currently around $5) will also receive Hotline Miami and Proteus. The package additionally includes a free Awesomenauts character skin; if you ever wanted to dress up as a chicken while playing a side-scrolling MOBA, today is the day that your dreams become reality.

All games are available as DRM-free downloads, and Steam keys are included. Humble 8 also marks the first time that Dear Esther, Thomas Was Alone, Little Inferno, Capsized, and Awesomenauts are available for Linux.

The Humble Indie Bundle 8 will be available through June 14.

Pippin Barr is up to his academic tricks again, this time with a bundle of six new games based on popular indie titles as if they were misheard in conversation: Gurney, World of Glue, Spy Parity, Proteas, 30 Flights of Loathing and Carp Life. These make up the Mumble Indie Bungle, and five of them are completely free, available to download for PC and Mac on Barr's site. Carp Life - a play on IGF mega-winner Cart Life - is extra special, available for $1 or any price over it.

"The idea for the collection, in keeping with the titles, is that it's meant to be this set of crappy indie games that someone perhaps bought for you, mistaking them for the originals," Barr writes on his blog. "So you might excitedly unwrap your new bundle of games to find something like Subpar Meat Boy and Flour (Instead of Super Meat Boy and Flower). Not that I'm using those two titles, though both were originally near the top of the list."

Gurney - a title parody of thatgamecompany's Journey - has players type out religious phrases as they scroll across the bottom of the screen, over the rolling, flickering lights of a hospital ceiling and anxious faces of doctors. The words become jumbled as the player loses consciousness, and Barr warns that eventually the game can cause seizures, so be careful with that one. Or, have fun.

World of Glue is a platforming play on World of Goo, Spy Parity is a jab at Chris Hecker's Spy Party, Proteas is an experiment on Proteus and 30 Flights of Loathing is a step away from Blendo Games' Thirty Flights of Loving.

Check out all the games your aging aunt thinks you're talking about on Barr's site, and buy Carp Life for whatever you think it's worth right here.

#proteus There's been some heated discussion as to whether Proteus—Ed Key and David Tanaga's award-winning lo-fi ambient exploration game—can be called a game. All the back-and-forth boils down to just so much fooferaw. But, if you want to nail Proteus down to a more restrictive, AAA-centric definition of what a game is, then cartoonist Zac Gorman is here to help you. More »

#proteus Opinions on Ed Key and David Kanaga's newly released game Proteus are likely as mixed as the crowd at a Justin Bieber/Mastodon double-bill. Personally, I think it's just lovely. It relaxes me, which certainly isn't true of most games I play these days. It's a rare game that just sort of is, and it manages to forge a connection with nature that's more spiritual than photorealistic. It's got soul, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. And it's mysterious. More »

#proteus Proteus, which went on sale on Steam on Wednesday, is the latest art piece to kick up a fuss over whether something deserves to call itself a game. Twitter's self-appointed video game cop has weighed in on the discussion, as have thousands of his deputies in message boards and comments. Now one of Proteus' creators has his say. More »

Jeff and Brad kick back, relax, and get hip to the stylistic world and sounds of Proteus.

#proteus Last year, I wrote about the beautiful digital island found inside of Proteus. Proteus is an exploration game where the world is reactive to the player. Stones will hum as you walk by. Frogs will sing to you. I'd tell you more but it's best that you experience it yourself; there's nothing quite like it. More »

Ed Key and David Kanaga’s Proteus has been floating around for a while, almost finished, almost finished. But now it finally is, and I’ve been playing it on a loop. A game I really didn’t get the first time I enjoyed its pretty colours on a GDC show floor, now makes complete sense to me. Going in, I had no idea what to expect. Coming out, here’s wot I think.

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Just a short post as I have to go and do a thing with vegetables and a knife and a saucepan, but I can’t not mention that Ed Key and David Kanaga’s wonderful ambient exploration/sorta-music game Proteus finally has a release date for its finished version. January 30th is that date, which it means it’s just over a week until we can discard our beta versions and noodle around in a new, expanded version of this quietly psychedlic dream-forest.(more…)

We’ve posted surprisingly little about audio-visual wunderkind Proteus, which I suspect is to do with the fact that, as a primarily sensory experience, it’s far more difficult to describe than it is play. Certainly, Ed Key’s ambient exploration game has at least three staunch fans in Castle Shotgun – myself, Jim and Adam – and it would be remiss of us not to encourage any and everyone who is introspection-inclined to play it.

Of course, to do so involves spending money on the current unfinished version without being entirely sure what you’re in for – no demo as yet, alas – so as an alternative why not watch Ed and the game’s musicman David Kanaga play Proteus live on stage at GameCity last week?(more…)

Oh how I adore Proteus. It’s equal parts minimalistic, enchanting, and really, really difficult to describe to people who haven’t played it. I mean, the point is to just walk around an island that looks like heaven as imagined by the tiny, tribal colony of Atari 2600s that have been forever exiled to your closet. And then things kind of just… happen. Except when they don’t. (See what I mean about the description thing?) Ultimately, though, it’s about taking in wondrous sights and sounds. And, as part of a brand new beta update, you can now share yours with everyone else. And not just with screenshots.

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#proteus I've never really been one for the appreciation of the "great outdoors." Take me out of my skyscraper rainforest, ground me in something other than the tangled detritus of concrete streets and roads, and I become unmoored. I blame it on my upbringing: I was largely sheltered, and as a result my outdoorsmanship was developed within the pages of a book or at the end of a joystick. More »

You awake in an ocean. In front of you is an island painted in vibrant colours, speckled with woods and ruins, meadows and mountains. You swim towards it. Wading onto the shore causes music to play. This music comprises how you interact with the world, altering depending on where you're stood, the t...