Little Nemo and the Nightmare Fiends

April update - intro levels and some befuddling challenges!
about 1 year ago – Tue, Apr 29, 2025 at 09:30:36 AM

Hello dear backers!

It's been a hectic but productive April at Team Nemo HQ. It's seen us shoring up the beginning areas of the game to prepare for an Early Access release (distinct from the full Act I release, so even a bit sooner!) This update is going to share some output from those efforts, alongside some previews and eye-candy. 

First of all, that city intro level. To give you some context, this is going to happen RIGHT AFTER Nemo wakes up from a nightmare and finds Peony waiting to sweep him off to Slumberland. Nemo and Peony hop on Nemo's bed, which grows legs just like the classic July 27, 1908 comic:

Our version will see Nemo's bed get spooked by a nightmare creature, which causes it to run through the town, and eventually dump Nemo and Peony on the rooftops, after which Nemo must chase the bed so it can take him up into the Night Sky. The result is a zany action sequence where Nemo leaps from roof to roof and fights some dream monsters (to teach the player the basic jump and attack commands), while the other floating beds of the town act like platforms for Nemo to jump on. 

This is still a work-in-progress, so you'll notice some of our developer notes still in the level as we animate the bed encounters that you'll have throughout the level (please also pardon some of the background chatter in the audio - for whatever reason it recorded ambient stuff.) Here are some sketches of what we have in mind: 

You may notice a few fun Easter Eggs in this video, like Nemo's new ability to throw candy to cause small amounts of damage to enemies (something we thought our retro gaming fans would like!), as well as a view of the New York Herald building in one of the backgrounds - the newspaper where Little Nemo in Slumberland was originally published! Since a lot of the team is based in Cleveland though, we may have put in a few of our own local touches (check out those statues on the clock tower!) 

Here are some other shots of this area: 

Befuddle Hall!

We've also had a ton of level design happen in some of the aforementioned challenge levels. Level Designer Max Kunze has done an awesome job mixing and matching different game mechanics to create challenge levels. You'll enter these levels by talking to different NPCs in the game - some who like to arrange fights, some who like to build obstacle courses, and some that dream of design! Some of these are playable by any character, but some are challenges for individual characters, or even combinations of characters (so players can see how their powers might work together.) 

(All of these video previews are works in progress and subject to change - unless you really like the moonwalking enemies in the one video...) 

These have gotten enough of their own identity (and became quite surreal in some cases), that we decided to theme them after Befuddle Hall - a section of Slumberland that Nemo and friends explore in the original comics and which feature different optical illusions. We thought it would be fun to not only use McCay's art, but create some inspired by later surreal artists like M.C. Escher and Rene Magritte. 

Here's some of what we have so far (again, all rough/in-progress and subject to change/have further refinement): 

Here's a taste of these designs and some of this artwork working together (with a little inspiration from Castlevania IV's rotating room!):

That's about it for the stuff we can show you from this month's work, but there's plenty more where this all came from. Once again, we appreciate the patience with the work - it's taken longer and been bumpier than we thought it would be in the context of the games industry from just a few years ago, but we're able to keep moving forward with this game when a lot of studios haven't been. For those who've never done it, video games take a long time to make, and the past few years have made them take even longer! We're really happy with the results so far (including on stuff we can't show quite yet!) and are looking forward to having it in your hands soon! 

Cheers and many thanks,

Chris and Team Nemo

March Update
about 1 year ago – Mon, Mar 31, 2025 at 11:51:11 AM

Hi Dreamers,
March just flew by!  We've been hard at work polishing what we're calling our Act 1, and fleshing out all the final details. As we told you last month, we're building our intro scenes, which includes a trip though the rooftops of Nemo's neighborhood, and an initial nightmarescape level to give you a preview of what's to come. We've also been hard at work on some upgrades to the characters that we will put throughout the game, including some that are Easter Eggs for Little Nemo fans.

We're also settling in on the puzzles that populate Nemo's house, and that act as the gates between the different dream worlds.  It's all coming together and is going to feel super adventure game-ish: we're super excited to get you playing soon.

The game is more or less broken down into two Acts.  The first act being the more traditional Metroidvania style of exploring the world and unlocking skills and characters as you make your way to Slumberland, and the second act more exploratory and quest-focused as you track down the Nightmare Fiends.  As you complete missions you'll gather Figments which will eventually open new pathways to the hideouts of the Nightmare Fiends.  The story we want to tell has a natural break at the end of Act 1, after a rather shocking reveal.

There have also been lots of updates in Slumberland. This area has been a big project since it includes so many different unique biomes, but the work is very much paying off! Here are some editor shots from one of our favorite areas, the garden, and a hint at some environment art for other areas: 

We'll have more info about timing on everything soon, including backer rewards.  Thanks so much for sticking with us as we chip away at the game. 

Since we're getting close on our Act 1, we've made a decision to launch this into Steam Early Access as soon as possible so everyone can start playing while we work on the Act 2 content (which we plan on continually adding). We've put a ton of effort into this project and think we have something really special that we can't wait to share. As we said during the campaign, backers will all get access to this regardless of chosen platform. If you read game industry news, you know that it's not the same industry it was when we started the project. But where other studios have had to close up shop, we've been able to pivot and keep the project going by keeping a steady pace. We know it seems like a long time to the folks eagerly awaiting the game, but we've been able to make a lot of progress that we think you all will be very happy with. 

Cheers and many thanks,

Ben and Team Nemo

February update - a big month of progress!
over 1 year ago – Fri, Feb 28, 2025 at 02:43:29 PM

Happy February Dreamers,

This has been a big month for us, moving towards some major milestones that we hope we can tell you about soon. With some of this in mind, we're going to quickly run down some of the major developments that we're able to share. 

Fleshing out the game intro

A big lift this month has been fleshing out the beginning of the game, where Nemo is going to have a nightmare then be awoken by Peony, who will guide him to Slumberland before his bed runs away and starts stomping through his hometown. Some of this is very work-in-progress, but our goal is to be able to walk front to back through the entire Act 1 edition of the game and have all the game spaces laid out, over having everything with polished art (again, more info on this mindset soon). 

Without giving away too many details, here's a sample of some of what we've been working on (again, these have some art but are still a work in progress and do not reflect the absolutely final look or design):

Challenge levels

Another lift has been creating challenge levels akin to the void levels in Astro Bot or the rifts in Kirby and the Forgotten Land - short, sweet, and focused on mastery of one or a few game mechanics. These will be used in some of the game's side quests. Right now, we've mostly focused on single-character levels, but we are going to continue expanding these to include multi-character challenges. 

These are all currently in the "graybox" stage of design, meaning that they do not feature their final artwork - they will get appropriate set dressing when they are fully playtested and finished. We're also in the process of making triggers for things like making doors unlock when enemies are killed, etc, but this should give you an idea of how these areas will look from a design perspective. 

CANDY!

Some of you may be looking at this headline like, "Wait...you already collect candy...what's the big deal here?" We decided to put in a fun Easter Egg by giving Nemo a candy attack if you press the attack button and up on the control stick or directional buttons. This won't cause a ton of damage to enemies and does eat up your candy supply, but it can be an option for players looking for a challenge. 

Beyond this fun callback to the NES game though, candy is the game's currency, and we're also in the process of adding in Doctor Pill's shop to the game. Here's some of the art for it below:

Monsters!

Are are also a few new monsters for the game, colored and ready for implementation: 

That should be all for now - we're looking forward to sharing what we have in the coming weeks as we continue sprinting towards our next milestones!

Again - we know the game is taking longer than folks wanted, but we want to make sure we can make this the Little Nemo game that Nemo and friends deserve, so thank you for your continued patience. We promise that it will pay off soon! 

Cheers,

Chris and Team Nemo

January Updates
over 1 year ago – Fri, Jan 31, 2025 at 02:06:34 PM

Hey there!  It's Ben with a technical update.  First up, thanks so much for checking out the Holiday build!  We got some great feedback and have made a few small changes.  

During play testing I noticed that folks were missing jumps, expecting the momentum of the jump to carry through in the air.  When I enabled this in the Holiday build, I forgot to zero out the momentum when you hit the ground - this made things feel a little slidier than expected, but I just fixed it.

I've been hard at work getting in all of the upgrades and a more final flow in the game.  You'll be able to collect your character upgrades, as well as health, stamina, and attack upgrades now.  We're starting to sprinkle everything in and it's starting to feel like a complete adventure!  I opened the house back up too, to start adding the hub world features.

Additional animations have been added for all the characters.  Nemo (finally) has his combo attack in, and all the characters are being given a dash animation.

The next thing I'm working on is the Dr Pill shop as well as some other ways to use all that candy you've been collecting.

Chris and Adrian are meanwhile working on Slumberland and the game's opening on the rooftops of Nemo's town. Chris is buried under a mountain of art and animation to do, but we were able to find this archival photo of him during these busy periods: 

We're going to be starting some very important sprints soon and ramping up with some development help. We're hoping to have more details why soon, but until then, we'll continue plugging away! 

Cheers,

Ben and Team Nemo

Post-Holiday Holiday Demo - Santa needs your help!
over 1 year ago – Sat, Jan 04, 2025 at 12:34:36 PM

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