DUNGEONS & DOOMKNIGHTS: An 8-bit AdventureQuest for the NES
Created by Artix Entertainment, LLC
Battle through a new 8-bit "zeldavania" game in the world of AdventureQuest. Available on a real NES Cartridge and emulators.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
300% Funded & Major Announcement!
about 5 years ago
– Wed, Apr 17, 2019 at 11:25:20 PM
300% Funded & Major Announcement
Greetings friends!
Thank you for your overwhelming support of Dungeons & DoomKnights: an new 8-bit AdventureQuest game for your NES. Unbelievable!
ANNOUNCEMENT!
I am excited to announce that before release, our game will be applying for (working with them and doing whatever it takes to qualify for) the upcoming official protocol for releasing commercial NESMaker games. Including rigorous testing by the experts in this space.
I had an awesome conversation with Joe Granato (be sure to see his documentary, The New 8-Bit Heroes on Amazon if you have not already) last night. He has big plans for for the future of NES games, and for maintaining a high level of quality in games that go through his official protocol.
To anyone else in the NESMaker community considering running a Kickstarter for an NES game, I encourage you please contact Joe and his team first to coordinate. (Really wish we had.)
About Artix Entertainment
If this is your first time meeting our team through this Kickstarter, then, "Good to meet you! Our studio, Artix Entertainment, consists of 34 devs that have been creating and updating video games for nearly 17 years. Over 200 million accounts have been created for our games on the web, mobile, and steam during that time. Our most ambitious being the cross-platform MMORPG, AdventureQuest 3D... which allows players to log on from any device and play on the same online world together. Many of our games are updated each and every week with new content. Our game cards, action figures, card game and other passion projects have been on store shelves at Toys”R”Us, Best Buy, and other major retailers. We are fun and light-hearted, but not light weights :D That is, we know how challenging and demanding it is to take a video game to the finish line, and the same for physical products.
Thank you again. We are excited to pledge Dungeons & DoomKnights to being a part of Joe’s vision for the future of commercial NES games.
P.P.S. We are working on stretch goals for... the 1st one will be at $20K. We will get George Lowe (voice of the TV show Space Ghost Coast to Coast, and voice actor from Robot Chicken and other Adult Swim shows) to narrate the official trailer for Dungeons & DoomKnights!
Dungeons & DoomKnights Stretch Goals!
about 5 years ago
– Mon, Apr 15, 2019 at 11:57:01 AM
Greetings and salutations!
Congratulations on blasting past our goal and making this retro video game project a reality. You have been requesting stretch goals and we put a lot of thought into it. We wanted to add stretch goals that added even more value to you, the other backers, and also our entire video game community. Also, as I am sure you will appreciate, we were careful not to add goals that would take our focus away from the game itself.
$20K (UNLOCKED) - Celebrity voice actor for trailer! George Lowe (voice of the TV show Space Ghost Coast to Coast, and voice actor from Robot Chicken and other Adult Swim shows) will narrate the official trailer.
$30K(HAPPENING SOON!) - Name in the credits! (All backers get their names in the credits. Since we can't fit that much text data on our cartridge (so tiny!) we'll create a web page.
$35K - Artix Live Stream (Ask us anything! ...while we embarrass ourselves playing retro games.)
$40K - Directors "Un-Cut" CHAOS ROM ( We'll send every backer a bonus ROM where you play as the villain and familiar places of the game are intentionally... strange, backwards, and wrong.)
$45K - Every backer gets their physical instruction booklet signed. (I'll hand sign all the physical ones. As for the digital one... I'll sign it, but they're gonna look awfully similar to each other.)
$50K - An 8-Bit map in AdventureQuest Worlds for EVERYONE! (We will convert fan favorite screens from Dungeons & DoomKnights into vector art and put them as a playable map inside AQWorlds for everyone to enjoy.)
$1,000,000K* - Broadway Moglin Musical with all star celebrity cast (Yes, that K was intentional. It's, uh, one-million thousand? Also, this is a joke. For legal reasons. Oh internet...)
Have an awesome weekend.
Battle on!
Artix
400% Trailer Soundbyte & Update Video
about 5 years ago
– Sat, Apr 13, 2019 at 05:23:36 AM
Congratulations everyone!
Way to go! It is day #3 and Dungeons & DoomKnights is now over 400% funded.
We need a trailer! ... and thanks to you, we were able to get the voice actor, George Lowe (Voice of Space Ghost Coast to Coast, Robot Chicken, other Adult Swim Shows) to narrate it. It is insane that I contacted him Monday night, and as I type this he already finished recording it in the studio. I wrote a trailer script. But he goes off the rails... a lot. You never know what he is going to say instead of the lines written on the page. Which makes him hilarious, and a lot of fun to work with. It is going to be interesting producing a final cut this weekend. Let me show you what I mean.
You definitely earned a short sneak peek clip!
Web Version
Good news! Rolith just got our older NES game demo working in a web browser. So, Digital Backers and above will be getting both the Dungeons & DoomKnights ROM file, and also access to play it on a web browser. Let's see what else we can get it to play on.
400% Update Video
One of the most important things our studio does, is listing to player feedback and taking action. I created a YouTube video for you and the community where we open up about this amazing project, answer questions, and share the behind the scenes things that everyone should know.
Thank you again for being a part of this crazy story.
Battle on!
Artix & all of your friends at AE
500%! Weekend update & Trailer Audio
about 5 years ago
– Tue, Apr 09, 2019 at 12:56:32 PM
Greetings and salutations!
Hope you had an incredible weekend. As I write this Dungeons & DoomKnights is now over 500% funded. Way to go! Thank you and congratulations!
Weekend update
This weekend we have been working on new monsters and re-organizing how we store our backgrounds. I think the people following me on Steam our Artix Discord Channel finally figured out that on weeknights and weekends when they see I am "playing" Asesprite, that I am actually working on Dungeons & DoomKnights. Asesprite is a tool for pixel art. While it might be a little bit of overkill for an 8-bit game, it has some pixel perfect features that have made it a better suited for this project than my first love, Photoshop.
Sneak Peek: Trailer Audio
Please enjoy a sneak peek preview of the audio from the upcoming Dungeons & DoomKnights trailer.
Please let me know if you liked it and got a laugh. I have been assembling the footage... which, has a few comical extra steps. For example, here is what I have been doing to keep the pixel art in the video crisp. First, I record gameplay from an emulator. NES games are 256x240 pixels. Which is pretty tiny. Then, I open it in Adobe After Effects, and scale it up to high definition size using "draft mode." I discovered I had to use draft mode because it keeps those crisp, hard edges. Otherwise, it would try to smooth and blur the edges... which certainly makes sense for regular video. Then I open the footage in Adobe Premiere to do the actual video editing. This might be useful information to anyone making their own Trailers, Let's Plays, or Game Play videos of 8-bit stuff who records the raw footage at the tiny native size and needs to blow it up to HD or 4K.
A few Retro things
I am not sure how into retro games you are. You might be brand new to it... or already submerged to your eyeballs. But, I want to talk about your ears. There are so many metal, techno, and orchestral versions of retro game music available now. Simply Google search your favorite retro game's name (ex: Zelda, Castlevania, Metroid, Wizards & Warriors, etc) with the words "theme song" and "metal" and feast your ears on the glorious results. Lindsey Stirling's Zelda dub-step violin cover ranks among my top 10. I was surprised to find there are huge numbers of tribute & remix albums like this available for stream on Apple, Amazon, & Google Play Music too if you have any of those.
In other news, it turns out we were not the only retro Kickstarter to launch on April Fools. Jeffery Wittenhagen from the VGBS podcast started one for a book for Nintendo's red-screened step-child, the Virtual Boy. If you loved this system, be sure to check it out. It ends in less than 44 hours.
On a final, unrelated topic. I really love video games. Playing them, making them, talking about them.... even just staring at the covers. When I was young, I would spend hours at a game store systematically going through the isle... picking up and flipping over each and every game to study it. OK, confession-- I still do this. I really get inspired just looking through games. Do you feel the same?
THANK YOU! 100% funded in 3 hours!
about 5 years ago
– Tue, Apr 02, 2019 at 09:02:05 AM
CONGRATULATIONS! YOU DID IT!
On behalf of all of us here on the AdventureQuest 8-bit team, thank you for 100% funding the Dungeons & DoomKnights NES game!
This is no joke. It's actually happening!
"This is the kind of funny success story we will be telling for the rest of our lives."
You are now officially a part of the craziest thing our video game community & studio has ever done. They thought it was a joke. "Haha... it says you're making a new AdventureQuest for a video game system that was released 34 years ago? Good one." Then they realized, it's real. "WHAT!?," they said, "But, but, but... you can't launch a Kickstarter on April Fools day... are you crazy!?" Yes. We are. This is happening. Most importantly, they underestimated you. Somewhere between your incredible sense of humor & love of video games, you defied all of the odds, rationality, and pulled off the best reverse-prank in the history of April Fools. You just funded Dungeons & DoomKnights: a new 8-bit AdventureQuest it in 3 hours! It's real, and it's happening.
Dungeons & DoomKnights: An 8-bit AdventureQuest for the NES
What to expect next!
"I certainly was not expecting to be writing this post today O_O" - Artix
If this is your first Kickstarter, then here is what to expect. The Dungeon & DoomKnights Kickstarter will continue running for the full 30 days. They don't actually charge your card until the end. I will be updating you with regular (and slightly funny) progress reports through Kickstarter. We are about to embark on a most unusual journey together :D
