SmuggleCraft is KICKSTARTED! THANK YOU!

First things first, we are deeply humbled that the SmuggleCraft Kickstarter Campaign Reached its goal and is successfully funded! It’s because of you, our incredible community, that we are now able to bring SmuggleCraft to its fullest potential. 2 years ago, Happy Badger Studio had a dream of bringing a fresh experience to the racing genre, and without YOU, that dream would not have seen the light of day. We are so excited to get the game into your hands. 

We are so grateful to have such an amazing and supportive community. Thank you so much for all of your love and support. Truly. Thank you. 

PAX East Adventures: 

TJ, Ben, and Richard traveled to Boston in early March to PAX East to show some SmuggleCraft! With our previous PAX being a PAX Rising Booth, this was our first PAX where the space was completely ours to work with! 

SmuggleCraft Updates:

With SmuggleCraft now in Closed Beta, we are learning a lot about what needs improvement and what needs to be added! 

The Beta’s main purpose is the online multiplayer, which has been going great! We ran into a few server issues here and there, but thanks to our awesome team, Smugglers were back online and racing in no time. We’re still working on getting sounds and particle effects pinned down. If you’ve played the beta, you may have noticed you are hearing every single sound that’s happening, including the sounds other players are making even if they aren’t in sight. Don’t worry! We are close to locking it down. Particle effects are undergoing some maintenence, so look forward to seeing beautiful particles while racing online soon. 

The game’s narrative has been fully fleshed out and is currently being added into the game. We have an awesome artist working on something special for the single player campaign, so be ready to be immersed in some awesome Dirahlian story arcs. 

If you’re looking for a chance to play SmuggleCraft, we’ll be demoing the game at a few upcoming events. We’ll be in attendance at the Saint Louis Science Center’s First Fridays event on Friday, June 5. We also just reserved game demo space at Indianapolis’ Indy PopCon from June 26-28. We hope to see you all there!

Dana oversees demoers as they play head-to-head mode from the cozy booth-couch

Last weekend we had the chance to demo SmuggleCraft to the public for the first time since announcing the game, which was quite a bit nerve-wracking since we had no idea what to expect from folks. I mean, WE like the game, but what would everyone else think? Turns out, they like it too! (Whew!)

We were invited to Anime St. Louis, a huge local anime convention where we managed to transform our booth space into a SmuggleCraft-themed game lounge, complete with a couch, pillows, and cozy chairs. It was definitely one of the comfiest spots in the con.

Carol commentates the final round of the tournament as Marceline the Vampire Queen, because why not?

As a last-minute surprise, we managed to show off the all-new multiplayer mode for the first time ever, which people immediately gravitated to (though folks still definitely enjoyed the single-player campaign mode quite a bit; some even played for well over an hour). We hosted the very first (of hopefully many) SmuggleCraft multiplayer tournament, which saw over a dozen competitors and some intense gameplay. The final round boiled down to a very heated sudden-death!

Brian (left, on the couch) won the tournament, which was cool, especially since he had some rad Stephen Universe cosplay going on.

We also had one of our very first demo reviews written, thanks to a writer from hardcoregamer.com who called it a “hovercraft joyride!” Consider us thoroughly flattered.

The SmuggleCraft development team from left: TJ, Carol, Joey, Ben, and Dana

All in all, it was an excellent event. Lots of people were glad to hear that not only is the game coming for Playstation 4, but also that the game is up on Steam Greenlight. A lot of folks promised to help us get the game some Greenlight votes, which gives us a lot of hope topped with some warm and fuzzy feelings.

Come see us at Booth 301-302 in the vendor room to kick back at the Badger Lounge while you play a shiny new build of SmuggleCraft. We’ll be debuting our two-player competitive mode for the first time ever, so bring a friend and come play!

We’ll have a free raffle to be drawn at 5pm on Saturday and 3pm on Sunday, so make sure you come see us for a chance to win some goodies, including a prize basket and SmuggleCraft posters.

We’ll also be hosting a SmuggleCraft multiplayer tournament at noon on Saturday, with a big prize basket for the winner!

See you all there!

We’ve decided to bring something totally new to the racing genre, because we know we can’t be the only ones who get kinda bored of driving in circles all the time. SmuggleCraft is a fast-paced hovercraft game with randomly generated tracks, a quest-driven branching narrative based on player choice, and fully modular upgradeable vehicles.

In SmuggleCraft, you play Ferre Astraea, a smuggler simply trying to survive in a world that doesn’t make it easy. Dirah is a world in which travel, trade, and technology are highly regulated and virtually inaccessible for most; it’s a world in conflict, with many citizens struggling to survive while others willfully hide behind their own lavish lifestyles, all while revolutionaries fight for change. Meanwhile, you have a big debt to pay, a kickass hovercraft, and an opportunity to affect the fate of your society, for better or for worse.

Gameplay is driven by player-selected missions complete with illegal contraband, high-speed chases, and valuable payouts.

SmuggleCraft looks incredible, thanks to our talented artists Dana, Carol, and TJ, and sounds even better thanks to an original soundtrack by composer Bravendary (Phil Hayes, who also did the music for our previous games Strange Donuts vs. The World and Stodgy Gents).

SmuggleCraft will be released on PlayStation®4 computer entertainment system, PC, Mac, and Linux in early 2016. It’s currently up on Steam Greenlight — we would love if you’d take a moment to vote for us and share it with your friends.

There will be plenty of exciting announcements over the next year, so keep your eyes out for more news, assets, and dev blogs as we continue development!