Progress is coming along nicely and we are aiming to release Road Not Taken before the end of the year. But we’re getting excited now and wanted to share a few tidbits of what’s to come!  :-)  Apologies for being a bit of a tease.

This game grew out of a variety of influences.   We borrowed the name and theme from Robert Frost’s 1916 poem “The Road Not Taken“.  The mechanics are reminiscent of an evergreen roguelike and should provide hundreds of hours of original gameplay.  The art, created by the amazingly talented Brent “Meowza” Kobayashi (previously the Art Director for the Glitch MMO) blends the puzzle rooms of Zelda with his own very personal storybook illustrations.

For Daniel, the designer on the project, (and previously designer of Triple Town, Panda Poet, Leap Day and co-designer of Steambirds and Realm of the Mad God) this is one of the more personal games he has created. When you grow up, you are often told that there is a singular path through life; you go to school, you get a job, you fall in love and then you start a family. What happens when someone wanders far off that path? There’s no single answer to that question, but this game is an exploration of at least one answer. It’s also an experiment with a more pointillist approach to narrative, which we think is particularly well-served by the roguelike genre. Each object, each animation, and each bit of text is a bit of paint on the canvas. Over dozens of playthroughs, a greater theme will be revealed to players.

Over the next couple months, we’ll share more progress on the game.  If you’d like to be kept in touch, please sign up for the Spry Fox newsletter, or follow us on Twitter or Facebook.

PS. This is hopefully the first of many comics by our ultra-talented artist, BrentK.

We are incredibly proud and excited to announce the open beta of our latest original game, Leap Day!

Co-developed by Spry Fox and Sparkypants Studios, Leap Day is the first-ever cooperative multiplayer video game of its kind! Join forces with up to seven other players, over the course of four real days, to help the cute but single-minded Flan recapture their homes from the frozen wastelands and ghosts of their ancestors. It’s a puzzle game unlike any other.

There are massive crafting networks. There are infinite problems to solve (with the help of friends and strangers alike.) There are adorable Flan hopping, chugging, and wobbling everywhere in service to their Flannish princes and princesses. If a Spanish restaurant and Toys-R-Us had a baby, it might look something like this.

Leap Day is 100% free to play; all purchases are entirely optional. We believe that everyone should be able to enjoy our games whether or not they can afford to spend money on them. So what are you waiting for.. give Leap Day a try!

Pox the Bear will be going to the writer of this unexpectedly sad story: http://bit.ly/QKcypg. Frys the Bear will be going to the writer of this clever poem: http://bit.ly/XfniiZ.

But there were so many other good submissions that we felt the need to give a few honorable mentions! Free, signed Triple Town posters will be sent to the writer of this sweet story about bear adoption: http://bit.ly/S09YxJ, and the writer of this unexpectedly funny ode to parents: http://bit.ly/S0a7RE.

And to everyone else, our sincere thanks for participating in the contest! We really enjoyed reading all your stories and are so glad you took the time to share them with us.

We’ve been trying to figure out what happened to these little guys. Did they eat radioactive bush berries? Did they get ambushed by a crack team of angry villagers? Have they discovered “illicit recreational uses” for all that grass in Triple Town? The mystery is killing us. So we decided to run a little contest. Tell us your story about how these bears became so special. Post it in our forums for the whole world to see. We’ll pick the best stories, and the winners will receive their very own FREE special needs bear!

These bears are truly one-of-a-kind, so please don’t participate in this contest unless you truly love bears and want to give one a good home!