It's Steam Next Fest – and our friend HIROTONFA, the artist behind Marie's icons, has a game in it that we're proud to be publishing: American Revolution Smuggler.
You're a broke Connecticut ex-lawyer who owes a debt to a literal demon, sailing the East Coast, buying low and selling high, while the Revolution burns around you. Dodge British blockades, outrun Patriot privateers, bribe customs, box dockworkers to train your courage stat… and, yes, romance the anthropomorphic colonial state-chans.
It's Recettear's buy-low-sell-high loop mixed with 100% Orange Juice dice combat and a Persona-ish dating sim, with a very cool voice cast. Nothing like Peri on the surface, but underneath it's the same thing: a labor of love, shoving an engine way past where it was meant to go. If that's why you're here, you'll appreciate HARS.
The demo's live right now. Go play it, wishlist it, follow Hiro.
Meanwhile, over in Peri…
The inventory transfer update is out. And since it shipped, a lot of time's gone into making it bulletproof: hunting down every duplication bug and edge case you've reported so carrying gear between levels just works. That grind's ongoing, and fixes are landing steadily.
Alongside that, what's new and on the way:
New weapons. A new grenade launcher, new APS-style needler gun, assorted iron of varying dignity.
New outfits for Marie.
UI update for level selection based on feedback and our ambitions.
Apartment is being further improved, with more detail in the intimate spaces between missions.
Smarter enemies, eventually. Enemies can hear your footsteps again (sorry about that) and we've started a real upgrade to enemy AI. Early days, the skeleton's in, but it'll happen.
On the horizon: we’ll be adding gibs. And we're setting up for a new distribution platform.
… plus a stack of smaller fixes. Full patchnotes will be available once the updates go public. For now, details are available as git commits on the Discord.
And on the bundle front…
Since the last update, Peri's been pairing off with a whole spread of games we admire – household names and one-person labors of love alike. Building these little crossovers with other devs has been one of the best parts of the year, and we're thankful to every partner who said yes. Go play their games. You own Peri and get the other at an extra discount, stacked on top of whatever's already on sale:
https://store.steampowered.com/bundlelist/1437760
Lone/Wolves – with ANNO: Mutationem
Machines of Loving Grace – with System Shock 2
Liturgy of the Punished – with No Sun To Worship
The Longest Shift – with halfmoon
Concrete Dreams – with NIDANA
Blood West x Peripeteia
Hard Grit – with G-String
Lore and Liminal Spaces – with Mycelium: The Silent Contract
Big studio or solo dev, every one of these is made by people worth supporting. Thanks for backing them alongside us.