On the Virtues of Gaslighting Your Community, OR: Okay, Yeah, There Is a Space Whale
I have a confession to make. I have been living a lie for far too long, and the guilt weighs on my conscience like a great, barnacled, blubbery mass. Lately, it's taken all my energy to keep my head above water, so I'm just going to spout it out:
It exists. There is a Space Whale.
Whew... That's a relief. I feel like I can breathe again.
So... context. If you're not already a member of our Discord community, this statement makes no sense. You see, I have been denying its existence for more than 7 years. It does exist, though it hasn't always, and it is very, very rare. What started as a running in-joke got carried away, and today I will tell you that story, but first...
My inky-black deception shall not go unanswered. I must begin the long journey of my penance! To begin, I pledge this to you:
When Nova Drift's 1.2 update launches, for the period of June 5th-12th, I will donate 20% of the game's profits to the WDC Whale and Dolphin Conservation charity. And over a hundred other games will do the same!
Please, mark your calendars, grab some amazing games at low prices, and let's do some good together.
A deep dive into Nova Drift's cetacean server lore.
Ever since Nova Drift's 2017 Kickstarter campaign concluded and people started migrating into the game's Discord server, players have been asking for a Space Whale.
They've been asking... a lot. The game's reception was more than I expected. I tried to respond to everyone but I was eventually overwhelmed by the torrent of feedback and requests. I got some help from players and also implemented some systems like a feature voting website and bots. Those helped, but even after I found a community manager, it was still a leviathan task.
After a while, I noticed that the more players requested Space Whales, the more other people piled on. This only became more true as it went unanswered. Interesting.
Years later into development the meme was still going strong, and people were enjoying it, so I leaned into it, pretending to forbid people from discussing Space Whales.
Naturally, this resulted in community members warning new players that they could get banned for even mentioning a whale, further stoking the fires. By the time the game started to go viral, I was refusing to engage with discussions about whales in any form, and the meme self-perpetuated for years after.
It was funny to me for a while, and it seemed to be a good thing for the community, but I felt compelled to take it to the next level. April Fool's was coming up soon, so that was perfect. I usually made fake patch notes or released a mini-game, but this time I did this:
Even with all the in app purchases and pay-to-win-dark-patterns-bullshit I was surprised that some people thought this was real, but I shouldn't have been. Every developer knows you can't make gamers read. I'm a gamer. I don't read.
Doing this made me realize that that the funniest thing I could do would be to secretly, finally, add the whale to the game. I'd already made the art. I had to do it.
I started work on this shortly after, but it got sidetracked, so the assets were in the game for a while before I actually made it possible for the whale to spawn in game. I realized that this could be fun misdirection. Knowing that my players love to data mine, I gave the files confusing names as an attempt at plausible deniability, but it was not enough. Players used the Undertale mod tools to rip the sprites and then assemble them into something approximating a whale, but I expected this. I claimed that putting them in the engine was the easiest way for me to spoof that April Fool's day shot. But mostly I tried to stay out of the conversation. I'd muddied the waters enough that, with the help of the other community members, people weren't sure what was true anymore. Perfect.
At long last, I put it in the game as a rare spawn. Riiiight before the game fully released.
I didn't want players to try to kill it, so I made it almost indestructible. Also, as long as it swims around, it unleashes a stream of orbs which grant experience. Early game, this translates to a whole lot of free levels, but its not so much that it breaks the game balance. So, if anyone did manage to kill it, it would be to their own detriment. One of our top players did actually manage to bring it down, and I doubled its health as punishment for his sin. Whales are our friends.
I wanted the encounter to be infrequent enough that seeing it was actually insane, but not so uncommon that long time veterans never saw it. Estimating play time, my friend and I tried to make it so that you'd be likely to see it once every few hundred hours. My plan was that it'd be just rare enough that players couldn't be sure whether evidence was doctored. After all, the art had existed in the game files quite a while before anyone captured it in a screen shot. This was of course unsustainable as video evidence did eventually appear, but by the time it did, we were way past the truth mattering. I'd just claim the video wasn't playing or that Discord was busted.
Or I'd deflect.
Or I'd just act really impressed at their forgery skill...
But All of That Ends Today
No longer shall I deceive you. Instead, let us revel in the existence of the Space Whale together. Nay, let us celebrate all whales! For we are all connected!
In honor of World Ocean Day and WDC, I have snuck a Space Whale calf into the game. See if you can figure out how to encounter it during the 1.2 update!
In Conclusion
Listen, maybe a 7-year-running gag is taking things a bit too far. Maybe I shouldn't have lied, obfuscated, and denied the evidence against my claims. I owe it to my players to apologize for that deception. So, I'm sorry.
Moving forward, what I can promise you is this (and I mean this from the bottom of my icy, black, abyssal heart):
I Won't Ever Lie To You Again
(Unless its funny.)
Cosmic love,
Oh, right, I should probably talk about the update:
June 5th's 1.2 update introduces a new mode of play, "Daily Challenge", where you can take on a new seeded challenge each day, competing with players globally.
Here are a few of the new modes of play you can take on:
SUPER NOVA BROTHERS – Begin your journey alongside a unique and powerful Ally construct. You and the Ally share a portion of damage taken.
SERPENTINE DRIFT – Begin your journey as a Leviathan and munch orbs to increase your size. Protect your head, and don't chomp your own tail! Your only threats are cosmic hazards and yourself.
BOSS RUSH – Face a gauntlet of every boss. Bosses are faster and much tougher. You earn massively increased score and experience.
All together, there are 10 main Daily Challenges, and 23 modifiers that can be applied to them to in different combinations. This results in an enormous number of unique challenges that cycle daily.
Other Daily Challenge modes include: Cosmic Egg, 20-Point Draft, 45-Point Draft, Purity, Turbo, Turbo Endless, and Way Of The Sword.
Daily Challenge launches June 5th, along with the World Ocean Day Steam Sale, as a free update. I hope you love it.
Thanks for reading!
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