Unearthed
-WINNER of the GBCOMPO21 Game Jam!-
A collaboration between Gumpy Function and BenJelter.
UNEARTHED is a logic puzzle game created for Nintendo's Game Boy Color.
You are employee #X276, contracted by the mining mega-corporation DSMR to travel off-planet and mine for valuable resources.
Use your company issued Mech to solve puzzles on various planets beyond the solar system. Every move counts as you carry out your mission in time to get home for your wedding anniversary and daughters birthday!
| CONTROLS | GAME BOY | KEYBOARD |
|---|---|---|
| MOVE | D-pad | Arrow Keys |
| INTERACT | A | Z |
| DIG | B | X |
| EXIT MECH | SELECT | SHIFT |
| PAUSE | START | ENTER |
Music by Lunchz.
Unearthed Soundtrack (Jam Version) available now! Just download Unearthed_Zero_OST.gb below.
Game Concept, Game Design, Level Design and Programming by Gumpy Function.
Art, Scenario, Dialog, Game Design and Programming by BenJelter.
Play-testing by Lunchz, Hamish Lockwood and Sysop-Delco.
Made using GB Studio for the GB Compo 2021 game jam.
Changelog
8th Oct 2021 - Unearthed_Zero_v1.1
- Added Additional Story Cut-scenes.
- Added Optional True Ending when all crystals are collected.
- Many Bugs Fixed.
17th Oct 2021 - Unearthed_Zero_v1.2
- Bugs Fixed.
19th Oct 2021 - Unearthed_Zero_v1.3
- Bugs Fixed.
- Known Bug: Uncommon Move Counter Bug will be fixed soon.
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Development log
- Devlog 6: End of the Jam and Beyond!44 days ago
- Devlog 5: Difficulty & Game Flow52 days ago
- New BETA now available for testing!Sep 19, 2023
- Devlog 4: The All-Important Master SceneMar 25, 2023
- Devlog 3: Planning UnearthedMar 18, 2023
Comments
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
How much longer will the full version be? And considering that there will be a physical cart, I imagine that the digital version will also be paid for, so how much will that be? Thank you.
I loved the art ! Inspiring!
so were we hired by the space woman as an artist or as a robot?
this was an awesome game! I enjoyed it a ton! I can't wait for the rest!
great sokoban derivative. i've been loving your and grumpyfunction's games.
The art in this game is just lovely. Looks like someone really put their heart into it. I can’t wait for the physical release!
Thanks, really appreciate it!
Can't add much to the other comments. Amazing stuff, atmosphere, writing, gameplay... So compelling! Be proud!
Thanks so much!
Found this game while doing a research project! This rocks!
Glad you liked it! We are working on a full non-jam version too.
I finally beat it! Some of the later levels are brutally difficult, to the point where I was questioning if they were actually possible. If this was released back in the day, it'd be all through those "hidden gems" videos on YouTube.
Fantastic Game
You'll be pleased to know that a big part of our overhaul of the game for the final release is going to be a more smooth difficulty curve!
LOVED this little jam gem, best homebrew game(in any console) I've played as of yet! It's just a lot of atmosphere, cool mechanics and art style on the gbc that makes this top notch. Would love to be a playtester for future releases! I'll join the discord as soon as I log into my pc, hope the 2.0/ final version comes soon! Keep up the good dev work :)
It's coming along pretty well. There always seems to be some new big thing to tackle but all of the levels are done so we are at the polishing stage.
Is the team open to producing physical copies?
I've played the first few levels and I am certain I would like to add the title to my physical collection.
Edit: Once finished, of course.
That's the plan! :)
What's the difference between the three files?
The 1.3.gb is the game, the pocket file is the game file exported for the analogue pocket, and OST stands for 'official soundtrack'
I'm really enjoying this. Were you familiar with Miyamoto's Mole Mania when you started?
Yes we were! It's a great game. Besides the digging over/under mechanic I do think it is pretty different too though. It is less of a puzzle game and more of an action game I think.
Looking forward to the full release! Ditto all the great things that others are saying about the atmosphere and quality of the puzzles.
-Two quality-of-life updates that would be nice to have are a move counter in the corner and an undo-move button (!)
-The 'high' (optimal) move number has occasionally changed on me, but I'm not sure this is a bug. On a fresh game, the 'high' for level 1-1 is 23 moves. I've somehow achieved a 22 and cannot recreate it and the current 'high' is now set at 22. Maybe holding down the arrow keys to move instead of individual inputs can mess up the counting?
-A move counter would help illustrate the move cost of some things that aren't intuitive. Burrowing down + back up (1 or 2 moves?) Moving into a fuel tank and getting pushed back out (1 or 2?) Getting out of your robot and jumping back in (1 or 2?) etc.
-The countdown to self-destruct is not the best for impatient people like me. Getting out of your mech and self-destructing does this immediately.
-Tip for others. If you collect the gem, you don't need to complete the level for it to show up in the level select, but sometimes it doesn't register immediately after leaving the level.
You'll be happy to know that the accuracy of the move counter has been one of our highest priorities for the final game. We have sped up the self-destruct sequence dramatically too (although there's a shortcut in the jam version-getting out of the mech before self destructing) The fact that you don't have to finish a level with a gem was a bug we have fixed for the final version of the game too.
For the undo move it would be really cool but I am afraid that the complexity of the game combined w the fact that it is on gameboy/gb studio make it practically impossible to implement.
Gorgeous game! As many other people have said, the atmosphere is just-right. There's something tonally magical about your art style, too. Thanks for making and sharing!
Thanks so much for the kind words.
I am loving this game, but I found a weird bug on level 2-3.
If, before pushing the block you need to push, you dig down from the spot to the right of the rock that's to the right of the fuel station, move 2 spots to the right, and then dig back up, you'll be on top of a hole in front of a magnet. You won't fall down the hole, but you can dig back down unless you move. If you do move, you're stuck, because you can't fall down and now you can't dig down, either. Also, weirdly, you can walk on some of the water tiles underneath where the hole is.
Thanks so much for reporting this bug! Would you be interested in helping us find bugs in the final version of the game? If so, we have a discord server going to find testers here:https://discord.gg/4Z66GCjahv
Just discoverd. Great job guys!
Thank you!
OMG you guys have done excellent work! Really. With the gameplay itself, the design of the levels, the story, how travel works, the comfy cabin of the ship with the picture of his wife and daughter, the sound/music, and the minigame where you reroute the electricity. Its an all around masterpiece. Some of the puzzles stumped me for a good moment which is freaking awesome, it makes it extremely satisfying to finish a level. I'm not usually a puzzle game fan when it comes to gameboy, but this is almost a completely different thing from the usual. Keep it up please and thank you fellas, its definitely not unappreciated, even if it's not as appreciated as it should be!
Thanks so much! Really appreciate the support
I was thinking about playing this game on my Youtube channel is it ok for kid
Yes I believe it is off of the top of my head but I may have forgotten something. Not 100% sure
It's fine for children. You will be okay.
man I feel so bad for missing out on these amazing games! Would rather play this than elden ring any day! Thank you for your hard work please keep it up and if you can tell Lunchz he or she is doing a great job as well thank you
Thanks so much for the kind words! We really appreciate it. Stay tuned for the full release ;)
I really hope you make a full and physical release, I will buy, you've done an awesome job.
This is great, nice work!
I just thought you should know that BestPig has made changes to GB Studio 1 and 2 so that they can be used to export games to .pocket as well. Hopefully it shouldn't be as much of an effort on your part to export it. If you're not interested, I can take a look, I would be happy to do the port by hand as an IPS patch.
BestPig's Port: https://github.com/BestPig/gb-studio#analogue-pocket-export
All done and ready to play on the Analogue Pocket!
Thanks! I appreciate it!
No problem. I also just put up a .pocket file for my newly released gbc game CUPID, if you're interested. Head to my itch page if you would like to check it out!
Man. looks so good to the eye balls!
Hello,
With the newly released Analogue Pocket, and the newest update for GB Studios, are you planning to publish the .pocket version of this game? I’d love to be able to play this on my Pocket, so I hope so!
^^^ Another Advertisement (;¬_¬)
No? Just looking for some more stuff to play on a new piece of hardware.
Figured this would be a good place to find some stuff. But I guess I'll take that as a no then...
You have a questionable comment history just like ianlatta. No activity except for yesterday when you copy pasted this comment all over successful GB Studio games. Just smells of disingenuous marketing activity to me.
But at least your account wasn't created yesterday. So, I apologize if you aren't working for Analogue, but I hope you can see that your activity together with ianlatta's is raising a red flag to me.
Devs will put .pocket files out in time. It will happen naturally. But migration to GB Studio 3 is A LOT of extra debugging work which many devs won't have the time (or patience) for when they can be working on other projects.
To answer your question, migrating this particular project to GB Studio 3 in order to export a .pocket file will not be feasible. The massive amount of debugging as a result of migration isn't worth it when the pocket plays .gb ROM files. So you can still play on your new hardware.
Fair enough. I just looked through available GB studios games, and commented on the ones that looked interesting.
The Pocket doesn't play .gb files, however. Via a flash cart they would, but I do not have one of those. So, oh well then.
Yep, I recommend getting something like an EZ flash so you can play .gb rom files on the Pocket. You don't have to get one but you will be locking yourself out of the vast majority of classic and homebrew GB games without one. And you will have a far better chance of playing these published GB Studio games on your pocket rather than hoping to see the devs debug a migrated GB Studio game just to output a .pocket file. Although you should make sure your flash cart of choice will work with the pocket before you purchase.
> You have a questionable comment history just like ianlatta. No activity except for yesterday when you copy pasted this comment all over successful GB Studio games. Just smells of disingenuous marketing activity to me.
Yeah, so sounds like a guy got a new device and heard that it had a feature, hey i did too, and now we want to try it out but there really aint anyone out here using that feature. It's just over excited fanboys who want to justify their purchases.
I migrated my Virtual BMO game over to GB Studio v3 so I could release a .pocket version for you folks that have the pocket already. It's a very small experience but that's the best I can do for you at this point given the amount of time it takes to debug.
You can head to my itch account if you're interested.
In future, I will be using GB Studio 3.0 to build games from scratch without the need to migrate obviously. In those cases, I will release a .pocket file along with a GB ROM but migrating bigger games is honestly a nightmare of bugs.
Hey, I'm real. I just didn't have anything to play on my Analogue Pocket and I didn't realize the complexities involved in exporting a game in the new version of GB studio.
Thanks to a newly released patch, we can now export to .pocket on the older GBStudio versions. So Unearthed is available to play on Analogue Pocket now!
Can you build this for Analogue Pocket? Thanks!
Thanks to a newly released patch, we can now export to .pocket on the older GBStudio versions. So Unearthed is available to play on Analogue Pocket now!
Is it just me, or are the buttons backwards on Keyboard? I would expect A to be on the right, and B to be on the left, like a gameboy. Tripped me up a bit on the menus.
I think that it is common for Z to be the 'main' button on pc games where the arrow keys are used. Since the 'd-pad' is on the right you can kind of think of the entire controller as being reversed. There's no perfect solution but it shouldn't take too long to get used to.
I see what you mean. To avoid this I've started doing both Z & C as the A button, allowing people to choose their preferred layout.
Interesting! In projects where I spent a lot more time on setting them up I've done stuff like making sure WASD will work etc. Ideally people will just download the rom and map the keys however they want in an emulator though.
Really nice game! All the feels of Mole Mania, too!
Anyway, I'm on planet 3 now, and I do wonder what that zone 2s on the second planet is for. You can't enter it until you finish the last level of the planet, but there's nothing you can do there other than take off. (You can't even go back left.)
Is that a bug?
The game is really enjoyable and I'll play more later. :)
Thanks!
That seems like a bug. You should be able to go left after beating 2-12. We'll look into it. Thanks for playing!
That bug is now fixed in v1.3 thanks very much for the heads up :)
Such a wonderful, unique and original game idea! I love it! The puzzle design is very clever and creative, the graphcis are simply beautiful. I play it on my Pocket GO S30 and I'm having a blast with it. Well done!
Thanks so much! Be sure to tell your friends. We want to try to release a cartridge at some point.
A realy great game. the puzzles are well made.
Thanks so much, glad you enjoyed it!
I'm unable to pass the 5th level of 3rd planet.
For me it looks like a bug (see the screenshot). I've successfully placed a block on one switch and put myself on second, but the little train didn't move.
Also, when I commit auto-destruction, I can see explosion animation but not on a fields where my mech is places, but on the second switch, where the ice block is placed.
Thanks for letting us know, Bug has been fixed. But you can still complete the level as it is - the solution doesnt require the Mech to be placed on a pressure switch. You will need to find a way to get an ice block on both pressure switches to progress.
Thank you - I've managed to pass that level :)
Great game BTW!
Thanks for playing! Glad you liked it.
Brutal! Brilliant art and animation, fun gameplay and great puzzles. A must have for everyone's GameBoy library. An excellent example of how hard work pays off with a great product. Congratulations guys!
Thanks so much! I have been enjoying your game as well. The regular achievement unlocks provide a satisfying reward while playing and I like the attention to detail you have implemented (Like the drop in player speed when walking up and down stairs in game!) Very well done :)
Such a cool game! One of the best gbcompo games for sure!
Cheers! Thanks for playing!
Great game! Reminds me of the Mole Madness game mechanic of digging. Jelter with another win.
Thanks! Mole Mania was one of my inspirations for this game! That and Into the Breach mainly. Glad you liked it. :)
I'm pretty much in love with this game... Will be looking for a cart release whenever you guys are ready! (I'm hoping - really soon)
Also - I never thought I would use a "self destruct" function this often..!
I'm showing this game to all my junkyard friends!!
If you want to restart a level the fast way you can skip the countdown on the self destruct by getting out of the mech first.
Dang this game looks great, and has a really fun puzzle mechanic too. Nice work!
Really glad to hear that you liked it. Thanks for playing!
Wow! Gotta love the palette O_O
Thanks! You wouldn't believe how much we nerded out trying to get it right.
Very unique and enjoyable concept. Wishing I had this for my Game Boy during those long drives as a child. Keep up the good work!
Thank you for the nice feedback. And so great to see a recorded playthrough!!
Amazing work! Great gameplay idea and beautiful graphics!
Thank you! Happy to hear you had a great time.
Very nice game!
Thanks, glad you like it!