Hey Everyone,

It’s been about a month since our last update and A LOT has happened.

The biggest news is that we welcomed the very first development baby to the fold! Our programmer Jim was graced by a beautiful baby girl a few weeks ago, and we’re incredibly happy for him and his wife.

On top of that, because we worked ahead in anticipation of Jim’s baby, most of Chapter 5 has already been designed gameplay-wise, and much of what we’re working on now is art/sound/story related.

Chapter 5 takes place in the grossest, strangest environment yet – Whale Fall. A Whale Fall occurs at several of the deepest portions of the Atlantic. When a whale dies, its corpse falls to the bottom of the sea, where it’s body and bones decompose and become hosts for other organisms. Eventually, their entire carcass becomes a thriving ecosystem for hundreds of other sea creatures.

And in Chapter 5, you and Abe get to make your way through it.

This area will bring a lot of new dangers to deal with, along with some environmental hazards you haven’t experienced before, like deep-sea pressure that can crack your hull and kill you if you stay in areas that are too deep for too long.

We don’t want to show you much yet (since so much of the art is unfinished) but here is a quick glimpse of a portion of the area:

On top of getting Chapter 5 in order, we’re also working on some overall game improvements for the next patch, as well as finalizing a secret weapon that some of you may already be on your way to unlocking, which we’re currently calling the Swarm.

Here’s a glimpse of an older version of it.

We’re hoping that next month we can give you a firmer date for the Chapter’s launch.

The last order of business is the Steam Summer Sale. If you’re reading this and haven’t joined us in Early Access yet, we’ll be on sale at 10% off throughout the Steam Summer Sale now through July 8th. It’s the perfect time to jump in, get up to speed on all the previous chapters, and give us your feedback before Chapter 5 drops.

We also want to thank those of you who have been playing and have been kind enough to leave a review – each one helps us so much, and we’ve seen wishlists slowly increasing every week with each new review, so thank you!

You can expect more frequent updates in the coming weeks now that the bulk of the development of Chapter 5 is done. Follow us on Twitter for more, and in the meantime, enjoy your summer to the fullest!

Thanks, The Bomb Shelter Games Team