play | play original version | play an early sketch

So here’s what happened.

I was playing all submachines in order to get into the right state of mind for the upcoming episode, right? Then I almost accidentally opened the submachine 2 work file, to see how much the code got old and how much work I’ll need in order to create an HD version. I don’t quite remember what happened after that – but here’s the revisited, renewed and kind of polished a bit version of the game. It’s still the same game, I just dusted it off.

So I took a long, upclose look at this game. I found a potential. A potential to reorganize a bit, stir things up, add new material, finally add some kind of rewards for finding the secrets – that’s all you wanted back in 2006 as I recall. All in the HD version that’s bound to happen someday. For now – here’s a good template to start working on the extended submachine universe.

Good times ahead.

Hang on.

revisited version

original version

an early sketch

[warning: this is for Polish readers only]

Tak sobie pomyślałem, że jednak bycie scenarzystą komiksowym to ciężki kawałek chleba.

No bo tak.

Załóżmy, że czytelnicy komiksów to taka wioska. Wioseczka taka. Powiedzmy – ostatnia wioska która opiera się jeszcze najeźdźcom. Natomiast ty, drogi scenarzysto jesteś pustelnikiem, odludkiem, wieszczem i wróżbitą, który mieszka na wzgórzu za wioską w swojej lepianko-dziurze w ziemi. Praktycznie nikt do ciebie nigdy nie przychodzi, bo prawie nikt nie wie że tam mieszkasz, a jeżeli nawet wiedzą że tam mieszkasz to nie przychodzą bo i po co. Nikt z nich nie wie, że w twojej głowie siedzą te wszystkie fantastyczne historie. Że gdybyś tylko mógł, opowiadałbyś godzinami o innych światach, wspaniałych bohaterach, niesamowitych zdarzeniach. Gdybyś tylko mógł.

Jedyną osobą, która czasami do ciebie wpada w odwiedziny jest wioskowy głupek. I to tylko dlatego, że kiedyś próbował sam wyjść poza wioskę na szeroki świat i się zgubił po dwustu metrach i jakoś doczołgał do twojej ziemianko-lepianki, gdzie go doprowadziłeś do stanu używalności, pokazałeś którędy się wraca do wioski oraz zmusiłeś żeby ci obiecał, że będzie szedł prosto do domu i nie skręci znowu na łąkę. I tak jakoś ten wioskowy głupek przywiązał się do ciebie z wdzięczności i teraz odwiedza cię czasami i zalewa klepisko w ziemiance wywarem z rumianku.

Tak naprawdę nie masz wyjścia. On jest jedyną osobą której możesz swoje opowieści przekazać. Wiesz, że to nie jest dobry pomysł, ale cóż zrobić. Albo to, albo nic. Więc opowiadasz. Opowiadasz wszystko, oddajesz mu każde słowo, każdą myśl, każdą konstrukcję. Oddajesz mu całe swoje światy. I on tak siedzi godzinami, rumianek dawno wystygł.

A potem leci na dół do wioski i tym swoim zidiociałym, głupkowatym językiem opowiada wszystkim twoje historie. Pieczołowicie, dokładnie, szczegółowo, no stara się chłopak. Jednak jest tylko wioskowym głupkiem, to nie jego wina, że z twojego opowiadania mało co zrozumiał, a jeszcze mniej zapamiętał. Co najdziwniejsze – to wystarczy. Bo cała wioska słucha jego opowieści. Potem klepią go po plecach mówiąc – fajna historyjka. Ładnie to wymyśliłeś, wioskowy głupku. Całkiem zgrabnie. Dobry jesteś w wymyślaniu tych takich historyjek, głupku. I nawet mówią to bez sarkazmu, bo jak na głupka – to te jego historyjki rzeczywiście w miarę zgrabne są. Te jego historyjki.

play | video walkthrough | movie from location | jayisgames review

The old town of Dubrovnik is one of the most beautiful urban formations I have ever seen. It’s walled off from the rest of the world (famous Walls of Dubrovnik), and the town was never sieged during the Middle Ages. A dictionary definition of a fortress. What follows is that all houses are built very tightly and the streets are narrow, but this “medieval style” is very human-friendly. The organic nature of the city shows how it’s supposed to be. It’s built like a hive, but not overwhelming nor claustrophobic. It’s the exact opposite of the suburban model, where everything is so far apart that you need a car to buy groceries or bread. Here? You probably had to walk for 5 minutes to get everything you needed. To sum it up: it’s beautiful, narrow, medieval and human friendly.

And full of tourists.

You can’t imagine how difficult it was to find a desolate place in this town. Tourists were everywhere. Even on this street – people were casually strolling through and I had to wait for them to move on and get out of the picture. Crowded is the word I’m looking for. I bet Dubrovnik is most beautiful right now, in October, when the summer season is over and all locals can finally go outside and not be greeted by a stampeding crowd.

Walled off from the rest of the world, the fortress-like old town of Dubrovnik has narrow streets and tightly built houses. It’s a human friendly town where tourists like to flock and residents seem to flourish in peaceful appreciation for their beautiful neighborhoods. Yet here, perhaps among the leaves of a succulent, the grains of potting soil, or the black depths of a wall crevice, live the unseen inhabitants of the town: the10 Gnomes in Dubrovnik. But can you find them all? That is the question in this lovely continuation of Mateusz Skutnik’s point-and-click find-the-gnomegame series.
In each scene, move your cursor to pan the camera angles, seeking out questionable spots which invite a closer look via the changing cursor. Investigate each view with precision if you intend to discover—and click on—every gnome before the ten minute timer expires. “10 minutes to find 10 gnomes?” You say, “Not a problem. They’re small, so how much time do they really need?” But this location is vast, despite its confined alleys and skinny doorways, and there are many times you’ll zoom so close you can see the thin fibers on a plant’s leaf yet still find no gnome. It could take several restarts and much more then 10 minutes to explore. Objects, such as a folded-up wheelchair or a single strand of human hair speak of the stories and life behind the walls, and you may end up too distracted to look for gnomes.
Even if some of those elusive imps manage to elude your investigative efforts or if hidden object games are not your idea of fun, play 10 Gnomes in Dubrovnik as art for art’s sake. Skutnik’s photography captures Dubrovnik’s quiet, dignified beauty that is both serene and surreal. It’s a wonderful adventure to explore the art and architecture and life of this enchanting location. So take a look around. Who knows what surprises you might find? Maybe even a troll.

Author: Elle.

Last week Dexter went down in flames and shame and we’re still asking ourselves – how is it possible that they made 8 seasons of that?…

Yesterday Breaking Bad finale aired and this series ended in the blaze of glory, taking the rightful place among the best tv shows of all time.

Lately I finished my opus magnum, Daymare Town 4, which proved that I still can do a neat game once in a while.

And today I finished 10 Gnomes. Now they just sit there in the window and once they cool off I’ll serve them to you.

Pastel Stories is no more. All my things are under my name right now. Aditionally I redesigned entire Pastel Games website, now you can easily access all of our distinctive series through their own mini-hubs.

Things are changing.

Time to move on.

Each time I’m about to draw or paint – I always buy few new things. It’s nice to have something squeaky clean, at least for a brief moment. This time it was a new batch of paper (but of course), few brushes and white gouache paint from Talens – the same one that served me so well when I was covering entire previous album in the fog. To be clear – I’m not starting a new album – I’m finishing it. It already has over 46 pages and I just need to add few more stories to wrap things up. It’s already written, by the way.

The sketches are waiting, now it’s only a matter of actually drawing the comic.

Through the years I learned that it’s kind of dangerous to have only one project open at any given time – if you hit a writers block on it – you’re stuck. But if you have two or even more projects at once – you can jump from one to another, and ride the wave of creativity as long as you physically can. That’s why I saved the best news for last. Starting from October I’m beginning the development of Submachine 9: the Temple.

Goodbye Walter White, thank you for everything.

Hello Murtaugh.

New Skutnik’s game has been released few days ago!
This game is (typically for Skutnik’s games) very hard, and beating it without use of walkthrough may be difficult. Even more, besides main quest of escaping the desert there are many smaller side-quests, though finishing them only serves to collect achievements (and showing a little more of weirdness of game’s world)
Unlike previous Daymare town games, in this one we can actually talk to few people we meet, though we don’t get to choose what to say. It’s still a nice difference, as it shows that mindset of Daymare Town residents is quite strange.

Well I seem to have missed Daymare Towns 1-3, but perhaps you’ll forgive me as the last was released over three years ago. (In the meantime, creator Mateusz Skutnik has given us the lovely platformy spin-off Daymare Cat.) The main Daymares are more traditional adventure games, set in a surreal, beautiful world and with no handholding in their puzzles whatsoever. You’ll need patience to overcome 4′s obscurity, but you’ll be rewarded in spades with yet more atmospheric, mysterious scenes and memorably unusual characters. An HD, full-screen version of Daymare Town 4 can be yours for $5 – it’s a bit of a pixel hunt, so if you enjoy the game, that may be worth a look.
Author: Tom Sykes.

I počítačová hra může být umění.
Polský výtvarník, tvůrce komiksů a počítačových her Mateusz Skutnik kreslí zvláštní tajemné světy. Jedním z nich je série černobílých adventur Daymare Town. Nyní již čtvrtá hra v řadě nás zavede do trošku strašidelných míst plných otázek, na něž musíme nalézt odpovědi. Procházením hry se dostáváme k mnoha zajímavým detailům, jako jsou obrázky na stěnách, výrazy ve tváři podivných obyvatel podivného města, kde nic není, jak má být. Ačkoli na první pohled obrázky můžou vypadat jednoduše načrtnuté tužkou, na druhý a třetí pohled prozrazují, že jde o promyšlené a propracované umělecké dílo. Lehce strašidelný dojem z obrázků je podbarvený příhodnou hudbou. Internet je plný her od mnoha různých autorů, plný hádanek pro ty, kdo rádi hledají jejich řešení, ale atmosféra Skutnikových her je jedinečná a neopakovatelná. Zahrát si jeho hru je umělecký zážitek.