Octbuster: Video Rental Store Cleanup

Note: these are full launch keys, you would be getting an exclusive first look at the entire game, not just the demo. There is extensive twitch integration with the following in-game commands available for your users:

• !party - the store's party lights come on and a random cassette plays over the PA
• !kitten - the first unnamed kitten in the shop takes the viewer's name
• !grump - summons the grumpy cat onto a shelf to start his stare
• !tape - while you have the tape editor open, a tape takes the viewer's name
• !drop - everything you are holding gets tossed lightly into the air
• !cart - your cart backflips and spills everything in it
• !effects - lists whatever you have switched on

It works two ways: plain chat commands on any channel, no affiliate needed, or channel-point rewards the game creates on your channel with one button if you are an affiliate. The game replies in chat so viewers know what fired or why it did not.

You stay in control of all of it from the in-game Stream tab:

• Every effect has its own on/off switch, its own cooldown, and a "who may trigger" setting (everyone, subs, VIPs, mods, or only you). The two messy ones, dropping your tapes and emptying the cart, are off until you turn them on.
• There is a per-viewer cooldown so nobody can spam, and the game answers refused requests in chat instead of ignoring them.
• Viewers never type anything into the game. Names come straight from Twitch, so there is nothing for anyone to moderate.
• A "protect leaderboard eligibility" switch is on by default and blocks the one effect that could affect your online board runs.
• One master switch turns the whole thing off, and there is a setup guide built into the tab that walks you through it in about two minutes.

From the steam store page:

Octbuster is a cozy organization game about closing up an 80s video rental store after hours as an octopus. With the help of your kitten pals, scoop up piles of procedurally placed VHS tapes with real tentacle arms and sort over 10,000 of them however you want. No timer, no score, no way to lose. Just you, nostalgia, and a store that slowly comes back together.

Don't worry, you have 8 arms, a cart buddy, and an army of kittens.

There are over 10,000 tapes on the floor of this shop. Grabbing them one at a time would take forever, so you don't. Each tentacle is a real arm you aim and reach with, so you can scoop a whole pile at once, dump it in your cart, and slide tapes home while the shelf shuffles over to make room. Once you get in the rhythm it's super satisfying. 

The kittens help pick up tapes, hang around on the props you place, and dance to your music!

There is the one grumpy kitten... they mostly just knock over stuff and give you mean looks, but maybe they'll warm up to you as you get this placed cleaned up.

Every cover is procedurally generated. No generative AI.

There are 600 unique movies across 16 genres, all made using procedural generation and open-source word banks. This mattered to me enough that I built the whole pipeline from scratch, and it is included in-game as a custom movie-maker where you can generate or create your own movie titles to be used in the game.

No two shops are the same

Every new game scatters the shop fresh from a seed, so the pile is different every time. And if you want to mess with it, there are controls for how the tapes spawn, so you can do huge clumps or completely scattered.

Made so anyone can play it

Accessibility by design. Genres are told apart by shape and brightness, not just color, so the game stays readable for every kind of color vision. You can tune the size and font of the text, and every single sound has its own volume slider, so turn the plops way up and the music way down, whatever your ears want. There are comfort options for motion and screen effects too.

And then there's all this

• A full upgrade system. Earn more arms, hold more tapes per arm, a bigger cart, and cart-specific upgrades too.

• A wall of every movie you find. Hidden in the piles are one-of-a-kind display copies. Pick one up and it lights up and flies to the wall, filling in your collection one rare find at a time.

  • There are 600 to find. No rush, they turn up while you tidy.

• Collectibles tucked under the mess, including cassette tapes that add to the shop's soundtrack and placeable props.

• Make your own tapes. There's a full in-game maker for building your own movie covers, and Steam Workshop support is already in, so you can share them and stock your shelves with the community's stuff.

• Play your own music through the shop and watch the lights sync to it.

• Little minigames to find and play while you tidy.

• Steam achievements that print into posters you can hang on the walls, stamped with your own stats from the run.

• Speed-run modes with a built-in split timer and separate Any% and 100% categories.

• Your own cozy corner to decorate, with the ability to free-place all your collectables that you've earned.

• Collectables and decorations are all account bound, so new stores start with all the carefully placed decorations of the last one.

I'm also working on Simplified Chinese for launch. Chinese covers are regenerated from Chinese word banks and profanity filters, so I am considering paying a service for all the other player facing text.

Have fun!