- Steam Playtest Sign-Ups Are Open! - 27 July 2026
Great news, Looters! Sign-ups for The Looter Steam Playtest are officially live.The playtest is kicking off in the next few weeks, and everyone who signs up will get access as soon as it goes live. Head over to our Steam store page now, click the "Request Access" button, and secure your spot immediately!How to sign up:Visit The Looter Steam Store page.Scroll down to "Join The Looter Playtest".Click "Request Access" .You will get notified when the Playtest starts.Behind the scenes: Progress UpdateWhile we prepare the playtest build for launch, we wanted to share a quick look at where development currently stands and what we’ve been busy with behind the scenes lately: Content Lock Reached: This is an especially massive milestone for us! All required assets are in, every feature is implemented, and The Looter is now fully playable from start to finish internally. Our team is running full p…
- The Looter Dev Update #10: How Tortura Learned to Fight Back - 2 July 2026
Hello Looters! This time we talk about the main element of our game alongside exploration - combat. These two are the main components of the gameplay loop. You clear the area of enemies and then you explore. Enemy Design Philosophy As you may know from the previous logs, The Looter is a shooter game with melee combat as the last resort/utility usage. The basic combat loop is the enemy moving towards the player and our job is to kill it before it reaches us. If it manages to do so we can use a melee weapon or dodge to get away and finish the job from a distance. This is the behavior of the basic cannon fodder enemies. Even though just changing the basic parameters like speed, health or size of the enemy makes a significant difference in how to approach the enemy, we tried to make enemies as interesting and unique as possible. Main enemy types Walking enemy - walks from left to right or w…
- The Looter Dev Update #9: Improvising to Stay Alive - 24 April 2026
Hey Looters, It’s Walczak again. This article is about crafting, game currency and some game mechanics related to resource management. Why crafting? Crafting became the must have mechanic in most of the adventure games. Survival horrors like Resident Evil or The Last of Us allow players to assemble useful tools or healing items from scraps. This mechanic is so appreciated among gamers that it was introduced even in the series that never had it before like crafting feature making "debut" in Elden Ring while it was not present in previous Fromsoft games. The Looter is no different. So the brutally honest answer to the question “Why do we have crafting in The Looter” is “Because it is a cool and widely appreciated game mechanic”. Hell there was even a whole TV series MCGyver dedicated solely to crafting as the ultimate problem solving method. Crafting menu Benefits of crafting system My fa…
- The Looter Dev Update #8: The Green Nightmare - 12 March 2026
Hey, I’m Krzysiek. In The Looter I handle level design and the slightly chaotic process of stitching everything together inside the engine. Today I want to talk about how a forest grew out of nothing, and how we managed to cut our way through a giant, mutated overgrowth of ideas. What Is Tortura Before The Looter even had a name, we knew we wanted to make a post-apocalyptic game. But not one set in distant Australian deserts or North American wastelands. We wanted something closer to home. Brutalist architecture. Concrete blocks. Dense forests. The first look of Tortura in the game prototype. It was so long ago it’s almost weird the forest didn’t grow in real life That’s how the idea of Tortura was born - an unnaturally massive forest that suddenly, inexplicably (or maybe just forgotten by those who survived), grew and swallowed fields, villages, and entire cities. This was the vibe we…
- The Looter Dev Update #7: Strays of Tortura - 20 February 2026
Hey everyone, Bald Pixel Artist here! Since it’s #LoveYourPetDay, I wanted to share a small (but very dear to us) side quest from The Looter. Tortura is full of lost souls… and yeah, some of them have fur. We’re adding 12 collectible, animated animal NPCs, all inspired by real pets from our team and friends. When you find one, it gets a little entry in your Journal, and a safe spot with a certain… peculiar human(?) NPC who’s been taking them in. Here are a few you’ll meet. Paprotek We adopted him from a shelter about a year ago. He never gets tired, whether he’s parked on your lap or out on a walk. And for some reason, he decided that gently biting your hand is his love language. Leon He’s 13 years old, but you wouldn’t guess it. He went from classic apartment lazy-cat life to becoming a full-time little huntsman, spending most of his days outside near his new home in a small town. He b…
- The Looter Dev Update #6: Designing Survival - 14 January 2026
Hello Looters! Welcome back to another devlog. This time we want to talk about survival mechanics in The Looter. My name is Walczak and I handle the programming side of the project. The first idea behind The Looter was simple: let’s make a game like Resident Evil, but in 2D. The main challenge was designing survival systems where the player always has just enough resources to push forward. This is our first game, and we are a small, unknown studio, so we want to make the experience approachable for everyone rather than cranking the difficulty lever too high or turning it into an extreme survival simulator.In The Looter, resources should be available, but never infinite. Games like Resident Evil or The Last of Us do this extremely well - you usually enter a fight with just enough ammo to survive. Early designs of shooting and death animationsCHALLENGES We want firearms to be the main way…
- The Looter Dev Update #5: Evolution of The Looter - 5 December 2025
Hello there, Looters! It’s been quite some time since the last devlog, but we definitely want to keep you a bit more up to date right until the launch because, well, we are finally getting there!In this one, the one doing the writing will be me - Łukasz, also known by some by the alias BaldPixelArtist. I want to do a little dive into the art of The Looter and how it evolved during this journey and what this game means to me as an artist.ENVIRONMENTWhere should we start? Maybe here, with the general environment. The Looter - as you might recall - is a post-apo game with a lot of platforming/shooting action, and the "post-apo" part is where I could really go hard on the lush forest reclaimed by nature, kind of like The Last of Us but sideways and with a 2D vibe.This is the earliest iteration of the general look of the game. What I always remember is that I wanted to get that immersive pix…
- The Looter at PAX West 2025 - 28 August 2025
Hey everyone! Exciting stuff! The Looter is heading to PAX West this year, and we're bringing a new game build with us. We've spent the last few months working hard to polish the game, and we're excited to show off all the progress we've made with a brand-new demo.We're super excited to show off the game and let you all get a taste of the post-apocalyptic world of Tortura. You will find us at the Games From Poland booth, so, if you're attending PAX, be sure to stop by between August 29th and September 1st. ARCH EXPO HALLBooth 1125Games From PolandCome on over, play the game, and say hi! We can't wait to see you there!
- The Looter is a part of 2D Platformer Vibes! - 26 February 2024
We’re excited to share that The Looter is a part of 2D Platformer Vibes online event hosted by Retrovibe! The event is held from February 26 to March 4 and it gathers an amazing roster of 2D platformer titles developed by talented teams from various parts of the world. Those indie gems will challenge your cleverness in adrenaline-pumping platforming, test exploration skills, eagerness to find every collectible, the reflexes in avoiding hidden traps and more. You can enter the event here: 2D PLATFORMER VIBES IN A NUTSHELL A VAST SELECTION OF 2D PLATFORMERS Discover amazing platformers in a wide range of settings and art styles - from retro-fueled fantasy worlds soaked with pixel art, to desolated post-apocalyptic lands or even space. From Webbed or Tribal Hunter, to Ultros, Lone Fungus and more! EXPLORE UPCOMING GAMES Browse through a selection of upcoming games and fill your wishlists w…
- Realms Deep 2023 - New Gameplay Trailer is here! - 30 September 2023
Survivors! The brand-new gameplay trailer for The Looter is here! See the new desolate corners of the post-apocalyptic planet of Tortura and struggle with deadly creatures that are always dangerously close! Watch the trailer: Wishlist the game on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1163020/The_Looter/ Connect with us on our official channels: Follow The Looter on Twitter Follow Retrovibe on Twitter https://i.imgur.com/XxEN88d.png Visit Retrovibe Publisher Page
- The Looter is coming to Realms Deep 2023 - 28 September 2023
Hey everyone! We're excited to let you know that The Looter is coming to Realms Deep 2023! Join us this Saturday, 30 September at 8 PM CEST / 2 PM ET / 11 AM PT on twitch.tv/3drealms! Make sure to grab snacks and drinks, and get ready for one of a kind show! We hope to see you there, Tactical Dogs and Retrovibe
- Exploring the Monastery - The Looter Dev Update #5 - 12 May 2022
Hey everyone! It’s been a while, so we thought we’d check-in and show you some of the stuff we’ve been working on recently. First up is the Monastery level in which you’ll journey through dark and spooky corridors, halls, and dungeons. In the previous Dev Update, we’ve introduced you to some of the new enemies. This time, we’ve prepared their animations. That’s a Carrier, if you kill it too quickly, it will spawn a dangerous enemy. However, you can ignore the red blob if you take your time. In the center of the stage stands Exploder. It stands, as it’s static and cannot move. You could call it a mothership. Instead, it will bother you by spawning 2 exploding monsters. Finally, the Teleporter will attack you by quickly appearing in different places. When it teleports to a location it releases an explosion of toxic matter. So keep your eyes on your surroundings. Please follow and wishlist…
- The Looter - Live Dev of a Post-Apocalyptic Action-Adventure Game - 10 March 2022
Join Tactical Dogs Team on Tuesday, 15 March, at 10 AM PST / 1 PM EST / 6 PM GMT / 7 PM CET to see them work on The Looter and share their design approach when it comes to making a challenging post-apocalyptic action-adventure game. The live stream will be available on Twitch, YouTube, and our Steam card.
- The Looter Dev Update #4: New enemies, tweaks, and more! - 24 February 2022
Hey everyone! We’re coming to you with another Dev Update. This one will be quick and short, but we still wanted to check-in, as it has become our monthly tradition. First of all, check out some then and now comparisons of how our game changed during the development. At a first glance, those look like two different games! You can also see a significant portion of the game in action in this recording from a live development stream, in which the Tactical Dogs team took everyone behind the scenes of our action-adventure platformer. As for some new content, take a look at some of the new enemies coming in the newest location. It’s rude not to make introductions, so from the left, meet Walker, Exploder, Carrier, Ram, and Teleporter. Teleporter might be called different in the near future, as we’re still debating if he’ll be able to teleport. As we’re on the topic of new enemies, here’s a lit…
- The Looter - Live Dev of a Post-Apocalyptic Action-Adventure Game - 11 February 2022
Join Tactical Dogs Team on Tuesday, 15 February, at 10 AM PST / 1 PM EST / 6 PM GMT / 7 PM CET to see them work on The Looter and share their design approach when it comes to making a challenging post-apocalyptic action-adventure game. The live stream will be available on Twitch, YouTube, and our Steam card.
- The Looter Dev Update #3 with some new faces - 20 January 2022
Hey everyone! It’s a brand new year, so it’s time for a dev update about The Looter. We’ve spent last month mainly polishing and testing things we had ready before, so this update will be a tad shorter. Still, we want to show you some new cool things we’ve been working on. First up, new location - The Church. A sanctuary hidden within the deadly lands. It’s a massive building that we hope will be to your liking. With the new location come new NPCs. Two of them will play a major role in your adventures. Can you guess which ones? We’ve also tinkered with a new finisher animation. Turns out that an axe is a perfect replacement for a katana. A true samurai-esque addition. Another thing we’d like to show you is a very short cutscene that we’re planning to add during a boss fight. It's not much but we think it adds some nice touch and improves worldbuilding. Let us know what you think on the…
- The Looter Dev Update #2 - Under the desert sun - 14 December 2021
Hey everyone! The last couple of weeks we’ve spent mostly on designing and building the desert, another big location you’ll explore in The Looter. We want this setting to look unique and pose new challenges to the players. We now have the whole geometry of this location ready and started filling it with gameplay. Your main task at this stage of The Looter will be to repair a motorcycle in order to get to the Monastery. Let’s have a closer look at the new enemies you’ll meet in the desert. Starting with this dried-up, mummified corpses that (for now) we call “Dry Arms”. They’ll be pretty challenging and often require you to dodge to avoid their attacks. The only way to deal them damage will be to find and attack their vital points. We’re also designing Raiders, desert outlaws with various weapons and combat styles. Ranged one will throw knives at you, while the fighter will press you wit…
- The Looter Dev Update #1 - Big Bad Wolf and new guns - 23 November 2021
Hey everyone! Welcome to our first (of many, we hope) Dev Update on The Looter. We’ve been working hard on the down-low for quite a while now, so today we want to show you some of the new features, enemies, and locations. Let’s start with brand new items and weapons. The Looter is full of large chasms and obstacles that block your way. In order to reach the highest platforms and cross dangerous ravines, you’re gonna need something special, and we’ve got you covered. The Grappler will allow you to access new areas, previously impossible to reach. It’s a true Batman-esque addition. Our hero's arsenal is constantly growing. A shotgun is a brand new weapon. It shoots 5 pellets that can pierce opponents and crates but has a limited range and long reload time. You’ll need to approach the enemies with caution, or you might find yourself in quite a bit of trouble. The Grappler and Shotgun will…
- The Looter Live Dev part 7 - 14 July 2021
Watch Tactical Dogs live today in the 32nd ever episode of Retrovibe's live Dev here on Steam - a series of daily streams showing devs working on their games. Tune in daily at 10:00 PT / 13:00 ET / 19:00 CET Also – if you can’t make it to watch the stream live today: see the archived episodes on Retrovibe’s Youtube channel The Looter and while you’re at it – also check out the other dev’s streams as well for: classic metroidvania B.I.O.T.A., precision platformer Janosik 2, retro fps shooter Project Warlock II and steampunk tactical rpg in Shardpunk: Verminfall on the same channel.
- The Looter Live Dev part 6 - 7 July 2021
Watch Tactical Dogs design miniboss sequence live today in the 27nd ever episode of Retrovibe's live Dev here on Steam - a series of daily streams showing devs working on their games. Tune in daily at 10:00 PT / 13:00 ET / 19:00 CET Also – if you can’t make it to watch the stream live today: see the archived episodes on Retrovibe’s Youtube channel The Looter and while you’re at it – also check out the other dev’s streams as well for: classic metroidvania B.I.O.T.A., precision platformer Janosik 2, retro fps shooter Project Warlock II and steampunk tactical rpg in Shardpunk: Verminfall on the same channel.
