Vlambeer has a lengthy history that has been gone into great detail through many interviews and retrospect, and has also been very well documented. As such this page will not cover those portions - the Wikipedia articles on Vlambeer and Nuclear Throne are both great resources to read on their entire history, and as that already exists this page will be more targeted towards the Throne community specifically rather than just being a birds eye view for non-Throners.
This page will focus on Throne, however here is a link hub to find projects that Vlambeer has worked on:
- Vlambeer's website which serves as a link hub for their bigger projects.
- Developer page on Steam which includes most of their major projects.
- JW's Developer page which includes his major projects worked on outside of Vlambeer, with different developers.
- Itch.io page which includes the original Wasteland Kings.
The versions page shares much more documentation on the dates and time of each update and will be referenced on this page. This is the other half of NT's history.
Wasteland Kings
Back in February of 2013 Vlambeer was invited to participate in the Mojam Humble charity, in which indie developers were invited to stream themselves developing games over a few days. The result of their work was Wastelalnd Kings. While their development was around their other game Luftrausers at the time, they found themselves returning to Wasteland Kings to continually add more content which would be the framework for the eventual development of Nuclear Throne.
Wasteland Kings is still available for download online for free by Vlambeer on itch. It only features 5 characters being Fish, Crystal, Eyes, Melting and Plant. Only the first three areas in the game are present being the Desert, Sewers and Scrapyards. Many basic features that are used here would find their way into the official game.
Nuclear Throne's development
As the game entered its early development cycle, a decision to change the name from Wasteland Kings to a new title was made after Vlambeer was approached about its name and the unrelated Wasteland series making a return. JW later shared a tweet in 2020 that showed names they were considering as a replacement for Wasteland Kings. While Nuclear Throne did not receive the most initial votes, it did end up being the winning pick as it is known today.
As Wasteland Kings was developed on a livestream initially, Vlambeer decided to continue its development as Nuclear Throne via Twitch. By August of 2013 the project went full-time, and it launched into early access on Steam on October 11th, 2013. In the early access notes they shared that the game would be streamed twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays for around four hours and would release an update every weekend.
Weekly updates stayed on a fairly consistent schedule during development. There would be two streams a week, and then a build uploaded on the weekend normally. During the livestreams viewers could watch members on the project actively develop the game and give feedback/ideas. The devs were also fairly active on the Steam discussion forums as it became a hub for feedback discussion. These paired together meant that there was an emphasis on community feedback/engagement during the development cycle and any issues could be readily addressed and fixed, usually within a few updates.
Active development of Nuclear Throne continued on for over two years until December 5th, 2015, in which the game officially released to the public on Update 96. This meant that across 111 weeks, 96 of those included an update for the public to try out and give feedback on.
The game would receive an update just ten days later, Update 97, which included cloud saving. This would be the last update in 2015, and can be considered the end of the main development cycle of the game.
Post-Release
Following the end of the original development cycle, there were only two more official versions released since.
The first being update 98 on February 21st, 2016, in which Thronebutt was officially integrated. This is a fan-made site to track the daily leaderboards, but was shut down due to the addition of weeklies among other issues that broke the site. This update saw that the site would be tied into the game for better tracking/support and official website hosting. There is a separate page for Thronebutt with its extensive history here.
During 2016 the popular mod Nuclear Throne Together was released by YellowAfterLife(YAL) which supported online co-op and by 2017, support for mods to be loaded in. Following its success YAL was invited to work on update 99, where the focus would be bringing many NTT fixes into the vanilla version. The full story about u99 can be found on YAL's site.
Update 99 released at last on November 6th, 2017. This would become the last 'stable' update of the game with a large focus on bugfixes(particularly with co-op) and some balancing. Most or all versions of Throne are based on either some form of u98 or u99 build in the present day.
Following the release of u99r1, YAL would continue to develop official betas of the game to present day to work towards u99r2, where he actively participates in the NT Discord to look at bugs found in the latest NT beta version and latest NTT beta branch(being v100). The first beta branch released in early 2020 and over a dozen branches have been released since then through late 2023, usually with multiple branches released back to back followed by longer gaps of waiting.
There is no official release date for u99r2 yet nor is there any indication it is releasing in the near future, however the beta branches can be opted into and tried by anyone with a Steam version of the game. Notable changes to the game include 60 FPS support and in the most recent beta, custom FPS/aspect ratios and widescreen. The main focus of these are bugfixes and balancing however, with major improvements to performance. A summary of notable changes can be found here.
On September 1st, 2020, Vlambeer officially 'shut down' during its tenth year anniversary. A large part of why Vlambeer was kept running was to help propel both Rami and JW into the gaming industry better, and its shutting down was made out to be more of its success rather than a failure. Rami would continue to work on advocacy in the video game industry towards diversity and indie developers from non-Western countries, while JW planned to continue working as an independent developer on various projects. Shutting down mainly seemed to cease functions on the official front and clearing out merchandise.
Despite shutting down Vlambeer still operated to some capacity. They still provided customer support and gave their games maintenance. Thronebutt was still being hosted, and YAL was still developing betas for NT. They also still had their game ULTRABUGS in active development. With all these factors, Vlambeer wasn't truly 'shut down' entirely.
On April 4th, 2024, Rami decided to sell out his portion of Vlambeer as JW now runs the company solo as he shared in a blog post. Along with this announcement, JW made a post about the current direction of Vlambeer, including the continued development of ULTRABUGS and an update to Ridiculous Fishing, with the intention to help preserve all of Vlambeer's games.
NT's future has much of its focus on the beta updates but much of this focus should also go to the dedicated community. Between an active modding community who has released a series of higher quality content mods, and an active meta community that hosts occasional tournaments and constantly try to push the limits of the game. While the main content of the game is around either beating the Throne or obtaining all the achievements for many players, the game has a lot of depth beyond this which can be attributed to years of passionate game development and helping foster a very active community.
List of Vlambeer & JW games
The following list may not be fully comprehensive, but will cover every Vlambeer title listed on their main website. The split between major and minor releases will depend on their availability based on platforms.
Major Releases |
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Super Crate Box |
Released: October 22nd, 2010. |
Super Crate Box is a shoot 'em up reminiscent of arcade games. It takes place on a single screen as enemies endlessly pour in from the top, and the player has to try to collect crates that spawn randomly around the screen while managing the amount of enemies. Early version was known as "Crates From Hell" before being developed into a full Vlambeer title. Many weapons that appear in Nuclear Throne make their debut here including the Flamethrower, Grenade Launcher, Revolver and Minigun. The Disc Gun also appears with the unlock text "We hereby sincerely apologize." as it is a weapon that can also kill the player. It is later referenced as a NT achievement. Other unlocks that reappear in Nuclear Throne includes a Robot character and arguably a Chicken characater. There is a hardmode called SFMT that gets referenced in many other Vlambeer titles, with the unlock text "Play this when the kids are in bed." |
Serious Sam: The Random Encounter |
October 24th, 2011. | Following the success of Super Crate Box, Vlambeer was approached by Devolver Digital and Croteam who were looking for indie devs interested in making spin-offs for the Serious Sam series. This would lead to three Serious Sam indie spin-offs being made with each of the devs own unique approaches, the one by Vlambeer being Serious Sam: The Random Encounter. Gameplay consisted of a somewhat turn-based RPG in which the player would have a planning phase on how to attack, and then an attacking phase where they could try to dodge enemy projectiles while continually running away from massive enemy hordes. |
GUN GODZ |
Kickstarter Release: February 10th, 2012 Itch.io Release: December 22nd, 2013 Steam Release: December 8th, 2019 |
Gun Godz was initially developed for Venus Patrol, a now inactive gaming blog site that was launched with a kickstarter. One of the reward tiers included exclusive access to a new Vlambeer game, which only released to the full public nearly two years afterwards. Gameplay is a boomer shooter styled FPS where the player tries to escape prison on Venus through multiple different levels using weapons such as the Shotgun, Minigun and Bazooka. The final area gets reused in Nuclear Throne as YV's Mansion, and all the enemies within the mansion originate from Gun Godz. The final boss of the game is the Gun God who has a similar arsenal to the player. He reappears in Nuclear Throne now known as Yung Venuz. |
Ridiculous Fishing |
Initial Release: March 13th, 2013 Ex Release: July 14th, 2023 |
Ridiculous Fishing is Vlambeer's main foray into mobile gaming. It is a fishing game where any fish caught are flung into the air and needs to be shot in order to cash them in, which can then be used for continual upgrades to fishing gear and weapons. Previously made unavailable on Google Play due to a false Malware claim. Whether this is the reason the app is still unavailable is unknown. Ridiculous Fishing EX is an updated version of the game released for the Apple Arcade, including upgraded graphics and many additional features. |
LUFTRAUSERS |
March 18th, 2014 | Development for LUFTRAUSERS began throughout 2012 as Vlambeer planned to have another game published through Devolver Digital. While development of the game largely ended by mid-2013 as focus shifted towards creating Nuclear Throne, the game would not see a release until 2014 due to certification troubles for a Playstation release. This would be the first Vlambeer game to be available on console. Gameplay consists of a shoot em' up bullet hell as the player partakes in chaotic aerial dogfights. Combo for score can be gained by continually killing enemies quickly, while health can only be regained by stopping firing. There are missions in-game that unlocks new parts, and the return of the difficult SFMT mode. |
Nuclear Throne |
Early Access: October 11th, 2013 Official Release: December 5th, 2015. |
(Add text later) Full list of versions and their differences here. |
ULTRABUGS |
Not yet released. |
Vlambeer first showed off the game without a title during PAX West 2018, and it was officially announced as ULTRABUGS in January 2019 for PAX South. On March 20th, 2019 during a Nindie showcase ULTRABUGS was teased as a part of the Vlambeer Arcade for the Nintendo Switch, to be released within the same year. While the arcade was ultimately cancelled, ULTRABUGS is still slated for release. The latest news is of April 2024, during JW's acquisition of Vlambeer he shared that the game will be released after an unannounced project is finished. |
The following table is a list of Vlambeer games that were minor releases. They can all be played for free, however they have limited accessibility due to the death of flash and the minimalism the current Vlambeer website has. Many games were created under the 'Not Vlambeer' label, which were done for experimental or commissioned projects. Some titles were created during game jams which were developed entirely in the course of a few hours or a few days.
Note: There are conflicting sources online about Super Crate Box and Radical Fishing original release dates. The dates listed on this page are their earliest releases accessible online. Release dates for all games in this section may not be completely accurate.
Other Releases |
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Radical Fishing |
November 24th, 2010 | Radical Fishing was Vlambeer's first game ever created, though Super Crate Box seemed to have gotten a release first. Radical Fishing was made for the now defunct bored.com which was a site for flash games. Released on Newgrounds in December 2010 where it is still playable today. It would later receive a mobile release with the much more expanded Ridiculous Fishing. |
Super Puppy Boy |
December 2nd, 2010 | A mini-project made during the PETA vs Super Meat Boy drama in support of Team Meat. Gameplay was a parody of Super Meat Boy as the player took control of a puppy in a platforming level with saws with a puppy girl needing to be rescued and a collectable bone. However the game itself was unwinnable, and dying as the puppy led to a comedic amount of blood bursting all over the screen. The Vlambeer website itself had a counter for the amount of puppies killed. The last number tracked via Wayback Machine archiving was over 2 billion puppies killed by 2021. Used to be downloadable via the Vlambeer website, still accessible via the Wayback Machine. |
GlitchHiker | January 2011 | A game made for the Global Game Jam 2011 in the Netherlands, GlitchHiker was a top-down game where the the player would run around a map with randomly spawning blocks while trying to collect coins. However, everything in the game was made purposefully glitchy as the screen would randomly tear and the blocks and players would constantly have glitchy effects. Players who preformed poorly would cause the game's code to 'degrade' making it much more glitchy and unplayable, while those who scored at least 100 points would extend the game's lifespan. Once a certain threshold was crossed the game would execute a code that made itself unplayable forever. As the game was meant to die the game is no longer accessible and died by January 31st, 2011. Some footage of particularly glitchy gameplay can be viewed on YouTube. |
KARATE |
April 12th, 2011 (Estimated) |
KARATE is a simple game made by Vlambeer in under two hours. Enemies continually spawn on the screen and the player can use multiple different karate moves in order to kill them to rack up points, but is a game over if any enemies can land a hit. Used to be downloadable via the Vlambeer website, still accessible via the Wayback Machine. |
Dinosaur Zookeeper |
June 16th, 2011 (Estimated) |
Dinosaur Zookeeper was a game created for Adult Swim games. It is no longer accessible on the website nor the wayback machine, but still exists via Flashpoint. A single screen game where the player must manage a park full of dinosaurs that each have different traits and must be properly managed to not kill too many park guests or other dinosaurs. Successful days increases income which can be used for tools or weapons to better manage the dinosaurs. |
LUFTRAUSER |
June 28th, 2011 | The initial version of what would later become LUFTRAUSERS created during a two day game jam. The core components of an aerial dogfight is present as the player can fire to kill enemies for points, or let go of fire in order to heal. |
Yeti Hunter |
March 2012 | A simplistic first person game created in two days where the player will wander around a snowy area looking for an elusive Yeti to shoot and kill. The Yeti blends in well with the snow and constantly runs from the player, making it difficult to find. Similarly the Yeti from Nuclear Throne will flee from the player if they ever draw near, however it is unclear if it is a reference to this game. Used to be downloadable via the Vlambeer website, still accessible via the Wayback Machine. |
SPACE MURDER | April 23rd, 2012 (Estimated) |
Space Murder was a planned space sim that was a mini project put on hold multiple times throughout 2010. A prototype of the unfinished game was released later in 2012, and is still loosely accessible on the Vlambeer site. |
Deer Santa | December 22nd, 2012 | A game developed over the course of 8 hours for a Dutch television show featuring video games. It is a co-op twin stick shooter in which the player controls Santa and shoots presents at children on the screen. It was posted on the Advent of Indies website, a now defunct website where a new indie game was posted daily for December. The download link is dead even in Wayback Machine, making the game currently inaccessible. Some footage exists online via YouTube. |
Techno King |
December 30th, 2012 | A simple top-down shooter made in about an hour where enemy mechs are trying to destroy Neo Tokyo, and the player pilots a Techno King in order to kill them. Used to be downloadable via the Vlambeer website, still accessible via the Wayback Machine. |
Wasteland Kings |
February 2013 | Full section at top of page. The prototype of what later became Nuclear Throne made for a MOJAM charity event. Later released in December 2013 on Itch.io |
FFFLOOD |
September 1st, 2020 | FFFLOOD Prototype was released as a parting gift from Vlambeer when they announced their shutdown. The full story is on the linked Itch page, but a basic summary is that it was one of the earliest ideas for a Vlambeer game following Super Crate Box. It never saw an official release as problems with core gameplay kept it constantly on the backburner for years, as other projects took priority. |
The following is a list of Steam games that JW has worked on with other developers. These are non-Vlambeer games, but may be worth the attention to any Vlambeer fan. All of the Steam games were published under Devolver Digital.
While there are not many references to Vlambeer games in these titles, all the Steam releases notably include 200% screenshake options as an easter egg which is a Vlambeer staple. ((Add other JW games later))
JW-related Releases |
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Minit |
April 3rd, 2018 | A top-down adventure that only uses black and white colors, Minit has a central gimmick of only having 60 seconds to live and progress in the world can be made during this time. There are multiple checkpoints around the world as mini-puzzles must be solved to progress through one minute at a time. |
Disc Room |
October 22nd, 2020 | Disc Room is a top-down game with a heavy focus on difficulty. Each room features different discs and hazards with their own unique mini-challenges. Abilities can be unlocked that lets rooms be approached in different manners, with quite a few secrets to discover. |
Minit Fun Racer |
February 18th, 2021 | A spin-off to Minit that was made for charity. It is a top-down racing game where the player only has 10 seconds to drive as far as possible, but can collect coins to extend the timer. Coins can be used to buy upgrades which helps runs go even further. |