About This Game

FEATURES:

• A retro love letter to the Metroid series, with a few quality of life adjustments, such as teleporters, rechargeable ammo, item collection tracking by area, and more
  
• Discover journal entries hidden throughout the facility, explaining the grim fate of humanity and its war against the galaxy
  
• Uncover the nature of the main character and their role in the conflict
  
• Collect and upgrade powerful weapons
  
• Traverse 8 different biomes, each with their own inhabitants, secrets, and traps
  
• Fight multiple massive boss enemies
  
• Unlock 2 endings based on item completion
  
• Original music tracks by Sam Bionn

STORY:

By the end of the twenty-second century, Earth was a dry, arid husk. Billions of humans were crowded into overpopulated shelters, rife with disease and death. Just as their ancestors did so long ago, humanity looked to the stars for salvation. Using incredible technologies designed out of desperation, billions of people forged journeys into the darkness, establishing vast networks of interstellar colonies. The discovery of countless forms of alien life was met with indifference - an indifference that quickly turned to contempt. A powerful human military, honed by centuries of warfare, overpowered and conquered isolated alien worlds, claiming them as new territory for the massive human diaspora.

Humanity had avoided extinction and resettled itself, but had made a galaxy of enemies in the process. Survivors of countless fallen alien worlds banded together, and launched a suicidal campaign of revenge against the upstart race. All of humanity’s military and technological advances crumbled under the fury of an enraged galaxy, and soon, only a few million people remained, hidden in isolated pockets across the stars.

Once again faced with extinction, humanity turned to the tool that had brought them to the stars: innovation. But now, surviving military leaders were uninterested in saving lives or defending worlds. Their focus was far more singular - the eradication of everything. Terrible, reality-warping weapons were created by bending the very laws of nature. Captured alien species were spliced together and twisted into genetic abominations. Artificial intelligences were designed and built to brutalize their enemies, stripped of any ethical or moral restraint.

But there were a few dissenters. Not everyone believed that humanity’s last acts should be dedicated to nihilism. Some tried to reason with those in charge. Some refused their orders.

And a small number decided to act.

DEVELOPER’S NOTE:

Ex Vitro began its development many years ago as a tribute to one of the greatest games of all time: Super Metroid. I quickly realized any fangame would be squashed with legal trouble, so I shifted the graphics to my own design and tried to ride the line between ‘tribute’ and ‘knock-off’. It remains to be seen how successful I was, but as a solo developer, I learned a lot about game design in the process. It was the first game I started making, and it contains all of the lessons I learned along the way. Due to its origin, I feel that it’s unfair to charge for it. But I’ve included a bonus pack to go with it, if you want to support future development of new games by me!

BONUS PACK INCLUDES:

• Instructions on how to build your very own Terrarium! (with special tips from the Facility Administration on how to care for genetic abominations)
  
• 3 original music tracks by Sam Bionn
  
• High res concept art images of the character, final boss, and ending slides
  
• High quality wallpapers with various resolutions
  
• Royalty-free sprite sheets of unused graphics that never made it into the game, and behind-the-scenes descriptions of why they weren’t included
  
• 8 Royalty-free tilesets of every environment from the game

Mature Content Description

The developers describe the content like this:

Gameplay consists of killing and/or injuring enemies using sci-fi themed weapons, resulting in them emitting yellow or red blood and leaving behind corpses. Datalogs found throughout the game contain cursing, references to violent or dangerous behavior, and mention murder, suicide, and genocide.