Nuclear Throne: You Did Not Reach the Nuclear Throne

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Nuclear Throne: You Did Not Reach the Nuclear Throne

In Nuclear Throne, your goal is simple: reach the Nuclear Throne. It’s a brutal mix of fast-paced, top-down action, random generation, permadeath, and player choice — and honestly, you probably won’t stand a chance. More than anything, the result of your run will be seven simple words: “You did not reach the Nuclear Throne.”

Nuclear Throne

To the two of us at Vlambeer and the four others who have been working on the game for the past 2.5 years, there’s something exciting about making a game that’s intentionally mean to you in every possible way, without becoming unfair. When we set out to make this game, we wanted to make a game that would be fun to play for us as its creators — something even we couldn’t fully predict.

Nuclear Throne did that, and then we made it harder and added more content. We continued adding little mean things to the game until eventually our gaming skills were pushed to the absolute limit. We didn’t stop pushing until we saw that dreaded “Did Not Reach” pop up because of mimics we forgot about while playing, or enemies that snuck up on us and ended our runs with a single well-placed hit.

In Nuclear Throne, you choose one of twelve mutants to reach that Nuclear Throne. Each of them has a passive and an active ability — sometimes simple, such as a temporary shield or higher ammo drops, and sometimes ridiculous, such as interdimensional airstrikes and the ability to fight on as a headless chicken after you die. When you get better at the game, you will get access to their own powerful Throne Butt or even more powerful Ultra abilities for your current run.

Nuclear ThroneNuclear Throne

A mutant can carry two weapons at once, and there are approximately 125 weapons in Nuclear Throne. Some of them are the usual fare, pistols, machineguns, screwdrivers, laserguns — and some of them are completely over the top — things like gatling sluggers, super plasma guns, and the golden nuke launcher. Either way, power isn’t everything — the more powerful weapons take longer to reload and use more ammo, and if you run out of ammo, you’re going to have a pretty pathetic end to your run.

As you kill enemies and bosses in the wastelands, your mutant will gain radiation — or rads — that help your mutant achieve mutations. There are almost 30 mutations in the game — but you’ll only get to pick from a random selection of four at any time. Some of them are fun, some of them are practical, and some of them are very situational.

Scarier Face is a good one to come across, because it lowers the health on every enemy you come across. Impact Wrists — which increases the force your weaponry has on enemies, slinging them further away — works wonders when you’re playing with the mutant Melting, whose active ability allows you to blow up corpses from a distance. Or you might want to avoid Euphoria when you’re playing as Crystal, because her shield ability reflects bullets, and Euphoria slows down all projectiles in the game.

Nuclear Throne

And that’s just the core of Nuclear Throne. As you struggle to figure out a way to beat the game’s areas and bosses, there are dozens of useful and less useful secrets to find — things called crowns, secret characters, areas, endings, cursed weapons, and all sorts of mysterious meta.

There are dozens of ways to enhance your run, or to make it harder. And if you feel like you’re ready to show off, we’ve got you covered, too. Play couch co-op with a friend, or participate in our daily challenge and a weekly challenge to show off your skills against everybody else.

Nuclear Throne will have an exclusive console launch on PlayStation platforms, and we’re looking forward to seeing how you do not reach the Throne.

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24 Comments

8 Author Replies

  • RAMIIIII!!!!! I can’t wait for your game please release. I love you.

    • Thanks so much! We’re super excited to finally launch on Playstation platforms. Let us know what you think when it’s there!

  • I’m anxious for this to finally get released on PSN. Especially on Vita. Is there at least a time frame for when this will get released? Are we talking this year or early next or … ?

    • We’re not 100% sure yet what the date will be, but we’re working as hard as we can to get it ready for release. Expect more news on a release date in the next month or two!

  • Is that Bill Cipher in the title PIC?

  • So we will hear more information about this at E3 I take it. Because there are alot of game coming about so until then we’ll see when there’s some gameplay footage.

  • Haven’t heard much about this game until now but gotta say I’m interested now! Hope to see more in the coming months guys and good luck.

  • I was sold on the main artwork

    • That artwork was made by Justin Chan, an art student who made fan art for the game very early on when we were just getting started. His work was so good that we brought him aboard officially. We’re glad we did.

  • Hi Rami!

    Really looking forward to having another great local co-op game, as well as something I can take with me on my Vita :-)

    • This is kind of exactly what we had in mind. Play for scores or with friends on the couch, or practice your runs on your Vita. Or just have fun on whichever platform.

    • Would you also say the title is Kinda Funny, and is loved by the Vocal Majority?

      -C

  • Great looking artwork. However, you should post some in game screen shots.

  • Will this game be on ps vita? I hope it will be

  • You forgot to mention the strategy of not getting hit to do well in Nuclear Throne.

  • Excellent news!!! I’ve been interested in buying this on Steam but would MUCH rather play this on a PS4 :)

  • I can’t wait to hear the release date?!

  • I’d be more hyped for this if it weren’t for the fact that you guys also made Luftrausers which is glitchy, has an unobtainable 100% and is still unpatched.

    How do we know this won’t get the same treatment?

    I hate to sound like a jerk and I know patching games takes time and money but it’s still annoying to see. I’d check this out if it were free on Plus but won’t be spending my money otherwise.

    • We completely understand. We’re a tiny team, and we couldn’t develop this and patch LUFTRAUSERS at the same time. We do want to emphasise that as soon as our workload on Nuclear Throne lowers a bit, we’ll go and see what we can still do about LUFTRAUSERS’ issues. Our sincerest apologies.

  • “You did interest me in Nuclear Throne.”

  • Been looking forward to this since your first trailer for PS4. MMMRRRFFF HRRRMMM BRRMM BMMM MMMLLBRRR!!!! Hilarious! Please post some shots of the gameplay to further whet our appetites!

  • An actual game screenshot or gameplay video would have been nice, maybe include that next time you do a game update?
    You know how they say mnore then a thousand words ;)

  • My last pay check was $9500 working 12 hours a week online. My sisters friend has been averaging 15k for months now and she works about 20 hours a week. I can’t believe how easy it was once I tried it out. This is what I do… wallstreet34.com

  • Thanks for supporting the Vita. Day 1 buy for me

  • Blatant!!!..as always,nowadays you guys don’t even bother to hide it eh,so blatant that it makes me wanna puke.

    As for the game not sure what to make of it…need to see some gameplay before saying anything but co-op is good,so expecting some fun.
    Also glad to see the support for Vita.
    And I’ve just read a comment about Luftrausers,didn’t know you guys were the same devs and I gotta agree that after seeing how long Luftrausers has been broken…its very hard to put faith in this game.I really hope you guys get around to do something about Luftrausers like you mentioned in the answer to CaptainJeff87.

  • Awe yeeeeah! It’s great to hear more news about Nuclear Throne! I’ve been super pumped ever since that first trailer, it was so epic! My Vita has been waiting very patiently, hehe! (ok, not really, he’s been pawing at me asking when he get’s to play Nuclear Throne!) :P

  • This game has been on my radar for ever, but have been waiting to Play it on my Vita, becaue thats the right thing to do. I had a blast in Vlambeers previous title Luftrausers and if this game is half as fun as that I’m sorted for a long time. Cant wait to play it specially on the Vita. Thank you for the Vita Love and please dont delay it on the VIta. Thanks.

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