Heys guys and gals, how are you doing? I don't know why we didn't came up with this idea sooner, but well, we will be posting Greenlight news here as well. This one here will be sort of a summary of whats going on until now!
As some might now we've got greenlit on the past year. We're mostly surprised, a bit shocked and immensely happy about that. We wanna thank all of you people that gave us your support, you're the real MVP. In order to properly thank everyone for their support, we've announced a revamp!
The game overhaul is alive and going, slower than we would like to admit, but IS in the works. Here are some of the changes we've been working on.
Graphical Rework
Making up our minds for an aesthetic wasn’t easy. We actually needed something that was fast, pretty and allowed us to update our designs. At first we thought about pixel art, but, considering how much content we had, that was a no go. Then we thought about 3d pre-rendering, but that would lack a je ne sais quoi. Hand drawn art had the potential to be really pretty but, just like pixel art, it would take forever. So we came up with a blend between modeling and vector art and it looks pretty, really pretty. Most of Guy’s animations are done and it already sums up 250 meaty frames. But he is not the only one receiving a rework.
Monsters Overhaul
We’ve came up with not only design rework, but mechanics rework. People who played the game before Greenlight will be surprised to see how some old faces got very different. We are also adding new challengers to the mix, we assure that they will spice up the competition. But fear not, true believer, Guy will be able to pack a punch in this new version.
Shiny New Toys
Guy’s armory will be, at least, doubled. We already settled for a target number of swords, axes and spears. Those weapons have been tweaked to offer a more diversified gameplay than before. Axes will hit even harder with a larger area, but much slower. Spears will still do their trick of being really fast, but with a skinny hit box. Swords will be jacks of all trades. The dagger, Guy’s long companion, will now be a permanent subweapon instead of something you drop after the first dungeon. It won’t do much damage, but will be great to get rid of something with really low health or to destroy a projectile mid air.
Keep Your Focus
This mechanic is new to the game. Instead of having to wait for skills to cool down, Guy will now have a Focus bar that fills up a little bit every time he lands a successful hit. The little dude can then use his Focus to unleash powerful attacks in the form of Skills. Focus will slowly drop as Guy stirs away from combat and if he dies it goes back to nothing, but fret not! We’ve added a new ability for our hero, which will help him move away from danger or shorten the gap between him and a fleeing enemy. Guy can now freely roll on the floor in order to quickly cover some ground. That simple movement will add a lot to the gameplay, allowing faster paced battles whilst removing the frustration of not being able to dodge just in time.
More Power To The People
Some people said that Guy didn’t feel that much powerful. Well, we are fixing that. With the addition of the rolling movement we’ve decided about removing the Sprint skill, it wasn’t that great. We’ve also buffed Guy’s Shout, it will really make a bang now. Guy’s Whirlwind will now be sustainable at the cost of more Focus, becoming a real threat to the army of monsters. And to top all of that, our little friend will be able to release a long ranged straight line of sheer destruction in the form of a crippling shockwave. Beat that, baddies!
Too Stronk Pls Nerf
Some people found Guy’s learning curve too steep, so we’ve made it smoother. However, with the addition of those new mechanics, we are also adding some more difficulty to the high end. We are looking to create a healthy amount of challenge, while keeping the game from becoming frustrating. We are still focusing on high skill gameplay; however, it won’t be impossible to someone unskilled to beat the game, it will just take pratice and a smoother curve will make the game more welcoming for new players.
Why Are There All Those Characters?
We are also improving the story. There is a lot being added. While we don’t want to add extensive cutscenes that don’t let you play, we also want to tell a bit more of each character and their role in the game events. We’ve not only added a few more lines, but we’ve improved the characters backgrounds. While still focusing on the action element, we still want to tell a story.
Blings
We won’t change the game core mechanics, that is a fact, but we are improving it, making it possible for players to come up with their own play style. In order to do that, the rings will play a more important role in customizing your experience. They will no longer be just a small tweak, some rings combinations might even affect how your skills work. How those combinations work? That is up to you guys to find out. But fret not, there will be a log for the ones you’ve already found out about.
Outfits
In order to take the idea of customization even further, without leaving behind our core mechanics, we are concocting a system analogue to a class system. Now this is where the small tweaks will happen: improving some of this while while taking away some of that. This system is meant for those who are having a hard time to overcome challenges and don’t mind grinding a little bit in order to become slightly more powerful while using their favorite weapon.
Shorter Dungeons
Based on some feedback from the earlier version we’ve decide to make the dungeons shorter in lenght, instead we gonna spend more time and effort in a clever dungeon design, combining monsters in many more ways than before. The strain of going through a huge level will be gone, however there will be plenty more ways to die. We’ve also changed how saving and life refill works, this is now a matter of strategy, your survival depends on when and where you decide to save your progress.
Engine
We’ve came up to a conclusion on what we gonna do about the engine, how to save as much code as possible and still get a good result out of it. Now we probably have more coding to re-do, but it will pay off in the end. We will address resolution issues, performance issues, and we will also be able to fully support gamepad, which is a big plus.
Satisfaction
We might hit some snags with the engine update, but in the other hand it will give us more time to work on more assets, since coding and art isn’t done by the same people. That is good because it might allow us to make the early access experience closer to the final game experience, which will provide us way better feedback for further improving the game.
Confusion
Yeah, our interface was really, really bad. But well, what can we say? We’ve come a long way and learned a lot, we were too green at the time. We are doing our best to deliver a better navigation experience and, at the same time, give less cryptic information. What do you guys think of our placeholder for the equipment window?
Eye Candy
We will try to post at least once every month, even if those posts are just updates with a few images and videos of what we’ve been up to. Fair enough? Good!
