Third-person 3D Action RPG with Dungeon Crawling and City Building. Revive your enemies once again and make them fight alongside you!
Latest Updates from Our Project:
April Project Update: Monster Time!
7 days ago
– Sat, Apr 13, 2024 at 03:29:14 AM
Hi everyone!
Not many exciting things lately, as always we keep working on the game at a steady pace (but slower that we had originally planned due to the lack of publisher funding, see the January update for more details).
This one will be mostly text until the end, where we show a bit of what we're currently working on. So please take your time to read.
We keep receiving messages asking if Revenant will be out by June (as it was the stated milestone during the campaign). As we clearly explained in the January update, that will not be the case. Remember that we had to delay Revenant's development and we are now working in parallel on the original game's remake, Sword of the Necromancer: Resurrection, to help funding the sequel (again, we're very sorry for this change in the plan, but there wasn't much we could do).
This "parallel work" is going well, and as we anticipated it's not making a big dent in Revenant's progress, because the projects share pretty much everything. Resurrection is coming along nicely, and we will share a trailer and more details soon.
New game writer
We recently hired a writer to help us with Revenant's dialogues and some "narrative design" for the sidequests. Up until now, the same person in charge of game design, half of the programming and writing these updates (hi!) was the only one who had the "writer hat" too. Hopefully, this will hasten development a bit. The new writer is working closely with the team to keep the tone of the game, while adding their knowlegde about narrative.
Console versions
In our previous update, we told you about how we managed to make the game run at super stable 30FPS on handheld Switch, barring a few scenes with lots of NPCs. We have also been working on that, and we optimized the entity management, by performing some common tricks. Now the game runs at the desired FPS, at the cost of sometimes seeing a monster or an NPC popping off at a long distance (anyway, we try to mask it as well as we can).
And like every month, we want to use this update to talk about one aspect of the game: this time being...
Monsters
The original Sword of the Necromancer release had 20 monster species (which was later expanded to 30 with the free update, the 10 new ones consisting of backer-designed and new designs from the team). For a monster-catching game, that would seem a low number, but you had to take into account that this was a real-time game, and every monster had their elemental variants.
For the sequel, we made a decision of not using any of the backer-designed monsters from the first game (we didn't want to pick favourites, it wouldn't have been fair), and make a selection of 20 monsters from the remaining ones. There were some we couldn't use due to being from collaborations with other games, and others simply didn't work with a free camera in 3D or because how the new dungeons would be (for example, the door mimic in the first game wouldn't make sense in a cave or a forest), so picking them was fast.
Then we decided to have at least as many new monsters as returning ones, which means we had to make 20 new more designs!
This time, we feel a bit more free about what we can design, as we have different environments that we can take advantage of, and we don't have to worry about "making it make sense" in a 2D environment. We can now have certain monsters be exclusive to certain locations, which is reflected in their design. Also, making them in 3D makes it very easy to animate (when we worked on the 2D SOTN we had to make EVERY ANIMATION at least in 5 different directions, frame by frame)
On the other hand, monsters have now more states and can perform up to 4 different attacks each, so that's a lot of animations. But again, the 3D makes it really fun to come up with movements to give each monster a personality.
Here you have a sneak peek at some of the new monsters in their tri-dimensional glory!
For now, we leave what each one of these do up to interpretation, but there are some clues (the giant butcher knife, for example).
Also, remember that monsters can now have attributes with out-of-battle effects. For example, is there some Burning Mist that is causing you trouble in a dungeon? Use a monster with the Dispersion attribute to get rid of it!
That's all for today's update. See you next time!
Kind regards!
March Project Update: Weapon rebalance + a small new mechanic
about 1 month ago
– Tue, Mar 12, 2024 at 11:46:19 AM
Hi everyone!
Pretty quick update today as there is not much to say. We keep working on the game at a good pace (remember to wishlist Sword of the Necromancer: Revenant on Steam if you didn't! Resurrection too!).
First of all, good news! We managed to get the game working on Switch at super stable 30FPS (in handheld mode!) bar some slowdowns when performing certain attacks for the first time and in maps with LOTS of NPCs, but that's something that we can fix quite easily. That was our initial goal, although we will try to squeeze the machine as much as we can. Anyway, we prefer steady 30 FPS rather than 60 with constant slowdowns.
We also tried the game on PS5, and it obviously can run better on that platform.
This was a test to see if what we currently have in the game runs good enough in the weakest console. As we could see that was the case, we can increase the details a bit, for example, having more dynamic grass in the fields instead of the billboards we were using (and it still runs at the target framerate!).
Besides this, we've been having some playtests, and worked on rebalancing things after noticing a couple of issues. That leads us to today's main topic.
Weapon rebalance
In Sword of the Necromancer: Revenant you will be able to use more than 20 types of weapons. These fall under 6 main categories (sword, spear, axe, bow, grimoire and staff), and each have a different number of max combo hits and different charge attack among other attributes (reach, base damage, etc.)
After having some internal playtests, we decided to make some changes to several weapons so they feel less "same-y" and have their own use cases. For example, we changed the charged attack of the Hand Axe and Halberd to shoot a small projectile:
We also had fun testing new weapon types, like this hammer!
Of course, this one is not balanced!
New mechanic: ledge grab
Something we noticed back when we showcased the game at Gamescom and Indie Dev Day last year was that some players had a lot of difficulties with the platforming, mostly because they didn't jump from the borders of platforms to reach the next one, but way before that.
We've been thinking on how to help those players since back then (from increasing the jump distance to make the jump a bit more "automatic"), but in the end we ended up doing the simplest and most elegant solution: a ledge grab.
Now, when the character is not able to get on a platform, it will grab to the ledge (as long as it's horizontal enough) and climb up! We were a bit reluctant because we were afraid it would "break" what we already had designed environment-wise, but it wasn't as bad as it seemed, and any level design issues that stemmed from this new mechanic were easily fixable.
This adds a whole new dimension to the game's traversal options, and as a result, moving across the levels feel a lot more fluid than before!
And one last thing...
Check out this Kickstarter campaign: Godshard Chronicles by J-Cat Games!
Finally, the time has come! Our friends at J-Cat Games are having a Kickstarter campaign for their 2D ARPG Godshard Chronicles!
Godshard Chronicles is a 2D top-down action RPG inspired by titles such as The Legend of Zelda, Grandia (having music from its composer, Noriyuki Iwadare!), and the Mana series. Travel through a high fantasy world rendered in beautiful pixel art. You can play alone or with a friend!
If you remember well, we announced during our campaign that one of their characters, Ruby, would appear in Revenant as a special summon! In addition to that, players will be able to obtain Ruby's sword, a powerful fire element weapon.
This is an old gif though, many things have changed ;)
They have already meet their initial goal and a couple stretch goals, but any help is always welcome!
Also, as part of our collaboration, the Sword of the Necromancer will be available as a weapon in their game! Maybe it will have any use besides hitting the baddies with it? Who knows?
Take a look at their trailer!
That's all for today's update. Thank you for your support!
Kind regards!
February Project Update: More details about Resurrection, Monster Progression and a new Revenant details + Special Attack
2 months ago
– Mon, Feb 12, 2024 at 02:40:04 AM
Hello everyone!
As we said in our last update, we have temporarily shifted the main focus to develop Sword of the Necromancer: Resurrection, the remake of the original game. Remember that this doesn't mean that we have stopped working on Revenant, in fact seeing the positive reception of last month's news has motivated the team a lot, and we have made significant advances in both projects during this month!
We would like to thank you for your understanding and support, and all your encouraging words. It means a lot for us as developers.
Having said that, let's go to the meat of the update!
First of all, we have made a Steam Store page for Resurrection, which you can see if you follow this link. As always, wishlisting the game helps us a lot, so if you have a Steam account, that'd be much appreciated!
As you can see, we are using the same engine and monster models as in Revenant, that's one of the reasons we can work on both projects in parallel.
Like in the original game, all of Resurrection will happen inside the Necromancer's Crypt, which is only one dungeon (remember that dungeons will work different than in the original, using the same mechanics as in the sequel, which we explained here in this update). To compensate for that, it will be larger than the regular dungeons in Revenant, and it will be divided in several "zones" with a boss at the end to match the "floors" in the original Sword of the Necromancer. Each of these "zones" will have their own style and challenges, but as it's inside the same "brick and mortar" dungeon, don't expect radically varied environments (as would be in the case of Revenant's dungeons; featuring forests, caves, volcanoes...).
We are working hard on remaking these dungeons to feel familiar but at the same time taking advantage of the additional dimension to make them more interesting. Same with the bosses: they were designed for a 2D game, so making them work in 3D requires changing the battles a bit.
Monster Progression
One of the new features in Revenant that will also be available in Resurrection is the new Monster Progression mechanics. In the original game, monsters had only one ability (normally attacks, but some monsters like the Restorebbit could do other things), but in Revenant (and Resurrection) they will have up to 4 abilities!
Otherwise, having the option to customize their behaviour (with the "Tactics" feature, explained in the Campaign section of this Kickstarter) wouldn't make much sense, right?
This means that there should be a way for monsters to get more attacks, and that way is, you guessed right, levelling up. By fighting alongside your summons, they will gain experience points and level up. Besides new Attributes, like in the original, monsters can gain new Abilities, and even elemental variants of Abilities they've learnt!
To not interrupt the game, when a monster levels up, it will automatically gain the stat boosts, but to "learn" the new Attributes and Abilities you will need to do some management in the Status screen.
If a monster can learn a new Attribute/Ability, you will see a notification in their Status screen. Select if you want it to substitute a previous Attribute/Ability or discard the new thing. A monster can have up to 4 Attributes/Abilities, so if you want it to have more attack options you will need to give up on additional Stat boosts or Passive Abilities.
The things a monster can learn will depend on their level and what attributes they already had when you resurrected it, so no monsters will be the same! Also, monsters raised from low levels have a wider range of options than one got at a higher level that could seem powerful from the get-go.
We hope this new feature, in addition to Tactics, helps players to get the most of their summons, and to have them work the closest to what they want.
Today it's Ozuzo's turn. Ozuzo will be a powerful Light-element Bow user that will take advantage of her speed to get rid of enemies. Once her summon time runs up, you will be able to command her to perform a last attack, in her case, Rain of Light.
As with all the other Revenants, you will have to find Ozuzo and defeat her in order to be able to summon and use her powers.
Speaking of Revenants, we have been working on the models of the Backer designed Revenants, and finished one of them: Ophelia (designed by Storm). She will be a Wind-element Revenant that uses one of the weapon types we unlocked in this campaign's Social Stretch Goals: the knives.
We will probably start working on her Special Attack animation next. By the way, we are thinking of looking for a more epic name for these kind of attacks instead of "Special Attack", do you have any idea? You can tell us in the comments here or in our Discord server!
... and one last thing!
Check out this awesome Kickstarter campaign: Bestiario by Wiggin Industries!
Our friends from Wiggin Industries are having a Kickstarter campaign for their Persona-inspired monster catcher RPG Bestiario. They are doing very good (reaching their goal in only two hours!), but if you're interested in what they are making, do not hesitate to support them!
Bestiario is set in our country, Spain, and features monsters from the Iberian Peninsula lore, like the Gamusinos, the Cocollona and others, with an artstyle reminiscent of games like Megaman Legends.
That's all for today's update. Thank you very much for your support!
Kind regards!
January Project Update: Important news about project roadmap
3 months ago
– Fri, Jan 12, 2024 at 05:17:36 AM
Hello everyone
First of all, we wish you a happy new year 2024!
We have an update on the release schedule of the game. Sadly, this is to announce a delay.
We have been having problems that we tried to work around but it’s impossible for us to meet the June deadline we had as a goal. We are very sorry and we understand this is a letdown; we owe you an explanation, so here it is.
Before having the Kickstarter campaign for Sword of the Necromancer: Revenant in February last year, we were in talks with a publisher (and a pretty good one). We had a “pre-deal” in which they told us they would fund the base game (the minimum viable product) if we had a successful Kickstarter campaign. Said campaign would be to fund the features we had to remove (the stretch goals) and a limited physical edition, which the publisher didn't cover.
The Kickstarter campaign was released and thanks to the backers it was a success, and the publisher was happy with the vertical slice (demo) we showed them, but the actual signing of the deal was being constantly delayed.
The publisher stalled for several months until they finally said it was not a good time to make that deal, leaving us alone. Their reasoning was that the game industry as a whole was not in a good place and that they had to prioritize “minimum risk projects”, i.e. an already finished product (so, already funded) with over 20000 wishlists on Steam that is 100% ready to port to consoles and launch.
We were obviously not at that point yet, and to be honest, we wouldn’t have needed a publisher if we were, other than for the promotion and marketing.
As these “pre-deals” operate on good faith and are not really legally binding, we can’t do anything (and we don’t want to go to court). Also, similar situations have happened to other friend studios during 2023, it was just not a good year.
So, we were left with roughly half the budget to make the base game. Thanks to the Kickstarter money and a grant we got from our country’s government we could keep working on Revenant, but we still needed a publisher or an investor to finish it.
This is the reason we have been going to events like Gamescom and Paris Game Connection, to try close a deal with a publisher that is up to fund the rest of the development. While we have several publishers interested in the game, we haven’t signed a deal with anyone yet, and it looks like it will take some time.
This means that, unfortunately, we will need to extend Revenant’s development, as we currently do not have enough people to finish it before the milestone we set (June 2024). The publisher’s funding would have been invested in hiring more professionals to hasten the development, so without that money we can’t reach that pace. On top of that, several members of the team have been dealing with personal problems (health-related and others) that haven’t precisely helped with the project.
On the other hand, and to have a closer release of a product that can help us gaining some money to inject into Revenant’s development, we have decided to shift focus to the remake of the first Sword of the Necromancer we announced as a stretch goal that was never reached, Sword of the Necromancer: Resurrection.
This project has a way smaller scope and is something that we can finish in a relatively short time with the team we currently have. Also, if this remake is at least as successful as the original game, that means that there will be more people waiting to play the sequel.
We know this would not be the best received news ever, but we have tried everything to be able to finish Revenant, and 6 months away from the alleged release date, it’s clear that we won’t be able to. That’s why we want to be transparent with you and share the state of the project.
In order to compensate for this delay, we want to offer all backers a free copy of Sword of the Necromancer: Resurrection for Steam once it’s ready. This way you can try the new combat and summon mechanics, as well as revisit the original game’s story or discover it in case you haven't played it yet. We can’t currently promise console versions, as those have an extra cost for us that we can’t assume now.
Also, shifting focus from the sequel to this remake doesn’t mean we have halted Revenant’s development. As both games share engine, mechanics, models and animations, we can work on both simultaneously, but our current priority is having the remake ready as soon as possible in order to be able to get more funds for Revenant. We will keep sharing updates about Revenant's development as we have been doing.
Again, we are very sorry we couldn’t deliver in the time we promised. We don’t want to half-ass Revenant and our purpose is to give you the game you pledged for, but these are difficult times for game development indeed (and for anything actually). Let’s just hope things go a bit better this new year.
Thank you very much for your support
December Project Update: Dungeon Mechanics and Revenant Special Attacks
4 months ago
– Fri, Dec 22, 2023 at 11:55:51 AM
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
Sorry for the late update everyone! We've been very busy sorting out several things, so we thought that at this rate it'd be better to do a 2x1 and delay the update until the holidays so we can also use it to send you our best wishes!
The refactoring is 90% done, and by doing that we have solved almost all of the problems we encountered while showcasing the game at Gamescom and other places. Also, it seems we have optimized the game a bit "by accident" while making things in this new way, so that's really nice.
As we told in the last update, we've been working on the game's new HUD lately. We also added more info for both playable characters and monsters, so you can see for example if a monster (be it one of your summons or an enemy) has a stat buff or an ailment. If you have equipped an Accessory with the special attribute "Sensor" you can see extra info like the regular enemies' health bar!
Today we will explain a bit on how the dungeons will work in this game
New Dungeon Mechanics
The first Sword of the Necromancer was very simple in this regard: you had a dungeon level where you had to find a key; once you got it, you could open the boss room door, and if you defeated the boss you advanced to the next dungeon level. Every level was bigger than the previous one and (potentially) had new traps. Do this a few times, and done, you're before the Final Boss.
The problem is that this didn't allow us to put puzzles or more interesting levels, because players should be able to beat the levels no matter what they had on them. If we put a puzzle where, for example, you needed a bow to hit some switches and the player didn't have a bow on them, what do we do? Gift a bow so they can complete the puzzle? Make it so they can skip the puzzle in case they don't have a bow? That would defeat the purpose of the puzzle, so we ended up removing these situations.
We wanted to go back to that idea we couldn't give form to, and we thought of different solutions.
As you know, Dark Chronicle is one of the inspirations for Sword of the Necromancer: Revenant, so we decided to take some clues from it. And the most important change is this one:
Level Selection Screen
While dungeon levels will be mostly procedural (some will be handcrafted), we decided to make them shorter but put more of them. Each level will have its own pool of monsters, items and everything else, so even if they will have different layouts, the experience will be similar between playthroughs.
This allows us to introduce "missions" for each level, like clearing it in less than X minutes, or not use certain weapons. By completing these missions you will earn special rewards, but you won't be obliged to do them. Think of them like "pseudo-achievements", like getting the 3 special coins and reaching the top of the flag in a Super Mario game.
As you can see, we are showing the difficulty level for each dungeon floor. This means that sometimes, you will reach a branching path and there will be an easy way (maybe longer and/or with lesser rewards) and a difficult one (with more rewards and potentially shorter to reach the end of the dungeon). Or maybe one of the branches requires you to have a specific item or monster to continue! With this we solve the problem we had to introduce puzzles and blocks to bypass.
By beating different levels in succession you will build up your Dungeon Chain, which will make you get more EXP from battles and better items from chests. Which brings us to another option: now you can exit the dungeon at any point from this Level Selection Screen, so even if you need some healing or an item you don't have, you can just continue later after going to the cities to prepare or save your game. Exiting the dungeon will make you lose your current Dungeon Chain, though, so think about it!
Now, boss levels are just a level like the others, so you won't be forced to beat the boss for a chance of leaving the dungeon, like in the original game.
Lastly, some levels will have Special Conditions that are imposed to you when you enter it. For example (as in the image above), one level might forbid you from using summons, while another will not let you heal yourself. With this, we can give each dungeon floor its own flavour, and come up with engaging challenges.
We hope these changes help to make the Dungeon Crawling part of the game more interesting!
To wrap up this update, as it will probably be our last this year, we would like to show you one thing we've been cooking for a while.
Revenant Special Attacks
During our playtests (going back to when we were having the Kickstarter campaign), several people commented that, while Revenants were useful and more powerful than the regular summons, they lacked some "oomph" that justified to use them instead of 3 monsters that can cover a bigger area even if they are way weaker.
The way Revenants were envisioned was more for boss battles, where they could lend you a hand if you were having some difficulties, at the cost of not being able to use regular summons for a while. The Revenants themselves are also time-limited, so you wouldn't be able to cheese your way against a boss by not fighting and let Revenants do everything.
So to make them more special, we took advantage of said time limit: if you summon a Revenant for long enough without getting it killed, when its time is up, you will see a prompt to unleash a final attack before automaticallyrecalling it.
As we are in Holiday Season, we will show you the attack of the Revenant that most resembles Santa Claus (?): Castel, the Amber King.
Castel's Finishing Move is Roar of the Lion. With it, you can hit up to 5 enemies with a devastating Fire Element attack. You can also get a glimpse of the Revenant's Theme by Dale North here!
These attacks can come in handy, but you need to stay alert to trigger them! If you lose your opportunity, the Revenant will just disappear and you won't be able to summon it again for a while!
We hope you like these new finishers and use them when you get to play the game! We are having a lot of fun making the animations, giving them a nice "Tales of..." Mystic Artes vibe.
That's all for today's update. As you can see we were saving up some things to have a meatier one as our year's last!
