We learned about the classics-inspired pixel art RPG Caves of Lore back in November, but the game has been in development for many years. Developer Michael Robins had to teach himself how to program and draw pixel art in order to create it. Despite this, the game was released today on schedule. Following requests from users on our forum, Mike even found the time to modify the engine to display the entire party on screen during exploration. You can see that and more in the game's launch trailer:
Caves of Lore is available on Steam for a mere $10. A fine first RPG release for 2023.
Owlcat formally unveiled the second season pass for Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous back in October. Today they announced the release date for its first piece of DLC, called The Last Sarkorians. As previously revealed, The Last Sarkorians will add a new companion to the game - Ulbrig Olesk, a surviving tribal chieftain of old Sarkoris with shapeshifting powers. The DLC will allow you to play as a Shifter yourself and will also include some new areas, presumably related to Ulbrig's companion quest. I wonder how he'll react to a certain prestigious backer content area. Anyway, here's the teaser trailer and announcement post:
Greetings, Pathfinders!
It’s been over a year since the release of Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, and we know a lot of you have now spent hundreds of hours fighting demons in the Worldwound. It may seem like all the mysteries have been solved and all the treasures found, and that this land has nothing left to surprise you with. But there’s still something we don’t know—what was Sarkoris like before the disaster turned it into a haunted wasteland? Our new DLC—The Last Sarkorians—will allow you to peer into the past of the fallen land, and give you the power to shape the future of its people!
Meet Ulbrig Olesk, a strange man with the unique ability to transform into a majestic griffon, who remembers Sarkoris as it was before Areelu Vorlesh opened the Worldwound. Take him into your party and experience the crusade through the eyes of the last surviving tribal chieftain of old Sarkoris. Explore new places, unravel the mystery of your new companion, and, perhaps, win his heart?
And if you like Ulbrig’s abilities, you can select the new Shifter class for yourself as well! Choose from one of six available archetypes, fight as a humanoid armed with sharp claws, or transform into a mighty beast—or both! The choice is yours. We’ve also added a number of new spells to make shifting more fun for you.
The Last Sarkorians DLC will be available on March 7, 2023. But you can wishlist and preorder it right now in Steam, GOG, and Epic Games Store.
Or, if you already have Season Pass 2, it will unlock automatically on release day.
Happy shapeshifting!
As stated, The Last Sarkorians DLC will be launching on March 7th.
Back in 2019, a completed version of the unfinished Tyrants of the Moonsea premium module was released as a DLC for Beamdog's Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition, thanks to the efforts of original creator Luke "Alazander" Scull. Working on Tyrants seems to have motivated Luke to revisit some of his other early work in the NWN modding scene. Last summer, he announced on his blog that he intended to create a new episodic module series called The Blades of Netheril as a sequel to the original Neverwinter Nights campaign (and more broadly to the official expansions and Luke's own modules as well). Such an ambitious undertaking has naturally taken longer than originally expected, so in September Luke decided that he would start out by producing enhanced edition remakes of the first two modules in his original trilogy, 2002's Siege of Shadowdale and 2005's Crimson Tides of Tethyr. After a couple of missed deadlines, Siege of Shadowdale: Enhanced Edition was finally released on the Neverwinter Vault last night as a free module for NWN:EE. Here's its trailer and description:
"Like a tide of darkness they came, butchering the folk of the Dale with wanton glee. Many are the foes I have battled in my long life but were it not for the actions of one brave adventurer I fear even I would have been undone that fateful day..."
Elminster of Shadowdale, 1372 DR.
20 years after the original release, author and game designer Luke Scull is delighted to present a remake of the classic Hall of Fame module Siege of Shadowdale for Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition! This new version features rewritten and expanded dialogue, new quests, new areas to explore, and the addition of several henchmen, as well as a new world map and completely overhauled graphics.
A huge thank you to all the folk whose generous contributions helped make this module possible! Please visit https://www.patreon.com/lukescull to keep up to date with development of The Blades of Netheril: an epic, seven-part campaign that serves as a mega-sequel to all the game's official content including the original campaign and expansions.
Good stuff, and another new record in revisiting old Neverwinter Nights content (Tyrants of the Moonsea was a mere 13 years old in 2019). Additional details about Luke's plans for the Enhanced Editions are available here. Naturally, the original version of Siege of Shadowdale for legacy NWN remains available as well.
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Larian unveiled the ninth major patch for Baldur's Gate 3 today during a special Christmas edition of the Panel From Hell. As expected, the highlight of the patch is the Paladin class, which at character creation comes in two flavors: the nature-oriented Oath of the Ancients and the classically lawful good Oath of Devotion. Uniquely, paladins who stray from their oaths during the game can obtain a third subclass, the Oathbreaker, who has the power to summon the undead. Just as importantly, the patch increases the Early Access build's level cap to 5, unlocking a host of new spells and abilities for all classes. Fans of Solasta should also be glad to hear that Larian have finally implemented a reaction system similar to the one in that game.
As for the panel itself, it was even sillier than the usual, involving a fireball-lobbing Geoff Keighley, an Astarion cosplayer and a paladin Santa Claus, with no fewer than three on-screen deaths. Most notably, after a brief fakeout Swen revealed that Minsc is being voiced by prolific voice actor Matt Mercer. There was also a behind-the-scenes style video with the game's writing team. The panel's gameplay session was fairly straightforward, taking the the party through a sequence of battles with owlbears, tieflings and a squad of githyanki to showcase some of the patch's new features. It's much easier of course to just read the accompanying community update:
Critical Roleplay: Introducing Paladin
A hybrid between cleric and fighter, Paladins are marked by the ability to unleash formidable and devastating blows on enemies while providing support to their team in the form of actions like Lay on Hands, their classic Paladin heal. While they progress more slowly through their spell slots than other spellcasters, they also pack extra damage thanks to their specialised Paladin feature Divine Smite which imbues weapons with a holy radiance and does massive damage.
Building on the direction of this class in 5th Edition, Paladins in BG3 are distinct from our other divinely inspired classes. Their powers are channelled through the Oath to which they have sworn -- one that they choose at the start of character creation.
Patch comes with two Paladin subclasses. Take the Oath of the Ancients and fight on the side of light and the natural world. Like Arthurian Green Knights in plate armour, these Paladins vow to preserve the sanctity of life and the beauty of nature, using Healing Radiance to let nature heal all nearby allies.
Take the Oath of Devotion and uphold justice in the pursuit of the greater good. These are your classic Knights In Shining Armour, Paladins who follow a code of honour and virtue both in and out of battle – the kind of guys who’d probably do their taxes early just because it felt like the right thing to do. Their signature feature, Holy Rebuke, lets them call upon their Oath in combat to envelop an ally in an aura that deals 1d4 Radiant damage to anyone who hits them with a melee attack.
Paladins are very much a roleplaying class, and those who take this path will have the opportunity to explore their character’s moral code and, depending on the choices they make, discover what it means to be an
Oathbreaker.
Oathbreaker is our third, hidden subclass that is triggered if a Paladin goes against their moral code. Once that Oath is broken, say by killing an innocent or selling out the Druids to the Absolute, you’ll lose your previous Oath-inspired actions. But in turn you will gain darker ones like Control Undead – a Level 3 spell that lets you enlist an undead creature to fight for you. This is a subclass for those eager to explore their character's motivations and beliefs in dialogue, who seek to define justice for themselves.
Powering up to Level 5
We’ve raised the level cap! D&D players will recognize Level 5 as a big power boost for many of the classes, and in Patch #9 you can now reach those same heights in Baldur’s Gate 3. To wet your appetite, here are a few examples: Spellcasters gain access to powerful 3rd-level spells like Fireball, Counterspell, and Animate Dead. Clerics receive Spirit Guardians, a spell that deals heavy radiant or necrotic damage to foes around them, while Sorcerers and Wizards get Haste, giving their character an additional action point, movement, and more AC. Fighters, Barbarians, Rangers, and Paladins also receive the extra feature at Level 5 allowing them to make a second weapon attack for free.
Level 5 also unlocks the Fly spell, which is ideal when positioning for a death-from-above ranged attack or just to escape the grasp of your pitiful gravity-bound enemies.
A Reactions System fueled by your choices
This update includes one of our most requested features: a revamped Reactions System. The Reactions System refers to the way that certain combat actions can be triggered by various combat circumstances. For example, if you have Counterspell prepared and an enemy casts a spell at you, the game can now pause and ask if you want to use your Counterspell to block the enemy’s spell.
The full patch notes for the update are available here. According to Swen, this will be the final major update for the Baldur's Gate 3 Early Access build before the game launches in August. That seems like a lot of time to go without any updates. I wonder how they plan to promote the game from now on.
The latest installment of Geoff Keighley's annual Game Awards show aired last night. I won't even pretend to care about everything that happened there. As a Codexer, the main reason to watch was the new Baldur's Gate 3 trailer. Having already teased the return of Minsc earlier this week, Larian's new trailer revealed that Jaheira will be a character in the game as well. Most importantly, it announced that the game will be launching in August 2023. Later on during the event, CD Projekt unveiled a new teaser trailer for the Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty expansion. The main point of the trailer was to reveal that actor Idris Elba has joined the cast, playing a federal agent named Solomon Reed. CP2077 seems to have gained a new lease on life since the release of the Edgerunners anime series in September and I guess it makes sense to try to follow up on that with more mainstream celebrity promotion. The first sentence in the trailer is pretty funny, though.
In related news, a new Baldur's Gate 3 Panel From Hell event is scheduled for December 14th, during which Larian will most likely release the game's ninth patch featuring the long-awaited Paladin class. Stay tuned, Geoff Keighley will be there too.
I had some doubts about whether they would manage it, but last week Owlcat announced that the Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader alpha build was on track for release this year. Unlike previous Owlcat alpha releases, the Rogue Trader alpha is not under NDA and can be freely streamed, so we already know a lot about it. They even put together an extensive alpha guide describing its mechanics in detail. These include a turn-based space combat layer that is already proving controversial. The official press release provides a good summary of the alpha's major features. I quote:
Nicosia, Cyprus - 7 December 2022: The Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader closed Alpha test has arrived! Award-winning studio Owlcat Games confirmed that all early founders who pre-purchased the Developer’s Digital Pack or the Collector's Edition will be able to download and play the Alpha from today.
The closed Alpha will eventually transform into the Beta version of the game, and will remain live until Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader‘s release, meaning that anyone who pre-purchases the Developer’s Digital Pack or Collector's Edition will still be able to try the game early starting from today. In-game progress will not be transferred from one version to another
Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader is the first cRPG set in the legendary grim darkness of the far future of Warhammer 40,000. Set to be released on PC and consoles, the game features turn-based combat and is being produced in close collaboration with Games Workshop.
Owlcat recently unveiled a new gameplay trailer during the PC Gaming Show 2023 Preview, giving viewers a taste of what it truly means to be a Rogue Trader. Together with the trailer Steam and GOG wishlists were opened for the eagerly-anticipated title.
About Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader closed Alpha
Players will visit a number of worlds in the Koronus Expanse, where they can aid the Emperor's loyal subjects, punish heretics, or even show treasonous sympathies and abet renegades. The Alpha features one of five chapters of the game.
Among other signature locations in the Koronus Expanse, brave explorers will be able to plot a course to:
Footfall – a void station populated by pirates, religious zealots, and common workers. A dangerous place even for a Rogue Trader, but one ripe with opportunity!
Dargonus – the hive world capital of the player's empire and the Rogue Trader's family seat
Janus– a jungle-covered agri-world where the player will decide the fate of a conflict between a rebel group and the local governor
Kiava Gamma – an industrial world where dark and strange things are happening
Among other signature locations in the Koronus Expanse.
Players will travel between worlds through the warp, repel pirate attacks in open space, explore new planets, and found colonies – all from aboard the Rogue Trader's majestic voidship housing thousands of subjects and crew members.
On their journey, the Rogue Trader will receive assistance from their companions - their loyal Seneschal, a Tech-Priest of the Adeptus Mechanicus, the ship's Navigator, an Interrogator of the Inquisition, a Battle Sister of the Adepta Sororitas, a smuggler, a diviner psyker, and even a xenos. However, it is up to the player to decide if they want to build solid relationships with their crew, help resolve conflicts between party members, or leave them loose!
As mentioned, the Rogue Trader alpha is available to those who preordered the game's $100 Developer's Digital Pack. Everybody else will have to wait until the beta launches sometime next year.
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Styg has published one last development update for Underrail: Infusion before the year ends. For the past few years, he and his team have been working on the game's new engine and in this update they're finally ready to showcase some of its environments. Infusion's upgraded renderer sports higher resolution assets, normal and height mapping for smoother lighting, and improved fog of war. Most interestingly, the renderer supports actual tile height and sloping, which will allow for all sorts of elevation and verticality mechanics. Check it out:
We're finally ready to give you a sneak peak in the new and improved Infusion environment visuals. We've done extensive work on the 2D rendering engine, and while there are still things to improve, we're quite pleased how it looks now. Keep in mind, though, that all the scenes you'll see below were made for demo purposes only and do not reflect how the actual game levels will look.
First thing we did is increasing the asset resolution significantly. We increased the size of the base tile from 96x48 to 160x80, which resulted in the asset size change you can see below.
Next, for all our prerendered graphics we're also exporting normal and height maps, which allows us to have smoother lighting, but, more importantly, it enables objects to clip through each other. This solves so many problems with sprite ordering and also allows us to easily combine items into interesting environmental compositions.
Another important thing that we introduced is actual tile height and sloping, so we no longer have to simulate it with assets that are otherwise logically flat - which used to result in weird discovery and lighting artifacts. This will allow us create more interesting maps, as well as have gameplay mechanics that relate to height (such as falling down, climbing, in-area elevators, etc). We're also going to have to adjust many existing mechanics to take elevation into account, but that's a story for another dev log.
We've also improved how shroud and fog of war works. It's now much smoother and will no longer leave weird gaps in the map while it's partially discovered as often happens in the old game.
There's still much work to be done with the rendering engine - fluids, decals, creature shadows, post-processing effects, and also many minor tweaks, so stay tuned for more updates. Once we get a bit more assets done, we're going to make a video to show you how the engine looks in motion. In the meantime, let us know how you like the new visuals.
Very cool. Verticality - not just for fantasy RPGs anymore.
The Colony Ship Early Access build was supposed to have received an update in late October adding new Chapter 3 content to its starting location, the Pit. It ended up taking far longer than expected to finalize due to Iron Tower's decision to pair it with a second major systems overhaul, which seems to have become the centerpiece of the update. In addition to balance changes, new weapons and improved visuals, the update also adds a "death timer" mechanic which allows characters to survive being knocked out in combat if the battle is ended quickly enough. The rather brief update announcement has more details:
You can finally return to the Pit to continue the story and deal with new problems, while enjoying new system improvements, most notably:
- A death timer. Now when a party member goes down in combat, you have 3 turns to end the fight to save the fallen comrade. There are minor side effects that slowly add up, so don't take the dirt nap too often,
While we're very happy with the overall state (grazes work all throughout the game, critical chance and damage depend more on your builds, evasion works as we envisioned, reactions work better, item progression and feats are improved, etc), the numbers will still need some work and we'll continue monitoring your feedback.
Since it's already December, we'd like to use this opportunity to wish you a Happy New Year and thank you for your support.
Due to the late release, the game's entire Early Access roadmap has been pushed back by one month. The next location update (featuring the hometown of the ship's mutant population) is supposed to be out next month and the final update is scheduled for late July.
The Duty Eternal expansion DLC for Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters was released today. A number of class spotlight and strategium videos have been published over the past two weeks highlighting the DLC's major features. It's been pretty much what you'd expect, and the launch trailer is more of the same.
The Duty Eternal DLC is available on Steam for $15. The accompanying free update for the base game sounds like it might be pretty interesting as well.
Space Wreck, the promising Fallout-inspired isometric RPG set aboard a derelict spacecraft from veteran Codexer Kamaz, was released into Early Access today as promised. As opposed to the free demo, which remains available, the Early Access build of Space Wreck includes all of the game's planned content. Kamaz intends to use the Early Access period to gather feedback from players and fix bugs (which are apparently plentiful). Here's the launch trailer, which is identical to last month's release date trailer except for the ending slide, and an excerpt from the release announcement:
Put on your helmet and close the hatch - the full version of Space Wreck has been launched into Early Access orbit!
If you choose to press THE BUTTON, there is an adventure ahead. Granted, it won't be smooth sailing, there are space pirates, rebels, tricky situations, and complicated solutions. And that's just one part of it - you would also be going in where "no man has gone before" - into fresh, rough, dangerous content that has not enjoyed months of public scrutiny yet.
I mean, there will be bugs. And I don't mean green-blooded squishy ones.
What Full Version Early Access means?
All of the planned content, 100%, is available to you with this version. However - while we have tested on our own - the sheer range of possibilities and combinations is beyond our reach, hence we expect a fair share of bugs in there as well. This is why it is early access.
How can I help?
By buying a game! :D Space Wreck has been developed by a small two-person team where we both have day jobs and limited time for development. We also have had practically 0 budget. If it turns out that people actually want to pay money for this game, we might have more options in the future!
But the other - very important - thing you can do is to give feedback. We improved the game greatly when we released the Early Access demo; the game changed significantly over the year and a half - as you can see in older videos, it was quite different. The Steam message boards here or discord, even Twitter - we keep an eye on these channels, so drop by, say hi and tell us what you think!
One very specific thing you can do, though, that will have an immediate and significant effect: if you buy the game, you can then leave a Steam review. If we get at least 10 or more of these (and probably positive) in the first 24 hours, the Steam algorithm will grant some additional exposure which will give us a chance to show off the game to more people.
What's next?
Full release sometime in the next 6-8 months, hopefully. And, depending on reception, we'll see if the game warrants an expansion, so leave a review ^^^ if you want to see more of this type of game!
The Space Wreck Early Access build is available on Steam for a cool $15, with a 15% launch discount until next week. As mentioned, the final release is expected within six to eight months, at which point the game's price point will likely increase. Seems like a good idea to grab it now.
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Last May we reported about Sonucido: The Mage, a low fidelity single character turn-based dungeon crawler from Daniel Da Silva aka Moaning_Clock. Following two years in development, including a regularly updated demo build, the game was finally released today. The launch trailer should give you a feel for its unusual atmosphere and choice & consequence elements.
Sonucido is available on Steam and itch.io for $8, with a hefty 25% launch discount until next week. It's a simple game and the price reflects that. Hopefully Daniel will get the chance to improve his craft over time as other indie developers have.
Earlier this month, the Codex was contacted by a gentleman by the name of Michael Robins to inform us of a game he was working on called Caves of Lore. It's a turn-based fantasy RPG inspired by a diverse set of circa ~1990 classics such as Ultima VI, The Magic Candle, Buck Rogers: Countdown to Doomsday and Final Fantasy. Visually, the game doesn't quite resemble either one of these titles, with lovely pixel art that looks more like something out of the mid-1990s. However, it's easy to see the influence of the Gold Box in its tactical grid-based combat system and of Ultima in its overall world design. It's even got some sort of moongate-like mechanic determined by the phases of the game world's three moons. In a rare subversion, Mike released an introduction trailer for Caves of Lore before it had a Steam page. That's up now, so here's the trailer and an excerpt from the game's official website:
What is Caves of Lore?
Caves of Lore is a turn-based CRPG that combines elements of environmental exploration and character interaction with tactical, grid-based combat. The story focuses on a small island in the world of Solamria.
What games were an influence?
Ultima 6, The Magic Candle, Buck Rogers: Countdown to Doomsday and Final Fantasy all come to mind. These are just some of the games that I grew up with, and there are elements from each in Caves of Lore.
The World of Solmaria
Solmaria is vast, but our story focuses on Emerisk, a town on the island of Springhold, and the caves beneath it. This island holds ancient civilizations and secrets, and is key to what is transpiring in the world.
Around Solmaria circle three moons, each of which cause changes in the world and hide terrible and wonderful secrets. Many things on Solmaria react to moonrise and moonfall, including monsters and heroes, spells, magical runes that lock away secrets, and even portals to other worlds.
Everything seems fairly straightforward at first. Monsters, dark lord, etc… or maybe, there is more to this story than can yet be seen…
Check out the website for further details about Caves of Lore's dialogue, character progression, spellcasting, itemization and more. The game's Steam page is rather sparse, but be sure to add it to your wishlist because it's going to be launching very soon, in January.
It's been over three years since Event Horizon's guns n' sorcery tactical RPG Dark Envoy was announced. The last time we posted about it, the game had managed to switch from turn-based to real-time combat and been delayed twice. Back in May, Dark Envoy was picked up by publisher Asmodee Digital (since renamed to Twin Sails Interactive), who appear to have quietly dropped it six months later. During that time, the game was once again delayed to 2023, which I suppose might have something to do with why it was dropped. But whatever is going on here, it doesn't seem to have stopped Event Horizon from putting together a fancy new gameplay trailer for today's Golden Joystick Awards show (spoiler: Elden Ring won everything). The trailer is narrated by an entity who seems to approve of neither technology nor magic.
The game seems to be quite polished at this point. but since the developers aren't ready to announce a precise release date yet, I can only assume it'll launch during the second half of 2023. Hopefully they'll surprise us.
Despite widespread skepticism on our forums, Complex Games' Grey Knights tactical RPG Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters turned out to be pretty damn good (if not quite as good as King Arthur: Knight's Tale). It's now been quite a while since the game launched and some of our users had begun to suspect that it would never receive any further updates. However, it became clear that something was in the works when publisher Frontier Developments announced that they were acquiring Complex Games earlier this month. After a brief period of teasing, today they revealed Duty Eternal, an expansion DLC for Daemonhunters in which the Knights team up with the Adeptus Mechanicus to combat a new technophage variant of Nurgle's Bloom plague. In practical terms, that means players receive access to Dreadnoughts and Techmarines, as well as a second frigate for the game's strategic layer. Here's the expansion's announcement trailer and the accompanying press release with more details:
Cambridge, UK – 22 November 2022. Frontier Foundry, the games label of Frontier Developments plc (AIM: FDEV, ‘Frontier’), today revealed the expansion pack Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters - Duty Eternal in partnership with Warhammer 40,000 creator Games Workshop. This major DLC for the acclaimed turn-based tactical RPG launches on PC on December 6th, adding thrilling new missions, a brand new class and the fearsome Venerable Dreadnought combat walker to the campaign, among other substantial changes. The expansion will have a suggested retail price of $14.99/£12.99/€14.99 on both Steam and the Epic Games Store.
Find English-language links to the reveal trailer below:
The Technophage Outbreak is at the heart of Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters - Duty Eternal. With the arrival of this new strain of the Bloom, the Grey Knights are tasked with aiding the Adeptus Mechanicus in halting its spread across space. The new Technophage Outbreak mission variant is the most challenging in the game to date, remixing standard maps and objectives with higher reinforcement numbers, new Warp Surge conditions and tougher consequences for failure. The potential rewards, however, are also much greater.
Fortunately, commanders will have some extra firepower at their disposal to suppress the escalating Nurgle threat in Duty Eternal. The Venerable Dreadnought – an addition that’s frequently been requested by players since launch – will become available to commanders early in a new campaign. This combat walker becomes a playable fifth member of the Grey Knights squad during any Technophage Outbreak-themed mission that appears across the campaign. Like the other Grey Knights, Dreadnoughts can be customised with different unlockable weaponry to suit the player’s tactical needs
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters - Duty Eternal also brings a vastly different base class to the game: the Techmarine. This new addition to the Baleful Edict’s barracks is able to deploy and control a cadre of Combat Servitors, which join the Grey Knights on the battlefield as more expendable allies, each equipped with a specific ability that serves a distinct purpose in battle. The Techmarine can repair or augment Combat Servitors and the Venerable Dreadnought during a mission, offering a support role to the rest of the squad.
The new features in Duty Eternal also extend to the game’s strategic layer. Early on in the campaign, players who own this expansion will have the option to liberate and commandeer the Gladius Frigate, a second strike vessel which considerably extends the Grey Knights’ reach across the Tyrtaeus Sector. From aboard the Baleful Edict, commanders will deploy squads onto the Gladius Frigate then send the ship across space, facing the Bloom in locations the Edict cannot reach in time. These encounters will then resolve automatically off-screen with similar risks and rewards to completing a standard mission in the campaign.
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters - Duty Eternal further builds on the ambitions of the team at Complex Games to build the ultimate turn-based tactical RPG set in this universe, significantly enhancing the replayability and scope of the campaign.
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters - Duty Eternal will require the base game to play:
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters is available to buy now on PC across Steam and the Epic Games Store, with a suggested retail price of £34.99/$44.99/€44.99 for the standard version and £44.99/$54.99/€54.99 for the Castellan Champion Edition.
PC Gamer broadcast a special 2023 Preview edition of their PC Gaming Show today to showcase some of next year's releases. I don't know if Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader is actually launching next year, but it was the only Codex-relevant title to appear during the event. Although we've seen snippets of in-engine footage in previous dev diaries, this is Rogue Trader's first proper gameplay trailer, offering a glimpse at its star map, turn-based combat against various foes, and general exploration. There's no user interface yet though, which makes it hard to get a feel for things.
Rogue Trader now has store pages on Steam and GOG as well, so update your wishlists. No word yet on the alpha release.
It was way back during the spring of 2016 when Josh Sawyer first announced that he intended to direct a "historical RPG" after finishing his work on Pillars of Eternity II. Most people were expecting some sort of Darklands clone, but the game that would become Pentiment turned out to be quite different. Shortly after its formal announcement during the summer Xbox showcase, in a relief to genre purists everywhere, Obsidian decided not to describe the game as an RPG at all. Nevertheless, as part of our coverage of the travails of Herr Sawyer over the years, we bring you this launch announcement.
Pentiment has been reviewed by a remarkable number of press outlets, who I suspect may have thought they had the next Disco Elysium on their hands. Impressions of the game are quite positive, with several perfect scores (though notably GameSpot's reviewer was less of a fan).
Pentiment is available on Steam for $20, and of course you can get it from the Xbox store with Microsoft's Game Pass subscription as well. For my part, I rather doubt the game will be a Disco Elysium-calibre breakout hit, but at least Josh has earned some critical acclaim from his industry peers. Now that he's gotten this out of his system, I wonder what he'll do next.
Solasta: Crown of the Magister - Inner Strength, the third DLC for Tactical Adventures' well-received 5th Edition tactical RPG, was released today. Inner Strength finalizes the game's lineup of classes with the addition of Bards, Monks and Warlocks, each one with four subclasses, as well as adding Dragonborn as a playable race. As previously mentioned, this release is accompanied by a free content update for Solasta adding three backgrounds and seventeen primarily martial-oriented feats to the game. All of these features and more are described in detail by the esteemed Myzzrym in a new community video released alongside the DLC's launch trailer.
Good stuff. The Inner Strength DLC is available on Steam and GOG for $8, which I'd note is a lower price than what the similar Primal Calling DLC launched with a year ago. The full patch notes for the update are available here. I'd guess that with this release, Tactical Adventures may finally be done with Solasta. Onward to a sequel?
Obsidian's historical narrative game Pentiment is launching next week and the Microsoft marketing machine has been activated. Since this is a small title that's mainly meant lots of social media posts, but today they released a new ten minute behind the scenes featurette, featuring Josh Sawyer, Kate Dollarhyde, Hannah Kennedy and other members of the development team. It starts with a more detailed overview of the game's setting and premise. There's a segment about the game's visual style, which goes into further detail about the art direction for its characters as well as its remarkably complex font engine. Pentiment won't have much in the way of actual gameplay mechanics, but Josh and the team do find some time to describe its assortment of intentionally simple minigames and exhaustive journal system, and also a bit about its sound effects and music.
Niche game is niche. In four days we find out whether Josh Sawyer's experiment was a success.
Owlcat have continued to publish various lore and companion updates for Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader over the past months, including a useful content digest in September. None of them seem to have any particular relation with today's dev diary video, however. Although it contains a few snippets of in-engine footage, it's primarily a lore video describing the role of the Rogue Traders in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. With the command of his own massive voidship, the game's protagonist will have to confront all manner of xenos and heretics as he ventures into the Koronus Expanse.
As you may recall, the first alpha build of Rogue Trader was supposed to be released this year. If that's going to happen, I suppose we'll be hearing about it soon.
After being delayed several times, the promising isometric space RPG Space Wreck was supposed to have launched into Early Access last July. However, shortly before that date arrived, developer Kamaz decided to postpone the release indefinitely and declared that the game's free demo was effectively its Early Access build. Many months and many cool updates later, I'd assumed that he'd shelved any plans to have a proper Early Access release, but now that's back on the table. An expanded Early Access build of Space Wreck, which Kamaz describes as the "Full Version Early Access" release, will be launching on December 5th. Here's its fancy release date trailer and the official announcement:
Good news everyone! We are releasing the full game into Early Access on December 5, 2022! That's basically it. Let me just answer some of your potential questions...
How much will it cost?
I want to keep the option to think about it and change it very last minute. But expect a somewhat typical price point in line with most indie titles. There will be a launch discount, of course.
Will the demo be available after the Full Version EA release?
Yes. Please note that we just released a hefty update to the demo - new content, new weapons, and new enemies - so you are getting a fair deal here, I think.
Try the demo before buying the full game, it's an honest, free preview of the product - see if the game is for you and if you find the quality acceptable.
What Full Version Early Access even means?
It means that you are getting full game - A-Z with all of the intended launch content. However, you are getting also all the bugs we haven't yet found. That's the deal.
How long is the Full Version?
One playthrough of a story fork will take you approximately 5 hours.
Note the "fork" part. If you play through the game just once, and even if you complete everything, you'll still see at most 60% of the content. By that I mean, you'll miss out on entire locations - with their own stories, quests, NPCs, and items that are available in the other fork.
And even within this storyline, there are many self-exclusive choices and hidden options and paths to proceed. Space Wreck is intentionally short but full of content.
If you've got other questions, drop them here in the comments or on the message board.
Otherwise - see you on December 5!
Great news. In a year that's turned out to be full of postponed launch dates, this might provide some consolation.
