Preview Realms Beyond Combat Alpha Gameplay Video

[Infinitron]

Tags: Ceres Games; Realms Beyond

Back in April, we got our first brief glimpse of footage from the upcoming Chaos Chronicles successor Realms Beyond. Today Ceres Games have published the first full-length gameplay video, a 26-minute long demonstration of the game's "combat alpha". The video shows a player party fighting against a band of orcs and a cave troll, a scenario we got a sneak preview of in a pair of screenshots published last month. The orcs are much sturdier than the goblins from the first video, making for a very long battle even after they're immobilized by a Web and Stinking Cloud early on.

If YouTube starts the video in low, blurry quality, please change the resolution manually to 1080p60 or 720p60.

Please be aware, due to the nature of alpha versions, the user interface (especially placeholder icons) and a other elements such as sounds, camera, FXs and animations are still work in progress and therefore not final.

If you wonder about the Wizard’s overcrowded spellbook: We made every spell available (according to his 9th level) for testing purposes. Under real circumstances, he wouldn’t had so many spells already unlocked.

We appreciate hearing your feedback and suggestions for improvements related to the combat system.

Also, based on your feedback to previously published screenshots, we reworked the ground terrain textures and the level itself to improve the readability of the scene.
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Even with the help of a powerful summoned demon, the video cuts off before the troll is taken down. The game seems promising from a visual and technical perspective, but they're definitely going to have to work on the pacing.

 

[Neanderthal]

Nice, bit too much swinging around in melee, after all whats wrong with a nice simple thrust? Still nice.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Is there gonna be a kickstarter for this so i can throw them some moneys

 

[Swampy_Merkin]

I want this game.

 

[Haba]

Confirmed features:
- you can romance dragons
- multiple genders
- portraits based on developers and their friends and family, that is why they look retarded

#codexleaks

 

[Goral]

JarlFrank
Again, way too slow. I thought we've talked about this.

the video is slow for the sake of being showy

Don't see how the slow-mo makes it "showy" besides the fact that the video lasts 23 seconds instead of 5 s. In the next video you should show the audience that the combat can be faster.

 

[vorvek]

Confirmed features:
- you can romance dragons
- multiple genders
- portraits based on developers and their friends and family, that is why they look retarded

#codexleaks

But can the dragons have both a double dick and a working cloaca? It's a hard pass for me otherwise.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

This shit is pretty much my fetish.

 

[Stormcrowfleet]

I hope we can speed up combat animation. That first green ball spell was damn slow.

 

[Farewell into the night]

Are these Super Mutants?

 

[Dorateen]

This looks better than Kingmaker in every regard.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

Better be a battle-animation slider. Orks look great.

 

[JarlFrank]

I told Peter to show off the speedup function because the animations are slow and people will want to speed them up during long combats, so I completely expected people to complain about this when he didn't include it in the video. Jarl was right again

We're likely going to do another combat video to show off the sped-up animations, and maybe the battle crowds (trash mobs moving as one instead of individually) too.

So expect another video to arrive soon-ish.

 

[ArchAngel]

I told Peter to show off the speedup function because the animations are slow and people will want to speed them up during long combats, so I completely expected people to complain about this when he didn't include it in the video. Jarl was right again

We're likely going to do another combat video to show off the sped-up animations, and maybe the battle crowds (trash mobs moving as one instead of individually) too.

So expect another video to arrive soon-ish.

Give Kobolds and Goblins the ability from Pathfinder where they become swarmlings and each two that surround and attack same target give everyone else in that group a +1 bonus. So if 6 goblins surround and attack same target they all get a +3 bonus to attack. Makes them much more challenging to mid level parties.

 

[JarlFrank]

The kobolds and goblins would already gain a flanking bonus for surrounding you.

 

[ArchAngel]

The kobolds and goblins would already gain a flanking bonus for surrounding you.

That is not enough, give them more so mid level parties can actually be scared of swarms of goblins and kobolds. We faced these in PnP and it was way more fun than standard swarms. Suddenly your 20 to 23 AC that you got at those levels is not enough to let you kill them all easily.

 

[Catacombs]

Looks good. I want it.

 

[JarlFrank]

The kobolds and goblins would already gain a flanking bonus for surrounding you.

That is not enough, give them more so mid level parties can actually be scared of swarms of goblins and kobolds. We faced these in PnP and it was way more fun than standard swarms. Suddenly your 20 to 23 AC that you got at those levels is not enough to let you kill them all easily.

And so low level parties can get completely ganked by mobs?

It's fine as it is now, and besides, we're not yet at the stage of finetuning the balance.

 

[Nazrim Eldrak]

Will there be some critical killing blows(Death scenes) like in Fallout or DOS ?

 

[ArchAngel]

The kobolds and goblins would already gain a flanking bonus for surrounding you.

That is not enough, give them more so mid level parties can actually be scared of swarms of goblins and kobolds. We faced these in PnP and it was way more fun than standard swarms. Suddenly your 20 to 23 AC that you got at those levels is not enough to let you kill them all easily.

And so low level parties can get completely ganked by mobs?

It's fine as it is now, and besides, we're not yet at the stage of finetuning the balance.

Low level groups don't get swarmed by 50 to 100 goblins. The problem is that even those numbers are not really a challenge to mid level parties if you don't turn them into swarmlings.

 

[JarlFrank]

We're not going to throw trash mobs of 100 goblins at you.

 

[ArchAngel]

We're not going to throw trash mobs of 100 goblins at you.

Of course you are not because mid game parties just trash them and it takes long and it is boring because it is not a challenge. Implement swarm bonuses for them and see mid level parties take them seriously, use real tactics and fear for their life. Those fights are still long but now they are different than 4 Troll fights and interesting.

 

[felipepepe]

So weird to see this after I fought basically the exact same battle with the exact same assets in Demons Age, but all I could do was auto-attack and cast like two spells...

 

[cherry blossom]

Parallel projection

It looks so appealing to play.

However, the game needs separate handling of general animation speed and missile speed. It was painful to watch stuff fly at their targets. Some of the animations are shit. And the colours could be a bit more vibrant. This looks way too washed out.

Also, this is stupid:

I hate to see it in almost any game with a hexagonal grid (exceptions notwithstanding).

Given the unit-to-tile-size ratios here, a character should be able to walk between/through friendlies to the nearest unoccupied tile on the other side. Maybe with some sort of penalty, depending on the situation. This could be too convoluted to implement with a square-grid but with a hexagonal grid, there is no excuse not to.

Even walking between/through hostiles should be an option with stat checks. Eg. player's dodge / evade, agility / dexterity vs. enemies' and whether they are already engaged to another target, equipment (heavy vs. light) and health, with a risk to trigger an attack of opportunity.

 

[sser]

Not sure what the penalty for a hex would be, but AP cost is usually 1.5x for that maneuver in a square/grid-based tbs.