Game News Caves of Lore Released

[ChaDargo]

I'm not saying they're all necessarily fake, just waiting for a bit more accumulation.

I'm saying they're fake.

 

[Kamaz]

QA is a surprisingly big problem if you are developing a game on a budget and without a publisher.

 

[Tyranicon]

QA is a surprisingly big problem if you are developing a game on a budget and without a publisher.

Even publishers these days don't hire too many QA staff. Early Access is specifically meant to address this, and it's great for indies.

You make some additional scratch to keep the lights on, people who want to play your game early/free bug testing do that, and it builds hype.

Unfortunately, early access is often abused so it leaves a bad taste in people's mouths. I try not to stay in EA more than two years. Reputation matters, even if consumers generally have short memories.

 

[Contagium]

Bought it on release, but will let it age like a fine wine in the back of my library for a while. $10 I would've wasted on something stupid anyway.

 

[ShaggyMoose]

Lmao wtf? My entire steam activity is spammed with updates to this game

I left a note for the developer that he needs to publish these as a single announcement, not an announcement per change to avoid spamming the shit out of people's news feed. Hopefully it won't happen again.

 

[HoboForEternity]

I already said i am not opposed to early access. I buy a lot of early access game but i usually won't play them as time is more important than money. Sure spend 20 bucks to support a promising game in early access, but i ain't spending 10 hours playing half finished game. I'd rather wait. But i do agree lots of indie games rather release in early access especially system heavy games like crpg

 

[WarHamster]

Bought it on release and have played about 5 hours now. The game's solid fun, if a bit buggy still. Given the speed the dev fixes things, give it a few weeks and I'm sure most of the bugs have been ironed out. Even now, a few days after release, the game is much more stable than on release.

The story/plot isn't much to write home about, but the exploration and combat are good, and there's a lot of skills, abilities and spells to experiment with. I like pixel art games, so the graphics do not bother me at all. Some of the inventory icons are a bit messy/blocky and sometimes it's difficult to determine if a ground tile is walkable or not, but other than that the graphics are at the very least 'good enough'. Some of the combat animations and effects are really good, in fact. I'm only at the early parts of the game, but so far so good. There's a lot to like and a lot of potential in the game. Here's hoping it lasts all through the game.

For a solo effort and as a first game, this is a stupendously good offering! And for the price, it's a steal. I much rather support a passion project like this than triple-A cash cows.

 

[ShaggyMoose]

I will almost certainly buy this, but I prefer to wait for a few of the rough edges to be smoothed out first. Developer seems very responsive so I have confidence this will happen quickly.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I already said i am not opposed to early access. I buy a lot of early access game but i usually won't play them as time is more important than money. Sure spend 20 bucks to support a promising game in early access, but i ain't spending 10 hours playing half finished game. I'd rather wait. But i do agree lots of indie games rather release in early access especially system heavy games like crpg

Time is more important than money, but I stopped buying early access around a year ago because it seems that it's just a way for various devs to fuck you in the ass by taking your money then abandon their project or change it so radically it's unrecognizable when it launches. I specifically look for early access tags and don't pick them up unless it's bundle trash I got or I didn't notice it was EA until later.
A dev can still do this with a "finished" title, but I'd rather give a guy $10 for something that looks promising and is feature complete, if buggy, than a dime for something that may never be completed.

 

[Daemongar]

I'm not saying they're all necessarily fake, just waiting for a bit more accumulation.

I'm saying they're fake.

ALL 5 OF THEM!?!!!!!

 

[Rpguy]

Bought it, rolled abilities for hours at character creation till I got my perfect caster.
Game definitely deserves more attention. It has some unique features and ideas that don't appear in other rpgs.
You level up your skills by using them, paying trainers or from level ups. Abilities and spells that you learn open up to other abilities and spells.
Abilities are unique to each character while spells you find in books and special items which you equip and then when you use them your character learns them and memorizes them slowly ( assuming they have enough mind/spirit stat )
So basically you dictate which spells goes on each character and how developed you want each spell to be , for example I trained my dog to cast a poison spell from a unique ring I found (since dogs can't use books), could have instead let him bite more foes so he would be better at melee combat or use his special howl to get an additional different howl.
Just starting but this game is definitely unique.
Sure it is buggy but it updated every day and the developer is consistently on discord and steam.

 

[Reggin Backward]

Talked to the guy about putting his game on gog, apparently he contacted cdpr and is still waiting for an answer. Here's hoping for the gog release.

 

[ShaggyMoose]

Dog uses ring to cast poison; sold.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Dog uses ring to cast poison; sold.

Lame. My dog casts poison cloud with his butt. It's an innate ability.

 

[Luzur]

So is this like 100% done now? or still updated?

 

[mediocrepoet]

So is this like 100% done now? or still updated?

It's not in early access, but the guy's patching like a mofo.

 

[Luzur]

So is this like 100% done now? or still updated?

It's not in early access, but the guy's patching like a mofo.

Ah, i'll hold off then til the patching stops

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

ahh 700 MB download

that alone should be a hint of quality

 

[ShaggyMoose]

It's great that he is providing so many updates, but even for a solo dev it does feel like this launched as EA in everything but name. I really don't enjoy acting as a free tester for an RPG especially without being told... At least I haven't seen any reports that it's impossible to finish the game, but I am sure there are still game-breaking bugs lurking in there.

 

[Lyre Mors]

Yeah, the game is great. Played about 4 hours of it before deciding to wait for the bugs to be mostly squashed before going any further. When it looks like that's the case, I'll be starting a new game and hitting it hard. Still happy to support the guy. This is exactly the type of RPG I want to see coming out, and the passion is clearly there.

A word on the difficulty discussion from earlier: the game does start to ramp up in difficulty after the tutorial area despite camping still being pretty abusable. While it's not nearly as bad as was suggested in Tyranicon's post on the matter, the camping mechanic would still benefit from further tweaking to make it less easy to abuse. Maybe later in the game there's factors that do just that, but I kind of doubt it. Hardly a deal-breaker by any means, but it's one of those areas that could be tightened up. Besides that, there is a lot to like here. I look forward to being able to properly dig in and play the shit out of it.

 

[HoboForEternity]

judging from the patch notes this cave has a lot of holes to fix

 

[Kedar]

I really don't enjoy acting as a free tester for an RPG especially without being told...

It's not free, you have to pay for the game.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

This game is dope. A nice big megadungeon with quests, combat, loot, and leveling. Decently spooky atmosphere with the mysterious fog around the city and the dimly-lit dungeon. I particularly like the touch that combat starts with a torch tossed out onto the floor to illuminate part of the battlefield.

-Game is classless with hard stat requirements on weapons and spells. All weapons require some level of strength, spells require mind or spirit (either is fine). There don't seem to be any alternate 'agility' weapons or anything like that, it's strength or bust. I recommend putting at least 14 points into spirit or mind starting out so your main guy can cast plenty of spells. Stats don't go up from leveling but there was a monolith that boosted the party's strength, kind of like the gods in Magic Candle.

-Every character has 4 unique abilities, plus they get a new one every 5 levels drawn from the same pool. Traits have to be unlocked by killing enough monsters, and spells come from books you find. There's a decent selection of spells including buffs and summons, they all feel a little more detailed than just "fireball and lightning bolt."

-Cast a spell enough times and you learn it from the book. Cycle the books to let everyone learn spells. Totally viable to give everyone healing magic this way. I don't know if there's a limit on how many spells you can learn but the spell screen only shows 16 slots. I guess I'll find out.

-The dog dies too easily until I found dog armor.

-Skills go up by direct use, bonus XP from leveling, or paying a trainer. No skill XP for failed checks, so if you want to boost lockpicking you need some minimum baseline of skill to have a chance to increase it. Naturally this encourages specialization. The hero starts with 100 bonus skill points, no one else gets that so spend them wisely.

-Brofist for not having the Diablo 2 skill tree.

-I have not seen enemies respawn but there is an enemy-summoning monolith early on where you can grind forever.

-I wish I could make map notes, or have the journal note NPC locations. I also wish the map exits were more clearly marked.

-Don't go to the orchard right away, the goblins will fuck you up.

-The store does not have much gear for sale, I'm guessing crafting is a big part of gearing up. I just found a pickaxe, and they come in tiers for higher level ores. Weapons can be made from different materials to gain different properties, so it's a true crafting system and not just an alternate form of currency.

-You can assign a party member to the potion room in the castle, I'm not sure what this does. Leave party members to earn gold ala Magic Candle?

 

[Rpguy]

This game is dope. A nice big megadungeon with quests, combat, loot, and leveling. Decently spooky atmosphere with the mysterious fog around the city and the dimly-lit dungeon. I particularly like the touch that combat starts with a torch tossed out onto the floor to illuminate part of the battlefield.

-Game is classless with hard stat requirements on weapons and spells. All weapons require some level of strength, spells require mind or spirit (either is fine). There don't seem to be any alternate 'agility' weapons or anything like that, it's strength or bust. I recommend putting at least 14 points into spirit or mind starting out so your main guy can cast plenty of spells. Stats don't go up from leveling but there was a monolith that boosted the party's strength, kind of like the gods in Magic Candle.

No classes in the game. The game now has respec option so you can take your 3 strength fairy character and turn it into a knight in shining armor weilding a 2handed polearm in 1 hand+shield if you want. The game is not that hard so min/max is not needed but if I went for it I would recommend putting your starting stats in mind and Resistance for maximum HP/MANA/Skill points on level ups and later respec out of those stats. ( EDIT: this was changed after this post in latest patch, so respecing changes your mana/hp accordingly )
There is 1 Obelisk for each stat so you get +1 to all stats eventually.

-Every character has 4 unique abilities, plus they get a new one every 5 levels drawn from the same pool. Traits have to be unlocked by killing enough monsters, and spells come from books you find. There's a decent selection of spells including buffs and summons, they all feel a little more detailed than just "fireball and lightning bolt."

One character for some reason has 0 unique abilities, annoying, I hope the developer will change that.
Each character have 1 special unique non-combat ability ( besides the 4 unique combat abilities )

-Cast a spell enough times and you learn it from the book. Cycle the books to let everyone learn spells. Totally viable to give everyone healing magic this way. I don't know if there's a limit on how many spells you can learn but the spell screen only shows 16 slots. I guess I'll find out.

No limit, you can have all spells.

-The dog dies too easily until I found dog armor.

Don't forget to upgrade the armor at the smith, there are 2 forms of upgrade - change the base material and also upgrade it. This only works on items made of iron so wood/bone/stone items are out of luck, again I hope this will change in the future.

-Skills go up by direct use, bonus XP from leveling, or paying a trainer. No skill XP for failed checks, so if you want to boost lockpicking you need some minimum baseline of skill to have a chance to increase it. Naturally this encourages specialization. The hero starts with 100 bonus skill points, no one else gets that so spend them wisely.

There are also books that increase skills permanently and items which gives you +skill as long as you wear them, for example I have a +10 to Identify cloak which is a lot considering the game is rolling a d20 and add your skill for these checks.

-Brofist for not having the Diablo 2 skill tree.

-I have not seen enemies respawn but there is an enemy-summoning monolith early on where you can grind forever.

Enemies did respawn in my game after many many in game days. ( you can sleep and pass the time )

-I wish I could make map notes, or have the journal note NPC locations. I also wish the map exits were more clearly marked.

-Don't go to the orchard right away, the goblins will fuck you up.

-The store does not have much gear for sale, I'm guessing crafting is a big part of gearing up. I just found a pickaxe, and they come in tiers for higher level ores. Weapons can be made from different materials to gain different properties, so it's a true crafting system and not just an alternate form of currency.

You actually have to upgrade the pickaxe just like weapons, you won't simple find a better one.
You can sharpen slashing weapons and enchant weapons with multiple abilities and then even amplify those abilities. You can also brew potions.

-You can assign a party member to the potion room in the castle, I'm not sure what this does. Leave party members to earn gold ala Magic Candle?

Nope this just train him at brewing, you can leave party members for training.
Later on you'll have more than 6 characters so you'll have to leave some behind - put them at training.
You will later be able to call upon an ally that is not in your current party in the middle of combat which is quite cool.

 

[Rpguy]

P.S this game has a day/night cycle which has an effect on the game - people go to beds at night and work at the morning ( they don't just pop, you see them walking around to their locations ) , ghosts lurk at the graveyard at night etc.
It is not just a day/night off switch - you can see the shadows in the game move from left to right gradually according to the hour of the day.
If that is not enough the world has a sun and 3 moons which cycle around and their state/position relative to you is visible at all times on the upper right area of your screen ( yes, even underground ) , there are many secrets related to the moons orbit ( examples - door only opens when all 3 moons are directly above, or you get a stealth bonus when the moon Tethrys shines )