Roguelike Path of Achra - dark fantasy roguelike now available in Early Access

[Aemar]

Just bought this game. It's so good it deserves its own thread.

 

[ShaggyMoose]

Graphics immediately reminded me of Nalakkh/Natuk. How much of a game/story is there beyond being hopelessly beaten down or god-like?

 

[Kabas]

How much of a game/story is there beyond being hopelessly beaten down or god-like?

Gameplay itself is super simplistic. You can only do some basic actions like move or attack. No active abilites apart from three prayers you get from your chosen god.
Character building is there the things get interesting. After picking your race/class/god and starting the run you can put points into skills like "perform extra attack on step" and then into "Deal fire damage each time you attack" and then "Heal yourself each time you do fire damage" and etc.
And after investing enough into certain skills you can unlock a prestige class that can alter you gamestyle quite significantly. Like overpowered Blood-drinker that makes it so that all of your blood damage heals you or Mura that can summon mirrors that reflect half of the damage back at the attacker.

^This guy died after hitting the third mirror.
And that's not even mentioning all of the items you gan get.

The game is all about trying to figure out overpowered or fun builds. As for the story there is not much.
Path of Achra clearly got some lore but all you ever get is a vague poem at the beginning of the run. Dev also recently added a poem at the end of the run that changes depending on your chosen elements.
Edit: I forgot, you also get some cool flavour text before entering a new area that changes depending on what kind of area it is and what enemies are inside.

 

[Aemar]

Like Serus said, it's mainly a buildfag game, and quite a good one at that; here is where the game really shines at. Streamlined, quick-combat, quintessential coffee break roguelike. The dev is constantly putting out updates and accepts suggestions.

My theory was confirmed, the dev greatly enjoys Illwinter's games, especially Conquest of Elysium.

 

[Aemar]

First win.

 

[Salvo]

Higher cycles (NG+) are brutal.

 

[Serus]

I very strongly suggest not to use other people's builds. At least not before making two or three working builds on your own and advancing one or two "cycles". In this game it makes even less sense than in other games simply because one run is very short. There's no fear of "my build will turn to be unplayable in the middle of a (long) game". It's almost never a problem in reality but even less in PoA. Just try and retry and eventually - probably faster than me - you will start to get a feeling of what may work and what not.

 

[lukaszek]

wanted to get it now but then ive noticed its EA. Should I jump on it or better wait?

 

[Aemar]

You should probably wait, yet I'm not sure the dev has left that much room for improvement. Most likely this will be more or less the final product.

 

[Kabas]

I very strongly suggest not to use other people's builds.

I would also like to add that it's not a bad idea to take a closer look at the avaliable prestige classes and start by building your character around their requirements.
All avaliable skills and prestige classes can be checked by pressing a "powers" button at the character creation screen.

 

[Late Bloomer]

1.0

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2128270/view/4187861330577428192

At long last, the first "official" version of PoA. This has been a very new experience for me, not just the computer stuff -- I've never worked on and thought about a single project for 2+ years like this. I have a lot of appreciation for you all who helped me do it, and tried to describe it in this credits screen:

new stuff for version 1.0

• Added 8 more cycles, can now right click the cycle bar to go down in cycle
• Added Arjana, culture, apply 1 Blind when attacked, +1 stacks of Blind applied by you
• Added Myrmidon, class, +1 Inflex per 5 points of Dexterity, Block doubled against non-adjacent enemies, shield retaliates with block-scaling death damage
• Added Apophis, religion, grants you strength every time you enter a level, causes you to inflict % max life astral damage to yourself whenever you are attacked
• 4 new starting poems, from the tablet of the vizier-imp
• 3 new tracks to round out the theme of the recent ones
• Added a brief "credits" screen

other tweaks -- as always, ongoing

• Kull now grants +1 stacks of Evasion applied by you
• Baghatar's Kilij now grants +2 physical damage per point of speed
• Takhal 2nd prayer now deals 100 * (number of enemies) damage to yourself
• Stormbringer changed, now instead gain charge on dealing ice (not freeze on lightning), removed on kill part, area damage now also triggers on divine intervention (previous freeze from lightning was causing an infinite combo involving crystal hand)
• Crowform self-damage changed to flat 15
• Zealot Hood heal reduced to 5% of max life
• Ill Manica changed, now deals poison damage on attack, applies meditate to self on dealing poison damage (previous form had an infinite combo involving cobra staff)
• Arja Spear ice damage changed to your total Block
• Xyston now increased physical damage by 20% of your armor
• Prayers no longer charge if you're dead
• Eris no longer continuously gains upgrades in the Path of Dust
• Skeleton is now treated as having a full bag in the Path of Dust

 

[DoWhocares]

Don't be afraid of the goblin man. He's just here to eat some loot.

Get very very fast by eating artefacts and various other means, deal a lot of lightning and slashing damage on step, dance around your enemies while they just stand there, then move out of the way if they can even survive getting near you.

If you're a buildfag, dis gaem is a godsend. /

I have some confidence in winning a basic bitch run now. But any time I crank up the cycle, I get smashed. Total incline.

 

[Sotomonte]

The game is really good... now I pray that the developer follows in the footsteps of Realms of Antiquity or Nox Archaist and makes an RPG with exploration, turn-based combat, dungeons, cities, etc. with the same lore and using the same art.

 

[luj1]

Quite an original game in more ways than one, so rare nowadays... massive respect!

 

[Cogemesiter]

The demo is available on Steam, and if I’m not mistaken it’s just an earlier version of the game and that progress/ glory will carry over if you decide to buy the full game. So far I’ve only played a bit of the demo but it looks promising, kind of a lot of stuff to digest at first for such a simple game, but that’s not a bad thing imo.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Gandalf]

I have not been aware that this game has it's own thread. It's a cool title, worthy of recommendation. I play it from time to time since last year and it always leaves me with this very special feeling that can be described as inspiration.

 

[Cogemesiter]

Honestly a really cool soundtrack for such a small game.

 

[luj1]

"Path of Achra is a roguelike focused on "broken builds" and fantasia of the ancient earth"

very good concept for such a small, clever game

 

[Martyr]

super addictive. can't remember the last time I've had this much fun with a recent game. it's like a mix of Conquest of Elysium and Tales of Maj'Eyal. glorious soundtrack, meaningful itemization, fast and to the point gameplay. without having a story per se, I am constantly building upon the existing lore with my actions and the powers I acquire.
magic is like a dark and hostile force, not some kiddy fairytale type of poser casting. I get the same feel of being in a horrible-to-live-in setting as in Dominions and Sacrifice.

 

[mediocrepoet]

super addictive. can't remember the last time I've had this much fun with a recent game. it's like a mix of Conquest of Elysium and Tales of Maj'Eyal. glorious soundtrack, meaningful itemization, fast and to the point gameplay. without having a story per se, I am constantly building upon the existing lore with my actions and the powers I acquire.
magic is like a dark and hostile force, not some kiddy fairytale type of poser casting. I get the same feel of being in a horrible-to-live-in setting as in Dominions and Sacrifice.

I played the demo before and it struck me that although the game was interesting and fun, it was basically like turn based Diablo with tiny levels and I'd be better served playing action RPGs for that particular itch.

Did I miss something or are there elements that aren't present in the demo? The demo was basically about crossing a small roguelite style overworld map and then getting put into a tiny map where you had to kill a few enemies, possibly pick up some rewards and then move to the next roguelite map tile.

 

[Martyr]

super addictive. can't remember the last time I've had this much fun with a recent game. it's like a mix of Conquest of Elysium and Tales of Maj'Eyal. glorious soundtrack, meaningful itemization, fast and to the point gameplay. without having a story per se, I am constantly building upon the existing lore with my actions and the powers I acquire.
magic is like a dark and hostile force, not some kiddy fairytale type of poser casting. I get the same feel of being in a horrible-to-live-in setting as in Dominions and Sacrifice.

I played the demo before and it struck me that although the game was interesting and fun, it was basically like turn based Diablo with tiny levels and I'd be better served playing action RPGs for that particular itch.

Did I miss something or are there elements that aren't present in the demo? The demo was basically about crossing a small roguelite style overworld map and then getting put into a tiny map where you had to kill a few enemies, possibly pick up some rewards and then move to the next roguelite map tile.

that's basically it and part of why I compared it to Dominions and Conquest of Elysium, which also have these small-map battles. it's basically a power fantasy game, getting stronger, crushing monstrosities, getting better and more powerful items.
if that fast paced loop of fighting and leveling doesn't do anything for you, you don't need to pay for the game imho.

 

[mediocrepoet]

that's basically it and part of why I compared it to Dominions and Conquest of Elysium, which also have these small-map battles. it's basically a power fantasy game, getting stronger, crushing monstrosities, getting better and more powerful items.
if that fast paced loop of fighting and leveling doesn't do anything for you, you don't need to pay for the game imho.

Thanks for the confirmation.

Yeah I can see the appeal and it is fun and at a good price point, I just felt that action RPGs do it better for my tastes for this type of experience and choosing where to invest a bit of time. But if people prefer that for their dip in and out games, I get it. It's not a bad game by any stretch.