Well, I mean, Rome exists, and Roman legionaries got around, so I wouldn't find it TOO outlandish for there to be at least one Darkie in Scotland. Obviously, your character is simply the ancestor of the Demoman.
Act 2 — Player Choices & Consequences Update
Hey everyone,
To boost role-playing even more, we’re adding a lot of new player choices and story beats to the game based on your feedback and suggestions. A big thank you to all of the testers on Discord for helping us make these new additions as immersive, tense, and fun as possible!
NOTE: there will be spoilers ahead for Act 2 — proceed at your own risk!
TLDR:
- Yes, you can kill your opponents in both Act 2 duels
- Yes, you can avoid all injury in Act 2 (both the back-stabbing and the spear)
Here are the changes and additions in detail:
1. GLEN BATTLE
There are some changes even before the battle begins.
You can now stop Ygrain from leaving the safe spot before the battle.
NOTE: There is no penalty if you don't stop Ygrain. Overall, this update respects your progress, so you don’t have to replay Act 2 if you’re happy with your playthrough.
The ‘Rescue Brian’ scene is now a proper risk chain,
with smart choices making the rescue run a little bit easier.
You can avoid getting stabbed by Flavius.
Your allies, be it your feathered companion Talon, or a former rival like Morl can warn you and help you dodge the cowardly backstabbing. If it’s Talon who warns you, make sure to feed him afterward
You can kill the Roman commander Flavius.
The Romans get a more thorough implementation as a beast with many heads. There are multiple Roman commanders leading the punitive raid, some obsessive like Flavius, some more rational. Gaining insights about them is crucial when making choices that will impact who you’ll be facing in the final battle in Act 3.
2. REST SCENES
The male protagonist’s playthrough gets three romance beats in Act 2.
Clair’s is part of her expanded backstory, which is itself full of new choices that can dramatically alter her fate. Etain comes to repay the favor, if you took care of her while she was unconscious at the beginning of the game, and keep you company, while you recover after the safe spot battle. And Morrigan can reveal her softer side after the pivotal royal feud battle if you manage to save her son. She plays a more active role in the courtyard aftermath and saving her son can elevate your status even if your protagonist's heart is already taken.
The female protagonist’s playthrough
gets all the nuanced text variations contributed by the talented Jennie Kong, and a better Leif introduction in the ‘Ygrain questions the threat’ and ‘Crying girl’ scene in Act 1. Besides Leif, new romance beats are reserved for Act 3, due to the male characters being introduced a little later in the story.
3. HILLFORT BATTLE
You can avoid getting spear-stabbed by Kean's man.
Again, your companions and allies might help to make this easier, or you can just get lucky. Furthermore, you can dodge Wid slamming into you, keeping a zero pre-scripted damage path possible.
You can kill Kean - let’s be honest, he had it coming That being said, for certain end goals, there is value in letting him live after defeating him
. There are multiple instances when the protagonist can go for the kill; including a ‘trial by combat’ duel that can prevent the loss of life of your men. Morl can prove to be an extra obstacle if he got banished before.
On the flip side, once Kean is defeated, you can get the raiders to join your ranks.
Things go a lot easier if you understand who Clair is and help her in her dilemma. Morl can again prove to be a hindrance. Or, if you managed to turn him into an ally in Act 1, he can help.
This results in two new Act 2 endings
'STRONGER THAN EVER'
or
'A DECISIVE VICTORY'
. Losses are tracked across each major battle now, affecting subsequent battle risk chains.
NOTE: If you got ‘A HARD WON’ victory in the original Act 2 release version, there is no penalty and you don’t have to replay Act 2.
Also, based on community feedback, the queen and king dynamic leading up to the battle has now been better explained with the
refined motives and behavior of king Uther.
4. OTHER CHANGES
A no man’s land community backstory moment
was added to Chapter #1. When returning from the hunt the player can better understand their place in the community before they decide whether they want to warn the others or share their prey with them.
It also provides context on how the necessity to survive, and a common enemy, motivated the remnants of the Caledonian people originally inhabiting the no man’s land to look past their differences and accept slaves escaping the Roman empire, or warriors from subjugated provinces like Gaul, into the resistance.
Thank you for your support and patience while we work on Act 3. In the meanwhile, I hope these changes will make the available scenes even more immersive.
Cheers, Andrej
Act 2 Finale Update & Winter Sale
A 3rd path through the 'Royal Feud' battle
Hey everyone,
As we continue working on Act 3, we'd like to share an important update adding a 3rd path to the previous heroic or cowardly play-through of the 'Royal Feud' battle.
You can also pick up Sacred Fire with a 25% discount during the Steam Winter Sale!
SPOILER WARNING: minor spoilers ahead — proceed at your own risk!
This new path is available both when you decide to stay behind in the main hall, or when you stay behind in front of the fort gates.
You can now fight to open the gate to bring reinforcements and directly save your brother's life.
Besides adding 3 new risk chains to the game, this also gives the player freedom to choose how challenging the playtrough will be.
This also presents the first time your people are left without any guidance whatsoever from Wid, and thus is a direct test of the leadership goodwill you accumulated with them.
We'd like to thank our community for helping us to deliver a great Act 2 this year. Thank you for your continuous support and patience, we can’t wait to bring the final Act 3 to you next year.
Happy holidays!
If you haven't already, you can join the community on Discord! It's the place for all things Sacred Fire.
Hello everyone,
it’s been a while. I’ll try to summarize the main Sacred Fire development events from last year we didn’t cover on our blog yet.
Act 2 Expansion
Since the initial Act 2 release last summer, we’ve implemented numerous updates to player choices and character reactions, based on our community feedback, almost doubling it’s initial size.
Among the most favorite scenes added was more screen time for a community favorite character, your eagle Talon. One of the latest additions was a complete new path through the Act 2 final battle.
Steam Page Localization
While we continue working on Act 3, we’ve also worked on updating the existing game and the Steam page text, which has also been localized into the 8 languages that will be supported in the full game. Feedback on the new text and the translations is welcome.
Czech & Slovak Games Week
Sacred Fire has been selected for the opening live stream for the Czech & Slovak Games Week, so I’ve recorded a video introducing the game to new players:
The annual Czech & Slovak Games Week is here to celebrate games made by passionate teams from two countries that share the history of a united struggle for independence and freedom.
A perceptive observe may spot a link why we’re not introducing the Caledonian resistance as one tribe, but as a community of different people, able to look past their differences, united in their suffering and struggle against a common oppressor.
Roadmap update
To make sure we can continue and finish up the story in the rich choice-making quality people love about the game, we’ve adjusted the Act 3 milestone to Q1 2023.
We would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to all the community members who help make the game better in various ways, and also to all those who support us.
A thank you also to everyone who liked the game and left a recommendation for their friends on Steam – the game has collected over 300+ user reviews already with more than 95% of them being positive.
An last but not least, thank you for your patience, we can’t wait to hear what you think about the final Act 3
Kind regards,
Andrej
Act 3 Roadmap Update
Hello everyone,
In this short update, we’d like to let you know that while all is well with the team and the game, as we keep working on Act 3, we discover new things to resolve for a satisfying ending for the main story and the many character relationship states.
At the same time, the localization of the previous acts is in full swing and while we work with experienced translators, they do need our assistance with context here and there which results in hundreds of questions due to the sheer amount of text.
So we'd like to ask you for a little bit more patience while waiting for Act 3 - it’ll be ready by the end of Q2 2023.
I can't wait to see which routes, self-expression choices, and endings players will favor in their playthrough, and plan to collect your experiences with the complete story in a survey afterward.
The next sale for the game will be the Steam Spring Sale starting on March 16th.
If you haven't already, you can join the community on Discord, or leave feedback here on Steam forums and let me know what you think about the game.
You are actually right. It has been recorded that the emperor Septimius Severus met a black legionnaire in Britain and was horrified by his appearance (ironically enough there have been attempts at portraying Septimius Severus as black because he was born in Libya). For those interested, I will also note that the last pagan emperor of Rome, Julian the Apostate, said that innate differences among peoples prove that they are under the influence of different gods. Many quasi-historians like to say racial awareness didn't exist in ancient Rome, which is blatantly untrue.
Spring Update! Act 3 Progress
Hey everyone,
A lot has happened since our last announcement, so we’re pleased to share a summary update on development progress.
Sacred Fire participated in the Steam Tabletop Fest last month and we'd like to thank everyone for your feedback here on Steam forums and on Discord. This resulted in many small bug-fixes and tweaks in today’s update, as well as a small refinement to the female character's backstory description and starting effects.
We’re continuing to prepare localization, as the full launch will include support for a total of 8 languages. With almost 300,000 words in the game’s script, this is no small task!
Some of the languages were enabled by a grant from the Slovak Arts Council, which is of course wonderful but also required us to tweak our development timeline to fit certain requirements.
At least now we know we got it all working correctly. The translations of story texts are progressing at a good pace that should leave enough room for testing them with the community before we release them with the full release of the game.
Most importantly, writing on Act 3 continues. The many game states that have accumulated for Act 3 (characters being alive or not, characters being allied or not, reactions to achievements or betrayals of the player character, etc.) are raising the complexity of the scenes.
Thankfully, writing the two previous acts has prepared us for the challenge, and we’re making progress on the main conflict resolution scenes, as well on some more personal long awaited scenes, like the Raven rescue mission, and the Etain backstory revelation scenes.
We’ll keep you informed about our progress and the availability of a community testing build, leading up to a Q3 Act 3 release.
Thank you all for your words of encouragement, and for your continuous support and patience. If you haven't already, you can join the community on Discord[discord.com], or leave feedback here on Steam forums about the game.
Winter Update
Act 3 Writing done, Localization and Visuals in progress
Hello everyone,
With the new year in full swing, we're excited to bring you a brief update about the game's development progress.
All the writing is now finalized, and localization of Act 3 has commenced. In the end, Act 3 contains almost twice as much content as Act 2. Currently, I'm in the process of integrating visuals, stat changes, and dice rolls into all the lines.
Minor spoilers ahead.
In addition to the three main Act 3 events—the Raven rescue mission, the Roman camp infiltration, and the ultimate battle with several siege stages and iconic moments—we're pleased with how we've tied up all loose ends. We've brought all relationship arcs, mysteries, conflicts, and player agendas to a narratively satisfying conclusion.
Furthermore, Act 3 boasts over 10 pages worth of individualized epilogues detailing the fate of the kingdom and the characters based on your choices, including a variant where the fort is saved, but the protagonist dies.
To highlight a few additions based on community feedback, here are some elements that made it into Act 3 and the Sacred Fire story thanks to you:
- A way to enable Ygrain rise above her bitterness
- An opportunity to get even with Wid, if you get knocked out in Act 1, without overdoing it
- Morl's relationship can develop romantic undertones for female protagonist playthroughs. This decision was made simply because it made for a better story than the originally planned romance with a Roman captive.
Please note, Sacred Fire does not focus on romance, and not all romances are equally extensive; some pairs have more to overcome than others- Three distinct ways to upgrade the fort before the siege
- Successful endings for a coward and an opportunist playthrough, including a royal treasury heist
While many lines still need setting up, I'm eager to share Act 3 with you all. Thank you for your feedback, support, and patience!
If you haven't already, you can join the community on Discord! It's the place for all things Sacred Fire.
