The time is upon us! As we have previously announced, a new version of Vagrus' free Demo is going to be published at the Steam Game Festival. You will probably be pleased to know that this incarnation of the Demo will have a small set of achievements you can complete!
TL;DR: A new, extended Demo is coming to Steam and GOG so that those on the fence can take Vagrus for a spin and see what we've been cooking for a while now. This all comes at the tail end of over a month of hard work with the freshly released Open-World prototypes.
Now, let us see in more detail all the things that happened recently around the game.
We have always planned a fairly elaborate system of healing mechanics but when creating 'Pilgrims of the Wasteland', we first focused on getting the main features ready and implemented a more streamlined, placeholder set of healing rules.
Out with the Old
The PotW system simply had you use a relatively valuable resource - medical supplies - to fully heal one Companion at a time during camp. This is not only too 'gamey' but also very obtuse and not what we intended for the game or the setting.
There were a number of project milestones that we managed to unlock recently over at fig. Some of these are quite big and we are very excited to be able to work on them as they make the game better and deeper by what they bring to the table. Let's take a quick look at what is being developed currently:
We have thought long and hard about how to deal with manual saves in Vagrus, because there are a lot of complications stemming from certain game elements. Do we let players choose mid-combat? Do we let them save mid-Event? Is there a point to Event tests if manual saves scumming works? These are just a few of the many questions that have arisen.
The decision to add the small portraits of Companions to the steps of Events where they appear was an easy one: it added a lot of character to the texts and was an easy addition due to the portraits being derived from the already existing art assets (idle combat images of said Companions).
But then in true Lost Pilgrims fashion we felt that this could become so much more if ALL major NPCs received a similar portrait, or 'chat head' in Events and so we started producing a few to see what they looked like. Most of these were based on friends to honor two decades of roleplaying together and they turned out so cool that we decided to open these up for Backers and influencers as well. So if you want your mug in the game as one of the many NPCs, here's the chance. :)
Crew Combat is the most common way you will handle violent conflicts as you roam the wastelands of the Riven Realms. We wanted to give you a rundown of the basic concepts here so that those interested might find some insights.
Disposition
Each Crew Combat encounter identifies the two sides as either the Attacker or the Defender. The player's comitatus can typically be the attacker when they raid small settlements or prey upon other travelers, while they are often found as the defender when getting accosted by monsters, outlaws, or worse.
We went to London to exhibit Vagrus at AdventureX 2019 on the first weekend of November and it's time to talk a bit about all the amazing things that happened there.
The two-day event was full of awesome speakers who gave talks about the aspects of narrative in video games, be it writing, design, methods of storytelling, or other intriguing subjects. Wish we had more time to attend these but the two of us very so busy talking to participants and showing off Vagrus that we could only watch a handful of speakers, taking turns. We did have a great time chatting with people though - the event was very cozy, intimate even: a lot of like- and open-minded people coming together for a common interest's sake.
The Lost Pilgrims Team
--------------------------------------------------
Our crowdfunding campaign is LIVE at Fig.co. Get instant access to the Alpha build now!
--------------------------------------------------
Wanna get the game as early as possible with even more content? Please share our pages and posts with your friends through your favorite social media channel(s). Appreciate it!
Fig.co | Steam | Website | Youtube | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Patreon | Discord