Hey All,
it's been a long time since we posted a project update, and we have a number of important news to share so here we go!
Lost Pilgrims is 2 Years Old
It is hard to believe that we founded the studio two years ago - who would have thought that time was going to fly so quickly. We have achieved many things and learned a LOT about game development. We lived through highs and lows alike, but the most important thing is that we persevered. Just to give you an idea, here are a few highlights:
One of the great benefits of our successful crowdfunding campaign is being able to expand on parts of the game we felt we were unsatisfied with. One such area was Sound Effects, which was largely (but not exclusively) populated by placeholders up till recently.
The have been or will be game design posts about all but one: narration so let's focus on that for a second.
New Content: Extended Narration
It has taken much longer than expected to reach Charles - the voice of Agos the Wanderer - due to some personal matters as well as his change of career. We are happy to share that now we have all the narration recorded for Agos through-out Pilgrims of the Wasteland, and even for the beginning of the main game as he leaves your comitatus after sharing his story. We plan to make a few minor sound editing changes to these new recordings but wanted to delay this build no further, so we will do that in a subsequent iteration only. When playing the PotW story, it gives so much to it already that we think you will like this a lot. Also, here's a shout-out for Charles' new focus as he instructs singers on how to become more confident. Check out and sign up to support his Patreon page if you are interested.
Laurels All Around
In our endeavour to get Vagrus into the sights of as many cRPG lovers as we can, we applied for featured spots in a number of nearby game shows - successfully! Not only did we get invited to present Vagrus the game itself but our art design and developer pitch has been rewarded as well making it into the official selection of said shows (see above). That reminds us to bring to your attention the upcoming opportunities to meet us in person:
April and May were tough on us with a super busy schedule but it was well worth it. Let' see why in some detail!
We attended Reboot Develop Blue in Dubrovnik as you may know and talked to a number of press representatives. A great example of that is the video above, which was recorded as part of a longer discussion that you can read here: https://www.shacknews.com/article/111819/vagrus-the-riven-realms-interview-born-from-a-tabletop-world
Gosh, what a year! Working on Vagrus has been super busy but very rewarding - in no small thanks to people like you, dear followers, whose contributions and feedback made a lot of things possible for us here at Lost Pilgrims. So let me thank you for everything and wish you very happy holidays on behalf of the whole team! Have fun, hang out with family and friends, and check out the Prologue of Vagrus!
During the first wave of Alpha testing just recently, we've received a lot of useful feedback, especially on the UI (and Combat UI specifically). We've been keenly aware that these elements needed a rework and labored hard on improvements. We are happy to report on how far we've got:
In the last part of our character design series, we talked about what goes into conceptualizing and designing characters and touched upon how Bazsó came up with distinct the art style for characters and how Szonja raised the bar when working with the majority of them.
Now it's time to discuss what actually happens after the initial phase of concepts and moodboards. Mind you, this will probably have information that is well-known by any graphic designers who work on 2D character art; yet others may find it intriguing.
As we've previously hinted at, parts of the game Vagrus has a narrator in the person of Agos the wanderer. An older man and a vagabond, Agos stumbles upon the player one evening on the road and begins telling stories of his travels (if you let him, that is). One such story is the Prologue that you can play through to be introduced to the world and gameplay at the same time, essentially playing through the story Agos is telling.
This week's character artwork and reveal is that of a fairly common enemy: the Bruiser; created by Szonja. These folks are on the 'wasteland outlaws' roster and represent the muscle of the group. Bruiser abilities include a bull rush (that pushes opponents away), a blunt attack (that stuns the target), and a cheap shot (that puts a savage debuff on the target).