Vapourware Battlecursed - Party Based Roguelike RPG?

[theSavant]

https://battlecursed.com

Spoiler

Someone posted a link in the Bards Tale Kickstarter comments. I thought I'd mention it here, because it looked interesting...



Some parts of the clip look like the player actively moves, some parts look like he's on rails. Like a Rail-Shooter. Is this a Rail-RPG? If it were on rails, it would be an interesting take (it could avoid the "dancing around").

Seems to have tactical positioning as well. The middle 2 slots of the player party seem to be a frontline, the outer 2 slots the backline (just guessing). Unfortunately realtime.

Edit: btw. the developer is "CodexWorlds"... I first thought this was a game by the RPGCodex

 

[Zetor]

RT blobber with randomized dungeons and no hint of how the character system works other than 3 static-looking cooldown abilities per char -- looks like bundle fodder to me, even considering that the entire on-rails thing (which would make this the first QTE-based blobber that I know of) is just for the demo. Also, "Battlecursed" sounds like something out of the Dwarf Fortress name generator...

 

[Courtier]

This stream of garbage mislabeled as roguelike is never going to end. Next up Depression Quest 2: a procedurally generated realtime roguelike tactical MMOARPG with a persistent rail progression system

 

[Dorateen]

Looks like they are trying to do a cross between Legends of Grimrock and Darkest Dungeon. Party is selected from a pre-set pool of heroes arranged by class, including a couple of grimdark archetypes "Grave Knight" and "Necromancer". Poor customization and the realtime combat is unfortunate. A shame, with better design decisions in a few key areas, this might have been good.

 

[Siveon]

Real time? Fuck off.

 

[Ziem]

Real-time, not grid-based, party.

Roguelike.

 

[SRPattison]

Hi there!

Sorry to bump a 7 week old thread. I stumbled across your forum in a routine search for references to our upcoming titles. First, neat community you all have here, I'll definitely have to stick around!

Anyways, I figured I would lend a little insider information and clarification to your discussion.

• Battlecursed is still very early in the design and development phase. Our first title, Infinium Strike (starship tower defense), is just now launching worldwide on July 14th. We have taken community feedback and suggestions on our first title very seriously, and will continue to do so on Battlecursed. If you've ever wanted to take a stab at helping shape the design of a game, this is an opportunity!
  
  
• Player movement is not on-rails. The camera is from a first-person perspective but the player controls the movement of the party, in typical FPS fashion.
  
  
• Your comment on tactical positioning is not false, though that system is far from finalized or able to be discussed with too much detail.
  
  
• Roguelike is a difficult mantle to assign appropriately, without seemingly falling short of the traditional feature set. As a dungeon crawler with procedural level generation, and the mortality of its heroes, Battlecursed falls short on the traditional definition with its real-time combat, modern 3D graphics, and free (not tile-based) movement. Technically, Battlecursed is a roguelike-like (a mouthful), or rogue-lite. From a press or marketing standpoint, it's a difficult distinction to make outside of fans of the roguelike genre. We have a lot of old school veterans on our team, and roguelikes have a special place for those early gamers. Our goal is to capture that old dungeon delve experience, and bring it up to modern day tastes, without losing that overall feeling of excitement, adventure, and mortality. A tall order, and a tough market!
  
  
• There are lots of ideas being thrown around about customization. It's a tough balance between minute-to-minute customization, and long-term customization without a persistent player character. That being said, the design team is working really hard towards finding that balance. Again, we are in early stage development, and will gladly take any constructive feedback to heart.

I'm looking forward to checking out the rest of these forums. I love all types of games, but there is this inexorable pull towards RPGs that I've never been able to avoid.

Feel free to ask me anything, and I will answer what I can!

**General disclaimer: anything stated in my descriptions above may not necessarily represent final feature sets, as Battlecursed is in early development at the time of this post. Game design is a very iterative process, and we have to play test each design decision in order to get the best idea of how the game is affected. (Sorry about the disclaimer, but unfortunately in today's world, it's necessary!)

Steven Pattison
Codex Worlds
stevenp@codexworlds.com

 

[Infinitron]

I'm not sure it was a great idea to make that other post.

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

 

[Grauken]

I'm not sure it was a great idea to make that other post.

I always like people admitting upfront that they are into shit games

 

[SRPattison]

I'm not sure it was a great idea to make that other post.

I always like people admitting upfront that they are into shit games

Haha, I see that now. I'm not surprised, 4am posts on any forum are not usually productive, let alone on a forum you are unfamiliar with.

To be fair, there are so many games that fall into the 'shit' category nowadays that keeping your expectations low seems to be the only way to guarantee you don't feel like you wasted your money. Regardless, touche, I have nothing to hide.

 

[theSavant]

Almost forgot about this game... (and I had a tough time finding it in the depths of the forum because I forgot its name).

Still isn't out as it seems, and I'm not even sure if it's still in development?? But there's at least a "newer" gameplay footage on youtube:

 

[Infinitron]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/454370/Battlecursed/

Notice: At the request of the publisher, Battlecursed is unlisted on the Steam store and will not appear in search.

O_o

https://steamcommunity.com/app/454370/discussions/0/3559414588257980301/

is the game dead ?
??

Yes, I think we all have been scammed. No activity on their website or forums, if you can call them that, there either.

Also, the trailer in the OP has been delisted from their YouTube channel.

 

[Infinitron]

Oh wait: https://steamcommunity.com/games/battlecursed/announcements/detail/1683665881203801123

You Spoke, We Listened
23 JUN, 2018 @ 10:08PM - STEVEN

Greetings adventurers,

We debuted “Battlecursed” on Steam Early Access in order to garner players' feedback on features and the game's direction. All the while, we’ve made our mark in the Steam community and have been providing regular updates on the game’s progress.

You’ve spoken, and we’ve listened. We are aggressively tweaking and changing our design, gameplay, and narrative structures to more closely resemble the game you all want to see. This means more RPG elements, storytelling structures, revamped and expanded abilities, inventory management, and (possibly) even a new name.

As a result of this massive shift in focus, we’ve made the decision to pull “Battlecursed” off of Steam Early Access. This is not a decision we made lightly, nor is it one we made without consideration for all those following the progress of our game.

Allow us to be clear: We are not shelving this product, nor are we halting or scaling down development. We are simply refocusing development in a new, exciting direction.

What does this mean for you?

Those who own “Battlecursed” already will retain the copy registered in their Steam Library, though it may be some time before any update is made available for that build. Rest assured, when that update goes live, announcements will be posted, and we’ll look forward to hearing your feedback.

For those who wish to request a refund on their purchase, we’ve spoken with our partners at Steam. They’ve made the decision not to extend their refund policy to Early Access adopters in this instance.

So, we will be issuing full refunds on our own.

If you’d like to request a refund, please follow this link[refund.battlecursed.com].

You’ll be required to provide a few details, including your name, a PayPal email address, and a copy (or screenshot) of your proof of purchase. Refunds will be issued directly from us through PayPal.

We hope you continue to follow our progress as we work to bring “Battlecursed” to market with all the gameplay and features we know you want to see.

No news since then.

 

[theSavant]

Makes actually sense to "refocuse" development. Looking at the gameplay, I'm not too happy about it either. It looks like a tournament of some sort, with the goal of getting through a series of dungeons, decoupled from each other. I'd rather follow a real storyline than just random combat sessions. To be fair the subtitle only says "The Trials", so it's exactly what it says. The combat also seems clunky and stressful to control, given it's fully realtime and not even a pause mode. They should probably automate some party attacks or redesign it to be like Might&Magic or so. But I guess they know that already. Other than that enemy animations are fluid and attack effects look nice.