Vapourware Realms Beyond: Ashes of the Fallen - Chaos Chronicles reborn and dead again

[JarlFrank]

Not much for updates this month, JarlFrank ! All is good?

All good! We're working on a big thing so the next update can show juicy bits like animated gameplay gifs of the combat.

 

[Jack Dandy]

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

More like Ultima VII or Divine Divinity. The creation process is so vastly different to IE's pre-rendered backgrounds. I can create a decent-ish level with the editor within an hour. That wouldn't be possible with pre-rendered backgrounds like those in the IE engine, those require a dedicated graphic artist to create each level rather than just a pure level designer.

From a creator's standpoint, we can deliver much more levels in a much quicker amount of time than pre-rendered backgrounds would allow us.

Elhoim , take note.

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

Realms Beyond isn't trying to re-invent the wheel, we just want to make a really solid RPG that takes inspiration from the old classics, which includes ToEE's combat, Realms of Arkania's world map exploration and resource management, Ultima 6 and 7's NPC schedules and cities that feel alive, Arcanum's open-ended quests with different approaches, etc etc.

Our defining feature is, I would say, our attempt of bringing the pen and paper experience to life in a computer game - which is pretty much what the computer RPGs of the 80s, 90s, and early 00s have been trying to do, too, to various degrees of success. We love Ultima, Might and Magic, the Gold Box games, Dark Sun, Baldur's Gate, Arcanum, ToEE, Realms of Araknia... and that's just the kind of game we want to create: an engrossing RPG experience that lets you create a bunch of characters, travel the world, have adventures, make some choices, and allows you to approach quests and dungeons in different ways (I fondly remember talking with a pal about Arcanum and Baldur's Gate 2 back in the day, discussing out different paths through the game, and how we were developing our characters, what the best builds are... good times).

We all have some experience with pen and paper RPGs, and that kind of experience is what we want to emulate in our game. We have a lot of different features - world map travel, combat, living cities, quests with mutliple choices - but if you want me to tell you the "one thing" that "defines" Realms Beyond, I'd say that it's the attempt to go for a P&P style experience.

Heck, some of our systems have been playtested in P&P, some of the things I want to add to the game come from my experiences with P&P (like the Dervish class which I've actually played in a campaign with friends and had lots of fun playing), and P&P is the very essence of what RPGs are and should be. Playing D&D campaigns on the tabletop is as much of an inspiration for us as the classic PC RPGs are.

 

[aweigh]

You should add Cloud's Sword and never mention it to anyone.

 

[JarlFrank]

I don't even know what Cloud's sword looks like because I only play games made for heterosexuals.

 

[Modron]

I don't even know what Cloud's sword looks like because I only play games made for heterosexuals.

You never play ToEE?

 

[Valky]

I don't even know what Cloud's sword looks like because I only play games made for heterosexuals.

You never play ToEE?

 

[Ninjerk]

I don't even know what Cloud's sword looks like because I only play games made for heterosexuals.

You never play ToEE?

Or Arcanum?!

 

[Citizen]

I don't even know what Cloud's sword looks like because I only play games made for heterosexuals.

You never play ToEE?

Or Arcanum?!

:TIMCAIN: - for homosexuals, by homosexuals?

 

[JarlFrank]

Sup guys wanna see some frying goblins?

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.realms-beyond.com/development-update-and-goblin-barbecue/

Combat Development and Goblin Barbecue
April 29, 2018

We haven’t posted much lately because we focused all our efforts into developing the first playable iteration of the combat system. This combat prototype (or let’s say Combat Pre-Alpha) will include almost every action and spell of the classes Fighter, Barbarian, Cleric, Wizard, Ranger and Rogue (about 100 actions and spells in total).

Along with animations, character models and visual effects, we already implemented the sound for various weapons, spells and hit effects.

Until we can show you a detailed insight of the combat system, this little preview video will give you a first impression of the Fireball spell at a higher character level. Those poor Goblins never had a chance and died many deaths during the development.

Except for the combat grid, we completely hid the user interface because it’s still work in progress.

 

[fantadomat]

JarlFrank,is the exploration turned based or only the combat? Hope that it is not.

 

[Beowulf]

Sup guys wanna see some frying goblins?

I'm aware that the game is still in some early stage of development, but the projectile is too slow.
It reminds me of Expeditions: Conquistador battles. It's all good and fine, until you start the n-th fight and those slow animations become a considerable time-waster.
Especially if the result of the battle is a foregone conclusion.

Have you considered implementing some animation speed slider/toggle?

Oh, and I really look forward to playing your game guys.

 

[JarlFrank]

The combat speed is deliberately slowed down for the video so it looks more flashy and cool.

In the actual gameplay, you can speed up the animations. Pressing <Space> will accelerate the playback time factor of AI moves and all animations.

 

[JarlFrank]

JarlFrank,is the exploration turned based or only the combat? Hope that it is not.

Just as in 99% of turn based RPGs (ToEE, Knights of the Chalice, Divinity Original Sin, etc etc) the game will switch into turn based mode when you enter combat. Having movement be turn based outside of combat would be a horrible waste of time and an utterly retarded design decision that would lead to 90% of players refunding the game on Steam and leaving a bad review because gameplay is too slow and annoying.

 

[Grunker]

The combat speed is deliberately slowed down for the video so it looks more flashy and cool.

In the actual gameplay, you can speed up the animations. Pressing <Space> will accelerate the playback time factor of AI moves and all animations.

phew, was just about to comment on this

 

[fantadomat]

JarlFrank,is the exploration turned based or only the combat? Hope that it is not.

Just as in 99% of turn based RPGs (ToEE, Knights of the Chalice, Divinity Original Sin, etc etc) the game will switch into turn based mode when you enter combat. Having movement be turn based outside of combat would be a horrible waste of time and an utterly retarded design decision that would lead to 90% of players refunding the game on Steam and leaving a bad review because gameplay is too slow and annoying.

Great,still have nightmares from the first shadowrun. I expected nothing less from the game,still had to check.

 

[JarlFrank]

Well, I've been a vocal supporter of faster animation speeds in combat for years, and you often find me complaining about slow combat animation speeds in threads all over the Codex when a game suffers from those, so you can be sure I'll make certain a game I'm involved in won't suffer from such a crippling flaw.

Maybe we'll show off the different animation speeds in the next combat video, which will be longer and features more than just goblin barbecue.

 

[FeelTheRads]

The combat speed is deliberately slowed down for the video so it looks more flashy and cool.

In the actual gameplay, you can speed up the animations. Pressing <Space> will accelerate the playback time factor of AI moves and all animations.

Wait, what? Then what do I press to pause the game and give commands???

Can't wait to fireball a bunch of XP-bags.

 

[Jack Dandy]

The wizard's chuckle at the end sealed the deal for me. Hope our guys will have these kinds of taunts in the final game, too.

Wait, what? Then what do I press to pause the game and give commands???

It's turn-based, you philistine!

 

[JarlFrank]

Wait, what? Then what do I press to pause the game and give commands???

You double-click on Baldur's Gate.exe

 

[dragonul09]

The combat speed is deliberately slowed down for the video so it looks more flashy and cool.

In the actual gameplay, you can speed up the animations. Pressing <Space> will accelerate the playback time factor of AI moves and all animations.

What? Someone sane enough to let us speed up the action in a TB game? That's preposterous, how dare you not force me to stand there for an hour, seeing the same trash mobs doing the same lousy animation again and again. How dare you break up the dogmas of TB games, they need to be excruciatingly slow to actually rack up those ''Our game is so long, it will easily take 150 hours to complete'' laurels.

 

[FeelTheRads]

The combat speed is deliberately slowed down for the video so it looks more flashy and cool.

In the actual gameplay, you can speed up the animations. Pressing <Space> will accelerate the playback time factor of AI moves and all animations.

What? Someone sane enough to let us speed up the action in a TB game? That's preposterous, how dare you not force me to stand there for an hour, seeing the same trash mobs doing the same lousy animation again and again. How dare you break up the dogmas of TB games, they need to be excruciatingly slow to actually rack up those ''Our game is so long, it will easily take 150 hours to complete'' laurels.

Who ever did that? I can only think of Bethestards measuring their e-peens in how many hours they wasted walking with that unbearable speed in the latest hitchhiking simulator.

 

[JarlFrank]

The combat speed is deliberately slowed down for the video so it looks more flashy and cool.

In the actual gameplay, you can speed up the animations. Pressing <Space> will accelerate the playback time factor of AI moves and all animations.

What? Someone sane enough to let us speed up the action in a TB game? That's preposterous, how dare you not force me to stand there for an hour, seeing the same trash mobs doing the same lousy animation again and again. How dare you break up the dogmas of TB games, they need to be excruciatingly slow to actually rack up those ''Our game is so long, it will easily take 150 hours to complete'' laurels.

We're actually going to fill the game with 150 hours worth of content.

That's just 50 hours less than Grimoire!