How have you been? I hope your new year has been going well so far. Soul Saga has made some major progress in the past 3 weeks and I just couldn’t wait any longer to share it with you! I’ve just put Soul Saga Beta v4 up on your Humble Bundle download page (if you’re a beta tester).
Beta Access!
If you’re not a beta tester yet, please consider supporting Soul Saga by purchasing the Soul Saga Guildmaster’s Collection! You’ll get access to the private Disastercake forums where we all vote on gameplay features, and lots of digital goodies when they’re complete, like the art book, soundtrack, a copy of Soul Saga, and beta access!
Soul Saga could never have been this great without you, so thank you very much for your support! =D
Enhanced Battle System
The biggest enhancement in this update is to the Battle System. Combat systems in a RPG are one of the most important aspects. I’ve spent a lot of time with Soul Saga’s battle system to bring you a unique and fun experience. There is a lot to go over, so let’s start from the top!
Team Based Turn Order!
In the previous Beta versions turn order was determined by speed. My biggest concern with this type of system is that it is very hard to balance. It’s also very hard, as a player, to determine when speed is more valuable than something like health or attack. With Soul Saga’s new battle system I set out to try and reinvent how this turn order works exactly and I came up with something that works extremely well: Team Based turns.
In this new system an entire team will move at the same time, moving any character in any order they want. When they have completed every character’s turn, then the opposing team gets to move all of their characters. Being able to act in this way allows for the player to have a lot more control over their character’s actions to build countless strategies. For example, perhaps you want Garen to stun the Spearman to disable his counter attack before Miera moves in for the kill with Omnistab. Or perhaps you want Miera to Expose weakness on the Swordsman to give Garen that extra boost to his execute to break through the Heavy Armor. The choice is yours! But the strategy doesn’t stop there…
Intervening!
Intervening allows a character to interject into the enemy’s turn at the cost of 1 IP (intervene point) to immediately act. IP is gained by using the defend skill. Each time a character defends they gain 1 IP, up to a maximum of 2. Intervene can be used in a lot of different ways, like to strategically place debuffs at the perfect times, heal characters that are at high risk of dying, or to throw up a defend skill to prevent incoming damage. It adds a whole other dimension to the strategic possibilities of Soul Saga’s combat system.
Ambushing And Flanking!
One of my favorite things about Soul Saga is that while on the field you can see your enemies. While that’s pretty cool itself, this update has made it even cooler by giving you bonuses for attacking your opponents from behind! On the flip side, you will be equally penalized if the enemy gets you by the tail! The different combat initiations that can occur are:
Even Ground – Occurs when both the player and enemy are facing each other on the field. The team to act first is randomly chosen based on a coin flip.
Flanking – If either the player or enemy approaches their target from the side, that team is guaranteed to act first.
Ambush – If either the player or the enemy are facing away from the other when combat initiates, the team that did the ambushing will get 2 turns in a row at the beginning of combat!
Shenanigan
Shenanigan is a very interesting ability that will be used a lot throughout the game once it’s implemented further. It will be a way for you to interact with different elements on the combat field like pulling levers, breaking an ally free from sticky spider webbing, and many other useful functions.
Reviving
Shenanigan’s most useful feature is its ability to revive a fallen ally. When I designed Soul Saga’s combat system I set out to find a way to add a unique spin to reviving fallen team members. The classic way of just dropping an item on them is good, but I really wanted something that was a bit more interesting. Enter Shenanigan’s most important feature: reviving fallen allies!
The way Shenanigan works when reviving fallen allies is pretty cool. When an ally falls in combat, they gain a Death Penalty debuff. If they already have a debuff, a “Stack” is added to it which increases its count. The amount of Death Penalty stacks determines how difficult it is for the character to be revived.
For example, the first time Garen falls in battle, Miera only has to use Shenanigan on him once. The second time requires 2 uses of Shenanigan, the third 3 times, the fourth 4 times, and so on in that manner until the debuff caps at 10.
This system puts a lot of value and strategy into making sure that your allies stay alive since you can’t easily revive them 99 times in a flash like other RPG combat systems.
Lunchbox
The lunchbox is Soul Saga’s unique spin on the classic item system. When I started working on Soul Saga I set out to design a way to make combat as strategic as possible. One of the things that I found would often remove strategy elements from RPGs were having access to a warehouse of items in your pockets. I had played games where you managed character’s individual inventories that attempted to counter this, but those systems get very heavy and bogged down with micro management. So I tried to find a fun and interesting way to turn the classic item system into a more thoughtful and strategic system. In the end, the Lunchbox was invented!
Each character carries their own lunchbox. Each meal has different effects and has a certain number of charges before the lunchbox becomes empty. Later, when the cooking is implemented, you will get a “taste” of how this system works and the great amount of variety in the cooking recipes!
Beta Testers will find their lunchbox is currently filled with Officer’s Rations, which heal for 500 HP and has 4 charges. There is currently no way to refill the lunchbox, so use them wisely!
Flee
Because of how important battle initiation is, I wanted to make sure fleeing wasn’t able to be abused. So the way fleeing works is that each character must flee individually, and they only have a 30% chance to successfully run away. If one character gets away, but the rest are stuck behind and fall in battle, the game will still continue on the field.
New Character Skills!
Garen's Skills
Last update we were introduced to Garen’s skills, but a little has evolved in the past few weeks. So let’s take a moment to reiterate over them and highlight the changes.
Rage: Garen’s abilities consume a unqiue resource called Rage. He builds rage by taking damage and also dealing it with Raging Strike.
Anger Management (Passive) – Garen gains 10 rage when struck by damage.
Raging Strike – Garen strikes the target for (Attack x1) damage and gains 10 rage.
Hail of Knives – Garen consumes 10 rage per enemy to throw a knife at each of them for (Attack x1) damage. This is a ranged attack.
Overpower – Garen consumes 30 rage to deal (Attack x1) and stun the target for their next turn.
Execute – Garen consumes all of his rage to deal ( (Attack x0.2) x ( CurrentRage x 0.2 ) ). If Garen kills the target, his entire party is healed for (Support x1).
Miera's Skills
New to this update is Miera’s skill load out! Miera is a powerful and exciting character that specializes in swiftly out maneuvering her foes to expose their weaknesses.
Energy: Miera’s unique resource is called Energy. Miera gains energy naturally each turn, from Swift Strike, and from counter attacking with Kill Stance.
Energetic – Miera gains 10 energy at the beginning her turn.
Swift Strike – Miera strikes the target dealing (Attack x1) damage and generating 10 energy.
Kill Stance – Miera readies herself to pounce on any opponent that approaches her. If she is struck by a melee attack, she will immediately counter dealing (Attack x1.5) damage and generates 10 energy. Miera will also gain a shield that absorbs the first ( Support x1 ) damage she receives.
Expose Weakness – Miera consumes 50 energy to strikes deep into the target for (Attack x1) damage and causing them to take (Support x0.5) extra damage from physical attacks.
Omnistab – Miera consumes all of her energy to strike the target once for each 10 energy consumed, dealing (Attack x0.3) each attack.
Enemy Skills Implemented!
I’ve also begun implementing in the enemy skills. In Soul Saga I want the enemy’s to have as unique of skills as the main hero’s to make Soul Saga’s Combat system as fun as it can be!
Swordsman
Heavy Armor – Reduces damage taken from Physical attacks by 50%.
Protect Ally – If the selected ally is targeted by an enemy, jump in the way
Spearman
Counter Attack – Can counter attack any melee attacks.
Multi-Strike – Attacks 3 times for 50% damage each strike.
Gunman
Aim Shot – Charge up an attack to unleash it the next round for 3x normal damage.
Lots Of Synergy!
As you can probably tell just from the descriptions, there is a LOT of synergy and combinations that can occur. Not just among the enemies themselves, but also in how the skills of the player react. I would go into detail, but I’d really like you to experiment yourself to find out what they all do and how to counter them!
Difficult Mode Enhancements!
Soul Saga’s difficulty modes have also seen more implementation to them this update. When designing functionality for the difficulty modes I really wanted each one to have its own unique personality. If the modes simply dealt more damage or had more HP, it would just entice power leveling instead of actually bringing a new strategy. Well we can’t have that in a game as cool as Soul Saga, now can we!
In Soul Saga the different difficulty modes actually alter the way the enemies act and the skills they have. In higher difficulties the enemies are a bit more relentless and mean with their targeting, and they have many extra skills to enhance their combat prowess. Here are some example from the enemies currently in the Beta v4.
Swordsman
Cake
Randomly chooses to either protect a target or attack the player.
Protecting a target will consume the swordsman’s turn.
Vanille
Will always try to protect a target with high priority (Any Gunman or anyone with below 30% HP). If a priority target doesn’t exist, he will attack the player.
Protecting a target will consume the swordsman’s turn.
Jacked
Protecting an ally does not consume a turn, so the swordsman will always be protecting an ally.
Will attack a random player character every turn.
When protecting a targeted ally, the swordsman will also counter attack the player’s character.
Spearman
Cake Mode
Will randomly choose to either add a Counter Attack buff to himself or attack.
Adding a counter attack buff only lasts 1 round and consumes a turn.
Vanille Mode
Always has Counter Attack buff enabled passively.
Will randomly choose to use either a normal attack or multi-strike attack.
Jacked Mode
Always has counter attack buff enabled passively.
Will always multi-strike a random target.
Gunman
Cake Mode
Randomly chooses to either attack or Aim Shot a random target.
Aim Shot takes 2 turns to fire.
Vanille Mode
Randomly chooses to either attack or Aim Shot a random target.
Aim Shot takes 1 turn to fire.
Jacked Mode
Will always Aim Shot and always targets the character with the lowest HP.
Aim Shot takes 1 turn to fire.
Where's Disaster Mode?!
You may notice that Disaster Mode is not mentioned, but fear not my friend! I will go into more detail on Disaster mode in a future update.
Other Cool Stuff!
I was able to add a lot of other neat stuff into Soul Saga since the last update. Here’s a few you might notice in Beta v4:
Can see target data by hovering over the character.
Added a secret item into the first scene. Many more to come!
Can sleep in the bunks in the dorm to replenish HP and AP.
Quest items now appear in inventory.
Placeholder Game Over text implemented.
The “Item Get!”, “Good Night”, and “Game Over” themes were composed by Ryan Camus. Ryan has done a lot of work on Soul Saga’s soundtrack and I’m excited to be able to show you his amazing work!
A Special Shout Out!
I’d like to make a special shout out to all of the beta testers. They’ve been doing an amazing job finding bugs and helping me squash them. I’m amazed at the talent you all have and I couldn’t do this without you, so thank you from the bottom of my heart!
And Thank You!
And thank you so much for being a great fan! I would love to hear your thoughts about the battle system so far, so please drop a comment or join us in this update’s forum thread here:
Happy New Years! Let's kick this year off with a juicy Soul Saga Beta update!
Beta v3 is Live!
Everyone who pledged extra for the beta access should now be able to access the latest beta that just went live today through their Humble Bundle accounts. Today's is titled "Beta v3".
What's New?
Since Soul Saga's Kickstarter about a year and a half ago, a lot has progressed with Soul Saga's development. This update focuses on starting to bring in the unique hybrid combat resource system you and I talked about during the Kickstarter and also voted on in the forums.
Hybrid Resource System
At the moment, Garen is the first to be implemented, and Miera will come soon. Let's take a look at Garen as an example. Garen uses 2 resource systems:
Rage
Garen has a unique resource called rage. When he uses his "Raging Strike" skill or is attacked, he gains rage. This rage can be spent on his unique abilities that other characters can't use. His skills consist of:
Anger Management - Passive skill that allows Garen to gain rage when he's hit.
Raging Strike - Deals (Attack x1) to a single target and generates 10 rage.
Hail of Knives - Garen throws knives at every enemy dealing (Attack x1) to each. The cost of this skill increases by 15 rage per enemy on the field, but the first enemy has no cost. (This is a ranged skill, which will produce different results in battles later after it is implemented further.)
Overpower - Garen spends 50 rage to deal (Attack x1) to a single target and break their defenses. (There are no defenses to break at this point in the beta. They will be added later.)
Execute - Garen spends all of his rage to deal (Attack x.2 X Rage x.2). The damage increases the more Rage he has. If the enemy dies, Garen and his team are healed for (Support x1).
These are just prototype names and are subject to change. The functionality is also always subject to adjustment based on balancing.
Amber Points
When aether energy gathers and crystalizes it becomes a gem known as Amber. Amber is utilized by Alchemist's to create stones that allow even non-alchemists to utilize magical powers. Each amber contains the ability to cast one skill, and up to 4 amber can be equipped.
Unlike Garen's other skills, Amber uses AP (Amber Points). AP can only be recovered through rest in a safe location, like town. Currently there is no way to recover your AP in the beta, but it will be added later.
Skill Menu
There is a skill menu where you can check out all of a character's available skills, including their amber. From here you can cast healing skills to heal up allies out of combat at the expense of valuable AP.
Equip Amber in the Equipment Menu
Make sure to equip your amber in the equipment menu! If you don't equip the amber, you can't utilize their useful powers! For testing purposes in the beta, you will find 2 Healing Touch and Fireball ambers ready for use in your inventory. I recommend putting one of each on Garen and Miera.
Tooltips
There are now descriptive tooltips in combat and in the Skill Menu that should tell you almost everything you need to know about a skill. The default tooltips are compact in their information for easier understanding, but if you hold shift before the tooltip pops up then you can also see a more advanced tooltip with the calculations used to determine damage or resource costs. This can be useful so you understand what equipment to wear for the role you're aiming for with a character.
Awesome! So what's next?
The "to do" list is large, but here are some things that will be implemented to the combat system in the near future:
A new turn based system implemented.
Intervene Points and functionality implemented.
Shenanigan skill implemented.
Lunchbox cooking and usage implemented.
What are all of those? Well, I'll reveal that in good time, my friend! This is just what's on the foreseeable horizon, and a lot more is to come. =)
So what do you think?
I love talking with you and am always excited to hear your valuable feedback, so please let me know what you think in the forums! You can find today's official update thread here.
Thank You!
Thank you so much for being such an amazing fan and a great friend! You've made all of this possible and I am eternally grateful for all of your kind words and support on this monumental journey. I hope you have a fantastic new year, and I know it will be a great one for Soul Saga!
TL;DR
Garren's Saga got confirmed, the beta was release to some backers, a whole lot of gameplay stuff was showed.
Daddy do you want some Sausage?
Wii U ID: dotmae
3DS FC: 3007-8540-3431
The game looks much better than it did when he first showed it. You can tell dude underestimated developing a full 3D game on his own contracting everything else.
WAT!
Hey check out my awesome new youtube channel shingi70 where I update weekly on the latest gaming and comic news form a level headed perspective.
3DS Friend Code: 3093-7342-3454 | Nintendo Network ID: shingi70
It’s great to see you! How have you been? Since the last update a lot has progressed with Soul Saga, and everyone working with me is really excited to show this update off!
Mithos Saga!
Mithos’ Saga in the first Soul Saga game will cover his early teens. I struggled with the decision of whether I wanted to show the childhood through short cinematic flashbacks, or if I wanted to have you experience the entire epic-ness of it all. After a lot of deliberation, it became obvious that there is just so much going on in this era that an entire game is required to capture it all!
By having Mithos and Garen start off in their younger years, there is a lot of potential for character and world development that will happen as the Soul Saga series progresses. I am SUPER excited to be able to share this fun story and gorgeous artwork with you!
The beautiful collage above was created by Akaneko and will be available as a wallpaper for backers who pledged for those. Wallpapers will be available with the next update along with the updated beta build.
Mithos' Airship!
Mithos has an airship! In the first Soul Saga, Mithos cruises around in a modest Koi model design as he explores the blue skies of Medonia. I’ll go into more detail on airship combat and exploration in later updates. Mithos’ Koi airship was originally designed by Kanipanda and then touched up by Zahra Haghiri.
Dragontree Village
Dragontree Village is the first town Mithos visits. Dragontree Village has a job board for quests, a general store for amber and equipment, blacksmith for weapon upgrades, a restaurant where you can fill up your lunchbox or cook meals, and Mithos’ home. In the next beta update you will get to visit Dragontree Village and help Mithos leave his first marks in the world on his journey to become the strongest Guildmaster! All of the 3d environment art in Soul Saga was created by Zahra Haghiri, and the Dragontree Village concept art was created by Yoshiro Mori.
Pleasant Woods
Pleasant Woods is a small area right outside of Dragontree Village. This is the first dangerous area Mithos explores as he takes his first step of adventure into the huge world of Soul Saga. There are a variety of creatures native to this area, such as Torne, Squabble, Honey Jackets, and Croakers. It is also an abundant source of resources such as cooking ingredients and lost treasure.
World Map
World maps are a feature many classic RPGs have. I noticed many modern RPGs have sometimes excluded the world map from their games. With Soul Saga I wanted to make sure I captured that same feeling from the classics, so each of the larger islands in Medonia has its own World Map area to explore on foot! The following image is a screenshot of world map exploration.
Equipment Slots
The way equipment worked in previous updates is that there were just generic slots that anything could be equipped to. This meant you could have something like 4 leather jackets and equip them all at the same time. This has evolved a bit to help with balancing and progression pacing. Now there are still 4 generic slots to equip in, but equipment pieces now have classifications, and multiple classifications cannot be equipped at the same time. This means that a leather jacket would now be a body classification, and only 1 could be equipped at a time. There are currently 6 different classifications:
Head
Body
Offhand
Hands
Feet
Trinket
Trinkets are special in that multiple of them can be equipped, unlike other classifications.
Stratagems
Stratagems are a new addition to Soul Saga that dictate how your stats are allocated. A Stratagem can be equipped from the equip menu in the Stratagem slot. Each character has a single Stratagem slot. Stratagems can be purchased from vendors, earned from quests, or found hidden throughout the world. Stratagems work like any other piece of equipment, so multiple must be owned if you would like multiple characters to use that Strategem at the same time. The way a Stratagem works is that is pushes around the energy in the owner to enhance them in different ways.
Some examples:
The Soldier Stratagem moves energy away from the Support stat and moves it to the health stat. This allows the character to have more HP at the expense of less Support.
The Field Medic Stratagem move points away from the Attack stat and puts it into the Support stat. This will allow a character to heal and augment allies more efficiently at the expense of not dealing as much damage to enemies.
Stratagems can also contain passive skills, such as reducing damage taken from different sources, counter attacking, and other nifty abilities.
Lunchbox Balancing
Some feedback I got regarding lunchboxes is that they are a little strong at the moment. I’ve attempted to balance these out by implementing a new lunchbox item in Mithos’ journey called the Seared Sushi. This item tests more dynamic situational functionality. Specifically, the seared sushi will heal twice as much out of combat as in combat. This means that using it in combat will not be as effective, but will still allow for the food to be very helpful in regaining health between battles so the characters remain fresh. This will hopefully make amber skill healing more viable compared to the lunchbox items.
Armor and Resist
Two new stats have been added to characters: Armor and Resist. In many RPGs, armor and resist calculations are generally kind of complex. When you think of HP, that stat is simple to calculate. If an enemy deals 100 hp damage to me, then if I add 500 HP to my character, I can take 5 more hits from that enemy before dying. However, armor and resist stats are usually a lot more complex. They use special diminishing returns equations that can be difficult to comprehend with head math. I’m not a fan of these complex equations, so I was initially planning on not having any armor or resist stats. After some planning and designing, I decided that armor and resist stats could be fun if they were simplistic enough to understand. So I implemented Soul Saga’s current Armor and Resist stats, which use a very basic equation: 1 point for 1 damage reduction.
For each point of armor, damage is reduced by 1 point from physical attacks. For each point of resist, damage is reduced by 1 point from magical sources.
There are very few items and Stratagems that give any armor or resist, but those that do can be utilized to make a character quite tanky in the right situations.
Smarter Enemy Artificial Intelligence
I’ve been working with behavior trees and pathfinding tools to come up with a smarter enemy artificial intelligence (A.I.) on the field. I’m still tweaking with it to get the perfect results, but I’m very happy with the progress that has been made so far with it!
Pathfinding
In the past beta versions, the field A.I. was very simple. It would simply check to see if you were in its line of sight, then would run at you. This is a basic A.I. that many games utilize, even some AAA RPGs. The downside to the A.I. being this basic is that they get stuck on obstacles in the field, like rocks, walls ,etc. They simply aren’t smart enough to find their ways around it without more of a brain behind them. For Soul Saga, I didn’t want the A.I. to suffer from this, so I implemented in pathfinding so that the enemies can navigate their way around.
Walking vs Running
In previous beta versions, you could only run. If an enemy wasn’t facing you, then you could simply run up behind it and catch it off guard. When the next beta build is live, you will notice this has drastically changed.
Now you can walk or run while on the field. If you run, then nearby enemies will hear you and move to that location you last made a sound at. This means that if you want to get the jump on an enemy from behind, you actually have to take the extra care to walk up behind them. You can also use this technique to lure an enemy you don’t want to fight away form their post if there is something like a rock that you can maneuver around so they don’t see you in time.
Costumes
Another new equipment slot is called the costume slot. This will allow us to create different color or outfit variations for the characters for you to obtain. I am super excited to announce the first costumes that are available…
Kickstarter Mithos and Elise Costumes!
That’s right! You can obtain costumes to play as Mithos and Elise with their chibi designs from the Kickstarter! Taro and Max will also have costumes available to them. The outfits will be hidden in the game for you to unlock and wear to sport your nostalgic Kickstarter pride.
Saving and Loading
I’ve begun implementing the saving and loading system into the next Beta build. I would like to request beta testers to please test this functionality thoroughly and please report any bugs to the Disastercake Bug Reporting Forum. Saving will be enabled at specific save points throughout the game.
Achievement System
I’ve begun work on the achievement system, and there are a few basic achievements currently implemented. When an achievement has been completed, there will be a pop-up notification on the right hand side of the screen stating so. I’m a big fan of achievement systems, and I have many ideas for them in Soul Saga. If you have any ideas, please add them to this thread started by fans on the Disastercake Forums. We’d all love to hear your thoughts!
Music
So far, there are 4 composers that have contributed to the Soul Saga soundtrack. Their order in number of songs contributed is:
Ryan Camus
Aivi Tran
Surasshu
Shannon Mason
During the Kickstarter, Aivi was planning on doing the soundtrack by herself, which was estimated around 20 tracks in total. However, she ended up getting long term gig with a large animation company soon after Soul Saga’s Kickstarter campaign ended. Aivi has finished contributing what she can to Soul Saga, which is about 10 songs. Surasshu came on mid-way through the project, but works on the same projects as Aivi, so also had limited time. Shannon Mason guest composed to help out a little, but we were still lacking in the amount of songs Soul Saga’s enhanced story and size demanded of it.
Soul Saga was initially scoped at 20 songs, but I felt that the story demanded more of it. It was becoming obvious we’d either have to leave the scope of the soundtrack at 20 songs and cut the new additions, or pick up a different composer to complete everything we needed. I ended up meeting Ryan Camus and bringing him on board. Within a couple months he almost doubled our soundtrack size. You heard some of his work in the previous Betas with the “Item Get”, “Goodnight”, and “Game Over” themes. In this version you will get to hear his World Map theme.
I’m excited to show you the amazing work all of the composers who contributed to Soul Saga created. For now, here is the World Map theme by Ryan you can hear in the next Beta version:
Release Date Pending
I am currently analyzing the release date for Soul Saga, and we are coming very close to having a solid one. Progress is going smooth, and many different areas of development are starting to reach their finish line. Once Soul Saga is at a state that I know nothing can delay it, I will let you know when the release date is. I will try to leave at least 2 or 3 months before the release from the time of the announcement of that date.
Unity 5 Porting
Soul Saga utilizes the Unity game engine, and recently they released their next big version: Unity 5. Unity 5 probably won’t bring anything different to Soul Saga’s aesthetics since we use very optimized shaders, but it will help me on the backend with porting to the consoles once the PC/Linux/Mac version is complete. This porting will cause some delays as a lot of third party tools I use are still porting themselves to Unity 5, and the lighting system has completely changed and will require I redo all of my previous work on the lighting. In the end it is necessary, as tools and support for previous Unity versions become non-existent, as is evident with Unity’s history.
Next Beta Update
The next Beta update will contain the first portion of Mithos’ journey. You’ll be able to explore Dragontree Village, the first town, and the nearby starter area named Pleasant Woods. There is also some story that unfolds. I will post another update will the next beta build is ready in a couple weeks.
In Other Kickstarter News...
I couldn’t have made Soul Saga without your support on Kickstarter, and there are many other talented creators out there in the same boat I once was! I’d like to take this moment to share their project with you for your consideration. Please take a look at their Kickstarter pages by following the links below. =D
Edge of Eternity completed their Kickstarter campaign, but you can pre-order the game to continue to help development from their site here: http://www.eoegame.com/index.php/store/
A note from the creators of “Edge of Eternity”:
“Edge of Eternity is an indie tribute to JRPG classics. Explore a universe blending fantasy with science-fiction, intense ATB battles and branching story. The Game is inspired by the great JRPG tradition for the strategical turn-based combats, the characters progression and by the latest success of western RPG for the vast open worlds to explore with a non-linear stories.
In a few words, Edge Of Eternity is all about exploring, building up your characters, fighting and living an adventure to remember.
They’ve been funded and unlocked the collaboration with the great composer Mitsuda Yasunori! They also have an early alpha demo if you want to try the game.”
A note from the creators of “Games, Anime, and More!”:
"We are Kickstarting what will be an annual pop-cultural festival in Utah. The G.A.M. Convention will feature games, anime, and more. (Think along the lines of Anime Expo, PAX, or Comic Con.) It will bring together people of all ages to have fun, celebrate, and enjoy good times indulging their “nerdy” passions! Everyone interested in learning more about the event should visit our Web site at [ http://gam.rocks/ ].
If you would like to be an awesome patron of the G.A.M. Convention by pledging your support, please visit our Kickstarter fund-raising page at [ http://kck.st/1F4hJeL ]. (If nothing else, visiting our page will let you see some ladies cosplaying as Sailor Moon characters.)
There is also some promo graphics at < http://gam.rocks/ > if you’d like to help advertise!
Thank you everyone, and game on!"
What Do You Think?
I’d love to hear your thoughts on how Soul Saga is progressing. Please let me know what you think on the forums in this update’s thread here:
Thank you for being an awesome fan and a great friend! I can’t wait to get Soul Saga into your hands, so hang on tight while I work on bringing you some even more awesome news in the future!
If you ask me I think the game is shaping up to be better than Bravely Default ,not like that hard to do.
I for one really like what I see. I had completely forgotten about this game until this very update was posted at gonintendo the other day, and now I'm really looking forward to it.
How have you been? This past month has been a huge step forward for Soul Saga, and I'm super excited to share it with you. Hold onto your seat, because this is going to be a biiiiig update!
Beta v7 Live
The latest version of the Soul Saga Beta is now available to Beta Testers in your Humble Bundle account! This rather large update contains all of the following information.
Elise's Combat Skills
Elise now has a unique resource system! Elise is especially unique in that she has complete customization over her skillset while other characters have 4 permanent skills. She has 3 extra amber slots that can have either amber or her inventions equipped in them. When she uses one of her inventions, her custom resource bar, called "Mess", increases based on the tools used. Some tools create more of a mess in her bag than others. Elise can then lower the bar by attacking enemies. By attacking enemies, Elise knocks loose all of the items in her bag so she can get to them. Once the mess has reduced to zero, she can then use an invention again. Elise is a very powerful in that, unlike Mithos, she can blow her top skills early and then recover from them rather than having to build up a resource, but her inventions are sometimes not the most reliable!
An example is Elise's first skill called Firecrackler. This tool explode 5 times randomly spread across all enemies. An enemy takes 50% less damage with each hit. Good luck can play a factor in the damage getting spread around for maximum potential, or that enough blasts are cast on the correct enemy to finish them off.
Inspiration Quests
Elise's tools can be invented by finding special quests called Inspiration quests. These quests usually require Elise to gather components to create her new invention. When the quest is complete, Elise will create the tool and can then equip it to enable the skill in combat. It is planned that Elise must be in the party for these quests to progress. This may change in the future based on fan feedback. Inspiration quests will be implemented in a future update.
Field Skills
My goal with Soul Saga is to add so much variety to exploring that it becomes just as much fun as combat. In previous updates I worked on more intelligent field AI so you have to avoid enemy line of sight, and also determine when to walk or run to avoid making sound. This update implements in Field Skills, which are unique for each playable character. They can be activated by right clicking while in a dungeon, like the Pleasant Woods.
Mithos
Mithos' field skill is his self-named Supreme Super Slash. Mithos will swing his sword in front of him in an attempt to hit an enemy. If the hit does connect, then it guarantees that his team gets the first turn in combat. If the enemy is hit from the side, it will initiate an ambush similar to that of approaching the enemy from behind.
Elise
Elise's field skill is called Friend-In-A-Box. Elise puts down a crate, then after 2 seconds a dummy of Mithos pops out to distract nearby enemies for 4 seconds. While distracted, the enemies cannot hear the player’s running, but will ignore the dummy if the player is seen. If another dummy is placed, the original will be destroyed immediately.
Harvesting
As you explore pleasant woods you’ll find some randomly placed items on the field that will respawn only after you've exited the dungeon. Examples are honey near the Honey Tree, flowers, fruits, grass, etc. The application usage of these items varies. They can be used in crafting different weapon upgrades, cooking lunchboxes, requirements for quests, or sold to shops for Jul. An item that can be harvested can be identified with its subtle sparkle on the ground and yellow dot on the minimap, and simply needs to be walked over to be picked up.
Buff Pickups
Besides items, there are pickups that are consumed immediately. In Pleasant Woods these take the form of mushrooms. These mushrooms may heal some of the party’s health, AP, or speed up movement temporarily.
Red mushroom that speeds up field movement for several seconds.
Green mushroom that heals party for 10% of the party’s HP.
Blue mushroom that recovers 10% of the party's AP.
Difficulty Level
Mithos’ Saga now has differences between difficulty levels. These enhancements follow my design philosophy that difficulty levels should be a different experience, not just increased HP like many games try to do.
Torne Pup
Cake
Puppy Eyes (Active) - The target is distracted by the adorable cuteness of the Torne Pup and miss their next turn. Can’t be used more than once every 4 rounds.
Vanille
Puppy Eyes (Active) - The target is distracted by the adorable cuteness of the Torne Pup and miss their next turn. Can’t be used more than once every 2 rounds.
Jacked
Cute Noises (Passive) - Lowers parties attack power by 50%. Debuff only active while Torne Pup is active. Does not stack with other Torne Pups.
Puppy Eyes (Active) - The target is distracted by the adorable cuteness of the Torne Pup and miss their next turn. Can’t be used more than once every 2 rounds.
Squabbling
Cake
Baby’s Cry - Squabbling will call for help, which will call another Squabbling. Takes 1 turn to complete. Only casts Baby’s cry when at low health.
Vanille
Baby’s Cry - Squabbling will call for help, which will call another Squabbling. Takes 1 turn to complete. 50% chance to cast Baby’s Cry.
Jacked
Baby’s Cry - Squabbling will call for help, which will summon a Squabbit. Takes 1 turn to complete. 50% chance to cast Baby’s Cry.
Squabbit
Cake
Squabble Love - If an ally is critical health, will heal them. Once per battle.
Vanille
Squabble Love - If an ally is below 40% health, will heal them. 2 turn cooldown.
Jacked
Squabble Love - If an ally is below 40% health, will heal them. No cooldown.
Honey Jacket
Cake
Simply attacks.
Vanille
Honey Sting (Active) - 25% attack power dealt each round for 4 rounds. Poison stacks.
50% chance to use Honey Sting.
Jacked
Honey Sting (Passive) - 25% attack power dealt each round for 4 rounds. Poison stacks.
Always uses Honey Sting.
Honey Striker
Cake
Sting Assault - Attacks the target 4 times for 25% base damage each hit. Does not leave poison.
Vanille
Sting Assault - Attacks the target 2 times for 50% base damage each hit, and leaves an application of poison for each hit.
Honey Sting - 100% attack power dealt as base, and leaves a debuff that deals 25% attack power dealt each round for 4 rounds. Poison stacks.
50% chance to cast sting assault or Honey Sting Sting assault has a 3 turn cooldown.
Jacked
Sting Assault - Attacks the target 4 times for 25% base damage each hit, and leaves an application of poison for each hit.
Always casts Sting Assault.
Main Storyline in Quest Log
Being able to take a break from a long RPG and come back to it with clearly defined goals guiding you forward is an important characteristic of modern game design. In Soul Saga, the main storyline will have an entry in the quest log to always keep you moving forward. Each milestone in the questline will reward you with experience, and sometimes Jul or other rewards.
Storyline Boss Battle Updated
I’ve also had time to update the boss fight at the end of the beta to take advantage of Soul Saga’s unique Shenanigan skill. The goal is to use Shenanigan and healing skills on Benny to keep him alive and get the Beehive off his head. While the Beehive is on Benny, it will continue to spawn bees every few turns. There are differences between the enemies involved in the fight, and in addition Benny has varying HP to scale the battle difficulty even more.
Shenanigan Gives More Detail
Now that the shenanigan skill has more functionality (and soon even more), it now gives a detailed tooltip to describe what action you would take with it if you were to use it on the provided target.
Weapon Upgrading
You can now upgrade each character's weapon by finding the ingredients required for the next tier. Each character has different ingredient requirements, and these usually require harvesting materials from dungeons like the Pleasant Woods. The way a weapon works is that it has a pool of points that are allocated automatically by your equipped Stratagem. This makes sure that the stats your weapon provides are in favor of the role you've chosen for your character.
Beind the Scenes
And of course, there has been a huge amount of tasks completed behind the scenes as well. Here is a quick list of a few:
And of course, there has been a huge amount of tasks completed behind the scenes as well. Here is a quick list of a few:
I added some advanced JSON serialization for serializing the complex dungeon manager that stores objects across different scenes.
Performance enhancements across the board.
Graphical touch-ups in various places.
Late game content being implemented and polished.
Thank You!
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I cannot put into words how grateful I am for the opportunity you've given me to create such a rich and fun game like Soul Saga. I can't wait to finally get it to you, and I will have news in a couple updates about when that is!
What Do You Think?
Your feedback is very important to me. I make sure to spend the time to read every Soul Saga fan's feedback personally, and I would especially love to hear your thoughts on this update! So please join me and other Soul Saga fans on the Disastercake forums to discuss it! You can find this update’s thread here:
http://forums.disastercake.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=746
And as always, you are welcome to create polls in the voting booth section of the forum to get your feedback implemented with the help of other Soul Saga fans. You can find the voting booth forum here:
Forums
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