itch.io

i'd like every NPC to have some kind of utility out of combat. It's just a matter of thinking of something and adding it. What I will proabably do first will be NPCs in your party raising your crafting limit depending on their trade. Then I will most likely do what you said. Tadeas plant knowledge, Olaf minerals and so on.

Ofcourse, I can tweak the numbers on the recipes and items. Getting more cheese from single milk sounds like the easiest option that also makes more sence.

Equiping characters is to a degree already in the game, but not in a traditional sence.

You can get a quest from Billy to get him a new shotgun.  Finish the quest and he will start using it instead of the blunderbuss. 

I plan to do this for the rest of the cast too. I want you to be able to specialise them even further. For example, Helena:

You will be able to make her focus on supporting magic or damaging magic. You will have a choice between high armor, low damaging weapons and low armor and high damaging weapons.

I don't want NPCs to equipable in a same way as you can equip your main character, but I want to add some NPCs that will be easier to equip and improve, like the golem companion I'm working on.

Couln't find a way to make this change into small patch, so I released new version with some additional changes instead. Your old save files should work now. Tell me if something else breaks.

By the way, don't know if this is a bug or if it is real but damn. I think that's a record.

Small patch:

• Changed construction projects to require 0 friends. Number of friends instead halve the time necessary to finish construction (Friends gained after you started construction project will not count)
• Added exception handling for time related save file corruption
• Added a way for me to release smaller patches in the future

It's some kind of time related error. The game couldn't get your current windows time and date and just gave up.

I have no idea what could have caused it. Could be the game hitching crashing when you saved it, maybe you changed your timezone from previous save time,.. No idea.

That said, this is just an exception that should have no bearing on the integrity of your save file. I made a workaround that will show and "ERROR" text instead of the save date. Saving and and loading should work. Right now, I'm trying to think of a way to release this fix as a patch and not as a entirely new game upload.

You are right that the combat feels off and "old school" in a sence where enemies just chase you and they initiate combat sequence when they touch you. 

Being able to press a button and shoot to initiate combat from affar would look nice, but would pose a lot of chalenges to get it right. 

• Enemies on the map that are in groups would need to be adjusted so the game damages the correct one once the battle starts.
• Maps would have to be edited to make projectiles pass through low and high obstacles properly
• Hit and run tactics or cheesing enemies with obstacles would have to be acounted for
• New scripts for handling enemies dying when you kill them with single shot on the map screen. Loot, experience and other stuff
• Behavior for shooting friendly NPCs would also have to be acounted for, since NPCs ignoring you shooting them is not something I want to have.
• Shooting in friendly crowded locations would have to be acounted for.

And these are just things I came up with on the spot. Sure, solution to most of these can be quite simple if you compromise, but I want to come up with creative solutions to simple problems like these if possible.

I'm experimenting with top down grid combat system that I found somewhere on the internet, which would solve this entire problem, but I have no idea when that's going to get implemented, if at all..

That's deffinitely going to happen. There will be more hideout stations and cheese making stations will be some of them. Just like there will be ways to make your own beer, vodka or cigaretes. 

As for the oven, that is going to happen too. First, you will get a wood stove which you will later upgrade to electrical one.

The game asks you to join a faction later on, but you don't even know what these factions are about. 

I will be adding several cutscenes showing you some interaction with these two main factions, and some dialogue options so you can ask other NPCs about them.

Noticeboard quests give you 2 renown each. NPC skill events give you 1 renown each. Normal quests should also give you some renown. I think there are other ways too, but renown is pretty hard to get in general.

I did a quick check and you need high science skill (Which you have), and more than 150 renown.

If I remember correctly, you need  certain skill level AND you need that skill to be higher than other skills to get that ending.. 50 should be enough, but you will also need it be your highest skill.

Pretty much. Every major faction choice, except for Suong, will result in you turning into killing machine to some degree. Russians and Germans will make you part of their expeditionary forces and white will train you and give you chemicals and artifacts to make you stronger. Only Suong wants you to stay normal.

My memory is a bit hazy on that one, but the only way to fix that is getting the scientist or assassin endings.

If I remember correctly, it should give you 50 food when you use it. It should be usable repeatedly, or once every week.

That is still partialy intentional. I still want the player to be able to get way too strong at way too young age even after I fully balance the game. I just want it to be much harder to do and I want it require a lot of game knowledge. Getting so strong so quickly without even really trying is ofcourse not intentional.

True, but I like to think that's one of the things that make this game unique.

You start as an absolute looser and you can't kill anything. Not even the basic scavenger (Unless you pick some combat related traits). And with hard work and training, you can become one of the strongest beings on the island. Most RPGs usualy start you at already somewhat decent power level, or they have level scaling and you stay pretty much at the same strength level through out the entire game. That's why I like gothic so much and why I want this game to have similiar feel in progression.

I don't think there is. Larger ammo is supposed to be rare, but you can find it in some dungeons and Mr. White should sell you pretty much unlimited amount every week.

The game isn't finished yet, so there are not that many consequences for being a mutant. Right now, some NPCs will refuse to talk to you and mutant hunters will come after you. 

In future versions, playing as a mutant will be quite harder. Not only will more people attack you or refuse to talk with you, but there will be some health related issues you will have to deal with.

Right now though, you can enjoy those traits as free points, if you know what you are doing and get the church robes early.

Definitely. The game is rougly balanced around your character getting 2 HP/SP a week and one stat point per week. Having as much as you have should be enough to solo almost anything, as long as you have good enough equipment. (Mr. White sells the best stuff in the game right now.)

That's pretty much the end of the game for now and the end of the first chapter. The rest of the game is just not finished yet. I will most likely do some content for the Russian and German side of the story first and then focus on Suong and White.

Partialy. Both Helena and George are not balanced properly yet, but Helene is supposed to be damage dealer and George is supposed to be a tank. I will be adding seperate classes and class advancements to them in the future, so you can customize them to some degree, but their current stats are definitely not final.

Go to the ara with the ruins and bear. Try to explore the ruins.

It gives me more flexibility and option in the future. The intro I'm working on is a good example.

The game starts, you meet Billy and you spend the night at his house. This passes time by one day. I have few planned features that will also require moving time in lower increments than one week, or even higher increments. It even supports time passing in smaller increments, like hours or minutes. This is used for minor activities like mining or working out.

Yeah. The game doesn't diferentiate between assault and self defence. I have plans to put this in the game eventualy though.

That's the internal way I measure things. The game doesn't skip one week, it skips 7 days in the game engine. For the player, everything in game is measured in weeks so you don't have to worry about days at all. Just divide the numbers I gave you by 7 and round up.

• Survive for 9 weeks
• Survive for 15 weeks
• Survive for 32 weeks
• Survive for 36 weeks

Cave crawlers are counted as animals. Animals also lower morality, but much less than humanoids.

You can follow these rules to find out if something is animal, humanoid or abomination.

• Humanoid shape, sentient and can talk = Humanoid
• Humanoid shape, disfigured, agressive, can't properly talk = Abomination
• Non humanoid shape = Animal

Morality right now doesn't do that much. It mainly affets if you lose or gain mood for killing certain types of enemies. If The higher your morality, the less mood you lose when encountering abominations. You will even start gaining mood once it is high enough.

Low morality will make mood loss from killing humanoids lower and you will start gaining mood once it gets low enough.

Aside from that, you get some minor perks, like lower addiction mood loss and things like that.

You gain or lose mood mainly by killing different enemy types. Killing humanoids lowers it while killing abominations raises it. Using Ichor will lower your morality every week.

1. Survive for about 60 total days.
2. Go to the souther beach with the cave. Cutscene should trigger. (You must be alone)
3. Wait for 100 total days.
4. Go to the forest area with the bear and the ruins. Cutscene should trigger. (You must be alone)
5. Survive for 220 total days.
6. At the start of the week, cutscene should play.
7. Wait for 250 total days. 
8. At the start of the week, cutscene should trigger.
9. Get your atributes to desired level (Check quest log)
10. Use the device near the boat in the location the previous cutscene played. (In front of Olaf's cave)

That's it. Now you just have to clear the dungeon.

That doesn't sound bad. It would also make having more friends worth it, since you don't need that many of them in the current version.

I didn't post any progress reports for quite some time, so I decided to show you atleast a little part of what I'm currently working on.

Among other things, my main focus right now is adding a proper intro to the game. This will show you the events between your arrival and Billy making your hideout.

This intro will mainly serve as a story / lore introduction. The gameplay tutorial begins right after it ends, like it does in the current version. Intro sequence will be mostly on rails and focus heavily on cutscenes and dialogue options, where you can ask Billy about the island, different factions, recent events and so on.

You will be able to skip the intro at any time, since it will be pretty much one long cutscene, so you won't have to sit through it if you find it boring or if you are on your second playthrough. 

There are some small systems that I will have to add to make this all work, but nothing major. Together with the intro sequence, I will also be expanding existing dialogue topics to other NPCs. No eta. for the next update yet, but I hope I can finish it before christmas.

All you really need is to clear the main story dungeon. The rest is optional / intended for post-game. 

I try to balance the game around gaining 1 in each physical atribute and 1-2 HP per week. You can get much more (and less), but unless you really mess up, you should be able to clear the main dungeon before the first year ends. 

Money is not something that is balanced yet. It is way too easy to get if know what you are doing, but it is not that useful in the end game, since most of the good stuff can be found (Mr. White's shop is an exception, but that is going to get removed once the game world gets big enough).

All trade skills give you the last skill at level 50 right now.

Most of the unlock challenges, fighting Mr. White and the endgame dungeon can be cleared in the first year only by experienced players. Everyone else will have to wait a few ingame years to get stronger, or unlock the imprint system and start with stronger character.

I played few games with system like that. Stick of thruth or persona 3 comes to mind. I was thinking about doing some kind of system to make weak enemies run away from you, or they instantly lose the battle when you touch them to cut down the number of simple fights. Having some skills to help with that might be nice. Maybe even skills that give you first strike or something like that. Having those skill usable in the overworld is possible also possible, but I will have to think about that.

Mr. White also sells some dynamite. And I think there is another spot with dynamite somewhere in the caves, but I'm not sure about that.

It's partialy intended. If I remember correctly, NPCs ignore your mutations if you have around 30 favor with them, so you can still get them to talk to you even if you don't join the church. I will change this once I get some kind of gift system in the game.

Exactly. The battles are pretty much already when I want them to be regarding the player control. It's the overworld activities that I will need to think more about, since things like stealth also fit into that category.

And there is an abandonware dos version of princess maker 2. The steam version and dos versions are pretty much identical content wise. It's just graphics and music that are different. You can get the dos version for free on the internet and you can get dosbox to play it on modern operating systems. Sites like abandonwaredos.com, or gamesnostalgia.com should have it.

Enter the beach cave and enter the north cave. Then go right. In the next location, there should be a mosin nagant on the floor and some stairs leading down.

I did think of this but as I said, I want to limit player skill as much as possible in that regard.

This a personal pet peeve of mine, but I always found the way most action RPGs work weird. you start the game as nobody and if you, the player, know the game, then you can pretty much negate the personality and skill of the in-game character by achieving things that shouldn't be possible. Soul level 1 runs in dark souls are a good example of that.

In Sinathir, the player is supposed to be something of an "advisor" to the main character. You tell her what to do and she tries to do it. If she fails and succeeds is entirely up to her skill, not to the player skill. 

As I said before, having no player input is boring so I can't really go all out on that design philosophy, but I want to get as close as possible.

Try playing the old "Princess Maker 2" game. This game is heavily inspired by it and it will show you what kind of feel I'm going after to some degree.

Dynamite is a rare resource and right now, there is only one in the game. It is in the beach cave.

Go to the cave with mosin nagant and go down stairs. Bloodstone is in that area. Another one can be found in the mine dungeon, but you need dynamite to get that one.

I think this was already suggested and I'm not fully againts it. 

My goal is to make combat in general less dependant on player skill and more dependant on the character skill. I can't go this way completely, since that would mean turning the game into auto-battler, which is not entirely fun. 

I would like to rework the combat system in the future and depending on how it goes, I might add something like what you are suggesting.

It is, but you can get that rather quickly. Praying at shrines gives you 1 or 2 standing, depending on the amount of money you give. The church job gives you 1. This means that you can get 9 standing per week if you really set your mind to it. 

Faction ranking is supposed to be kinda slow, so that it doesn't end up like in bethesda games, where you can become a faction leader in a matter of days.