Hellooo cool cats,
Welcome to the next edition of What’s Noodling, our dev blog for Cloudheim! In case you missed it, we recently premiered our new combat trailer at the Future Games Show Spring Showcase. You can check out the video here:
🍀Squad Up with 4 Playable Classes
Cloudheim offers four playable classes, each bringing unique strengths to the battlefield.
- The Spellblade weaves physical attacks together with magical abilities. Cast down a crash of lightning or lay down a healing aura to turn the tide of battle!
- The Outlander favors big, heavy-hitting attacks, striking down foes to expose their weaknesses and wearing down enemy armor.
- The Treasure Hunter jumps in and out of battle with their swift movements, always on the lookout for vulnerabilities to maximize their next attack.
- The Sentinel brings both defense and utility to the field, with skills that can summon tools, buff allies, and knock around enemies to change up the playing field.
All four classes in Cloudheim allow you to experience the robust combat system in different ways. We wanted to hit a wide spread of interests and playstyles, resulting in the classes you see here.
Of course, you’re not locked into any one choice — any unlocked weapon and skill is yours to freely equip and mix around. Try switching things up: how about launching a grobb with your hammer and then blasting them with a beam?
🪩Q&A Time!
We managed to wrangle some of our team's game designers and gained some insight into what goes into designing an action game like Cloudheim. Take a look!
Why an action game?
David: I love survival-craft games and play all of them. But, most of them are set in dark worlds with a slower, more strategic approach to combat. This felt like a great opportunity to make a game in a genre I love while doing something different, and really focus on the moment-to-moment experience and how it feels to use skills in combat.
Kevin: Something we wanted to avoid was “window overload” where more of your time is spent in UI menus than really experiencing the world and its gameplay. It’s like having you and your friends show up to a party but everyone whips out their phones. The hope with Cloudheim is that we can capture the fun of exploring, looting, and crafting in a more immersive way.
What would you say makes Cloudheim’s combat unique?
Kevin: One thing we agreed very early on was to make combat the differentiating factor compared to other games in this space. With our team, we really wanted to bring more elements that are usually seen in fighting games into the project. For example, the sense of timing and flow you get from a combo in real-time — and being able to remix it as you go depending on the flow of battle. Or how addicting it is to try juggling an enemy in air as long as possible. We've spent a lot of time trying to give the player a strong sense of control over combat, and aimed to make it easy for anyone to go cook up a combo. We want each new fight to feel like you're about to create another chaotic masterpiece.
Ivan: With Cloudheim, the chaotic and physical nature of each engagement means you’re always adjusting your moves on the fly. Even if you come in with an idea of what combo you want to execute, odds are you’ll be changing it up depending on how the battle goes. Blink, and you might miss a good opportunity to juggle an airborne Grobb.
David: There’s a system in the game called Mana Burn, where you can keep casting skills even on cooldown, but at a cost. Do it too often, and you enter a state that has your movement greatly reduced, and any next attack can K.O. you. Stronger spells naturally fill up the bar faster, so there’s an added layer of decision-making that comes with this kind of risk-and-reward mechanic.
Are there any challenges in making this kind of game that people might not realize?
David: Starting out, we weren’t even sure if it was possible to make this game. Having fluid, combo-driven combat in a peer-to-peer multiplayer environment was certainly a big undertaking.
Ivan: The playable characters in this game are very powerful. Monsters can easily be tossed and juggled around. When trying to design enemies that can still feel threatening despite this, some choices might be at odds with our combat values. It’s a worthwhile challenge to find that balance!
Any gameplay tips for players?
David: There’s a lot of room to leverage the animation cancelling in our game. Try mixing different attacks together, such as throwing a thunder spear in the middle of a weapon combo — if you press fast enough, you’ll still be able to complete the attack chain.
There you have it! We hope players have as much fun with our combat system as our team has had in developing it.
🌠Community Spotlight
Can you guess which of the four classes is the most popular so far? We polled across our communities and the winner is…
🥁Drumroll, please… 🥁
…the Spellblade!
Here is a breakdown of the results:
🔨Up Next: Crafting!
Running around the world and conquering dungeons is fun, but eventually you gotta bring all that loot to your base. We’ve covered the action part of our action-craft game… you already know what’s coming up!
Our next trailer will dive into the mechanics of blacksmithing, shopkeeping, alchemy, and more.
As a teaser, here’s an NPC mid-contemplation. Which potion do you think they’ll buy?
Stay tuned!
