It’s time for a new update, this time bringing several new features to Dustgrave, which can be tried in the demo!
While the full extent of how those changes will affect the player’s agency and the gameplay will be explored with future dev diaries, today we will introduce the new features.
More Interactions
So far, you could only interact with NPCs by talking or killing them, and with objects by using them. It is now time to explore an extra dimension of interactions, to make things truly sandbox and dynamic!
Are you tired of people remembering bad things you did to them or reacting negatively when stealing from them? Say no more! With the new magic scrolls we added, you can finally alter the mind of those poor NPCs, making them forget your crimes or ignore them! You can also implant in their mind a feeling of warmth and friendliness toward you.
Are you interested in committing war crimes? Or maybe just normal, plain crimes? Well, you can now poison wells, pick locks, assassinate sleeping people, or kick that locked door that’s blocking your way!
To access those new interactions, you only need to right-click on entities you want to interact with, and see which kind of extremely unethical option better suit the current situation.
Progress Meters
What’s the purpose of having dynamic and reactive systems when you, the player, the person we want to please, have no way of actually having some feedback from the world? To solve this, we modified how quests works and added a new UI that will let you track your progress when dealing with major quests or specific events. You can now see the effect of your deeds, including the ones unrelated to active quests: any act of sabotage or retribution towards the enemy will affect the Progress Meter, and you can drive away a group of brigands just by decimating their number. Don’t let those annoying officials tell you what to do!
It is also used to track relationships with Factions and Settlements, explaining in detail what happens when reaching certain thresholds. We still have to implement the option of joining a faction, but it will soon be available!
Future Updates
Those two new major features will greatly expand the variety of content we can create for Dustgrave, with the goal of providing a truly sandbox and dynamic experience. Having more ways to complete a big quest is always good, but when those ways don’t solely rely on pre-written dialogues or quest branches, you players can enjoy an even greater freedom in choosing how you want to live your story in the game.
Here’s a list of a few things we plan to add to Dustgrave in the future:
- New Quests that don’t rely on fighting or talking, but instead take advantage of the new interactions to let you steal, sabotage, sneak, or investigate.
- Also, existing quests will have new ways of completing them. Right now, when tasked with retrieving a stolen item, you will have the chance of simply sneaking past the guards and taking the item. This kind of freedom of action is what makes a sandbox RPG truly interesting, so we will make sure to always add multiple ways of progressing through quests.
- Many more interactions will be added, allowing you to sabotage or steal supplies, pickpocket people, or change the NPCs’ behavior to your advantage.
- We plan to add dynamic events to the world, like the plague spreading to a settlement and eventually killing everyone in it if nothing is done to stop it.
- Some Major Quests will have their specular counterpart, allowing you to double-cross factions by accepting to help both sides and betraying one when the time is right. For example, it is already possible to help a faction conquer a settlement, but in the future, every time such a quest is triggered, a specular one of defense will be available to the opposing faction. With those features fully implemented, betrayal won’t only be easier, but also have an exquisite taste.
And now, the full changelog of this new build.
Major Changes
- We introduced the concept of Progress Meters. They will let you know more about what’s happening in the world and how your major quests are going, while also letting you progress in major quests without only relying on completing related minor quests.
- It is now possible to interact with entities in the world in many more ways, thanks to a menu dedicated to secondary interactions. You can finally pick locks, break open doors, cast spells on people to make them friendlier or make them forget things, and even poison stuff. Many more interactions will be added in the future.
- Added a new major quest type with several variants, revolving around rebuilding destroyed settlements or improving the economy and stability of existing ones.
- Added several new minor quests to improve the overall variety.
- Added many barks to NPCs, they will now complain about everything bad happening in their life.
- People will now lock some of their containers, and you’ll have to pick or break those locks. Which is considered a crime, so they may get a little angry if they find you.
Fixes and Improvements
- Fixed a major issue that could completely block the game during fights.
- Improved performances in levels.
- Greatly reduced saving time and save games size.
- Fixed the AI’s pathfinding, now NPCs will less likely waste their turn dashing or moving around with no purpose.
- Added many sound effects to the UI.
- Fixed the minimap in levels to be clearer and to work properly in most levels.
- Improved loading times for many levels.
- People now actually use a pen when pretending to work.
- Fixed the difficulty level not working properly.
- Fixed an issue with healing actions having wrong values.
- Academians without a body now have one, the ones that already had a body now can move it.
- Change the Money item in the inventory and all other panels to be always on top and have a much less ugly icon.
- Enemies will now disengage when they run out of Morale, without causing game-breaking issues. You can still beat them to death, though.
- The behavior of several Statuses like Bleed or Bravery has been fixed and they now do what they’re supposed to. Good boys.
- You will no longer see torches being lit without actually emitting light.
- The Root Status now has a proper visual effect.
- The Persuasion Minigame is now harder and takes relationships into account.
- Couples will now try to sleep in the same bed, even when angry at each other after a petty fight.
- NPCs will no longer refer to quests you didn’t start yet.
- It is now easier to access some settlements on the map.
- When stealing stuff, you will no longer be accused of murder.
- NPCs will no longer all share the same ethical values, but will finally enjoy the wide variety of beliefs we made for them, promoting further chaos and instability in the already ravaged continent of Yarsa.
- Added more music to the game, with many new ambient tracks and one combat track.
- When deserters are sent back to the settlement, they will now be hanged properly if their superior is not willing to forgive their actions.