Welcome to devlog #5! We're finally at the point where alpha testing is right around the corner!
Character Reveal: Grayson Brannigan
Before we start the overview, we've got a couple more characters to fully reveal. These characters have been present in previous promotional materials, but we haven't gotten the chance to get to know them yet. Running up the back line is Grayson Brannigan!
Grayson takes on a friendly, older brother-like role in the story. He's sociable, easy-going, and is genuinely committed to helping out his comrades. While most of the members of the squad are present out of obligation, Grayson's here on his own accord. His ultimate goal is to reclaim his hometown from Egdel—but are his motives pure, or driven by revenge?
Grayson brings a new spin on ranged attackers by utilizing guns in combat. Guns have a range of 2-5 nodes away, more than bows' 2-3 range. However, they can only fire in cardinal directions. You'll need to position Grayson well in order to make the most of his restrictions, but doing so offers powerful damage from a safer distance.
Grayson takes sniping to the extreme with his Inner Vision, Deadeye. After activation, Grayson can increase his already massive attack range for the rest of the turn. When used correctly, he can fire upon enemies who have no hope of reaching him. Do keep in mind his limited mobility, as he tends to have less Stamina than the rest of the cast.
Character Reveal: Grover
And another one! After Grayson comes his trusty companion, Grover!
Grayson found Grover during the Mad War all those years ago. Since then, the two have become inseparable. Grover has all the lovable traits of a dog—friendliness, playfulness, loyalty, the list goes on. He's as much of a fearsome presence on the battlefield as he is a calming one off of it. Where exactly he came from isn't known, as his previous owner seems to have vanished.
Grover's gameplay is fast-paced and wild, just like him. With a large Stamina pool, he can travel far and attack many times in one turn. Grover also wields a knife during combat, which can attack from close or far range. No other weapon type allows this, so Grover is best used by weaving him in and out of enemy lines to minimize his own risks.
Several of his skills are concerned with movement and positioning. For example, he learns the Highwayman Command, which swaps the position of himself and the enemy after a clash. It's powerful to move enemies around, but do be careful not to overextend Grover, as he is quite frail.
And with that, we've revealed the new playable characters that will be playable during the Arc 1 alpha and betas! Do note that this is only a portion of the full roster, with the rest of them being made playable in future builds! Even with the current roster, you'll still be able to choose different team compositions over multiple playthroughs, further magnified by features like the Comrade Duo system and other mechanics. Having a great variety of choices is a core aspect of the game, and it's only going to get better!
Maps are Getting a Makeover!
One opportunity that running the Kickstarter gave us was the ability to get feedback from completely new people! So, we were taking notes on how people liked or disliked certain aspects of the game—with one important sticking point being presentation of the maps.
Previously, Stratagem Lost used 32x32 sprites to represent characters on the map. Pixelated graphics are a style that's rather common for many SRPGs, and it's easy to see why. It prioritizes readability, making it so that each character is distinct and easily recognized from a glance. Even games that feature fully 3D models in battle animations sometimes use them, as it's important for players to know exactly who each character is on the map.
However, for some people, this style felt weak and disjointed, especially compared to the battle animations being detailed and bombastic. Truthfully, this arises from the map sprites being some of the oldest assets in the game—long before battle animations were first conceptualized.
This image is from 2019. The game's presentation and overall atmosphere has greatly developed since then. In general, sophistication and fidelity have been improved on.
With that, we took player feedback into account and decided to take another look at the map presentation. There were several different approaches we had, but eventually we decided to upscale the sprites while keeping the general silhouettes to preserve readability.
There is a noticeable change in style that comes with it—the sprites are more detailed, even allowing Stratagem Lost's line texturing that the battle animations and visual novel portraits have. We believe that the main benefit is keeping the game's presentation consistent with itself, as now the gap between battle sprites and map sprites has been lessened.
We'll still be gathering information on how people respond to the updated presentation. For those that prefer the old style, the alpha and beta builds for Arc 1 will include a "Retro Sprites" toggle to keep the sprites that were used in the Kickstarter demo. We are open to continuing support for retro sprites—even for future characters—if there's a demand for it. However, our current plan is that the current style will be the game's default style going forward.
Alpha Testing for Arc 1 Begins Soon!
We're happy to announce that we're starting alpha testing for the Arc 1 build shortly! We're covering this over on our Kickstarter page for those who are eligible for it! What this also means is that the beta for Arc 1 is soon to arrive as well!
And with that, we've covered everything that we needed to cover before testing starts later this month! As always, feel free to contact us for any questions or concerns you have! We appreciate your support in helping us reach this point, and we're happy to take this next step for the game!
Thank you for your time,
-Smithy, Hybrid Fiction Games