Hello folks, The Baron here with some pretty exciting news. As you know, Kospy tends to hold all his cards close to his chest, so it has been quietly sizzling away in the background for some time now, but all the pieces are now moving nicely into place that it is safe for me go on record with a reveal of the future direction of Blade & Sorcery, including some long awaited information on a campaign mode!
So first up, there are some roadmap shuffles. U7 is now going to be a small boi and will be mainly just the BAS SDK - Maps, along with some possible other goodies if there is time. The nice thing about maps getting priority right now is because we will be able to enjoy modder map content while we wait on other features. This is not to say the big update has been pushed back or anything. But rather because it has some coding changes, for the internal dev record it makes sense SDK Maps gets its own update title. So timeline-wise, no changes there.But you may be wondering where is the long awaited Gravity? I will say only this -
Update 8 - The Sorcery Update. This should be a good one, folks.
After that we will be looking at some NPC love with armours for NPCs and the player (this will be a huge game changer and should add some difficulty to the NPCs), two handed weapon support for NPCS and armour storage (like the weapon storage). Following this we should be getting support for apparels in the SDK so modders will be able to add all sorts of crazy custom costumes for characters. This could be amazing for the modding scene and we could start to see some true conversion mods as weapons, armour, apparel and maps will be fully supported for modders by this point.
With those completed the main structure of the game will be constructed, so it will then be possible to move on to CAMPAIGN MODE. Can’t believe I am saying those forbidden words… This will involve buying equipment, experience leveling, skills trees and earning gold. Still to be exactly decided what it will be, but generally the idea will be competing in increasingly difficult fights with a sense of climbing a progression ladder. It won't be an RPG but hopefully the progression will be satisfying for some who find B&S too sandboxy. But don't worry, there is no plan to remove sandbox. When creating a character, you will be able to select either sandbox or campaign. Around this time we should also see multi-language support and a tutorial.
BUT WAIT THERE’S MORE.
It’s a bit of a way to go, but the final piece de resistance is something we all hoped for and it went from “not gonna happen” to “well maybe” to “yes it will”. As a little bonus thank you for the overwhelming support B&S has gotten from the community, Kospy hopes to add: Dungeons.
This will add in semi-procedural maps/dungeons to the game with improved ai that are already spawned in the maps patrolling, have a fields of view, etc…. Yes, this is real. No plans for any story mode to go with this though; it will just be random dungeon spelunking. Details of this to be expanded on at a later date of course, because we are still so far out from this. Kospy has some wild ideas about it but as is his nature he prefers to underpromise and overdeliver rather than anyone be disappointed if something he promised doesn’t make it. Doesn’t wanna pull a Molyneux or No Man’s Sky.
Lastly, thanks to the amount of people who have supported the game through Early Access thus far, the B&S team has expanded! The only coder and fulltime actual WarpFrog member is still Kospy, but the full expanded team is now Kospy as the main developer, myself as community manager and marketing (same as always), and 2 Artists for weapons, props and later level design. On the “possibly coming soon / researching the possibility” list is a sound designer, an animator, a character designer and a concept artist. Pretty huge jump… the idea being we might be able to get some all around quality bumps with specialists and with an animator we may be able to get some motion captured animations. (INSERT MEGA-DISCLAIMER HERE! Lol Very big maybe, nothing confirmed, etc, etc) And then on the community side of things we of course have our 3 ever patient moderators and 4 community helpers who all sacrifice their own time to help the B&S community. Show your appreciation to a moderator / CH today!
Everything is possible because of the people who supported the game, guys. This is the real deal Early Access in action. The community makes B&S what it is! Cheers!