Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms is the next chapter of the Heretic Kingdoms saga. The Action-RPG is produced by Games Farm and published by bitComposer Games for release in Q4 2014. Set a few years after the events of Kult: Heretic Kingdoms, players are caught up in a terrible conspiracy and propelled upon an epic journey through a world of dark fantasy. Epic battles and unexpected plot twists await those brave enough to rise to the challenge! Take control of the Devourer, a demon that swallows the souls of the dead and brings them back into the mortal realm as puppets. But is the demon their master – or their servant?
Features:
* Switching seamlessly between the shadow world and the human world provides depth in story and gameplay
* Freedom of choice allows players to dictate the course of the game
* Dynamic day and night cycles in elaborately designed locations
* Gripping story in a world filled with myths, fates and legendary creatures
* Unique party system puts players strategic thinking abilities and reaction times to the test
Last edited by prudislav on Thu, 17th Aug 2017 22:08; edited 1 time in total
Characters in Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms progress in multiple different ways as the player uses them in battle and to complete quests. New weapons and armor can change their external appearance, but their skills and attributes also develop as the character gains in experience. Although the game features a party of characters, this is not like other RPGs! Everyone shares the same body, that of the Devourer that has consumed their souls. Each hero in the party is a captive soul of this demon, and levels up independently according to how much the player embodies that puppet. Players can focus on a single character and level them up, or choose a cadre of heroes, villains – and even monsters! – to form their party. Each of the puppet souls has its own advantages and disadvantages.
Captive souls begin at level 1 and progresses towards the basic game’s level cap of 30 through the acquisition of experience points, like any class-and-level RPG. However, there is a relationship between the individual souls and the Devourer that possesses their souls: abilities that the Devourer unlocks can power up the captive souls, and certain abilities that the souls can unlock will power up the Devourer.
Attributes increase automatically upon leveling up, but can also be raised by spending points on certain abilities. There are four attributes: Strength,Dexterity,
Endurance and Willpower
So party-based AND single-hero-based at the same time? That sounds cool, sounds like something I could get into as well. Can't say a lot about the game as the trailer doesn't show much. We'll see...
Why Early Access?
“Now - Shadows are ripe for the first adventures and we are excited to bring you into the Heretic Kingdoms universe again!
The game is in an early state - as perhaps Early Access suggests - but to improve the final game we need YOU! Only your feedback can help us to make the better game for you ...
Now you have a unique chance – one and only – to join the juvenile and fast growing Heretic Kingdoms community. You can participate on the development with your critics, ideas and thoughts in the forums. We are here to listen to your feedbacks – both positive and negative – and we will carefully consider your ideas which we would perhaps miss without your input. Only YOU can make the Shadows more fun!”
How long will this game be in Early Access?
“We plan to be in Early Access for several months to make sure we will have enough time to listen to your feedback and consider it for the final version of the game.”
How is the full version planned to differ from the Early Access version?
“We will constantly update the version, so here´s what you can expect for a later version:
1. Crafting
2. Full Voice Over
3. More main heroes with their own subplots and quests
4. Additional skillsets and secondary heroes
5. Almost 50 maps and locations
6. Editor and development tools
7. More combat and more bosses
8. More quests, items, skills … more, more, more!”
What is the current state of the Early Access version?
“Here´s a short summary of all the fun you ´ll get with the first Early Access version:
1. The first chapter is fully playable with one main hero
2. Partial Voice Over, spoken by famous actor Tom Baker
3. Several hours of the gameplay, with plenty of quests, side quests, items, skills
4. More than 10 locations and maps
5. Fierce combat and fights against the first bosses”
Will the game be priced differently during and after Early Access?
“For the Early Access start, we plan to offer the game with a special start-discount for a short time, so don´t miss the chance to purchase your game and take part
in the development process of the game.”
How are you planning on involving the Community in your development process?
“You can participate on the development with your critics, ideas and thoughts in the forums. We are here to listen to your feedbacks – both positive and negative – and we will carefully consider your ideas which we would perhaps miss without your input. Only YOU can make the Shadows more fun!
Don’t miss this unique and time limited opportunity to enter the early version of Heretic Kingdoms and influence the final shape of Shadows! Those actively participating in the development might earn a place in the game credits - so do not hesitate anymore! We look forward to meet you in Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms!”
Tested it a little bit, crashed when I was about to go to the next area via a teleport so I lost most of the progress but it's just the intro area.
You start with a cutscene introducing the game and then you are for various reasons in control of a spirit/demon and from there you traverse the area until you reach three crypts where there's souls of three heroes, ranged, melee and magic (not available in early-access.) so you possess one of those souls to resurrect the character.
So now you are in control of both the demon and the "puppet" and can switch at will which also changes the world around you, spirit realm and the well normal realm or whatever it should be called, both have various things you can do in them and some restrictions and both have different sets of enemies, took a while to clear the intro area due to that since I had to do everything in both realms.
Plays similar to say Diablo 3 (Or the earlier KULT game.) you have your character, you gain XP, you use abilities and find gold and equipment so it's pretty standard so far.
Game version is some pre-alpha build so it's far from finished, options menu isn't even implemented yet and there's a number of known bugs and issues plus lots of stuff that has to be added before the game is complete.
How are the combat animations? Does it have any physics? After Diablo III awesome physics + animations its hard to go back. This could be good tho, crossing my fingers
Just tried it, it´s like diablo meets souls reaver
Graphics have a Revenant feel to it and animations are really nice Movement is a bit slower than most A-RPG, but overall the game has a lot of potential really.
I quickly tried the pre-alpha and it looked like it could be a blast! I'm not sure how I feel about the dual-character system yet, I was less-than-thrilled with it in Beyond Divinity, but we'll see how it goes...... once it's been updated a few times. The pre-alpha as it stands is just far too unoptimised to be enjoyable, chugging around the 30 mark, sometimes higher depending on the scene, and it's not smooth. The lack of options menu is a drag too and I hope they implement some kind of "auto gold pickup" as having to highlight and pickup all the gold manually is whoa
A few hours late with posting this since I was busy with other stuff but anyway, the first large update is out.
Quote:
bitComposer and Games Farm today released the first big update for the early access version of Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms. Amongst other smaller fixes the update introduces Zaar, a new playable character and the Outlands, a brand new zone with several new areas. Additionally, the developers have implemented changes based on player feedback from the early access, including controller support for Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms and much more dynamic battles within the game.
The Highlights of the Update include:
1. Based on the feedbacks from the players Games Farm has implemented
a. Controller support
b. Speed and combat dynamics
2. New content
a. New playable character – Zaar
b. New enemies – Nomads, Sebekans, Maggots, Scorpions, Porcupines, Soulravens, Revenants, Mercurial Demons, Bone Demons
c. Additional Voiceovers
d. New skills for the characters
e. Lair for Devourer
f. 6 maps, including Nomad’s camp, Outlands and associated maps around.
g. Several quests will be added; some of them won’t be possible to accomplish though (those which are related to Oasis, or later locations). Approximately up to 10 new quests.
h. Additional equipment, adjusted drop system and RPG system
i. GUI updates and improvements
j. Options updates
k. Optimizations
l. DirectX11 support
m. Ragdolls and physics updates
n. Improved drop system, looting system, respawn
Recorded a video with the new female (mage) character from yesterday´s update.
Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms gets second update
All early access players can enjoy new features today thanks to a major content update. The update brings a new playable character to the world of Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms: Evia, the Daughter of Fire. Evia is the last of the three primary main characters. She is the princess of a long-extinct kingdom and an extraordinarily mighty mage with the power to control the elements, which she uses as a weapon to destroy her enemies.
The crafting system is also now available, allowing players to craft their own weapons and armour, brew potions and create powerful rings. Additionally, due to feedback received during the early access phase, the developers have opened up the skill system, giving players more freedom when selecting their skills.
The new features at a glance
• New playable character: Evia, Daughter of Fire
• Crafting system
• Improved skill system
• Many minor improvements and new options
You could it´s a mix of Diablo and a classic RPG @ Soul Reaver. Neither too arcadey, nor too slow, being able to shift between worlds to solve puzzles and featuring different skill trees, items, etc
Unlike action rpgs, main quests involve dialogs with multiple lines. Gfx, voices and music are quite nice too -ost is sort of similar to diablo.
All in all a good balanced mix, but i´ll wait until november to play the final version.
The extensive new update for the PC action RPG Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms comes with a prologue to the game, as well as numerous new features and improvements. Players of the Early Access version can now play through a tutorial, introducing the game's basic features, that reveals the back story.
Those familiar with Kult, the predecessor to Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms, will meet an old friend: Carissa, who is joining as a new playable character. Carissa Cantrecht is a former member of the secret society Penta Nera, and a skilled melee fighter, who finishes off enemies with her sword and shield.
All new features and changes at a glance
• Introduction of prologue and tutorial
• New playable character - Carissa Cantrecht
• New abilities and effects
• Improved, challenging combat
• Configurable controls
• Improved menus and user interface
• New recipes and a menu book for crafting added
• Enemies now respawn on most maps
• RPG system has been balanced
• Additional graphical effects
• Improved performance
• Numerous bug fixes and improvements
FINAL MAJOR EARLY ACCESS UPDATE - 30/10/2014
Hi everybody,
Despite the fact that the current times are very hard for us we are very exciting that the release date is approaching fast. We release Shadows in two weeks!!!
Today we released the final major update for Shadows prior to release.
Please see the following changes:
1. Chapter 2 - Fully playable Chapter 2 until the very end.
2. New optional soul - Sebekan Slaver. Sebekans are mysterious humanoid crocodiles skilled in lightning and water magic.
They are well known across Heretic Kingdoms as undead slavers.
3. New skils and effects - plenty of improvements and changes.
4. GUI modifications - including new fonts, recipes, books and Crafting.
5. Major update to Crafting system - now you can finally truly craft. Look for the recipes out there as well as the plants and other ingredients scattered throughout the Heretic Kingdoms...
6. Major optimizations on memory and performance
7. Improved combat system, RPG system
8. New quests, enemies and maps
9. Fixed a lot of reported bugs
10. New fonts
I hope you will enjoy the update and it will fix and improve the game experience for you!
Please comment and share your thoughts below, or in other threads here! - We are really very glad to have such dedicated community.
Have fun and thank you for your continuing support!
Last edited by [= GF =] Slnecnica; 6 hours ago
Some financial problems or what do they mean with that first sentence?
Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms – Release delayed by one week
Eschborn, November 06, 2014: As bitComposer Entertainment AG announced today, the release of the action RPG Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms will be delayed by one week until November 20th, 2014. The action RPG will be released on Steam for Windows PCs at a price of €29.99 (RRP).
Turning into a powerful demon and back into a human form is a nice touch however it's one of the easiest ways to essentially double the number of gameplay hours without much effort...
So if you don't wanna miss some quests\loot \XP then you are practically forced to run through basically same areas twice. I'm not sure I like it.
So if you don't wanna miss some quests\loot \XP then you are practically forced to run through basically same areas twice. I'm not sure I like it.
Yup, that was my experience in the early access too.. and, like you, I'm not sure I like it either. I'm all for prolonging gameplay, but playing through every area twice - once as a human and once as a ghost - to see the content? No. Thank. You.
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