For someone who is really bad at games in this style, the game is currently very accessible! Ammo was reasonable, I love the huge variations in weapons that we get to play with as we run along the first few levels. I enjoy the environments as well! I think perhaps a little more variation in what decorations are in each area and some work on the enemy AI are the only things I would want to see improved compared to where the game is currently. I am REALLY into the notes and story!
Alrighty, so the first time I played Coven it was... Kind of bad. Ammo was STUPIDLY scarce, magic felt pointless and overall the feel of the game was very lacking. However, with the 2024 demo a lot has changed. I am really glad that you have addressed these issues. Ammo is still scarce, but not to a ridiculous degree, kind of in a way that encourages you to experiment more. Magic system is far easier to use, I actually don't mind the fact that we don't get alt fires anymore because they weren't very useful in the first place. The atmosphere has been improved DRASTICALLY, I love how more gloomy it looks. But, I do have my fair share of issues that I would like to be addressed in the early access (or hell, even in another demo).
Firstly, please let us rebind keys and as well invert mouse scrolling. Not a huge issue because really the binds aren't that bad except for one being the magic switching. I disabled caps lock key because I don't care for it, but that also means I can't switch magic abilities.
Going off the magic issue, the system just doesn't work for me. For example, the book where you can view the magic abilities is bugged, as pressing right click doesn't do anything. And also, even though I bought the hanging spell, it didn't equip in the next level.
And lastly, this is perhaps the biggest current issue with coven: The movement. It sucks. I'm sorry, but this game feels terrible to move around in. I mean okay, walking around isn't too bad but literally everything else is just awful. Crouching and jumping for example. I'm going to be honest, I have no idea why my acid meter doesn't go up to 100 when I do these moves because the bobbing is... Remove it. Just remove it, don't even give us an option to keep it because I can guarantee you that every player will turn it off and for good reason. It is incredibly disorienting, and I don't think you'll lose much if you just axed it. Sliding and dashing have a fairly unique problem, and that's that I don't think the coding considers strafing. Sure, if you move directly in a straight line then it works fine, but this is an oldschool shooter so you'll rarely do that. I think you need to check up on that, just to make it feel a tad nicer.
But overall, I'm glad that Coven is heading in a far better direction, and I'm sure it'll be great. I have nothing but good luck to bestow upon you for this project.
Rebinding is coming. I was hoping to have it in for this demo but I just ran out of time, gonna give it another look next week so could have a demo update out soon with rebinding.
The book where you can view spells you have to press alt-attack which is middle mouse, I should probably have mentioned that in the tutorial totem thing but it is displayed in the controls. Right click is now magic attack, middle is alt. I guess I should change it for the book though, since then mouse 1 is magic attack. I'll add that to the list to fix.
Yeah movement could be improved for sure, my first character controller I've done so it's a bit of a learning process. As for the bobbing, I'll add a toggle. Tbf so far you're the only one who's mentioned it so 🤷♂️ a toggle will do
Sliding can only be done forward right now, dashing on the other hand can be done in any direction.
Thanks for playing and thank you for the feedback.
Ну что сказать , и немного хекстена и немного еретика и немного руны с его боевкой. играл в эту игру когда все локи были снежными. Пугает меня это многообразие и тебе заклинания и тебе пушки и деш и топор и щитом чтобы пофехтовать можно было бы. Но одно сказать точно могу , VR пошел на пользу и видно что локации стали не такими сложными как в прошлых обновления. Спасибо за игру, но я может уже стар для такого типа игра.
Hi! I was wondering if you have any plans to add something like map editor/tools to work with? I would love to create custom content for the game. Thanks.
Unfortunately it's not in my plans for now. To be quite honest I think it's above my skill level haha, this is my first proper full game and I don't know where I'd begin with making a map editor or mod tools. That may change in the future of course but for now there's no plans.
Hey, I already have someone making the music which is present in the demo. I appreciate the offer but maybe check in with the games you're commenting to see if they have music already? Not trying to be mean but it comes across as you not really caring about the project you're asking to work on.
Some games we worked on had different music composers. That’s why we were asking. We do care about the games, and we always contact projects that look interesting to us. There are a lot of beautiful games, including yours, that we like and would like to work on. But It's alright, we apologize for bothering you. Thank you for your response and I wish you the best of luck with your game!
Apologies, I just get a lot of messages regarding adding music to the game and it seems like most haven't even really bothered to look at the project other than screenshots.
had a great time playing 2 episode. so fun to interact with all the stuff(especially nailing heads to the wall with crossbows :)) can't wait for the full version!
Just played it. Was stuck at 2nd level with silver door/silver key, although I thought its in my inventory it just wouldn't insert in the door. Then I went around some more and found it. I love the aestheticcs. Great job! Smashing through the enemies I really had to laugh it off cause of the great gore and ambience. Just also thought the bullet time was more anticlimatic than useful. I was looking for your Discord but coudlnt find it! Anyways, wishlisted, followed, and sure buy!
Hey, glad you had fun :) Thank you so much for the wishlist. Yeah I don't have a discord for the game, I honestly just don't have the time to run one. What with working full time then developing Coven in my spare time. I post regularly on twitter with updates https://twitter.com/GatorShins if that's any use
just wondering. It's still running in a modern engine, with a lot more stuff going on even though visually it's simplistic. I can make a 32 bit build, tho unsure if it will just work without issue. It's nice to know specs of people who will be wanting to play.
After playing it in entirety, I definitely wanna see this one as a full fledged game, the axe was so damn good that I didn't even need the sword or the guns at all, full sigma activity, and it hits the spot on that unreal front, the similarities to to the '98 title, female protagonist, story explained through found texts, A+ imo.
Releases into early access this halloween, will be the first full episode set in the 1600's. Thank you for playing, glad you enjoyed it :) I post updates regularly on twittter: https://twitter.com/GatorShins
Ayeee, so the second episode won't be too far in the future from the first, maybe 30 years or so but in a different place. Third episode will be in a vastly different time and place.
I loved the demo and was surprised that I could shoot throwing axes and break doors while sprinting. It's good that you didn't add any tutorials. It's better to experience those details and find them out yourself. You can add features like stunning the enemies after you sprint past them, or being able to play shield only, just like the type of enemy with only a shield. Also, you might want to add some text to the books lying around. Perhaps some Bible quotes, or better yet, your own mythology. It'd make the world more immersive if we could read the books.
By the way, I am an official Turkish translator. I can help out with the localization, if you want to add Turkish.
Hey, sorry I thought I'd replied to this but I guess I typed it out then just didn't send -_-
Yeah, I might add some descriptions to certain books lying around for more world building that'd be good. I'll keep you in mind when I get to localization :) thank you
Just finished playing the Steam demo, awesome work!
To start, the atmosphere is amazing. The story and general environments are very convincing and playing as a woman believed to be a witch is very unique. I loved the weapon arsenal and the mana abilities, they all feel well-balanced and "juicy" enough in mechanics, animation, and sound design. It did take me some time to get used to the alt-fires but once I did everything went great.
A few small flaws (blemishes really, nothing major) were the music felt a bit repetitive at times. Listening to the same song for 45 minutes was a bit tiring but the crossfade of the electric guitar helped a lot, so kudos for that. Also, really minor but native ultrawide resolution (2560x1080) doesn't work properly, so I'd advise either disabling it completely or adjusting your UI canvases to scale accordingly.
Keep up the good work, can't wait for the full release!
In the EA release there will be a different song per level of course, unfortunately didn't have the time nor money to get another song made for the second level in the demo.
Hmmm, I tested standard ultra-wide aspect ratio in the editor the UI scales to it properly but the effects don't, like the vignettes for picking up items or when you dash. I'll take a look into it. I don't have a ultra-wide monitor so I kinda just rely on setting the custom res in unity, guess it might not scale properly :\
Again, thanks for playing! And thank you for the feedback <3
Thanks for sharing the RD2022 demo! Really love what you are doing, love the atmosphere, the story, the progress you've made from the first demo and also that you're so responsive to people.
Best of luck, this game + Incision + Cultic are the next big three retros to look forward to with Wrath, Dread Templar, Graven and HROT soon coming out of EA! Please keep it up!
I've seen many lets plays and want to experience this for myself, but I have a bug - after the intro when I wake up in a cave - the screen sides blink in and out of view changing the aspect ratio and FOV. I've tried launching in different resolutions, FOV, PSX mode, different monitor and changing nvidia panel not to scale anything etc. Nothing helps.
Otherwise the game is already on a wishlist on Steam!
It seems to have gone away on its own without me changing much. Not sure what it could have been but yes, it felt like it was switching PSX mode constantly.
probé la primera demo y simplemente me ha encantado la ambientación, sin duda alguna a los amantes de los shooters clásicos nos va a atraer mucho este juego. quizás me perdí un poco en algún momento pero por que ignoraba que se podían abrir las puertas. tocará probar la demo de halloween.
So after playing both the origonal demo, and now the Halloween demo about a hundred times. I would have to say this is the greatest retro shooter I have ever played. It feels like the perfect homage to Blood and Hexen. The concept alone using the Salem Witch Trials as a place for this shooter is just perfect. Most replica shooters still feel modern in some ways that can sometimes either hinder the experience or make it more akin to modern shooters. This feels fluid and congruent with every old school shooter with its own modernizations.
I think my only comments would be that I kinda miss the vomit I am not gonna lie, but I kinda feel like stylistically its better without it, the green bile on the floor did tend to be distracting when you were trying to just look at the mess you made of five or so villagers. But it was an incredibly fun and inventive attack from the origional demo. If there were like cannibal runs or no eating runs or even a morality system of sorts it would have been cool to see how the health benefit and vomit attack played into that mentality. But I dont know if that would overcomplicate the very streamlined experience as it is.
I like all the weapon models a lot, but I feel like the look of the standard shotgun just feels slightly out of place I am not sure why. But I still love it nonethless. Also I have not found every secret in this new demo yet I am still struggling with a few, so I assume the sword is tied to one of them and I just have to get there. But the only other melee weapon I have not seen yet is the pitchfork. Again that could be tied to a secret and I just need to find it, but I just wanted to say it was nice seeing multiple options in the origional demo.
I also wanted to say I love all the new little details added to this demo, (the blood dripping off the axe in the origional is probally one of the greatest details I have seen in a game in years) opening chests with the axe or a gun, shooting off the knights armor, beheading enemies, or taking out their legs and watching them crawl away from the fight. All of those are absolutley amazing it feels just like in the origional Duke Nukem when you would find those details like being able to flush the toilet. Just another litle thing to make the game feel immersive. Even being able to change your hud and gun postion is huge to me, more games need that kind of choice and its kinda skipped out on.
But the new enemies alone are amazing, I love the knights they are so great. But I kinda also miss the zombies, but again that whole green vs red splatter effect thing kinda made sense style wise. But they really reminded me of Thief where you could find the zombies in the mines it was a cool little touch. I tried getting the zombies to attack the villagers and even though it did not work it was nice being able to try and think creativley in a game and not feel like you would get punished for it.
All in all I have rambled way to long but if you read this I hope you understand you have made a fantastic game and it has so much potetional and has been so much fun to play. I wasant around for big titles like Doom and Blood so being able to play this was very excting. I cant wait to see more.
Hey, thank you so much for the detailed feedback. I'm glad you enjoyed the demo's so much, it really makes all this work feel worth it.
So I removed the vomit as it wasn't really used by many people who I watched play the original demo. I was in the process of adding a parry when using the shield which would serve the same purpose to stagger enemies but it wasn't done in time to get the demo out for halloween. I'm going to revist the whole vomit mechanic though and see if I can find a good use for it, since it does make eating enemies more worthwhile when above full health. Maybe some kind of one shot big ol' vomit when the gut meter is full, so it's more like a special attack that just melts all enemies.
Yeah the normal shotgun is a bit out there, seems a bit out of place. I was just trying to make something a little different, the revolver shotgun. As it's not really seen much in any game.
In the latest demo I removed the sword + pitchfork as I made some changes to the way picking up interactables worked, again due to time constraints I didn't add them back in. They will be back though, with their own animations. As previously they used the same animations as the axe.
I'm glad you enjoyed all the little details. I feel it's what makes a game, I loved all those small details in old games myself so I get a lot of enjoyment out of adding them. There will be plenty more as well as I progress further with the game. So keep an eye out!
The zombies may make a return in the early access version of the game, they just felt a bit out of place in this first level I think. Also yeah, they don't fight with the villager enemies which I felt kinda limited them. It will be something I explore in the coming months to see if I can get infighting working in a fun way. I'm also currently adding a bunch of new villager enemy types. A pikeman who wields a pike + a shield, an axe throwing villager who will circle the player at a certain distance, as well as making armored villagers more like captains, so when they're killed there's a chance some of the weaker enemies may try to flee/hide. Just a bit of variation to make the combat more engaging and varied. Also going to add npc's who aren't violent, so you can choose to kill them or spare them depending who you feel. Maybe some livestock as well, for extra health and to stick it to the villagers who wronged.
Again, thank you so much for the feedback and praise. It really does mean a lot to me. It keeps me going! <3
Loved the demo! Can’t wait for the whole release! It feels weird shooting my shot publicly, but there’s no private messages here, so if you need or want help getting a trailer for your Steam page, I would be honored to be considered. I make trailers for small indie teams for small indie prices. Here’s my website. Shoot me an email if you’re interested, and have a great day!
I already really liked the area in my first playthrough but after having played this version of the stage, comparatively speaking, this is a more fun design and so much more visually impressive than the last demo.
I like the new enemy types and landing headshots with the crossbow is my new favorite thing, well, only because the super shotgun runs out of ammo so fast but that's mostly my fault.
I haven't been keeping up to date with this as much as I'd like to but I hope everything is going well with development and I wish you and Phil the best.
Sick video! I noticed you had a bit of a bad time with the bunch of enemies after the shack, dashing around more helps. Also the axe does damage to different parts of the enemies, so if you hit them in the head you get a chance of a nice decapitation! Excited to see the new video.
Hey Ethan, enjoyed your demo and just wanted to let you know I'd included my thoughts in the attached video if you wanted to check out my feedback (games are marked by chapter if you need to jump to yours)!
This was an awesome game to play! I hope you continue to work on this. also I kept trying to break open those coffins to see if I'll get an Easter egg. I tried hitting every one of them.
Thank you :) I'm continuing to work on it, I post dev updates on twitter quite often. You could break coffins in an earlier version of the game but it seemed to distract too many people. I may add it again though and make certain ones drop items.
Great game! Atmosphere, movement, moment-to-moment gameplay and overall design are absolutely great. Can't wait to hear more about this project since I want to play more!
Really awesome little demo! This, Incision and Cultic are the future of the retro FPS genre. Awesome atmosphere, really cryptic, love the fact that you can light lamps to progress, eat corpses for health and puke on enemies. Really novel, evil, ugly, dark and all-round general good stuff! Nice weapons too.
Only criticism: the voice acting. I know it's question of taste, but the voices of the enemies sound pretty terrible.
Otherwise, good shit! Really looking forward to future releases!
Glad you enjoyed it so much! The enemy voice acting is just placeholder, I recorded them at like 3am pretty quietly just to have something in the game. In the full release they will be much better :)
Just finished the demo, and I really liked it!! I'm a huge fan of Blood, so seeing this game makes me really excited to follow its development. Hard to explain, but the game just felt really nice and cozy.
What angle do you think you're going to take the game in the future? Maybe go for a really campy vibe, something a little serious, or somewhere in between? I can see mechanics like eating and vomiting getting really fun and sillier as development goes on... vomit based puzzles would be a joy to see lol
Glad you liked it so much! :D Yeah, Blood has been a big inspiration for sure. Generally the tone will be serious but with the odd bit of humour here and there. If you want to keep up to date on development I post stuff now and again on my twitter.
This as potencial, I like the gore and the time period. I hope that the gun sounds get better in the future because now they sound a bit weak and it would also be cool when I shoot a shotgun shell at point-blank the enemy model gets always bloody (because sometimes they dont get bloody).
Overall I'm looking forward to see this evolve and become a great game!
Played the demo and was very impressed! I agree that the torch puzzle (part 2 for me) could be a little more clear but I see it was already addressed. My only other complaint was that the axe felt a bit finnicky with its short range. That really could be me playing poorly and it was helped a lot with the time mechanic so it's not a big issue. I had a blast and I really wanted to keep playing after level 1!
Glad you enjoyed it! The range on the axe is quite far, it helps to block and also circle strafe of back peddle. At least when playing on hard difficulty.
My god your game is the best indie fps (aside from Dusk) I have ever played. You definitely *spoilers* earned the highest grade possible in my review video. Do you have a patreon or kickstarter because I'd love to donate
Hey :) I'm glad you enjoyed it so much, it means a lot to me. I don't have a patreon or kickstarter unfortunately. It is possible to donate by paying (what you want) for the demo. Don't feel you have to though of course. Going to give your video a watch now :)
Well done! I enjoyed Coven, there is some stuff I think it's worth mentioning.
First of all, I loved the weapon variety, I think I've discovered all the available weapons for the demo (Axe, fork, dual pistols, shotgun, xbow, grenades). All the weapons were great but I really liked the xbow, specially because of the alt shot. I think you're going to address this later but I feel the grenade is quite cheap in terms of VFX (loved the resting hand pose though).
The visuals were great, I liked that the environment is breakable and that you can pick up some stuff like torches and crates.
At some particular situations I found myself running around without knowing what to do, specially the torch puzzles parts, maybe you can find a way to highlight the task the player must do.
I liked how you can slow down time (even though I didn't use this too much, I think it will be useful on later stages). Eating stuff is disgusting and I love it.
Overall this is a good demo, I really liked it. Keep it up!
Hey :) thanks for playing the demo. I'm glad you enjoyed it. The feedback is super appreciated, I'm going to fix those things you mentioned. Most specifically the torch puzzle part, it needs to be more clear for sure.
Ok, first of all, I'd like to say that this game is great! So far I haven't come across any issues. The weapons are mostly satisfying, though it's kinda easy to run out of ammo (around the big tree I ran out of shotgun and almost ran out of pistol ammo). The melee weapons feel a bit weak though. Something I'd add is more ambushes, John Romero style, you know - really dicky ones - because on highest difficulty, the game still felt too easy, I only died once and that was because I wasn't paying attention. Otherwise, I really liked the visual storytelling, the notes, the health mechanics, the easter eggs. Keep it up! This game has great potential!
Awesome game my friend and my viewers really liked it. The game ran fine for me and I didn't experience any issues/bugs. Yes it was difficult but I did make it through the level :P I think I played an earlier version so things may be different now. I had some great reaction in this one and I would recommend it to others. I play tons of horror games and this one was another fun one. Hope you enjoy my video :)
Glad you enjoyed it :) Yeah the new update has a couple of difficulty options, one of which is a lot less difficult for people who aren't so accustomed to old school shooting games. Added your video to my watch list so I'll give it a watch later :) thanks for playing
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For someone who is really bad at games in this style, the game is currently very accessible! Ammo was reasonable, I love the huge variations in weapons that we get to play with as we run along the first few levels. I enjoy the environments as well! I think perhaps a little more variation in what decorations are in each area and some work on the enemy AI are the only things I would want to see improved compared to where the game is currently. I am REALLY into the notes and story!
Interesting evolution. Congratulations. Here, my video. In the comments I left old alpha version 0.31 videos in my other channel:
Alrighty, so the first time I played Coven it was... Kind of bad. Ammo was STUPIDLY scarce, magic felt pointless and overall the feel of the game was very lacking. However, with the 2024 demo a lot has changed. I am really glad that you have addressed these issues. Ammo is still scarce, but not to a ridiculous degree, kind of in a way that encourages you to experiment more. Magic system is far easier to use, I actually don't mind the fact that we don't get alt fires anymore because they weren't very useful in the first place. The atmosphere has been improved DRASTICALLY, I love how more gloomy it looks. But, I do have my fair share of issues that I would like to be addressed in the early access (or hell, even in another demo).
Firstly, please let us rebind keys and as well invert mouse scrolling. Not a huge issue because really the binds aren't that bad except for one being the magic switching. I disabled caps lock key because I don't care for it, but that also means I can't switch magic abilities.
Going off the magic issue, the system just doesn't work for me. For example, the book where you can view the magic abilities is bugged, as pressing right click doesn't do anything. And also, even though I bought the hanging spell, it didn't equip in the next level.
And lastly, this is perhaps the biggest current issue with coven: The movement. It sucks. I'm sorry, but this game feels terrible to move around in. I mean okay, walking around isn't too bad but literally everything else is just awful. Crouching and jumping for example. I'm going to be honest, I have no idea why my acid meter doesn't go up to 100 when I do these moves because the bobbing is... Remove it. Just remove it, don't even give us an option to keep it because I can guarantee you that every player will turn it off and for good reason. It is incredibly disorienting, and I don't think you'll lose much if you just axed it. Sliding and dashing have a fairly unique problem, and that's that I don't think the coding considers strafing. Sure, if you move directly in a straight line then it works fine, but this is an oldschool shooter so you'll rarely do that. I think you need to check up on that, just to make it feel a tad nicer.
But overall, I'm glad that Coven is heading in a far better direction, and I'm sure it'll be great. I have nothing but good luck to bestow upon you for this project.
Rebinding is coming. I was hoping to have it in for this demo but I just ran out of time, gonna give it another look next week so could have a demo update out soon with rebinding.
The book where you can view spells you have to press alt-attack which is middle mouse, I should probably have mentioned that in the tutorial totem thing but it is displayed in the controls. Right click is now magic attack, middle is alt. I guess I should change it for the book though, since then mouse 1 is magic attack. I'll add that to the list to fix.
Yeah movement could be improved for sure, my first character controller I've done so it's a bit of a learning process. As for the bobbing, I'll add a toggle. Tbf so far you're the only one who's mentioned it so 🤷♂️ a toggle will do
Sliding can only be done forward right now, dashing on the other hand can be done in any direction.
Thanks for playing and thank you for the feedback.
It’s pretty rad!
YOU'RE RAD!
Ну что сказать , и немного хекстена и немного еретика и немного руны с его боевкой. играл в эту игру когда все локи были снежными. Пугает меня это многообразие и тебе заклинания и тебе пушки и деш и топор и щитом чтобы пофехтовать можно было бы. Но одно сказать точно могу , VR пошел на пользу и видно что локации стали не такими сложными как в прошлых обновления. Спасибо за игру, но я может уже стар для такого типа игра.
Phenomenal game, been playing it nonstop lately ♥
yooo, thank you :) glad you're enjoying it so much
Hi! I was wondering if you have any plans to add something like map editor/tools to work with? I would love to create custom content for the game. Thanks.
Unfortunately it's not in my plans for now. To be quite honest I think it's above my skill level haha, this is my first proper full game and I don't know where I'd begin with making a map editor or mod tools. That may change in the future of course but for now there's no plans.
Hello! Nice game!
Are you interested in some cooperation? We're game music composers
Hey, I already have someone making the music which is present in the demo. I appreciate the offer but maybe check in with the games you're commenting to see if they have music already? Not trying to be mean but it comes across as you not really caring about the project you're asking to work on.
Some games we worked on had different music composers. That’s why we were asking. We do care about the games, and we always contact projects that look interesting to us. There are a lot of beautiful games, including yours, that we like and would like to work on. But It's alright, we apologize for bothering you. Thank you for your response and I wish you the best of luck with your game!
Apologies, I just get a lot of messages regarding adding music to the game and it seems like most haven't even really bothered to look at the project other than screenshots.
That was really fun
Hey, thanks for playing :D towards the end when you were trying to bring up the spell select you must have pressed X, it toggles walk/run.
had a great time playing 2 episode. so fun to interact with all the stuff(especially nailing heads to the wall with crossbows :)) can't wait for the full version!
Hey :) thank you for playing. I'm glad you enjoyed the demo so much. Keep an eye out, there will be an update soon regarding the demo :D
Just played it. Was stuck at 2nd level with silver door/silver key, although I thought its in my inventory it just wouldn't insert in the door. Then I went around some more and found it. I love the aestheticcs. Great job! Smashing through the enemies I really had to laugh it off cause of the great gore and ambience. Just also thought the bullet time was more anticlimatic than useful. I was looking for your Discord but coudlnt find it! Anyways, wishlisted, followed, and sure buy!
Hey, glad you had fun :) Thank you so much for the wishlist. Yeah I don't have a discord for the game, I honestly just don't have the time to run one. What with working full time then developing Coven in my spare time. I post regularly on twitter with updates https://twitter.com/GatorShins if that's any use
what are your specs?
just wondering. It's still running in a modern engine, with a lot more stuff going on even though visually it's simplistic. I can make a 32 bit build, tho unsure if it will just work without issue. It's nice to know specs of people who will be wanting to play.
After playing it in entirety, I definitely wanna see this one as a full fledged game, the axe was so damn good that I didn't even need the sword or the guns at all, full sigma activity, and it hits the spot on that unreal front, the similarities to to the '98 title, female protagonist, story explained through found texts, A+ imo.
Releases into early access this halloween, will be the first full episode set in the 1600's. Thank you for playing, glad you enjoyed it :) I post updates regularly on twittter: https://twitter.com/GatorShins
so time jumps... damn, I like the sound of this one.
Ayeee, so the second episode won't be too far in the future from the first, maybe 30 years or so but in a different place. Third episode will be in a vastly different time and place.
Assuming this demo isn't officially the first episode yet? Because the ending.... Definitely didn't make sense in a traditional manner of an ending.
No the demo is 2 levels from the first episode. The first episode will be around 8 - 10 levels long.
When I saw Timesplitters and Unreal, say no more lmao.
Hi Ethan,
I loved the demo and was surprised that I could shoot throwing axes and break doors while sprinting. It's good that you didn't add any tutorials. It's better to experience those details and find them out yourself. You can add features like stunning the enemies after you sprint past them, or being able to play shield only, just like the type of enemy with only a shield. Also, you might want to add some text to the books lying around. Perhaps some Bible quotes, or better yet, your own mythology. It'd make the world more immersive if we could read the books.
By the way, I am an official Turkish translator. I can help out with the localization, if you want to add Turkish.
Best.
Hey, sorry I thought I'd replied to this but I guess I typed it out then just didn't send -_-
Yeah, I might add some descriptions to certain books lying around for more world building that'd be good. I'll keep you in mind when I get to localization :) thank you
Just finished playing the Steam demo, awesome work!
To start, the atmosphere is amazing. The story and general environments are very convincing and playing as a woman believed to be a witch is very unique. I loved the weapon arsenal and the mana abilities, they all feel well-balanced and "juicy" enough in mechanics, animation, and sound design. It did take me some time to get used to the alt-fires but once I did everything went great.
A few small flaws (blemishes really, nothing major) were the music felt a bit repetitive at times. Listening to the same song for 45 minutes was a bit tiring but the crossfade of the electric guitar helped a lot, so kudos for that. Also, really minor but native ultrawide resolution (2560x1080) doesn't work properly, so I'd advise either disabling it completely or adjusting your UI canvases to scale accordingly.
Keep up the good work, can't wait for the full release!
Hey, thanks for playing! Glad you enjoyed it.
In the EA release there will be a different song per level of course, unfortunately didn't have the time nor money to get another song made for the second level in the demo.
Hmmm, I tested standard ultra-wide aspect ratio in the editor the UI scales to it properly but the effects don't, like the vignettes for picking up items or when you dash. I'll take a look into it. I don't have a ultra-wide monitor so I kinda just rely on setting the custom res in unity, guess it might not scale properly :\
Again, thanks for playing! And thank you for the feedback <3
Thanks for sharing the RD2022 demo! Really love what you are doing, love the atmosphere, the story, the progress you've made from the first demo and also that you're so responsive to people.
Best of luck, this game + Incision + Cultic are the next big three retros to look forward to with Wrath, Dread Templar, Graven and HROT soon coming out of EA! Please keep it up!
xD
Thank you :) glad you enjoyed the demo. To be put alongside Cultic + Incision is amazing, they both look fantastic.
Hello!
I've seen many lets plays and want to experience this for myself, but I have a bug - after the intro when I wake up in a cave - the screen sides blink in and out of view changing the aspect ratio and FOV. I've tried launching in different resolutions, FOV, PSX mode, different monitor and changing nvidia panel not to scale anything etc. Nothing helps.
Otherwise the game is already on a wishlist on Steam!
Regards,
P
Hmmm, sounds like PSX mode is being set over and over. Is there an issue with the P key on your keyboard?
No issues, perhaps some other input device?
I didn't know about P shortcut.
I will disconnect everything and try again! Thank you!
Yeah maybe a controller or joystick, left d-pad on the controller sets PSX mode also, could be another device using this axis.
Did you manage to get this working?
It seems to have gone away on its own without me changing much. Not sure what it could have been but yes, it felt like it was switching PSX mode constantly.
Pretty strange, I've added it to the buglist and will keep an eye out if anyone else experiences it.
probé la primera demo y simplemente me ha encantado la ambientación, sin duda alguna a los amantes de los shooters clásicos nos va a atraer mucho este juego. quizás me perdí un poco en algún momento pero por que ignoraba que se podían abrir las puertas. tocará probar la demo de halloween.
So after playing both the origonal demo, and now the Halloween demo about a hundred times. I would have to say this is the greatest retro shooter I have ever played. It feels like the perfect homage to Blood and Hexen. The concept alone using the Salem Witch Trials as a place for this shooter is just perfect. Most replica shooters still feel modern in some ways that can sometimes either hinder the experience or make it more akin to modern shooters. This feels fluid and congruent with every old school shooter with its own modernizations.
I think my only comments would be that I kinda miss the vomit I am not gonna lie, but I kinda feel like stylistically its better without it, the green bile on the floor did tend to be distracting when you were trying to just look at the mess you made of five or so villagers. But it was an incredibly fun and inventive attack from the origional demo. If there were like cannibal runs or no eating runs or even a morality system of sorts it would have been cool to see how the health benefit and vomit attack played into that mentality. But I dont know if that would overcomplicate the very streamlined experience as it is.
I like all the weapon models a lot, but I feel like the look of the standard shotgun just feels slightly out of place I am not sure why. But I still love it nonethless. Also I have not found every secret in this new demo yet I am still struggling with a few, so I assume the sword is tied to one of them and I just have to get there. But the only other melee weapon I have not seen yet is the pitchfork. Again that could be tied to a secret and I just need to find it, but I just wanted to say it was nice seeing multiple options in the origional demo.
I also wanted to say I love all the new little details added to this demo, (the blood dripping off the axe in the origional is probally one of the greatest details I have seen in a game in years) opening chests with the axe or a gun, shooting off the knights armor, beheading enemies, or taking out their legs and watching them crawl away from the fight. All of those are absolutley amazing it feels just like in the origional Duke Nukem when you would find those details like being able to flush the toilet. Just another litle thing to make the game feel immersive. Even being able to change your hud and gun postion is huge to me, more games need that kind of choice and its kinda skipped out on.
But the new enemies alone are amazing, I love the knights they are so great. But I kinda also miss the zombies, but again that whole green vs red splatter effect thing kinda made sense style wise. But they really reminded me of Thief where you could find the zombies in the mines it was a cool little touch. I tried getting the zombies to attack the villagers and even though it did not work it was nice being able to try and think creativley in a game and not feel like you would get punished for it.
All in all I have rambled way to long but if you read this I hope you understand you have made a fantastic game and it has so much potetional and has been so much fun to play. I wasant around for big titles like Doom and Blood so being able to play this was very excting. I cant wait to see more.
(Also if theres any typos I am sorry in advance.)
Hey, thank you so much for the detailed feedback. I'm glad you enjoyed the demo's so much, it really makes all this work feel worth it.
So I removed the vomit as it wasn't really used by many people who I watched play the original demo. I was in the process of adding a parry when using the shield which would serve the same purpose to stagger enemies but it wasn't done in time to get the demo out for halloween. I'm going to revist the whole vomit mechanic though and see if I can find a good use for it, since it does make eating enemies more worthwhile when above full health. Maybe some kind of one shot big ol' vomit when the gut meter is full, so it's more like a special attack that just melts all enemies.
Yeah the normal shotgun is a bit out there, seems a bit out of place. I was just trying to make something a little different, the revolver shotgun. As it's not really seen much in any game.
In the latest demo I removed the sword + pitchfork as I made some changes to the way picking up interactables worked, again due to time constraints I didn't add them back in. They will be back though, with their own animations. As previously they used the same animations as the axe.
I'm glad you enjoyed all the little details. I feel it's what makes a game, I loved all those small details in old games myself so I get a lot of enjoyment out of adding them. There will be plenty more as well as I progress further with the game. So keep an eye out!
The zombies may make a return in the early access version of the game, they just felt a bit out of place in this first level I think. Also yeah, they don't fight with the villager enemies which I felt kinda limited them. It will be something I explore in the coming months to see if I can get infighting working in a fun way. I'm also currently adding a bunch of new villager enemy types. A pikeman who wields a pike + a shield, an axe throwing villager who will circle the player at a certain distance, as well as making armored villagers more like captains, so when they're killed there's a chance some of the weaker enemies may try to flee/hide. Just a bit of variation to make the combat more engaging and varied. Also going to add npc's who aren't violent, so you can choose to kill them or spare them depending who you feel. Maybe some livestock as well, for extra health and to stick it to the villagers who wronged.
Again, thank you so much for the feedback and praise. It really does mean a lot to me. It keeps me going! <3
i love it, cant wait to see the final project
glad you enjoyed it :)
Loved the demo! Can’t wait for the whole release! It feels weird shooting my shot publicly, but there’s no private messages here, so if you need or want help getting a trailer for your Steam page, I would be honored to be considered. I make trailers for small indie teams for small indie prices. Here’s my website. Shoot me an email if you’re interested, and have a great day!
TheChrisLohrVG.com
Yup, I still love this game.
I already really liked the area in my first playthrough but after having played this version of the stage, comparatively speaking, this is a more fun design and so much more visually impressive than the last demo.
I like the new enemy types and landing headshots with the crossbow is my new favorite thing, well, only because the super shotgun runs out of ammo so fast but that's mostly my fault.
I haven't been keeping up to date with this as much as I'd like to but I hope everything is going well with development and I wish you and Phil the best.
Thanks for making games!
Thanks for playing it dude. Video was a blast to watch. And aye development is going good! Excited to make more levels, enemies and weapons!
It says its an extractable file but its not a zip folder how do i run this?
oh, it's a 7z file, which is a 7zip folder. I'll upload a normal zip instead. Be up in a few minutes.
There you go. I added a normal zip folder. Sorry about that.
The new demo is challenging but good and the dash came in very useful at the end section
Glad you enjoyed it :)
Great game so far, have been looking forward to this update! Here are a short gameplay vid :) Will make a longer soon.
Sick video! I noticed you had a bit of a bad time with the bunch of enemies after the shack, dashing around more helps. Also the axe does damage to different parts of the enemies, so if you hit them in the head you get a chance of a nice decapitation! Excited to see the new video.
This was an awesome game to play! I hope you continue to work on this. also I kept trying to break open those coffins to see if I'll get an Easter egg. I tried hitting every one of them.
Thank you :) I'm continuing to work on it, I post dev updates on twitter quite often. You could break coffins in an earlier version of the game but it seemed to distract too many people. I may add it again though and make certain ones drop items.
Nice!
Great game! Atmosphere, movement, moment-to-moment gameplay and overall design are absolutely great. Can't wait to hear more about this project since I want to play more!
Yooo, thanks! Glad you enjoyed it so much <3
Really awesome little demo! This, Incision and Cultic are the future of the retro FPS genre. Awesome atmosphere, really cryptic, love the fact that you can light lamps to progress, eat corpses for health and puke on enemies. Really novel, evil, ugly, dark and all-round general good stuff! Nice weapons too.
Only criticism: the voice acting. I know it's question of taste, but the voices of the enemies sound pretty terrible.
Otherwise, good shit! Really looking forward to future releases!
Glad you enjoyed it so much! The enemy voice acting is just placeholder, I recorded them at like 3am pretty quietly just to have something in the game. In the full release they will be much better :)
Just finished the demo, and I really liked it!! I'm a huge fan of Blood, so seeing this game makes me really excited to follow its development. Hard to explain, but the game just felt really nice and cozy.
What angle do you think you're going to take the game in the future? Maybe go for a really campy vibe, something a little serious, or somewhere in between? I can see mechanics like eating and vomiting getting really fun and sillier as development goes on... vomit based puzzles would be a joy to see lol
Can't wait to see where it goes from here!
Glad you liked it so much! :D Yeah, Blood has been a big inspiration for sure. Generally the tone will be serious but with the odd bit of humour here and there. If you want to keep up to date on development I post stuff now and again on my twitter.
Cool man! I wish you the best of luck going forward <3
This as potencial, I like the gore and the time period. I hope that the gun sounds get better in the future because now they sound a bit weak and it would also be cool when I shoot a shotgun shell at point-blank the enemy model gets always bloody (because sometimes they dont get bloody).
Overall I'm looking forward to see this evolve and become a great game!
Things will improve over time for sure. As for the enemy not getting bloody, that's a bug! I'll be fixing it soon :)
Played the demo and was very impressed! I agree that the torch puzzle (part 2 for me) could be a little more clear but I see it was already addressed. My only other complaint was that the axe felt a bit finnicky with its short range. That really could be me playing poorly and it was helped a lot with the time mechanic so it's not a big issue. I had a blast and I really wanted to keep playing after level 1!
Glad you enjoyed it! The range on the axe is quite far, it helps to block and also circle strafe of back peddle. At least when playing on hard difficulty.
My god your game is the best indie fps (aside from Dusk) I have ever played. You definitely *spoilers* earned the highest grade possible in my review video. Do you have a patreon or kickstarter because I'd love to donate
Hey :) I'm glad you enjoyed it so much, it means a lot to me. I don't have a patreon or kickstarter unfortunately. It is possible to donate by paying (what you want) for the demo. Don't feel you have to though of course. Going to give your video a watch now :)
Well done! I enjoyed Coven, there is some stuff I think it's worth mentioning.
First of all, I loved the weapon variety, I think I've discovered all the available weapons for the demo (Axe, fork, dual pistols, shotgun, xbow, grenades). All the weapons were great but I really liked the xbow, specially because of the alt shot. I think you're going to address this later but I feel the grenade is quite cheap in terms of VFX (loved the resting hand pose though).
The visuals were great, I liked that the environment is breakable and that you can pick up some stuff like torches and crates.
At some particular situations I found myself running around without knowing what to do, specially the torch puzzles parts, maybe you can find a way to highlight the task the player must do.
I liked how you can slow down time (even though I didn't use this too much, I think it will be useful on later stages). Eating stuff is disgusting and I love it.
Overall this is a good demo, I really liked it. Keep it up!
Hey :) thanks for playing the demo. I'm glad you enjoyed it. The feedback is super appreciated, I'm going to fix those things you mentioned. Most specifically the torch puzzle part, it needs to be more clear for sure.
Very entertainig game.
When I was messing around with sliding, the witch slowed down permanently, even out of crouch (I think because I alt+tabbed?)
Yeah, both alt and x toggle run. I think I'll remove it from alt.
Ok, first of all, I'd like to say that this game is great! So far I haven't come across any issues. The weapons are mostly satisfying, though it's kinda easy to run out of ammo (around the big tree I ran out of shotgun and almost ran out of pistol ammo). The melee weapons feel a bit weak though. Something I'd add is more ambushes, John Romero style, you know - really dicky ones - because on highest difficulty, the game still felt too easy, I only died once and that was because I wasn't paying attention. Otherwise, I really liked the visual storytelling, the notes, the health mechanics, the easter eggs. Keep it up! This game has great potential!
Hey :) glad you enjoyed it. Yeah I need to tweak the game difficulty. I'm definitely up for adding more ambushes.
Awesome game my friend and my viewers really liked it. The game ran fine for me and I didn't experience any issues/bugs. Yes it was difficult but I did make it through the level :P I think I played an earlier version so things may be different now. I had some great reaction in this one and I would recommend it to others. I play tons of horror games and this one was another fun one. Hope you enjoy my video :)
Glad you enjoyed it :) Yeah the new update has a couple of difficulty options, one of which is a lot less difficult for people who aren't so accustomed to old school shooting games. Added your video to my watch list so I'll give it a watch later :) thanks for playing
Tried out the Demo!
Nice one! Thanks for playing :)