After nearly 3 weeks of testing, iteration and feedback on the Beta branch, the new build is finally ready to move to the main branch!

As you know, Tales of Glory 4 is still in Early Access, and this is exactly what Early Access is for: pushing major changes, reworking systems when needed, experimenting, listening to your feedback, and steadily building the game toward its full potential.

This update is a big step in that process, with major changes across combat, physics, weapon handling, army commands, sieges, horses, NPC behavior, spectator cameras, performance and much more.

A huge thank you to everyone who joined the Beta, tested the different builds, reported issues and shared feedback along the way. Your feedback has been extremely useful throughout these last three weeks.

And we're far from done. With this major update now reaching the main branch, it's time to move on to the next big items on the roadmap.

🚀 What's Coming Next?

There is still a lot planned for Tales of Glory 4. Here are some of the major things I'll be working on next.

🛠️ SDK Release — Coming Next Week

The first release of the Tales of Glory 4 SDK is planned for next week.

The goal is to give the community the tools to create everything from custom weapons, maps and NPCs all the way up to total conversion mods.

I'm really excited to see what you guys will build with it.

🧠 Commander AI

Another major system coming to the game is Commander AI for enemy armies, with the goal of making opposing forces capable of making more autonomous tactical decisions on the battlefield.

🗝️ Infiltration Mode Expansion

Infiltration gameplay currently exists mainly through Dungeons & Caves. I want to expand this mode considerably and make it a larger part of the game and, eventually, the Campaign.

🥊 Standalone Arena Version

I'm also starting work on a standalone version of Tales of Glory 4 dedicated to Arena battles.

The idea is to offer a focused experience for players who mainly want to jump straight into TOG4's physics-driven combat and fight.

🗺️ And in Parallel... Building the Foundations of the Campaign

Alongside all of this, I'll start laying the first bricks of the Campaign.

This isn't a single roadmap milestone or something that will suddenly arrive in one update. It's a larger underlying task that will progressively take shape throughout development.

I'll begin working on the foundations: the Overworld Map, movement mechanics, armies and territories, interactions with locations, and the underlying systems that will eventually connect all those battles and game modes into a persistent Campaign.

You'll see these systems progressively taking shape as development moves forward.

And of course, these are only the next major areas of development. There's much more to come.

💬 Come Shape What's Next With Us

If you have ideas about where Tales of Glory 4 should go next, join us on Discord and take part in the discussions.

I read your feedback there constantly, and we're already discussing some of the game's future additions together — for example, we're currently talking about new game modes that could be added to the Campaign.

If you have an idea, come share it. Community feedback has already had a real impact on the direction of the game throughout Early Access.

❤️ One Small Favor

If you enjoy Tales of Glory 4, I'd really appreciate it if you could take 3 minutes to leave an honest review on Steam.

Positive or negative, what matters is that it's your honest experience with the game.

As a solo developer, Steam reviews are incredibly important. They help the game get discovered, help new players understand what to expect, and ultimately help me continue developing and expanding Tales of Glory 4.

So if you've been enjoying the game and haven't reviewed it yet, taking those few minutes really does make a difference.

Thank you for your support. ❤️

Now, let's get into everything arriving on the main branch today.

⚔️ Major Combat & Physics Rework

A large part of the combat system has been rebuilt from the ground up.

Weapon Physics & Handling

• New time-based controller velocity filtering, giving more consistent weapon behavior across different framerates and headsets.

• Completely rewritten weapon kinetic system, taking weapon mass, linear/angular velocity, inertia and grip position into account.

• Major one-handed & two-handed weapon handling rework.

• Two-handed weapons now use the actual movement of both hands instead of simply combining controller velocities.

• Full wrist constraint rework for more natural movement while still reacting physically to weapons and impacts.

• Automatic dominant-hand switching based on your stance and how you're holding the weapon.

• Reworked sword handling with support for different grip configurations, including different pommel grips.

• Improved throwing for classic weapons and shields.

• Improved weapon grabbing from racks.

Impacts, Blocking & Enemy Reactions

• Major overhaul of the enemy impact/reaction system.

• Enemy reactions now scale more progressively with the actual strength of an impact.

• Blocking and countering reworked with improved weapon-on-weapon interactions.

• Improved detection between blocking, parrying and no successful defense.

• Enemy blocking now takes weapon kinetic energy into account — blocking a hammer with a dagger may not end well.

• Improved physical hand and arm tracking.

• More damage when hitting or slashing the head.

• More damage against enemies on the ground or getting back up.

• Improved limb stabbing reactions.

• Projectiles can now cripple enemies.

• Additional balancing for maces, hammers and flails.

🩸 More Physical Combat

Several new physical interactions have been added:

• Headbutts against enemies without helmets.

• Additional dismemberment for forearms and legs.

• Enemies can now surrender.

• Enemies can now be pinned to the ground or environment with any weapon capable of stabbing.

• Pinning works with swords, daggers, spears, arrows and other compatible weapons.

• You can pin enemies while fighting, while grabbing them, or after they're dead.

• Improved impacts and damage while fighting from horseback.

• Blood appearing on weapons now matches the current enemy's blood color.

🛡️ Full Army Control

One of the biggest additions is the ability to command your entire army instead of only your personal squad.

The Order menu can now switch between Select All and Select Squad.

The troop selection wheel has also been completely reworked:

• Select or deselect troops by category.

• Select your squad.

• Select your entire army.

• Invert your current selection.

For orders that require a location, such as Rush or Guard, formation markers are now displayed while choosing the destination.

Pressing the left controller trigger lets you cycle between multiple formations such as single line, two lines, three lines and more.

Voice recognition has also been expanded:

"Soldiers" / "Everyone" → Select the whole army
"Viking" → Select your squad

When attacking, both army and squad units initially spawn in Follow mode. When defending, the squad starts in Follow while the rest of the army starts in Attack mode.

🏰 Siege Warfare Rework

Sieges received a substantial overhaul.

• Full siege logic reworked.

• Siege maps reworked.

• Dedicated defensive positions for archers.

• Point at a defensive position and assign an archer to it.

• Player-usable siege features are highlighted while maintaining the command laser.

• More time to position troops when defending.

• Improved siege archer defense-position mechanics.

• New logic for determining whether NPCs are inside or outside areas, providing a major performance improvement during sieges.

• New spawning priorities on Conquest maps, allowing units to spawn more heavily in strategically important zones — for example, more defenders starting on castle walls.

🔥 New FireWall Order

Archers can now perform indirect volleys on a designated area.

Switch between ShieldWall and FireWall by pressing the trigger while the order is highlighted on the wheel.

Point at an area on the ground and all archers capable of reaching it will aim at approximately 45 degrees and fire into the designated zone.

FireWall can also be paused and resumed using the Hold / Loose orders.

Location targeting for orders has also been changed from a straight pointer to an arc/ballistic trajectory.

🐎 Horse Controls & Mounted Combat

Horse controls have been extensively reworked.

• Speed controlled with the left stick.

• Turning controlled with the right stick.

• You can rotate your avatar body independently up to an angle before the horse starts following.

• This makes it easier to turn sideways to fight enemies or shoot a bow while riding.

• Increased maximum horse speed.

• Jump and rear kick remain available.

• Improved impacts and damage while fighting from horseback.

• Procedural Openfield maps now have more vegetation variety, fewer dense forests and obstacles, and more clearings for better horse riding.

🏹 Archers & NPC Improvements

NPC combat behavior has received a lot of work as well.

• Improved NPC defense.

• Improved dodging and normalized dodging speeds.

• Archer close-range defense completed.

• Archers now have a small delay before switching targets, making it possible to sneak up on them a little more easily.

• Reworked logic for archers switching between bows and close-range weapons.

• Better Spearwarden attacks.

• Nearby moving enemies now produce audible footsteps.

• Active NPC cap increased to 150.

🎥 Spectator & Cinematic Camera Rework

For those recording gameplay, the spectator camera has received a substantial upgrade:

• Spectator camera FOV slider.

• Customizable player-camera angle.

• Customizable world camera.

• Fixed-angle world camera or optional LookAt Player mode.

• Improved cinematic camera with better obstacle detection and smoother transitions.

• Custom spectator-camera aspect ratios: 16:9, 16:10 and 9:16.

• Switchable camera color profiles.

• Full Cinematic Slow Motion rework.

⚙️ Quality of Life & Other Additions

There are plenty of smaller additions too:

• No longer necessary to press the B button to run when using arm swinging or autorun.

• Pause Game.

• Battle statistics.

• Battle-end menu allowing you to reload the battle or return to the lobby.

• Overall statistics displayed in the lobby when the last battle stats contain no data.

• Distinct sound when performing a perfect block.

• Bow draw-length rework.

• Improved bow-string hand.

• Selected-unit rings turn red while troops are buffed by a Warcry.

• Warcry can still be issued during the buff cooldown without applying another buff.

• Updated tutorial.

• Updated loading and transition screens.

🐛 Bug Fixes & Stability

Alongside all of these additions, a large number of bugs and physics issues have been addressed:

• Helmet detection sometimes allowing attacks to incorrectly cleave or stab through helmets.

• Random physics issue when severing forearms.

• Pinned enemies occasionally disappearing.

• Random weapon/body collision issues.

• Perfect blocking not working correctly against left-handed units.

• Reversed Shield Wall attack/defense animations for left-handed units.

• Archers getting stuck when re-equipping their bow after using a dagger.

• Archers flying when entering close-combat mode.

• Arrow flight issues.

• Arrow impacts occasionally sending enemies flying.

• NPCs spawning at the wrong location behind the Citadel.

• Issues with troops using siege features.

• Town-map collision issue that could leave the player stuck.

• Multiple loading at the end of caves/dungeons.

• Custom-map selection issue.

• Facial hair not displaying while a helmet was equipped.

• Spectator-camera saturation reset issue.

• Losing a shield potentially causing a locked wrist.

• Left-handed Elite Berserkers falling when hit.

• Various weapon constraints, body collisions, ragdolls and general physics stability improvements.

⚔️ And We're Just Getting Started

This update represents a big step forward for Tales of Glory 4, but it's still one step in the Early Access journey.

Next week comes the first SDK release, while work continues on Commander AI, expanded Infiltration gameplay, the standalone Arena version, and the underlying foundations of the Campaign.

Keep sending your feedback, keep throwing crazy ideas at me, and come join the discussions on Discord if you want to take part in shaping what comes next.

And once again, if you're enjoying Tales of Glory 4, please consider taking 3 minutes to leave an honest Steam review. As a solo developer, it genuinely matters and helps enormously.

Thank you to everyone supporting the game, testing the Beta and helping me build it.

See you on the battlefield! ⚔️

— BlackTale Games