Hey everyone!

Our first major update is now live and marks the first milestone of our Roadmap!

This update targets two major points: improvements of the game’s experience with quality of life and bug fixing, as well as brand new content to discover! This new content is featured into the Act 1 of the game and will unlock by meeting specific people on the World Map.

It is the time of the demon hunters, their caravan stalks and hunts beasts, demons, and warlocks alike, as long as the reward lives up to it…

Watch our trailer!

New playable heroes

We already introduced them in our previous news, Hagias, master of traps and Verdun, the herald of poisons, will join your crew of heroes but don’t expect them to fit the heroic archetype, for they turn hunt into death…

• Hagias is a Controller who can attack from a distance and inflict status effects to his target, from bleeding damage to burning one;

• Verdun is a Tank and turns nature into a weapon, poisoning his victims and slowing them down;

New bosses to face

Two new main bosses are threatening Statera and will challenge you with their unique playstyle!

• Knekro’s laugh will echo all over Statera, a bit like the tricks he will display to teleport from one corner of the battlefield to the other, the Blue Nets will probably not find his antics funny, but surely this jester can turn a joke into a deadly fight!

• Revenant will not tolerate any disrespect on his lands, for he is a lord who punishes intruders with his sword! But what could a single man possibly do against a team of heroes? Who said he was alone…

Forge overhaul

Crafting in the Forge was not ideal with our current version and we can’t thank you enough for mentioning it! We heard your feedback and now, everything can be made directly from the Forge:

• Switching characters

• Comparing stats

• Equipping items

• Accessing more items information

• New gear items added (especially for damaging roles)

• Rebalancing of some items

• Grey Gear can now be broken

Controls and camera changes

We also heard your feedback on controls and contrary to the Forge, it’s a process that will require a bit more time to be complete as it encompasses many layers of the game. We’re hard at work improving controls and UI during this Early Access, our first steps starting with this update!

• Pointer navigation across the ground grid has been redesigned, making it smarter when it comes to avoiding obstacles and moving around corners;

• Some keys have been rebound to make it more intuitive, especially to access the pause/exit menu, but if you prefer to make it your own way, we have incorporated the possibility to remap keys.

• New control profile for gamepad "Free MODE" that simulates free mouse navigation. Now with your gamepad you can select between the SYMMETRIC and the FREE MODE.

Quality of life improvements & performances

First, we targeted experience distribution points to make it more fair and balanced, especially with specific roles that had less direct impact in battles. Heroes that are not in the BATTLE PARTY will also receive some residual experience (20%) to help ensure there is not such a large difference in levels.

Control roles like Tanks have improved the overall experience distribution for the MVP system. Now, it is easier that Tanks are MVPS after battles.

Our second objective is optimization. Our first step to improve performances is the grid/navigation, redesigned to reduce system consumption. Other optimization processes will be added during the whole Early Access.

Among our QoL improvements you can also find a brand new save system!

Battle replayability

Whether it is to try out new strategies or to complete all battle bonuses, you can now access the valor quartermaster in the capital of BIRKA, which allows replaying unlocked battles and obtaining achievements. In the future there will be a store to spend valor points on unlockable items and heroes, including the quartermaster himself.

Bug Fixing

Thanks to all your bug reports during this first month of Early Access, we’ve managed to tackle numerous bugs in this new update. However, new bugs may occur so don’t stop sharing them to us on our Discord server or in the Steam forum as it is a precious help in fixing them faster! You can read the complete Patch Notes with all the bugs fixed at the end of this News!

We hope you will have fun with this new major update, we’re already working on the next one and we’re eager for your feedback! Statera is not short on demons and evils to slay, but we know you’re not afraid of getting your hands dirty, so enjoy the coming battles!

- Prelude Dark Pain Team - 

PATCH NOTES 0.3.14:

Add

• New Hero HAGIAS

• New Hero VERDUN

• New World Boss REVENANT

• New World Boss KNEKRO

• 2 new quests related to the Demon Hunters

• Improved progression with a redesigned XP distribution system

• Rebalanced some roles, including TANKS

• New Valor achievements for the two new encounters

• Added the ability to REMAP KEYS

• Manual and automatic save options are now available

• Optimized the tile system

• Improved grid management

• Battles can now be replayed to earn achievements in the Valor Quartermaster

• Forge overhaul: The system now includes item comparison, expanded item information, and the ability to equip items directly to characters. We've also redesigned most of the interface to significantly improve the overall user experience.

• Added six new items to the game

• New Demon Hunters Reputation

• New Status Effects

• Added a “Fast Travel” button to return to the capital

• New Talent Trees

• New beneficial status effect “STEADFAST”

• New beneficial status effect “INVULNERABLE”

• New negative status effect “POISONED”

• General performance optimizations and improvements

• New “Controls” section with all configuration options

• Reworked the battle loot calculation system

Change/Adjust

• New scenes added to GALA’s side quest

• Sade now deals damage with her “Pestilence and Pain” ability

• New enemy AI behaviors, enemies are now smarter when making decisions

• BLEEDING, POISON, and BURN behavior has been redesigned to work more appropriately against BOSSES

• Settings menus have been reorganized to make navigation easier.

• Remapped of some buttons to make it easier to exit the game and access the menus

• Fixed class and stat display for borrowed characters in the Battle Manager

• Improved navigation focus in the character equipment menu

• Added a notification when accepting a new World Quest

• Random map battles now vary depending on the zone where the enemy is located

• New “Controls” section with all configuration options

• New movement type for gamepad: Isometric or Free

• Improved save system: up to 8 manual saves and 2 automatic saves per playthrough

• A new type of triggers for KNEKRO/REVENANT

• Adjusted the damage of "Warlord"

• Adjusted the damage of "Scorch"

• Adjusted the damage of Tarja's "Fighting Spirit"

• Adjusted the battle flow so that the battle ends when Revenant is defeated

• Added two new weapons

Fixed

• Fixed visual issues with some MVP poses

• Second demon mission direction pointer locked

• Broken demon clown fight

• Big enemy is not pushed off the train

• Horse sfx lasts even after horses have disappeared

• Lag when hovering actions

• Sade's flank on front attack

• Can't place turret on Engineer's trap even if tile is displayed as available

• Hanged corpse above fog on world map

• Wrong outline default colour in settings

• PC above MVP text in victory recap

• City icon behind city names

• Level up number covered by exp progress bar

• Difficulty clicking on tiles

• Corzo missing Inquisition crest's slice on combat sprite

• White square in Rufio's dialogue/MVP sprite

• Character outline broken in settings

• Unknown character and impossible to change team in Demon hunter quests

• Demon quest indicates spot of already done quest

• Missing demon hunting quest names in journal

• Adjusted the damage of Crab Mines

• Inconsistent volume selection

• Missing line in first demon hunter dialogue

• Go to Birka mission appears twice in popup

• Stuck at Return to Birka mission

• No jumping animation for Rayder

• x2 UI too close to other options UI

• Skill description hides number of skill points available

• Same battle always restarts after win

• Finishing the Saving Hegoa mission and going back to the menu leads to infinite loading screen and save loss

• HQ UI before fight

• Stuck in endless generic fight

• Character missing in list of heros sent in mission

• Impossible to select more than 1 character for incursions

• Settings not save on closing the game

• Enemy one-shot Sade in Everlasting Blessing

• Tagline in Mission selection screen

• Failing Houndmaster fight and reloading save pass the fight

• Infinite loading screen after recruiting Duocco's kid

• Can't select objectives if there are multiple in a single scene

• NPC never playing its turn in Citadel fight

• DG48F02 as dialogue before Birka Ambush

• Exaust FX plays in loop

• Tizon bear trap wrong damage displayed

• UI_EMPTY in no reward after combat

• Rear damage when character is facing the enemy

• Hagias lv 14 on recruit

• Fixed the Revenant intro cutscene

• Fixed Verdun’s splash art to make the stats visible

• Fixed direction marker positions for some new characters

• Adjusted several sound effects

• Adjusted Verdun’s auto-attack

• Added evasion sounds for Revenant’s dogs

• Fixed some duplicated sounds in the menu

• Hovered equipment category icon doesn't change

• Hover escape menu button SFX

• Fixed graphical issues with some ITEMS

• Fixed an issue where quest icons were not displayed correctly

• Fixed minor graphical issues in some locations

• Fixed a reputation issue affecting some heroes

• Fixed an issue where some ROLE icons in the squad menu were not refreshing correctly when changing specialization

• Fixed minor visual issues in Map Mode

• Adjusted armor balance for some VERDUN, URZA, and SADE enemies

• Increased some POWER values to adjust magic damage