A tactical RPG where all players' choices come together to drive a living story, created by a AAA veteran and a chart-topping author.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
CotS Is At Insomnia This Weekend! UI Art Updates And Our Methods Behind The Music
over 7 years ago
– Thu, Aug 25, 2016 at 12:02:31 AM
Hi Everyone,
It’s time for Insomnia! And while sleep deprivation is a hallmark of game development, Insomnia is a major game show here in the UK where we’ll be showing City of the Shroud all weekend!
The event runs from this Friday through Monday at the NEC in Birmingham, and it’s predicted to be the biggest-ever in the history of the UK’s biggest gaming event! I’ll be showing CotS in the Indie Zone (our third IZ appearance, for those keeping score), where we’ll have a new build with some very welcome visual upgrades.
In game news, over the last few weeks we’ve worked with Tom Pickard, who built the 3D environment assets you see in the current game, to finalize a bunch of our core UI elements like buttons and text boxes. We are very happy with the results:
Here we have the final Hat Merchant artwork paired with our shiny new text-box and font. I think that looks leagues better, don’t you?
Next, here’s an image that best shows off our UI buttons (because it has lots of buttons in it!) and another that shows how we can start combining these elements to make a clean, thematically consistent UI for the game as a whole. Also, I’ve snuck in a preview of something big that’s on the way - see if you can spot it ;)
In addition to UI, we’ve also wrapped up our “Victory Theme” - this epic riff will shred whenever you emerge victorious in combat. Here’s a preview to get you pumped:
On the topic of guitar riffs, after wrapping up the Victory Theme, Chris took off to play the stage at V Festival - that’s right, he’s a bonafide rocker.
Chris is on the left with the arm tattoos!
But not only has Chris been busy shredding both digitally and in real life, he’s also been breaking down how he composed City of the Shroud’s main theme in a series of videos about his approach to writing music for games.
In them, he talks about how we worked together to come up with the theme, how he crafted its unique elements, and more. They’re super interesting, and if you’re interested in how music for games is written (or specifically the music for this game!), I highly recommend checking them out:
With that, I am going to pack up all of our game-show materials and head off to Birmingham - if you’re going to Insomnia, be sure to drop by CotS’ spot in the Indie Zone!!
All The Best,
Keaton & The Abyssal Arts Team
New Gunner Abilities and Animations, Insomnia 58, and Games by the Sea!
almost 8 years ago
– Sat, Jul 23, 2016 at 10:37:59 AM
Hi Everyone,
How is your summer going? I recently acquired a wicked t-shirt shaped tan line by way of a nice, red sunburn. Who says developers never go outside?
First, I want to give a big thank-you to Charlie Ewing, creator of Flow Point, and Liz Henwood of The Yarn Mouse (she’s doing our amigurumi!) and Sock Thuggery for showing City of the Shroud at Games by the Sea at Develop, where they were showing off local indie talent! Chris and I weren’t able to go to the event this year, but our friends stepped in to help us out. The game went over really well, and “lots of people played it for a really long time,” which of course is a good thing!
On the game front, we’ve got a few things we’ll be adding to the Steam build for you to play around with soon - first, we’ve received all of the Gunner’s animations and have put them in the game!
Attacks in CotS use a combination of animation and visual effects to show each ability. Last month, when I mentioned new abilities, we were still in process of getting animations and VFX set up, but now, they’re pretty much ready to go. Since we have the Gunner’s animations fresh off the… animation software, I’ll run you through some of the new ones (and some of the ones that make way more sense now) below!
Just a note: they’re not all tuned yet, meaning the timing on some of the movement and visual effects may be a bit off, but I figured: why wait?
Dynamite: throw a stick of dynamite that deals damage to adjacent tiles after a set amount of time. The danger indicator is new too (and placeholder)!
Buckshot: The opposite of Snipe - deal more damage the closer you are to the target. Can be combined with Scramble and Parting Gift, which deals damage to adjacent tiles when you move away, for an in-your-face playstyle.
Aim Down Sights/Scramble: when the Gunner has certain buffs active, like Aim Down Sights or Scramble, she will take on a unique idle animation until the effects wear off.
Staggering Shot: deals damage and removes a dodge buff from the target, dealing bonus damage if it does (dodge buffs negate an opponent’s yellow gem attacks).
Vault: Jump backward one tile and deal damage while you do it! Great for getting out of melee range and making the opponent pay for it while you do. Works well with Magnetic Mine.
And finally, Spray and Pray: shoot 21 times, spreading the damage across all tiles adjacent to the target.
We’re really happy with how the animations turned out and can’t wait to let you guys play with them!
Those of you with keen eyes may notice some slight graphical improvements to the game as well - hopefully you like them!
We’re about ready to roll out the new character class abilities for testing to our Noble-tier and higher backers! We have a bit of tweaking to do before we do (we want you to be able to just get them instead of having to fight random battles until they drop, for example), so as soon as that’s all ready, we’ll be rolling out a new test branch on Steam. Keep an eye out!
We’ve also got some very cool possibilities on the horizon, but we’re still feeling them out. If it happens though… oh man, it will be exciting.
Last but not least, City of the Shroud will be going to Insomnia 58 from August 26 - 29 at NEC in Birmingham, UK.
If you’re going, come by and say hi - we’ll have a (hopefully VERY) updated version of the game on display!
The next update will be a big one, so keep an eye on your inbox - and be sure to leave us a comment!
Best,
Keaton & The Abyssal Arts Team
Remember to Fill Out Your Backer Surveys! + New Art and Class Sneak Peak
almost 8 years ago
– Mon, Jun 20, 2016 at 01:45:14 PM
Hi Backers,
We’ve got a few fun updates for you, but first I wanted to thank everyone who’s filled out their backer surveys! We’re really close to getting everyone’s replies in. Have you added CotS to your Steam library? :D
If you haven’t filled out your backer survey through BackerKit, please do so! It will help us lock down rewards so we can start preparing to them to send out to everyone. You can always retrieve your backer survey from our BackerKit URL:
We’ve also set up pre-orders! Anyone who’s interested in picking up a Steam key directly from us or grabbing some extra merch can do so at our Pre-Order URL, either up at the top of the Kickstarter page, or here:
First off, we have finalized the in-game portrait for the beloved Hat Merchant. Here he is, in all his finery:
Take a moment to let that soak in. Also, dig that fez-patterned bow-tie. It’s majestic.
...
I love the Hat Merchant.
Moving on: our primary goal with the Kickstarter was building the art for our remaining character classes, and we’re making really good progress on that front. If you’ll forgive me getting a wee bit detailed, we spoke with our friends at Playerium who are making the characters, and together, in addition to making the new characters, we decided that we would rework the existing models to look better, animate better, and allow for way more customization (without affecting our production schedule to boot!).
We aren’t quite ready to show you the fruits of our labor (it’s looking so cool), but as a testrun, we reworked the Gunner model basically from the ground up and have gotten her animating leagues ahead of where she was before… along with a few other features we’re keeping secret for now. We have new animations for all her abilities incoming as well, and I can’t wait to show some of them off!
Speaking of abilities, we recently got the last remaining abilities for the Mage, Gunner, and Brute classes into the game and they are currently undergoing bug fixes and placeholder VFX creation so that we can send them out to our in-dev feature testers. I’ve been playing with them, and depending on how you use them, they can really change the way a class plays.
Finally, I know I said we weren’t quite ready to show anything off yet, but I just can’t help myself… here’s a preview of something coming down the pipe soon:
Thank you as always for all of your support, and we can’t wait to get all the stuff we’ve got in the works out to you!
Best,
Keaton & The Abyssal Arts Team
Surveys and Keys Coming to an Inbox Near You!
almost 8 years ago
– Thu, May 26, 2016 at 02:21:47 PM
Hi Backers!
I clicked a big bluish-green button, so that can only mean one thing: surveys and Steam keys are on their way to you! Chances are you saw those emails before this one!
The survey will let you choose add-ons, upgrade your pledge level if you so desire, and tell us what rewards you want depending on your tier. If you have any questions or need assistance, check out our FAQ or use the Contact Us button at the bottom of the page:
We’ve also sent out Steam keys! Once you activate these, you will have access to in-development builds of CotS on Steam. We’ll be updating these with new features as they come online, so keep an eye on the game!
For the reward tiers that have access to in-development features before anyone else, we’ll also be setting up special beta branches where you can try the most bleeding-edge content - get your safety goggles ready, for there will almost certainly be bugs to squash!
We have a few other cool things on the way, but for now, please get in touch with any questions and load CotS into your Steam library!
Cheers,
Keaton & The Abyssal Arts Team
PS: We’re getting the ball rolling on our new characters, and I wanted to share a fun little preview our friends whipped up for us with the updated animation rig:
Surveys Are Going Out Soon!
almost 8 years ago
– Mon, May 23, 2016 at 09:31:44 AM
Hi Backers,
We’ll be sending out surveys for rewards very soon! To help us handle everything, we’re going through BackerKit - you might have seen their logo on the KS page. We'll be using BackerKit to distribute your Steam keys, so keep an eye out for the email!
Once the survey comes in, please fill it out - we need that info to start preparing your rewards! Filling it out doesn’t require an account, so you can just click on the link, fill out the survey, and you’re good to go.
You can also upgrade your pledge level or add extras (like the novel!) while you’re at it ;)
If you pledged over the amount of your selected reward tier, the extra amount will be shown as credit inside of BackerKit. For example, if you wanted the signed novel as an add-on and added $30 on top of a $20 pledge, you'll see the $30 as a credit inside of BackerKit. You can then use that credit to select the signed novel add-on, and you're done!
We aren’t going to lock down the surveys right away, so you’ll still have time to go back and adjust your selections within your reward tier if you feel the urge.
BackerKit also supports logging in with Facebook, should you so choose, in which case it will send your survey to your Facebook email address in place of the email address you used for Kickstarter.
If you have any questions about BackerKit, they have a FAQ set up just for us here:
We wanted to give a quick shout-out to the award-winning Tower of Samara - a beautiful 2D sidescroller (always a favorite of ours). They’ve got 9 days to go on their campaign with about 75% to go - even if they don’t pull it off this time, I’m sure they’ll succeed their second time around (wink wink), so if this is your kind of game, they are one project to watch!
