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[gimymblert]

congratz for the wedding

[Oddball]

Thanks for all the kind messages. The wedding went without a hitch, but since then we've had a run of rotten luck. In fact all throughout the development of HSL I have phenomenally terrible luck, with the wedding being an exception. Anyway, as the Devlog has just past 100 posts and 10,000 views I thought you guys deserved an update.

I have added a 'backup weapon' slot to the inventory system. This is something that has been requested a lot, but I never really saw a need for it. Having played the game a fair amount now there occasionally occurs a situation where your weapon gets lost, destroyed or nerfed, and I felt this was too much of a punishment if you are in the middle of a combat. The backup slot now gives you a chance to recover the situation instead of facing certain death. I'm currently working on the quests. I have three done so far with a forth well underway.

[Majestic]

Oddball, good work on this game.

Also congratulations on the marriage.

Do you still need music for your game? I'm a musician myself credited to 3 small indie games.

[Oddball]

Do you still need music for your game? I'm a musician myself credited to 3 small indie games.

Thanks for the offer but all the HSL music is done by KomradeJack.

[Oddball]

This is getting pretty close to done. I have all 32 playable characters in and 5 of the 6 quests done. I've sorted out the stat preview for picking up items so now it shows how the individual stats will change. Altered the inventory display to better show when item slots are unavailable. Added several new character/monster/item special abilities, including regeneration, spawning/summoning and a couple of others that I'll leave as a surprise. Added some new 'end game' scenarios. I've given some of the weaker visual effects a good spit and polish and generally jazzed things up a little. And there are probably several other updates which escape my memory at the moment, so to make up for that here's a screenshot.

The latest quest. Also shows the updated inventory display.

[happymonster]

When you say 32 playable characters, does this mean you can have more than one character at a time (i.e. as in a party of 3 or 4), or only one?

[Oddball]

Hehe, I couldn't imagine having to keep track of 32 characters at the same time. Sorry, by that I mean there are 32 different characters available to play as. You can meet allies along the way who help you, but you have little/no control over their actions. In the screen shot above there are 2 palace guards and 3 servants that will try to assist you.

[happymonster]

Have you thought about adding a game mode where you can control a party of 3-4 characters? I think that would add more to the game in that you would have more decisions about whether to attack with ranged or close combat specialist units, as well as protecting weak HP units with strong ones.

[JobLeonard]

Considering it's all turn based anyway, it's not a big modification game-mechanic wise (not saying anything about the code, obviously).

[Eldboll]

How did I miss this? Looks. Frickin. Solid.

I only skimmed through the other pages so I might have missed this. But when are you aiming to release it?

[Oddball]

Considering it's all turn based anyway, it's not a big modification game-mechanic wise (not saying anything about the code, obviously).

Some parts would be easy, some not so easy. As it's written I can just make more than one character a player and when it gets to his turn it'll wait for player input. Other things like the HUD, auto mapping, and the like would need a total rewrite and rethink. It's too late in the development cycle to make such large scale changes. Maybe multiple playables will make it into the sequel 'Hack, Slash, Loot Some More'.

I only skimmed through the other pages so I might have missed this. But when are you aiming to release it?

No official release date, but I'd like to get it done as soon as possible. It's really close to being finished. I've got to finish up the last quest then it's just a case of balancing, polishing, and bug fixing.

[Udderdude]

So, this was my first time playing the demo.

How any player, even a seasoned pro let alone a noob like me, is supposed to deal with these kind of odds in the first area of the game, is beyond me.

[Oddball]

I'd say you were very lucky to get a Stun Lizard companion in the starting room. He should be more than a match for lowly goblins. Also you seem to have got yourself surrounded. Try clearing the area you are in before moving on, and if an enemy tries to escape to get help take him down with your bow. Give it a few more goes and you'll quickly be able to deal with situations like this.

[Udderdude]

I'm pretty sure the Stun Lizard was in the first room with me, however I somehow killed it accidentally.  I think I clicked on it, which automatically attacked it.  That first room is really cramped and the graphics are squashed/hard to see, so I really didn't realize what happened until now.

Consider making it so clicking on allies doesn't automatically attack them.

Also, this is a minor issue, but in my screenshot you can see some of the pixel zoom/scaling is not 100% accurate.  On some of the walls and tables you can see a single row of pixels sticking out.

[Oddball]

Also, this is a minor issue, but in my screenshot you can see some of the pixel zoom/scaling is not 100% accurate.  On some of the walls and tables you can see a single row of pixels sticking out.

That's really odd. I've never seen that happen before, and I can't think what would cause it. What OS and graphics chip have you got? I suspect it's going to be something out of my control though.

For those having difficulty, 'Mask Of The Boy King' is a much easier quest to get to grips with because there are less wandering monsters, you mainly get attacked when desecrating tombs.

[Udderdude]

Also, this is a minor issue, but in my screenshot you can see some of the pixel zoom/scaling is not 100% accurate.  On some of the walls and tables you can see a single row of pixels sticking out.

That's really odd. I've never seen that happen before, and I can't think what would cause it. What OS and graphics chip have you got? I suspect it's going to be something out of my control though.

I'm running Vista 64-bit with a GeForce GTX 280.  I notice the distortion happens at 150% and 50% Zoom while at 3x window scaling.  Also, if I set the total window scaling to 4x, all of the distortion goes away on every Zoom level.

[Oddball]

Thanks. I'll look into it.

[Udderdude]

Play attempt #2: I rolled a Human Wizard and got one of the Lizard pets, this time I didn't accidentally kill it.  However, when I opened the first door, the Lizard positioned itself in the doorway and sat there taking hits from Goblins, while I was unable to help it attack the Goblins because I couldn't attack through it.  I could only click on myself to skip my turn while I sat there watching it die.  So it died, and then again I was left with no Lizard pet thing.

Eventually I cleared 2 more rooms, however I had no way to heal myself and no healing potions appeared for me, so I was pretty much doomed at that point.

[Eendhoorn]

I'm getting a EXCEPTION_ACCESs_VIOLATION window while running the exe. I'm using windows 7 64bit. Tried running as administrator aswell.

[Oddball]

@omgnoseat: I've not had problems running it in 64bit Windows 7 before. Make sure you unzip it before running the exe. Once unzipped the exe can be run from anywhere.