The Division (no, not that shooter).So it's been awhile, and for good reason! We have decided to split the roguelike mode and Metroidvania into two separate games entirely. What was once a bonus mode in the roguelike has now been way more fleshed out and will be its own game, called...
... Adaeus: Rogue Planet, which we will be putting through Steam Greenlight soon! Since this will be an iterative process, we plan on putting it out on Early Access first (as roguelikes really lend themselves well to EA) so we can get feedback about our engine, mechanics, etc, as the Metroidvania will be built with the same engine.
Metroidvanias are absolutely terrible candidates for early access, as once you've played part of the game, nothing changes and it's far easier to get burnt out having to do the same things all over again. We feel Rogue Planet, with the random levels/monsters/skill acquisition will still hold great replay value even in early access, and allow us to get our engine nice and refined as we continue to work on the game. In turn, the early access money earned from Rogue Planet will be pumped straight back into both games making them even better (because art is crazy expensive... the sad truth about not having a dedicated artist on the team).
So as far as the game itself is concerned, we have a fully fleshed out talent system as you can see here:
Each time you venture outside the safety of the lab you have a chance to come across nanites. If you manage to get back to the lab safely (either by defeating a boss or miniboss and using the teleporter room, or by using an expensive emergency evac item), you will get to spend those nanites on talents that will stay with you permanently, allowing players to make more progress each time as their power will grow. For every 5 points the player spends in the talent tree of an attribute type, a bonus is given to the player's stats and the next tier opens up.
If you die with those precious nanites on you, however, it's a sad day on Adaeus as you'll drop them, whatever gear you had on you, and be reset to level 1. You will get to keep your money however, which you can use to buy new gear to give yourself an edge (if the shop happens to have something good for you), or on upgrades to the lab making your life easier in general, hopefully allowing you to keep those nanites you picked up.
We've also made numerous improvements to animations and interactions in the game, both with enemies, objects, and item acquisition. As you will see in the gif below, enemies explode in satisfying ways now and leave behind energy which you can store to fabricate items at the shop (aka, money). A little visual gratification goes a long way!
So as you can see, we're humming along here, and the approach to greenlight is an exciting one for us. What once started as a bonus mode is now turning into a fully fleshed out game, and in our biased opinions, it's really fun to play! Haha.
Look for our next update in which we'll feature more of Adaeus: Rogue Planet's progression mechanics, difficulty levels, and systems.
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