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[Kebbab]

Vote on Steam Greenlight!
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=922194713

Introduction
Dungeons of the Fallen is a diablolike action rpg/dungeon crawler with focus on coop and epic plot.
This game started as a little project made to play with my friends who live abroad now. Until now I have already spent around 900 hours making it and I am planning commercial release early 2018.

Main features:
-Around 50+ unique spells and abilities
-No class system, you can be a healing wizard warrior archer depending on what abilities you choose.
-4 player LAN coop- game will put a lot of focus on cooperation (healing, tanking, buffing) but can be played solo too
-Crafting system- make weapons and armor from gathered resources
-Lots of randomly generated loot with 4 tiers of rarity (common, magic, elder and legendary)
-Immersive story- You are a member of elite magic support squad who has to stop the return of the God in Chains.


I hope the game to be different from other dungeon crawlers/rpgs through the true epic non-anime story (think Song of Ice and Fire/Malazan Book of the Fallen), no class system and opportunity to truly cooperate through heals, taunts and buffs.

The engine itself is almost ready.
Currently I have 8 areas/dungeons with one central city.
36 basic spells(each with 3 tiers differing with stats), weapon/armor skill and mastery system.
6 monsters + some with same sprite different collor/behavior. (grey spiders shoot slowing goo, green poison you)
4 player LAN coop

I will greatly appreciate any feedback, since I have shown the game only to my facebook friends and on Clickteam forum (I use Fusion 2.5). I use paid tilesets and some free graphics for UI but the characters and items are done all by myself. Recently I also made a facebook page where I will post regular updates. https://web.facebook.com/fallendungeons/

Guardian of the Chains wishes you all the best this Christmas!

[Kebbab]

I'm currently working on a diablolike item generation system with different rarity and stat dependent prefix/suffix naming.

Since the beginning of the development items had been created by me and stored in the database. Now I have to adjust the whole engine including saving system, the UI and of course peer synchronization. Thats what happens when you change the main features in the middle of the development..

[TonyManfredonia]

A++ for local coop and multiplayer. Definitely the kind of style I loved to play in college. Gauntlet, for example, was an all time favorite for me and my friends!

[Kebbab]

A++ for local coop and multiplayer. Definitely the kind of style I loved to play in college. Gauntlet, for example, was an all time favorite for me and my friends!

Yeah, the game was originally made only for that exact purpose- playing with my friends. I really want to catch the magic of playing together, bonding, supporting each other and fighting through the dungeon. The game will not be released until I achieve this. Thank you!

[Pixel Noise]

Yeah dude. You can tell you've spent a lot of time on this already - the visual effects and spell menu look really nice. How will the story be related?

[Kebbab]

Yeah dude. You can tell you've spent a lot of time on this already - the visual effects and spell menu look really nice. How will the story be related?

The story begins with your ship being destroyed and you land up in the foreign country trying to find your squad. However, there is a bigger plot going on with the incoming war (you will actually get to fight in the battle to come) and the return of the God in Chains. Only later in a game you will realize what part you are about to play in the scenario already laid by the gods.

I'm currently not 100% sure how Im about to convey the story in the game. I love storytelling and I want the player to get immersed in the world. On the other hand this will be a coop game and I know that while playing together players will not have enough focus to delve too deep in the story. Cutscenes and dialogs should be rather short and simple. This will be a challenge for me but I hope I find a good balance between story and the party driven gameplay.

[wurthers]

Fantastic! This looks like the kind of thing my best friend and I have dreamed of making for years. We love Gauntlet, and recently Hammerwatch has been the game of choice for us when we need something to play online.

If you haven't played Hammerwatch, I'd suggest taking a look at the way it does story, especially in the second campaign -- "The Temple of the Sun" I think. Rather than have a cutscene or "Mash-A" style dialogue box to distract from gameplay, there are NPCs strewn around the world that give you a dialogue pop-up when you bump into them. The pop-ups are non-blocking, so if your playgroup wants you can walk right past the NPC as they're talking to you and keep on dungeon crawling. And at the very least you don't have the feeling that you're forced to sit through the story, since you can still run around inputting things like idiots while you read. 

[Kebbab]

If you haven't played Hammerwatch, I'd suggest taking a look at the way it does story, especially in the second campaign -- "The Temple of the Sun" I think. Rather than have a cutscene or "Mash-A" style dialogue box to distract from gameplay, there are NPCs strewn around the world that give you a dialogue pop-up when you bump into them. The pop-ups are non-blocking, so if your playgroup wants you can walk right past the NPC as they're talking to you and keep on dungeon crawling. And at the very least you don't have the feeling that you're forced to sit through the story, since you can still run around inputting things like idiots while you read. 

Thank you, thats a great idea! I have played the original Hammerwatch without the expansion but I saw what you are talking about on youtube. I didnt like it at first since its so simple and does not allow any choices for the player. On the other hand I am aware how it fits the party game design. Im thinking of mixing the pop-ups with standard rpgmaker like dialog for rare cases like the end of episode. Once again, thanks, this got me thinking.

[wurthers]

Thank you, thats a great idea! I have played the original Hammerwatch without the expansion but I saw what you are talking about on youtube. I didnt like it at first since its so simple and does not allow any choices for the player. On the other hand I am aware how it fits the party game design. Im thinking of mixing the pop-ups with standard rpgmaker like dialog for rare cases like the end of episode. Once again, thanks, this got me thinking.

Yeah, I think cutscenes/dialogue at the end of an episode or story arc could work well for party-style play, to punctuate play sessions. I think doing it that way does give a sense of relief and accomplishment at the end of a particularly hard boss battle or wave of enemies.

As far as player choice, what about implementing some kind of voting system at key moments? Each player casts their votes, and maybe if there's a tie the game chooses randomly for them? I don't know what kind of choices you're thinking of in the story, but that could add an extra element of fun to the dialogues too.

[Kebbab]

Cute spider(cancer-crab?) boss I made recently.




During last month I fixed many network problems (implemented automatic reconnect in case of crash)and reworked my internal level editor. Also, loot rework is almost finished. Recently I have been thinking  a lot about level and enemy design. Gotta delete and create some levels again from the scratch. I also made a decision to delete quests from the game even though I had already created a wow like quest system. Maybe a sequel could be more rpgish but right now im going more Hammerwatch/Gauntlet style so I can finish the game next year.

As far as player choice, what about implementing some kind of voting system at key moments? Each player casts their votes, and maybe if there's a tie the game chooses randomly for them? I don't know what kind of choices you're thinking of in the story, but that could add an extra element of fun to the dialogues too.

To be honest idea of voting has crossed my mind too. However, Im not sure if there's any reason to implement it if the choices you make will not impact the game anyway. In a more rpg like game this could be indeed fun.

[Kebbab]

Pre-alpha gameplay footage below. Feel free to share some feedback Does the game look fun to you?

[Kebbab]

Woodsman boss. I'm actually getting better at this. Love drawing the bosses, but animating them is a bitch.



In-game. Don't mind the shadow. It's a placeholder.

[Pixel Noise]

Looking good! Gameplay video looks like a solid starting point - obviously still some things to fix there, but it looks like all your basic systems and mechanics are in place?
 

[Kebbab]

Looking good! Gameplay video looks like a solid starting point - obviously still some things to fix there, but it looks like all your basic systems and mechanics are in place?

Yes, the basic engine is almost finished. This took me exactly a year of work. Now I can focus on bugs, smaller improvements and designing new levels and enemies.

However, I am tempted to make a big change and implement customisable look of the hero depending on the equipment you wear. I think that apart from the satisfaction you get from changing looks it will look much more appealing on marketing materials. This will require additional month or two of work but I have to cut my base sprite and create eq parts to make npcs anyway.

[Kebbab]

Hi guys, quick question. Do you think I should greenlight the game now? Ofc I would need to prepare a nice trailer, but do you think the game looks "greenlightable"? If not, what should I improve to make it more appealing?

I'm also considering to put the game on Kickstarter around the end of March/April after I polish the game. I don't need a lot of money but  2 or 3 thousands dollars would give me money for at least a proper soundtrack. Honestly, I was a bit afraid of it at the beginning but I dunno. It's weird because this started as a game for just me and my friends. Now I started to admire the game myself for what I've done so far.

[Pixel Noise]

Re: Character sprites - if you have the time, and can do it, having the sprites reflect the armor you are wearing, etc, is a very cool feature IMO.

Re: Greenlight - It looks like you've got enough gameplay foootage, etc, to show on Greenlight. Obviously it's a very tough time right now, but it's worth a shot, if you are ready.

Re: Kickstarter - raising $2-3 should be possible for almost any project, and certainly one with as much footage, etc, that you have to show. Of course, you would probably want to talk with someone about your plans for the music first, to get an idea of how much music you will need, and how much you might need to raise.

[Kebbab]

@PixelNoise

Thanks for the feedback. Also, Underworld Dungeon looks great and I am really looking forward for the full game

Currently I divide my time between marketing stuff and drawing the armor/ weapon sprites. Also the new Woodsman boss turned out really deadly and fun. We managed to kill him as a 3 player team after 6th approach.



Twitter up https://twitter.com/rodplgames
IndieDB up http://www.indiedb.com/games/dungeons-of-the-fallen
Greenlight concept up https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=873769936&searchtext=
Art for Kickstarter commisioned and is WIP.
Website coming soon.
Posted a topic on IndieDB to look for OST offers.

[nam1995]

Great progress you've got there so far. And it also belongs into one of my favorites since I'm quite a co-op addict.
How many levels or how long will the final version be? And are all the levels in this game fully random-generated?

[Kebbab]

Thank you Glad you like it. Not sure yet but to beat all four chapters the player would need around 8-10 hours.

I've spent some time last summer trying to integrate the tileset I have with the scripts for random levels but I wasn't satisfied with what I got. Also, developing the system was very fun but too time consuming.

If I find the time at the later stage of production I will give the players access to randomly generated worlds through portals to find some additional treasure.

[Kebbab]

Unfortunately sometimes putting ideas into work can be too daunting. When I first saw my new sprite in game I was like fck this s#$@ im deleting this game. I managed to fix it a bit today but finally I decided to stick to my base sprite (the hooded wizard).

 I will make him able to wear different weapons because thats easy, but I ditched the armor and hats. I'd rather go on with the next changes. There are levels to be designed, bugs to be fixed and my girlfriend agreed to be the final boss so yeah, there's still stuff to do.