Glorious Companions News

Hello there, Companions!
It’s been a while, but we are back with the best news possible!

We are finally ready to announce that the new era of Glorious Companions is coming to Steam this December! For the last few months, we have been really focused and dedicated to refresh the game and rework a lot of things. To catch a glimpse of what’s coming - check out the teaser below:

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

From the 30th of September to the 7th of October, we will be attending Steam Turn-Based RPG Fest and it’s a great opportunity to try out the demo of Glorious Companions! It will not only be free, but it will also present all the changes we’ve made throughout the recent period of time. During this time you can also grab the game 50% cheaper and it will be the only occasion to do that before the december’s re-launch.

Let's focus a little bit more on what you may expect in the refreshed version of Glorious Companions!

[h3]BRAND NEW MAIN MENU[/h3]

[h3]THE PROLOGUE[/h3]
Prologue storyline with cutscenes (and voice over!), dialogues, story quests and more. After this prologue (available in the demo as well!) the game allows for more free exploration with some main quests/goals included.



[h3]THE WORLD MAP[/h3]
Whole new handcrafted world map. With new places to visit, explore and challenge.

Before

After

[h3]BRAND NEW BATTLE UI WITH IMPROVED UX AND INFORMATION READABILITY
[/h3] Improved unit control in battle - long gone are the days when you had to change actions to attack enemy or had to rotate to move backwards. Movement and attacking is now omnidirectional and contextual - just hover mouse over the enemy to attack or on the ground to move.
Despite these changes, units facing still plays a big role in combat - attacks of opportunity are made only in front of the character and backstabbing enemies gives multiple bonuses.

[h3]THE JOURNAL[/h3]
We added journal for easier bookkeeping of active and finished quests. There is also a tab with all tutorials that player already encountered.

[h3]NEUTRAL ENEMIES[/h3] Visual and mechanical upgrade to neutral enemies. Animals even got array of new skills and passives to provide You with better challenges.

[h3]POINTS OF INTEREST[/h3]
A lot of new points of interests with various interactions - some of them will even provide unique quests or challenges.

⚔️⚔️⚔️

Above all, we prepared over 60 new battle maps - there are custom maps for story battles, for new dungeons and each biome on the map got their own unique maps in various sizes!
Challenging dungeon battles with new enemy types with their own weapons and unique abilities. These battles will take you through series of encounters one after another - better prepare for it!



We made some changes to the equipment as well. It now comes with various tiers that modify their stats and bunch of enchantments with secondary effects (burn, poison etc). There might be even some more new mechanics for them - stay tuned!

Thank you everyone for your attention and support!
Ancient Forge

Hey everyone!

First of all, we need to apologize for being so quiet for a while. For a long time we were processing the feedback coming from you to the Glorious Companions team, and while we were working on The Tenants to close all the publisher milestones, we had more than enough time to start thinking about new features for you! Now it’s time to get back with some great news, a big sale, and what’s most important, a full release date!

But first, let me share with you our special news. Today on May 7th, all of us celebrate Ancient Forge's 5th anniversary 🥳. The GC team wants to thank all the players who have been with us during this journey. We gathered the experience, tailored the strategy for our future titles and have watched our team grow from 20 to 50 amazing individuals over the past few months, and we're just getting started! ✨

The Future of Glorious Companions ⚔️

After the success of The Tenants, our team has been busy refining Glorious Companions, a turn-based tactical RPG set in the fantasy world of Navaroth. We're aiming for a full release in early December this year, bringing loads of new features and enhancements based on player feedback from the Early Access phase.



Here are some key changes and additions we've made to Glorious Companions this year:

• Brand New World Map: Handcrafted and visually striking, offering a more immersive experience.
  
• Prologue: A revamped tutorial and storyline that helps set the stage for player goals.
  
• 12 New Battle Maps: Unique battle maps for each biome, offering varied combat scenarios.
  
• 5 New Dungeons: Tackle challenging dungeons with epic loot, unique enemies, and powerful bosses.
  
• New Side Quests: More variety and depth as you explore the world of Navaroth.
  
• New Points of Interest: Encounter fresh challenges and secrets as you journey through the world.
  
• Overhauled UI: An improved user interface for smoother gameplay.
  
• Balancing, Fixes, and Quality Improvements: Enhancing the overall experience.
  

Anniversary Sale - 50% Off for 5 Years of Ancient Forge! 🏷️

In celebration of our milestone, we're offering a special 50% discount on Steam for Glorious Companions and The Tenants. Take advantage of this amazing deal from May 7th at 6PM CEST with our anniversary bundle!

Anniversary Broadcasts 🎦

During the sale, we'll be hosting broadcasts for our released and upcoming games:

• Blockbuster Inc. (Steam release June 6th! Wishlist now)
  
• The Tenants
• Glorious Companions
• And The Constructors

All broadcasts will be available from May 7th at 6PM CEST. Join our new Community Manager Janek, and check out all 4 titles!

If you want to know more, see what's more we are preparing for this year and check our other projects, visit our blog post here.

We will be back soon with more content details about the upcoming full release!

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/41220/AF_Anniversary_Bundle/

Today on May 7th, all of us celebrate Ancient Forge's 5th anniversary 🥳. The GC team wants to thank all the players who have been with us during this journey. We gathered the experience, tailored the strategy for our future titles and have watched our team grow from 20 to 50 amazing individuals over the past few months, and we're just getting started! ✨



The Future of Glorious Companions ⚔️

After the success of The Tenants, our team has been busy refining Glorious Companions, a turn-based tactical RPG set in the fantasy world of Navaroth. We're aiming for a full release in early December this year, bringing loads of new features and enhancements based on player feedback from the Early Access phase.

Here are some key changes and additions we've made to Glorious Companions this year:

• Brand New World Map: Handcrafted and visually striking, offering a more immersive experience.
  
• Prologue: A revamped tutorial and storyline that helps set the stage for player goals.
  
• 12 New Battle Maps: Unique battle maps for each biome, offering varied combat scenarios.
  
• 5 New Dungeons: Tackle challenging dungeons with epic loot, unique enemies, and powerful bosses.
  
• New Side Quests: More variety and depth as you explore the world of Navaroth.
  
• New Points of Interest: Encounter fresh challenges and secrets as you journey through the world.
  
• Overhauled UI: An improved user interface for smoother gameplay.
  
• Balancing, Fixes, and Quality Improvements: Enhancing the overall experience.
  

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1001040/Glorious_Companions/

Hello there, Companions!



We know that it's been a long time since the last update so we wanted to share some light on the development of Glorious Companions. Unfortunately over the last year we've had some major problems related to the development of the big update that we've been working on. We've had a few issues with important refactors of key systems, as well as the ongoing war in Ukraine also had an impact on the development.



However we're still commited to release the 1.0 version with everything we mentioned in the last devlog. Recently we've managed to get the gears going and involved new programmers in the process, so we're hopeful that it'll go much faster now. Taking into consideration the scope of changes and additions we don't want to throw random dates at you and we'll keep working on the storyline until we have a more realistic release date to share.



Thank you for your understanding,
Ancient Forge Studio

Hello there, Companions!



As we're approaching the release of our biggest update yet, the Titans Rising Update, we wanted to share a summary of what you can expect to change when it goes live. We've been working on this update for one and a half years so we're extremely excited to finally reach the end of its development.

As the game currently stands, we're pretty happy with the battle mechanics and the big aspect that we've wanted to change for a long time already is the world map gameplay. While the foundation is here, the overworld lacks clear direction and progression, as well as it is hard to balance properly, due to the procedural generation approach.



With the Titans Rising Update we're remaking the World Map from the ground up. The whole map will be carefully handmade with various areas and biomes to explore. On top of that we're introducing a fully-fledged storyline with cutscenes, NPCs, side-quests and most importantly, the main story with vital choices. We don't want to spoil it here, as we'd love for you to experience it first-hand.



Anyhow, let's finish up this lengthy introduction and go over the major changes and new additions that you'll find in the Titans Rising Update.

[h2]New World Map[/h2]

The biggest upfront difference (apart from the overhauled main menu) will surely be the new world map visuals, along the fact that we're scrapping the old procedural generation approach in favor of a finely handmade continent with much more variation and carefully balanced biome layouts. Additionally we'll be strategically placing various enemy spawn zones, which will allow us to balance the progression and difficulty curve in a much easier manner.

On top of those changes, we're adding a bunch of new types of Interactive Objects, as well as brand new Resource Outposts and a Fog of War mechanic on the world map.

[h2]Main Storyline[/h2]

The story in Glorious Companions revolves around the mysterious Titan statues scattered across the land and the nearby shores. One day the Titans begin to slowly awake and the whole continent is thrown into chaos. Amidst it all the player tries to forge their own path to glory.

As mentioned above, we don't want to spoil you the fun of experiencing the story, and thus we won't go into more details here.

This update will introduce the Prologue and the First Act along with a lot of main and side quests to complete. You'll be able to explore the Grassland Biome as well as the Swamp Biome, with further areas unlocking in a future update.

The story will feature both various recurring NPCs as well as cut-scenes that we've put some effort into making them visually enticing.

[h2]Journal[/h2]
To make the story progression easier to track we'll be adding a Journal where you'll be able to read through your previous quests and see your current objectives in more detail.

Additionally we'd like to add a way to browse through tutorials via the same UI panel, so you'll be able to go back to crucial information at the time when it's relevant to you.

[h2]Dungeons[/h2]

This is a feature that we've been teasing for quite some time already and with the Titans Rising Update you'll be able to challenge the defenders of 2 tough dungeons, with each one ending in an exciting boss fight.

While exploring a dungeon you'll be faced by a series of encounters with increasing difficulty. If you lose a battle or decide to leave the dungeon before the final fight, you'll have to restart it from the beginning. In-between each battle you'll have a chance to heal up your units or make some crucial roster changes.

[h2]New Enemies[/h2]

Along with the addition of new dungeons and new storyline acts, we'll be adding in new enemies with their own abilities and play styles. While providing a fair challenge, they will also drop unique loot if you manage to beat them.

[h2]New Battle Locations[/h2]

With this upcoming update we'll be introducing a plethora of new battle locations. First of all, each biome will have a bunch of dedicated battle zones of various sizes. Then there'll also be unique battle maps appearing throughout the storyline to make the whole experience more memorable.

On top of that each dungeon will come with its own set of maps, scaling up their epicness factor right up to the final boss stage.

[h2]New Camping Actions[/h2]

We've decided to remove the old placeholder Camping action of prisoner watching and instead introduced a new unique action for each of the playable races. The Scarres will be able to perform Blood Rituals and sacrifice their blood in exchange for random buffs for up to three units. And the Valrenay will receive the Prayer action that allows one selected unit to also gain a random buff. Bare in mind that sometimes the will of fate might turn against your favor, and your unit(s) will receive a curse instead of a buff.

[h2]Wounds & Blood[/h2]

We've felt like our companions' looks after a tough battle didn't exactly correspond to their HP bars. To make the encounters seem more impactful, wounds and blood will be now visible both on the 3D unit models as well as on their portraits.

[h2]New Main Menu[/h2]

To celebrate all the grand changes coming in the Titans Rising Update we felt that the main menu also had to be overhauled. With the new look we're aiming to better convey the atmosphere of Glorious Companions, the hardships of a mercenary life and the companionship it creates among the crew members.

[h2]New Music[/h2]
[previewyoutube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTXILrea1bo&ab_channel=GloriousCompanions[/previewyoutube]
The new atmospheric soundtrack we've teased a long time ago will finally find it's way into the game. Give it a listen and let us know what you think!

[h2]New promo/cover art[/h2]

As some of you might've already noticed, we've gone and replaced our promo assets on Steam. While the old artwork was well done, it didn't seem to convey the heart of Glorious Companions, and so we've decided to remake it. We'd love to learn what you think of the new cover art!


Let us know your thoughts in the comments and remember to follow the game for more updates!

Thank you, AFS