Greetings, Royal ORX slayers!
ORX is approaching its Early Access Anniversary, so it’s time to talk about our current and future plans for the game — with the updated Roadmap and lots of teasers!
First of all, we’re so thankful to everyone who decided to support ORX in Early Access! Without you nothing would be possible, and we feel a special bond with you, early adopters. Coincidently, this is also a large reason why ORX is still in Early Access — we feel obligated to substantially improve the game based on the feedback we’ve received from all of you in these past months.
We'd like to take a moment to apologise for not getting ORX to version 1.0 this year, and a somewhat slow update schedule. But rest assured no part of this was due to a lack of capability or an excess of naps!
Far from that, we’ve been hard at work internally discussing some really big changes and upcoming additions to the game. And now, it’s time we finally share them with you — our dear players!
*Click the image to open it in full resolution
As you can see, the Roadmap became considerably bigger, yet at the same time more focused and direct. There are so many items on it, that we didn’t have enough space to elaborate on some of them! As such, we’re going to tell you more about
most important roadmap beats in this post, so you know what to look forward to!
The first major addition on the horizon is, of course, the
Boreal Nomads. We worked hard to provide this faction with truly distinct gameplay, and now we’re confident it’s going to feel different, yet familiar compared to other factions. As promised in our
Lore Devlog, we’re currently writing its
2nd part, focused specifically on gameplay — coming up very soon!
Boreal Nomads are going to feature indirect controls for their units. The Giants have a will of their own: hunting, gathering Miracles and buying items from your village! You might be wondering how this looks in practice, and what exactly is a Miracle?
Be on a lookout for our Gameplay overview devlog!
This 3rd playable faction will be added to the game in two parts: the initial release will feature all of the mechanics and every important card, and the 2nd release will provide cards to open up more playstyles and maybe introduce some additional mechanics.
Before the Boreals however, we’re planning to add couple new systems targeted to enhance the strategy aspects of the game and increase replayability —
Elemental Villages and Advisors.
Villages are the evolution of the Neutral Buildings you’re already familiar with. This time, though, they can be captured by both the player and the ORX! To capture a village you need to simply build something on a tile adjacent to it — same as always, — this will grant you global buffs depending on the village’s elemental type. However, if ORX manage to capture it first, then you’d better prepare to face off against Elemental ORX, supercharged with an according element. We hope that Villages will provide more strategic elements and breathe new life into missions.
Players, who have tried out the Experimental Branch of the game, already know about the
Advisors, which we tested couple cycles ago. We’ve heard your feedback, and felt ourselves that this system wasn’t engaging enough, so we changed some things! Now Advisors provide useful abilities or cards, which you can play get on demand during missions, by expending one of the Advisors “charges”.
In their first iteration these won’t be refillable, but we’re thinking of ways to change this in future updates. We hope that this system will provide players with a way to complement their playstyle and an additional layer of tactics.
Giving more power to the players is great, but
we’d like ORX to be more engaging and pose a bigger threat as well. So we’re giving some power back to the greenskins! Since the deck builder is finally coming to the game, it’s only natural that ORX should demand certain tools and strategies to deal with them. We’re changing the clans to be uniform and feature a single ORX type, and also making them more distinct from each other — with each clan posing a unique threat and nudging the player to use specific cards.
For example, ORX archers now deal higher damage, but they will also lose their composure when attacked by melee units. Additionally, we’ll also tackle wave behaviour in order to make it more engaging and have a better difficulty curve. With these changes we’re bringing “menace” back into “greenskin menace”!
*Concept visualisation - final implementation may vary.Next up are
Smart Events — a thorough expansion of the existing random events. Inspired by other deck-building games, we’ve decided to add new mechanics to our random events to make their outcomes less predictable and more meaningful. We haven’t decided how Smart Events will look just yet, but they will most likely include memory and precision checks, randomization, and maybe even mini-games.
Events will also receive logic improvements, making quest chains and branching stories possible. After all, even a good story gets stale after awhile, and changing things up a bit is sure to make the game all the more exciting!
*Concept visualisation - final implementation may vary.Now let’s talk about
meta-progression and what the Throne Room will bring to ORX.
Currently, players can only unlock new cards, artifacts, acts, and factions by accumulating points at the end of the run. We want to improve this and make meta-progression more interesting — add new kinds of unlocks, a way to showcase your achievements and marry this system with the overall game.
This is where the Throne room comes into play! It will be your main hub, where you can find even more new systems (still very WIP), set up decorations, brush up on ORX lore, see your overall progress, and interact with Advisors.
We also have plans to expand the Advisors with this update to include new interactions, means to regain their charges, and maybe even a little something extra! Once we add the Throne room you can finally be the lord of your castle at all times.
And finally, let’s talk about
Void Arcanists. As you might’ve guessed, it’s the code name for the
4th and final playable faction! Since we only have the concepts for its ruler, we don’t have a lot of details to share just yet, but we still want to spoil you a bit with the faction’s fantasy we’re aiming to fulfil.
Void Arcanists come from the Western and Eastern Void Poles — the parts of the world where Medea clashes with the Void, affected by the Corruption the most. They’re the greatest scholars in the lands of Medea and pursue the knowledge of arcane manipulation and the art of artifice — unlocking the extraordinary potential in any object and animating them.
Their towns rise above the clouds with enormous pagodas, resting upon floating islands. And their armies consist of arcane beings, machinery and… reanimated cadavers. With their minds veiled by the Corruption, Void Arcanists see magic as a utility to achieve enlightenment and goals bigger than any human’s life. Are you prepared to discard your morality in pursuit of building the biggest empire known to men?
That's all for now! We hope this devlog covers anything from the Roadmap which might’ve been a bit unclear, but
if you still have questions please feel free to ask them in the comments!
We’re happy to finally reveal the updated roadmap to you all and feel immense determination to deliver everything promised. We have such an amazing community and we want you to have an equally amazing game! Thank you for supporting us on this journey — be it by providing feedback or by simply playing and enjoying ORX. See you very soon in our upcoming Boreal Nomads gameplay overview and updates!
Make sure to join our official Discord server and follow us on Twitter to learn more about the development of the game, get a first peek at upcoming content, or just to say hi to the team!
One of the new artifacts, the Silver Abacus, helps boost the gold bank when you need it the most!
