Ghostlore News

Dear players, we are currently laying the groundwork for many new features in Ghostlore. This is going to be the first of several progress updates detailing our plans to expand the game.

[h2]INTRODUCING: MYTHIC LEGENDARIES [/h2]
As mentioned previously, we are planning to add what in common ARPG parlance is known as ‘Legendary’ items in the game. As legendary items are already a tier of items in Ghostlore, officially these items will be known as ‘Mythic Legendary’ items in order to differentiate them. Here is a tentative list of Mythic Legendaries:

Vajra
Grants Thunderstorm at a random spot on the skill grid.
Causes sparks of lightining to emanate from enemies when hitting them with a basic attack.
Trishula Grants Radiant Spear at a random spot on the skill grid.
Chance to summon 3 rays of light that deal attack damage when using a skill.

Sudasharna Chakra
Grants Chakram at a random spot on the skill grid.
Greatly increases area and damage of Chakram.

Kharga Grants Blood Magic at a random spot on the skill grid.
Primordial Blade Asi
Chance to cast any available skill on basic attack.

Damaru
Chance to cast any available skill on block.

Jayantha Vel
Grants Warp at a random spot on the skill grid.
Warp automatically triggers when taking fatal damage. Adds 3 chances. Greatly reduced HP.

Four Seasons
Grants special Glyphs that greatly increases elemental damage.

Teen Baan
Grants Pressure Point at a random spot on the skill grid. Automatically activates Pressure Point every 3 attacks. Arrows have homing property. Greatly increases accuracy.
Badang's Stonesplitter
Grants Geomancy at a random spot on the skill grid.
Greatly increases damage of Geomancy, Stampede and Seismic Roar.

Badang's Earthshakers
Grants Stampede at a random spot on the skill grid.
Greatly increases damage of Geomancy, Stampede and Seismic Roar.
Badang's Heavyweight Belt
Causes an earthquake which does basic attack damage on block.
Greatly increases damage of Geomancy, Stampede and Seismic Roar.

Indrastra Chance to cause a rain of arrows that deal attack damage when using a skill.
Pushpa Dhanu
Chance for enemies to become temporarily smitten and not attack you. They would still attack any minions or allies. Does not work on elites or bosses.

Ashwathama's Gem
When receiving fatal damage, casts every available skill at no cost.

Ruyi Jingu Bang
Changes the attack animation into one where you can attack while moving.

Wukong's Binding Circlet
Grants a special Glyph that increase damage taken but greatly increase Crisis Damage and Crisis Absorb.
Nimbus
Immune to movement impairing effects.

Nandaka Greatly increases cooldown.
Agni’s Philosophy
Grants Immolate at a random spot on the skill grid.
Increased HP Regen.
Way of No Way
Gain a Combo meter that increases damage the more it is filled. The meter is increases upon skill usage, but decreases upon consecutive usage of that same skill.

Vijaya Greatly increases Knockback and Pierce.
Causes fear.

Ekasha Gada
Greatly increases Knockback and Armour Break.
Increased melee attack radius.

Thousand Cuts
Grants special Glyphs that greatly increase attack speed.

Sharanga Grants special Glyphs that greatly increase projectile count.
Chandrahasa
Grants Shroud of Darkness at a random spot on the skill grid.
Shroud of Darkness' Eviscerate damages enemies around the target as well.
Mundamala Minions explode and do damage upon death.
Decreases minion HP and increases their movement speed.

Phurba Grants Excorcise at a random spot on the skill grid.
Excorcise autocasts linked skills every 5 seconds.

Legionhide 30% of damage taken is transferred and averaged out among your minions
Parushu Grants special Glyphs that adds attack damage to skill damage when using skills.
Han Feizhi’s Unstoppable Force
Greatly increases MP.
Cannot be used with Han Feizhi’s Immovable Object.

Han Feizhi’s Immovable Object
Greatly increases HP.
Cannot be used with Han Feizhi’s Unstoppable Force.
True Taming Sari
Grants Taming Sari at a random spot on the skill grid.
Taming Sari gains damage from your attack damage instead of your minion damage.

Windfire Grants Dashing Strike at a random spot on the skill grid. Greatly increases dashing strike charges.
Dashing Strike leaves behind a trail of fire.

Armilliary Sash Creates Whirlwinds at regular intervals that deal basic attack damage.
Universal Ring On basic attack, releases a swarm of ricochetting rings that deal attack damage.
Yin Blade
Greatly increases HP Steal.

Yang Blade Greatly increases MP Steal.
Bhaumastra Increased gem effect.
Khatvanga Grants Ice Trap at a random spot on the skill grid.
Launches 3 icicle spears when attacking.

Phoenix's Blessing
Turns crows into Phoenixes. Phoenixes have the abilities of both Sunbirds and Doves.

Dragon's Blessing
Grants Guardian Spirit at a random spot on the skill grid.
Limit guarduan spirit to one, subsequent casts adds more heads to the Guardian Spirit.

Aruval Increases critical hit chance by 1% for every second you do not land a critical hit. This effect is reset after landing a critical hit.
Jaivardhan Grants Mind Over Matter at a random spot on the skill grid.
Causes an explosion at the end of Mind Over Matter's duration that causes basic attack damage.

Lord Shiva's Tiger Skin Grants Weretiger at a random spot on the skill grid.
Allows skill usage as the Weretiger or White Tiger.

Vessel of Brahmari Your minions are surrounded by a swarm of bees which drains their life, but damages enemies around them.

Brahmastra All projectiles gain the homing property
Duyi's Grasp Creates a trail of grasping undead hands the block enemy movement BUT allows the player to pass through. Allows players to create enclosures around enemies.

Kumaras’ Curse Greatly increases reflect damage and missile reflect.
Karna Kavacha Greatly increases absorb and avoidance.
Rudraksha Mala
Grants Mandala at a random spot on the skill grid. Mandala follows the player.

Nagapasha Grants Poison Vial at a random spot on the skill grid.
Enemies in the area of Poison Vial are slowed

Yamapasha Gain the affixes of the last elite killed for 20 seconds.

One of the things we've been unhappy with about the skill system is that a build only had a very limited set of combo skills to choose from. Since each combo skill requires 2 classes to access, 3 classes only allows access to around 5 combo skills. Another thing which we wanted to avoid was to find items which did cool things to skills but were useless to you unless you played that specific class. Many of the new mythic legendaries come with affixes which grant a skill (and sometimes change the way the skill works completely). These will affix a node on the skill grid with that skill as long as the item is equipped. These skill nodes can be used to access combo skills.

You might’ve also noticed that a good number of these come from Hindu mythology. In Hindu mythology, supernatural weapons are not just one-off artefacts. Instead, they are metaphysical ‘astras’ that can be invoked or bestowed. In one epic known as the Mahabharata, the legendary figure Ashwatthama managed to summon a weapon of the god Brahma from just a blade of grass. Lore-wise, this means we have an in-universe explanation as to why duplicates of Mythical Legendary Items can exist. If you read the Classified Reports, you will know that Ghostlore also goes through some length to justify in-universe why random loot drops happen, and why people fight with swords and bows when post-industrial revolution technology exists.

[h2]SLAY DEMONS IN STYLE[/h2]

In addition, to make Mythic Legendary items feel more special, many of them will have unique graphics.

Because of all this, it was necessary for us to re-visit the player character’s 3D model to make these new graphics and animations.

While we're at it, we thought it'd be good to give the players a bit more customisation options too. Here is a sneak peek:

Yes, Ghostlore’s graphics are actually 3D models pre-rendered into spritesheets at a very low resolution. But that's another story for another time.

We also plan to change the UI to be able to showcase a turnaround of your character:
Please bear in mind that all this is still work-in-progress. Things might change, be expanded upon, or even left on the cutting room floor if we cannot manage it (hopefully we can). We set ourselves a deadline to get all new features out by August. We have other exciting features planned, but this update has gone on for long enough. Please look forward to what we have to share next time!

Andrew

[h3]Work on Legendary Items[/h3]

One of the most requested features for Ghostlore are 'Legendary' items in the usual ARPG sense, where they have fixed affixes that may be designed around a certain theme, or intended to support a certain build.

I am currently trying to brainstorm ideas for these new legendaries for the update. I would like to ask if anyone has any memorable experiences with specific legendary items in other ARPGs, such as Path of Exile, Diablo Series, Grim Dawn, Torchlight and Last Epoch.

It would be super super helpful if you can any ideas either here or in our Discord. I hope to be inspired by hearing what the community wants and try to adapt it into Ghostlore. THANK YOU 🙏

Andrew

[h3]Update 1.014[/h3]

• Fixed issue with minions and shadow clones not being affected by map buffs/debuffs.
  
• Fixed bug causing items to overlap in inventory when max stack is reached.
  
• Fixed crash when modding powers and status effects.
  

[h3]Update 1.015[/h3]

• Moved critical hit chance bonus from llo to Alasa.
  
• Slightly reduced critical hit multiplier rolls across the board.
  
• Greatly reduced avoidance increase per level for all monsters and minions and increased based avoidance.
  
• Buffed damage reflection rolls.
  
• Reduced exorcise resistance reduction strength.
  
• Changed exorcise absorb reduction to be flat -15 instead of multiplicative. This is to fix a bug where exorcise causing absorb to go negative would stack with another skill which also caused absorb to go negative, leading to the target gaining absorb instead.
  
• Fixed maximum sound instances not set for some sound effects. This shoud fix performance issues with Monsoon and poison vial.
  
• Fixed missing localization for MP steal multiplicative.
  

It's spooky season once again, and Ghostlore is 25% off to get you into the festive mood!

As mentioned previously, Ghostlore has some pretty respectable numbers for a small indie game done by two people.

But what we are most grateful for are the players who have played the game for literally hundreds of hours. (seriously how do you guys do that)

As game developers, we believe that our job and our value is to entertain people and bring joy to their lives. Nothing makes us happier than seeing that we have been able to do this.

So, this update is focused on new endgame content that allows hardcore players to test their mettle against a variety of self-imposed challenges.


While traversing the depths of Hell, you might sometimes find these corrupted, purple portals. These portals will lead to the Chaos Arena, where you must fend off waves of enemies. Completing the challenge gives you a chance to enter the Orang Bunian's Realm, and/or a chance to skip to the next floor of Hell. Oh, and of course, loot.

Bear in mind that the death penalty for Hell Levels is still in effect, so it is up to you if you want to risk it or not.


In certain places (or non-places), you might meet a mysterious old lady with a backpack full of Keropok, crispy crackers made from prawns that is popular here in South-East Asia.
👀👀👀seems kinda sus👀👀👀

She asks if you would like to have something to eat, and insists on serving you some food with her special Keropok...
VERY VERY SUS

...Do you accept?

Like many things in Ghostlore, this is based on an actual ghost story found here in Singapore. But this time around, I'm not going to tell you how this is all supposed to work. If you know, you know.


One more thing, you might occasionally find this enigmatic figure travelling the open road as well. Catching up with her allows you to claim the contents of her backpack as your spoils. But you better be quick about it though, she runs pretty fast for an old lady (Like your Encik's fabled grandmother).


We still have a couple of updates planned for Ghostlore and we are looking for feedback on our Discord. But for now, this one goes out to all our loyal players out there.

Thank you, and happy hunting this Halloween!

Ghostlore is a made-in-Singapore game with a setting inspired by Singaporean and Southeast-Asian culture, so in order to commemorate Singapore's Independence Day on the 9th of August, Ghostlore will be on a 25% discount this weekend!

Shoutout to our sister countries, Malaysia and Indonesia, who will also be celebrating their Independence Days later this month too!

Ghostlore has succeeded far beyond our wildest dreams, with 30k+ downloads on Steam, 100k+ downloads across all platforms and a peak of 1000+ concurrent players.

Most of the work since launch has been to fix bugs found by players. We have also tried to address some of the common criticisms found in reviews. Here is a quick recap of the improvements since launch.

• We have greatly increased the size of the personal stash.
  
• Improvements and new options for the item filter.
  
• Improved character stat tooltips to correctly include all modifiers.
  
• Show items on ground toggle is now saved between sessions.
  
• Added option to bind a third key to actions.
  
• At crafters, you can now craft equipment and gems to the max level by holding the shift key.
  

We've worked on addressing the issues people have had with the end-game content. The hell gate maps should now be a lot more challenging but also more rewarding and feel less tedious. After killing a certain amount of monsters on an Institute or Hell Gate Map, keep a lookout for a red portal that will appear in the vicinity. The portal will transport you directly to the boss.


All Institute and Hell Gate maps will now only require you to kill 1 boss in order to proceed to the next map. We have removed the requirement for multiple bosses.

We realized that the unique affixes which only came from the shrine of balance led to the shrine being the only source of "perfect" items. We've added a new rare Tranquil Turmoil crafting material which adds this affix to any item.


Finally, Hell ingots now have a chance to drop from elites as well as bosses. The chance of hell ingots dropping also increases as you go deeper.


We've made some small changes here but are mostly still waiting for more feedback on which skills or combinations are too strong or weak. A big part of Ghostlore is being able to create absurdly powerful characters, so we don't want to nerf skills too much. At the same time there's definitely still a lot of work to be done to make some options viable and others less of an obvious choice. With the complexity of the skill system this is hard to do without feedback from players.


Adam and I both got our start in game development by modding, so personally we are happy to see that there have already been some mods for Ghostlore. Adam is happy to answer any modding questions or even help implement features modders want in our Discord. As modders, we strongly encourage players to go crazy and mod whatever they would like to see in the game. So in addition to the official mods, we would like to highlight some community mods that have caught our attention:

QoL changes by Godog

Russian Translation by Blueberry

InfiniPin by BlackNemo

Dual wield by Bonizin Fair warning, this last one might not be good in all circumstances, but it did spark some discussion of where we want to go in future updates, as outlined below.


Our plans revolve around changes to itemization to make them more varied. Possibilities include:

• More gear slots for shirts, pants, boots etc.
  
• Visual customization and more visual variety
  
• Proper dual wielding
  
• Legendary items with unique affixes and designed around a theme
  
• Affixes that add or modify skills to a character
  
• Cosmetic pets that can pick up gold or items
  

This is going to be a major update, akin to what we did for the skills overhaul and post-game overhaul. We will continue to release smaller updates and fixes, but the major item update will likely be only done next year.

In the meantime, Ghostlore is 25% off for the Steam Summer Sale, please enjoy the game and keep the feedback coming!