SWORDHAVEN News

Greetings, dear friends!

Thank you for the positive reception of the Early Access launch of Swordhaven. We greatly appreciate your trust in our team, and we are committed to bringing you more content to enjoy. Additionally, we are focused on addressing the issues you've uncovered and reported while playing.

The most glaring issues were addressed on day one thanks to your swift response, and many more substantial fixes are on the way. These include a wide range of problems, from mouse click delays and pointer offset on 4K resolution screens to rowdy chickens provoking aggressive fauna to assault villagers, as well as players being unable to reach a chest due to a pathing error, unfair crafting tool self-destruction rates, ammo shortages, etc.


As an example of this, here's an explanation of what your feedback influence crafting-wise:

The tool component used in crafting will have a definite use count. When you buy a brand new tool, it will come with a limited number of uses. Each crafting attempt with this tool will deplete one use point and will either produce the item you were crafting (if your skill check is successful) or not (if it fails). This system makes crafting more controllable, reduces reliance on randomness, and increases overall openness.
Of course, your feedback will be the defining factor in this.

Balance will take a bit longer to completely level out, but we're getting there.

First of all, we will enhance the default Normal difficulty, as we plan to add Easy and Hard modes with their own unique features soon. To achieve this, the Normal mode should be as close to ideal as possible. We understand that this is an ongoing process, so please feel free to share your thoughts.

More content is planned for Balance—and ultimately, fun—including ability-teaching masters, secret ability scrolls, and peaceful abilities that some of you asked us to incorporate. Hit, miss, and dodge rates, weapon technique values, and much more will evolve sooner, thanks to your feedback!

NOTE: Viltyb is not a bug. Trust us on this one :-)

A lot of work is being done to optimize the game for various hardware configurations. As a small team, we don't have access to many machines for playtesting our games, but the data that you provided has greatly compensated for that.

The low FPS bug present on certain machines, crashes on Linux, and other issues have mostly been resolved by now. As is the case with all our projects, the game will become more efficient on hardware with every update. That FPS count won't stay in single digits for long—trust us!

Another beautiful thing about Early Access is all the feedback we received from you in these few days. Quality of Life ideas like:

• the option to switch units of measurement from imperial to metric;
  
• broader camera rotation speed slider;
  
• hotkeys for speeding up or slowing down battle animations;
  
• more HUD sizing and font sizing options;
  
• weapon switching;
  
• the not always intuitive location of the weapon technique menu;
  
• more sorting options.
  

Honestly, there are more good ideas than we can list here, or this thread will grow to abhorrent size =) We are thankful to each and every one of you for all the great ideas.

We will keep working non-stop until most issues are dealt with, and parallel to that we will be continuing the development.
A major update will come in 1.5-2 months, and there you will get a large new chunk of content, including resolutions to quests you may have started in this version, new quests, new characters, dungeons, weapons, armours and items.
A much more thorough summation of what to expect from the first big update will come out later.

Patch notes:

• Optimized pathfinding;
  
• Cursor visibility fixes;
  
• Main menu save-load UI bug fix. Turning off gamepad during loading no longer wrecks control scheme;
  
• Optimized FPS in dialogue screen and story screen;
  
• Improved localizations;
  
• Lockpicking bug fixed—lockpicks no longer disappear on success;
  
• Added new painted minimaps;
  
• Updated forest, water mill, Aldar's house musical tracks;
  
• Ability points now granted per level (temporary);
  
• Fixed unending attacking animation in real time;
  
• Scrolling in text encounters fixed on gamepad;
  
• Nulki questline fixed;
  
• Experience farm via Nulki fixed;
  
• Grainhold fence fixed. Now he buys stolen and illegal goods;
  
• Manual targeting in RT combat during pause fixed;
  
• Fixed wolf dodge sound effects;
  
• Improved real time combat flow and speeds;
  
• Mendog questline flags fixed;
  
• Localized pins for minimaps;
  
• Fixed pathing to certain containers that was inaccessible before;
  
• Fixed freezing during panic;
  
• Optimized texture sizes;
  
• Highlight object improved for higher resolutions;
  
• Fixed visual settings for Grainhold village (black water, wrong tree textures, etc);
  
• New item icons;
  
• ESC closes move item menu;
  
• Added tooltips for gamepad during sorting;
  
• Fixed combat freezing in Grainhold;
  
• World Map colours adjustment;
  
• Fixed Skink stun animation;
  
• Proofread English texts;
  
• Fixed the attack behavior of all goats;
  
• Vibration bug fixed (controller no longer jumpscares players).
  

Thank you for a great start to Swordhaven's story! Stay tuned for more.

Yours,
Atom Team

Greetings, friends!

We have finally reached a major milestone for our game: Swordhaven has been released into Early Access.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Of course, the game is not yet fully developed content-wise, and some mechanics that are already in place may require further refinement. But thanks to Early Access, we can communicate with you directly and consider your ideas and suggestions as we progress, truly designing Swordhaven in the way our players envision it.

This, however, is only possible if we receive feedback. Please feel free to contact us in any way you see fit to share your opinions. We will evaluate your feedback and implement it into the game before our full release.



So, what comes now?

First and foremost, we're planning updates to the game, with major ones hitting roughly once every couple of months. We will provide you with all the necessary information to keep you in the loop about what's been implemented and what the next big addition is.

One area we will focus on is the Real-Time with Pause battle mode, which is currently available for testing in the game. Swordhaven already provides a variety of settings for the AI, including the option to turn it off completely, and we will continue to make improvements in this regard. Animations are also a priority; we already have a lot, but there's much more to come!

Compatibility, optimization, and bug fixing are also top priorities for us. We're doing everything we can to test the game on all available devices, but a small team cannot cover every configuration out there.
If you encounter a bug (such as launch problems, graphics issues, or freezing), please send us a report at [email protected]. Our new Bug Tracker feature will help us track your problem, and you can check the resolution status at any time.

Thank you very much for being with us, and let's hope for a smooth ride towards the biggest milestone yet: the full release!



Stay cool, as always!
Yours,
Atom Team

Greetings and salutations, friends!

Today, we are very excited to share our final update before Swordhaven is released into Early Access.

This long-awaited milestone is scheduled for December 12, 2024, when the game will finally arrive on both Steam and GOG.


There is still a lot of work to be done before we achieve the desired build quality, and everything is continually being tweaked, updated, and bug-fixed to provide the best experience possible. Here are some of the features we are currently working on.


First of all, let's discuss the stealth mechanics. As you know from the demo, we aimed to make stealth a more active and influential system than in our previous games. Now, stealth includes the ability to see enemies' detection zones and features a covert strike mechanic that allows you to land the first blow in combat for double damage.


We've added many more diverse special encounters to the world map, including additional battles, hunting and foraging options, and text-based adventures. They not only serve as a distraction from your main goals in the game but also provide special items, experience, and loot.

New locations are also in the works. We have added an extra layer of polish to the background-specific dungeons and improved those that every player will encounter.


We have also introduced new mini-bosses and enhanced the existing enemies with new skill sets and animations to provide a better overall combat experience.


Ironing out kinks is as important as introducing new content, so we've improved several features of character creation. We also added new combat and mundane animations, weapons, armour, crafting recipes, and much more.

See you on the 12th of December 2024!
Yours truly,
Atom Team

And let there be Swordhaven!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Hello, friends!

Today, we decided to conduct a little experiment by making a short video about what we’ve been up to over the past month. What do you think of this format? Would you prefer us to make the next update in a similar fashion, or do you think a text format would be better? Let us know in the comments!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Stay as awesome as always,
Yours faithfully,
Atom Team