Gods Against Machines News

Hi all,

We have some exciting news to share with you today: the release date for Gods Agains Machines has been set! We are looking forward to you checking out the game.

[h2]Release date[/h2]

Worldwide release date: 23th February 2024

For specific times check out this short list:

• Europe: 10am Central European Time
  
• US: 1am Pacific, 4am Eastern
  
• Asia: 5m Tokyo Time
  

[h2]Major demo update[/h2]

In preparation for the Steam Next Fest starting this Monday, October 9th, we have prepared a major update to the demo. This update adds tons of new features, spells and even allows you to play as Nadea, the water goddess and progress in the campaign a bit further than previously possible! Check out the full list of all major changes bellow:

[h3]Core[/h3]

• Greatly expandend meta progression with the Gaia Powers system (2 core powers available in the demo)
  
• Revised random events in the game - they are now tied to corruption and resource levels, thus making them more deterministic
  
• Random events are now much more powerful and can turn the tide of battle in either direction
  
• Many new events added - alien satellites, celestial focus etc.
  
• Added a few more tutorials and streamlined the existing ones
  
• Added several settings regarding Gaia's voice, camera shake intensity, health bars etc.
  
• New types of minions (golems, sheep, phoenix...) and machines (advanced tank, satellite, battlecruiser...)
  
• Rebalanced the difficulty of the regions at the beginning of the campaign to give players a bit more challenge (previously they were way too easy and thus boring)
  
• Changed Urus' core power (we completely removed the age aspect of buildings and minions, and instead let Urus summon more units when he casts certain types of spells)
  

[h3]Progression[/h3]

• Gaia powers meta progression - earn essences of life to upgrade the powers of Gaia. These carry over between playthroughs and can become extremely powerful when fully upgraded, thus allowing you to progress faster and further.
  
• Several spells are now locked to a specific god, further reinforcing each god's identity
  
• The progression of each god has been improved to make unlocking new spells more fun and rewarding (very powerful spells are now at the end of the progression path, such as the spell Eclipse)
  

[h3]Spells & Blessings[/h3]

• Over two dozen new spells, with about half available in the demo as well, some examples include: Shatter, Tornado, Builder's hammer, Clone Creature, Tree of life, Call spirit etc.
  
• Over twenty new blessings and curses, most of which are also available in the demo
  
• A lot of balance changes to most spells and blessings to make upgrades more impactful while keeping the game reasonably challenging
  

[h3]UI[/h3]

• Added completely new progression UI (both Gaia powers progression and also progression paths for each god)
  
• Improved spellbook to be able to handle both regular spells and also Gaia powers
  
• Added UI indicators in the main game view to better inform the player about special events or situations they need to pay attention to
  
• Reworked the way miracles are shown in the main game's UI
  
• Improved the way rewards are displayed and offered (mostly bugs related to too long descriptions or missing rewards)
  

[h2]Conclusion[/h2]

We hope you like the changes we made and would love to hear your feedback! Let us know what you think in the comments or on our forums, and be sure to report any issues you encounter so we can fix them before our launch in less than 6 weeks!

Thank you very much,
Peter from Silver Eye Studios

In our game, we have created a complex spell system designed to provide players with strategic choices, customization, and an immersive gameplay experience. At the same time, we want players to be able to experiment and discover what works on their own, without having to rely on online guides. This is why we give players more control over the difficulty of the game, so that those who want a more relaxed experience can get it without feeling like they are missing out on important parts of the game. Once you are familiar with how the spells work and in which situations they are most effective, you can challenge yourself and try to complete the campaign as quickly as possible with only a limited number of upgrades to your arsenal.

Below, you will find an overview of the core features of the spell system:

[h2]Elemental gods and starting spells[/h2]

• Four primary gods represent different elements: Fire, Water, Earth, and Wind. Each god has a different playstyle and core power which you can base your build on (or go a different route entirely).
  
• Players choose one god at the beginning, receiving a basic spell aligned with that element and a second spell from the same element to start the game.
  
• Core powers can also be upgraded - if your build relies on them, be sure to get these upgrades whenever you can, as they are immensely powerful.
  

[h2]Spell progression[/h2]

• Players get additional spells as rewards throughout the game after conquering particular number of regions (1, 4, 7...)
  
• Initially, spells from the chosen element have a higher chance of being offered.
  
• Later stages allow players to access spells from any element with equal chance.
  
• Spell upgrades can also be found among rewards. Furthermore, these upgrades can increase the power of a spell property by more than one level and work regardless of the current level. Keep an eye out for such upgrades, as they can save you a large amount of power shards and dramatically increase the power of a spell!
  

Choose a spell that best complements your build!

[h2]3. Spell customization[/h2]

• Each spell has core properties like mana cost and cooldown, and spell-specific attributes like damage, effect radius, frequency of attacks, number of summoned minions and their strength etc.
  
• To upgrade properties of spells, players use power shards. These are obtained mainly by conquering regions and hunting down enemy evacuation drones.
  
• Spells can be augmented with additional effects, such as piercing shields, granting temporary blessings or even summoning additional minions or casting other spells. These upgrades can only be obtained as rewards after conquering a region.
  
• All these properties can usually be upgraded multiple times, with each consecutive level costing more power shards. Upgrading the right properties of a spell can dramatically increase their power or even change the way they are used in the game.
  

Void beam with the "Mirror" upgrade, casting itself repeatedly on a random nearby target.

[h2]Expanding spell limit and earning power shards[/h2]

• Players initially can have up to five spells but can find ways to increase this limit.
  
• For every conquered region players get a predetermined amount of power shards.
  
• The amount of power shards granted depends on the level difference between the previously conquered region and the current one. For example, if the player conquered a region 2 levels above his previously conquered region, he will get 4 power shards. If the level difference is 4 the reward is increased to 11 power shards.
  
• This mechanic makes it so that players who want a challenge can try to skip as many regions as possible, thus always fighting an uphill battle, but receiving a lot more rewards for their trouble.
  

Upgrade the right properties to optimize your build. If you are running low on mana often, perhaps it is a good idea to reduce mana cost of expensive spells?

[h2]Blessings System[/h2]

• "Blessings" are passive perks found as rewards for conquering regions.
  
• They provide classic benefits like increased damage or unique abilities like casting spells for free
  
• Similarly to spell properties, most blessings can be upgraded multiple times. This increases their level and thus also the benefit they give.
  
• Since the player has limited control over which blessings will be upgraded the upgrades are much more powerful than in case of spell properties.
  
• Each region has a temporary blessing that is active only in that region. This "blessing" can also be a curse - for example water spells don't work very well in a desert so they have reduced damage!
  

Blessings are always benefitial, but you might also be affected by curses that will make your life a bit harder!

[h2]Conclusion[/h2]

The spell system in Gods Against Machines reflects our commitment to providing a strategic and engaging gameplay experience. The combination of elements, spell progression, customization, and the integration of Blessings offers a variety of tactical possibilities.

We believe that both seasoned strategists and newcomers to the RTS genre will find this system rich and rewarding. We invite you to explore the magical universe of Gods Against Machines, where strategic planning and mastery of magical elements will lead you to victory.

We hope you found this short article interesting. Keep an eye out for more articles like this one - there is a lot to cover:

Azzinoth, god of fire and destruction Nadea, goddes of water and life Urus, god of earth and spirits
Zafira, goddes of wind and fate

We are also preparing a few posts about the mechanics of the game:

Resources & Corruption Spells & Blessings
Campaign & Regions
Machines & Spirits

Thanks for reading,
Peter from Silver Eye Studios

The third in our series of articles about the different gods you can play as in our game is about Urus, the Earth God. He is a master tactician and likes to use different types of minions to do his bidding. But don't worry, his arsenal also includes powerful damage spells! Each time you start a game as Urus, you will have the following powers at your disposal:





Rock Spike is a fast and very cheap spell with good damage, but it cannot hit flying targets. While this is not a problem early in the game, you will need to address this issue sooner rather than later. Fury of the earth blessing can be one way to do this - many minions are capable of attacking flying targets, and they can also penetrate enemy shields and, most importantly, antimagic zones. For this reason, Urus has the easiest time dealing with these things, but you will still need to use your minions wisely, as you cannot control them directly once they are summoned.

[h2]Build Ideas[/h2]

As an Urus, your build will most likely revolve around minions. You can summon them yourself or let Gaia do it for you and use your other spells to make them stronger:



One of the most powerful minions in the game is the Rock Giant. When upgraded, it is a force capable of destroying entire enemy outposts on its own:



And if you combine it with some other spells (like Clone!), it can quickly and easily win you the game! Just make sure you always have a backup plan in case your minions fail to defeat your enemy. A big Earthquake will usually do the trick!



[h2]Conclusion[/h2]

We hope you found this short article on Urus interesting. There are many more different spells and blessings you can use to customize your spellbook! Keep an eye out for more articles like this one - there is a lot to cover:

Azzinoth, god of fire and destruction Nadea, goddes of water and life Urus, god of earth and spirits
Zafira, goddes of wind and fate

We are also preparing a few posts about the mechanics of the game:

Resources & Corruption
Spells & Blessings
Campaign & Regions
Machines & Spirits

Thanks for reading,
Peter from Silver Eye Studios

As you may have noticed, the demo is no longer available for download. We have received a lot of great feedback from many of you and are now working hard to improve the game.

Since there are going to be completely new features and some of the existing ones are going to be heavily modified, we felt that it would be really difficult to keep the demo updated and working properly. For this reason, we are temporarily deactivating it. But don't worry! It will be back sometime this summer for further testing.



We would like to thank everyone who tried the game and especially those who gave us detailed feedback. We learned a lot, found problems we never thought were there, and got a lot of new ideas that we are excited about. We hope you will share our excitement when you get your hands on a new version of Gods Against Machines!

Cheers,
Peter and the team

Based on feedback we received after our demo's launch we implemented a plethora of changes, some small and some quite substantial. Here is a list of the most important ones:

[h2]Campaign[/h2]

• Increased the number of power shards received at the start of the game from 2 to 8
  
• The machines can now use the Shield and Refinery buildings sooner to give more variety and challenge at the start of the game, but their utility is more limited compared to later levels
  
• Considerably increased power shard amount when skipping regions
  
• Spell rewards - starting from the third spell reward player element is no longer prioritized by 2 choices but by just one thus allowing for larger variety in builds
  
• Enemy builders will now have a harder time building stuff when the corruption is high (slower build speed), which should give players a bit more time to deal with the enemy
  
• Reduced the amount of extra corruption (bonus for nearby residential buildings) that is generated by terraformers by 50% to offset the change above
  

[h2]Spells[/h2]

• Many spells received additional audiovisual cues and effects to make casting them more fun
  
• All spells now have a targeting indicator (previously only some spells had it)
  
• Combustion - increased damage by 30%
  
• Wildfire - increased duration by 25%
  
• Rock giant - initial attack cooldown has been removed so that the giant can attack immediatelly after spawning
  
• Fire eater - fixed a bug that prevented this spell from working properly in most cases
  
• Rejuvenation - fixed a bug that caused no effects to be shown when the spell was cast
  
• Cleansing rain - increased the amount of corruption that is cleansed and fixed tooltip for stun (extra effect that can be unlocked)
  
• Spells that generate mana or miracles will now show the generated amount on screen
  
• Increased base mana regeneration by 20%
  

[h2]User Interface[/h2]

• World screen - added the ability to open the game menu with the Escape key
  
• World screen - menu buttons are now a bit larger
  
• Spirit screen - added missing icons for some rewards
  
• Spell properties - added highlight for upgraded properties
  

[h2]Controls[/h2]

• The button for casting spells can now be held for continuous casting
  

[h2]Other[/h2]

• Settings - fixed a bug that prevented audio volume to be correctly applied when loading settings
  
• Buildings- enemy buildings can now be targeted and damaged during construction but have a 90% damage reduction during that phase
  
• Fixed a bug that sometimes caused weird sound artifacts when the player moved fast over the map
  
• Fixed a rare bug that could lead to crash when the moving target of a spell died before the spell finished casting
  

[h2]What is next?[/h2]

We still plan to update the demo as we find bugs, but these will mostly be minor updates. In the meantime, we will continue to work hard on the game, taking all of your feedback to heart.

In a future post, we will reveal some of the much bigger changes coming to the game - such as a new, much deeper progression system centered around working with Gaia, some major changes to how we distribute rewards, as well as major improvements to the AI, new enemy types, random events, and more!

Thanks,
Peter