Talented News

Greetings Talented Gamers!

Let's get back to talking DLC! In Devlog #72 you might recall I highlighted how Ninja didn't use a resource for his Abilities like other Classes - there's a good reason for that!

[h2]Quests[/h2]

Ninja has access to objectives that can be completed during combat.



Completing a Quest will grant a Trophy and grant you a new random Quest. As the run continues the Quests will slowly increase in difficulty and may even require access to certain tools to complete.

Trophies can be spent to increase your Reputation with...

[h2]Clans[/h2]



Instead of Talent Packages - Ninja has access to Clans, a new way to access high power rewards. Each of the 3 Clans have hideout Talents dotted around the Talent Tree, when entering the Clan Hideout you are able to deposit your hard earned Trophies to gain reputation.

Each Reputation Level offers a reward - the very best rewards are always at the very end of the Reputation track. Will you focus on a single Clan any gain the high tier rewards or collect lots of immediate power by spreading your influence?

As you'd expect, there are Rares, Epics and Legendaries to collect - but there's a brand new tier of Ability Available too!

[h2]Ultimate Abilities[/h2]



This brand new tier of Ability should create a win condition in its own respect. Always available as the final reward of a Clan, the Ultimate Ability makes space for itself by adding an additional Ability slot to your bar.



Each Clan has its own unique Ultimate - the Spirit Clan offers a unique type of Soulflame that never expires!



So... Which Clan will you be dedicating yourself to in your first run?

Next time we'll be taking a look at the other big feature coming to the Wave of Shadows DLC - Wave Mode. Remember, you can Wishlist the DLC here so you won't miss it on release!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3423250/Talented__Wave_of_Shadows/

Until next time...

Stay Talented

Greetings Talented Gamers!

This week I'm very excited to announce we have worked with the amazing developers at Game Smithing to bundle Talented with Soulstone Survivors!

I've been following the development of Soulstone Survivors since I picked it up nearly 2 years ago and I can wholeheartedly recommend it. As a huge fan of the Horde Survival genre I'm pleased to say it has a top of the class combat system, tons of build crafting and an extremely satisfying giant skill tree (which I suspect will be of special interest to anyone looking at Talented!)

I'm blown away by the amount of new features added during Early Access along with great, regular communication. I've also seen first hand how the developers listen to community feedback and integrate it directly into their design choices.

You can grab the Talented Soulstone bundle with an additional 10% off right now -

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/50606/Talented_Soulstone/

Time for me to get back to work on Ninja (more on that in Friday's Devlog!)... Until then, to any Talented Gamers or Void Hunters reading this...

Stay Talented

Hello Talented Gamers!

We're happy to announce that we've bundled with Ballionaire! You can now get the game with an extra 10% off in the Ballented Bundle.

You can check out the bundle here:

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/50485/Ballented/

As always, thank you for your continued support!

Stay Talented

Greetings Talented Gamers!

Now there's been plenty of time to look back on Talented's 1.0 release, we've collected all of the feedback both in the Steam Discussion Forums and our Discord and Alchemist has stood out as not meeting your expectations for a Talented Class.

Alchemist was always the most experimental design. Combining Ability Crafting, Ingredient Gathering, Runes and the harsh limitation of absolutely no Basic Attack upgrade Talents.

There are many parts of Alchemist's core kit we are proud of and we're still confident in the variety offered by the Ability Crafting system (even if we understand that Charges can be frustrating sometimes) - but the way each of these components mesh together doesn't quite sit right with us...

...So we want to revisit this Class in a surprise Mini Update to the game coming before 1.1!

[h2]Alchemist Rework Time![/h2]

So what are the main issues?

• Gathering Ingredient can be a tedious process and figuring out which ingredients to go for when can be unfun.
  
• Crafting Abilities can start interesting, but quickly becomes tedious - especially when you want to craft the same Potion over and over again.
  
• Having absolutely no way to improve your Basic Attacks means that at certain enemy health breakpoints, basic attacks suddenly cannot be relied upon. This means if you don't have enough ability charges, you become overwhelmed in a single day - this has always felt unfair.
  
• The random nature in which most Runes spawn can often make them appear out of range of Abilities which can be extremely frustrating.
  

And what are we doing about it?

We're overhauling the way you gather ingredients. Instead of two different Ingredient Talents, there will be a single Forage Talent that grants two random Ingredients. This will mean easier access to ingredients overall and no more tedious selection of Ingredients as you traverse the tree.

The Alchemy Talent will now allow you to craft as many Potions Abilities as you like - you will even be able to craft multiple copies of the same potion at the same time. The tradeoff here is that Alchemy will appear on the tree less often (we're currently thinking around the same rate that Bandit's Shops appear).

We'll be adding some simple support for Alchemists Basic Attacks. This isn't intended to be a win condition in its own right, but should make the fall-off less sharp. For starters, Alchemist will now have access to the Attack Speed Up Talent.

We'll be reworking all of the Sigil Talents - instead of a % chance to Activate they will now require a number of enemy kills. Once that number is reached a Rune will appear in a random lane but, unlike the previous iteration, the Rune will always appear in a spot designed to be easily accessed by any Ability.



[h3]Other Changes[/h3]

The Mini Update will also fix a few of the more glaring issues with the 1.0 build.

We know Divinity has been a bit of a run-ender in Endless Mode, so we'll be reducing its potency to bring it in line with the other Enemy Curses. We're also keenly aware of the Bandit Shop bug that causes Talents to have negative costs!



[h2]Supporter Pack[/h2]

Talented has always been a labour of love for everyone involved - we certainly didn't expect to reach the amazing audience we have and I know I am speaking for the whole team when I say the opportunity to continue making games and improving our craft is one we will always be grateful for.

Given the low price point, throughout the development of Talented we had the occasional request for an additional way to support the development team and the number of requests has substantially increased over the last few weeks. For this reason we've decided to begin work on a Supporter Pack!

The main purpose of this pack is to support our continued development of Talented and future projects, but it will include a unique Character Skin for each of the 6 original Classes and a special Thank You Note from the team. Keep an eye out for more information in a future update.



And that about covers it! The Mini Update should be on its way in the next few weeks, as with our Early Access updates we'll be uploading it to the Community Beta Branch to get as much feedback as we can before it goes live.

Next Devlog will be a return to more reveals for what's coming in the Wave of Shadows DLC, until then...

Stay Talented

Hello Talented Gamers!

The first DLC for Talented now has a Steam Page and is ready for your wishlisting purposes!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3423250/Talented__Wave_of_Shadows/?beta=0

As announced in the previous Devlog, Wave of Shadows will contain a new Ninja Class, new Mode, Challenges and new Achievements to add to your collection.

We'll continue to reveal the new features as we're working on them in our Devlog series!

Stay Talented