Age of Tribulation News

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]Video Developer Log #18 has just been uploaded to YouTube. This log focuses on the new enemies and loot containers that will be in the Demo. Let us know what you think, enjoy! ;)[/p][p]Dev Log Begins: 2:07[/p]

• [p]We now have 3 main enemy types: Bandits, Wolves, and Rats.[/p]
  1. [p]Bandit Class[/p][p]Thug - Sword & Board Bandit that carries a Hand Club & Plank Shield at higher levels.[/p][p]Goon - Tank Bandit that carries a 2-Handed Pitch Fork; lots of Life Points.[/p][p]Ruffian - Ranged Bandit that carries a Short Bow; low Life Points and cowardly.[/p]
  2. [p]Wolf Class[/p][p]Gray Wolf - Extremely fast and aggressive with a medium amount of Life Points.[/p][p]Timberwolf - Tanky with high physical resistance to damage, slow but powerful.[/p]
  3. [p]Rat Class[/p][p]Giant Rat - Low Life Points & damage, easy to farm and earn experience.[/p][p]Plague Rat - Fat & slow but does more damage and infects the player's party with Rat Bite Fever which remains after combat.[/p]
• [p]Enemies now have a random level between 1-5 and have a chance to drop a class-specific loot item upon death.[/p]
• [p]Each enemy has its own unique sound effect for damage, attack, healing, & death.[/p]
• [p]Random encounters in the world map have higher level enemies the further away from the main roads you get. The closer you get to forests, the higher % you will encounter a Timberwolf.[/p]

• [p]Enemies in combat instances have random patrol routes and if you get within a certain distance (measured in tiles) of them, they will begin chasing you until you either fight or leave the map.[/p]
• [p]Both enemies and loot containers in combat instances will scale according to the time of day; Daytime contain Tier 1 Enemies/Loot, Morning/Evening contain Tier 2 Enemies/Loot, Nighttime contain Tier 3 Enemies/Loot.[/p]
• [p]All enemies & loot are reset every morning at 6am allowing the player to farm previously visited areas.[/p]
• [p]Enemies & loot in combat instances are randomly chosen when entering the map for the first time that day, and remain until reset the next day.[/p]
• [p]The party can run away from enemies in a combat instance giving them a chance to heal up after the fight. The enemies will then begin chasing the party once again after a short duration but will maintain the same amount of Life Points they had in the previous encounter.[/p][p]Note: Enemies in a combat instance heal back to full health when the party leaves the map.[/p]
• [p]Party members that fall unconscious during a fight will NOT receive experience after the encounter concludes.[/p]
• [p]Status penalties now play a sound effect when applied for the first time.[/p]
• [p]Loot containers have a sparkle animation until opened by the player's party. Opening the container will play a breaking open sound effect , the sparkles will disappear, and the graphic will be updated with a broken container.[/p]

[p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]After watching the video, we would like to invite you to engage with us in feedback about what you saw and listen to suggestions and ideas that you may have to make this project even better. Feel free to leave comments here on Steam, on our Discord Server, YouTube channel, or Twitter Page.

If you wish to support this project, you can Wishlist AoT on the main page; that gets us extra exposure on Steam.

Thank you and God bless!
Apostle Games[/p]

Fellowship of Apostles, grace and peace to you,

Normally, I wouldn't make an announcement like this but we reached a huge milestone today as Age of Tribulation had our FIRST article written about us on Turn Based Lovers! ːsteamhappyː

https://turnbasedlovers.com/overview/age-of-tribulation-a-dark-fantasy-open-world-survival-rpg-overview/

For those who haven't heard of TBL, they're an online group of writers and content creators with a passion for turn-based RPGs who bring exposure to less-known projects like this one. They run a fabulous website full of articles and features on indie RPGs, make first impression videos on YouTube, and have a Discord channel where you can get content on the fly. If you aren't already subscribed to their content, go check em' out!

Lastly, I would personally like to thank Marcello for creating Turn Based Lovers and his hard work and dedication to bringing exposure to small indie studios like this one.



After reading the article, we would like to invite you to engage with us in feedback about what you read and listen to suggestions and ideas that you may have to make this project even better. Feel free to leave comments here on Steam, on our Discord Server, Youtube channel, or Twitter Page.

If you wish to support this project, you can Wishlist AoT on the main page; that gets us extra exposure on Steam.

Thank you and God bless!
Apostle Games

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Video Developer Log #17 has just been uploaded to Youtube. This log focuses on the Stronghold animation, Player Armor Sprites, and the new Time Conversion. Let us know what you think, enjoy! ;)

• We have a new development studio! Check out the picture below. ːsteamhappyː
  
• Our 3-month hiatus has been addressed at the beginning of the Dev Log, watch it for more details.
  
• Stronghold now has a proper animation and an exclusive sound effect tied to the character using it (e.g., The male hero sounds male, the female hero sounds female, the enemies sound like the enemy, etc...)
• All 18 player portraits now have a custom sprite sheet reflecting the ethnicity, skin/hair color, and hair style of the respective portrait.
  
• A Special Thank You to HiddenOne for allowing us to use her sprite sheets as a base
  
• The player sprite graphic now updates according to which cuirass is being worn (e.g., No Armor, Serf Set, Commoner's Set, etc...); this includes both a male and female variant.
  
• Time previously counted in 2-hour increments, but now counts in 1-hour increments allowing for much more flexibility in game mechanics that rely on time.
  
• Previously, the internal clock expressed 60 seconds of real time into 2 hours of game time. This has been changed to 20 seconds of real time for every 1 hour of game time.
  
• Food, water, sleep, praying, and armor tailoring have all been adjusted to reflect the new time mechanic and now performs in a much more intuitive way.
  

After watching the video, we would like to invite you to engage with us in feedback about what you saw and listen to suggestions and ideas that you may have to make this project even better. Feel free to leave comments here on Steam, on our Discord Server, Youtube channel, or Twitter Page.

If you wish to support this project, you can Wishlist AoT on the main page; that gets us extra exposure on Steam.

Thank you and God bless!
Apostle Games

Fellowship of Apostles, grace and peace to you,

Good News! The personal reasons that were preventing me from continuing production of Age of Tribulation have been satisfied and I have secured a new and stable development studio. As of yesterday, this title is back in full swing and I was blessed enough to put in a full day of work. Wow, it FEELS GOOD to be back! ːsteamhappyː

In the meantime, I have updated the Demo Roadmap on the front page of Steam and our Discord server. As you may have noticed, a new entry was added called "Time Conversion". After much thought over the past several months, I have decided to convert the internal 12-hour clock into a full 24-hour clock which will allow me more flexibility with game mechanics moving forward. The day/night cycle was one of the first things I implemented nearly 3 years ago and at the time, it didn't make sense to use a full 24 hours... now it does.



I have also updated the target date for the Closed Public - Beta Testing to October instead of April/May. Because summer is coming up and my daughter is out of school, naturally production will slow down a little and I don't want to change the target date again so I'm making sure I have plenty of time to complete the demo on schedule.

Once again, I want to thank all of you who have remained loyal and supportive of Apostle Games and this project. I promise you, AoT will be worth the wait.

We would like to invite you to engage with us in feedback and listen to suggestions and ideas that you may have to make this project even better. Feel free to leave comments here on Steam, on our Discord Server, Youtube channel, or Twitter Page.

If you wish to support this project, you can Wishlist AoT on the main page; that gets us extra exposure on Steam.

Thank you and God bless!
Apostle Games

Fellowship of Apostles, grace and peace to you,

I'm excited to announce that the personal reasons that have led to a 2-month delay in development are being resolved right on schedule. April (next month) still appears to be the time that production will resume and I'm chomping at the bit to get started back up again.

I have used the time away from AoT to study, research, and reevaluate some of the core features in this title. Taking a closer look at old-school JRPG games like Dragon Warrior, Ultima, Breath of Fire, and Final Fantasy have turned the cogs in my brain to move in a slightly new direction. Closely analyzing these staples in the genre has opened my eyes on how to improve upon the current game, and implement a few new ideas that would benefit AoT.

Thanks again for those of you who have supported me in this project and I look forward to firing up my dev PC in a few weeks to hammer out this demo!

We would like to invite you to engage with us in feedback and listen to suggestions and ideas that you may have to make this project even better. Feel free to leave comments here on Steam, on our Discord Server, Youtube channel, or Twitter Page.

If you wish to support this project, you can Wishlist AoT on the main page; that gets us extra exposure on Steam.

Thank you and God bless!
Apostle Games