Deep Dark Wrath News

It’ll only be a week left until Deep Dark Wrath final releases and I would like to quickly inform you of some news about the game.

Bush and Rock Fluffing



A small little addition to give the bushes and rocks a little more life. The rocks squashing is a little weird, but its fine for me right now. I mainly want it so you can see if an enemy is hiding behind them. Maybe I should remove it for the rocks? I’m not sure, leave a comment about it below if it feels too out of place.

Final Testing



Final Testing has been done to the game to make sure everything is working alright. I was able to finally test and use controllers for the game, and as such perfect the Partial Controller Support. It was a whole can of worms I didn’t account for but I was glad to finally be able to fix them while stress testing this Full Version. Since I didn't test the demo properly, the rebinding didn't work, small quality-of-life things didn't work, so I made sure it was all working well for the Full Version release. I'm not sure if I'll update the demo with these new updates.

Fullscreen is available as an option as well. It's still maximized on first time open or when first time opening from an older save so you won't be forced into the option if you don't like it.

1 Week Left



If you have any feedback, please do leave them anywhere down below as it is always greatly appreciated to help Deep Dark Wrath improve more on being a fun, lightweight, and grindy game. That's all for this article, thank you for reading through it.

This has been CraftedCircuitry, signing off for now.

Heyyo, it’s CraftedCircuitry again with a small announcement. It’ll only be 2 weeks left until Deep Dark Wrath’s Full release. I'm proud to announce I'm finally nearing its Full Version completion.

As mentioned in the Summary, the release date of Deep Dark Wrath is 2024 May 27, Monday.

v0.9.10 - Final Bugfixing



I still had some time to polish and bugfix and it’s good that I still try to break my game whenever I can. A remnant of an old bug that destroyed a few weeks of game dev was the Area Notifier not properly syncing whether I was in a certain area or not. This time it was in the Hidden Veil Shop, which is a very big misstep if I did not see that bug.

The Area Notifiers have 2 main collision areas, signifying the 2 areas it would connect. What I would do is check collisions to see if the Adventurer has passed through it or not. On my first iterations, it would not properly log what area the Adventurer was in, making it possible where enemies would not spawn in the area you want to go and not properly activating certain important functions for that area.

I fixed it by simply checking if the Adventurer’s current area was already different from the collision’s area, making it more precise.

However, I didn't do it properly for Veil Shop, which resulted in this bug again. This can be easily manipulated by players as there is a very powerful function it does that would essentially break the game if I let the bug happen. Luckily, since I already know how to do it properly, it's an easy fix.

V0.9.11 - Adventurer Hit Effects



In pursuit of polishing the game further, I added more hit feeling whenever the Adventurer gets hit. I made it more exaggerated, I emulated the feeling you get on how Hollow Knight does it. Blackening of the screen, shockwaves to see that you got hit, and more red when the Adventurer is already at 1 HP. There’s also a lot more effects when the Adventurer dies in the run. Again, I wanted to add a bit more exaggeration.

I essentially just reused the Oracle Appraisal effect for this so I didn’t really have to make a brand new module. It was also White normally, so I can easily modulate the colors to what I need it to be. It’s the same as the small effects you get when Enchanted Cards apply, the Adventurer healing, or when they get Points. The effect only ever gets used for the Oracle so I might as well reuse it.

V0.9.12 - Stamps



The Adventurer can now get Stamps from their adventures that automatically show up in their Save Journal. This is only saved on your Save Data and is not connected to stuff like Steam’s Achievements system. I might add the functionality post-release.

I’ve even added a little Info page in the Dungeon Chronicles so you can get a hint of how to get the three Stamps on your Save Journal.

V0.9.17 - Plume Color



Something that’s been on the backburner for a long time, didn’t even write it on my to-do lists and documents. A small little change that lets Adventurers change their Plume Colors. It adds some nice more personality in your adventures as your venture deep into this deep Dungeon.

The simple color bar was changed to the sprite of the Adventurer eventually as it’ll help you get a glimpse of what it looks like without having to go out of the Options Menu.

Overestimated Requirements



I sadly over-estimated the minimum requirements for a PC. I had only been testing the demo on the lowest spec laptop I have available and it can run it, for a lack of a better way to say it. I only tested the Full Game recently, and well, it doesn’t run xD. I really thought GLES2 could save me with lower budget spec hardware, but with how I made the game, it was just not able to. GLES2 still saves me on older Androids which is still very good though.

I’m just gonna play it safe and put the recommended requirements as the minimum. At the very least it actually runs properly and very smoothly. Going lower will still be fine if ever anyone wants to try, but the lower the spec you go, the less performance and less guarantee it actually runs.

Ready for Cloud Saving



Yes, I was honestly debating whether to add this or not. But it always stuck in my mind that this is a grindy game. Adding Cloud Save to Steam is another layer of protection with the Save Backup functionality of the Save Journal. I decided to do it, it was pretty easy with Steam's Auto-Cloud anyway, and I got it working in literal minutes.

I’ve done some developer tests and it seems to be working flawlessly. What’s nice is that both this and the Save Journal Backing Up work very seamlessly together.

A Quick Ending to a Quick Announcement



I feel like a broken record, but it’s simply just polishing and playtesting as the game is about to release in roughly 2 weeks. Hoping for a good launch, and once again, thank you for all the support.

This has been CraftedCircuitry, signing off for now.

I rested a lot during these past few weeks so updates have been really slow. Now that I am a bit more rested, I am a bit more ready for the coming weeks until Deep Dark Wrath’s Full Version release. There’s a bigger focus on polishing and finalizing the game so the changes aren’t going to be too big.

[h3]v0.9.2 - Special Points[/h3]



A special interim task the Player can aim for. It holds a lot of Points, 500 to 750 depending on which area you gathered it from. I’ve been really trying to add as much mid-game content as the game does get pretty boring and one-track once you start aiming for the 7 Oracle Pieces.

So this should add more things for the Adventurer to explore. I might add one more thing, but this should be plenty enough places to get more rewards like more Points and Cards like Shadow Force.

[h3]v0.9.3 - Booshes and Rocks[/h3]



I wanted to add a bit more life to the areas, so these bushes and rocks help liven up the various Dungeon Areas.

[h3]v0.9.7 - Flameboyance[/h3]



I was planning on putting Flameboyance into a future Post-release update, but I decided to add it here now if I ever take a long time to add the Post-release content updates of this game. I want to make this game complete out of the box, and having more options to venture the Dungeon helps that.

[h3]v0.9.8 - More Bugfixing[/h3]



While testing some features out, I noticed that the Config was not loading properly from the Backup. I kept trying and trying and somehow it just did not work. I looked through the code and kept trying to find the culprit, and it was a simple variable I did not change.

Loading player progress uses a single Load Static function, and in that function it needs a variable of whether it’ll load from the actual save data or from the backup save data. At the very end, the config loading is supposed to be loaded. It actually takes in the same variable.

The problem? The config loading was always set to False, meaning it would always attempt to load from the actual save data and not backup. This works fine normally but if I want to load from backup, well it did not work. That was a bit of a headache xD but I finally fixed it.

I actually had a bug that I did not mind with the Fireball. I added lights to it before, but didn’t make it more apparent. Some feedback on Reddit gave me a reason to revisit it, and apparently the lights did not properly follow the direction of the Fireball. It’s now fixed and the lights made more apparent, which adds a lot more life to that attack.

I’ve also been doing my final tweaks to the game, upping Sound Effects and Background Music and the like.

[h3]Updates to the Compendium[/h3]



I added more clarifications, re-iterated some more information, and added information about the recent additions like the Flameboyance Card and the Special Points. I’ve been looking to also be more mindful of the grammar in the Books and rewriting when necessary.

[h3]Visual Updates[/h3]



Lots of updates recently, so I decided to update the screenshots on the various platforms and the game’s Press Kit to be updated with the recent changes. You can check them out on the game’s various platforms.

The CraftedCircuitry YouTube channel is also now filled with tons of Shorts about the various Enchanted Cards you can get. You can check them out if you like.

[h3]Release Date Nearing[/h3]



I’ll announce the release date 2 weeks before the date. It’s been nice to have some rest from Deep Dark Wrath, playing it with the intention of actually playing it, doing the goals and living the idea of being able to play one of my dream games that have been on my mind for years.

Echoing my previous Devlog’s ending sentiment, thank you all for the support or even just reading through this Devlog. It is much appreciated and it has been fun to show Deep Dark Wrath to the world.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2891520/Deep_Dark_Wrath/

It’s been CraftedCircuitry, signing off for now.

Heyyo, I am CraftedCircuitry and welcome to my first to-be-released game, Deep Dark Wrath! It’s been 6 months of game development and it's finally about to be released in a couple of months.

The game started as an idea when I was playing Monster Hunter World: Iceborne. I wanted to get the endgame grind experience, but at a smaller package. For years the idea of a quick-to-play game was in my head but was left on the backburner because of life. I also haven't really set on a proper idea of what the game loop would be.

But inspiration hit me from a very odd place. I got inspiration from a Minecraft minigame, Decked Out from Hermitcraft. And it finally clicked, I really liked the dungeon diving experience that minigame had so I put a little twist on it and gave it my own flare.

The game loop for the game was:

• Enter the Dungeon
  
• Gather Points from Dungeon
  
• Safely Escape the Dungeon
  
• Use those Points to buy Enchanted Cards, ideally increasing in rarity and power
  
• Repeat
  

With the end goal of diving deeper and deeper so that you gain more and more Points, access to more powerful Enchanted Cards, and to find the source of the darkness, the Oracle Pieces, at the end of the Dungeon. The Oracle Pieces which can turn into Oracle Cards that can be used to make it easier to dive deeper in the Dungeon, and to hopefully quell the Deep Dark Wrath.

I now had a game loop, a rough idea of what the game will be, and a drive to make this game. It's been 6 months of solo developing and here we are. I'm proud of what I've achieved and done so far. And, I hope people like and enjoy this small game.

[h2]Let me quickly showcase the progress so far.[/h2]

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h2]V0.1[/h2]



Promptly after the idea was finally formulated, I started prototyping the mechanics. Making sure everything works and all that. After weeks of prototyping, I spent almost 2 months completing the content of the game. The vast Dungeon Areas, the challenging Enemies, all the Key Items, and the goal of the game. I already had a pretty good idea of what I want this game to be so it was simply a matter of making the game a reality.

[h2]V0.2[/h2]



The Lighting and Feel of the Game were added here. This gave the game the mostly signature look it has now. It's a lot lighter back then as I still wanted to keep the big visibility. This was also when I ripped out the camera movement via mouse as it wasn’t really needed anymore.

[h2]V0.3 - v0.4[/h2]



These versions focused on polishing the content and mechanics of the game. This was also the time where I was finally confident enough to start showing off this game to the world and on various social media platforms.

[h2]V0.5[/h2]



The Fireball was introduced in this progress version, a powerful attack the Adventurer can unlock later down the line(not in the Free Demo). I also did a lot more polishing to this game, of course.

[h2]V0.6 - V0.7[/h2]



The Combat Update happened in v0,6, while a Speed and Pacing Update happened in v0.7. These were 2 very big balancing of mechanics updates that I did due to a lot of feedback from a game jam. These updates helped shaped a better experience for the player as they explore the Dungeon.

I also made this game a bit more optimized for lower-end hardware. It's a fairly simple 2D game, surely it can run on a good range of hardware. A lot more lag was quelled, and a lot of mechanics optimized and made easier to run.

v0.7 is also the version of the Free Demo you can download to try out the game! I’ve been working hard to polish and perfect it, and to give it the best experience so that you get the gist of the game. As such, this is also the point where I finally made and released the Steam Page!

[h2]V0.8[/h2]



The Final Stretch of Polishing is here. From little quality of life changes to bug fixes, this current version I’m working on is really about finishing this game. I've still got a lot to do, better sound design, better quality of life changes, and maybe add some Steam Achievements later on.

Multiple times I thought, 'I am done with this game'. I'm glad I didn't just released my game willy-nilly as it wouldn't have been so much better. I'm glad I can introduce this first Steam game to you all, Wishlist the game if you like what you see!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2891520

This has been CraftedCircuitry, signing off for now.