The Vow: Vampire's Curse News

[h2]Our public playtest is now live, jump in and try it out![/h2][p]
[dynamiclink][/dynamiclink]We’re excited for you to try the game! After playing, feel free to share your thoughts, your feedback helps make the game better.[/p][p]We ran our first playtest back in December, and it was very helpful for us. Players shared a lot of valuable feedback, and we’ve made several changes based on it. In this playtest, you’ll be able to see many of those improvements. [/p][p]If you’d like to chat with us and other players, feel free to join our Discord as well. [/p][p][/p][p]We’re also participating in the TurnBasedThursday Fest and Wholesome Underdogs, so it’s a great time to check the game out!

Thanks for playing!

[p]
We’re officially announcing our next playtest.
Aaaand… It’s happening on March 9.
The Public Playtest is open for requests starting NOW.
All requests will be accepted when the playtest officially opens, so feel free to invite your friends. The more players, the better! [/p][p]
The playtest will run from March 9 to March 16.
If you want to see the game early and help shape it, now’s the time.
[/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p][p]Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about what February looked like for us, because we locked ourselves in and went full polish mode. [/p][p][/p][h2]Changes to Defeat Rules[/h2][p]
After the last playtest, we received feedback that losing the run immediately after buildings were destroyed felt too punishing and cut runs short..
So we’ve reworked the mechanic.
Now, when a building is damaged, it applies a debuff to your deck by cursing one of your cards, increasing the pressure without immediately ending the run.

You now only lose if the hero dies or if all four buildings are destroyed.

[/p][h2]Day Abilities Reworked[/h2][p]
We redesigned the Day phase. Now you have 4 actions per day which you can spend them on randomly rolled abilities of the buildings or invest them to increase the number of options available.
And so from that you decide do you commit early to what you’re given or spend actions fishing for something stronger?

Now preparation feels tighter and resource management matters more.

[/p][h2]Three New Building Types[/h2][p]
As promised, added three new building types.
Each one introduces new utility and decision making. Some support you directly. Some shape the battlefield indirectly. Some create powerful timing windows if used correctly. ( items and untis and abilities)

The Lighthouse, Alchemy Lab, Smithy
[/p][h2]Battlefield Control [/h2][p]
Two major mechanics entered the battlefield.

[/p][h3]Traps[/h3][p]You can now place traps to control space and punish enemy movement. Positioning matters more and also you can lure the enemies into the traps. [/p][p]Stakes and Vines [/p][p][/p][p]Auras[/p][p]Certain buildings and units now radiate passive effects around them. It can be a Buff or a Debuff. [/p][p]
[/p][p][/p][h2]Items & Allies [/h2][h3]
New Items[/h3][p]We added several new items, each bringing its own gameplay twist, blessings, calling in the Wolf, mobility boosts, and more. Items work the way if you stand on their tile, their ability activates. [/p][h3]New Ally Types[/h3][p]We also introduced new ally types, each with distinct roles and interactions on the battlefield.
The Cow is our personal favorite.
Enemies will prioritize attacking the Cow first. Poor baby. She can be used strategically to redirect pressure
[/p][p]These are some of the abilities tied to the buildings you choose and upgrade during the Day phase. [/p][p][/p][h2]We have more sounds now *woosh*[/h2][p]
We spent a serious chunk of time integrating new SFX across combat and systems.
You’ll here them when you play it !

[/p][h2]Visual Clarity [/h2][p]
We added:
[/p]

• [p] Directional arrows for movement and effects
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• [p] Clear spawn markers for enemies
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• [p] Counterattack indicators
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• [p] Burning visuals on ignited units
  [/p]
• [p] Color-coded action highlights
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• [p] Stronger visual separation between different effects
  [/p]

[p]Combat reads faster. You understand what’s happening at a glance, chaos still exists tho. [/p][p][/p][h2]A New Blood System[/h2][p]We rebuilt the blood engine. More reactive splashes, better tile interaction, stronger visual response to heavy hits.
When things get violent, the battlefield reflects it.
[/p][p]Ok, so
February was about improving systems and clarity. So now, it’s your turn to try it.
Request access and join the playtest. And if you wanna hang out with us, share your thoughts, hop on to our Discord! [/p][p]See you there!

Hope you all had great holidays! We got some much-needed rest, and now that we’re back in our routine.

January was a productive month for us. As some of you already know, in December, we ran a playtest, and spent significant time analyzing player feedback. The results showed strong potential for depth and complexity, but also highlighted an important issue, that early on, the game felt overwhelming due to the number of mechanics, abilities, and terms introduced at once.
Based on this, our focus shifted toward helping players feel comfortable first, while saving deeper complexity for later stages of the game.
At the same time, we integrated several long-awaited visual updates that had been in the works for quite a while.

New Blood Visuals



We updated the blood visuals and added a spreading system. This makes combat feel more impactful and helps sell the brutality of what’s happening on the battlefield.

Unit Spawn & Disappearance Effects



We added new visual effects for unit appearance and disappearance. These effects improve combat readability and strengthen the overall atmosphere.

We also addressed a number of subtle but annoying problems that could be fixed quickly:

• Increased cursor size
  
• Improved the lighting algorithm
  
• Fixed awkward seams between water tiles and regular tiles
  

Individually, these changes are small, but together they significantly improve the overall feel of the game.

We’re continuing to iterate based on feedback and are excited to share more as development progresses.
If you’d like to follow the development more closely, give feedback, or join future playtests, feel free to join our Discord, we’d love to have you there!

[p]As the year comes to an end, we wanted to take a moment to look back, and most importantly, to say thank you for supporting The Vow and our team.[/p][p]This year has been incredibly exciting for us. We announced the game, opened our Steam page, took part in our first festivals, and got to know so many of you along the way. Our Discord community has been growing day by day, and we even ran our first public playtest, the first time the game was played by people outside our friends and family.[/p][p]Seeing real players try the game, share feedback, and enjoy it was huge for us.We’re still early in development, but reaching the point where more people can play and shape the game with us feels really special.[/p][p]And next year is going to be a big one. We're planning to release a demo and run more playtests so we can keep improving the game and make it the best it can be with your help.[/p][p]With all of this in mind, we’re incredibly grateful and excited. Thank you for being here, for supporting us, and for believing in The Vow.[/p][p]We can’t wait to continue this journey with you ![/p][p][/p]

[p]The playtest is officially over, and we can’t thank you enough for the time you spent playing The Vow and for all the feedback you shared with us. You’ve been incredibly inspiring and helped us highlight some very important issues. We’ve carefully read all the feedback, watched playthroughs, and discussed the results as a team. [/p][p]We think it’s important to share what we’re preparing for the next playtest, and we’re excited to continue running more playtests as we move toward the demo. [/p][p]To make the experience clearer, and more comfortable to play- our first focus is on improving onboarding, overall readability, like from tutorials and cards to combat UI, defeat conditions, controls, and audio. And besides these improvements, the upcoming playtest will introduce 3 new building types. Each run will start with four random buildings, making repeated playthroughs more varied and tactically interesting. [/p][p]Once again, thank you to everyone who participated and shared their time, it truly means a lot to us and helps us make the game better! [/p][p]To get updates on upcoming playtests and development, or to chat with us, you can always join our Discord.[/p][p][/p]