Feeble Origins: Path of a Hero News

Sorry I've been quiet lately, summer brings with it a major shift in my priorities and work schedule. I hope you can be patient with me because the next update will take a few months longer than the previous updates. This is the first update in a series of big updates. From this update on, I'll be moving to a 3 month update schedule to bring bigger, more meaningful updates for you instead of these small changes.


Right now, questing feels pretty linear, but the game is intended to be an open world where you choose your own adventure, so there will be some major changes to questing and progression.

I intend to make the Adventurer's Guild, and in fact almost all quests, completely optional for completing the game. The guild and quests will help you progress, and increase your "fame", which is a new mechanic I plan on adding. This number will replace the current "quest progress" value.

A new bulletin board will provide a new straightforward way of getting and completing new quests. Note that not all quests will be on the bulletin board, in fact most won't be. Also note that you don't have to collect or accept quests on a bulletin board to complete them.

These changes will allow me to streamline quest flow, and make it easier to add encounters for future updates. It will also make exploration more rewarding and meaningful.


The area under construction in the forest will be opened up. This area includes a new shopkeeper, more caves, a mini-dungeon, elementals, golems, orcs, and more. Most of these things are mapped out and almost ready to go, but I'm still working on what special encounters and quests will be in there.

This is a very large area and will probably triple or quadruple the amount of content in the game. Writing entire quest lines for all this land would take me months and require it to all be done at once, which is why I've come up with the quest/progression system above.


I'm designing a new skill system, which will be pretty simple to match the style of the rest of the game. It will involve you finding things, like books, that give you "knowledge" points. You will spend these points to unlock abilities. This will likely get pushed into its own update due to the complexities involved, but it's next on the list.


There will be a new interface window for viewing all the artifacts you've collected, which will hopefully add some more purpose to your adventuring.


Because I need to revamp some of the UI to add the abilities interface and collection interface, it will open new doors for other interfaces. One that I hope to add next is the ability to remap the controls. I may not get around to it with this update, but I'm hopeful.

* Items marked with an asterisk are stretch goals and may not make it to update 8.

Finally, the combat update you've been waiting for. This is phase 1 in combat improvements and I hope you enjoy it.

Each weapon "class" now has its own secondary attack! Short swords stab, bigger swords do a power attack, and spears do a quick swing attack (it's very fun, I love the spears).

You can also do a dodge roll. You can perform the roll at any time. It will even interrupt your attack animation, which is really nice for slower weapons when you've made a timing mistake.

• Implemented secondary weapon attacks
  
• Implemented a dodge/roll mechanic
  
• Added a 'controls' window that pops up your first time playing and can also be accessed from the settings window
  
• Moved around some keys and locked doors in crypt level 2 to fix some issues using running out of keys
  
• Added a shopkeeper that sells crypt keys just in case you experienced the issue of running out of keys. He also sells potions and recall scrolls at a markup. This is likely to be a temporary shopkeep
  
• Fixed stairway keys names and descriptions
  

Progress on the next update has been slow due to me being sick (allergies, man cold, bronchitis, whatever you want to call it), but I am plugging away as best I can.


I decided to focus on combat with this update because as a player, I myself was getting bored with the repetitive circling/evading, and timing attacks with the current combat system. So I had all these ambitious goals to make a targeting system with blocking and dodging, but after working on that for a few days and not making any headway, I decided to lower the scope and come up something a little more feasible for a solo developer. So here's what I came up with:

• Secondary Attacks. This feature has been coded and I'm assigning each weapon type its appropriate secondary attack.
  
  
  
  • Shortswords and swords have a stab attack which is guaranteed to do the weapon's max damage.
    
  • Longswords, large swords, and short spears have a spinning kind of roundhouse attack (not the AoE kind) that do extra damage and knockback.
    
  • Axes will have a powerful attack but I haven't decided much beyond that.
    

• Rolling. You can roll to quickly evade or get closer to an enemy.
  

• Blocking is a stretch goal because it also requires a strafing mechanic I'll have to look into.
  

• Ranged weapons will not be coming in this update, but will probably use the same strafing mechanic as blocking.
  

Please give me your feedback and ideas so we can make these systems the best they can be! As an early access game, you have the power to shape the game if you participate in the community. The best way to do that is by joining our Discord server (https://discord.gg/ubERWYF). But you can also post in the Steam forums if you prefer.

• Fix a blocking issue where if you collected the key to go to the next floor of the crypt before the update but didn't open the door, you couldn't open it. Now you can find the stairway key in the boss room next to the door.
  
• Fix a bug that would keep some map icons on the map forever.
  

I'm happy to announce that Update 6 is now available! Please enjoy these release notes.

• Added in-game maps! Note that you must first find the area's map except outdoors
  
• Added 2nd floor of crypt
  
• Added chain and plate armor for sale
  
• Added short spears for sale
  
• New and improved main menu!
  
• Show more stats in character sheet
  

• Enemies no longer attack you when you spawn until you move. This prevents you from instadeath upon entering a portal to an unsafe spawn point
  
• Darken gradient behind dialogue
  
• Graphics and lighting tweaks
  
• New HUD artwork
  
• Increase sell prices dramatically
  
• Increase default graphics quality setting
  
• Increase interaction distance for some objects
  
• Game credits added to menu screen
  

• Fix blacksmith discount
  
• Fix a bug that allowed 1 damage through even when blocked
  
• Fix for random character not generating female
  
• Fix for gates not open for old saves
  
• Fix for portrait in shop window
  
• Fix portrait in item received/taken window by removing the portrait
  

• Maps show a quest indicator in the center even when there's no quest available