Equin: The Lantern News

After a pretty arduous year and a half plus it's just about that time.

Equin 2: The Warren Peace, the sequel to DXF Games' best seller Equin: The Lantern will finally be here this Friday, November 19th! When an evil wizard writes the longest and most boring book of all time- which literally bores people to death- it's up to the town stranger to get rid of it.

Follow the exploits of your new adventurer in a brand new and improved traditional roguelike game that pits them against all manner of nasty beastie, on a grand quest to return the damn book to its evil master. Featuring four different player classes and playstyles, skill choices for builds, over 250 different weapons / armor / potions you get the idea. With a special focus on gear variation and the ability to upgrade hundreds of items, even that lowly wooden staff can be a weapon of mass destruction.*

*Potentially, I mean after all it IS still a wooden staff in the end!

Journey through jungle swamps, arid deserts, haunted caves, a frozen prison and more for a one-way trip to the evil wizard's menacing tower in A PLOT THAT HAS NEVER BEEN DONE BEFORE.




But best of all is this game's easy to use control scheme- a rarity in this genre from what I've seen. By primarily using only the arrow keys and space bar many of your actions are done through a special context menu. No need to memorize a thousand input keys or hidden keyboard shortcuts.

By standing next to this witch's cauldron and pressing the space bar you'll have the option to fill an empty bottle and get a free potion- you DID bring an empty bottle, don't you?

"Fight monsters?? Why's everybody hatin' on us zombies? All we want is a little love, dammit. Well that, and some brains of course."




The game has a free demo in which to try this time! Though the full game has been greatly expanded upon in the weeks since the last demo build, it'll give you a good idea on what this game is all about. If you enjoy it, there's no way you won't like the full game. NO WAY, I said.

The demo can be found if you scroll down a bit on EQ2's store page here:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1630690/Equin_2_The_Warren_Peace/



I want to give a special thanks to those of you here who have followed my games' development and enjoyed them over the years up on Steam. It's a fact that we're all getting older and my 47th birthday will be here pretty soon (!!) Don't laugh, it'll happen to YOU TOO one day lol..

Being a solo dev isn't exactly the easiest thing in the world however I wouldn't change it for anything. I don't know how many more of these things I can pump out, but I'll try my damnedest to deliver quality experiences that offer fun, humor, and heart as long as I'm able.

Thanks and have a great day!

And here's a bonus shot of me and R2-D2, who encourages you to at least try the demo. Or is he trying to blink twice for help? Since I don't speak Bocce, I have no idea.

The upcoming sequel to Equin: The Lantern will be part of the October Steam Next event which starts later today, Friday Oct. 1st. Be a part of it and check out the new updated demo. The demo lets you play as the Warrior class though the first two areas. I really think anybody who enjoyed Equin: The Lantern will for sure like The Warren Peace as well.

And I even made a new trailer to show off some of the later areas too!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1630690/Equin_2_The_Warren_Peace/

As always any feedback would be super helpful to me. The game is planned for a Nov. 19th 2021 release.

Thanks and enjoy the event!!

Hey everyone, the Equin 2 demo is finally available!

This is a short demo showcasing the first two areas of the game using the Warrior class. The full game has all four playable classes and six areas to adventure through.



The game is designed to be easy to learn how to play, yet still challenging to give you a good time. You will be using the space bar to call up a context menu to perform actions most of the time. For example if you walk over a treasure chest, pressing the space bar will give you the choice to open it (or attempt to disarm the trap, if it has one). Walking up to a door while in the dark and pressing the space bar will let you listen to see if you can hear monsters on the other side. These are but two small examples.

Plus it'll show you a small picture of what you're interacting with at the bottom. Hoorah!





This joint holds the kind of jerks you read about: Bats, Snakes, Zombies, and Slimes are some of the monsters you'll encounter here. Second in rainfall totals only to Ferenginar, the place is covered in swamps and ponds. Careful swimming in them!





Overall much more open and spacious than the temple area, it's like a giant beach that nobody in their right mind would ever visit. Orcs- vicious pig men- make their homes here amongst the heat and sand. While here be sure to watch out for the random firestorms that sweep through every now and then, as touching the flames will surely burn any wooden gear away.





About pretty much every item can be gotten in this thing if you're super lucky. Swords, helmets, potions.. to the tune of near 275 items of varying degrees of rarity and power. Most can be further upgraded and made much better. There's even an item log to keep track of them now too:



The full game is set to release this November 19th, 2021.

You can download the demo from the Equin 2 storepage's GIANT GREEN button below all the stuff. You can't miss it.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1630690/Equin_2_The_Warren_Peace/

-Dave / Del_Duio

Is my 2nd ever roguelike (and probably my 20th ever completed game, give or take). It takes place in the same world as Equin: The Lantern and makes many significant improvements from my first effort.






An evil wizard has written a 6000-page book, "The Warren Peace", which is the longest and most boring book known to man. Sending it to your village, the curious townsfolk started to read it and then PROMPTY BORED THEMSELVES TO DEATH. As the mysterious stranger, you found the book and have vowed to destroy it by returning it FROM WHENCE IT CAME.

"The Warren Peace" is also an in-game indestructible item, which can be equipped in your off-hand slot and read in combat. This will put your character to sleep for a single round, but enable him to recover stamina. Stamina is used for fighting and many other actions within the game like fishing or digging up graves.

• Easy to use controls, which I find to be a rarity for roguelikes
  
• Lovable rabbit warriors, thieves, wizards, and clerics to routinely kill all the live long day
  
• Equipped gear visibly shows on your character
  
• Larger visible playing field
  
• Battle enemies in first person combat, or automatically 'bump to kill' weaker ones at high levels
  
• Hundreds of items and gear to upgrade
  
• More diverse class skills and this time you can choose what you learn
  
• Travel the world to dispose of the evil book- from swampy temples to arid deserts to underground prisons and more!
  
• A brand new OST featuring real drums, bass, keyboard / synths, and guitars.
  

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1630690/

Please stop by and take a GANDER, if you like what you see please by all means Wishlist and Follow! Know anybody who is interested in roguelikes but is easily scared by how complicated they can be to play? Tell them about it too!

Good afternoon!

Today I'm going to try something a bit different. I'm holding a contest / sign-up for those who'd like to become Equin 2 beta testers! If this doesn't sound like fun, you need not apply of course!

As I'm fast approaching an entire year with the project I can safely say that while it's got tons of cooking left to do I'm getting happier and happier with what I have every day I work on it. Even though I playtest the crap out of my games a lot I believe that in order for me to deliver the best overall product in the end I'd need help to fully test things and probably more importantly get early feedback from you guys so that this can happen.

I've been a long-standing supporter of NO EARLY ACCESS, and while maybe other devs would take what I currently have and try to sell it to make some easy money that's not what I'm going to do. I figure this way I can get the help and feedback I need and some of you can get a free game out of the deal and hopefully a lot of fun, too!




Equin 2: The Warren Peace is my 2nd roguelike game, and the sequel to Equin: The Lantern. It follows the traditional roguelike structure for the most part and has randomized dungeons / permadeath / turn-based, tile-based movement. The biggest thing that separates my games from those however is the inclusion of a first-person battle system akin to the Dragon Warrior (or Pokemon) games. Depending on what items you have equipped in your hands will determine what battle actions your character can perform.

Unlike almost every other roguelike I've ever tried, this game purposely has easy-to-learn controls. Arrows move you around, "I" is for inventory, "W" waits a turn, "S" shows you your Special combat skills and special effects, "ESC" lets you quit and save for next time, and "H" is a small Help section if you need it. Most importantly though is the Space Bar. Pressing Space Bar while you're on or near something you'd like to interact with will bring up a small context menu and let you choose what to do next. This ranges from opening a chest to closing a door to entering a building. So don't forget the space bar!

The game's controls are also always shown on the right bottom of the screen so you can't forget.

There are four playable character classes, each with their own good and bad points. You begin with a set combat skill at level 1, and upon reaching levels 3 and 6 you'll be able to choose one of two other combat skills as well. This differs with the first game as you only had 3 total skills that were always the same. So while it's not Final Fantasy Tactics levels of depth, it does make for more interesting gameplay.

The inventory screen came out really well!

As of this writing, there are 198 total weapons, armor, and other items in the game. Almost all of these can be found upgraded (rarely) or upgraded yourself through use of the amazingly-named "Upgrade Dust". These can also be found in sacks or chests, won as rewards or purchased at shops. Upgrading your gear can really make you more powerful, and unlike some games it's not always going to be "+1 damage, +2 damage, hurr durr". Equipped items also show on your character this time around! I've really put a lot of thought into this game's itemization and I hope it shows through.

Item categories (from worst to best): Common / Rare / Unique / Heroic. Additionally there's "Enemy Drop" which are items that can only be found by killing enemies and getting them from a dropped sack. Very often enemy drops are excellent- rivaling the best rares or even some uniques! To balance them, they will never drop pre-upgraded. That doesn't mean you can't use an Upgrade Dust to upgrade them yourself later, of course! Heroic items are very rare and can't be upgraded at all since they are already pretty damn powerful as-is. Don't fret if you aren't finding many powerful items right away- I'm designing the game so that a player can succeed with a full stack of common gear too!

The game's water generation is a billion times better than ETL's. Sometimes you can get huge lakes like this!

Overall there are less treasure chests in this game than the first one, but that's by design. However, every chest will hold an item in it 100% of the time. Gold pieces are also harder to come by, but for the most part shop item prices have been lowered over the first game's too. Money is acquired through a few ways: 1) Find it in barrels / crates / pots. 2) Scrap an unwanted item for a small amount of cash. 3) Enemies can sometimes drop sacks which contain gold pieces.

Currently, I have 3 dungeon areas more or less complete (Temple / Desert / Crypt) with 2 more planned. Upon reaching the end of the Crypt area you'll be taken to the "end of content" screen.

• This is a very unfinished / unpolished game, and will only improve over time. Many of the battle effects and etc. for example are really rough-looking.
  
• It's only me making all aspects of this, but I do work on it when I'm able to and will absolutely finish it bar an asteroid falling on me or some other godly event.
  
• Your feedback will be kind of greatly necessary to me in order to make this the best game possible for everyone in the end. Think a weapon is too weak? Say so! Think that font looks like ass? Let's hear you! Can't get past the desert area and ready to pull your hair out? Let me know!
  

• I'm looking specifically for those who have extensive knowledge of the first game, Equin: The Lantern. I figure this is the best way to go about it, since I'm trying to improve upon it.
  
• If you can't really put the time to play more than a few minutes of this here and there, please let someone else give it a shot. I only asked for a small amount of beta keys from Valve and want to give those who really want to do this a chance.
  

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I only have a handful of beta keys, so these probably won't last too long. If it's something you'd like to participate in please comment below saying as much and we'll friend request and all that fun stuff afterwards.

Thank you for hearing me out and let's make a good game, dammit!