FreeHolder
Update Planned for Tomorrow
I've been clearing out a number of long-standing bugs including a bug in battles where characters cannot attack with empty hands. I'm making good progress and so rather than call an arbitrary halt and update today, as I had been thinking, I'd rather keep rolling while I have momentum and time and get as much done as I can, and update tomorrow, Saturday. Thanks for your patience.
Chris
Welcome to Our New Players!
You have picked an excellent time to jump in. I have been working a number of things out in my life in order to organize, after many delays, the final push to 1.0 to make this game reach its true potential.
It would appear that all of your positive reviews have finally garnered some kind of attention from the recommendation algorithm and many more people can now see our game, whereas before it was lamentably obscure. We do not understand much if at all of what the mysterious Steam algorithms do, but we do know it is thanks to you taking the time for some kind words that we have staked out a better position, and that means more momentum for everything.
So, make no mistake. Your reviews make a tremendous difference and we are grateful that you take the time to invest in what ultimately is just as precious, if not more so in the long run, than your monetary investment: your good will and enthusiasm.
So thanks again, to players new and old. Expect some sort of update late this week.
And special thanks to Davadin for keeping a watchful eye on the forums.
Happy FreeHolding!
Okay, seriously. It was updated this time. I checked. Hotfix 6 is operational.
I thought I had fixed them. And I had, but some bizarre issue with Unity that I still do not understand was preventing them from appearing after compilation. So for a while I will be triple checking the compiled executable against executed fixes to make sure they have gone through. Hopefully it was a one-off, but in any case, you all won't have to worry about it.
Thanks for your patience. 2020 is the year.
Chris
Hotfix 6 Stability Update
We appreciate your support tremendously, and please be assured that FreeHolder is still in development and will be completed. We are excited to bring you the rest of the content that you have been waiting for with incredible patience. Thank you!
Chris
FreeHolder Into The Future!
I was positioning myself to make serious strides towards getting this game complete when life happened, hard. My family including my baby daughter had to uproot our whole situation and move to Oregon, and my time has until recently been completely used up being a husband and especially a new father, but after about three months of getting our situation well and truly sorted, I am finally back where I want to be and still motivated to complete this game.
It seems like a daunting task, but I have had some discussions with the other designers on ways to streamline the process, cut out certain inefficiencies and generally bring the thing to a level where RogueWare can be truly proud of it as our first game and (necessarily, at this point) our flagship title, in relatively short order, say, by my 36th birthday at the end of June.
As our first title, my coding inexperience, love of design complexity, and vulnerability to feature creep has allowed the process to slow down to inactivity a number of times in combination with other aspects of my life, as this has always been a side project and I have not been able to work on it full-time for various reasons, not least because financially it has never been anything close to capable of supporting and driving our company into the black. Not least because it is not finished.
When we conceived and released FreeHolder originally about seven years ago, we incorrectly imagined ourselves to be in the indie situation that actually existed about five years before then, with people generally willing to put money towards early access games because so few people had been horribly burned by them. FreeHolder was and remains a unique concept, a fun-to-play game, and even now contains tremendously more replay value than the vast majority of early access or full release games that cost as much or much more, but at the same time it is not without some annoying and elusive bugs, and we are now competing with large companies releasing slick free-to-play, pay-to-win games that capture a disproportionate market share because free is free, and furthermore people are much less willing to gamble on early access projects, which is of course completely understandable.
This is not to complain. The support we have been shown by our community at large has been tremendous, and your patience has been extraordinary. And although I wish things could have been different up to this point, the only thing I can do and we as a company can do is pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and try again.
I cannot really move on in my life or as a designer until this game is complete, and I feel like I can actually be proud of it, and so, it will be completed. Expect genuine updates soon. You all deserve it and more.
Thanks again for everything you have done for me, and RogueWare.
Best,
Chris
Delays...But Good News! And We're Looking for Artists!
On that note, we do not have a staff artist of any sort, which has been problematic as the game development continues. I am only capable of making simple graphics and retro character sprites, and my time would be better spent coding. If YOU are a graphics artist, if YOU have ideas about the art direction of FreeHolder, some demo work to show us, and are willing to work for share in the company, please contact us. We cannot pay a salary at this time. If you are of the same belief that this game can be driven to a high level of success, and want in on that process, we are interested in hearing from you! Send inquiries to chris@theroguewareproject.com.
A lot of extraordinarily positive changes are on the horizon, and I only hope that your patience and goodwill have not yet been totally exhausted by the sporadic development of this game. I want to bring a better experience to you all and am committed to making whatever changes are necessary to make this game the best it can be. I am going to be very busy over the next six weeks or so, but I promise FreeHolder will never be far from my mind.
Thank you for your support of FreeHolder. It means so much to me, and all of us here at RogueWare.
You all kick ass.
Chris
Upcoming Features: Campaign Mode
Hello everyone. I apologize for the lack of updates or activity in recent months. However, I have managed to squeeze some new art for the game in spare moments, which inspires me to work on the code because I have something tangible to integrate into the game.
The campaign section as previously conceived, and not really implemented, was overly complicated and served to reimpose limits on your play just as you supposedly transcend them by overcoming the census taker. The mission system was just a rehashing of the old "wheat and money" limitations. I wanted the mid-game to feel more like a new game, something fresh, like "Super FreeHolder."
Rather than being pigeon-holed through the resource demands of missions, you can freely convert goods you obtain to "faction resources" in line with whatever development strategy you want to follow. This direct interface with faction statistics ties your fate much more closely with them.
The campaign section will involve managing your faction capital and seizing territory around the towns, producing squads and ultimately attempting to overcome the other two factions. It's a combination of some mechanics of the old Genesis classic Gemstone, Heroes of Might and Magic, a zone control board game I can't remember, and some other stuff.
I'm psyched to implement these factors as soon as possible. Constructing a rudimentary faction computer strategy will take a bit of time, but I want to get this to you as soon as I can. I just wanted to assure that FreeHolder is not only still in development, but I have exciting new content planned and I am very much intent on getting it to you.
Thanks for your patience and support of the game. It means everything to me.
Chris
FreeHolder Alpha 7 Hotfix 6
12.6.2018
Upgraded Workshops
The Spinnery, Pottery, and Smoking Hut are now upgradable to their improved versions, which allow spinning of Spider's Silk to Bolts of Silk, the firing of clay into Bricks, and the smoking of Meat respectively. Smoked Meat is immediately awesome; the Silk Bolts and Bricks will really be more useful a bit more into the mid-game, but for completeness and extra profit they have been added.
More Fixes
More bugfixes and upgrades on the way. My time has been unfortunately severely limited as of late, but I hope to make a few more good steps forward in progress over the upcoming holiday, including dealing with those pesky bandit/strike forces issues on the villa map during the mid-game. Stay tuned!
Bugfixes
-Fixed equipability of certain lootable items
-Influence actions no longer give an extra XP
-Master Clothier double speed silk weaving functionality restored
-Certain item sale prices corrected
Upgrades
-Bolts of Silk, Smoked Meat, Bricks added to Resources
-Spinnery now upgradeable to Weaving Shop
->Spider's Silk can be spun into Bolts of Silk
-Smoking Hut now upgradeable to Smokehouse
->Meat can now be smoked
-Pottery now upgradeable to Kiln
->Clay can now be fired into Bricks
Upcoming Features
(! = Major feature)
Muse's Song skill for Guildmaster (requires addition of art objects)
More battle gear (battlecapes, battlepack, sling pouches and special ammo)
(!)Steam Achievements(!)
-----alpha 8 (tentative)--------
More advanced classes and class skills
Remove studio action
Second factorium size upgrade
FreeHolder Alpha 7 Hotfix 5
11.2.2017
Level 3 Fabrica and New Iron Items
I was all ready to start coding iron mining and smelting when I suddenly realized I had actually done it already. This virtually never happens. It was wonderful. So, straight on to the Fabrica.
***REMINDER: The Fabrica Upgrade button is placed obscurely, to the left of the open crafting ledger once you enter the Fabrica menu. Not sure where else to put it, but this is temporary.***
The Level 3 Fabrica upgrade which allows you to craft iron items is now available. Keep in mind that iron requires not merely firewood but CHARCOAL to smelt and smith with it, and right now the only truly reliable source of charcoal is slashing and burning areas with dense vegetation. I think it would be wise to add a workshop type that allows conversion of firewood into charcoal; such a "Charcoal Kiln" would be historically known and available, and it is a significant sacrifice to use up a workshop space just for charcoal production. However, if you are planning on making heavy use of iron ore, it would be well worth it. Plus charcoal would be relatively valuable to sell directly.
The five new items released with the L3 Fabrica are not exhaustive of what is ultimately coming. There are other planned items including Atlantean technology and adamantine metal for the endgame, but that will wait for some time.
L3 Fabrica Items:
HEAVY SHIELD. The best ordinary shield available, made from iron.
STORM QUIVER. The best quiver, holds 24 arrows of up to three different types.
SPLINTMAIL. Relatively simple iron-reinforced armor that can be worn by non-warriors.
BATTLEAXE. Excellent iron axe that wreaks severe havoc.
TRIDENT. Iron spear which pierces and causes bleeding.
IRON MAUL. Powerful two-handed blunt weapon which is not too heavy for non-warriors to wield.
Journeyman Smith and New Craftable Items
SCUTUM. An improved heavy shield that also slightly protects allies from ranged attacks.
CHAINMAIL. An intricate iron armor that is light enough for anyone to wear but still quite strong.
SPATHA. A longer and more deadly gladius made of iron.
LAJATANG. An exotic bladed staff for use by warriors only.
WARHAMMER. An iron hammer also capable of piercing through armor with its pointed spike.
Master Clothier and New Craftable Items
The Rancher's L2 upgrade of the Tailoring skill, Master Clothier, now is implemented and immediately unlocks the ability to craft 5 new items at the Fabrica regardless of its current upgrade level. (Generally forging of progressively better metal items is what is unlocked when upgrading it.) These include:
COZY HAT. Multipurpose weather resistance accessory.
WAYFARER BOOTS. Great fatigue reduction and slight wet resistance.
HEAVY GLOVES. Small roll boost whenever using tools or any weapon in combat.
ARMORCLOTH MANTLE. Gone for a bit, now back as a non-leather alternative light armor.
SPLENDID VESTMENTS. Big time Charisma boost, of limited use until mid-game is more implemented.
I have removed the skill reference to spinning Bolts of Silk twice as fast, as this is not currently possible. I will add that back to the skill when I add silk spinning to the game.
Dark Gadgetry and New Craftable Items
The Agent's L2 upgrade of the Thiefcraft skill, Dark Gadgetry, now is implemented and immediately unlocks the ability to craft 5 new items at the Fabrica dependent its current upgrade level, depending on whether iron or copper is required. I took two items away from the excessive number available for Thiefcraft and put them in Dark Gadgetry, RogueWear and Shade Raiment.
ROGUEWEAR. Espionage-action and charisma-boosting inner layer.
SHADE RAIMENT. Cloak with large stealth and evasion boost.
SMOKE BOMB. Provide one character with immediate stealth during combat. (Requires L2 Fabrica)
CALTROPS. Provide thorns effect for one character for an entire combat. (Requires L3 Fabrica)
CHAKRAM. Accurate iron throwing weapon that causes exceptional bleeding. (Requires L3 Fabrica)
Bugfixes
I keep putting off bugfixes unintentionally because of the limited time I have to accomplish things when I sit down to work. At my next not-insanely-short opportunity I will start cracking through the buglists and fixing stuff. Bugfixing is much less harder to predict in terms of how much time it will take than coding known and planned features. But it can't wait much longer. This next fix should be quite bugfix-oriented.
Upgrades
-L3 Fabrica Upgrade, Advanced Smithy (for smithing iron items) now available
-->Heavy Shield, Storm Quiver, Splintmail, Battleaxe, Trident, Iron Maul battle gear added to game
-Warrior's L2 skill Journeyman Smith now functional
-->Scutum, Spatha, Lajatang, Warhammer battle gear added to game
-Rancher's L2 skill Master Clothier now functional
-->Cozy Hat, Wayfarer Boots, Heavy Gloves, Splendid Vestments equipment added to game
-Agent's L2 skill Dark Gadgetry now functional
-->Chakram, Caltrops battle gear added to game
Upcoming Features
(! = Major feature)
Muse's Song skill for Guildmaster (requires addition of art objects)
More battle gear (battlecapes, battlepack, sling pouches and special ammo)
(!)Steam Achievements(!)
-----alpha 8 (tentative)--------
More advanced classes and class skills
Remove studio action
Second factorium size upgrade
FreeHolder Alpha 7 Hotfix 4
10.14.2017
Ledger Tools Page Added
Got that tools page for the Ledger in. Now you can check your entire collection of tools, durability, etc, right in your Ledger. All that's left is Events, and I don't think that is a critical upgrade at the moment. I haven't completely conceived of what it will track yet, and I will have to take some development time to flesh it out, so I suggest we hold off on that feature for a while. However, I think it will be fun later to see a history of everything you have done that you can page through.
Crafting Ledger Reorganized
Finally reorganized the categories in the Crafting Ledger to reflect the new division of domestic equipment and battle gear. This should stop the surely existent confusion of the non-mapping of items from the old system to the new.
Bugfixes Up Next
Gonna sweep the forums and do some bugfixes ASAP, and then move on to other systems to prep for the campaign mode midgame upgrades in mind. Stand by, folks.
Upgrades
-Ledger tools info page added
Bugfixes
-Reorganized Crafting Ledger categories to reflect new equipment and battle gear items
Upcoming Features
(! = Major feature)
(!)Steam Achievements(!)
Dark Gadgetry for Agent (requires addition/reworking of Use Items)
Muse's Song skill for Guildmaster (requires addition of art objects)
Journeyman Smith for Warrior (requires additional items and iron)
More battle gear (battlecapes, battlepack, sling pouches and special ammo)
-----alpha 8 (tentative)--------
More advanced classes and class skills
Remove studio action
Second factorium size upgrade