This playtest update includes all of year 4. This also comes with a lot of balancing and tweaks - old saves will still work, but if you start a new save, you'll notice you start with less happiness and mana, making the battles overall more difficult.
Changelog:
Added year 4
Added CGs
Added a calendar of events
Allowed friend to help in greenhouse
Added study with friends option
Adjusted stats/battles
Added achievements
Minor adjustments and bugfixes
There's a considerable amount of things and polish to do before the early access release, but this is the end of the content we plan to release in the early access launch in October. All four characters have now had their introduction year, and Apex has finally made his move.
Let me know what you think of year 4, and if you have any feedback or suggestions!
Year 3 - Update 0.1.62
This playtest update includes all of year 3 - which is probably one of the most dramatic (and fun) of the years so far. By year 3, you should know a good amount of spells and the battle system starts to show it's depth, and there's the contest which is a good test of your skill (but you can give up if you just aren't good with the battles).
Changelog:
Added year 3
Added achievements
Added new backgrounds
Added Lorni/Stern art
Added year 2 evidence art
Added chapter saves (work like autosaves, but give you a save you wont lose at the beginning of each chapter)
Minor adjustments and bugfixes
Let me know what you think of year 3, and if you have any feedback or suggestions!
Stardander School for Witches in Turn Based Festival!
We're really excited to be part of the turn based festival this year - as the battle system is something we're really proud of! I even made a video talking about it and the new quick cast system here:
I think the Stardander battle system offers something new and fun, even for turn-based veterans! There's strategy involved in being able to cast multiple spells per turn, while knowing who the enemy is going to attack beforehand. And the fact that only a few of the spells are direct damage dealing spells pushes players to get creative and use everything at their disposal to win.
You can read more about the battle system update and more here: https://steamcommunity.com/games/1733050/announcements/detail/3469488996650784384
We will also be live streaming a team playthrough of the game tomorrow at 2PM EST! https://steamcommunity.com/games/1733050/announcements/detail/3497637038443371261 Drop in if you want to see the developers talk about the game and ask us questions live!
Hope to see you there!
Team Playthrough
Join the devs as we play through Stardander School for Witches and talk about development!
This will be a half hour long stream during the #TurnBasedFest - follow along and try the demo yourself!
Demo Update 0.1.48
While we've mostly been focused on Year 2 and beyond, we got a lot of good feedback during the Steam Next Fest and wanted to post an update to the demo!
One of the biggest complaints I've had is that the battles are clunky, and this update attempts to fix that, along with a number of other quality of life changes and improvements!
Changelog:
Improved battle UI - you can now memorize spells, and quick cast them without opening their spells list.
Added glossary to encyclopedia, and made some words clickable to bring it up.
Trial gives more info on each evidence (like date you got the evidence and a brief refresher). You can also bring up the evidence list at any time during a trial.
Many edits and improvements to Year 1 - including more foreshadowing for future years.
Added graphics for bars (like the health bar).
Added particle effects.
Added animations to using potions & items, and improved potion crafting animation.
Added enchanting animation.
Added icons to the inventory and crafting menus.
Any ally can now be chosen to make potions - not just the party leader!
Changed Options to Menu on the title page - as there are several things I wanted to put there (credits, community link, and later achievements).
Added load option in game pause menu
Minor improvements/stat changes.
Added a small shake when changing pose.
Removed animal guide and book from equipment. These were part of the original game to increase personality points, but we decided they were no longer needed.
I'm hoping to have year 2 finished and uploaded to the playtest by the end of this month - so if you have access to the playtest, look forward to that! If you don't, then hop on our discord and ask to be given access!
Minor Update 0.1.34
Some minor adjustments and improvements to year 1 - unless there is additional feedback, this will probably be the final demo build for the steam next fest!
Changelog:
Added Blantree's and Tommia's theme (music)
Added carriage frame
Revised rory sprite
Added and edited some scenes
Stardander at Steam Next Fest!
Ready for some spooky magical mischief this fall? We’re showcasing a demo of our upcoming game, Stardander School for Witches, at the Steam Next Fest from October 3-10! We’ve been working hard on polishing the first chapter (of seven) to share for the demo, and we’re now all set to show it off in time for the festival!
Welcome to witch school! Learn spells, solve mysteries, make friends, and battle (or befriend) Fae creatures in a turn based battle system. Can you defeat the malicious enemy who has laid siege to the world?
We’ll also be running two featured live streams during the Next Fest.
The demo and live streams are free and open to all during the festival week, so please stop by our Steam page and say hi! This will be a great time to try out the game, interact directly with the developers and ask us any questions you might have.
For those who have been following Stardander's development, we were originally considering launching the full game this halloween. However, we made some major changes to the game’s structure after great feedback on our spinoff game, Stardander Revenant - which changed our trajectory. Plus, we wanted enough time to polish the game properly, and so decided to postpone the release and focus mainly on the demo this year. We don't have a firm release date yet but the full game will be coming out sometime in 2023!
Aground Zero
We haven’t forgotten about our 3D Aground spinoff - Aground Zero! Development is progressing well, and we even plan to share a demo in the Steam Next Fest in February 2023!
The world has ended. You are deep underground, and all alone other than your AI companion. You will have to mine and build to survive, and search for other survivors to help you. Will you be able to reach the surface? And what will you see when you get there?
The demo content of Aground Zero is already mostly done, it just needs some polish and a few more 3D models. Since you can build bases from pretty much the beginning, the demo requires a large percent of the models to be complete. I’ve started working on the questlines and NPCs beyond the demo area - and I’ll probably update the trailer and share more about Aground Zero once those last incomplete models are done!
For those curious about why we decided to make two games at the same time, I just released a blog post all about it here: https://david.fancyfishgames.com/2022/09/two-games-at-same-time-crazy-or-genius.html
Behind the Music of Stardander - Live Stream
Join Chase Bethea (Composer) as he reveals the magical mysteries and inspirations behind the soundtrack of Stardander School for Witches!
This will be an hour long stream during the Steam Next Festival - follow along and try the demo yourself!
Team Playthrough
Join the devs as we play through Stardander School for Witches and talk about development!
This will be an hour long stream during the Steam Next Festival - follow along and try the demo yourself!
Update 0.1.32 - Preparing for Steam Next Fest!
We've submitted Stardander to the fall Steam Next Fest - coming this October! In preparation, we've replaced all placeholder assets in the first year, made some improvements based on feedback, and set the playtest build to the demo. This does remove the interlude - so any January year 2 saves might not load.
Changes:
Added dungeons background
Improved the navigation screen
Improved Dare, Rea, Touchstone, Clear and Mivette character sprites.
Improved evidence sprites, including adding details to the corridor background.
Added credits/demo ending
Modified studying - instead of study harder, you now always study one normal class, and can optionally study one lore class each navigation.
Can select spells to use during some investigations
Added Touchstone's theme
Added 2 new enemy groups to the first forest
Witch stat tabs now show their icons
You now gain some personality points when you pass lore classes (instead of no benefit).
We have time to make changes between now and the next fest - so definitely give it a try and let us know if you have any suggestions or feedback! After the next festival, we'll be moving on to year 2 and the interlude will be added back to the playtest.
