The Demon Rush: Legends Corrupt
Tenebris expansion progress update 4
Since the previous update, the music and a large portion of the story content has been completed, with the main story content for Tenebris completely finished and the side quest content for Tenebris past the halfway point for completion. Once the remaining side quests are completed (and some additional remaining tasks, such as battle animations for new enemies), all of the content work for Tenebris will be done and work will begin on the programming/testing for the new content (hopefully starting in a couple of weeks).
Tenebris expansion progress update 3
I apologize for the late update -- I had not wanted the progress updates to be a series of variations on "still working on the animated models", but I had run into some heavy slowdowns due to the sizable number of unique non-humanoid models needed for Tenebris. Unlike humanoid models, a lot had to be done and prepared from scratch, rather than having templates from my previous work that I could draw from, and that contributed heavily to the delays in completing the 3D work.
Otherwise, work on Tenebris is still continuing on as normal.
Legends Overload
- Barklord, the dog, was added as a recruitable customizable pseudo-party member in Story Mode and Endless Dungeon.
- New content added to Story Mode (New sidequests, new superdungeon, new Challenges).
- New game mode added -- Boulderball (Action mode in the form of two teams trying to score goals against each other using a giant Boulder).
- New Legend Plus Difficulty added that can be set for Endless Dungeon, Onslaught, Conquest, Heist and Boulderball.
- 3 new passive abilities were added for each of the 9 characters, and can be acquired in Story Mode through side quests or randomly in treasure in Endless Dungeon.
- Heist passives altered for Ground Team -- Cherry's Sky Corps Phalanx boosts party Defense from 25% to 50%, Knight's Disgraced Past boosts back attack damage from 2x to 5x, Alberto's Heart of Gold boosts healing power from 10 HP to 30 HP, and Jimmy's Parkour makes party dodges inflict Stagger.
- Throat Jab affects more damage sources (such as Poison).
- Conquest has a new action that allows multiple soldiers to be assigned at once to a single location.
- Some textures have been updated, including skies, brick walls, trees and world maps.
- Some field maps have had changes added -- some are required for new content, such as the Devil's Playground, while some are cosmetic, with the Technology Graveyard gaining piles of scrap metal.
- Early battles with Enforcer have his HP cut in half.
- Stairs and enemy jitter removed.
- Miscellaneous changes and fixes.
Short Legends Overload progress update
The coding is presently done, and testing is underway -- save file futureproofing has been tested, as have the new models. Legends Overload adds 11 new models as far as data is concerned, but old models were also edited so that 90 characters could be made, primarily for NPCs/new enemies. One thing that Demon Rush has done (both original version and Legends Corrupt) was aim to make all NPCs look different, at least somewhat (unless there is accidental overlap between eye colours/hair colurs/clothing colours/etc., this should still hold true with Legends Overload).
Other miscellaneous things included getting some testing in, and some of the media prep (which includes dev blog work, screenshots, video, etc.) have also been started on.
Time to get back at it -- testing has been going smoothly enough, but not as fast as I'd like. I apologize that I could not get Legends Overload released by November.
Legends Overload update, Barklord the dog, Boulderball and new expansion details
One of the two new modes that was mentioned to be included for Legends Overload has been scrapped. While there were no specific details on it previously (referred to as just an Action type mode), that is one less previously announced thing that is to be added. I apologize for that, and I plan to write up a dev blog page at the time of Legends Overload's release revealing why this 11th hour scrap occurred for this mode and the details behind it.
So far as Legends Overload's progress, final testing is to begin soon and coding is nearly done. A November release is very very tight, but not impossible -- if the testing runs smoothly and the test cases are gone through efficiently, it can still happen (even with needing to also get the marketing materials/admin tasks prepped). I've pumped up my personal hours for this final sprint, so I hope to bring good news on this front -- I intend to provide another progress update by the end of November regardless.
This update also includes a more detailed expansion roadmap -- some of it will look familiar to the July roadmap, but it now includes all expansion names, the addition of a future 6th expansion, new combat mechanics (Barklord the dog and Warbeast summons, in particular), and more specific details on the modes that are intended to come with each expansion. The newer details will be emphasized more heavily, and the details mentioned previously in July will get shorter mentions.
Expansion 1 -- Legends Overload
- Barklord the dog -- a German Shepherd trained as a guard dog, whom the party rescues from a less-than-kind kennelmaster. While Barklord is not a playable character, he is a pseudo-party member who can be called into battle temporarily (and repeatedly) by any playable character once he joins in either Story Mode or Endless Dungeon. Rather than Augmentors, he can gain Daugmentors for customization as he is called in battle, and they can be used to customize his basic attack, Bark Raid, as well as provide party HP regen and lesser summoning cooldown/summoning costs -- there are plans for additional abilities/customization in future expansions. He can also optionally influence the Body and Mind Field Effects. More specific details on Barklord will be provided on Legends Overload's release.
- Boulderball -- A pick-up-and-play Action mode that is essentially a sports game involving a giant damaging boulder as the ball, where the Heroes (consisting of your chosen character and the Sky Corps) go up against the Jerks (Demons). Perma-death is planned as a feature, so fighting the enemy players (and the goalkeeper) while protecting your own teammates will be as important as trying to get the boulder in the enemy net. More details will be revealed on Legends Overload's release.
- New story content and Legend Plus Difficulty for Endless Dungeon, Onslaught, Conquest, Heist and Boulderball (and all appropriate future modes).
- New passive abilities and new Challenges.
Expansion 2 -- Tenebris
- Naval Conquest -- An Adventure mode that is intended to have ship battles, sea monsters and magic used by the party that can include altering parts of the sea battle's environments (for example, Knight's ice magic freezing parts of the sea). May or may not be implemented into Story Mode to some capacity -- there are a number of design factors that will determine this, and the final decision will be made as more of Naval Conquest's specifics are implemented into the game.
- A new original Fire elemental character who is playable across Story and all modes. At this point, they are planned to be a melee-oriented character who has both offensive and defensive stances.
- New story content and new world based on Dragoon's Tenebris Conquest series, which is a more medieval setting.
- New passive abilities, new Challenges, new Conquest Monsters and new Heist Artifact.
Expansion 3 -- Into The Past
- Side Stories -- A Story mode that is intended to consist of very short stories focusing on playable and non-playable characters. The intention is to start with 20 in this expansion and add more with each subsequent expansion.
- RopeRange -- An Action mode that is based off of the minigame in the 2008 The Demon Rush. The character is dangling from an unsturdy rope from a great height and they need to fire their gun at targets while dodging or shooting sawblades that can cut their rope. Different playable characters are planned to have different advantages for this mode.
- Prison Break -- An Adventure mode where the player forms a party of 3 to escape prison and then try and survive being on the run. Some light horror elements may be present when on the run (more for tension/atmosphere, not jumpscares -- I would rather avoid jumpscares for this mode). The broad strokes are still being worked out, so a lot is subject to change.
Expansion 4 -- Warbeasts
- Warbeasts -- A new summoning mechanic that is intended to be similar to Barklord, but planned to remain on the battlefield more persistently rather than being called repeatedly. Each character is planned to get their own unique Warbeast for summon.
- Counterintelligence -- A Strategy mode that is intended to be somewhat similar to Conquest, but with the aim of having more spy-versus-spy mechanics/themes to it. Like most new modes planned for later expansions, the broad strokes and specifics are still being worked out, so plans for this mode can change.
- A new original Water elemental character who is playable across Story and all modes. At this point, they are planned to be a defensive support with long range disabling as a focus.
- New story content and new original world that has themes of war, magic and psychic abilities.
- New passive abilities, new Challenges and new Side Stories.
Expansion 5 -- Forlorn Future
- City Expansion -- A Strategy mode that is intended to also be somewhat similar to Conquest, but with plans to have characters maintain and expand the city. The specifics and the like still need to be worked out, but the overall goal is to have some level of city management and have each playable character bring different skillsets to this management (combat and non-combat).
- A new original Wind elemental character who is playable across Story and all modes. At this point, they are planned to be a defensive area-of-effect character, with the possibility of having enemy mimicry/enemy-based attacks as part of their basic moveset.
- New story content and new original world that is set in a futuristic hedonistic dystopia.
- New passive abilities, new Challenges and new Side Stories.
Expansion 6 -- A Mirror Warped
- New story content and a "new" world that is a mirror version of Altair (with mirror versions of story characters present) -- even if the world looks similar, the intention is to make a number of locations different.
- New passive abilities, new Challenges and new Side Stories.
- No gameplay mode is planned for this expansion, but given how far away this expansion is, there is a good chance that a suitable mode could be planned and implemented for this point (it would be nice to continue the pattern of at least one new mode per expansion).
Final Notes
The roadmap was included alongside this update to make the previous roadmap a little less vague -- saying just "an Action Mode" or "a Strategy Mode" felt too lacking in detail, and this is meant to provide the amount of detail that should have been present earlier.
Now it's time to get back to work on finishing Legends Overload -- hoping to bring good news on it soon.
Legends Overload progress update
What's been completed for the Legends Overload expansion so far?
So far, the new story events, the models, the maps, the textures and the animations have been finished -- essentially, all of the new story content.
What's left for Legends Overload work?
Coding -- Most of this should be straightforward and will likely not take too long, as a lot of the work is primarily already-created content that fits into already existing game/engine mechanics. The primary exception to this will be the new gameplay mechanics of the new modes, which will require a little extra work.
Testing -- This will end up being the longest part of what remains, just due to the large quantity of tasks within it, including models, animations, maps, new passive abilities, new Legend Plus difficulty, new mechanics, old and new save files, and so on. Testing taking a long time is nothing new, but it's the biggest thing out of what remains.
Release/marketing -- The release of Legends Overload, as well as any media and information on new modes, will likely all occur at the same time and will likely come suddenly and out of the blue. November is currently the likely point of arrival for Legends Overload, but that depends on how smoothly testing will go.
Is there any other news regarding Legends Overload?
Yes, a new mechanic involving a new pseudo-party member who can be customized to some degree is going to be added -- this was previously unmentioned in past news, due to it being planned and worked on very recently. This new character will NOT be one of the three new playable characters that are planned for future expansions, but they are intended to have availability in Story and Endless Dungeon and are planned to be available at almost all times in any party when recruited (called by the player into battle directly).
Similarly to the two new gameplay modes, more information on this character will be made available around release.