Flash Abandoned Crimson Keep [Ch. 7 v1.6] [introspurt]

[F1forhalp]

are the exes safe?

you can check

You must be registered to see the links

on the topic of virus alerts and software devs. it's written by a dev.

in short, your daily AV is looking for lots of different things on each and every file in use. some things a game usually does, are done by some sorts of virussenss as well, like inserting code into files or running processes, create 'hooks' into running processes and alot more: a 'hook' tells (example) your graphics drivers what exactly to do with the game's craphics output. and so on.

the AV of course doesn't tell virus from game, unless it's told exactly what the game is (thus, wanted behaviour, by you) and what a virus is. so, it does raise alert on whatever the AV 'thinks' is a possible intruder.

 

[SpicyWintercress]

the truth is that the dev knows there a lot of stuff that could be better

So I replayed the games to have them fresh in my mind again rather than speaking from memory of years ago, and I have some thoughts on that (I got to chapter 6 so far):
- the invisible vs visible enemies thing, ehhhh, it really won't work unless the maps get made a lot bigger. I would still prefer it changed but it would need to come with a rework there. The actual two problems are the randobattles tear you out of exploration (when you're walking somewhere and see something you want to get to but no actually it's battle screen time), and that they get tedious (when you have to fight the same battle over and over, especially if that comes after you've been walking back and forth in one place). I don't really see a super good solution for this. Animation speedup is a bandaid (not that it's available here anyway), but the animations are nice so turning it up comes at a cost. Maybe put some sort of an adaptive system into the options where the more times you fight the same enemy using the same moves, the faster the animations for those moves (and also the animations of the enemy moves) get? It's also a bandaid, but at least you'd get to experience the first time fighting a new enemy properly, and then the fights would get shorter as they get more repetitive.
- the game is grindy at times, but that can't be helped much. The adaptive animation speed would help a bit with that too though
- gotta point to the exit in chapter 5 in the post boss fight segment properly because hoboy
- also that one artifact you find in that chapter needs its description reworded
- elucidate has a ton of room for being made better. If you cast it on something the basic description could go to some sort of a monster compendium, with the possibility to call the information up without recasting it - and if not that much, then at least by clicking the elucidate buff icon rather than by having to cast the spell again. Also I mentioned earlier the idea that since the bosses are puzzle bosses, a page can be taken from puzzle games about providing hints. Elucidate already kind of does it sometimes (see the description of a certain red blob for an obvious example). Maybe repeated casts instead of repeating the same description could reveal more hints?
- plenty of actions have buttons that are just begging for a proper short description on a mouse-over, not just power and the like
- time management is king in the battles in this game, yet the timing info is unfortunately presented obtusely. Often the fights can hinge on who moves next, yet despite the player getting to see the enemy action bar fill up and the speed that it's happening, as well as literally having the delay times listed, there seems to be no way to actually tell which of the moves available will let you squeeze in under the limit (an example problem this creates: "can I sneak in a heal potion or do I need to vexclaw right now?"). I get that the dev might not want to clutter the UI with numbers, but there's a huge QoL improvement opportunity here - when you hover over an action or item, a rectangle should appear on the enemy time bar to show by how much you can expect it to fill up before you get to act again (a different color rectangle if it means the bar gets full and actually it's the enemy who goes next). This change would also enable an option to scale how fast the action bars fill up (right now messing with it is a bad idea as you need to be able to judge the timings by feel), minimizing the dead time of waiting as neither you nor the enemy are on turn.

I wonder if there's like an "ideas submission box" I could drop these into. On another note, the games are very good and it's really cool to see how they evolved in scope and mechanics chapter by chapter. It's still worth to play them for that since this aspect will get lost once the Unity rework comes. The difficulty is nice (as is the approach to lowering it - there's a clear intended difficulty, and an assist in the option that scales the bosses down for players that really need it, that's perfect) and I love that it's one of those very rare cases where the design isn't at cross-purposes with itself where you have to either deliberately play badly to get access to the lewd content or it's basically impossible to lose because the "game" bit is actually just a thin lewd delivery vehicle so the mechanics are wonk and you're quickly in godmode. Instead you really play (other than in the super easy chapter 1 but that's understandable), and you are rewarded with a nice prize when you really win. Good stuff.

 

[crackad]

So I replayed the games to have them fresh in my mind again rather than speaking from memory of years ago, and I have some thoughts on that (I got to chapter 6 so far):
- the invisible vs visible enemies thing, ehhhh, it really won't work unless the maps get made a lot bigger. I would still prefer it changed but it would need to come with a rework there. The actual two problems are the randobattles tear you out of exploration (when you're walking somewhere and see something you want to get to but no actually it's battle screen time), and that they get tedious (when you have to fight the same battle over and over, especially if that comes after you've been walking back and forth in one place). I don't really see a super good solution for this. Animation speedup is a bandaid (not that it's available here anyway), but the animations are nice so turning it up comes at a cost. Maybe put some sort of an adaptive system into the options where the more times you fight the same enemy using the same moves, the faster the animations for those moves (and also the animations of the enemy moves) get? It's also a bandaid, but at least you'd get to experience the first time fighting a new enemy properly, and then the fights would get shorter as they get more repetitive.
- the game is grindy at times, but that can't be helped much. The adaptive animation speed would help a bit with that too though
- gotta point to the exit in chapter 5 in the post boss fight segment properly because hoboy
- also that one artifact you find in that chapter needs its description reworded
- elucidate has a ton of room for being made better. If you cast it on something the basic description could go to some sort of a monster compendium, with the possibility to call the information up without recasting it - and if not that much, then at least by clicking the elucidate buff icon rather than by having to cast the spell again. Also I mentioned earlier the idea that since the bosses are puzzle bosses, a page can be taken from puzzle games about providing hints. Elucidate already kind of does it sometimes (see the description of a certain red blob for an obvious example). Maybe repeated casts instead of repeating the same description could reveal more hints?
- plenty of actions have buttons that are just begging for a proper short description on a mouse-over, not just power and the like
- time management is king in the battles in this game, yet the timing info is unfortunately presented obtusely. Often the fights can hinge on who moves next, yet despite the player getting to see the enemy action bar fill up and the speed that it's happening, as well as literally having the delay times listed, there seems to be no way to actually tell which of the moves available will let you squeeze in under the limit (an example problem this creates: "can I sneak in a heal potion or do I need to vexclaw right now?"). I get that the dev might not want to clutter the UI with numbers, but there's a huge QoL improvement opportunity here - when you hover over an action or item, a rectangle should appear on the enemy time bar to show by how much you can expect it to fill up before you get to act again (a different color rectangle if it means the bar gets full and actually it's the enemy who goes next). This change would also enable an option to scale how fast the action bars fill up (right now messing with it is a bad idea as you need to be able to judge the timings by feel), minimizing the dead time of waiting as neither you nor the enemy are on turn.

I wonder if there's like an "ideas submission box" I could drop these into. On another note, the games are very good and it's really cool to see how they evolved in scope and mechanics chapter by chapter. It's still worth to play them for that since this aspect will get lost once the Unity rework comes. The difficulty is nice (as is the approach to lowering it - there's a clear intended difficulty, and an assist in the option that scales the bosses down for players that really need it, that's perfect) and I love that it's one of those very rare cases where the design isn't at cross-purposes with itself where you have to either deliberately play badly to get access to the lewd content or it's basically impossible to lose because the "game" bit is actually just a thin lewd delivery vehicle so the mechanics are wonk and you're quickly in godmode. Instead you really play (other than in the super easy chapter 1 but that's understandable), and you are rewarded with a nice prize when you really win. Good stuff.

Sure, you can put these in #feedback channel in the discord server.

 

[Kisama33]

Maybe put some sort of an adaptive system into the options where the more times you fight the same enemy using the same moves, the faster the animations for those moves (and also the animations of the enemy moves) get?

Don't know anything about codding but that sure sounds like a pain to do still I can totally see some sort of battle animation speed option like the one we saw in Eld but just as simple as that, maybe with different speed values.

- gotta point to the exit in chapter 5 in the post boss fight segment properly because hoboy

Lol you mean the exit of Ziggurat, yeah lots of people have problems with finding the exit mostly because of the fact that in chapter 3 there are 2 routes and only one uses the main entrance that is on 2F but if you notice in the chapter 3 when you reach the Imp City you have a "scene" of the city where you can also see the temple and the stairs that give acess to it going directly to the 2F but of course most people forget or not even notice that so it became a problem later on.

- also that one artifact you find in that chapter needs its description reworded

That's another good one, even became a meme in the discord server, don't really know if you need a better explanation, it kinda already tells you everything you need to know, I think the big problem is that most people just equipped it right away without even reading properly and then when they went to fight the next boss or started chapter 6 they were all "Hey, now all enemies suck my mana off, buuh bad game design" the dev even had to add a "buff information icon" during battles to see if people noticed the issue by themselves but it doesn't work for everyone.

- Then at least by clicking the elucidate buff icon rather than by having to cast the spell again. Also I mentioned earlier the idea that since the bosses are puzzle bosses, a page can be taken from puzzle games about providing hints. Elucidate already kind of does it sometimes (see the description of a certain red blob for an obvious example). Maybe repeated casts instead of repeating the same description could reveal more hints?

The problem here is "Immortal's Wisdom" Enet unique skill, that replaces "Aim" (yeah what you see is not exactly elucidate but a buff that doesn't activate every time unless you are using Yil covenant) with a new buff that go down after sometime, so Elucidate information would need to have its own icon unrelated to the respective buffs of each skill, but the idea of more information with each cast is a good one too I always miss the fandom page because you could check the enemies attack types (magical/physical), respective element(s) and raw power when the case, something that you can't do in game unfortunately so I would like to see that kind of extra info in-game if possible.

-There's a huge QoL improvement opportunity here - when you hover over an action or item, a rectangle should appear on the enemy time bar to show by how much you can expect it to fill up before you get to act again (a different color rectangle if it means the bar gets full and actually it's the enemy who goes next).

The problem here is that I can't see the dev adding such an "OP" QoL like that here, like you said much of the combat is related to timing, one wrong option and you are dead such QoL would remove that issue and I don't think he wants that.

With that being said I hope you have luck with your "Suggestions" that has actually the name of the dircord channel that is now "Feedback" mostly because everyone was making suggestions related to fetishes or on how to make the game "much easier" but that doesn't mean that they are not open to good suggestion if they are related to gameplay, mechanics or QoL improvements so just go ahead and join the server if you can.

 

[SpicyWintercress]

Don't know anything about codding but that sure sounds like a pain to do still I can totally see some sort of battle animation speed option like the one we saw in Eld but just as simple as that, maybe with different speed values.

It doesn't sound that hard to implement. At the most basic level you can just track how many battles you already had with a given enemy if you have it toggled on. 1st battle, no animation speedup, 2nd battle 25% speedup, 3rd battle 50% speedup, 4th battle 75% speedup, 5+th battle 100% speedup. Ezpz. The fresh battles you get to experience fully as intended (won't be so if there's a straight up 2-3x animation speed toggle hidden in the options, nobody will keep manually flicking that back and forth), then they get shorter as they get repetitive.

Lol you mean the exit of Ziggurat, yeah lots of people have problems with finding the exit mostly because of the fact that in chapter 3 there are 2 routes and only one uses the main entrance that is on 2F but if you notice in the chapter 3 when you reach the Imp City you have a "scene" of the city where you can also see the temple and the stairs that give acess to it going directly to the 2F but of course most people forget or not even notice that so it became a problem later on.

That's the one (I was trying to avoid spoilers, but then it's not a huge spoiler that yes you get in there and yes you get out). There's multiple things that compound here:
- multiple routes mean players might not even enter through where they're supposed to leave, yeah
- the players enter the Ziggurat in a different chapter than they exit it, so there's really no reason to expect they'll remember it, especially since they might(?) experience a forced level change for plot reasons soon after entering
- there's two guard's training area <-> 2F connections, so with how zoomed in the view is at a glance the exit just looks like the other entryway to there, not something that leads somewhere different entirely
- entering the area which connects to the exit from the south (guards -> 2F hub -> exit) means you basically have to advance by going back which isn't intuitive at all
- entering at 2F is just unintuitive. This can be fixed if the entrance level would be called "ground floor" or 1F depending on the convention chosen, while the level below that would be called a Basement, 1B, Dungeon or somesuch

If this layout is to be kept, one way to help would be for the connection to the exit to be a different color. For example say there's shining magical rubies near the entrance or something and so there's a red glow spilling out of it into that 2F hub, while the guard's training area has sapphires and the glow is blue.

That's another good one, even became a meme in the discord server, don't really know if you need a better explanation, it kinda already tells you everything you need to know, I think the big problem is that most people just equipped it right away without even reading properly and then when they went to fight the next boss or started chapter 6 they were all "Hey, now all enemies suck my mana off, buuh bad game design" the dev even had to add a "buff information icon" during battles to see if people noticed the issue by themselves but it doesn't work for everyone.

Sure, people just assume it's good (rather than Super Situational and outright bad otherwise) with how talked up it gets in the plot and equip it right away, but there's more to it. Firstly the description is phrased awkwardly, a bit like maybe getting damaged should GIVE you mana, not take it away. Secondly there's a large gap (mental one too - the player gets it when they can reasonably be expected to be like "I did it, this is a post-victory party, no more fighting in this chapter") between getting and equipping the artifact and then getting into a fight, and that fight is likely with enemies who are described as weird, dangerous, wrong and corrupted so them messing with mechanics is not completely unexpected.

There's a simple solution to all the confusion, which is to force-equip it and then have a quick one round combat where Nefris just takes a swipe at the player with some dialogue that this is to demonstrate what the artifact does (N: "Ready? [smack]", MC: "wow this hurt less than I would have thought, but I also feel a bit drained?"), right after the player gets it. If after that a player still doesn't get it there's just no helping them.

The problem here is "Immortal's Wisdom" Enet unique skill, that replaces "Aim" (yeah what you see is not exactly elucidate but a buff that doesn't activate every time unless you are using Yil covenant) with a new buff that go down after sometime, so Elucidate information would need to have its own icon unrelated to the respective buffs of each skill, but the idea of more information with each cast is a good one too I always miss the fandom page because you could check the enemies attack types (magical/physical), respective element(s) and raw power when the case, something that you can't do in game unfortunately so I would like to see that kind of extra info in-game if possible.

Ideally there's be a new icon to access the encyclopedia, the "click on aim buff" idea is for if a new icon wasn't made. The alternative elucidate isn't a problem because the icon can just have the same effect on click, or there can just be two separate effects that are both applied at once - aim/wisdom (depending on the skill) and encyclopedia (applied by both skills). A skill could already apply multiple effects no problem after all, see Captivate with ALR tactics.

The problem here is that I can't see the dev adding such an "OP" QoL like that here, like you said much of the combat is related to timing, one wrong option and you are dead such QoL would remove that issue and I don't think he wants that.

It's pure QoL though. This information is already there, it's just presented obtusely: you can see the enemy bar and how fast it's filling up, and your actions other than getting speed buffs/debuffs mid-fight always take the same amount of time each. It's 100% deterministic whether you'll get to act again or not given what choice of move and there's enough information to know that before clicking, it's just all obfuscated by the UI.

With that being said I hope you have luck with your "Suggestions" that has actually the name of the dircord channel that is now "Feedback" mostly because everyone was making suggestions related to fetishes or on how to make the game "much easier" but that doesn't mean that they are not open to good suggestion if they are related to gameplay, mechanic or QoL improvements so just go ahead and join the server if you can.

Sure, you can put these in #feedback channel in the discord server.

Yeah I was hoping for some other option, I'm much more comfortable with forums like this one than discord. Ah well, I'll think about it.

 

[Kisama33]

- there's two guard's training area <-> 2F connections, so with how zoomed in the view is at a glance the exit just looks like the other entryway to there, not something that leads somewhere different entirely

For this at least we don't know if it will still be the case in the Unity "Remake" since with it you can make full use of the entire screen it's possible that all 3 entries/exits may me visable at the same time.

It's pure QoL though. This information is already there, it's just presented obtusely: you can see the enemy bar and how fast it's filling up, and your actions other than getting speed buffs/debuffs mid-fight always take the same amount of time each. It's 100% deterministic whether you'll get to act again or not given what choice of move and there's enough information to know that before clicking, it's just all obfuscated by the UI.

I will not deny that but I also can't ignore all those times were I and probably many other players died because we were not able to predict correctly the outcome of our action, because we expected to be able to have a turn before or enemy or because we didn't expect that or choice would allow said enemy to score 2 turns in sequence without anything we could do to stop or inevitable death. I'm fine with QoL if they don't turn the game into "Lazy Mode", this is not a AAA game I don't want to it become one, I don't need a full map full of icons telling me each localization, each enemy and boss with weekness and elements, every secret and collectionable, I don't need a arrow pointing out to the correct path the next objective or a wall of text in a side telling me every step I need to take to complete the game, I don't need the game to grab my hand and play for me, I want to feel that my options have an impact and that my mistakes are punished so I can learn from it, I know that somehow such a QoL would affect the way a play, I would start to look what options would allow me to make more actions before my enemy and give up on those that would allow said enemy to act before me like they were a bad option, but it may not be like that because the game doesn't know that, maybe go Kamikaze is actually the only solution to win in that scenario and moment and I will not see it because the feature made me think otherwise even if that my be my fault and not the QoL I still see me do such a thing if it's there.

This is only my opinion and I can see how much this would help, I just don't feel that CK needs it that much, I apreciate that kind of feature in games with a timeline with many characters involved were your focus should be into manipulate said timeline and play strategically but in a 1vs1 fight looks like too much, it would save time for sure, avoid many deaths but I would probably still not like it and see the fights become more boring and with less need to evaluate all the options and possible outcomes that I feel enjoyable on CK, so is such a thing is introduced I would like to al least have the option to turn it off as well as any other "helpers" QoL that may be introduced, the problem is that I feel unfair to ask a developer to have that extra work (no mattering how much he sees it a "too much trouble to waste time with it" or not) when all the support he gets is our enjoyment and praise.

So basically I am only trying to say that just like for all many other games around there are different types of players that like different things about them and dislike others and it's (probably) impossible to please them all, I'm sure that there are a lot of people out there that would like said changes but I want to belive I'm not the only one that doesn't see them as necessary and even "bad" in some cases so take this as only a different point of view as I see yours as another one, no one is wrong, no one is right, there are only different preferences on the table, both from CK players that want the best for the game on their own mindset.

 

[Kisama33]

A few more dev updates about Crimson Keep Chapter 8 development.

16/Fev/24




20/Fev/24

Another Dev Update:
Overworld walk sprites, costume switches, collisions, mapswitching are implemented.


10/Mar/24

Dev Update
For the past few weeks I have been moving the battle animations over to Unity. This involves splitting each animation into parts and rearranging those parts using Unity animation, as you can see from the example (sprite sheet used for Shield Breaker).

So far the following moves have been uploaded:
Demonbolt
Trisect (and all weapon morphs)
Vulcan's Heel
Vexing Claw
Steam Burst
Light Arrow
Sinister Hook
Combust
Penumbra Flare
Groundswell
Blade Whirl
Immolating Claw
Frigid Spikes
Razor Claw
Caustic Venom
Shield Breaker
Assassinate





Things have been going a little slower than I would have liked but that is in large part due to me altering the animations once to fit the new resolution and also touching up quite a few things. Some animations may get an entirely new part (like Basalt Spear) while others may be reduced like Penumbra Flare, as follows





25/Mar/24

Current animation progress:




That's all the new information available in the game discord server, consider to join if you want to see this updates in real time.

 

[SpicyWintercress]

For this at least we don't know if it will still be the case in the Unity "Remake" since with it you can make full use of the entire screen it's possible that all 3 entries/exits may me visable at the same time.

The zoom level is a design decision rather than an engine problem. Consider how the sulfur side city in chapters 6-7 is actually pretty zoomed out, and that's still in the flash engine. It's going to be a design decision in Unity too, and making it zoomed in would be a valid choice to produce the right game feel. There's other ways to fix this "players can't find the exit" issue, after all.

<time stuff>

I don't really see "estimate how fast a progress bar fills up by eye" as a particularly interesting skill to learn. The tougher boss battles rely on finding a strategy that works (and ideally one that doesn't run you dry on resources), and that's where the game shines, not there. Showing what the "1.25s cooldown" or something listed for a skill actually means by lighting it up on the timing bar wouldn't really affect that as it's still all about the strategy and without a good strategy you'd still get squashed. It's certainly nothing like a quest compasses or whatever else handholdy nonsense is in those other games. In terms of development time, the most basic version of this feature is simply to display the time remaining before the next enemy move as a number next to the current progress bar, and to adjust the cooldown in the skill descriptions to match what it really is when we account for the player's speed. The game already has these numbers (it's how it can even do the progress bars to show), it just needs to print them on screen, and that's it. Putting it behind a menu toggle feels like a good compromise for people who like the classic "eyeball the bar" experience though.

<art updates while transferring to Unity>

Oh, that reminds me of another idea I had. The VICTORY text looks super teen-edgy. Wouldn't it be cool if it changed as the MC's attitude changes? Imagine: at the very start edge it up even harder as he's frying the imps with lightning, but then as he learns some chill the VICTORY text starts to use a chiller font. Then an even chiller one. Then maybe back with some more edge when he gets mad from plot developments? Feels like it'd be a pretty cool thing.

Or, for a much simpler version of this, maybe keep the edgy font text for battles won by reducing the enemy HP to 0, and have a new one for battles won by using tempt?

 

[QuietSun]

Hello friends, does anybody know why I loose mana every time I get hit? is that some form of anti piracy stuff?

 

[TGafy]

Hello friends, does anybody know why I loose mana every time I get hit? is that some form of anti piracy stuff?

Have you checked your equipped gear?

 

[Dixen Chix]

Hello friends, does anybody know why I loose mana every time I get hit? is that some form of anti piracy stuff?

There are also certain attacks that drain your mana, it could be whoever you're facing, but yeah make sure you don't have Zanza's Sigil equipped

 

[QuietSun]

There are also certain attacks that drain your mana, it could be whoever you're facing, but yeah make sure you don't have Zanza's Sigil equipped

Thank you so much both! It was the sigil! I was very confused about how it was supposed to work!

 

[Dixen Chix]

Something I noticed about the saves listed is that they don't have the item "Tourmaline Rose" which boosts tempt magic and since you get it in Chapter 4, I went all the way through to make sure my saves had it. Similarly, my saves didn't have "Groundswell", the powerful earth type spell, so I went through again to make sure I had both Tourmaline Rose and Groundswell. Also, some of the Chapter 3 saves didn't transfer when I copied and pasted them into the game. All of that to say, here are my completed saves for Chapters 3-7:

Spoiler: Saves

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

 

[crackad]

Something I noticed about the saves listed is that they don't have the item "Tourmaline Rose" which boosts tempt magic and since you get it in Chapter 4, I went all the way through to make sure my saves had it. Similarly, my saves didn't have "Groundswell", the powerful earth type spell, so I went through again to make sure I had both Tourmaline Rose and Groundswell. Also, some of the Chapter 3 saves didn't transfer when I copied and pasted them into the game. All of that to say, here are my completed saves for Chapters 3-7:

Spoiler: Saves

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

The saves failing is expected considering these saves probably were posted during beta of respective chapter releases or very closely after beta testing concluded, there were changes to the versions post that so saves should be regenerated to comply with latest versions.

 

[Dixen Chix]

The saves failing is expected considering these saves probably were posted during beta of respective chapter releases or very closely after beta testing concluded, there were changes to the versions post that so saves should be regenerated to comply with latest versions.

Ah, that makes sense. Well, I hope someone could use mine to their advantage if they ever wanted to. The saves needed to be updated anyway

 

[Eiden0]

Hey all, have you got any games like this one to share?

 

[Kisama33]

Hey all, have you got any games like this one to share?

Unfortunately I don't think there is anything quite like it, but you may want to check Evenicle sunce the dev took some inspiration from it (once again check the tags, this game and the Dohna Dohna I mentioned in Eld thread are made by the same group).

 

[ummfckkoffusono]

any progress

 

[Kisama33]

any progress

Nope. Dev is still working on transfering stuff from the Flash version of the game to the Unity version.
When something worthy to report happens he may make a dev update in the game discord server.
In previous chapters we had the opportunity to see 1 thing of each major phase, things like a combat animation, a lewd scene teaser and a new soundtrack but that was before the new channel so we may get more detailed information like we have been reseaving so far.
Consider to join their discord if you can so you don't miss it.

 

[crackad]

Soriel's Moves are ported, Battle coding next