Oh, and if you haven't seen the CB2 trailer yet, check it out right here.
Progress Report - March 2022
about 2 years ago
– Fri, Mar 11, 2022 at 12:46:29 AM
Greetings, Tacticians!
It’s been a couple of months since we shared a game update via the monthly stream. We hope to return to streaming soon but will be sharing updates via web posts like this for the foreseeable future rather than have you wait.
We are gearing up for our big announcement with a featured spot in the upcoming ID@Xbox show so stay tuned for that as well!
—New Looks—
Game Logo
As you probably noticed, Lost Eidolons has a new logo! Our last logo had emphasized the turn-based aspect of the game (that red square), but we thought it might be better to accentuate the fantasy genre by weaving in the dragon head design. Along with the logo, we are updating the title screen to better fit the mood of the game.
Starting today, Lost Eidolons will be using the new logo to represent the game.
Check out how the new logo looks on the newly refreshed official website too!
Cutscenes
Cutscenes are hugely important for a story-driven game and we received a lot of feedback on exactly this during our first beta. So we spent some time last year rethinking how and when to present cutscenes for maximum emotional impact.
From the start of this year, we hit the ground running executing on the new strategy for cutscene production and we now have a new opening cutscene, new illustration cutscenes (watch some of them HERE) as well as full 3D cinematics to give specific moments that extra oomph for a more immersive experience.
Here's a look at the illustration cutscenes:
And of course, 3D cutscenes:
Quite a few of the 3D cutscenes are in the final stage of polish such as lighting adjustments, while many more are in production as we wrap up scripting and storyboarding.
Just look at the difference between the before and after!
Before
After
Before
After
UI
We are still scrutinizing UI elements from flow to design, and have made quite a headway. Since it needs to be intuitive on the keyboard and gamepad, we are really taking our time and poring over everything.
Shall we take a look at some of the screens done in February?
Here's a peek at the Equipment screen:
And the Rapport screen:
And the Dialogue History screen. We're pretty proud of this one:
–New Sounds–
Voice-Over
You probably noticed from our social channels (TWT, FB, IG) that we have amazing voice talents dubbing Lost Eidolons. We’re in the thick of it right now and everyone at ODS is dying for the recording to wrap so we can put them in-game and test!
The videos represent only a snippet of the long list of exceptional talents we have voicing the game, and we’ll be sharing the entire cast list soon.
SFX
But that doesn’t mean our Sound team is twiddling their thumb doing nothing. With all the cutscenes coming together, there is a lot of SFX to add, tweak, and optimize.
We’ve also worked on adaptive music (beat and tune of the background music changes in response to the game) for combat sequences and are in the middle of testing it for good measure. It should help get your heart pumping in those go-for-broke attack moments.
–New Features–
Tutorial
Now let’s talk about the meat of it all–the gameplay. One of the biggest challenges our beta testers pointed out to us was that the first 8 chapters were a little slow to build up and doesn't hook you into the story right away. So we created a whole new tutorial that takes you right into the thick of things from the start.
You get a glimpse of the story’s main conflict and learn the very basics of the game at the same time!
Here, Eden faces down an army, only 2 mins after you first enter the game:
Skills
New combat skills are in the works, and there’s even a skill specifically for Eden that plays a role in his storyline.
But the skills that robbed us of our sleep in February are not character skills–they’re accessory item skills.
There are three accessories that, when equipped, allow for special combat skills while lighting up the weapon selected.
Battlefields
As we unfold more of the story we explore the vast land of Artemesia that Emperor Ludivictus lay waste to. It is made up of smaller kingdoms that present a unique challenge in the form of the battlefield. These last couple of months, we’ve honed in on an imposing castle that appears in a few of the later chapters. Scenarios from this map introduce new game mechanics like camouflage and all the snow flurries.
Look at Andrea trying to camouflage herself to sneak past castle guards!
Well, that’s it for this update! Hopefully, that gives you a good look at the progress we’ve made so far. And rest assured–we will be announcing our next beta very soon. Stay tuned and keep an eye out on our social channels (TWT, FB, IG), join our Discord channel, and sign up for our newsletter if you haven’t already.
Until next time!
January 20th Dev Update Livestream
over 2 years ago
– Wed, Jan 19, 2022 at 11:24:16 PM
Greetings, Tacticians!
It's about that time of the month where we get together and talk about the latest and newest developments in Lost Eidolons on our local Twitch channel! This one is our first one in 2022, so it's a great time for us to catch up since we haven't seen each other since last year.
When:
6:00 PM PST, Thursday January 20th (US West)
9:00 PM EST, Thursday January 20th (US West)
2:00 AM GMT, Friday January 21st (London)
11:00 AM KST, Friday January 21st (Korea)
This month will be a lighter showcase! Because we'll only be showcasing the updates we made last month in the shortened work month of December, it'll be just a small catch-up with a few new developments. The developments that we make this month will be condensed into February's livestream!
For those of you who missed the previous broadcast back in November, please refer to this chaptered supercut of it uploaded onto YouTube:
Any questions that anyone has about the game or its development are free to be asked in the comments here or in the #town_hall section of our Discord server and we'll definitely answer it during the cast.
Update on Kickstarter Rewards!
over 2 years ago
– Sun, Jan 16, 2022 at 06:28:26 PM
Greetings, Tacticians!
It’s been a short while since our last update on Lost Eidolons. In that time, if you follow us on Twitter or are regularly checking up on Discord, you may be aware of the ongoing progress we’ve been making when it comes to development. Today, we wanted to take some of the things that we’ve shared in these places that are particularly pertinent to Kickstarter backers so you can see how things are coming along!
(GIF) All three of the tombstone models that we implemented in the cemetery!
Each grave is interactable with the names, age, and cause of death for each Lord of the Empire. Honor the great heroes before us.
Another angle of the solemn yet peaceful resting place for the fallen.
A vassal of the Monarch of the Empires. Special guards strewn throughout the camp that have a special message to share with you from the monarch that they serve.
Another variation of the NPC.
A third variation of the NPC. You’ll find them doing various activities including cooking, feasting, patrolling, guarding, and so on.
The wanted board, where Outlaws of the Empire go down infamy.
Sample of a wanted poster, featuring everyone’s favorite inebriated mage Gilbert.
We’ve also made headway creating the unique weapons and the merchant NPCs that Legend of the Empire and Treasurer of the Empire backers will be naming as well. We’ll refrain from images of them for now to keep things spoiler-free!
In our previous update, we discussed how we were moving the timeline back for Lost Eidolons, by removing the Early Access section and instead focusing on polishing the game as much as possible before going right into release in Q3 of this year.
To that end, you should expect news in the coming months regarding the next beta test, where we’ve made numerous changes in line with what you all provided feedback on the previous beta test last year. We’re hoping that the differences will really shine and you’ll be able to tangibly feel out how much better the game has become thanks to your input last time.
And, if you missed it last time, last month we sent out a survey via BackerKit regarding fulfilling your backer rewards. 90% of you filled out that survey which we’re currently working on implementing, but 10% of you still have to fill it out! Please double-check your e-mails if you haven’t done so already, and if you have any problems let us know! For those of you who have filled it out, we’re currently reviewing your submissions to make sure that everything is clean and appropriate to implement into the game and credits!
Thank you once again for supporting Lost Eidolons. Soon, we’ll be coming up on a year since we first announced Lost Eidolons and ran the campaign, and rest assured you won’t have to wait so much longer beyond that before you have your hands on the game itself.
We’ll be live next week with another update stream showing the progress made on Lost Eidolons in December, which we didn’t get to share with you last month.
Hopefully, we’ll get to see some of you guys on our Twitch channel then!
Updated Release Plan
over 2 years ago
– Wed, Dec 01, 2021 at 12:30:42 AM
Greetings Tacticians,
Today, we’re discussing why we’re delaying Lost Eidolons to late Q3 of 2022.
Recently, we published an article that detailed a thorough review of the feedback we received from players during Closed Beta 1. Our goal with this post was to really show folks, “Great! My feedback is actually making a difference!”. You can see some of the big changes we’ve made in just a month’s time in our latest dev stream from last Tuesday.
Our previous estimated timeline was Q4 2021 Closed Beta and Early Access by Q1 2022. While we did meet our planned beta date, what we learned from it was that we were still too ambitious, aiming for a Q1 2022 Early Access. It’s not ideal for those who’ve been anticipating the game, but an additional delay so that Lost Eidolons can meet everyone’s expectations is far more important to us than rushing a release.
Before and after of the character status UI after improvements based on feedback!
This is our first project as a budding new game studio. We want to do it right and to the best of our ability. Closed Beta 1 came with a lot of positive feedback, but it also revealed several shortcomings that must be addressed.
As such, the new plan for release is as follows:
There will be two more beta tests. They will be for both PC and Xbox, and will be a further demonstration of just how much we’re leveraging your ideas and feedback to polish Lost Eidolons. The first one in Q2 of 2022 won’t have additional chapters to try out, but will instead feature a host of improvements across the board to what you may have seen in the first Closed Beta. The second one in Q3 of 2022 will introduce additional chapters and content, but not everything so that testers have more to look forward to when the game comes out.
On the subject of release, we’re currently estimating late Q3 of 2022. This will no longer be an Early Access launch, rather a full launch with all the content that was planned, available from day one. We believe Lost Eidolons should be enjoyed as a full, beginning-to-end experience. Pairing that with the schedule delay led us to this decision.
We’re going to allocate more of our time and resources towards making a game that our community can be proud of supporting and enjoy playing. A well-told story, masterful tactical turn-based gameplay, and an engaging unit management system are the three creative pillars that we want to nail properly. We’ll continue to keep you all informed on our progress, as we have already been doing by sharing new updates via both the dev streams as well as new articles each month, so that folks can digest new information in both video and text format.
Thank you for understanding why we’re doing this. If you have any questions about the new development timeline or any of the recent updates, please join our Discord or Tweet at us. Our staff is always available to chat!
