Hey all! It's been a while since my last blog post. Since then, a lot of amazing things have happened in the project. The good news is that now you get to play the demo because it's finally out!
Making this demo was an interesting process. There were some concerns that I had to address in it. For example, usually demos are short and have a linear experience. But I didn't want you to play a demo that is not representative of the actual game.
In the full game, you kinda have this feeling of being lost. "Where should I go next?", "Which path should I explore next?", these are questions that may arise, and they should. This is intended.
But make players feel that, in a short demo, it could be quite a challenge. I thought about how to balance teaching the basics of the game and letting you all enjoy this exploration excitement.
"So much to see! So much to do!": This is what I want you to feel. So, you might realise while playing this demo that it is actually longer than most demos out there. There are hidden secrets, treasures, different paths, a bunch of materials to craft and recipes to cook. And no time limit to it. You can just enjoy it for as long as you want!
There's two major things that you won't have the chance to taste in the demo: Bosses and big puzzles. We only have a few of those in the full game, so I didn't want to spoil that for you.
Our Discord playtest
Last week we invited people in our Discord server to play the demo before everyone else. It was such an exciting moment to have that happening. We got to watch around 40 people playing it.
The most surprising thing for me about that experience was observing actual players interacting with the game: It made me put aside some of my design decisions, things that people would always ask "Why is this like that?", and see them with new lenses. It made me realise that changing those small things would certainly make a better game out of it.
So I did! I implemented some changes right away, like adding a feature that you can hold your shield up and block some of the enemy attacks, and the possibility to rotate big objects that you are carrying. And the one that I thought I would never change, but in the end I did: You cannot reset your torch time in a Torch Holder on the wall anymore. Hahahah, don't ask me, but I always thought that this was a cool thing and everyone else thought it was a bug.
And there's more to come!
These next weeks will be exciting! I hope to see some of you playing and streaming the demo. I'll be reading your reviews and feedback. And with that, we'll certainly work on the game to make it even better.
If you wanna talk with other players and with the devs, come join our discord server at discord.gg/beholdstudios
Have fun!
Cheers
- Saulo Camarotti
Creative Director, Designer and Coder of DDD