Hello everyone!
This update adds Dread Catacombs, a completely rebuilt portal and the first example of a new direction for Portalborn.
Thank you for your patience over the last several days. This update took longer than I expected, and I want to explain why—because the reason is more important than the dungeon itself.
Dread Catacombs
The old Dread Catacombs was procedurally generated every time you entered.
The new one is hand-built, room by room.
That means the map stays the same every visit. You can learn it. Corridors connect the way they connected last time, landmarks stay where you remember them, and the things written on the walls stay written.
This new version includes:
59 handcrafted rooms across three distinct levels: the outer catacombs, the cult-occupied middle floor, and an ancient prison beneath a broken seal.
Seven rotating story quests. One is active each visit, cycling back to the beginning once you've completed them all.
A permanent boss encounter that exists whether or not a quest sends you there.
Multi-stage story quests that combine exploration, investigation, combat, and discovery within a single adventure.
Quests have also become much more dynamic.
Instead of simply asking you to kill a number of enemies, quests can now ask you to investigate locations, examine clues, uncover information, defeat what you awaken, and return to the person who sent you. Existing examination mechanics are now fully integrated into quest progression, allowing objectives to unfold naturally as you explore rather than simply counting kills.
Your quest journal now tracks your current objective instead of only displaying a kill count, making multi-step adventures much easier to follow.
Completing the full seven-quest cycle rewards a permanent stat pill.
Why this took a week—and why Hero Classes didn't stop
From the outside, it probably looked like I paused Hero Class development to build a dungeon.
I didn't.
Very little of this week was spent writing room descriptions.
Most of it went into building the systems underneath them:
Handcrafted portals that remain stable instead of regenerating every visit.
Deliberate encounter placement instead of purely random enemy distribution.
Multi-stage quests with investigation, exploration, combat, and discovery in a single objective chain.
Quest rewards that scale properly with player level.
Those aren't Dread Catacombs systems.
They're Portalborn systems.
Hero content is being built around handcrafted realms with meaningful exploration, memorable encounters, and objectives that go beyond simply clearing every room. None of that could exist until these underlying systems existed first—and, just as importantly, had been proven by something players could actually experience.
So Dread Catacombs serves two purposes.
It gives everyone new content to explore today while simultaneously becoming the foundation that future content will build upon tomorrow.
This is only the beginning.
Future quests will continue expanding with more objective types, more branching interactions, deeper stories, and more meaningful rewards.
The foundation is now in place.
With that proven, I'm returning to direct Hero Class development.
Looking Ahead
Dread Catacombs is not intended to remain the exception.
Over time, every major Level 1–100 portal will receive the same treatment.
Those areas are not temporary content, and they are not being replaced. They will remain a permanent part of Portalborn, both for new players experiencing them for the first time and for veteran players returning later.
As more Hero Classes are added, you'll have additional base classes to level in order to unlock them. Those journeys will naturally take you back through these realms, and I want them to be places worth revisiting rather than content you simply rush past once.
Even after unlocking Hero Classes, you'll still be able to return to these portals whenever you want. Whether you're chasing equipment, completing quests, leveling another class, or simply enjoying the base-class combat, those adventures are intended to remain relevant throughout the game's lifetime.
That's why I chose to rebuild the underlying systems instead of simply adding more procedural portals. Every improvement made to Dread Catacombs can now be carried forward into the rest of the game, one realm at a time.
Other Changes
Chinese combat localization
Ten enemy types appearing across multiple portals still displayed portions of their combat messages in English, with several lines breaking in the middle of sentences.
These have now been fully localized into Simplified Chinese.
Quest rewards now scale with your level
Story quest rewards previously granted fixed amounts regardless of player level, making many early portal quests far less rewarding later in the game.
Quest rewards now scale with your level instead.
If you've been skipping story quests in places like Whispering Woods because the rewards no longer felt worthwhile, it may be worth taking another look.
Thank You
Thank you all, genuinely.
Every bug report, suggestion, translation correction, balance discussion, and design conversation continues to shape Portalborn.
Several improvements in this update came directly from player feedback, and Dread Catacombs itself is stronger because of everything I learned while building—and rebuilding—the portals that came before it.
I know five days between updates is longer than usual.
Now that this foundation is complete, the focus returns to Hero Classes.
Thank you, as always.
— TheHand