Comrades! This week we have a small update to Corrupter Mode, adding a few spells to the Golem and weapon durability. Head to the downloads page!

In Corrupter Mode, weapons will now last 15 swings before they break. Humans will need to seek out new weapons as they battle your army of monsters. Golems can use their Shock spell to damage those weapons, and their Reverse Polarity spell to booby-trap a weapon and make it deal considerably less damage and break earlier.

For Adventure Mode, I’ve completed cutscene work and added some basic enemy encounter capability. Patrons will be getting a prototype release sometime fairly soon, once I’ve redone the combat UI (it’s currently a text-only placeholder), added saving/loading, added enemy respawning, fixed the remaining incomplete UI parts… okay maybe not that soon.

As always, I’m open to suggestions for Corrupter Mode additions. If I don’t get any more bug reports for it, I’ll work on migrating it into 3D mode sooner or later.

Currently, Adventure Mode’s first prototype release will come out sometime in mid-March for the public. How long it will take before it is completed is unknown, we have a lot of art to go. I’ve got my artists working on it, and they do good work. Patrons get to see their art sooner, so sign up today! Or, you know, don’t.

Argue about this post on the forums!

Hey, it’s HoP:Remastered’s first birthday! Go look at this post, get all nostalgic!

Update: Forumgoer and Hero of the Imperium Caeserofgaming has reported that using the Slime transformation in Corrupter Mode causes a crash. So don’t do that. Next week’s patch will fix this.

Salty here. This week we have a lot of improvements for Corrupter Mode, moving it firmly into the realm of “things that are playable”. It’s still not very balanced, but it’s actually fun on the higher difficulties.

Windows Version (Mediafire)

OSX 10.12 Sierra (Bundled: Mediafire) (Raw: Mediafire)

Magic Spells

I’ve added a lot of new magic spells to several races, in the order of popularity on the recent poll.

Imps had several of their spells buffed or fixed. They’re now complete as far as Corrupter Mode goes.

Darkslaves can create mana traps, become an impervious wraith, devour their minions to recover their own HP/WP, and can summon clouds of darkness at will.

Rilmani can teleport at will, including to the location of an unsuspecting human, and can create warp globes out of nothing. They can further lay a warp beacon that will redirect any human who uses a warp globe to its location, and can drop a Rune of Paralysis that prevents humans from escaping if they set it off.

Nymphs have several seductive powers. Not only do they passively damage WP, they can seduce the humans into not attacking them, or even attacking other humans! Of course, seducing them in these ways is hard – which is why they can spike a potion to create an aphrodesiac…

Pixies have gained a set of powerful offensive spells, like Fireball and Frozen Plume, so you can wage a direct assault on the humans. You can also buff your minions or even make your fey followers become invincible for a short time – if you’ve got the MP, that is.

More spells are due in for the remaining monster species next week, so stay tuned.

Improved UI and Options

I’ve improved the main menu’s UI. Options are now split up between Game and Engine options, and the options now have a description to inform you what they actually change.

In addition, you no longer have to look at the Corrupter Menu to cast spells on yourself. There is a quick-cast spell menu in the upper-right of the console to make your life easier. You can still check spell descriptions in the Corrupter Menu if you don’t know exactly what they do.

I’ve also added a lighting overlay to 2D mode to better illustrate which parts of the mansion your character can currently see. As usual, it can be disabled through the options menu.

Noise and Suspicion Improvements

Finally, Corrupter Mode will now make a valiant attempt at simulating the propagation of noise through the mansion. Some actions are loud, like creating a glyph or channeling MP, and will cause the humans to become suspicious. They will randomly decide to check out loud noises, and will become suspicious if they find you at the source of one. Stay mobile!

Boring Patch Notes

Engine Fixes

1. Added GL dummy functions that will catch failed wrangling calls and instead replace them with non-crashing non-functional calls. This should help very old graphics cards to be able to at least run the program (it won’t look good or be optimized, but it will run). (Thanks, Husky!)
2. Fixed textures too large for old graphics cards causing a crash. You will notice image anomalies, such as misalignments, but the game will run. (Thanks again, Husky!)

General Changes

1. Modified the order in which containers get opened vs. printing.
2. Unified the UI color scheme and highlighting method.
3. Fixed a stack error in the wakeup scripts.
4. Added brightness overlays to accurately demonstrate what the player can currently see relative to the backdrop. This can be disabled in the options menu.
5. Greatly improved the options. Game and Engine options are now split up, and they have descriptions to help you tell what they do.

Corrupter Mode

Additions

1. Added the unrolled magic menu, allowing you to cast spells on yourself with a single click. You can see the details of the spells on the Corrupter Menu.
2. Added noise generation to Corrupter Mode. Humans will now investigate loud noises, like the sound of you channeling mana or creating a glyph. If they see you at a location that created noise, their suspicion of you will increase based on what the noise was.
3. Added difficulty levels to Corrupter Mode, from “Easy” which gives you lots of MP to “Hard” where you have less MP and tougher humans to the staggeringly hard “True Corrupter” where the humans have 99 HP and can take down most monsters bare-handed. You’ll need to use cleverness to take them down!
4. Added the podling transformation to the transformation list. Raise an army!
5. Added Mana Trap to the Darkslave’s spells. This will cause a human who opens a trapped container to lose some WP and generate MP for you.
6. Added Summon Cloud to the Darkslave’s spells. You can summon a cloud of darkness, much like container traps do.
7. Added Wraith Form to the Darkslave’s spells. This makes you unhittable in melee combat, but unable to deal more than 1 point of damage.
8. Added Beckon to the Darkslave’s spells. This causes AI humans to prioritize attacking you instead of your minions. Works well with Wraith Form!
9. Added Devour Soul to the Darkslave’s spells. You can destroy one of your minions to fully restore your HP/WP and double your damage output for 10 turns.
10. Added the Rilmani’s teleport ability to their magic list (as Blink).
11. Added Stalk to the Rilmani’s spells. Teleports you to a random human. Makes chasing down the last one a breeze.
12. Added the ability for Rilmanis to generate warp globes for humans to use.
13. Added warp beacons to Rilmanis, allowing you to force the humans who use warp globes to land at the beacon.
14. Added Rune of Paralysis to the Rilmani’s traps. You can place one and it will prevent humans from leaving the room for 10 turns. Warp Globes clear the trap on a per-individual basis.
15. Added Charm to the Nymph’s spells. Does a bit of willpower damage, but also reduces the target’s damage output for 1 turn.
16. Added Seduce to the Nymph’s spells. Very unlikely to hit, but if it does, the target will not attack you for 3-5 turns. They will run away if they are injured as usual. You can greatly increase the success rate by tricking a human into drinking an aphrodesiac.
17. Added Enrapture to the Nymph’s spells. Has a 3% hit rate, but makes the victim fall in love with you for 8-12 turns. They will follow you and attack nearby humans. An aphrodesiac guarantees the success of the spell.
18. Added Fireball to the Pixie’s spells. A straight damage spell, 4-8 damage with 80% accuracy.
19. Added Lightning Bolt to the Pixie’s spells. Also straight damage, hits every human in the room for 3 damage. Useful if you can clump them up.
20. Added Frozen Plume to the Pixie’s spells. Another straight damage spell, deals 12 damage with 80% accuracy, but is less MP-efficient than fireball.
21. Added Choking Gas to the Pixie’s spells. Creates a cloud of gas which (surprise!) chokes humans in the room, reducing their HP by 2 and defense by 1 for 3 turns. Persists for 3 turns, and humans are not smart enough to flee from the gas cloud.
22. Added Rally Followers to the Pixie’s spells, buffing all monsters in the mansion with +1 to all combat stats for 20 turns.
23. Added Might of the Fey to the Pixie’s spells, making the player and all fey monsters invincible for 10 turns at a huge MP cost.
24. Added Summon Fairy Ring to the Pixie’s spells. Thematically suiting, not that useful unless your minions have a bigger WP than HP bar.

Changes

1. Item spawning in Corrupter Mode is now internally handled and can’t be modified by options. The spawn rate increases after 100 turns passes, which is both good and bad for the player.
2. Fixed Glyphs of Power to be unable to be created if you’re in the same room as an existing glyph, or adjacent to one.
3. Humans will now destroy Glyphs of Power if they find them and have no other priorities in that room.
4. You can now harvest a glyph of power after 30 turns to immediately gain 15 MP.
5. In Corrupter Mode, humans will use Warp Globes to escape when their stamina is too low to run.

Bug Fixes

1. Monsters will now cancel their current orders when you change their orders. This usually takes a turn before it applies.
2. Fixed an error in the menus that caused the main menu not to populate when backing out of the monster select screen.
3. Fixed some imp spell bugs.
4. Nymphs will no longer sap willpower if their disguise is still up.

Known Bugs

1. There are still several UI improvements I want to make to 3D mode, such as damage animation, resetting how entities are positioned when the player is looking around,
   and changing the icons for weapons and items to match what they actually are. These will be added in time, I am focusing on Corrupter Mode right now.
2. Navigating using the mouse in 3D mode seems to have been borked at some point. Not sure what I did, but it’ll be fixed next version.

Salty here. Before you do anything else, please fill out this survey. Version 1.00a got over 2000 downloads over its lifetime, but only a few responses on the forums. If you would like to help steer this project’s course, this survey is a great way to do so and will only take a minute to fill out.

Update for OSX Users

I researched the framework issue and have upload this patch to attempt to fix the problem. Use the new executable from the patch, and place the osxbin/ folder in the same folder as the executable. If this causes an error, please copy the console contents and send me the report ASAP. If it works, doubly let me know!

Update 1.60a

This is a big update, as all the work I had done before and after the holidays is now on display. Let’s go through them one at a time, shall we?

If you’re impatient, you can find it on the downloads page, or from this link. (Link fixed, thanks SammiLogan!)

Corrupter Mode

Corrupter Mode allows you to play as a monster from the first turn. You begin in disguise and must subvert the humans through stealth or through more overt means.

This is the first release of Corrupter Mode, but it’s still largely incomplete. You can play it start to finish, but you can only play an imp, most of the spells don’t work, and nothing is even remotely balanced. The disguise system is partially implemented (you have to directly assault a human for them to suspect you) and the noise system is not (when it is, humans will track you down if you do something noisy – like generating the MP you need…). Consider this an alpha release and just have fun with your stupidly overpowered 12-damage-per-turn imp.

This guide gives a brief overview on Corrupter Mode and how to play it. Not all of the features on the page are implemented, but they will be eventually.

Mac Release

The .zip file now contains a mac version of the executable (presently using the SDL libraries, Allegro version is in the pipeline). However, this is literally the first time I’ve ever packaged something for Mac. I probably did something wrong without knowing it, so bug reports are appreciated. If you’re going to post one, please specify your OS version and provide any graphics driver information you can.

Update: Please download this patch and let me know if it works on the forums or in the comments section!

UI Overhaul

As you can see from the image above, I’ve redone the UI in 2D mode. It now uses a much darker palette, white text on black, bitmap fonts as opposed to TTF fonts (bitmap fonts render considerably faster and for less system resources), and I’ve also added damage animations and map-icon animations. You will now see your character’s icon move around on the map, and those of other humans/monsters moving around, and you will see animated damage indicators (or miss/resist indicators) during combat. This is a new feature, so there are probably some errors.

In addition, sound effects have been added. The credits are in Data/Audio/Credits.txt if you’re curious as to who made them. All the sound effects were taken from OpenGameArt.org and are under open licenses. They are by no means finalized, and more will likely be added in the future.

More 3D Mansion Real Estate

Several new rooms on the upper floor have been added to 3D mode. (Click to enlarge).

The exterior and roof of the mansion are still largely incomplete, and the eastern and central parts of the upper floor are still incomplete.

Patreon

If you filled out the survey (here’s another link, really, fill it out!) then you can see that I asked about a Patreon. While Rune is a hobbyist who is completely happy working for free, I would like to speed up development and also expand the project’s scope. However, most of the artists I know won’t work for free, and I’m also the kind of person who thinks that the amount of time I put into this project might possibly be worth some remuneration (selfish, I know). Therefore, I’ve been discussing creating a Patreon with the team. While receptive, we’re not sure how much support we can expect from our valued players.

I also have absolutely no idea what to provide for patron rewards. Suggestions would be appreciated.

Boring Patch Notes

1. Added the western half of the mansion’s upper floor in 3D mode.
2. Actors will now animate in 2D mode, moving between rooms and fading out if they exit your line of sight. This behavior can be turned off via the “Actors Animate Move” flag in global options.
3. Added some sound effects to make the game less unnervingly quiet.
4. Added damage animations. These can be toggled off with the “Show Damage Animations” flag in global options.
5. Added map underlays to the 2D modes. The world now looks prettier! You can shut them off with the “Show2DUnderlays” flag.
6. Gave the game a spiffy new UI. Black and gold, more usage of bitmap fonts (which render considerably faster and have better shadows).
7. Gave the game a spiffy new icon. Approximately 15.7% more spiffy than the previous icon, which was fairly spiffy!
8. Fixed a crash where the player was present, in 2D mode, when an AI opened a container and tried to print to the 3D level.
9. Fixed a bug that caused rooms in 2D mode to not grey out when not visible.
10. In all modes, a confounded human will receive a base -10 to their defense rolls. Physical attacks are thus extremely likely to connect.
11. Fixed a bug where the player could move to another room while already moving by clicking the radar. (Thanks, Sairus323!)
12. Fixed a bug where subdivided console lines would not inherit the color of the source line.
13. Added Lua Tarballing, which speeds up program execution speed.
14. Player-controlled harpies were doing insane amounts of willpower damage. That was fixed.
15. Optimized the font code so it renders faster in the console.
16. Optimized the 3D loading code so it no longer loads the lightmaps its not going to render.
17. Cows would get their AI stuck on neutral entities like the Golem Tube and the Harpy Nest. They will now ignore those entities.
18. Humans who get polymorphed outside of the player’s sight will now correctly show their polymorphed portrait when examined. (Thanks, several people!)
19. Fixed a font-deallocation error in the Zone Editor, and a double-deallocation error on program exit.
20. Fixed some 3D geometry issues.

Known Bugs

3D portraits are still often misaligned. It’s really not a high priority for me, just look at all the stuff I got done!

Feedback

As always, you can discuss the project in depth on the TFGS forums.