Last time we posted was around a month ago, and what a month it has been. We’re finishing the last area of the game and designing the final boss, and I wish we could just show everything off, but we’d rather you play the game and experience it all by yourself. We’re not really implementing any new mechanics at this stage and are just pumping out tons of content, which we don't wanna spoil too much, but we also don’t wanna go radio silent. So one of our designers prepared a short read about some of the tools we give the player that allow them to shape and react to the world around them, as well as some other stuff. Enjoy.

There's more to cards than meets the eye. When browsing the Skill Tree, you'll notice that apart from different effects and keywords, some cards also contain Attributes. This means that these cards have a vital role outside of combat and boost your character's abilities during map exploration and story events. You can recognize these cards by the Attribute Icon in the top right corner. Every Hero has 2 Attributes that can be invested in.

First of all, we have "Card Checks" that you could've already seen, if you played the demo. Some story events let you play cards to unlock additional interactions. Only cards with Attributes are used during these events, so you'll always know which cards are special beforehand. Be mindful that using your Attributes will not always guarantee a "better" result. It's simply a way for your characters to do things their way. People will remember your choices.

Secondly, we have passive "Skill Checks" that are hidden from the player. If you have unlocked a required number of cards with the same Attribute, some story events will contain more dialogue, information, and/or options. The simplest example is Perception – if it's on a high enough level, your character may notice a hidden item, making it available to be picked up.

Now for the main topic of our last month's shenanigans - playtests. Here are the results of people playing our game for the last month:

This aspect was quite controversial, with some contradicting opinions, but overall, people enjoyed the atmosphere, choices, items, and the overall map size, and disliked the readability, lack of guidance, and large amounts of backtracking while visiting certain npc’s and areas of interest. 

This part is something we pretty much nailed, 75% of players thought that the progression pace was just right. The game was not overwhelming the players with too many choices at once, all the while providing enough content to keep the players engaged with the progression systems.

People mainly enjoyed the time mechanics, synergies, and tactical planning, which is complemented by allowing the player respec the skill points they acquired at any point in the game. The map skillchecks mechanics we explained at the beginning of this post were also fan favourites. They disliked how some mechanics introduced by new enemies introduced difficulty spikes, and how the characters that are not in the active party didn't gain experience.

Testers complained about basic fights being a bit too long. The unique fights were also difficult, but as we desired for each hard encounter, the players had to adapt their decks and form unique strategies. Some of them, however, didn't stick around and decided that the game was too hard. 

The general feeling here was that the game was difficult, but not unfair, meaning that every obstacle was beatable as long as the player made up a plan and tried to counter whatever it was that troubled them. This is just as we wanted, but we still think that balancing the game to make it a bit easier is a good decision. This won't happen by simply twisting the numbers, but by allowing players to manipulate reality itself. As mysterious as it sounds, we don't want to spoil it for you. That way, people that dont enjoy the deckbuilding mechanics can still enjoy the RPG elements, all the while providing hardcore players with the satisfaction of not giving in to the games attemps to lure them into borrowing the power that they don't fully understand.

The exploration part, which had the community divided, is something we’re not too concerned about; we want the player to feel lost while playing the game, experience the atmosphere of navigating a strange world, and make sense of it. We also don't want to clutter the screen with too much UI, popups, exclamation points, and the like. We did, however, decide to make it so that the points of interest are more visible on the map by making them stand out more from the elements around them.

Lastly, the experience part, we decided to make it so that all the characters gain experience regardless of them beeing in an active party or not. 

Now for my favourite part - showing off some of what our amazing artists made, featuring the most freaky, mind-bending creatures they pull out from god knows where. This time though, we will not provide much context regarding their origin, so as not to spoil the game too much. Tell us what you make of them!

There are many more where that came from, and that’s not even featuring any of the main story bosses, which are the main focus of our development process. We’re really putting work into them and making them the best they can be, and no, we won't show them in these posts 👹

Thank you, everyone, for playtesting our game. It gave us a much-needed insight and a fresh dose of feedback that will help us shape the game into a better version of itself, and we hope to see you in the next round of tests. 

Sorry for the lack of posts this month. The playtests, and what is essentially full-steam development, really filled up our schedules and didn't leave much time for talking. That being said, our schedules aren’t getting any lighter, so I can't promise that the next post will be released next week. We will post whenever an open window shows itself.

Have a fantastic rest of the week and as always…

Stay safe!
Fardust team

Q&A form: https://forms.gle/RjVhs3oSfyjRQtrH9.

Join Our Socials: TikTok[www.tiktok.com], Blue Sky[bsky.app], Discord[discord.com], https://x.com/Shards_of_Order/.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3432480/Shards_of_Order/

As mentioned in our previous posts, the development is progressing well, but as the playtime keeps increasing, there’s more room for holes, balance issues, and those pesky bugs. And so, the time has come, when we come asking for your help. If this game is something you’re passionate about and want to help out with, we implore you to sign up for our playtesting program. 

Before the full release, we’re planning to conduct around 4 playtests, each targeting a different area of the game. The first test will begin sometime next week and will target the shrike’s nest and the village. We’re starved for other people’s opinions and have done all the testing we can, so the game is stable enough that it won't cause frustration and accurately represents the direction we’re heading in.

We’re looking for feedback on our lore. We want you to try different builds and share your input on balance and difficulty. We want feedback on our UX and the parts that cause frustration when playing, while reporting any bugs you find along the way. Anything that you think could be done better, we want to know about it.

We’re deeply grateful to everyone in this community for trying to help our game be the best it can, and your efforts won't go unappreciated. The playtesters will receive the keys for the full game, and the most active ones will receive gifts from us as a token of our gratitude.

We wish you a fantastic rest of the week and, as always…

Stay safe!
Fardust team

Q&A form: https://forms.gle/RjVhs3oSfyjRQtrH9.

Join Our Socials: TikTok[www.tiktok.com], Blue Sky[bsky.app], Discord[discord.com], https://x.com/Shards_of_Order/.