Hello again everyone!

Deadwind alpha-2 will be releasing this Friday, September 23rd so I thought I'd write this post to summarize and talk about the changes and additions in this upcoming version.

I've also included a little life update at the bottom of this post as there's going to be some big changes moving forward.

New Abilities

• 14 new abilities.
• New abilities for different weapon types. Must equip that weapon to use that ability.
• Targetable abilities.
• Abilities with reagent costs.
• Sound effects for all abilities.
• Added a cooldown next to ability names to show how many turns until the ability can be used again.

Tomes of Knowledge

• Consumable items that teach you abilities.
• You no longer start the game knowing all abilities.
• Must purchase or farm these tomes to learn new abilities.

Options Menu

• Music/SFX volume settings.
• Fullscreen toggle.
• CRT Shader toggle.
• Low Contrast Mode toggle.

New NPC Portraits

• 7 new portraits for NPC dialogue.

Town Interiors

• Most buildings now have interiors with "clutter objects".
• Tables, chairs, countertops, etc.

Tutorial Sequence

• Teaches basic controls and gameplay.
• Start the game as a stowaway on a ship with no memory.

Ice Caves

• Contains 2 new monsters: Wraiths, and Yeti.
• Wraiths drop "Cryotheum Dust"; a reagent used to cast one of the new spells.
• More cavernous generation. Still experimenting...

Talismans

• New offhand items that simply boost an attribute while equipped.
• Purchasable from merchants, and farmable from hobgoblins, bloodfiends and bandits/outlaws.

Numpad Controls

• You can now use the numpad to move, attack, and navigate menus.
• Trad roguelike players rejoice!

Dungeon Entrance Locations/Pointers

• Dungeon entrance locations within an "Area" are now random within the room.
• Added on-screen pointers that point towards dungeon entrances.
• Pointers are also present within dungeons to point to stairs up and down.

Location Popups

• Walking over a location will give a floating text notification and log message.
• This applies to all dungeon types and towns.

Thanks for reading. In case you missed it, I've recently landed a job with Larian Studios in Tech QA (YAY!!). Over the next couple of weeks, I'll be doing a bunch of apartment research in preparation to move out to Quebec so Deadwind progress might be a little slow.

Moving forward, I'd also like to release smaller updates more frequently as opposed to larger updates every month or two. I think in the future (especially when I start work) this will lead to a better work schedule for me, and less content drought.

Anyways that's all. I hope to see you all playing alpha-2 on Friday <3

Cheers,

Jason