Ascension (Release, v 1.4) - by Big Memka and Shadowman

[Shadowman]

"Ascension", v. 1.0 now is released!
Look at the 1-st post for more details.
Have a nice game!
Download Ascension demo from Google.drive

[Cassidy]

Wow, I just looked at the screenshots and they look marvelous! And 18 maps? This should keep me busy for a long time. I will most likely write a review on this once I finish this game. Thanks for your guy's hard work

[John Stalvern]

Excellent! It's been a long wait. I'm going to begin immediately.

[skdursh]

Played this for a few hours last night. Absolutely loving it so far. This might be my pick for 2020 Caco #1.

I am curious though, are there any console commands available to increase stats/give experience/levels? I don't intend to cheat through the game but I'm really curious what the speed/jumping ability difference is between a char with like only 5 dex and one with 50. Also, there is at least one instance I ran across where something wasn't translated to English from Russian in the game. In the lower temple area there is a room with what looks like Egyptian hieroglyphics on the doors and in the center is what looks like a square button with a scarab on it. When you step on it the character says something in Russian, but a dialog box also pops up which is untranslated and still in Russian as well.

In any case, thank you both for all your hard work, this game has me enthralled.

[John Stalvern]

I am really enjoying the game so far, but I have discovered what seems to be a major sequence break that you may wish to fix.

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When you first reach the river, it is possible with 9 or so DEX to jump over to the waterfall with the small stone bridge. It is possible to enter a cave and see a dormant shadowbeast guarding an elixir of life, and head down to a cave full of undead corpses and a wight. It is also possible to go through a cave full of cultist adepts (which remain dormant until you exit the cave at the other end) and go on to the gates of the New Fortress. From there, an NPC called Tormund can take you to Sorona... and I never even went to the Temple of the Sun! Tormund's dialogue seems to imply you are already familiar with him as well, so I don't imagine this was intended. It was possible to access these areas in the demo as well with careful jumping, so I didn't think it was a glitch.

[BigMemka]

I am really enjoying the game so far, but I have discovered what seems to be a major sequence break that you may wish to fix.

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When you first reach the river, it is possible with 9 or so DEX to jump over to the waterfall with the small stone bridge. It is possible to enter a cave and see a dormant shadowbeast guarding an elixir of life, and head down to a cave full of undead corpses and a wight. It is also possible to go through a cave full of cultist adepts (which remain dormant until you exit the cave at the other end) and go on to the gates of the New Fortress. From there, an NPC called Tormund can take you to Sorona... and I never even went to the Temple of the Sun! Tormund's dialogue seems to imply you are already familiar with him as well, so I don't imagine this was intended. It was possible to access these areas in the demo as well with careful jumping, so I didn't think it was a glitch.

Yes, thank you for your observation. I think I've found the place you're talking about. We will fix this bug with the next patch. For now, you'd better not use this road, so as not to break several scripts.

[Toyoch]

Congrats for the release! Downloading! Will update this post when I got far enough to write bug reports, thoughts and review.

EDIT 1 : Playing on Nightmare, just exited the temple.

- Aiming for DEX/STR hybrid for the first run. Maybe I'd go with INT/WIS focused next.
- New weapon balancing is good so far, and Vampire Hand is helpful when I really need health from anything... namely from critters.
- Ranged enemies are overpowered. Rogues pretty much oneshots the player, making the melee impossible and you're doomed when you run out of crossbow bolt before reaching the shop.
- The first NPC says he can train you up to 13 stats, but I could raise my stat up to to 15 there.
- Skeletons are too fast, possibly due to -fast option from Nightmare difficulty.
- Found Russian texts even with English setting ; A floor switch in a room west of first Healing Pool.
- The plant's bramble spawning rate is insane. Good thing the brambles won't move much once they are surfaced, so where you make them appear is important to take the seed down.

[skdursh]

Congrats for the release! Downloading! Will update this post when I got far enough to write bug reports, thoughts and review.

EDIT 1 : Playing on Nightmare, just exited the temple.

- Aiming for DEX/STR hybrid for the first run. Maybe I'd go with INT/WIS focused next.
- New weapon balancing is good so far, and Vampire Hand is helpful when I really need health from anything... namely from critters.
- Ranged enemies are overpowered. Rogues pretty much oneshots the player, making the melee impossible and you're doomed when you run out of crossbow bolt before reaching the shop.
- The first NPC says he can train you up to 13 stats, but I could raise my stat up to to 15 there.
- Skeletons are too fast, possibly due to -fast option from Nightmare difficulty.
- Found Russian texts even with English setting ; A floor switch in a room west of first Healing Pool.
- The plant's bramble spawning rate is insane. Good thing the brambles won't move much once they are surfaced, so where you make them appear is important to take the seed down.

I disagree and think the ranged balance is fine considering all the projectiles can be dodged and aren't hitscan. Skeletons also move at a fine rate and it's easy to just get them in a group and then stutter-step backwards while swinging and kill them. I mentioned the Russian text in that room above, but I don't think anyone saw my comment. The brambles only spawn more if you attack/kill the vines before killing the main pod. If you just ignore the initial 3 vines and concentrate on the core it won't spawn any more (it's usually really easy to take out the core from a distance with the crossbow and ignore the vines entirely).

[BigMemka]

Played this for a few hours last night. Absolutely loving it so far. This might be my pick for 2020 Caco #1.

I am curious though, are there any console commands available to increase stats/give experience/levels? I don't intend to cheat through the game but I'm really curious what the speed/jumping ability difference is between a char with like only 5 dex and one with 50. Also, there is at least one instance I ran across where something wasn't translated to English from Russian in the game. In the lower temple area there is a room with what looks like Egyptian hieroglyphics on the doors and in the center is what looks like a square button with a scarab on it. When you step on it the character says something in Russian, but a dialog box also pops up which is untranslated and still in Russian as well.

In any case, thank you both for all your hard work, this game has me enthralled.

Thank you for noticing the untranslated text. As for the difference in jumps depending on dexterity: in the console, type puke 901, then your characteristics will rise to the maximum and you will take away the difference between small and large dexterity.

[BigMemka]

Congrats for the release! Downloading! Will update this post when I got far enough to write bug reports, thoughts and review.

EDIT 1 : Playing on Nightmare, just exited the temple.

- Aiming for DEX/STR hybrid for the first run. Maybe I'd go with INT/WIS focused next.
- New weapon balancing is good so far, and Vampire Hand is helpful when I really need health from anything... namely from critters.
- Ranged enemies are overpowered. Rogues pretty much oneshots the player, making the melee impossible and you're doomed when you run out of crossbow bolt before reaching the shop.
- The first NPC says he can train you up to 13 stats, but I could raise my stat up to to 15 there.
- Skeletons are too fast, possibly due to -fast option from Nightmare difficulty.
- Found Russian texts even with English setting ; A floor switch in a room west of first Healing Pool.
- The plant's bramble spawning rate is insane. Good thing the brambles won't move much once they are surfaced, so where you make them appear is important to take the seed down.

Are you serious about going all the way to the temple for this nightmare? I was only able to pass the first level I suggested that Shadowman add a nightmare as a joke. Honestly, I have no idea if it's possible to go through the entire game on nightmare! Theoretically, this is possible, since you can be treated for free. But the projectiles and enemies there are really very fast!

[Toyoch]

Are you serious about going all the way to the temple for this nightmare? I was only able to pass the first level I suggested that Shadowman add a nightmare as a joke. Honestly, I have no idea if it's possible to go through the entire game on nightmare! Theoretically, this is possible, since you can be treated for free. But the projectiles and enemies there are really very fast!

I'm serious on playing Nightmare, and I thought it's intended, tested and recommended for newbies.

One little typo found : Death message from Heavy Archer is written as "Havy".

As for the enemy ranged damage, is that intended that LIGHT Archer deal no less than 100+ damage a shot? Is Defender the only way to defeat the Vampire without cheat, due to the amounts of homing projectiles everywhere?

Another Russian text :

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The second and third pentagrams in the Cultist's cave, where you visit to slay the Vampire(Warrior's Guild quest).

EDIT : I give up. Ended up using freeze cheat in the finale battles.

Here are more thoughts with spoilers.
- The maps are overall beautiful. Fast Travel teleports are there, but not that useful in my opinion.
- Good thing there are no more gold shortage issue, if you use the bank properly.
- On Nightmare, some charging enemies like Fresh Imp, Satyr Berserker or Lost Souls act weird; they try to charge you but the action gets reset and they just retry, causing them to almost freeze on one spot.
And this enemy behavior makes ALL ranged enemies fire at insane rate.
- Fire Launcher Primary has pathetic range, usually killing myself.
- The Blunderbuss is as reliable as Doom BFG; sometimes the Alt Fire can destroy a whole corridor, sometimes it doesn't do any damage as the projectile hits something and disappear.
- Blunderbuss seems to create error lines each time I fire either modes.
- Greatsword is simply a suicide to use, due to enemy fire rates.

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- The defense part is impossible on Nightmare because of overpowered enemies and very weak statue. Please consider making statue and ally guardians immune to your attacks somehow.
- Guardian Minotaurs are impossible without Defender Icon.
- Getting Baracus(or the warrior who you rescue and escort in Western Coast) out of the cage doesn't make you invulnerable and it takes few seconds until you are able to walk again, which allows golems to charge and kill you in a split second.
- Fire Beast revives itself with the ghost attack. Seriously?
- Satyr Riders are overpowered with spamming poison blobs and elemental spears all the time.

I disagree and think the ranged balance is fine considering all the projectiles can be dodged and aren't hitscan. Skeletons also move at a fine rate and it's easy to just get them in a group and then stutter-step backwards while swinging and kill them. I mentioned the Russian text in that room above, but I don't think anyone saw my comment. The brambles only spawn more if you attack/kill the vines before killing the main pod. If you just ignore the initial 3 vines and concentrate on the core it won't spawn any more (it's usually really easy to take out the core from a distance with the crossbow and ignore the vines entirely).

Please try Behemoth on Nightmare Difficulty and see if its projectile is dodgable.
As for the plants, the top tier main pod WILL fight back and pretty much instantly kill me with its poison shot spam.


EDIT 2 : Now I am trying again with Hard difficulty. The enemy speed(move, attack, projectile) is about x2-x3 SLOWER than Nightmare.

[Shadowman]

Thanks for watching! If possible, send screenshots with the identified bugs.
Nightmare is a special mode, we did not test the passage on it, but left it for fans to tickle their nerves.
The standard modes for playing are easy, normal, hard.
Characteristics can be improved by teachers. The first is the old man on the tower in the lower temple. To improve the characteristics, you need both abilities (see the player statistics menu) and money.
Stock prices change when you leave Sorona and exit the gate towers of the city onto the road (south exit or west exit). The prices are also affected by events that occur with the guilds of magicians and warriors.

[Toyoch]

So I have finished on Hard. Took me 8 hours this time.
Final stats are 11/8/30/30, went for Mage Guild branch.

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- Mage lategame spells/weapon alts are incredibly powerful. Apocalypse deals insane damage, Lightning Storm is same as Inquisitor 3(which was OP), Golem is a great help, and Raven altfire just destroys almost everything.
- All the boss fights and the defense battle on Hard were managable. So it's just Nightmare that makes things literally impossible.
Oh, Behemoth was trivial as Mage because hellfire simply stunlocked it.
- Now I wonder one thing about story progression : Is it possible to entirely skip Necromancer's questline(especially Young Blacknore rescue) and progress to the finale? WIll there be any story changes at the very end?
- Even on Hard, I felt Satyr Riders(both forms) have mysteriously high resistance vs everything.

So, in the end, this TC is really enjoyable. Cacoward worthy I would say.

[BigMemka]

So I have finished on Hard. Took me 8 hours this time.
Final stats are 11/8/30/30, went for Mage Guild branch.

---

- Mage lategame spells/weapon alts are incredibly powerful. Apocalypse deals insane damage, Lightning Storm is same as Inquisitor 3(which was OP), Golem is a great help, and Raven altfire just destroys almost everything.
- All the boss fights and the defense battle on Hard were managable. So it's just Nightmare that makes things literally impossible.
Oh, Behemoth was trivial as Mage because hellfire simply stunlocked it.
- Now I wonder one thing about story progression : Is it possible to entirely skip Necromancer's questline(especially Young Blacknore rescue) and progress to the finale? WIll there be any story changes at the very end?
- Even on Hard, I felt Satyr Riders(both forms) have mysteriously high resistance vs everything.

So, in the end, this TC is really enjoyable. Cacoward worthy I would say.

Congratulations on passing! Do you think that we need to complicate the last stage of the game, when we leave through the Northern gate of Sorona? That is, to make the mage's weapon less powerful, or is the difficulty normal and destroying crowds of enemies is fun?

[Toyoch]

I think everything is okay as they currently are, except one thing : The defense statue shouldn't be damagable by the player(if they have massive AoE, it will die fast. Repulsion will kill it too but I think that's fine as repulsion pushing is exploitable).
Mages can still die quickly due to weak armor, if they let enemies get too close or they were too lazy to switch appropriate weapons for enemies.