Exanima 0.6 Released

Blodetsprutar · Dec 6, 2015

I believe Everyone was impressed by what they saw on kickstarter and longed for a playable game, the months and years went by and a community has grown that has followed the game in its detail together with an amazing and "intimate" Dev team. Great work everyone! Great work baremettle.

Edit* So i've played a bit on the fourth area, finally beat sir. Hearing his steps in the cold hard corridors made my heart beat loud, coupled with the weird eerie music, i think of mystery and deep forgotten anger or something, its hard to describe, but its really beautiful.

I dont know if its just me, but I feel like killing sir is sort of based on luck, I havent tried fighting him in the open head to head. Maybe you can duck under his left right swings? He should be slower turning etc in general so you can strafe. And that old requested mechanic of being able to roll away would seem really useful in this particular case

.

Mati9319 · Dec 28, 2015

[CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS REGARDING MORE OR LESS DETAILED CONTENT OF 0.6 UPDATE!]

Hello again after a long break!

As to begin with, 0.6 is simply great so far! "So far", because I've only just managed to kill the giant monster (troll or something) so I really can't say anything more than:

the new environment design is stunning!
combat feels somewhat more precise and responsive,
I've nearly died of terror when meeting the giant monster for the first time.

But well... I need some help. As I mentioned before, I managed to kill the said monster. I did it using the simpliest method in the world: luring him to the giant square hole and he fell in there like an idiot. But is it proper method for dealing with him? Killing him ordinarily felt impossible and he made some roar falling to his death, but on the other hand it seemed like I've got no experience for this effort.

NachoDawg · Dec 28, 2015

@Mati9319 I haven't really been able to get more than 2-3 headshots at him when fighting him "squarely". I don't know if we are supposed to be able to, but the controls are complete enough yet to do it in a pretty way. Or, we aren't expected to fight him mano-e-mano, and have to chose between cheesing him or escaping him

-Tim- · Dec 28, 2015

Mati9319 said:
[CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS REGARDING MORE OR LESS DETAILED CONTENT OF 0.6 UPDATE!]

Hello again after a long break!

As to begin with, 0.6 is simply great so far! "So far", because I've only just managed to kill the giant monster (troll or something) so I really can't say anything more than:

the new environment design is stunning!

combat feels somewhat more precise and responsive,

I've nearly died of terror when meeting the giant monster for the first time.

But well... I need some help. As I mentioned before, I managed to kill the said monster. I did it using the simpliest method in the world: luring him to the giant square hole and he fell in there like an idiot. But is it proper method for dealing with him? Killing him ordinarily felt impossible and he made some roar falling to his death, but on the other hand it seemed like I've got no experience for this effort.

Nice to hear you're enjoying 0.6! I don't think using the hole is the proper method for dealing with him. The hole was mainly added so people could suicide into it and start again from the checkpoint at the portal, allowing them to replay the fourth level. It's quite possible to kill the monster by normal means. But it takes skill, caution and wit

Mati9319 · Dec 28, 2015

-Tim- said:
It's quite possible to kill the monster by normal means. But it takes skill, caution and wit

I'm curious what do you mean exactly. Because:

I've tried my hardest to dodge his attacks, but it never works. No matter how hard I try, he always manages to reach me with his hands. Literally no exceptions. And we all know what happens next: in 90% of cases we got knocked down, our friend does 2-3 overhead attacks and that's it - we're dead.
I've also tried some other technique, which is pretty much hugging him and holding LMB. I managed to place quite a lot of hits using this method, but sooner or later he manages to finish me off.

-Tim- · Dec 28, 2015

Mati9319 said:
I'm curious what do you mean exactly. Because:

I've also tried some other technique, which is pretty much hugging him and holding LMB. I managed to place quite a lot of hits using this method, but sooner or later he manages to finish me off.

This is the best way I've seen so far to beat him face to face. Take a good one-handed sword or shortsword and keep it up long enough, eventually he'll drop dead. Having good technique helps a lot here. Try to combo as well as possible. Usually just holding LMB won't do it, carefully manage how you string together your swings. Also, ducking is very powerful against him.

Mati9319 · Dec 28, 2015

-Tim- said:
This is the best way I've seen so far to beat him face to face. Take a good one-handed sword or shortsword and keep it up long enough, eventually he'll drop dead. Having good technique helps a lot here. Try to combo as well as possible. Usually just holding LMB won't do it, carefully manage how you string together your swings. Also, ducking is very powerful against him.

Got him finally!

Thanks for the advise! It took me about five tries. Hell, I even managed to knock him down few times!

Too bad he wasn't carrying anything (which also adds to the realism, because who'd expect such monster to carry... anything?

) and the experience I got was... well... hardly noticeable (if any).

Anyway, I'm little angry at myself for not killing him using only my own brain. Guess I need to be more creative next time (hope there'll be some other mini-boss later in this level).

Orlacktherof · Dec 29, 2015

You could just "hug" him and try to punch him to death. It does work.

Anthony Obilor · Dec 29, 2015

You have to remember, you dont gain experience immediately, you absorb experience at a set rate, this helps prevent grinding. So no matter what you do you still absorb exp at the same rate it just adds to a pool.

NachoDawg · Dec 29, 2015

one thing i dont understand about the experience system

It gives us xp at a steady rate as long as we're doing something that is worth xp. (exploring, killing, discovering, so on), but at a low cap. does that mean there's an "xp pool" that we fill during gameplay, and a steady stream of xp goes to our character from there?

Can't we still grind to fill that pool and still gain xp? Or if the pool has a capacity limit, does that mean we could potentially not all the xp we should if we gain it too fast?

Tony · Dec 29, 2015

NachoDawg said:
one thing i dont understand about the experience system

It gives us xp at a steady rate as long as we're doing something that is worth xp. (exploring, killing, discovering, so on), but at a low cap. does that mean there's an "xp pool" that we fill during gameplay, and a steady stream of xp goes to our character from there?

Can't we still grind to fill that pool and still gain xp? Or if the pool has a capacity limit, does that mean we could potentially not all the xp we should if we gain it too fast?

The only time you'll lose XP is if you go too long without assigning a new skill/technique to train (since the XP gained goes towards that). The XP is gradually absorbed instead of being instantaneous. You can perform a hundred actions that increase XP and you'll still gain all of it after enough time passes. The only time you won't be able to gain any more XP is in the future when it's possible to train 15 techniques (the maximum number of techniques a character can learn); this will be a "maxed-out" character.

Mati9319 · Dec 29, 2015

Thank you all for clarifying on the experience gathering.

Oh and also, I don't want to create a new thread or anything so I'm posting it here:

I managed to finally beat the expert arena few minutes ago!

It took me about 6-8 tries in total and there's a fun fact: the last victorious try was also the only one where I made it to the final boss, which basically means that I defeated him on the first try. He was strong, fast, massive and demanding as hell, but it seems that the experience I've gathered during all the attempts for beating both novice and expert arenas taught me well.

I've finally started to develop a better feel of my character's movement (probably partially thanks to the latest update - the one this thread is about

) and learned to plan my moves wisely. On the other hand, I still tend to accidentally hug my opponent sometimes, which means losing a lot of nice hit opportunities.

Orlacktherof · Dec 29, 2015

Mati9319 said:
Thank you all for clarifying on the experience gathering.

Oh and also, I don't want to create a new thread or anything so I'm posting it here:

I managed to finally beat the expert arena few minutes ago! It took me about 6-8 tries in total and there's a fun fact: the last victorious try was also the only one where I made it to the final boss, which basically means that I defeated him on the first try. He was strong, fast, massive and demanding as hell, but it seems that the experience I've gathered during all the attemps for beating both novice and expert arenas taught me well.

I've finally started to develop a better feel of my character's movement (probably partially thanks to the latest update - the one this thread is about ) and learned to plan my moves wisely. On the other hand, I still tend to accidentally hug my opponent sometimes, which means losing a lot of nice hit opportunities.

Well, the important part is that you don't die.

AiChichi · Jan 14, 2016

lvk said:
Absolutely amazing, as I'm sure you're aware of. The future's exciting.

On the note of the journal, I think it'd be good to have some sort of 'base entry' marking off the beginning of your quest (or some kind of hint on how to use it properly), and have the rest written by yourself. Having your own place to take notes seems like a great asset in a game where you shape the exploration, so you can decide what's important to write and what to leave out.

Also, you could include an unnerving part in the game where entries randomly start appearing in your journal.

Speaking about journal, that's exactly my thinking... I wouldn't let the player to make an entry to his journal from the beginning. That would be chaotic as some players might be too lazy to write it down.
I would see 'the Base entry' from devs as essential and then it would be on player what he would write down and how he would progress in the quest.

Maybe there could be 'the ending entry' from devs as well, where they would sumarize the quest, write the touch of story or eventually pass along some ethical message?

Of course all would be written as it would wrote the player himself...

Beyre · Jan 15, 2016

Nice job! Been a long time but I still believe in you guys and the game! 100% no regrets of my backings.

5alv4 · Jan 29, 2016

I had not caught me in this way a video game. im hyped! Thank you so much guys!

Synagoga_Satanae · Jan 31, 2016

Amazing game, keep up the fine work BM

HagAX · Feb 8, 2016

I like this game. Good job BarreMettle. Success in work.

Merlkir · Feb 8, 2016

Have to say - spears are really fun. Glaives are super strong, but spear are just right.

LostSoul · Feb 21, 2016

I cannot find enough good words to tell how much I am excited for this realistic and wonderfully unique game. Its potential, physic engine, graphic, atmosphere, gameplay etc. are truly stunning. May it expand with even more contents and features. Hope to see the editor and script support fully available for players to customize and make one's own scenery, events, maps, characters, items, spells etc.

Love this project!