It’s been 2 months since the updated demo version was released. During this time, I haven't been idle. I’ve been working on feedback from the demo, game balance, but most importantly, I’ve been working on new content. This post will be about the development process, where I'll briefly explain what has changed, what has been added, and the future of Menace from the Deep.

Immediately after the release of the updated demo version, I began working on the visual and game-mechanical design of 2 new playable characters. In internal tests with my friends, both characters passed the concept check.

The full version of the game will feature 3 playable characters (Heroes), each with their own deck of cards and unique fighting style:

• Detective
  
• Professor
  
• Cultist

The Professor is the weakest of the playable characters in terms of stats, but he is usually not alone in battle. He specializes in summoning experimental animals in battle and mutating them into more terrifying and dangerous forms. He has cards to enhance his allies and even to sacrifice an ally for a bonus. His second specialty is alchemy. It’s not a problem for him to set fire to or poison an enemy. He also receives various bonuses when attacking poisoned or burning enemies. With the highest sanity stat, he can manipulate his sanity, even entering to a madness form that grants him additional energy points but makes him even more vulnerable.
The Cultist has no allies at all; he is a solo player but has many tricks up his sleeve. First, he has a Bloodlust stat, which fills up from attacks on the enemy and bleed effects. As his Bloodlust levels increase, he enhances his cards or even spends Bloodlust for very powerful combat bonuses. He can throw bad statuses back at enemies or steal their positive statuses. Some attacks can inflict the Trauma status. The Cultist is a cunning manipulator of combat mechanics. He has many ways to heal himself, but I often become a victim, or even a victim of his own actions.
The full version of the game will have 3 acts:

1. Suburbs - The act presented in the demo version
   
2. Wilds - The act I am currently working on. Most of the work is already done.
   
3. Borderlands - The area where the human world borders the world of creatures.

I am now finishing work on the second act, which will have a completely different set of locations and enemies. Each of the new enemies has at least one new and unique mechanic that you did not see in the demo version. To avoid spoiling the surprise, I will not explain the nuances and behavior patterns, but to give you a taste, I want to present the appearance of the enemies in the second act.

For greater convenience, I have developed a separate background for each act during the travel card gameplay, so no one can confuse which act of the game they are currently in.
New content and mechanics that I’ve already added to the game (or changed) are not only related to the new act. Specifically:

• 40 new inventory items.
  
• Additionally, Relics can now be combined into Collections. By gathering the components of a collection (2-4 relics), you’ll receive another Legendary Relic. Collections components will likely be hidden. The player must figure out which Relics can be combined into a collection.
  
  Example: Hypnosis Pendulum + Brain + Freud’s Book = Straightjacket (which completely protects the hero from enemies' Sanity effects in battle)
  
• 18 new combat statuses. I won’t reveal their workings just yet.
  
• Nearly a month was spent on combat code refactoring, but now combat works much more stably and is more flexible for introducing new mechanics.
  
• Attack Bonus no longer disappears at the end of the character’s turn. Now it can accumulate but will be neutralized if the character is attacked by an opponent. This innovation allows for deeper player and opponent tactics.
  
• Poison now deals double damage to human enemies. Paired with Burning, which deals double damage to monster enemies, it allows for more interesting deck builds.
  
• Refusing a new card is no longer possible. The demo version showed that not taking a new card after a battle was sometimes more advantageous to play only with upgraded basic cards already in the deck. Now this abuse of the mechanic is impossible.
  
• The game now features different forms that characters (including Heroes) can be in. These forms change the character’s appearance and bring various bonuses and penalties.
  
• The Combo Bonuses mechanics have changed. As before, each additional attack (or block) card increases the corresponding bonus, but the strength of this bonus can now vary depending on the hero and inventory items.
  
• Refactored the VFX invocation system. It has become simpler yet more flexible, allowing each action in battle to be visually noticeable and “juicy.”

These are not all the innovations, just the most significant ones. In the future, I plan to eliminate another abuse that was very common among players in the demo version, namely farming card upgrades. I already have an interesting solution, but I haven’t had time to implement it yet.

The full version release is planned for AUTUMN 2024, approximately in 4-6 months.

Those who follow the game’s development know that I am developing it myself, with a little help from my girlfriend-artist. Because of this, I cannot frequently update on the development. But this doesn’t mean development is at a standstill. Every day, sometimes even on weekends, I spend an average of 10 hours on development.

Doing promotion simultaneously takes up a lot of time. Therefore, each of you can help me. I do NOT need funding for development. But I do need help spreading the word about the game. Please recommend the game to your friends. Be sure to add it to your WISHLIST, even if you’re not sure you’ll buy it.

If you are a content creator, showcase the game to your audience.

All of this will be extremely helpful for me, as I put my soul, time, and even some money into the game’s development. My goal is to make a really interesting and fun game. It would be very sad if I succeed, but few people know about it.

A small disclaimer at the end of this long post, which I decided to add after some feedback from players of the demo - The game world is only INSPIRED by Lovecraft’s works, so it is NOT a canonical world of the Cthulhu mythos. This is a game about fights, of course, no human could fight the Elder Gods or even most of the creatures from Lovecraft’s works. Therefore, I reserve the right to change anything important for the gameplay or the story of my game.

Thank you all.