Chapter 11: The Wolf (Patreon)

Itchio is being a bit of a pain and not letting me post images without them immediately breaking SO we'll do the usual devlog here on patreon!

Quick reminder, Chapter 11 will not receive a standalone update, but will be bundled with Chapter 12 and 13 once all three are completed. I will avoid as many spoilers as I can and will completely omit anything related to the final boss, so no need to worry too much about spoilers! With that out of the way, let's jump straight in, shall we?

Coming off Chapter 10 Red has to go through one final detour before she can cross the bridge leading to the forests exit. Here though you'll run into a strange little fellow wandering around. While the chapter title might be "The Wolf" the core theme here is really on the undead, ghosts and ghouls, if you will.

And what better location to battle zombies at than an actual Cemetery? Welcome to Broomhill Cemetery, where the long historic village keeps their dead. Live out your wildest grave robbing fantasies by searching new item spots like coffins and urns!

But as you search the area you find the Crypt locked up tight, and somme signs of something strange. It's almost like the Gravekeeper was in the midst of some work but just...vanished? And oh great, he took the keys with him.

A big part of this chapter is focused on this central question. Where is the Gravedigger? And how can you manage to get past the locked doors without him? There's some fun lore documents to pick up, puzzles and of course the new undead enemies, so I hope you'll enjoy going through it all and piecing it together for yourself.

The Crypt is just one example of such a puzzle. Three torches stand outside and a note on the door gives you a clue. Perhaps you should inspect the nearby graves and keep that thinking cap on?

Once inside you'll find even more spooky scary enemies abound. Zombies that are lit on fire and even actual ghosts! But searching this place is the only way you can find a way into your other main location of importance, the Cathedral. More on that latter though!

Battles have a lot of interesting properties when it comes to these unique enemies. There's a lot of conflicting weaknesses at play that will punish you for just trying to spam AOE coverage moves non stop, and the ghosts themselves well, they aren't exactly physical, so finding a reliable way to even hurt them becomes a challenge. You might want to try avoiding combat sometimes here!

But once you solve that problem you can officially come to your final "dungeon' so to speak! Broomhill Cathedral. And look at that, a crime scene to greet you. How lovely.

The main challenge of the Cathedral is that the gate out front is locked up tight. And without the keys you can only open it via an automated system controlled by the Cathedrals bell. The bell goes off at precise times to signal the "opening" and "closing" of church, but you can't wait until tomorrow and the clock that controls it is broken anyway! So it's a bit of a scavenger hunt to find the missing pieces, put the clock back together, and then solve the question of what time to set it, to actually open up the path forward. It's a very different location that I had a lot of fun putting together!

With freedom insight, Red finally makes it to the other side of the bridge only...another gate? But wait, you didn't pick up any keys for this one? What's going on here?

How very very strange.

Unfortunately, what happens beyond this point is something I simply cannot talk about.

Now I want to come out here and clarify that, even though July is over, Chapter 11 is not actually complete. As of last night, I was actually pretty frustrated with the original version of the final boss fight. I playtested it and I just didn't think it worked very well or was satisfying. And so I devised a new approach that is already in development. It'll be fun to talk about at a later date, what was cut, what was added, but for now all I can say is, I've settled on something truly unlike any fight you've ever had in this game, and I can't wait for you to play it in the next update with the rest of the story.

Chapter 12 is relatively short, only needing a small handful of maps, but from here I'll be hard at work drawing up the CG's for all the games main endings. All things I can't cleanly share obviously. Rest assured that I'm not just sitting on my ass doing nothing!! I'll try and find things to share where I can of course!

As always, I want to thank you for continued patience and support. Please continue to anticipate the conclusion of Project Red coming later this year!