[img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35905874/638b2759f543fafb4416f5a2f03db1f9cc9d06e4.png[/img] Hear ye, hear ye! A new Necrofugitive announcement doth come! Greetings and salutations, dear friends. We, the team at Black Garden Studios, come bearing news and information about Necrofugitive! Let this issue of the Avencian Herald commence! [h3]The Paladin Draws Nearer![/h3] Earlier this year we shared a first look at our newest enemy type, the Paladin. Paladins will be advanced enemies that challenge your skills as a player with their unflinching resolve and towering shields. The presence of a Paladin on the battlefield is sure to raise the morale of friendly troops. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35905874/1363bd45df5a6192985fbb62bdd019c6626ae1d5.gif[/img] Just what is the holy order these brave knights belong to? Stay tuned to learn more. [h3]New Unit Type — Political Prisoners [/h3] Along with a second look at the Paladin, we’re also happy to introduce another new unit type— the Political Prisoner! [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35905874/1d8575de71dd754df8ea1f95326cfd34b74f05e6.gif[/img] Most often born to the common folk and peasantry, these individuals find themselves in a situation much like the titular Necrofugitive prisoner. With their future hanging in the uncertain hands of a tyrannical kingdom, their allegiances lie with no one but themselves. Happening across such an individual opens an interesting opportunity for interaction. Will you set them free and let them serve as a distraction? Will you prey upon them to bolster your own abilities? Or will you simply choose to ignore their plight and leave them to their fate? Choices like these are a critical element of the Necrofugitive experience. [h3]Tech Demo - The Centurion Conflict[/h3] Among the many updates made this year include optimizations to the game’s code to improve performance. We’ve prepared a video to highlight these new changes and give you a brief glimpse into the world of Necrofugitive beyond the role of the game’s protagonist. Taking place during the Avencian Civil War, the Centurion Conflict Tech Demo features at least 100 active combatants on each side fighting in a pitched skirmish to claim the plains of Avencia. Please take a look at the video showcase below. [previewyoutube=8XHzlwiNggA;full][/previewyoutube] As you can see in the video above, we are proud to confirm Necrofugitive can support large scale conflicts in the midst of normal gameplay without compromising performance. This includes not only soldiers battling in the field of play, but also additional skirmishers in the distance along the horizon. We also would like to point out that each soldier on screen has their own independent AI behaviors and personalities processing simultaneously all throughout the conflict. This should give a sense of scale for the experience we wish to give players as they claw their way toward freedom. The Avencian Civil War plays a large role in the story of Necrofugitive. Just why is the nation divided, and who are the factions at play? Stay tuned for a future post diving more into the conflict and those taking up arms in it. [h3]Black Garden Studios is Looking for an Environment Artist [/h3] As we ramp up Necrofugitive development, the team at Black Garden is currently on the lookout for an environment artist to join the Necrofugitive project. With that said, we are also not opposed to sourcing environment assets from various different artists, rather than bringing on a single dedicated artist. Things like boulders and bushes, trees and guillotines, the limits lie in your imagination. The most important thing is that the asset must be consistent with the pixel art style of the game. For artists looking for a very low-stakes opportunity to, at minimum, get their name in the credits of Necrofugitive, this is also a great chance to get a taste of the game development experience without the commitment and expectations of a formal hire. If you are interested in submitting your work for consideration, please send an email to [b]art@blackgarden.games[/b] with the subject line “Environment Artist”, your portfolio, and a little bit of information about yourself, your availability, and the level of involvement you are interested in should you be selected. [h3]International Localization Plans — Translator Recruitment [/h3] Our team is incredibly thankful to be able to say Necrofugitive has many fans across the world. As we receive our reviews, reports and feedback from players, we notice quite a few of these reports are in languages beyond just English. As a small independent team, we have had to rely on limited resources, including machine translation, to attempt to offer some degree of support beyond the English language. With this said, we are not satisfied with the current state of things and wish to recruit those who can provide the proper localizations our players deserve. While we are interested in hearing from speakers and translators of all languages, we have also noticed that Chinese speaking players are among our largest player base. For this reason, our team is looking for Chinese localization in particular to help us better respond to the needs of this very large group of players. As mentioned before, though Chinese language support is the most urgent of our localization needs, we have a strong desire to provide localization support in as many languages as possible. If you are a person who can assist us with this need, please reach out to [b]localization@blackgarden.games[/b] with your information, including rates, languages, experience, and level of familiarity with Necrofugitive. Include subject line "LOCALIZATION - [Language]" with your specific languages in the brackets. Even if you have not done formal, professional localization work in the past, if you are a passionate fan who wants to contribute to the Necrofugitive project in this special and important way, we would love to hear from you. Please send us an email. [h3]Other Black Garden Projects — DEAD MAN’S HAND: Card Roulette Action [/h3] As mentioned in our last Necrofugitive update, our team is still also providing steady content support for our other title, DEAD MAN’S HAND: Card Roulette Action. [img]https://clan.fastly.steamstatic.com/images/35905874/6aef9ca8fc91bdfc4b51ab21d2a31d73f0c2c727.png[/img] In addition to new unlockables added in regular intervals, the game has now featured two seasonal events (one of them ongoing at the time of this post), improvements to the UI, guest player slots, bounties, web browser & mobile support, and more. While it is not Necrofugitive, we are very proud of what we have achieved with this project, and as always, would like to remind you that each sale of DEAD MAN’S HAND helps to support the continued operation of our studio, and the development of Necrofugitive. The game is currently seeing a steep discount as part of the Steam Winter Sale, costing only $2.50 at time of writing. If you’re looking for a quick gift for friends that won’t set you back, please consider buying our game. [h3]Support Black Garden Studios — Patreon, Ko-fi, & PayPal [/h3] We have been tremendously blessed to have fans of Black Garden Studios reach out and ask how they can give donations or further support our studio. In response to this, we are launching three different ways for fans to contribute. For those who wish to make a monthly contribution, we have the Patreon & Ko-fi options. For those who wish to make one time contributions, you can donate directly via PayPal. Regardless of your choice, we are tremendously grateful for all support, paid or otherwise. We will be offering exclusive rewards such as flairs for DEAD MAN’S HAND and copies of our games as thanks. If you would like to check out any of our donation pages, please visit the links below: [h2][url=https://www.patreon.com/c/BlackGardenStudios]Patreon[/url] | [url=https://ko-fi.com/blackgardenstudios]Ko-fi[/url] | [url=https://www.paypal.com/biz/profile/blackgardenstudios]PayPal[/url][/h2] [h3]When Will Necrofugitive Release? [/h3] Unsurprisingly, one of the most frequent questions we get from players is when Necrofugitive will be releasing. At this time, the Necrofugitive team does not have a formal release date to share. While development has remained steady and ongoing through the year, we have likewise still continued to develop the game when able, rather than full time. We are optimistic, based on developments behind the scenes, that this will begin to change in the coming year after certain goals and benchmarks are met. We thank you for your continued patience, and hope to have more information to share in 2025. Until then, we thank you once more for all of the support, well wishes, and kind words you have shared with us since this journey began. We are committed to getting Necrofugitive into your hands as soon as we can, and want to make sure that when you get it, you’ll love every second of the action, tension, and excitement in your sprint toward freedom. Until next time, this is the team at Black Garden Studios wishing you a happy new year. We’ll see you then.