Fireside Hero - a turn-based strategy / RPG (Devlog)

Hi fellow Stencyllers!
What do you think about this game?
Fireside Hero is a compact turn-based strategy / RPG set in a fantasy world.
Very roughly the concept can be described as "Heroes of Might and Magic meets Minesweeper"

Key features:
- Cosy old-school look
- Original rumour mechanics
- Combat built on rock-paper-scissors principles
- Emergent story with a bit-size narrative
It's my first personal project, and I've been working on it for about 9 months, planning to release later this year.

You can get an idea of the gameplay in this video snippet: https://youtu.be/6bZXTubFmiI
Or access the latest alpha build on Google Drive: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Vou63-tatnzZKFyB3oq0SESykXdO2oDQ

Any feedback and comments highly welcome, especially if you love RPGs, strategies or puzzle games.
Thanks a million!

Really interesting stuff! Two quick things I noticed:
1- It took me a while to find where the days counter and gold were on the video. I think that font is too small for that, or the placement doesn't help. It would help to make that part of the HUD stand out more.

2- You could rework your grass "tiles" to be more seamless, to minimize the appearance of a grid. And I mean just the green grass itself, beneath the houses and whatnot. That alone could break up a bit of the grid. If the map is not randomly generated (and is a full image) that could be even easier to accomplish. Admittedly this is very minor stuff.

Thanks Luyren!
Good points, added to my bucket list

This isn't usually the type of game I play, but I really like the presentation of the whole thing.

Very good job!
I like that you see the whole "world" infront of you and are motivated to explore.
Maybe some "fog of war" might be interesting to add.

One wish: A bit less text. maybe you could add icons in the left part under the portraits to make it easier to read/digest.

Cheers!

Very good job!
I like that you see the whole "world" infront of you and are motivated to explore.
Maybe some "fog of war" might be interesting to add.

One wish: A bit less text. maybe you could add icons in the left part under the portraits to make it easier to read/digest.

Cheers!

Thanks!
- I tried the fog of war in an earlier build and it definitely adds to the exploration part, but it also contradicts the rumour mechanic - the player doesn't know which clues to buy until the whole map is revealed.
- As for the amount of text and icons, can you clarify? Part of the rumour mechanic is interpreting the text into actual map phenomena, e.g. "evergreen plants" can be desert cacti or conifer trees. How would you make an icon for that?

Fog: True that makes sense.
Icons: You know use color coding for the segments on th left (hints/status and so on). I thought diving them a bit more or adding an icon at start would make the screen easier to digest.

Cheers!

Fog: True that makes sense.
Icons: You know use color coding for the segments on th left (hints/status and so on). I thought diving them a bit more or adding an icon at start would make the screen easier to digest.

Cheers!

I'm actually using colour coding for different rumour classes (rumours about monsters = black; rumours about perils = red; rumours about artifacts = blue). I suppose I could additionally separate rumours about monster behaviour / stats from rumours about monster location - that totally makes sense from the mechanics viewpoint. Thanks again!

Created a homepage for the game: http://www.tishin.me/firesidehero
But most importantly, started a Telegram channel: https://t.me/firesidehero
So if you're into strategy games and want a cosy company of likeminded people - do consider subscribing!
I'm planning to roll out fresh builds, post devlog entries and discuss new features there. Suggestions and bugs welcome, too. Keep warm!

Fireside Hero in early access on Itch: https://dtishin.itch.io/firesidehero
Critical feedback and suggestions welcome!

Congrats!!!

Congrats!!!

Thanks Sebastian, it's an honour to get feedback and a word of support from you!

The game still has a long way to go (more maps, more characters, more interactive locations, easter eggs, UI polishing, performance optimisation, save system etc.) but it's time to start building a community, hence the open beta.

By the way:
- I put back the fog of war feature, with the ability to turn it on / off in the main menu. It makes the game more fun in the end (you were right).
- Getting back to your earlier suggestion to replace some text with icons: did you mean putting in place some sort of a familiar turn-based strategy UI (like in HOMM, Disciples etc) where the player would see their dashboard, switch selected hero etc, so that "buy rumours" buttons could be small square buttons with an icon of artifact, monster, etc? If that's what you meant, we're thinking in the same direction  - I've got in on my to-do list for next week.

- I put back the fog of war feature, with the ability to turn it on / off in the main menu. It makes the game more fun in the end (you were right).

Thats a very user friendly feature! cool

- Getting back to your earlier suggestion to replace some text with icons: did you mean putting in place some sort of a familiar turn-based strategy UI (like in HOMM, Disciples etc) where the player would see their dashboard, switch selected hero etc, so that "buy rumours" buttons could be small square buttons with an icon of artifact, monster, etc? If that's what you meant, we're thinking in the same direction  - I've got in on my to-do list for next week.

I think having a small icon on the buy button would add some flavor. But i was referring to the lower left area. It can be a wall of text and i was just wondering if you could add icons there. An icon for the herbs which grow there for example.  But some rumors might be difficult to translate into an icon. Not sure if doable and too much work but would improve the readability .

Good luck with the game!

Thanks! I might try separate tabs for the journal (monster location / monster behaviour / artifact location / peril location) - could improve UX. Anyway, I need some more player feedback to know better.

Fireside Hero has got a Steam page Just the right time to add it to your wishlist!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1306950/Fireside_Hero/