The big black unknown is coming into focus as we complete v1 of Sim Hero. 

Today is monumental for our little game as we've graduated beyond 640x480 resolution! (ya know, resolution from 1990)

The resolution fix was a big deal as it opens up some core game features we really wanted to get in there and fixes some of the "wonk" we all experienced with mouse controls.

What's next on the horizon for Sim Hero? 

We continue to prep the remaining planned & contributor content (classes, skills, events & more), so expect that stuff to pour into the game in the coming weeks. Continued tweaking, balance, bug fixes are also planned. 

The next 'literal' big thing should be the castles. Get ready to proudly decide the path of your settlement (and see that visual representation on the map) to truly take things to the next level!

What's beyond that horizon?

It's always tough to talk about "the beyond" as plans & circumstances always change. But, many of the "back-end" improvements y'all see in Sim Hero are actually coming from another -yet to be revealed- PC Sim project we have going on... So, while it takes away a little time from Sim Hero, the benefits have been quite major.

Once Sim Hero is at v1.0, we'll have some announcements on that front, as well as more info on where Sim Hero will go from here. The world is actually 8x the size of the current Sim Hero world (after you open up all adjacent zones), so it's quite large (and I have sneaky plans for a "plot" that could take you back to your homeland to conquer it...). We hope we can get the chance to bring the rest of the Sim Hero experience to you!

We started the redesign to more closely align Sim Hero as advertised - a RPG Management Sim. And I think we've accomplished some great things - you'd be hard-pressed to find an old-school RPG built quite like Sim Hero.

As promised, we had a ton of the content ready to go, and we're quite far along today with the release of v0.2.2 (patch notes are in the Community Forum). 

In the current build, you can:
- Adventure in dungeons (Sim Hero style, of course!)
- Recruit & Customize your heroes with primary/sub classes, hundreds of skills, choose from thousands of pieces of loot, train them to gain special abilities, and watch them progress/regress as they adventure... the level of Hero customization is mind-boggling, and some of it happens organically as the Heroes train & adventure)
- Assign a hero to be your Guard Captain to help fight battles alongside your Army. Assign another hero as your Champion to deal with a CRISIS or perhaps investigate a POINT OF INTEREST.
- Explore the land with MAPS (unlock new zones to conquer, explore & adventure in)
- Manage your Villagers by setting them to tasks (chopping wood, mining tin, smelting bronze, farming for food, guarding the settlement, burning wood for charcoal, entertaining the populace, performing diplomacy w/neighbors, hosting feasts, scouting the land, scribing books, tending livestock, butchering that livestock and much MUCH more)
- Expand your settlement by building & upgrading a myriad of structures. Watch it all grow from meager tents into soaring battlements & fine establishments.
- Craft gear & trade goods. Focus your crafting into several specialized disciplines.
- Encounter, Squabble & Trade with neighbors (so much more to come on diplomacy that we never could have done with the old design)
- Make choices and deal with over 50 different events (and counting!), including several UNIQUE events which are super-rare, can only happen once and offer drastic choices to be made.
- Try to survive as long as possible!

Some things you can expect as we develop the next 4 zones of content:
- More, more and MORE classes including knights, mages & elementalist classes who can have a summoned elemental "pet" ala Beast Tamers and their animal companion. The goal is to allow free-form hero building so you can pull-off that awesome combo you always dreamed about (for example: You can build an Undead WightMage who causes Fear through her claws & spells, and "feeds" on that fear -if an enemy is feared- and has several attacks which chain into mass crippling against Feared foes... /satisifiedgroan)
- More, more and even MORE loot
- More events (yeah, we promised ONE more event type on the Kickstarter Stretch Goals... I think we've added 40+ beyond the planned events... Geek Fever Games is all about overachieving!)
- More dungeons, bringing back the dungeons in the previous design - can you defeat the Chimera? (content designed to take the heroes up to level 20)
- More villager types, mines & crafting materials (such as Brass, Iron, Steel)
- More UNIQUE choices to take your settlement down a certain path (next one could involve a Mages' Guild, Temple or Alchemist Lab)
- Recruitable Fey back in the game
- Kickstarter contributor content re-introduced into the game!
- Some interface cleanup & enhancements
- Kid-Gloves come off (get ready for multiple crises hitting at once - do you have what it takes to adeptly manage your kingdom in the face of it all?)
- Bug Fixes & Balance Changes
... and so much more!

We'd love to hear from you!
Post screenshots of your settlement and/or party in the Community forum. Have you discovered an obscure class combo that absolutely rocks? Let's see some stats & combat log brags! 
 

Here it is!

Sim Hero has undergone an overhaul. A good overhaul. A needed overhaul.

Download now!

Right now, the game is light on content while we balance/redesign. So, download and play if you want, but just understand that we are focusing testing the new gameplay. Most of the content is built, it's just waiting to be slotted-in. The gameworld is 32x the size of the little starting area, so there's plenty to explore!

Check out the new Getting Started guide here.

We believe this is the right direction and it's where we always wanted it to be. 

More updates and information to come!

Sim Hero enters Closed Beta Testing!

Emails are on their way out to all Kickstarter & Website contributors with the Beta download link & Beta info.

The full list of recent changes appear below:

Completed:

- MOVE INTO CLOSED BETA


Changes:

- All crafted gear boosted slightly
- Loot scripts tweaked to sometimes hand out less loot
- The Event System got an overhaul:
RESULT: Events 2 places in the future are determined at time of previous event resolution, negating the 
ability to save/load until a "favorable" event is rolled.
RESULT: The war events got some variety and the math was overhauled to actually work now. No more easy 
fights!
RESULT: Fiddled with the frequency of certain events.
RESULT: Added a new event type to potentially "give back" Happiness, Safety or Resources. Will expand 
upon this down the road.
RESULT: Slightly increased the amount of troops gained when recruiting troops.


Fixes:

- Fixed an instance where a War Hero would join the Court instead of the Reserves.
- Fixed court XP gain from some monsters (raised to normal levels - it was far too low)
- Fixed Event Battle Resolution Event text to include current *Safety* level on battle win/loss message.
- Fixed (hopefully all) instances where the wrong cutscene would play, or multiple cutscenes would 
play. This may cause some "cutscene weirdness" if you don't start over, but the worst that happens is 
you watch a duplicate cutscene once. Certainly no reason to start the game over if you don't want to.


Enjoy!
- The Sim Hero Team

March has been a busy & productive alpha testing month. In fact, it's been so smooth - we plan to open things up to the closed Beta testers much sooner than anticipated!

The biggest change on the horizon is the Event system. It needs a code overhaul and some new features (like, an event which allows the recovery of Happiness, Safety & Resources). Stay tuned for that.

Patch notes appear below, for all the major releases over the past 2 weeks (newest first). Enjoy!

- The SimHero team


Patch 0.0.4

> Completed:
- STRETCH GOAL: Recruitable Fairy & Centaur heroes.
- CLASS: Knight Errant
- CLASS: Dragon Knight (contributor content)
- DUNGEON: Ancient Wyrm Cave (contributor content)
- UNIQUE HERO (recruitable): Artur Erebus (contributor content)

> Changes:
- Minor review of the Marksman class. TP costs & Damage adjusted favorably, slightly.
- Dwarves are more resistant to poison & disease
- Migrated the remaining Court battles to the new scaling system
- Begun to add in some of the new, commissioned Orc portraits
- Changed all goblin sprites to the new, commissioned Goblin sprites
- Review of loot rolls & higher level difficulties balancing:
Result: Purple & better gear is more rare. (you can sometimes "sneak" a purple out under the old chances tho)
Result: Higher difficulty remained okay, so no changes made
Result: will continue to test higher difficulty dungeons for tweaks


> Fixes:
- Human Artifacts should now be properly found in the correct dungeons
- Tweaked the drop rates for "special" dungeon find items to be a tad more favorable in certain cases
- Fixed a few cutscenes
- Fixed a few bugs with the Training info messages
- Fixed a few more remaining cases where summoned allies would be DOA
- Fixed a few dialog errors
- NOW, When a hero returns from training, the training hall will properly show nobody "currently training"


Patch 0.0.3

> Changes:
- Re-tooled Court battles to add more variety and have it scale better as the game progresses 
- Re-tooled how "special" items get handed out. (they are now a special roll in a dungeon's loot roll) 
- Added a one-time quest to the abandoned mine on the island 

> Fixes: 
- ITEM drop rates were too high (compared to Weapons/Armor). Code was changed a while ago to lower them, but it wasn't changed in all required places. Fixed now. Armor/Weapons should drop more frequently than Items (as intended)
- Fixed instances where a hero would summon an ally, and that ally would not arrive


Patch 0.0.2

> Completed: 
- CLASS: Yellow Mage 
- CLASS: Lord 

> Changes: 
- Added more Contributor Content 
- Added a few unique Warlord skills 
- Changed undead hero graphics to commissioned art 
- Added an option to force wandering NPCs to "Make Way" and get out of your way - to prevent NPC traffic jams.

> Fixes: 
- Fixes a game crashing bug when producing armor/weapons from a Worksite. 
- Various typo fixes 
- Various Class Fixes 
- Fixed a bug where a cutscene wouldn't allow the switching of parties afterwards. 
- Fixed the Tent icon (General Item) 
- When a hero returns from training, the training hall will now properly show nobody "currently training"

Alpha Testing!

If you donated $10 or more during the Kickstarter campaign (or directly through our website), you should have gotten an email. (check your spam/junk mail folder if you don't see it) The email has everything you need to get started with the Alpha build of the game.

Sim Hero is fully playable & beatable in its current form with dozens of classes & dungeons and hundreds of items. This is just the beginning of Alpha, so we will be adding many features & content as we move along towards Beta.

If you plan to help us test, please file bug reports here.

A few things are on the weaker side (like Court battles) and will be improved straight away. We also have Orc artwork almost completed so all those graphics are simply placeholders for now. 

Many thanks to everyone who has supported us this far! Now get out there and send some perfectly good heroes to their deaths!

- The GeekFever Team

The demo can be downloaded from here, like usual. 

*** this version requires a new game. Saved games will likely crash **

Sim Hero Bug Fixes / Additions

This may very well be the last major update to the Demo Version of the game, as we've pretty much crossed off all "core" items from our list. From here on out, it's mostly content build in prep for the Alpha release. (hopefully January or February)

Changes:

- Training Hall. A new building in the castle was added (look in the southeast corner after you defeat the goblin camp). Talk to the trainer there and you can purchase "Training Orders" to give to your heroes to raise their core statistics and also unlock special, permanent abilities! 

- Mage Tower. A new building in the castle was added. Clear the rat infestation in the basement (new dungeon!) to unlock the tower's potential.

- Added a "State Resist" section to the "Status" menu so a hero's ability to resist States being applied to them can be visible.

- The Game Manual was removed. It was clunky and we're looking into better ways to achieve this.


Fixes:

- Fixed the Phisical Accuracy (HIT) stat when multiclassing.

- Reworked some core properties like HIT and Evade (EVA).

- Reworked a pile of backend math and other stuff.

- Added Leather into the Crisis rotation.


Known Bugs/Issues:

- Disabling / enabling mouse doesn't "survive" past game shutdown.

- In both the Pub tent and Inn, you must use the ENTER key to talk to Sam or Delaney. (the mouse won't work over the counter)

- the logic to handle "game over" isn't in yet.

The demo can be downloaded here.

** This is the largest update yet! A new game is certainly required **


Sim Hero Bug Fixes / Additions


Changes:

- Added the last of the Tier 1 Work Sites: The butchery. Harvest hides, turn them into leather and craft leather/bone equipment.

- The core stat "LUK" has been changed to "WIL" (willpower) and now factors into the chance to "hit" with a magical attack type skill, and the target's chance to resist the magic. (before, the calc was 100% - MagicEvade of the target). So, this stat is important for magic-users (imposing their WIL on a target) and for all heroes (avoiding an enemy magic-user imposing their WIL)! Beneficial magical effects still auto-hit friendlies.

- Rebalance of all classes core statistics & growth

- Made the 1st dungeon easier (and the next 1st level dungeon is easier as well). This should A) help new players to complete it faster and B) make early party wipes non-existent (or 99% non-existent).

- On that note, the healer in the beginning of the game will NOT raise dead heroes any longer. This was only a temporary "fix" while dungeon balancing for the beginning of the game was sorted-out. It's sorted out now. Enjoy the afterlife!

- Toned down those first bandits too.

- Added "States" to the "Status" menu option. This will describe each state the hero is under.

- Expanded the "Status" screen to show all Elemental damage bonuses & resistances for the hero! (screenshot above)

- Dead heroes will now become a coffin in the onscreen "congo line". Fun! :)

- Added some Events which call for Polished Wood.

- Added items to the Alliance shops (Dwarves, Wood Elves, Plains Orcs).

- Added the "Scholar" basic class. They work much like Herbalists, but they use "Scrolls" (which they can also make mid-combat if they run out).


Fixes:

- Fixed adventuring with an all-dead party and still getting an item. You can no longer adventure with an all-dead/wiped party.

- Added cooldowns to most non-direct-damaging spells. This was always planned as the AI still isn't at a place where it's smart enough to not spam those skills. The cooldown # of turns can be seen in the skill window. Some skills may also require a "Warmup" time before they can be used... to-be-added.

- Balanced Beast Tamer classes (now that they aren't endlessly summoning their companion, they needed to be nerfed a tad).

- Processing Ore & Wood into refined products fixed.

- Many background math-type fixes, including hit calcs.

- Borric fixed to properly have the Lycan state now.

- Fixed all "passive" bonus type abilities. They weren't applying correctly.

- Some item fixes.


Known Bugs/Issues:

- Disabling / enabling mouse doesn't "survive" past game shutdown.

- In both the Pub tent and Inn, you must use the ENTER key to talk to Sam or Delaney. (the mouse won't work over the counter)

- the logic to handle game over isn't in yet.

The demo can be downloaded from here: https://www.copy.com/s/ImfUykDYYGqs


Sim Hero Bug Fixes / Additions


Changes:

- Added a "party status" column to the adventure summary screen which shows each party member and if they A) died or B) gained/lost a random stat as a result of the adventure (rare, but as heroes adventure, their stats will gradually fluctuate). Screenshot above.

- Updated all Class, State & Skill icons to give a uniform look & feel, and to also make them more appropriate to the class or skill.

- Added a new Work Site type: Lumberyard. This works like the Mine, but it harvests & processes Wood (and added wood-craftable weapons/armor/accessories). Planning to add the worksite end product into the event rotation.

- Rolled back the random attribute growth change, as it caused failures in the multi-classing system. Random stat changes are now handled by random gains/losses while adventuring.

- Made a few graphical display updates here and there.


Fixes:

- Floor numbers fixed on the adventure summary

- Fixed Party 2 & 3 loot summary in adventure summary screen.

- Fixed Steel cradfting: Armor / Accessories.


Known Bugs:

- Disabling / enabling mouse doesn't "survive" past game shutdown.

Demo available here: https://www.copy.com/s/ImfUykDYYGqs

** this build requires a new game - saved games will likely crash **

Sim Hero Bug Fixes / Additions


Changes:

- Added a post-adventure summary screen! This will show the results of the dungeon and also all loot found. We will look at expanding this in the future. (screenshot above)

- Added a "Guard Tower" upgradeable building to the Castle. This building will allow you to re-hire a deceased Court bodyguard and will eventually add more heroes and defensive upgrades.

- Fully implemented the random stat growth scripts. Heroes will now gain random stat growth per level up, in accordance with their class (ie: Warriors will gain more HP -on average- than mages, etc). This will add the level of replayability we were looking to achieve. Now you can truly discover some unique & awesome heroes as you progress thru the game! (or, some duds... maybe send them off to the Military?). 

- begun to add Kickstarter supporter content 

- Added tons of new art (icons, characters, faces) soon to be used!

- Added a "System Menu" where you can change several settings. (including disabling the mouse - working on making that setting "stick"... right now, you'll have to disable each save/load - you must toggle it on/off to re-disable). You may also adjust the menu color (screenshot below)

- Fancied-up the Status menu a bit with xp bars for the primary AND subclass.

- Added a mini-quest to Markus (once he appears in the throne room/tent). Completion of the quest will add another Court character! 


Fixes:

- Many, many "background" code/math/script changes & updates.

- Activating a subclass now reduces XP gain by 25%. (this was always in there, just never worked quite right)


Known Bugs:

- Disabling / enabling mouse doesn't "survive" past game shutdown.