A downloadable game for Windows, macOS, and Linux

Buy Now$5.00 USD or more

The game has a Steam page now! Feel free to visit and wishlist.

Alchemist is a "traditional" roguelike dedicated to crafting, resource management and world interactivity. It's heavily inspired by the immersive sim genre.

It's still an early version and a lot will be added later.

Featuring:

  • Unique alchemy system. Raw materials are refined into abstract essences, which are then used in crafts. For example, "something sinister" might be a chain from an old dungeon or a wing of a bat. "Something verdant" might be a young branch, or herbs, or moss. There is no such thing as useless loot in this game.
  • Highly interactive environment. Start wildfires, rust metal grates, fell trees and push dangerous creatures into chasms. Use your creativity!
  • You are smart, not strong. Overcoming the challenges requires learning, preparation and strategic thinking, not better stats.
  • You progress by learning from books, rather than fighting, with an extract from the book accompanying your progress. Learn new recipes and expand your arsenal as you explore the world!
  • Infinite procedural areas with a lot of hand-crafted set pieces and little stories wait for you to explore.
  • Play the traditional roguelike way, with only one life, or the more relaxed way, with extra lives.
  • A lot of reading, for those who enjoy it. A whole library of lore, item descriptions and dialogue. For those who don't, most of it is optional.
  • Original music composed by Ridderick specially for the project. 3D sound effects.
  • 64x64 tiles, soft lighting, Purkinje shift, water distortion and all other kinds of eye candy.
  • Rains and storms to immerse you into the world.
  • Full support for either keyboard or mouse control.

I really love feedback and listen to all of it, even if I don't always agree. I will be happy to hear your suggestions or criticism.

For development updates, you can subscribe to my youtube channel.

Differences between the free and paid versions:

The free version allows you to play either without extra lives, or with 3 extra lives. The paid (sanctified) version allows you to have infinite lives, and my sincere gratitude.

Aside from that, the "demo" version contains all the same content as the paid one.

Save files, settings, etc are all shared between the two versions. If you ever decide to move from one to the other, nothing will be lost.

Troubleshooting:

If the game looks blurry on Windows, follow this instruction.

If the game crashes or freezes unexpectedly, or the graphics look weird, try changing the settings in the "Troubleshoot" tab in Options->System menu.

If the game freezes when you try to interact with horses (or takes extremely long time to load the map), go to Options->System->Troubleshoot and switch "Complex map colouring" off.

If the loot overlay stays enabled when it shouldn't, press "Alt" once. This is caused by alt-tabbing while the game is loading.

(for non-Windows version only) If you experience semi-random crashes while running the game under LÖVE 11.4, try loading LÖVE 11.3 instead.

Purchase

Buy Now$5.00 USD or more

In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $5 USD. You will get access to the following files:

Alchemist 0.2.4 — Sanctified 199 MB
Alchemist 0.2.4 — Sanctified (.love package) 196 MB

Download demo

Download
Alchemist 0.2.4 — Free 199 MB
Download
Alchemist 0.2.4 — Free (.love package) 196 MB

Development log

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How is the development going? The release date on steam is close, will it be postponed again?

I think so. I got back on track, though, so it will hopefully be the last time.

(1 edit) (+1)

Recently came back to this game, and it’s still as amazing as I remembered!

There were a few things that I wanted to note / ask from my playthroughs:

  • I feel like clairvoyance potions should counteract the vision-reducing effects of fog.
  • Why can’t I get “Something toxic” from fiend’s powderbox mushrooms? Given their effects in-game, I would think they would be a potent source of it.
  • Some way to “unequip” potions from the throw action would be nice. I’ve lost a game due to an errant mouse wheel and 2 fireball potions, so it would be nice to have some way to prevent that. If a way does exist right now, I think it should be indicated better.
  • After a while, the list of locations you can visit becomes rather crowded. I think it would be useful if there were some way to remove locations from the list once you no longer intend to visit them.

I also have a couple of suggestions for the game, though obviously you shouldn’t feel compelled to add them. I’m mostly just throwing around ideas I had while playing:

  • I feel like all the mid-game research is all bunched up on the third row of the tech tree, and it would be better (both for readability and progression) if the third row were split into 2 rows, resulting in 2 rows for early-game research, 2 for mid-game, and 2 for late-game.
  • I think it would be interesting if there was some way to “transmute” one alchemical ingredient into another. Perhaps tempering “Something to burn” into “Something volatile”, or vice-versa. Or maybe condensing “Something metallic” into “Something that glitters”.

All in all, keep up the great work, and I look forward to the upcoming Steam release! Don’t feel pressured to rush on the update, your health & personal life is more important than getting an update out sooner.

(+1)

Hello, thank you for your input!
>I feel like clairvoyance potions should counteract the vision-reducing effects of fog.

That is a cool idea. It fits the flavour. I will probably make it that way.

>Why can’t I get “Something toxic” from fiend’s powderbox mushrooms? Given their effects in-game, I would think they would be a potent source of it.

They used to give that, but I changed it to something sinister at one point for more usefulness, as something toxic is abundant anyway. Now that I think of it, though, I can just make both options available.

>Some way to “unequip” potions from the throw action would be nice.

I never considered that it would be useful, but implementing it won't take long, so I will.

>I think it would be useful if there were some way to remove locations from the list once you no longer intend to visit them.

I will need to think of such a feature.

>I feel like all the mid-game research is all bunched up on the third row of the tech tree, and it would be better (both for readability and progression) if the third row were split into 2 rows, resulting in 2 rows for early-game research, 2 for mid-game, and 2 for late-game.

What is currently a late game won't be for very long, and specifics of the research tree, too, will be subject to change.

>I think it would be interesting if there was some way to “transmute” one alchemical ingredient into another

Something like alchemical gold is a possibility, but I don't have any specific thoughts yet.

(+1)

Oh no, steam release is postponed again...

Yes, sorry about that. There are reasons I can't fully concentrate on development lately.

I stil have 0.1

(+1)

I have a few small suggestions that I hope can give this game more appeal to people trying it out and give it the recognition it deserves:

The introduction is a bit redundant when you are asked to give your soul to the devil. Many people would normally not agree to this and the game forces them back to the title screen and redo all the tutorial crafting and prison escape again. Its not a ton of time lost but can be pretty frustrating especially for a new player who is deciding if they want to play any further.

I suggest having the narrator come in after the second time you refuse and say something like "After realizing that there is no exit, the alchemist reluctantly agrees." and move the story forward instead of ending the game and wasting the player's time.

Another idea would be to put in an option in the title menu to skip the intro section altogether and start directly after the prison escape. Choices for extra lives could be selected in this menu. This would be perfect for players who want to just go directly into the real game.

(1 edit)

There is an option to skip the tutorial that appears after you meet with Ricardo.

As for replaying the introduction, there is a purpose, but I might make individual parts skippable.

Really like the game so far


Feels like the upgrade for the boots/gloves should be cheaper, the upgrade seems to be the kinda thing you'd smack out in like...the first three areas. But consistently I have 5-7 areas available to explore and only 1-3 max common-knowledge (I forget its actual name), so I'm running around getting hurt by nettles/snakes when that feels like something I should be able to solve in the first five minutes. Knocking the cost to 3 shouldn't be a huge deal should it?

(-1)

Everyone is going to have different experience in terms of which and how much knowledge they find at any given point. You seem to be getting unlucky.

The cost of the research is proportional to its benefits. It would not make sense to have it lower.

(+3)

Hello, dear creator of this game and everyone else here.

There is a unofficial subreddit for this game called r/Alchemist_rougelike.

There currently are no rules and if you have any suggestions just message me on reddit.In the moment I am writing this comment I am the only moderator.

If the creator of this game wants the subreddit to be removed just message me.

(+1)

My only issue with it is that the correct spelling is "roguelike", not "rougelike". Would be great if you fixed that. I'm fine with the idea otherwise and won't mind posting some updates there.

(+1)

Thanks for correcting me, English is my third language with the other 2 being Romanian and Russian.

(1 edit) (+1)

Hello!

I just wanted to leave my feedback after playing for a couple of hours, but first, a preamble.


In videogames I have two favourite things - necromancy and alchemy. I'm also of the opinion that both of these elements of fantasy are horrifically underutilized. Both, of course, because the elements that I like most about them would often necessitate the creation of a game built entirely around them and not merely have them be classes in something larger... Which brings us to Alchemist, a game built entirely around alchemy.


I think you've knocked it out of the park, all in all. I love the elegance of the system you've presented here. Just enough moving parts to make you feel like your little alchemist is brewing and distilling without drowning players in the nitty-gritty details (Said by one who adores such details in, say, Cataclysm DDA). Additionally I adore the idea that this is a game in which you are intelligent, not strong, and appreciate your stance on preparation and observation being the keys to making it in this game. The lack of armour +1 and flametongue swords that enable me to just run in and eviscerate every last viper in the forest is a lovely and grounding choice. It makes me pay more attention to the world and brilliantly sells the fact that you are just an alchemist. I adore it, and think that what you do have here is brilliant and, again, elegant. The focus on the fact that you are an alchemist and not the generic roguelike hero is refreshing and exciting alike. I read earlier that you want to keep permanent upgrades relegated to tools, which I would also like to gush about, but this is long enough already.


The music in the main menu was excellent for setting the mood, and I do quite enjoy the writer and listener's back and forth while discussing the story. It's personable and well written all in all, though I did want to go through at some point and collect any typos I've found if that would be something you'd consider valuable. 


The weather having an effect on the world, the lighting, the graphics easily and readily conveying all of the important information, the intriguing story... I've nothing but praise and excitement for this game and really very much just wanted to offer my encouragement. I'm most assuredly and certainly an ardent and enthusiastic fan, and look forward to buying it the second I see it pop up on Steam. (Stalked your reddit posts a bit, noticed it was a priority for you.)

Thank you very much, means a lot.

(+1)

Question: Is there any time pressure, aside from the travelling merchant and cyclical things like fireflies and shop restocks? Any other quests or events that can just expire if I take too long hanging out in early zones?

(+3)

Currently, there isn't.

(+2)

Thanks for the answer! I think the travelling merchant is a good kind of way to handle time pressure, you want to move fast enough to get the bonus, but it's not run-ending if you don't. 

(+3)

Just wanted to say I saw this game and picked it up, and I'm really enjoying it so far! I'm hoping as I get past the earlygame and into mid/lategame that I can learn cool new ways to use alchemy to improve the player character. If that's not a thing, consider that a suggestion! Also, it would be nice if one could leave notes for locations and mark them as cleared so they don't clutter up the list. 

Deleted 1 year ago
(1 edit)

If you press "F" in the examination mode (or click the icon with the magnifying glass and the door), the game will point the camera at one of the exits from the area. If you press it again, it will move to the next exit.

You can also move the camera by holding Ctrl or mouse wheel and either moving the mouse, or pressing the movement keys.

(1 edit)

I've played a new save to have a look at the lumberjack quest and the church shop, which I have missed before.

The lumberjack quest unlocks a new buff potion, and it seems that this potion can also be sold for money. 5 gold each.

I think this potion itself has some limited use, as an early game replacement of rift potion (for escaping) and time freeze potion (for other actions).

This potion accelerates player action, which is useful for dangerous situations. However it costs HP, so it can also cause problems. I think in early game this can be used to solve some farm dungeons that are otherwise difficult. It won't have much use in late game.

Selling this for money is only viable in mid-game, when you have a steady supply of blood from the scarlet flask, and you still go to tier 1 forest for mandrake. 

In early game I don't have much spare sanguine essence for this. In late game I don't often go to tier 1 zones, and tier 2 zones don't provide enough something fey for crafting this. There is also no need for so much money in late game either.

About the church shop, it sells ingredients for something holy, but I don't need much of it either. It is indeed an early-mid game shop, just like the dev log said.

Hey, a quick question. I think it would be relatively easy to add visually impaired/blind support to this game. Is this something you'd be interested in?

You're already doing quite complex sound work, even including spatialization, so most of what would need to be added would simply be more of this. The rest is text and menu accessibility, which would need to be spoken using TTS. You're using Love2D, so you could use the Love2Talk package by Pitermach on GitHub to easily add TTS to the game.

I don't want to overwhelm you with too much info right off the bat, I've just been following your progress on this game on YouTube for a long time now, and I'd really love to be able to play this game myself, and I believe adding blind accessibility shouldn't be a huge task! There is quite a big community of blind gamers out there that would potentially want to play it as well. But if this is something you'd be interested in, please feel free to reach out, I'd really love to help! 

(1 edit) (+1)

I am not actively opposed to this idea, but currently my priorities are elsewhere (I want to complete the core game first). I might return to it after the game is fully complete.

(+2)

I've played this game again in v2.1. It's so addicting, I've been playing it for 3 days. I've reached 2 years, solved all the areas, and unlocked all the potions except the lumberjack one. It seems I have missed the lumberjack quest, and now I can only buy wood from him.

It seems I have also missed the shop of the lonely church.

As of now I have 3k something dead and 6k fuel, and ~900 money. I wonder whether there will be a late game Richardo shop upgrade, as I have nowhere to spend this money now.


I have encountered a bug. It caused a crash. Reloading the game and repeating the steps caused the game to crash again.

I was exploring the fort area, in depth 2. I was trying to kill the wyrm. My tactic is, first use rot potion, then retreat and wait until it has only 1 hp, then go back and use a fireball.

The wyrm is usually in a special room with only 1 exit. This crash happens when the only exit is blocked by pits. I threw a rot potion from the other side of the pit, and retreated. About 4 turns later the game froze, and I have to kill the process by the taskmanager.

This tactic would work perfectly without the pit. Eventually I killed the wyrm with a different tactic, and moved on. I guess there is some problem with the wyrm's pathfinding logic.


I have some thoughts about the new items and changes:

1. The skeleton key is super powerful. It trivializes the traps in the dungeon, as they can now be lockpicked for no cost.

2. The bestiary is also very powerful. It allows the player to make effective tactics without trial and error of death.

3. The weather system caused something luminiscent to be less abundant, but there's still enough for me. This is mainly because the rains cause the fireflies to hide.

The weather visual effect is a bit too heavy, and it causes some difficulty for me to see the path. But I don't want to turn it off completely, maybe there should be an option to reduce weather visual effect.

4. I can't find a use for the black fire. It deals only 15~20 dmg, and is not enough for the stronger enemies. It is also too expensive for killing weak enemies. I tried it in a forest and it didn't spread well. It also has severe issue of potential backfire.

I think this potion is designed against swarm enemies but there is no such enemies in the game for now.

5. The scarlet flask makes something sanguine quite abundant. It's now a little too abundant, as this component is only used in healing and curing potions.

6. The leatherskin potion seems powerful, but isn't actually that powerful, since not many enemies deal physical damage.

7. The eelskin potion seems to be designed against crimson ivy. It could probably be helpful in later combats like crystal mansion, and it's quite cheap. I didn't use it though, because I could already kill the enemies quickly enough, and I prefer to avoid the damage completely.

8. The salamander boots make burning down forests easier. Instead of finding somewhere safe from fire, I'm now immune to flames.

9. The sparkling gloves are quite powerful, it can kill enemies easily in wet environments, and it's quite powerful in crystal mansion, saving a lot of shockwave potions. I think both of this is by design.

10. The efficient burner seems helpful, it saves a lot of fuel in distilling, and saves a little fuel in brewing. 

Strangely, it halves the fuel cost of ember potion, but some of the fuel is supposed to be a part of the potion, instead of used in brewing. Maybe the effcient burner makes fuel in the potion also burn more efficiently?


Some previous problems:

1. The snake problem is solved. The snakes are a lot less aggressive now. The bestiary also explains why they are sometimes aggressive.

2. Umbral essence seems to be not that scarce now. I think the coffee thing is added in this version, and it provides some umbral essence. This allows me to use some frost potions, though it's still not very useful. I think frost potion can solve crimson ivy, but we have eelskin now.

3. The loot overlay now has its own UI component, together with a new creature overlay. Nice job done.


This update has also caused a new problem: Frequent switching of equipments.

In the previous version, I only have 2 equipments, and I use the sinister gloves most of time. There isn't much switching between them. In this version, I have 3 equipments, and I often need to switch between the sinister glove and the sparkling glove.

I think some equipment effects should be merged. As I can switch to the basic gloves at anytime with no time cost, its effect should be merged into all of the more advanced gloves. The same with boots, though verdant boots might have some adverse effects, so making it permanent is not good.

I think this could be solved be adding a new mechanism: Equipment enchantment. When you unlock more advanced equipments, some lower tier equipments can be turned into enchantment. Enchantment can be equipped with other equipments at the same time, but doesn't stack with its original equipment.

Thank you for such a detailed feedback. And for catching that bug especially.

(1 edit)

Suggestion: When starting a new game, there should be an option to start with the items in the cellar, the inn, and the border of town automatically collected (perhaps at the expense of a bit of time if that really matters, though I doubt it does.)

Collecting them by hand is fun the first time but gets repetitive, and since there's no danger or complexity to it there doesn't seem to be any value in having the player go through it again with every new game.

Perhaps also a "go to travel map" shortcut from the basement or just outside it.  It could take a bit of time, but walking the entire path to the stables manually is time-consuming and boring.

It's complicated. I see the issue, but I don't like the suggestion. I will have to think.

Finally the game is out! 

Now we have a free and paid version. Unfortunately, I don't have access to itch's payment tools, so I can't get the paid version now. I have the money,  it's just the payment tools.

So I decide to play the free version for a while, and buy this game later, and then transfer my save file to the paid version. Is the save file compatible between the two versions?

Yes, of course. The save files, settings, etc are all shared between versions.

very great game, I enjoy playing it.

Also, how can you get your save file and will it be compatible for newer versions?(I have Alchemist 0.1.2)

(1 edit)

If you're playing on Windows, the save file should be in Users/.../AppData/Roaming/Alchemist/saves

There will be two files of the same name, called something like 12323.save and 12323.metadata. You'll need both.

Unfortunately, it will not be compatible with the next version due to major changes. For smaller patches, saves are generally compatible.

Idk if im impatient or my laptop just too old for this game, but i can't seem to progress with the horse.... it just freeze when i interact with them..

It's a known issue that happens on some hardware. Go to Options -> System -> Troubleshoot and switch "complex map colouring" off.

thank you!! Works well now

Is it possible to set a multi-key combination for a single keybind (Shift+Up Arrow)? If not, could this be added?

I can't get the hang of vi keys and would like to setup an alternative for movement.

It's not currently possible. I will consider adding such an option, but don't expect it too soon, as it's going to take some thought to implement.

There's also another option for diagonal movement aside from rebinding keys: you can point at the target in examination mode and then press the "confirm target" key (default Z, enter, space). Try it, maybe you'll like it more.

Great game; patiently waiting for 0.1.3.

I have an ... idea.

A permanent stat increase optionts.

WAIT!!! Wait! wait, put down the pitchfork, let me explain.

There would be 2 type (tier) of potion: lesser and greater.
For example:
Lesser strength potion would increase youre meele attack damage by 1 and the greater by 5, the greater would cost 4 time more to create then the lesser.
Speed: 10 and 50%.
HP: 1 and 5 ETC

How can you obtain the recipe:
All the "bosses" (the goat, the poison wyvern, the shadow spawnin skeleton) have a 1% chanse to drop 1 lesser and 0,1%  chanse to drop the greater recipe. These recipes would be unique so you would't get a duplicant of them.
The real kicker come from the cost of the  recipe.
I'm talking like 1000 metalic 500 holy 500 fey and similar cost for the lesser.

Easy to obtain: no
Easy to farm: definitely no
Would give a further goal: for some definitely; others ehh not so much.
Would be some crasy people out ther how would grind it like crasy:
absolutely (including me).

This is just an idea, but maybe you can considered it puting in somting similar, I know it supposed to be a difficult game, but it would be a great reward for thos who put a lot of time and effort in the game and
.
.
.
I JUST GOT AN EVEN BETTER IDEA:

Who about if you put this in the 1 life mode because you have "the knowledge of all mortal languages" so you can read this ancient books about the recipe.

(+1)

It's not a terrible idea, and I might consider something like that in the future. But I mostly want to keep permanent upgrades in the "tools" category.

(+1)

A high fixed cost for permanent stat increase might be difficult to balance. I have a better idea: not make the potion cost high, but as you drink more of the same potion, the effect of each additional potion will get lower. 

I think a square root or cube root diminishing return is good enough. That means the total effect scales with the square (cube) root of the amount of potions drunk. For certain special stats that have a large influence, you can use logarithm.

For players that want to grind, they can get relatively high stats, but not too high that would break the game. (A mage with 100 melee attack is certainly broken.) And for players that don't want to grind, they can still benefit from the potion.

(+3)

Fantastic game! It's been a while since I've checked in on your progress, and I'm excited for all the new stuff! I've decided to name all my characters after St. Patrick, because I *will* kill all the snakes :P

My only real gripe (other than snakes, which you are addressing) is that you seem to have a rounding error in your code? Sometimes I'll wind up with 1.001 of something. Or it'll say that I have 1.0 of something, but then I cannot make a recipe that requires 1 of that thing; my guess is that I actually somehow have 0.999 of that thing, but it displays as 1.

A few suggestions and nitpicks for down the road, if I may...

  • When skipping the intro, it'd be nice to have all of the stuff in the Heavy Purse done (stuff picked up, bartender talked to, first location acquired). That part is a bit tedious.
  • It seems as tho remapping the shift key doesn't work as intended. The other key doesn't make actions happen twice, and shift still does.
  • Tooltips in the journal would be nice, such as being able to see what other stuff can be made from a raw material when you see it in the Components tab.
  • Being able to pin a recipe, including which materials you plan to convert into ingredients, would be super helpful.
  • I know it's not the intended way to play, but an accessibility option to enable reloading would be helpful for various folks who struggle with the traditional rogue permadeath, like if you misclick and blow yourself up O.o

This is a very fun game, and I'm eagerly awaiting future progress :)

(+2)

>is that you seem to have a rounding error in your code

There is some weird display issue that causes things like 1.01 to display when there shouldn't be. As far as I know, actual calculations are not affected, but I should probably get to fixing that either way.

>It seems as tho remapping the shift key doesn't work as intended.

Thank you, there was a bug with this command. I'll fix it by next release.

>Being able to pin a recipe

Planned for a while, but will probably not do it right now.

>an accessibility option to enable reloading

There will be an option for extra lives.

(+1)

> There is some weird display issue that causes things like 1.01 to display when there shouldn't be. As far as I know, actual calculations are not affected, but I should probably get to fixing that either way.

I've definitely run into the problem several times where I was unable to make something despite having enough ingredients. Would it be helpful to screenshot such things, or send in a save file?

(+2)

Yes, it would. Please do.

(+2)

Here's a screenshot showing one instance:

Here's the save files:

https://anonfiles.com/H8a9Xf7ay8/alchemist-saves_7z

I'll keep an eye out for more instances.

(1 edit) (+2)

Interesting. I looked into it, seems like there is an issue with floats comparison. Thank you for the save file, it helped.

I've added rounding of the items' quantity and tested again with the save that you gave me, and it seemed to have fixed the issue, so expect it to be gone in the next release.

(+1)

I love this game so much, and now that I’ve finally completed all the research, I feel that I can give my thoughts on it.

Firstly, the praise:

  • The alchemy system is really well done. I like how it actually feels like I’m putting together a complex concoction out of different components, rather than just clicking around a gui. It also avoids being so complex that it’s hard to use. Brilliantly done.
  • The overworld art style, despite being taken from google IIRC, is very cohesive and sells the atmosphere of the game really well. Nothing feels out of place.
  • There are certain situations, specifically in the destroyed mage’s house mission, where the game really throws a excellently timed emotional punch. The little note at once you’ve travelled there; about how nobody is visiting anymore, or how the forest would be beautiful if not for the nearby tragedy; hit harder when you remember that these people aren’t really all that different from the protagonist, and he’s probably feeling some level of kinship with them at that moment.
  • The game is very fair. Even the snakes, as complained about as they are, aren’t that bad, and normally just require some careful navigation to get around. I do have my criticisms of them, but 99% of the time, when you die it feels like it’s your fault. The game as a whole falls squarely into the hard but fair category.

Secondly, things that I noted while playing, but don’t feel are strictly good or bad things:

  • The homeward crystal is, objectively, the best item in the game. I’m guessing that the delay was to stop you from using it to run from a fight, but that only works if you’re being swarmed. It’s easy to run around for 20 turns and avoid, for instance, the lich, and then come back and explore around elsewhere in the level. I’m not sure whether this is intentional, or even a bad thing, as too long a delay would be even worse. However, I feel that it bears noting.
  • There are a large amount of resources which only have a sorting or grinding recipe, and no others. I’m not sure if you’re planning on giving them more recipes, or just leaving them as something to immediately be converted into essences.
  • Why can you push stuff around? This isn’t a problem with the game, it’s just something I’ve never used, and I kind of want to know why it was added.

Thirdly, criticism and feature requests:

  • Let’s get this one out of the way first: Snakes. I know that in your latest devlog you mention that you are going to make them less likely to move towards the player, which I think is a great change. My problem with them, however, is that semi frequently they will “chase” me, repeatedly moving towards my character. I’m not sure how this specifically could be fixed, but it’s somewhat annoying.
  • This one’s more of a quality of life tweak, but could you change it so that you treat bats like passive animals while the character is holding a light source? Please? It gets somewhat annoying to go into my settings and turn on “ignore hostiles” whenever I want to move halfway across a dungeon without clicking a million times.
  • I would like to see more uses for ecclesiastical knowledge, but you shouldn’t feel pressured to add it. This isn’t a big deal at all.

That’s about it. Sorry for writing an essay, but I have a lot of thoughts on this game.

Thank you for writing this. Actually, the fact that someone got so impressed by the game as to write such a post is the highest praise I could hope to have.

>The alchemy system

To be clear, it's directly inspired by Prey's recyclers. So if you like my take on the crafting system, you'll probably like theirs.

>The homeward crystal is

It is, of course, intentionally pretty powerful. It's, after all, one of the later researches, and pretty costly to make. But there are plenty of items that allow you to escape danger, sometimes out of way worse situations, like the rift potion or the frozen time potion. Most of the time, if you can survive 20 turns, you can probably reach the exit anyway.

>I’m not sure if you’re planning on giving them more recipes, or just leaving them as something to immediately be converted into essences.

Some might receive additional properties, but in general there will always be simple items with only one use. I am considering adding some kind of autoconvert feature for those later.

>Why can you push stuff around?

Mostly niche tactical uses. Like moving a barrel of gunpowder to cause an explosion where it would be most useful, arranging debris to make a large fire, building an improvised barricade.

There's also something I forgot to mention anywhere in the game (I should), and it's that you can move stunned or crystallized creatures. You can move them out of your way, into hazards, or even push them into chasms, which is an instant kill. Try it, it's fun.

>My problem with them, however, is that semi frequently they will “chase” me, repeatedly moving towards my character.

The aforementioned update is probably going to help here. As they will be less likely to move towards you in general, they will be even less likely to do so repeatedly.

>change it so that you treat bats like passive animals while the character is holding a light source?

Good idea, I'll arrange that.

>I would like to see more uses for ecclesiastical knowledge

Not promising anything right away, but I am planning to expand the research tree in general, so there probably will be.

So one of my problems with the game is the vipers, sometimes there's too much of them and they surround me and I now carry at least more than 10 of those alcohol hand potions and antidotes since I got killed bunch of times because of that. I also think that maybe you should make the start more engaging since I thought of quitting two times before I got hooked to the game. I also made another run that lasted a year and four months before I stupidly punched a tomb from a witch forest, after that I just didn't wanna play again since I played it for 2 days and unlocked almost all the potions. I think you should add a normal mode where you'll just get back to your laboratory after you die since it's so depressing when you lose the save file that you worked hard for. 

I will be adding that. There will be an option for additional lives.

Some notes I took while I was playing the tutorial for the first time:

First of all, I appreciate the option to play on Mac.  

Great Menu upon loading the game, immediately made me feel like this game could be epic. 

A bit too much talking from the Alchemist at the start of the game in my opinion. Consider making the very start of the game a bit more actiony? Perhaps the devil saves you from an intro fight before you make your pact? You gotta remember new players don’t know what they’re getting into, they don’t know it’s the awesome game you know it to be as the developer. You need to hook them early. Starting the game to find I’ve made a pact with the devil was interesting, but then got a bit text-heavy and boring after that.

I liked the torch to illuminate hidden passages thing. I hope this isn’t a one time tutorial thing and is actually introducing me to a mechanic that is used throughout the game.

Once I met Ricardo I got a better understanding of the story. Tutorial got better after that when got to my Alchemy room.

Got killed by a bunch of Vipers in the first fight. It wasn’t clear to me how to cure the poison?

>Perhaps the devil saves you from an intro fight before you make your pact?

Indeed, there will be a new intro in the next release.

>I hope this isn’t a one time tutorial thing and is actually introducing me to a mechanic that is used throughout the game.

You are correct.

>It wasn’t clear to me how to cure the poison?

Antidote is an unlockable recipe. But in general, the best tactic is not to get poisoned, or at least not let it stack too high.

Vipers aren't actively aggressive, but I know a lot of people have issues with them.

So Idk how to "kindle" the flame under the cauldron, how do I do that? I tried wielding a torch and interacting with it but it still doesn't work, am I missing something here?

That's just flavour text. So long as you have all the necessary components and the recipe, you just click whatever you want to craft, choose the amount and hold the button to confirm.

Oh, ok, I also have another question, I'm stuck on the "Ricardo's Friends" because there's no clue or instructions on how I actually do it. Can you add like a clue or instruction on where to start? It's really confusing and I would l love some help. Thank you and great game as well.

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You'll just unlock the recipes for the potions naturally as you keep exploring the areas.

You should probably have some of them unlocked already.

Lots of good ideas here, and lovely presentation, but the terrible mouse handling made it so painful to play I don't think I can bear to do it again. Making this mouse-compatible would make it open to a much wider audience.


(basics like: dont make the player tap z, click 4 times because your mouse handler is guessing the wrong thing to do, then click z a million more times, for stuff that is directly achievable by the user clicking on things. You even have the popup context-sensitive menus already, so there shouldn't be any need for the 'forced keyboard' stuff)

Thank you, I'll see what I can do to make it more convenient.

Hello, so i have this problem whenever I try to mount the horses at the stable, meaning i haven't even left the first area. What happens is the screen freezes black with the game still running I can hear music and footsteps when I touch movement buttons.

am I the only one with this problem? any idea how to solve it?

No, you're not the only one. It seems to happen on certain old graphic cards. Go to the "troubleshoot" section in Options - System and switch the "Complex map colouring" option.

I can clearly see the resources used in the TOME. How is the project related to this?

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It's not related. ToME does not own game-icons.net, which it what you're probably talking about.

Okay, thank you, projects are linked by resource source. 

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I've encountered a problem that some of the people here have experienced before. When I go to the stables at the beginning of the game and interact with a horse, the game freezes completely, leaving only the audio of the game in the background. I have a low-end PC. If anyone has any solutions please comment below.

It's a known issue that some people had before. Go to the "troubleshoot" section in Options - System and switch the "Complex map colouring" option.

It worked! Thank you very much.

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Very addictive game. But also very frustrating. The amount of times I’ve died due to there being way too many freaking snakes is ridiculous

I can't say how much I can relate to that.

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I had another run, and I have unlocked most of the recipes before accidentally dying.

The run lasted 1 year and 2 months ingame, and I have solved all of the areas except the tier 2 woods. I have also gathered a lot of materials, and here are some things I noticed:

Something dead is surely overabundant, I have about 3000 of them when I died.

Something epiphemeral is scarce until late game, and then you get many bats to kill. I think this is by design.

Something umbral is rather scarce, and this severely limits the use of frost potions. Potion of rust is almost taking all of my umbral essence, and thus frost potion becomes almost useless.

I haven't figured out how to use potion of chaos. I just can't think of a situation that I need the effect of a random potion, and this potion is not cheap enough for me to try in large amounts to get the desired potion effect. Perhaps it's used to use the effects of locked recipes?

I've unlocked homeward crystal, rift potion and potion of frozen time. In theory, these 3 items could save from any danger, but I wasn't careful with my HP and got killed by a trap.

Collecting items indeed becomes tedious late game. I think it does need some work, either auto collection of some sort, or resource compression, and ideally both.

I have some new thoughts about auto collection: autocollect with queued action. With a given amount of movement steps, the game marks all items reachable in X steps and in sight. Then the character moves to each item and collect them.

I'm going to wait for the next update, and play again when I get to disable permadeath.

Thank you for your very detailed feedback. I'll take it into account.

>I haven't figured out how to use potion of chaos.

No one had. It's just for fun. But accessing the locked recipes is one way it can be useful.

I've noticed another problem: with the toggle resource display option, it's difficult to tell whether you had it toggled on or off, when there is no resource in sight. This could cause confusion when the player enters a new area, when there is resource but he turned it off.

I think there should be a small icon that shows whether the resource display is turned on. This icon should have a tooltip to let the player know what it does.

I have some more thoughts about this game.

1.Large amounts of low value items repetitive to collect

More condensed items are a good solution, but I also like the auto collection. Perhaps we can have some sort of telekinesis potion, that auto collects most simple items within 2 tiles and within sight, and lasts for a duration. It might not work on the core loot of the zones, as this could break balance.

With permadeath players are expected to experience the "refine forest for charcoal" stage quite many times, and this stage needs lots of collection. So this potion should become avaliable shortly after this stage,  maybe this recipe could be included in forest zone loot list.

2.Gardening?

This is mainly about exploring locations, so gardening may not quite fit the theme. However, some items are mainly bought, and can't be reliably found in exploration. These items include food and beverage. Probably these items can be gardened. And gardening is also a good place to go for my 300+ something dead, which is overabundant from refining forests.

3.snakes

For gameplay, I'm okay with the snakes as they currently are. In forests they are very easy to deal with, also easy in farms, but much more difficult in swamps, because fire no longer works. Perhaps I need to freeze them instead. I have completed a few forests, so I'll talk about snakes in forests.

The special loot of forest area is near the path (bag in zone 2, mangrove in zone 3), and the only natural threat is snakes. In the lore, snakes recognize the path as human territory and try to avoid it. In the game however, I have to go off the path very often to avoid snakes. The path is still important because it leads to the  loot, and the open space helps me avoid the snakes. I'm ok with the snake challenge but not the conflict between lore and gameplay.

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This game is really nice, and burning down whole forests is fun, but the permadeath is frustruating. 

Some other roguelike games I've played have options to disable permadeath, like noita(via mods), and wayward(via an option on creating a save). I think a causal mode option when creating a save would be nice, so I don't have to start from scratch if I got killed when exploring something new.

I've only reached the point of being able to mass craft amber potions from burning down forests, then I died in a dungeon.  It seems that homeward potions (in the tech tree) could save me from such danger but I'm way too far from unlocking that.

Edit: I've also noticed another problem: As you play a save for longer, you will have more and more unlocked locations, but it seems there is no way to delete them after completing a location. This will cause the save file to inflate as the player progress. So we should be able to delete a location after completing it (or if it becomes no longer possible to complete).

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I am indeed planning to add such an option in the next release.

Save file size only becomes noticeably large after extremely long games (and I mean, longer than you'd need to unlock everything). Even at that point, the only noticeable difference would be time it takes for the game to save or load. File size is a pretty far-fetched concern here.

The casual mode will be really nice, it'll surely improve my gameplay experience a lot. I just wonder how long will I need to wait for it.

For deleting completed locations, I originally thought that this would help reduce UI clutter with lots of locations. Now looking at it, it's somewhat unnecessary, as new locations are abundant, and therefore usually I will only ever visit a location once. I originally thought that I would need to come back to a previous location when I get better equipments, to search it more completely, and it turns out this isn't the case.

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I can't give you the exact date, since I don't work full-time on the project and it's currently a very turbulent time for me. A few months, I think.

As for deleting areas from the map, I see how it could be useful in some cases, I'll consider that.

A few months? I certainly can't wait for the new version, so I guess I'll play the current version more and also die a few more times LOL

Another important thing is savefile compatibility. If you add the multiple life system, pls make it avaliable for old saves.

This game really has quite some potential to become a successful rougelike game, perhaps as successful as Noita.

This game isn't really a rougelike yet, it is lacking a core mechanism: limited resources. I could think of 2 limitations: Either limit days, or limit the amount of locations, or perhaps limit both.

Location limit: After exploring this number of locations, no more locations will be provided by the bartender, until you complete his quest, which provides another limited supply of locations.

Time limit: Starting from some point (like day 20), the bartender asks you to pay him rent every some time (in the form of "something that glitters", can have debt but must pay off the rent to get more locations) , and this amount increases gradually to make time a limited resource. This way rent acts like the hunger mechanism of other rougelikes, making time a limited resource. Completing quests for him will reduce this amount by some, giving you more time to get resources.

Perhaps past some point, this amount no longer grows, or is even completely removed, as the bartender wants you to focus on creating powerful potions for him. This could be simply implemented by adding a constant supply of quests, as long as you complete enough quests, you no longer have to pay rent, and the quests are relatively easy for late game.

If this game is to be converted to a rougelike this way, then it's important to add QoL improvements, like collection convenience.

And of course also a casual mode without rent and permadeath, perhaps customizable when creating a save.

In Noita, the main limiting resource is HP. Methods of regaining lost hp is extremely limited, until you get extremely powerful spells to break out of the main dungeon, and then the player can grind as much resource as he want, allowing a save to be persistent, until the player makes a mistake and dies.

Noita doesn't have ingame option to remove permadeath, instead it's provided by mods. Mods are a good thing to have, many successful games have either a dedicated modding platform, or steam workshop for mods. The only problem is the coding difficulty, but it's rewarding enough to pay off its cost.

amazing game but....


snakes they are everywhere!

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Snake problem is something I'm working on. Latest devlog mentions some changes I'll be making to them.

its nice to see a game dev do someting with the comments/comunity.

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This seems really interesting! I’m looking forward to digging into it a little deeper.

Are there any plans to allow you to customize your character’s gender – or better yet, specify preferred pronouns/nouns (woman/man/person, etc.)?

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I'm afraid not. Even though you can choose the name, you really are playing as an established character in a story. That part will probably become more obvious with the next update, as I will include more story there.

Moreover, there is a problem of effort, as the game already contains a ton of dialogue, and planned to have even more. Writing that to account for many posibilities is going to complicate things a lot, or unnecessarily neuter the writing.

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That makes sense! It was just a little jarring to name my character after myself and then get called “he” straight away, so I wanted to check. I’m looking forward to seeing more of the story you have planned!

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I understand your problem.
I'll think of a better way to convey the question. Probably rephrase it as "What's his name?" or something similar.

Is there anything (or multiple things) planned that use large amounts of one or two specific resources? I do have to do something with 100+ of something dead. Something luminescent + something dead = blinding powder, maybe?

There might be a use that I just haven't encountered, though, since I didn't get hugely far before dying to a mushroom while attempting to hunt witches. I should've gone back home to make more rust dust to carry on through an abandoned fortress.

It might also be interesting to see potions applied in different ways, like as traps.

For now, the main use for something dead is in antidote recipe, but it is, in fact, overabundant. The economy will definitely be changing as I add new recipes.

So far things I'd be interested in seeing:

- Potions, as traps or with creative uses (Possessed weapons vs rust dust? Poison potions as herbicide? A potion as a repellant that makes snakes wander away from you?)

- *Some* gardening aspect. I do need some permanent source of pine sap without having to burn down new herb groves. Perhaps Ricardo allows you to get some potted herbs for your cellar, which regrow periodically?

- An unlockable material stash in your workshop. Once unlocked, you get the ability to leave, say, 10% of any (or all of) your materials there. If you die after leaving that 10%, it appears in a chest in the cellar.

- Golems/elementals! I saw this mentioned by someone else lower down. Unconventional materials on golems would be fun (After all, why not? Why shouldn't I make a golem out of something sticky?). I know I wouldn't be too big on party mechanics though.

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>Possessed weapons vs rust dust?

There are animated armours that are specifically weak to this potion.

>*Some* gardening aspect.

That's possible, but not very likely, as I expect the player to go explore anyway.

>An unlockable material stash in your workshop

Probably won't happen, I have certain plans for the story that won't fit with this mechanic. But I do plan the "lives" mechanic instead.

>Golems/elementals!

In all likelyhood, there will be one golem, since I, too, don't enjoy large parties very much. But I haven't yet decided on the details.

Perhaps an easy mode for those who love the style and idea but are looking for a bit more chill playstyle?  


It would be a huge win for accessibility, I have a condition where concentration is something I have on a good day.   I would love to play this on good and bad days. 

I am planning to add optional extra lives in the next update.

Next update!  :)  That is awesome thanks

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Really enjoying this game, but think it would be less frustrating if there was an option to lighten the consequences of death a bit.  I keep exhaustively clearing out the missions one by one, but then one bad encounter makes me lose the dozens or hundreds of stockpiled ingredients.  So far my record is managing to die near the end of the third mission.


It would be super nice to be able to make consistant/permanent saves when I'm back at the basement between missions, so I only have to repeat the most recent one if I die.  Or, if permadeath is important, maybe adding some roguelite new-game-plus features -- like starting with an amount of each raw ingredient based on 10% of your highest previous total.  It could be leftovers salvaged from your previous shop.

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I will probably not do exactly that, but I am planning to give the player multiple "lives" instead (Devil saving you and transporting you to the lonely tree), which is likely to help this issue.

That would probably help!  I'll give it a rest for a while and come try again when I remember next.  Really neat game in general by the way

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By the way, if there were some specific things that gave you trouble, feel free to tell.

I am interested in how people perceive the game's difficulty.

So far the only way I can survive is through getting some distance and throwing fire potions, so once creatures get too close to me I'm ruined unless I can lose them.  I gained access to shock/stun potions once via plot progression, but was saving them for the quest.  I haven't managed to unlock anything on the technology tree aside from torches and fire potions.  I suspect armor or access to more tools would help, but I keep not getting that far.

It is nice that massive forest fires produce plentiful resources for more fire potions.

this game look so good, but i cant seem to be able to open it?

What is your OS and what did you do?

Fantastic! Looking forward to more development.

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