Updates from the Forge 13: May 2017

[Jubal]

Issue 13: May 2017

EDITORIAL

Hello there, and welcome to Updates from the Forge, Issue 13!

There's plenty of news from around the site this month. We've done some significant overhauls to the organisation of the forum, condensing to fewer top-level forums to make the board structure easier to navigate and removing some smaller subforums that were no longer being used. We also have an ongoing programme of visual and technical improvements to the site – some invisible, like our new backup systems, some more so like clipping images to page sizes and pretty new "E" symbols that show new posts instead of the standard SMF paper. Particular thanks should go to new tech volunteers Koobazaur and Florp, and to the webmaster of the chiark webservers who is kindly providing hosting for our new backup capacity. There are several more changes planned for June, so stay tuned and expect more announcements in June's Updates!

Exilian is also going to be present at UK Games Expo next week – there'll be a separate newspost soon giving the full details of how you can find us if you're there.

On top of all that, of course, we've got this month's updates – from regular appearances like Bigosaur and Utherwald Press to new projects like WarpDogs' Village Monsters and Jubal's Magician's Labyrinth, there's plenty to get excited about! Do read on and check out the great stuff we've got in this issue...

CONTENTS:

• A rather Monstrous Village...
• My Mom Is A Witch - Mods and More Content
• Dare you enter the Magicians' Labyrinth?
• Editing and Expos at Utherwald Press
• Come and join in with Exilian Poetry!

Welcome to a rather Monstrous Village!

New member WarpDogsVG has been bringing dev diaries and of his in-production game Village Monsters, in which a once-played computer game world has settled down into peaceful village life and monsters have relaxed into pastoral harmony... which, for the first time in an age, you enter as a human player! You will be able to discover a great deal about the world, take up hobbies like critter collecting – and also take advantage of the ways that the game has degenerated since the monsters were at their prime all those years ago, with "glitch powers" that let you turn bugs to your advantage! It's all looking great, so do head over and have a chat about what's going on.

Enter the Village (Thread & Demo Download)

My Mom Is A Witch - Mods and More Content

Bigosaur's My Mom Is A Witch continues to go from strength to strength, and there are plenty of recent updates, including the new crystal wizard boss and many bugfixes and balance tweaks such as faster and more powerful archery becoming available. The game also has two additional skin-packs that you can download made by our very own Jubal, both of which are Doctor Who themed – one that turns the standard wizard character into Peter Capaldi's 12th Doctor, and one that turns the goblins into Sontarans. You can find those in the Bigosaur forum at the link below.

Most importantly, though, June is likely to see the release of the dungeon level, the next  major part of the game. We've been seeing a range of great new screenshots for that, including the one above of the deadly Simerian Butcher boss who will face the players as they reach the end of the fourth level. There'll be new enemies and new traps, and a whole new set of rooms to explore - and we can't wait! If you want to keep getting fresh updates on this great game, do keep checking the main thread in Bigosaur's forum, and follow @Bigosaur on twitter.

Visit the Bigosaur Forum

Dare you enter the Magicians' Labyrinth?

A new boardgame from Jubal with a free PDF of downloadable rules, the Magicians' Labyrinth is a simple boardgame where each player is a wizard trying to rush to the centre of a maze and out again. There's only one problem – the labyrinth doesn't have any doors or corridors, just a set of walled-off rooms. The players must use their spells to forge a path to the centre, block off their rivals, gain additional magical powers, and potentially duel their enemies in mortal combat. Take a look and try it out!

Thread & Download Link

Editing and Expos at Utherwald Press
Frozen Skies, the Savage Worlds sourcebook from Utherwald Press covering the background and rules for the ice-cold dieselpunk setting of Aleyska, is rapidly taking shape. As well as the book going through its editing phases, recent discussions have included tweaks to the coinage system and an early release of the map in the Press' May Update. Showing the sweep of Aleyska from the tough eastern metropolis of Gravenburgh to the wild, terrifying Wulflands in the west, you can really see Aleyska come to life in it:

Discussions have also started on the possibility of Utherwald Press producing setting documents & rules for a range of Cold War conflicts, which you can check out and discuss in their forum – there's lots going on. And also of course, if you're at UK Games Expo this weekend (2nd-4th June), do check out Utherwald Press at stand J7!

Head over to the Utherwald Press forum

Come and join in with Exilian Poetry!
The Exilian poetry section is always a great place to read, write, and relax. If you ever feel like writing and want to get feedback, or just want to express yourself, do come along and join in. Whether you're planning to be prolific or less frequent, whether you write blank verse or sonnets, there's a warm welcome waiting for you. You could well get your poem featured in a future issue of Updates - we're every bit as keen to promote indie writers, academics and artists as game developers - so do head over and take a look. And we'll leave you with this little poem, added this month by Jubal:

Tarasthalay

Perhaps there's a land where the bluebells grow
In song and silence shadowing, in hope and hopeful flowering,
Where soft are the summers and brief the snow,
In leaf and root meadow-grown
In Tarasthalay

Perhaps there's a land that is over the sea,
Past great grey sails billowing, and breeze and zephyr following,
Where the harbours are sound and there's light in a window
In welcome and kindness
In Tarasthalay

Perhaps, o perhaps, there too shall go I,
And never more a-tarrying where cold gales oft are harrowing
I shall build the world found in my mind's quiet eye
And on earth and in hope-song
Build Tarasthalay

Join Exilian's Poetry Corner

So that about wraps it up for this month: of course as usual, if you want to help with writing or you have a story we should be covering, please PM me (Jubal) or email megadux@exilian.co.uk to get in touch. We try to cover a wide range of projects and we're always interested in more whether it's game dev, art, writing, or any other sort of geek creativity!

That's all the updates from the Exilian forges for now - there'll be lots more to talk about in Issue 14!