Topic: Carpathian Night Starring Bela Lugosi - Now Available on Switch and Steam!

[Guy Belmont]

This is amazingly made, the controls are smooth as ice,  And the whip action, Ohhhhh, ohhh that whip action is amazing. oh in all directions. and the art all direction out standing, I love how the whip lights up at the end. same goes for the spear of Couse. its Just in most of the fan games I've played  you rarely see the whip get anyone love. So it does my heart when  I see this sort of thing. I can't wait to play the full game thanks so much for your hard work.

[VladOfWallachia]

I can't wait to play the full game thanks so much for your hard work.

Thanks, very hard work is the reason the game is turning out so well, and we will continue to work hard until the game is finished.

[VladOfWallachia]

More art of the hero of CN Prologue, the young (human) Dracula:

(click to show/hide)

[VladOfWallachia]

I was not planning on giving an update this soon, but unfortunately, I have some very bad news.

All of the hardware that I have been using to develop Carpathian Night has been stolen. My computers, monitors, drawing tablets, development 2DS, absolutely all of it has been stolen. Luckily the game itself is safely stored in our source code repository, but this tremendous setback makes the future of Carpathian Night uncertain. I do not know when I will be able to obtain all the equipment I need to get up and running again, so as of now, development of CN will be suspended.

I'm sorry this happened and I hope justice comes to these despicable people.

[Aceearly1993]

I'm so sorry to hear that and as well as I believe everyone who have read the reply above. Pray your best luck bravo.

[Dark Nemesis]

So sorry to hear that, i hope they get caught up and brought to justice.

[X]

Put those theives' nutz in a vice will ya 

[VladOfWallachia]

Put those theives' nutz in a vice will ya 

I would if I knew which nuts to crack.

 I am immensely depressed over losing my desktop. The other things can be replaced, but so much pertaining to Carpathian Night was on that machine and wasn’t version controlled, so now it’s lost forever. For example, I’ve been recording videos of the game as it progressed in development from the very beginning. I had hours of videos of the game back from it was Wallachian Night up until our progress on Carpathian Night Prologue, now all of that history is lost. Many other artifacts like concept art, storyline details, storyboards, all lost. A significant part of the history of this game has suddenly been lost forever and I feel like part of me has died, as I’ve been pouring my heart and soul into this game for the past year.

I can get over losing material things, but that PC was much more than a material thing, it had the history of Carpathian Night’s development saved on it. I don’t know how long it will take for me to get over this.

Thanks for the support everyone. I hope one day I can look back on this and say it wasn’t enough to put an end to Carpathian Night. I’ll update this as soon as I’m able to work on the game again.

[VladOfWallachia]

It's going to take a while to replace everything I needed, but I have enough to get up and running again! We are back in business (with crappier hardware than before) and the grind to finish Carpathian Night Prologue has resumed!

So I guess I'll describe Prologue a bit more, as this is a good opportunity as ever.

Prologue will take place before the demo that is currently available, and it will star a young, human Dracula and will follow his quest to find a cure for his younger sister, who has been cursed with a terrible disease. Despite his wealth, he has been unable to cure her with the best doctors and medicine money can buy. The only hope that remains are legends passed down from generation to generation, legends of an angel that rests deep in the Carpathians and grants divine wishes to those who worship him. With no other hope remaining, the young Dracula sets out into the wilderness of the Carpathians, hoping to find this legendary angel and trade anything in exchange for saving his sister.

Gameplay wise, it will use the exact same mechanics seen in the demo. The same controls and gameplay as the CN demo. However, there is one big difference in terms of level design. While CN demo was designed as a traditional linear style action platformer, Prologue will be more like Simon's Quest. There will be a mix of traditional linear levels, but also "dungeon" levels similar to the mansions in Simon's Quest. These will have backtracking and a bit more emphasis on exploration. To support this style of level design further, there will also be a bigger emphasis on RPG elements, so more unlockable skills and decisions to be made with money you acquire throughout your journey.

The scope has increased since I originally announced it, so it will take us longer than initially expected to finish it, but its for the best. The mansion levels really compliment the linear levels, and the whole experience feels more varied as a result. Despite the scope increase, it will still remain a fairly short game, and will serve to hold fans over to the much bigger main game.

Currently, we have 2 linear levels and 1 mansion level mostly complete. My goal is to have 3 mansions, and 5 linear levels, plus a central town for the final release. I am very happy with the way its turning out so far and I am excited to show some videos and screenshots soon.

Stay tuned!

[X]

Glad to hear you're back on you're feet 

[VladOfWallachia]

This post isn’t an update about the game, but something related.

I was browsing a comic book store last weekend when I spotted this on the shelf:


http://aftershockcomics.com/brothersdracul/

Brothers Dracul by Aftershock Comics. I was immediately interested and picked up all five issues. Those who have been following Carpathian Night since the beginning will remember that the game use to be called Wallachian Night. The villain of the game was a vampire version of Vlad Tepes, and the hero was his half brother, Vlad the Monk (who eventually became Dorin). I thought the combination of the historical Dracula with the Stoker Dracula was a cool idea, but I was never satisfied with what I could do with the idea story wise. I have since abandoned the idea in favor of focusing on the Stoker Dracula combined with my own original characters, and I am much happier with the result, but it’s so cool to see somebody else take roughly the same concept I had and actually execute it well.

Brothers Dracul starts off as a seemingly accurate portrayal of the young Vlad Tepes and his brother Radu, but shortly after the story introduces vampires and it basically becomes a vampire hunting comic with Vlad and Radu playing the role of the hunters. The characters and setting are a perfect fit for vampire stories in my opinion, and it’s refreshing to see Vlad Tepes as the protagonist with vampire elements being incorporated into his story, as opposed to what we always see instead, the Bram Stoker Dracula taking on attributes of the historical Dracula.

The story moves along pretty quickly, overlaying plenty of vampire hunting action on top of the interesting historical backdrop. Ive always thought Vlad Tepes was more terrifying than the fictional Dracula, and they do a good job here of not just portraying him as a madman, but they give historical context to why somebody would turn out the be the person Vlad was- the world he was born into and raised in was horribly chaotic and violent even without the vampires. Vlad and Radu basically spent their entire childhood and teen years as hostages to the Sultan, and after Vlad became free, the freedom of his homeland was in constant threat by overwhelming foreign military power and backstabbing fellow countrymen. In this comic, Vlad is rightfully a reflection of the horrific world he was born into, and he takes this rage into his battles with the vampires, and the factual mixes well with the fantasy.

Of course, I would recommend this to any Castlevania fan, especially those with any interest in the real life Vlad Tepes. It’s a good combination of what we love about Castlevania and the historical figure that inspired its main villain. Check it out!

Also, this guy reminds me of Dorin:

(click to show/hide)

[VladOfWallachia]

Gameplay footage of the introductory level of CN Prologue:

https://youtu.be/ArZtj4dX9oI

[X]

It reminds me of Game Gear with all the colours onscreen

[VladOfWallachia]

Making video games is hard.

I've been quiet for a while, and I decided its a good time for an update.

We are still making steady progress on the game. One obstacle for us has been trying to manage scope- I can get too ambitious at times and its been slowing us down. Those who have been following this thread over the past year will see that I will announce something then a month later I pivot to something completely different. It's an inevitable part of the game development process, but I'm trying to get better at keeping scope under control.

That being said, the change I'm announcing is the order in which we plan on releasing the games - the original Carpathian Night, the one staring Dorin and Irina, which I released a demo of last year, will be released first. After the release of this game, we will finish up Prologue, and release that sometime in 2020. The reason for this is simple- the RPG elements I wished to introduce in Prologue increased the scope far more than I initially thought it would, so we simply need more time to refine that game than original CN.

That being said, I've missed every target release date I've posted in this thread, but I think the Halloween season is a realistic goal for the full release of Carpathian Night. I will do my best to have it completed and released by October. Prologue could take up to another year to complete.

I'll try to post art, screenshots, and videos more frequently. As always, stay tuned!

[X]

You're only human dude. Do what what you feel you can do