Steam page is up and running and ready for wishlisting:

Chronicles of Vaeltaja at Steam
Added in followed, pre order or coming are in whish list only if with a Mac version planed, not that I request/suggest any, as I'm using a cloud computer and it's windows, so I'm probably in a process of a big change from playing mainly Mac games particularly for cheap indies, it's just that it's still more conformable to play on Mac so I didn't changed yet my habits of whish list and buys, but I'm close and even could say I started the change process.

This for a question, does dev on Steam only bother on whishlist or on followed too? Steam provides the numbers for followed?
 
There's an option to make a Mac build of the game, but I have to find a mac user to test it as I don't have one myself.

If there's statistic for followers I haven't found it yet.
 
Past couple of days I've added some side-quests. Some of them have alternative way to be solved. Some of those solutions may lead to a longer outcome or even to a new quest. Some quests are not that easy to find in the beginning as there are some variables in play. Some of those quests have small story lines that evolve during the game.

There's at least one hidden character to hire, but you have to find her first and complete a small quest to win her over. I'm planning to add one or two more eventually.

Reputation/honour system added, also 'stealing' skill to the main character which will give the opportunity to try to steal stuff in various places. Reputation/honour may affect how NPCs treat the player and some other things.

Screenshot (531).png
 
I'm preparing a demo version for Steam. It is already in testing phase, so it shouldn't take too long.

Demo contains the Great Forest area, which has southern and northern parts and one of the early optional dungeons to solve, if you get access into it (there's two way). The demo ends after the dungeon is completed, but until then player can freely explore the Great Forest and try to find it's treasures and secrets. There's traveling merchant to trade with and one side-quest that has been altered for the demo. This version of Great Forest is designed specifically for the demo, so I've removed all the story elements and some of the mechanics that has no use in this version.

I would be interested in trying to compile a mac build, but unfortunately I don't have one to test with. So if anyone using mac would be interested to test it, please send me a message.
 
Alright, before I get more feedback about 'broken combat', here's some words of advice:

Chronicles of Vaeltaja contains lots of mechanics in the play, so here’s few gameplay tips to get you started. When spending stat and skill points to characters, balance is the keyword. You won’t get far by placing all the points to ‘strenght’ and weapon skill, that will only lead to a character build that may hit hard, but is unable to wear better armor and sucks at defending. Therefore characters dealing physical melee damage need to find good balance between ‘strenght’, ‘stamina’ and ‘agility’, and weapon and armor skills.

Some battle techniques may need good values in other stats too: for example some bow techniques may deal better damage if the character’s ‘perception’ is good and so on. In battle ‘strenght’ is important for melee characters, and ‘agility’ is important for ranged characters.

Caster character has to find balance between robe, staff and magic skills. For example mage has to increase ‘elemental power’ and the certain spell skill, such as Flame, to increase the power of the Flame spell. ‘Intelligence’ also affects magic damage. On the long run some caster characters, such as priests, can be balanced to be an effective healer, while being able to deal some physical damage.

Main character has the skills, such as ‘speech’ or ‘lockpicking’, which are used to interact with the world, but also stats will have some affect. For example your ‘speech’ skill won’t help much if your ‘charisma’ is so low that nobody wants to talk to you about anything interesting. There is also a slight random element/dice roll for stat and skill actions, so if you fail to pick a lock the first time, try again. But if you keep failing constantly, your skill is too low.

There are also some skills that can’t be improved, such as Shadow’s ‘shadow cloak’ skill and Priest’s ‘cure poison’. That might change for the final release of the game.

W,A,S,D movement, with Q,E for turning. For activation SPACE or mouse left button. ESC or mouse right button to exit menus.

For ‘fullscreen’ press F4.

Known issues:

1. There happens some stutter occasionally, when the game loads cells that it has divided levels into, but optimization will be done for the final release.

2. In Stat&Skills menu when spending points, arrows that allow to increase or decrease skill value don’t align properly. Changing to different character can help the issue little bit, but it won’t fix it. I’ve been looking into it, but haven’t found a solution yet.

3. Sometimes enemy hit boxes doesn’t register mouse cursor properly, so it’s adviseable to choose enemies with keyboard.

4. Because of the unorthodox camera settings to achieve proper gameplay feel, interacting with the gameworld using keyboard may cause a certain issue: You may be facing a door or treasure chest, but SPACE doesn’t activate it. In this case press W and then SPACE.
 
Released a small balancing update.

1. Now there shouldn't be any other enemies than bats in the first enemy encounter.
2. Party has 750 coins at start.
3. Aesis has now better starting gear.
4. Healing spell should be now little bit stronger.
5. Nikarus (wolves) has now slightly lower strength.
 
Released a small balancing update.
  1. Tweaked damage for attack skills and spells, so party's ability to deal damage is little bit better now.
  2. Edited armor and weapon descriptions.
 
Not sure you want any feedback here but I can't play without key binding, at least support a numpad fully (it's missing turn left/right for my keyboard) or implement UI buttons (I see no UI but the mouse cursor and the automap, nor any option to show one) but I know that just UI buttons for move won't work well long for me.
Sure, this is a good place for feedback.
There are some restrictions with the engine when it comes to key bindings, and I've been trying to solve them from time to time, so this is definitely something I'm working on. I hope I will eventually find a way to implement it without any issues.
 
Sure, this is a good place for feedback.
There are some restrictions with the engine when it comes to key bindings, and I've been trying to solve them from time to time, so this is definitely something I'm working on. I hope I will eventually find a way to implement it without any issues.
Ok but Numpad has move forward/backward/strafe left/right but not turn left/right.
 
Ok but Numpad has move forward/backward/strafe left/right but not turn left/right.
Yes, problems start when I try to implement turning keys to numpad, but I'm trying to find a solution.

I've been testing camera zoom when talking to NPCs: When clicking NPC the camera goes a little bit higher and zooms closer to NPC, so conversations have much more natural feel. I'll be doing some more tests and if there's no problems, I'll update it to the demo.

I've also been planning some changes to the skill system, to make it easier to understand, but those changes won't probably come to the demo.
 
Minor update for the demo: I've added the camera zoom for conversations and updated the Stat&Skills-plugin, so arrows using to increase and decrease Stat and Skill values should work now properly.
I'm also doing some redesigning for the Skill-system for the full game, so those changes will probably not come to the demo version.
Be careful when carrying that goo of rotten fish in your bag!

Screenshot (583).png
 
I've just released a balancing update for the demo.

Changes:

Fallen party members are revived when resting at the farmer's house.
First bat encounter now only has 2-4 bats.
Changed loot in treasure chests to be more useful in the beginning.
After a certain point in both questlines merchant will have new equipment in his inventory (check before entering the Old Tower).
Warrior's, Hunter's, Mage's and Healer's rings will slightly raise certain stats.
Balanced enemy troops in the Old Tower.
 
I've received quite good feedback from the demo so far and some of it has inspired me to make some changes to the skill system. These changes won't be coming for the demo as I have to focus on developing the full game, but I thought that I share some information about it beforehand.

I've renamed 'Stats & Skills' menu to 'Character'. Stats and skills are still presented in the same way, but there are some changes to how skills work. Each class have two 'class skills', which are the first two skills in the skill list. For example Mage now has 'Warlock' and 'Wizard' skills and Hunter has 'Archer' and 'Survivalist'. These new 'class skills' determine what kind of spells and combat abilities character is able to learn. For example when improving 'Warlock' skill, it will unlock the ability to learn various elemental attack spells, while 'Wizard' skill grants ability to learn different kind of spells. While these new 'class skills' give access to spells and abilities, you still need to buy/learn them from various places.

Under these 'class skills' are listed the basic skills of the class. For example Mage still has skills like Staff, Robes, Magic Armor and so on, which determine what kind of equipment character can use. But there is one quite significant change to these basic skills: Now some of the classes have skills that were previously restricted to the main character. For example now Shadow has 'Lock Picking' skill and Hunter has 'Disarm Traps'. This means that instead of improving main character's 'Lock Picking' skill, you can spend those points to some other skill and improve Shadow's 'Lock Picking'.

These changes will provide much more variety when building your party and leveling up the characters and therefore add even more replay value. You can even try to find two Mages for your party and make one of them Wizard and the other Warlock, or stick with only one who is something in between.

I hope these changes will get you excited!