Code Three Fifty One and posted a development update on Project Haven and will release an updated demo on July 24th for Steam Stealth Fest 2023 (that's today):

July Development Report

New updated demo and a sneak peek at Project Haven's latest development progress.

Hello mercenaries (and stealth enthusiasts)!
We are happy to announce that Project Haven will be featured in the upcoming Steam Stealth Fest 2023 (from July 24th to 31th), and we will be releasing a new updated demo so that you all can enjoy the thrill of stealth gameplay like never before!

Your feedback matters!
But before we get started with the exciting updates, we want to express our sincere gratitude to everyone who took part in the previous event and provided us with invaluable feedback. We've been working hard to incorporate your ideas to make the game even more immersive and polished. Your insights have been crucial in shaping the game's direction. So, let's dive into the key points you've raised during the previous event.

The things you loved the most!

Multiple paths:
We are happy to hear that you guys really enjoyed the freedom and flexibility of our level designs. The wide range of options provided by the environment with its multiple paths and different vantage points were a real hit among you. Make sure to play the follow up to the first mission to see for yourself!

Numerous Gameplay Elements:
The options offered by the gameplay mechanics were also well received. Mechanics such as lean, strafe and change stance offered a range of tactical options during combat, empowering you to devise multiple strategies to overcome different challenges.

Stylish Aesthetic:
The overall style and aesthetic of the game seems to have resonated with you. The soundtrack also found a special place in your hearts, and that means a lot to us, but especially our composer.

Story and Setting:
The storyline and rich setting grabbed the attention of several of you, leaving you curious to see what more lays ahead.

Areas We Should Improve.

Clunky Cover System:
Some of you shared concerns about the cover system functionality and responsiveness. A few of you felt that certain areas that should have provided cover weren’t properly identified as such, causing confusion and frustration during combat.

Inaccurate Aiming:
While many of you enjoyed Project Haven’s third’s view aiming mode, some found the reticle occasionally to be imprecise, affecting the overall shooting experience.

Difficulty Aiming Grenades:
Tossing grenades from a third-person view proved to be challenging for several of you. Accurately judging the grenade's trajectory, landing spot, and blast radius seemed to not be an easy task.

User Interface Clarity:
The user interface requires improvement, as some elements were not intuitive or could be more user-friendly.

Awkward Dialogue Lines:
While many of you seem to really love or be neutral about it, some of the dialogue lines and voice acting did not resonate well with others and were perceived as awkward or out of place.

We hear you!
We have been carefully working to address the feedback received, while staying true to the game’s original concept, and we are excited to share the following changes in this next demo that address some of your concerns along with a few new additions:

Enhanced Cover System:
Say goodbye to clunkiness! The cover system was completely redesigned. We've added a new snap-to-cover mechanic, allowing you to easily take cover where you want. We also added a mercenary’s ghost figure when the mouse hovers over a potential cover spot, making it easier to see their current stance and know exactly where they are going to end up facing. Additionally, the shield icons previously projected on walls have now been moved to the floor, improving top-down visibility. We now also display all the nearby potential covers, for more situational awareness.

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Thanks Redglyph!

The RPG Codex interviewed Sergio Gil about Project Haven:

RPG Codex Interview: Sergio Gil on Project Haven

Hey re.var, thanks for agreeing to do this interview. I think it's safe to say that Project Haven is one of the most anticipated games of this year (if it doesn't get pushed back again) for many Codexers. First of all, can you give us an introduction to Code Three Fifty One, as well as what got you guys into game development?

Hey! Thanks for having me. Truly appreciate the interest in Project Haven! We've always been avid gamers since childhood back in the early 90's, and like many always wanted to make our own games. I've personally started my professional game dev career in 2000 and have been making games since. Joana has a master's in Psychology and a PhD in Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, she always loved games, particularly games with a good story. Back in 2015 we started creating a game together for fun, and it eventually turned into Project Haven when we saw its potential.

If you could describe Project Haven to an audience of grognards who love CRPGs and tactical games, how would you do so?

Project Haven is our attempt to recreate the same feeling you had in firefights in games like Jagged Alliance 2, Silent Storm and the original Xcoms. Essentially it's a turn based game where fights are very messy, uncertain, and you have to deal with a lot of variables in the field at the same time. You have very granular control of your characters (it's not a simplified experience) allowing you to engage each encounter exactly as you like. In Project Haven we've paired this gameplay with a cinematic storyline that will push the player forward through the streets of Haven city.

​The implementation of a non-grid-based system to provide the player with more granular control is an interesting one not seen in too many tactics games. Furthermore, players are able to do things like sidestep, free aim, etc. In an era where tactics games have become increasingly streamlined to appeal to more gamers, why did you choose to go the other way?

From the start we wanted to have significant emphasis on the characters' mechanical control. Free Aim was actually one of the first features we tried, it started out as a test to see how it felt, but in the end, for us, it improves the experience and the immersion in the world. It does depart from the percentage based hit systems that are more common, though Free Aim arguably seems like a more "fair" system as you can visually assess how likely you are to hit. The gridless movement comes together with all the rest of the features we have in Project Haven like strafe, lean, direction of facing being important, etc.... It would be a disservice to the game to have gridded movement when we have all the other means of controlling the characters. I personally don't think steamlining increases the appeal in general, look at games like Path of Exile or Escape from Tarkov, they are very complex experiences and can't really be considered niche, they have massive audiences too. I think it's more risky to do a complex game, since there's more opportunities to shoot yourself in the foot as a developer, but if managed and tested properly it can definitely be a plus.

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Thanks Couchpotato!

Henriquejr spotted the May development report for the strategy RPG Project Haven:

May Development Report

Attention Mercs, grab the latest insights into Project Haven's development progress.

Heads up, Steel Dragons!

If you've been downrange in our Demo during Tacticon, we salute you. Your debriefs have been pouring in and we've been combing through every piece of intel. We've already started patching up a few weak spots based on your feedback.

Now, let's bring you up to speed on the recent developments since our last devlog!

Level Design: Crafting the Battlefield!

When we embarked on the development of Project Haven, our initial plan was to use procedural generation for level design. We even posted some of the tech we’ve developed for it on this platform.

However, as time went on and we further honed the game's storyline and gameplay, we realized that procedural level design wouldn't do justice to our vision.

Despite the monumental task it posed for our small but dedicated team, we made the conscious decision to craft each of the 45 mission maps by hand. And now, having completed the vast majority of the levels, we can confidently say that the extra effort and time invested were undeniably worth it.

While handcrafted maps may limit certain aspects of replayability, they significantly enhance the overall experience. Having said that, we’re happy to report that our missions offer a diverse range of approaches tailored to different playstyles and squad compositions, ensuring ample replay value.

Environmental Art: Elevating the Visual Look!

Besides gameplay, an important aspect of level design is the look.

We have what we’d say is a fairly distinct look to our game and we want to bring it to the next level. With this in mind, we have dedicated some time to revisiting and refining every level, elevating them to their final polished form so we can achieve our unique artistic vision.

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 Apscp2008 spotted the initial roster trailer for Project Haven:

Project Haven | Full Initial Roster Trailer

Code Three Fifty One has released a new demo of Project Haven, which is available for the duration of Tacticon (11-15 May):

Project Haven featured at Tacticon

Greetings Steel Dragons!

We are excited to announce that Project Haven will be showcased at Tacticon!

Tacticon is a digital convention dedicated to strategy and tactical games that takes place from May 11th to May 15th. This year, brings together over 106 hand-picked recent and unique strategy games by long-established studios to solo indie game developers.

But that's not all! We are also delighted to announce that a new demo is now available for players to try out during the event. This demo features significant improvements from the last one, including the full initial campaign roster to choose from, enhanced level design and art, new weapons, new items and a totally new mission! We are confident that these enhancements will make the game even more enjoyable. We can't wait for you to try it out!

[...]

Thanks Redglyph!

Code Three Fifty One released a new demo of Project Haven for TactiCon 2022 (22-26 September):

-> Twitter

Thank Redglyph!

Henriquejr spotted the July development report for the strategy RPG Project Haven:

July Development Report

Hello Steel Dragons!
Welcome to another Project Haven development update!

This time we have quite a few gameplay additions to show you, some art updates and more, so let’s get straight into it.

Gameplay
One major task we’ve finished since the last update was reworking the whole action system backend. While it’s not particularly visual or exciting, it allows us to more easily add complex gameplay systems. It was also designed with modding in mind. In fact, every action in the game is done with the exact same tools and system modders will have available to them! We hope to see some really cool things from the community!

After finishing the system we quickly recreated all existing actions iterating and implementing a few new actions to help flesh out the gameplay:

MOVABLE OBJECTS:
Characters with enough Strength are now able to push some objects to gain access to otherwise unavailable paths, allowing for more interesting strategic decisions on your character selection and level up!

CARRY DOWNED TEAMMATES
There’s some situations where healing your downed merc in place is just not an option and moving while downed is a slow affair. You can now carry downed teammates to safety before reviving them.

CARRY DEAD ENEMIES
In the same vein as the previous system you can now carry dead enemies to prevent others from spotting the body. We’ve also included handy containers where you can dump them, though if all else fails a secluded corner will work just as well!

IMPROVED ACTION POP-UP
Along with all the backend system improvements we also improved the UI, the action popup (right click) now contains more information and is better organized, allowing for smoother interactions!

Art
Gameplay doesn’t get all the spotlight in this update though, as we’ve continued our upgrade of the character art.

Here’s just a couple of them:

Bubbles, everyone's favorite Steel Dragon’s hacker in service, sporting an updated look.

Iron Dogs mob, a brand new foe you’ll find in the streets of Haven. Don’t let his looks fool you though, they’re tough nuts to crack!

One of the main reasons for updating existing characters was to give them all new facial rigs to allow for higher fidelity facial animation, here’s a sneak peek at Daisy’s updated facial animation:

Level Design
We can’t really show much here as we’re mostly working on very late game content. But we did get back and did some updates to previous levels, fleshing out the gameplay and art.

You can see the different lighting styles in the image below representing different areas of the city.

Graphics
For those with supporting cards we’ve also added Raytracing. Make those rain puddles shine!
And to lighten all that GPU load or just to improve performance we’ve also added DLSS and FSR2 support!

With all the changes the game underwent we’d like to have you all test the game and give your feedback. Throughout Project Haven’s development it’s been extremely helpful reading everyone’s ideas and suggestions. As such, we’re planning on having a new Demo as soon as we have a stable build, stay tuned for details!

And finally we’d like to thank all the community for your support, we know you guys are eager to get your hands on the final product. We’re a small team doing our best, and we want to make sure your experience is as good as it can be. We’re not cutting any corners, so while things sometimes take a while to develop we believe it’s for the best in the end. We hope you guys understand.

Thank you! And see you next time!
Code Three Fifty One

80.lv interviewed Code 351 about Project Haven.

Project Haven: Developing a Sci-Fi Turn-Based RPG

Code Three Fifty One, the developers of Project Haven, have discussed the development process behind the game, talked about implementing game mechanics, and shared some advice regarding the marketing of the game.

Introduction

80.lv: Please introduce yourself. Where did you study? What companies have you worked for? What projects have you contributed to?

Hey! We are Sérgio Gil and Joana Dimas, a couple from Portugal with different but complementary work backgrounds.

Sérgio: I left college to pursue my dreams of working in the games industry back in 1999, on a game called Tactical Ops that launched way back in 2001. I then went on to work on several other titles throughout the 2000s, eventually joining the VFX company Video Copilot in 2009 as their Technical Director, where I had the chance to work on all sorts of titles.

Joana: I received my Ph.D. in Computer Science with a specialization in artificial agents, after finishing my Master's degree in Psychology. I’ve always wanted to expand my knowledge in this field, especially when it comes to improving how computer characters enhance a player’s experience. So, in this instance, that’s through a combination of cognitive science and game design; both of which are big passions of mine. 

Project Haven

80.lv: How and when did you start developing Project Haven? What inspired you to create the post-apocalyptic-style game?

Sérgio: Project Haven’s development began in 2015. The biggest inspirations for the game are genre classics such as Jagged Alliance 2, Silent Storm, and the original XCom series. Its development came about after a frustrating and failed attempt at playing JA2 using a co-op mod.  With us being a huge fan of the tactical genre and as we both like to play cooperatively, we decided Project Haven would become something we’d both enjoy making.

Joana: As for the setting, we’ve drawn pretty heavily from classic films such Johnny Mnemonic, Blade Runner, and other sci-fi staples. We really wanted to bring a gritty dystopian feel to the turn-based strategy genre. We’ve always loved movies and storytelling, and both of us have a huge appreciation of good cinematography. We always had a very strong vision of how we wanted to present our game’s story and setting. 

[...]

IGN posted a video of Code Three Fifty One showcasing gameplay tactics.

Project Haven - Official Developer Gameplay Walkthrough

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Join a member of the development team for a look at gameplay from Project Haven, the upcoming squad tactics game. The video gives a look at an encounter where the game's heroes are ambushed by enemies and showcases some gameplay tactics, including a look at weapons and more, that can be used to navigate the situation.

Code Three Fifty One shares an update of their development, news and an FAQ. Thanks @henriquejr!

October Development Report

Hey Steel Dragons!

At the end of August we debuted our Gamescom 2021 trailer, and since that time, we’ve been hard at work on not only refining the game, but also looking closely at many of the common issues you’ve encountered.

Before we get onto those, we thought we’d point out a few things that have been happening since Gamescom.

A Little Bit Of Our Development Process

First up, we’ve continued trickling out some small videos showcasing our development process.

You might have missed a couple of the last from “Camera Control” that lets you use the middle-mouse button for far more flexibility.

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We also showcased “Floor Visibility Control” to manually toggle between visible floors, along with more UI Updates. A few days ago we released “Continue Move”, a long anticipated feature to continue your movement after a mercenary stops, if they detect a new enemy midway, allowing you to re-evaluate your strategy.

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Code 351 posted on Twitter that Project Haven has been selected as finalist for the Nordic Game Discovery Contest Season V. Details in an Indie DB article.

Project Haven shoots its way to huge recognition

Project Haven is a deep, squad-based tactical game set in “the last city of Earth, Haven”. Players get to experience cutting-edge technology that meets old-school design in this story-driven game of urban squad tactics, playable solo or cooperatively across a massive 45+ mission campaign.

As the Nordic Game Discovery Contest Season V tour comes closer to the finish line, a new finalist for the NGDC Grand Finals at NG21 Autumn this November was chosen in Portugal.

The NGDC online qualifier during GameDev Camp in Lisbon featured three selected contestants: Art house murder mystery Who Killed Mr. White from Notagamestudio, 3D puzzle stealth side-scroller Tamed: The Unseen Show from PopCoin Studios and Project Haven from developer Code Three Fifty One. All three studios are from Portugal.

Although the first two put up a good fight, it was Code Three Fifty One with Project Haven that took the victory and earned a seat in the NGDC Season V Grand Finals this fall.

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[...]

It was a busy week and we missed some news from Project Haven: a demo, and a trailer.

Project Haven infiltrates the Indie Arena Booth at gamescom 2021

Greetings Steel Dragons!

It’s showtime again! This time we’re bringing Project Haven to Germany (and beyond - it’s a largely digital event) at gamescom as a featured title in their surprisingly exclusive Indie Arena Booth. It’s not just show-and-tell time, either. We’ll have a spot on gamescom’s digital show-floor for you to visit, a fresh new trailer and (most importantly) an updated demo featuring an all-new mission.

[...]

There’s a demo this time, right?

Indeed there is! Starting on August 25th there’ll be a new demo build to download here on Steam. Not only will you get to check out our latest improvements to the UI and cover system, but a whole new mission. Rather than extend the demo and risk padding it out too far, we’ve swapped out the third mission for a new one to give you a fresh experience to tackle.

Let your friends know, challenge them to a round of PvP or bring them along for the ride in co-op. Don’t forget that as with previous releases, the Skirmish mode will provide near-endless new combat scenarios once you’re done with the campaign missions.

The new demo will be available for a while after the show, but not forever, so dive in while it’s still fresh out the oven.

[...]

New Trailer Live Debut

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The Turn Based Lovers checked out Project Haven:

Project Haven - Demo Gameplay (Next Fest 2021)

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The second time I'm on Project Haven by Code Three Fifty One. One of the most anticipated games for me. This is the new demo available during the Next Steam Fest 2021. Let me know what you think about Project Haven in the comments below.

Some feature highlights videos for Project Haven.

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Haven city is a dark place. But that doesn't mean you can't have some sweet highlights to lighten up your way!

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In our continual pursuit of improved player experience we have reworked our player detection indicators. You can now see where exactly in your path you will be detected by known enemies!

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Today we reveal a new challenge you and your Steel Dragons will be facing! In Project Haven cameras can pose as a roadblock for your path, but can also be an opportunity with the right skills!

The Turn Based Lovers show some Project Haven gameplay:

Project Haven | PC Turn-Based Tactical RPG | Gameplay

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Demo Gameplay of Project Haven. The Turn-Based Tactical developed by Foresight Games. A promising game that features a manual aiming system, mature storytelling, an RPG character building, and flexible tactical combat. Let me know what you think about Project Haven.

Turnbasedlovers has an overview of turn-based RPG Project Haven. You can find the Steam page here.

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Background Story

You command the Steel Dragons, a mercenary outfit fighting for survival in the harsh, urban near-future that is Haven City.

Gameplay info

Select and control squads of mercs as they battle gangsters, rival mercs and corrupt government forces in a bid to make ends meet, and make a difference where you can. Manage your crew’s stats and gear, wrangle a diverse range of merc personalities, and conquer the deep tactical elements that make Project Haven a standalone turn-based combat experience.