Khayyin spotted an update for Realms of Arkania: Star Trail HD:

Version 1.10

Hello knights of fortune and adventurers of Aventuria!

We bring glad tidings from occupied Lowangen! After orcs had pushed back our scouts in skirmishes again and again, the first caravans with new relief goods have finally arrived. The Svellt Valley has been rebuilt and repaired many times over, and you, dear adventurers, may now feast on what the peoples of Aventuria have given you.

Many thanks to community supporter Martin Wunderlich, he has tirelessly built improvements in mod form and made this patch possible with his unparalleled perseverance. Also many thanks to CaptainKidd (lunatic) for the feature video and many more!

Well, let these things be proclaimed:

[big feature and fixed bugs list]

Realms of Arkania: Star Trail HD has been released today:

Version 1.0 - and we are out of Early Access

Hail to the twelve,

after almost exactly nine months in Early Access, we are leaving EA and go into Release as of today. As a little thank you for all of our wonderful Early Access Supporters, the Digital Deluxe DLC is automatically included for all Buyers so far. It includes additional recipes, an alternate starting party with Aventurian Legends, beautiful city maps of Lowangen and Tiefhusen as well as the remastered Soundtrack in MP3 and FLAC formats.

Thank you all for supporting us, it was a wonderful journey so far, and we are looking forward to all the goodness to come!

Your
Crafty and Alpha Development Team

The Early Access version 0.95 of Realms of Arkania: Star Trail HD has been released:

Version 0.95

Hail to the twelve!

This Update was all about "Sound": Actions in the inventory and out of it result in "audible Feedback", footsteps change their tone when stepping on a different underground, torches sizzle audible in Dungeons, water drips in caves and flows on fountains. We also included reworked spells, elfs now have their own "elfish representation" of the according formula. Combat also sounds a lot more lively, even though it isn't completely done yet, there is more to come! In Detail:

General

• The heroes now give audible comments in certain situations (e.g., injured, becoming leader)
• All doors in dungeons now have soundeffects
• Soundeffects added to inventory actions (e.g. eat, equip and drop)
• Warriors and Dwarfs now get a bonus on encumberance ("armor familiarity")
• Mages, druids, and witches can now access new wardrobes.
• The travel experience "buzz and hum" now has a soundeffect.
• It is now possible to exchange water in the inventory between waterskins and glass / water bottles.
• In dialogs with group NPCs their portraits are now displayed.
• The footstep sounds now adapt to the respective underground.
• A further fix attempt was made for blurry spell texts
• Spell voiceovers have been completely replaced, there are also separate elf interpretations
• The spell "Eagle, Wolf" is now only applicable to the caster himself.
• The effect "healattempt" after trying to heal wounds now lasts 24 hours instead of formerly 8.
• Effect "healattempt" is now no longer set on several other occasions, like with dagger rituals or when sleeping in Finsterkoppen
• A rabies infection is no longer identifiable by medical practitioners
• The group NPCs now have their correct portraits. Caution: Unfortunately, this does not work with existing savegames, if the respective NPC is already or was in the group.
• More than 60 dialogs and events were given images from game assets.
• Inadvertently deactivated 8 landroute random events now trigger again.
• 6 key icons have received a wooden background.

Combat

• When having Agility 16 or better, a character receives +1 movement per action
• Created a special arena for the fight in Ingramosch's house.
• Significantly more fighting sounds were implemented, some non-humanoids and few humanoids are still inactive
• "Wait until end of turn" now works again
• Skeletons are now losing their weapon visually as well es in the code
• Prevent yellow battle messages in accelerated combat, only show LE / AE changes.
• The life energy of the Dragon Arkandor was significantly increased.
• The starting positions of a battle in the Vault beneath Tjolmar have been corrected
• Another fight in the Vault beneath Tjolmar has been corrected

Towns and Dungeons

• Swamp of the Forgotten: You move very slow in swamp grass.
• Reworked ambient sound in Finsterkoppen Pit
• Reworked ambient sound in Swamp of the Forgotten
• Illusion walls in the blood pinnacles now disappear when they are discovered
• Various item containers (chests, shelves, cabinets etc.) in the vault beneath Tjolmar don't show unnecessary warnings any more.
• The missing transversalis targets in the vault beneath Tjolmar have been added.
• Druids and witches are now allowed to pass the guards at the Finsterkoppen mountain entrance.
• The sunken chest in the Swamp of Forgiveness now includes a pair of trousers and a shirt that can be worn later on by Agdan Dragenfeld.
• The text for opening and closing the secret door in the Vault beneath Tjolmar is now displayed only once.
• The "LOD" system for characters has been disabled, the village characters should now look better
• Fixed blood pinnacles on lowest quality
• When entering the swamp, you no longer land behind a barrier.
• Prevented falling through the ground in the Vault beneath Tjolmar
• The handling of Aumond has been fixed, it is now unaccessible as planned
• Hillhaus is accessible again
• Swamp of the Forgotten: The usefulness of the minimap has been improved.
• Some stairs in the Vault beneath Tjolmar were "sealed"
• Swamp of the Forgotten: Prevented hanging in the boats.
• The Lanterns in the Swamp of Forgiveness now have a correct collisions.
• Some "catapults" in the blood pinnacles have been corrected
• In case you have the "correct" heather, but not the Noctrux document, an additional query and a new text have been added.
• There is now an Autosave before the NPC leaves the group in the 3rd level of the Vault beneath Tjolmar.
• In the Vault beneath Tjolmar the assignment of the adventure points was completely revised.
• Vault beneath Tjolmar: The heroes are now told about the use of the flame key.
• Vault beneath Tjolmar: The heroes are now informed about the loss of amulet parts.
• The trigger positions in the Vault beneath Tjolmar have been reworked.
• The Hiltorp priest now correctly has a female avatar.
• There are now torches and tinders in level 6 of the Finsterkoppen Pit
• Blood Pinnacles: You can not get the Gravesh dagger several times now.
• Water bottles can now also be filled on the rivers in Tiefhusen and Gashok.
• The blacksmith in Gashok now also allows elves, who can not be recognized as elves by the spells "eagle, wolf", "harmless figure" or "visibili".
• Blood Pinnacles: Fight in large hall triggers no more a second time
• Blood Pinnacles: Fleeing Ork can now sound an alarm

Modding

• Voiceover Modding is now possible
• Directories can now be given as source not only for image files, but also for general files
• Character classes can now have permanent effects (like check boni)

The final Tjolmar dungeon is already playable in Realms of Arkania: Star Trail HD:

Tjolmar Dungeon

loading...

Version 0.9 is out. The final release is announced for the end of July.

Thanks Farflame!

The Early Access version 0.82 for Startrail HD has been released:

Version 0.82

Hail to the twelve!

We have a large "stabilization update" for you this week, almost 90 changes should make your life in Aventuria more pleasant, especially in combat, where now among other things shields are represented and correctly taken into account and the NPCs now also switch weapons, or put the weapon away when they are encircled to continue fighting. In detail:

General

• Some diseases now require a whole set of herbs for healing
• The party is now visible in the prison scene in Lowangen
• New scene "lonely tundra"
• Fixed a problem when closing the merchant window
• When moving items, the item will no longer hang on the portrait
• The Jugglers Shirt is now also displayed on female characters
• Fixed a problem where characters left behind could lead to corrupted savegames
• Fixed a problem when camping the second time
• Various consumables (eg weapon care utensils) are now consumed correctly again
• The second visit to a market stand no longer releases the entire set of potentially available items
• Item containers now show the correct icon
• The functionality of "Keeping Guard" has been restored
• The main menu difficulty window size has been increased
• Unconscious and rehealed heroes will be displayed correctly again at the next camp
• Hungry and thirsty heroes no longer help themselves to alchemy ingredients
• Fixed a problem with item containers and items that were moved to characters other than the currently active character

Cities and Dungeons

• The party is shown in the dungeon-campscreen
• NPCs were persuaded to remain invisible when they are supposed to be
  Running in doors in the blood pinnacles now looks better
• Running in doors in the cellar vault now looks better
• Market stalls have been repaired
• Fixed the runin animation in other existing dungeons
• NPCs no longer slowly turn on the spot
• A problem with the hostels in Lowangen has been corrected
• The blood pinnacles trigger positions were revised
• Special items no longer get lost in the chests of the blood pinnacles dungeon
• Fixed a problem with "popping" grass in the swamp of the forgotten
• Improved the water in Lowangen
• Improved the Automap in Lowangen
• The flying gallows in Lowangen is no longer flying
• Other floating objects in Lowangen are now on the ground
• Fixed some occlusion problems in Lowangen
• Made the staircase at the Lowangen taverns easier to climb
• Fixed another error on the socket puzzle of the cellar vault
• Fixed a house without collision
• Improved the palisades in Tjolmar
• Prevented NPCs in Tjolmar passing through the walls and palisades
• The torches in the first 3 levels of the Finsterkoppenbinge dungeon, which are inflamed by Ingerimms day work, now go out again after 12 hours
• Trigger a chance to counter the fire sponge effect in the Finsterkoppenbinge every hour
• Fixed the coordinates of the rear entrance of the blood pinnacles dungeon
• Fixed some holes in the walls of the blood pinnacles dungeon
• Thurazz only joins the party once
• The Tairach priests rom no longer triggers multiple times
• Empty chests in the blood pinnacles now trigger a corresponding hint

Travel

• When resting on journeys, the console shows which modifiers the camp has
• Fixed a save/load problem on the travel map after displaying scenes
• Fixed a problem with the basilisk event
• Limited the maximum regeneration bonus in nature camps
• Fixed another problem with basilisk event

Combat

• Crowbar, Pickaxe and Shovel can now be used as improvised weapons
• There is now a spiderqueen battle avatar
• All monster portals have been reworked
• Fixed a problem with the end of combat mode
• The initial position of the combat camera is now much more meaningful
• Fixed the Gorger and Arkandor getting stuck
• The loot window after the battle is no longer in "combat mode", so equipment can also be changed
• Ogres were reduced to 2x2 squares and should now have fewer problems when filling battle arenas
• Fixed drawing paths for enemies
• Fixed enemy alignment in autobattle
• Used up throwing weapons and lost weapons are correctly removed from the avatars hand
• Alignment and looking direction was fixed for the heroes
• The bow animation is chosen correctly when using a bow
• Fixed various problems in auto battle with ranged fighters
• NPCs are now using their shield correctly, if they have one
• Corretly show a weapon switch
• Fixed a few lighting problems in battle arenas
• Enemies now cast their Ignifaxius with more than 1-6 damage
• The action display is now correctly updated when the current weapon is switched
• Some probabilities in battle were displayed too high or too low
• Removed unnecessary messages when loading a battle
• The dodging and not the parry value will now be correctly used for remote attack
• Fixed the Ghul avatar getting stuck
• Fixed shield bearers getting their dodge made more difficult for no reason
• Equipped shields are now displayed in the battlearena
• Correctly consider shields in calculating chances
• Fixed a problem with the stagga beatle battle

Modding

• There are now the new modifiers "evade" and "oppEvade" to change the evade value of current character or possible target
• Monsters can now also be defined as being on the heroes side
• Allow to determine the amount by which a check failed
• Script changes update the inventory immediately
• Building events are now correctly overwritten by mods

The Blood Pinnacles Dungeon has been added to the Realms of Arkania: Startrail remake, bringing the current version to 0.81.

With today Update the Blood pinnacles dungeon is finally available, a content extension promising several hours of additional gameplay! Moreover, the trade interface was completely reworked and is immensely more comfortable than before, and of course there were huge amount of bug fixes and feature implementations!

What follows is a long list of additions, changes and fixes. read that by visiting the link.

Also note that the 25% discount on this game in Early Access is still valid for another hour or three.

Startrail HD will likely leave Early Access in May 2017. A character editor will be integrated into the game and it will be possible to import save games from the previous game! -> dev-blog (in German)

Thanks Farflame!

The Early Access version 0.73 of Startrail HD has been released:

Version 0.73, Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays dear Friends! On time for this great time of the year and a little late due to a Steam downtime we are proud to present Version 0.73! Big Highlight of this Version is the completely reworked and enhanced battles, from damage types to maneuvers and actions a lot was changed, extended, improved and fixed. Moreover, we included a little christmas tree search for you, we would be happy to see some screenshots from those you found!

Features

Battle

• The battle system has been changed to "Actions", at the moment everything costs 1 Action, but therefore allows for double the movement distance
• All weapons now have a specific damage type (cut, thrust, blunt)
• Some monsters no have resistance (half damage), immunity (no damage) or vulnerability (double damage) on specific damage types
• Monsters can also cause specific damage types
• Implemented the melee maneuver "relentless attack"
• Implemented the ranged maneuver "targeted shot"
• Melee and ranged attacks now display a chance of success as a tooltip
• Added some buttons to make control of the battles easier
• Improved lighting in some battle arenas
• Added new simple weapons: club and wooden spear
• The battle arena camera can now be tilted in a wider range and can also be tilted now via right mouse button dragging
• Saving and loading is now also possible while in battle
• Items can now modify the damage caused by weapons (e.g. fine arrows or magic items)
• The battle order display (top left corner) was improved and also allows highlighting the next characters when hovering over the respective portrait
• Weapon wear and tear has been reactivated
• Ranged weapons are also subject to wear and tear
• Encumbrance is now also correctly used in ranged battle
• Ranged weapons are now twohanded because of the new bolt and arrow slots
• We can now set specific starting positions for heroes and monsters, e.g. to create battles in narrow passageways

General

• The witch can now enchant her witch kettle, similar to druids and magicians
• there is an introductory text when entering the starting temple on game start
• Help has been extended for current topics on battle actions, maneuvers and the like
• The initial values for spells are more in line with the pen and paper rules
• The avatar in the character screen is not cut off on top any more, should it be too big
• The gameover text has been adapted
• UI scaling can now be modified with the console (F9) command "uibasescane 100" (where 100 is the percentage of the base scaling). Moving this to the settings is on our todo
• "Take all items" now uses the currently selected hero instead of the party leader as "first to try"
• The spell categories have been reorganized and extended
• All 8 possible companions have a unique avatar now
• Some scripting commands have been added or extended
• Save games can now be saved with only one letter filename length (before: 3)
• The whetstone has been renamed to weapon care kit
• Only useful spells can be selected as "free spells"
• Captions of the keyword dialog window have been improved

Travel

• In a new game, the main road through the svellt valley and its main cities are already known
• The ferryman now has a more suitable goodbye

Towns and Cities

• Santa Claus rode across the svellt valley and placed some trees, one per town and city. Who can find them all? ;)
• The market assortments have been reworked
• The keyword dialog for the market in Kvirasim has been improved
• The way up into the settlement in Kvirasim has been improved
• The keyword dialog for the market in Gashok has been improved
• Gashok was a little optimized
• Removed some quest spoilers in Gashok
• Tiefhusen has been completely reworked (e.g. curbs, ground texture) and optimized
• Tiefhusen's water has been improved
• Tiefhusen will now load a lot faster
• The map of Finsterkoppen has been resized
• The gate guards in Finsterkoppen now also react to Elfs, Druids and Witches on the way out

Dungeons

• In the Cellar vault there are now some "very cramped" battles
• The socket riddle in the cellar vault has been made easier and more comfortable
• A climbing riddle in the cellar vault received some more hints
• The Ingerimm-Picture in the Finsterkoppenbinge is now better staged
• A battl ein the Finsterkoppenbinge was improved so all monsters can actually reach the heroes
• Some checks in the Finsterkoppenbinge have been adapted

Bugfixes

Battles

• The characters don't move way too far any more
• The arena mountain-01 was repaired (e.g. Harpy battle)
• Characters are now "correctly killed" from effect damage
• A problem with the line of sight calculation has been fixed
• Beneficial spells do not "kill" the receiving heroes any more
• Characters should be visually killed correctly when they are supposed to
• A problem with heroes not attacking in autobattle was fixed
• Autobattle shouldn't cause characters to try to occupy the same fields any more
• Harpys don't have money on them any more

General

• When selling, Items past position 21 now appear correctly in the sell list
• The intro music now correctly respects music volume
• The hero portrait can be changed correctly again
• The avatar in the character generator is correctly and always changeable now
• A remark to Blade of Destiny has been removed
• Temple cannot be left with empty party any more
• The Wanderer-Set in the Character editor was fixed
• Arrows and bolts are now correctly placed in their respective equipment slots
• The Buy-dialog can now be left without buying anything
• The minimap is now in the correct location regardless of resolution
• All items can now be correctly thrown away
• All items can now be correctly equipped via button
• The gameover-scene now has the correct music
• An overlapping error in the diary has been fixed
• The damage display can now be correctly set
• The take note-Button in the keyword dialogue window now has its correct size
• The gameover screens isn't overlayed by travel routes any more

Travel

• The gameover screen will not display the "continue journey" dialogue any more
• Junctions on the map change their colors correctly
• Events on travels now respect the 35 inventory slots

Towns and Cities

• Jittery NPCs on the roads are fixed
• A stray candle flame in Kvirasim was fixed
• NPCs know their way around Kvirasim again
• More graphical glitches in Kvirasim have been corrected
• Entering the "cellar" of a building when leaving it in Kvirasim was fixed
• The mountainside of Finsterkoppen lost its acoustic birds
• Missing doors in Finsterkoppen retrofitted
• A flying tower in Finsterkoppen has been brought back down to earth
• Barrels in Finsterkoppen are now correctly recognized as obstacles by the NPCs
• "Flights" above Finsterkoppen shouldn't happen any more
• A rooftop in Finsterkoppen was closed off
• Several flying objects in Finsterkoppen were brought back down to earth
• Two carts in Finsterkoppen are now correctly blocking
• Female dwarfs don't have the occasional bald head any more
• Houses in Finsterkoppen are now actually obstacles
• Lighting in Tiefhusen has been improved
• A flying tower in Tiefhusen was brought back down to earth
• The optimizations in Gashok should prevent further crashes
• A dead end on a Gashok Quest was removed
• Small graphical glitches in Taverns were fixed
• Lighting of the Rahja temple has been reworked

Dungeons

• Events in Dungeons only trigger once on exit any more
• The party marker in dungeons now always has the correct size
• Wrong colors on the color box riddle in the Cellar vault were fixed
• A secret door in the Cellar vault is now easier to find
• An XP-Exploit at the socket riddle in the Cellar vault was fixed
• Deactivated bolt traps in the Finsterkoppenbinge are now only reported once
• Many jumpy elements in the Finsterkoppenbinge were fixed
• Texture glitches in the Finsterkoppenbinge were fixed
• Some inaccessable areas in the Finsterkoppenbinge were better fenced off
• Some collision bugs in the Finsterkoppenbinge were fixed
• Some graphical glitches in the Finsterkoppenbinge were fixed
• A chest in the Finsterkoppenbinge was turned around
• A dialog in the Finsterkoppenbinge was fixed

Unfortunately there is a little downside to this really long list: we were unable to get all the new texts translated in time, so you might encounter several "untranslated codes" instead of texts. We are sorry for this inconvenience and will try hard to get this down first thing in January and issue a patch as soon as it is done!

The whole team wishes you happy holidays and a happy new year! The next major Patch will be coming up around the 20th of January.

Farflame spotted that the Early Access version of Startrail comes along with five well made remastered music tunes. You can find german update notes for version 0.71 here.

The remake of Realms of Arkania: Star Trail will be available as Early Access version on November 10:

The united orc tribes attempted to invade the region of Thorwal, but a group of valiant adventurers thwarted their plans during their previous quest. Now the orcs have regrouped and attacked other, more vulnerable areas – Lowangen is occupied and half the Svellt Valley lies in ashes. An elf ambassador summons the party to the city of Kvirasim. To unite the races of the elves and the dwarves in the struggle against a common enemy, they must recover an artifact known as the Salamander Stone.

Yet not all is as simple as it seems: As the party approaches an abandoned dwarven mine that may hold the answers to their questions, someone else makes it clear that not everyone in the country favors a cooperation between the two races.

Star Trail is a faithful remake of Realms of Arkania’s classic sequel. This hardcore RPG features dozens of talents and spells, distinct races and character classes as well as a challenging isometric turn-based combat system. Obey your orders and succeed in your quest to retrieve the Salamander stone – the peace between elves and dwarves depends on it!

KEY FEATURES:

• Hardcore RPG with isometric turn-based tactical fights
• Hand-crafted cities and dungeons to explore in first person view
• Master dozens of talents including fighting and magical skills
• Meet countless endearing characters within the lovingly detailed cities and villages
• Create your characters and manage your party
• Plan your extensive travels through the realm in detail
• Based on the TDE ruleset as a hybrid between v3 and v4

The Early Access version of Realms of Arkania II: Startrail HD will be available in Q4 2016. Farflame spotted some pictures of a dwarfen mine called 'Finsterkoppenbinge' -
take a look here.

Crafty Studios released a few more screenshots of their Startrail remake -> link

Thank you for the info, Kordanor!

Farflame spotted a new blog post (in German) for Startrail HD:

Short summary:

• they learned a lot in the past so development process is different for Star Trail HD
• they brought to alpha team few enthusiasts who helped find bugs in Sword of Destiny HD. They test, discuss and suggest improvements
• modding in Star Trail HD should be more intuitive and powerfull, thanks to suggestions
• modding feature - "location-based trigger" for events in dungeons now available for cities and villages, too
• they have fully automated server that makes new builds for alpha testers daily
• they already implemented travel map that displays known and traveled roads
• implemented many road + city events
• implemented keyword dialogue system
• implemented and refined Gashok quest
• implemented all items
• magical weapons/armos have stories in description text
• new extended texts for elves, dwarves and gods in temples

Farflame spotted the new map of Startrail HD:

Info:

New routes can be discovered or you learn about them in your travels.

A route editor to create new routes is build into the game!

The devs of Startrail HD are experimenting with a new self written character-editor for unity - here are the results (article is written in German).

Thanks Farflame!

Kordanor spotted and translated two FAQ-blog-entries for Realms of Arkania II: Startrail HD:

On the 5th of November Crafty Studius announced that they continue working on Startrail HD, the next chapter of the Realms of Arkania Trilogy.
Back then they mentioned that it's based on the patched version of Blade of Destiny HD but also that some elements like character models will be reworked.

Now they released two FAQ blog entries. As they are German only here are some shortened summaries:

Part 1:
…bug free would be nice
They are aware that the release of Blade of Destiny was quite bad and they don't want to repeat it.
They think they can achieve that by already having a better base to work on and a group of beta testers which also significantly helped with the last patches (some of the patch content was indeed from the community).
In addition they will also have an open early access phase.

What is going to change with the Combat System?
They will overhaul big parts of the combat including new animations. More details will follow.

When will Early Access start and when will the game release?
They estimate that EA will start in summer 2016. Neither price nor exact dates are set in stone yet. Release is planned for 3rd quarter 2016.

Part 2:
Will you be able to import your party from Blade of Destiny?
It's being discussed a lot, but the general answer is yes. But as Blade of Destiny has more content than the original game from 1992 and also gave more Experience Points, new characters will start on level 5 this time and will rise to 6 shortly after start of the game.
As XP are decreasing the higher you are compared to your opponents, new parties will catch up quite fast.

Will you be able to enter the settlements which you couldn't in the original?
Yes. You will be enter all settlements. To visualize it they will take lore from existing DSA rulebooks.

Will you have a log-book again?
Yes. They will also implement some comfort functions like a search for text strings in dialogues. You will also be able to make notes on maps.

Will Startrail be moddable?
Yes. And even more than Blade of Destiny. Also thanks to the new version of the unity engine.

Will you implement the improvements to Blade of Destiny as well?
No definite answer yet. "Maybe". First they plan on make Startrail to the best experience possible. After that they will check if they can implement improvements to Blade of Destiny. But if it happens it will definitely be after release of Star Trail.