Witchfire

[Asian tech support]

It has released in early access.
Which is weird because I could have sworn it was out on Epic for quite a while now, does EGS have its own Early Access equivalent?

They pay retard developers for timed exclusivity. Some times it's early access, sometimes it's a full release. This has happened quite a few times. Off the top of my head I can list Darkest Dungeon 2, Metro Exodus, and Borderlands 3.

 

[Douglas Mortimer]

They should have aimed for the 20 dollar sweet spot introducing it to Steam. Terrible choice on the devs part considering it's still EA.

 

[BiggestKai]

Copy pasting my post from /v/.

It's mediocre. It's not purely Soulslike but it's enough to make for a not so good FPS, and painkiller this isn't.
>stamina bar with the big combat gimmick is that if you dash while looking at an enemy, they spawn this weak point that stuns them if you shoot it. This only happens if you haven't taken damage for a while and your stamina bar is yellow.
>Magic("Witchfire") bar that regens when you kill enemies and pick up their stuff. Is ok but so far the two spells I've unlocked(lightning and a fire attack) are really, really weak. Like the magic spells from Graven weak.
>The one map I've entered is large and mostly empty outside of the "Dangerous areas" marked on the map, which have 4(the regular dangerous areas) or around 12 or so(the highly dangerous areas) enemies. This is the part I dislike the most and is making me refund it because there's no real level design to combat encounters and enemies on their own are not that much fun to fight.
>Enemies are slow, a bit on the tanky side. They would be fun to fight in larger quantities but again this isn't like Painkiller, more like Souls so it just doesn't mesh right.
>It also has some extraction elements, you finish an island and get out or you die and lose your shit and have to go back to your grave and pick them up again. You have your main base where you upgrade stats(health and stamina and witchfire), unlock perks for your weapons spells after you've used them enough or done some other requirement or research new weapons/spells/dunno what else.

It's interesting where I kind of want to see where it goes but what I've played didn't grab me at all.

 

[ZMOT]

Some retard will definitetly pornify the characters , causing a mass wave of retardation as degenerate fucks climb out of the woodworks to say how much they want to fuck the disgusting rotten skeletal ghoul enemies.

rule 34 mate...

Which is weird because I could have sworn it was out on Epic for quite a while now, does EGS have its own Early Access equivalent?

EGS is "early access: the store" basically.

 

[30+GameOvers]

Copy pasting my post from /v/.

It's mediocre. It's not purely Soulslike but it's enough to make for a not so good FPS, and painkiller this isn't.
>stamina bar with the big combat gimmick is that if you dash while looking at an enemy, they spawn this weak point that stuns them if you shoot it. This only happens if you haven't taken damage for a while and your stamina bar is yellow.
>Magic("Witchfire") bar that regens when you kill enemies and pick up their stuff. Is ok but so far the two spells I've unlocked(lightning and a fire attack) are really, really weak. Like the magic spells from Graven weak.
>The one map I've entered is large and mostly empty outside of the "Dangerous areas" marked on the map, which have 4(the regular dangerous areas) or around 12 or so(the highly dangerous areas) enemies. This is the part I dislike the most and is making me refund it because there's no real level design to combat encounters and enemies on their own are not that much fun to fight.
>Enemies are slow, a bit on the tanky side. They would be fun to fight in larger quantities but again this isn't like Painkiller, more like Souls so it just doesn't mesh right.
>It also has some extraction elements, you finish an island and get out or you die and lose your shit and have to go back to your grave and pick them up again. You have your main base where you upgrade stats(health and stamina and witchfire), unlock perks for your weapons spells after you've used them enough or done some other requirement or research new weapons/spells/dunno what else.

It's interesting where I kind of want to see where it goes but what I've played didn't grab me at all.

It still sounds fun, or at least like my cup of tea. I hope they iron things out in the future, might not be where it's supposed to be right now.

 

[Asian tech support]

Additional thoughts and information:

• The stamina bar is genuinely a bad inclusion. I get that they're going for this hybrid RPG experience but it's only an RPG in the sense that there are attributes. Same with the soulslike nonsense; it's only a "soulslike" in the sense that there's a bloodstain. Ditching the stamina bar/attribute in favor of faster enemies would IMO be the way to go.
• The first zone is the tutorial. The enemies are few and there's only one extra encounter which you have to clear the first zone to access anyway. Seriously, all you have to do is find every obelisk thing, clear each enemy encounter, and kill the elites at the gate to the objective. Shouldn't take longer than 20-25 minutes unless you suck. It's not worth getting bogged down over this.
• Clearing an encounter gives a "arcana" which is basically just a bog standard roguelite perk/boon/whatever. Some are good, some are useless.
• The second zone is where things get spiced up. Enemies are more numerous, (some) encounters blend into each other, there are roaming bosses, there are a bunch of other random events that trip the ritual, etc.
• I don't understand the ritual as I've never survived it but I have escaped it. I think killing bosses and interacting with events trips it but other things can too and I'm not sure what. One time it spawned a ton of suicide bomber ghosts but the other time it didn't really do anything besides drain sanity (when your sanity zeroes, you take a ton of damage).
• The game can get chaotic quickly if you get cocky or ahead of yourself. This is when it gets fun and the Painkiller pokes its nose out.
• Healing is mega scarce. There are poison mushrooms in the second zone that heal you a little but flask drops are too rare to be counted on.
• The game is not a looter shooter or at the very least I don't see how it is. Weapons are unlocked by research (clearing objectives/spending time in game) but you can pay gold to accelerate the process. From what I can tell, the only things you lose on death is your souls (witchfire) and any unconverted cursed objects (these become gold when extracting). The couple of trinkets and doodads I died with came with me when loading back into the hub.
• Weapons have three upgrades, each requiring a number of kills and some other crap. These are substantial upgrades and can absolutely make a weapon. My favorite is the painkiller stake gun (deals bonus damage to stunned enemies) plus the stun spell. The stake gun is true to its predecessor and pins niggas to objects. Bonus points if the player gets a rate of fire arcana.
• Since everything upgrades and needs a ton of kills at the bare minimum, it's a grindy game.

@30+GameOvers this game is absolutely not worth $40 but what's there is mostly ok. The stamina shit is really the worst aspect. They said it was gonna be $40 when it leaves early access so there isn't even any savings to be had purchasing it early.

 

[CreamyHerman’s]

I've decided to pick up the game last week, and I have to say, there is a lot that I dig here after 18 hours:

• Stamina bar is a bad idea, but if you decide to dump points into it, it does become manageable and some of the events do play into Stamina (They should allow you to air dash though)
• Some people are correct that the first area is the tutorial, there's more to it than that, especially if you solve the tower riddle and descend into the tower to grab prophecies(This will allow you to control aspects of what you can get with Arcana)
• Second zone is where the game introduces most of the core mechanics, and yeah it can get pretty hectic. The witch can spy on you and your luck can play a role in how things play out for you in a run with this map.
• Healing is hard initially, but if you level up your luck enemies can drop a ton of elixirs as well. There is a Arcana perk as well that will grant a 20% drop on Elixirs as well, as well as beating calamities.
• Most of the weapons are amazing. My personal favorites are the shotgun that shoots explosive pellets(3 if you land critical) that induce burn damage, the stakegun, and ricochet(rifle that allows bullets to bounce into other enemies). There's a sniper rifle that does insane damage, but it will eat at your stamina. 2 out of the 3 demonic weapons are very fun as well, though I would say stick with the crossbow as that allows damage to bounce around and clear out areas as well.
• The spells are extremely fun, especially the electric ones. Ricochet can synergize with the electric ones and you can cause insane damage with it.

I would recommend picking it up when they add more regions, though for me I am definitely enjoying my time and am looking forward to going deeper into the tower.

 

[Asian tech support]

(They should allow you to air dash though)

There's actually a ring that lets you do that. Seeing as in the future there will likely be perks associated with stat tiers, air dashing should be there, rather than on a piece of equipment.

I spent a few more hours with it this weekend and cleared the second map's boss. Had to use the ricochet and the midas. I ran out of ammo using anything else. Also went back into the tower basement on the first map but dipped after getting jumped by sanity draining monks. I'm going to assume there's a boss or puzzle of some kind at the bottom but I'm definitely underprepared.
So far my favorite weapons have been hatred (ace of spades from destiny), the basilisk (burning sniper rifle), and the midas (burning smg with an overheat mechanic). Been coupling those with the iron cross and either the cone of cold or fireball spells. Fire and lightning make explosions and on top of that the lightning arc fetish item combos super well with high rate of fire guns.
At some point when I finish what's currently in game I'll make an effortpost detailing and dumping a much info as much as I possibly can. Information on this game is scarce.

 

[CreamyHerman’s]

At some point when I finish what's currently in game I'll make an effortpost detailing and dumping a much info as much as I possibly can.

That would be Kino, I'm still trying to figure out the prayer's echos and what they do. Also this game runs pretty well on the Steam Deck, I can surprisingly eek out roughly 4 hours of battery life

 

[Asian tech support]

I'm still trying to figure out the prayer's echos and what they do.

This isn't exactly straightforward. Echoes are used to both strengthen the flame altar as well as activate the fallen prayer shade things. It costs the base 50 to activate the shade but you need all three corresponding mask shards to actually make it do anything. Each map has a trifecta. I've found one set that I'm pretty sure came from the second map but I'm not 100% certain. Regardless, fully activating a shade gives a passive bonus and has an active component too. Since the echoes don't drop on death, I'd say make sure to only bother activating the shade thing if you have all three shards. I fucked up and activated one where I didn't have any of the shards, wasting 50 echoes.

 

[Preacher ✝]

I've played

I've decided to pick up the game

I spent a few more hours with it

Any chance y'all could shed some light on my concerns:

Personally I'll also want to know how it handles theology, and if the Church has more significant role than just set dressing.

As for gameplay, I'll reserve final judgement for after I've taken the time to look at footage, but the extraction shooter genre isn't really my style to begin with so any interest I might have will heavily depend on those answers.

 

[Asian tech support]

Any chance y'all could shed some light on my concerns

Sure. The Church is just set dressing, or at least it is currently. As it stands in game, the Church is the player's armorer.
According to the devs' website, the story hasn't been implemented yet, though that comes from a page about the roadmap which I personally don't hold any stock in. Most of what's told to the player about the Church comes from item descriptions. We do know that using magic is blasphemy and the player was imprisoned for that crime, though the Church is not above making use of magic users or even witches for their own ends. Apparently, this is a contentious course of action.
The player is not an exorcist or priest or other man of the cloth. The player is arguably no better than a witch, the only difference being that the player seeks to repent.

 

[BiggestKai]

Any chance y'all could shed some light on my concerns:
-on theology-

I really would not know, it felt to me like just a cool backdrop for the setting. Witches are bitches, you're like the inquisition but the elite(and also you have witchfire™ in you which gives you powers) group of witch hunters. Your spells are artifacts and rings and whatnot that you pour witchfire in, and the meta progression stat for unlocking new story/gameplay/whatever items is called Gnosticism or Gnosis or something along those lines.

0/10 did not have Noah's Ark 3d bible quote quizzes.

 

[Preacher ✝]

The Church is just set dressing, or at least it is currently.

Gnosticism or Gnosis or something along those lines.

Thats disappointing but not surprising.

Someday we might get a game where the Church is accurately portrayed in its full glory.

The second quote is particularly bad if it's Gnosticism as that's a heresy, but if it's Gnosis that just means knowledge so I'm hoping it's the latter.

Maybe then they can really fill in a lot with the story but that's optimistic.

 

[Asian tech support]

The second quote is particularly bad if it's Gnosticism as that's a heresy, but if it's Gnosis that just means knowledge so I'm hoping it's the latter.

In this case, it's Gnosis, not Gnosticism. The mechanic presented as the player character obtaining arcane knowledge. With each level of Gnosis, the game becomes harder: new enemies appear, unseen objects become visible, closed doors are open, etc.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole 2]

It's mediocre. It's not purely Soulslike but it's enough to make for a not so good FPS, and painkiller this isn't.

Painkiller was an accident. They made something really good, partially, but they didn't understand what they had or what was good about it which can be felt in half* the levels.

*haven't played it in 10 years but there are truly stellar levels with a flow that makes the game shine like a million candles and then there's the rest of the levels.

 

[Romeo]

The anticipated October fix patch is out.

---

Patch notes - 0.4.5.56088​

Link | Archive

Here are the biggest ones.

• New area, new Faithful, and two new events were added to the Wailing Tower.
• Hangfire got nerfed hard. (subsequent explosions to the same enemy gradually do less damage)
• Unveiling new arcana now costs 1 feather instead of 2.
• Experimental: Spell notifiers added to crosshairs (can be turned in Settings -> Gameplay -> Experimental)

---

Devblog - When Players Have Your Back: Witchfire's Steam Story​

Link | Archive



Good devblog by head developer Adrian Chmielarz on dealing with Steam reviews to a game, include those that are negative reviews but are also not constructive criticism. The devs highlighted a review that they liked a lot where a guy pirated the game, then bought it when he finally got a credit card, and suggested a early-access exclusive DLC (devs rejected this idea) just so he can support the devs more.

---

The Hangfire is now pretty being garbage against Familiars now. I was struggling to fight the Prophet and I realized the Hangfire barely does any damage. Resorted to using the Hunger in the next run, and I was able to blast the Prophet away.

 

[Asian tech support]

I've finished everything available, including running the prophet for all available prophecies. For the sake of brevity and not sounding like a fag, I've scrapped my promised effortpost at least until there's enough of a game to merit it. There's not that much content, even if it's indecipherable. The game has been out for six weeks and the information has proliferated. What I had came out looking like the wiki and at that point one might as well just read the wiki. Still, if anyone in the future is curious about anything, ping me and I'll answer.

 

[Intensening Rapeye]

What's the best early doors load out (I'm Gnosis 1, level 24) and finding it tough. Even the sailor dude from the first map is a challenge; its also one the few games that if I die and leave behind a ton of witchfire I need to put the game down for a bit so I don't tilt.

 

[Asian tech support]

What's the best early doors load out (I'm Gnosis 1, level 24) and finding it tough. Even the sailor dude from the first map is a challenge; its also one the few games that if I die and leave behind a ton of witchfire I need to put the game down for a bit so I don't tilt.

The cricket (machine pistol) is very strong without upgrading, same with the hunger revolver. Firebreath and frost cone paired with iron cross can carry you through the early game (you can't get the burning stake until the castle - it's the best spell imo). Elemental effects need to be combined for any real value. Are you getting hung up on the Shieldbreaker boss or are you still on the first map? The best advice I can give for early early is to get used to dashing backwards with the enemy in your sights to expose the red orb things. Break those and they get stunned and take a ton of bonus damage.