@Max_Jones I’ll need more information. What exactly is wrong? What isn’t working? If the game isn’t even opening, it might be something with your browser.
All I get is this when I click on the link and I did think maybe it was a problem on my end but other WIP links work just fine.
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Try it on a different browser, see if that makes a difference.
The link works just fine for me on Chrome for example.
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Weirdly it works now after I removed nordVPN as my PC’s proxy don’t know why that’s happening as other WIP links work fine as I said already.
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I liked the story the baby dragon is the highlight, the characters are interesting can’t wait to see what comes next.
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Holy fuck.
@Dariel I absolutely adored your last work, and now you’re making a Western fantasy game?
Praise the gods. Christmas has truly come early.
Expect me to be all over this, cheering you on and whatnot.
Good luck!
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@Lucha_Markre Thank you! When you say “last work”, do you mean The Hidden Sanctum or Temple of Endless Night? I’m glad you liked it, regardless of which one it was!
And I hope you keep enjoying this one! 
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Temple of Endless Night! Still among my absolute favorites.
@Dariel My first feedback!
The atmosphere is wonderful. The game maintains a consistent sense of fantastical wonder. It doesn’t explain every tidbit at once, it leaves room for you to make notes and ask questions. It leaves room for you to digest the lore and have fun thinking of the possibilities. It’s like a DnD campaign session where the DM paces everything extremely well and lets the story flow very naturally without infodumping all his cool ideas all at once.
The opening act introduced us to the world well, and never once dragged on. The character creation is woven adeptly into the storytelling, and the mystery surrounding our mother was a breath of fresh air amid a myriad of games with loving, perfect parents. I’m interested to see where that thread goes, and I enjoyed the touch of taking after our late father. I was a little let down that the cave contained no real threat or challenge, but it was fun to explore and featured plenty of beloved Western fantasy tropes that scratch the itch early and let you know you’re in the right place, from hidden levers for locked doors to loot to dark paths to falling rocks to a talking magical artifact to the ominous, serene, magical forest, there’s plenty to recognize and enjoy here for the more hardcore fans of the classic stuff.
The lore itself is inspired and intelligently lied out. From the unique, charming races that each offer their own authorial spin, to the numerous, well-written passages on the world, to the references to the outer realm from characters, everything down to the naming style of the fictional places feels right at home and all roll right off the tongue. It’s clearly all written by a fellow fan of the genre.
There is not a single bad character so far. Each one is endearing or even amusing in their own right. My favorite so far is Cerina. She comes across as cute without being creepy; an awkward, shy hopeless romantic who definitely knows way more than she lets on. You can tell she’s been crushing on us hard for a long time. In my opinion, it’s fairly obvious she’s the cat. And that could not be more perfect.
The baby dragon is definitely the best so far, though, objectively. His dialogue and hilarity quickly won my character over, and I found myself calling on his aid even when I didn’t need to. The festival was a fantastic way to give us some fun, magical scenes with the egg before it hatches.
Speaking of that, the most well-written scene in the current demo is the very last page of Chapter 1. What a genuinely great fucking example of writing. The tension, the build up action, the slight panic, all culminate into an extremely epic reveal that had me cheering like an excited fan at a wrestling event. The moment the egg cracked, I knew something was happening, and I was not left disappointed by the end of my first playthrough. A perfect end to a thoroughly enjoyable first chapter that only gets me pumped for more. That being said, the human undead has a distinct lack of description, which really could have added to the scene.
Now on to the negatives.
I don’t recall having this problem in The Temple of Endless Night, but the dialogue feels…off. For the most part, the characters have well fleshed out personalities and quirks, but the heavy overuse of conversational questioning breaks the flow and immersion several times. Whether I’m being asked why I don’t remember something, or a character awkwardly calls out out my apparent ignorance of a certain topic, certain scenes paint my character as constantly aloof or misguided, and, as the player, it only serves to be a minor annoyance. This is either a tool to explain why our characters are asking questions they should know the answer too, or it is a real life habit of the author during conversations. Either way, it is definitely used way too much, and deserves a comb through to smooth out some of the dialogue between the PC and the others.
Options involving the grandmother. It feels like we have a small lack of agency regarding how to regard and even interact with this character. I was planning to play an emotionally distant grandson who partly blames her for the disappearance of his mother, thus resulting in him having a level of disrespect and even anger towards her, and, instead, I found myself being a tiny bit railroaded towards being an obedient descendant who did not want to step on her toes, even when many secrets are clearly being held between us, and my character is still in the adolescent stage. I simply feel like there should be more player agency here to define our relationship with on a deeper level, one that better fits the tragic mysteries around the family.
Now, onto some questions I had after playing:
- What are your plans for weapons?
- How big will racial traits play into choices?
- Exactly how will learning magic and spells specifically be implemented?
- Will our dragon reach full maturity in this book?
- Will we be able to have other animal companions along with the dragon?
- Will we be able to choose our party at certain points?
- What’s your biggest inspiration for this story?
- Can we pet the dragon ever? If not, why are you choosing to be evil?
That is all I have for now. Thank you!
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@Lucha_Markre Thank you for the feedback! I read it a few times over the last week, and it’s given me a lot to think about. Nothing bad, so don’t worry. I’m paying closer attention to dialogues in Chapter 2 (let’s hope they feel more natural), and I will likely change some of the ones present in Chapter 1.
As for Grandma Telana, I thought I included a lot of options to be mean or distant, but I may have slipped in the paragraphs that described MC’s thoughts outside of choices. Thanks for telling me about that!
Now, I’m not going to respond to the compliments, as that would make me feel quite strange, but let me just say that I appreciate all of them, and they made me feel really good as an author.
Onto the questions, then.
What are your plans for weapons?
There are three weapon types available (swords, bows, and staffs), and your character has to choose one of them to use in combat. Even if you want to use purely magic in the future, you still have to have a primary weapon. There will be some unique weapons available throughout the game, and the first ones will appear in Chapter 3.
How big will racial traits play into choices?
Racial traits are currently one of my main concerns. Chapter 1 was filled with unique interactions for Ciriennian Elves (because Valdahne is a Ciriennian festival), and I added unique paragraphs for the Crystal Elves just this afternoon. There are also two unique moments for the Sunborn (one of them is near the end of Chapter 1).
The Unliving also get significant attribute bonuses whenever one of their attributes rises. (extra +1) I would like to have interactions like these for all races, but they will need to make sense. That’s why they won’t be equal in every chapter. For example, it makes sense for Ciriennian Elves to have the most content during a Ciriennian festival.
Exactly how will learning magic and spells specifically be implemented?
You’ll be able to buy (or get) magic scrolls in Chapter 2, and you can learn dyen magic around the middle section of the game (Chapter 5). For scrolls, there are five types (fire, ice, lightning, change, summoning), and they can be used to basically do something. If you have a scroll of fire, you can cast a fire bolt, etc. Or you could light a candle. “Spells” will be broader than “light a candle” or “shoot a ray of fire at a chosen target”.
Scrolls will come in different sizes (lesser, regular, greater), and the size will determine what you’ll be able to do. The same thing will apply to actual spells later in the game. I’m currently considering adding magic seals that would give you access to stronger spells (1st seal=firebolt, 2nd seal=fireball, 3rd seal=fire wall). I haven’t made that decision yet, tho.
Primal Magic will be more situational, and you’ll be getting specific options. Primal Magic will basically mean interacting with the Elder Tapestry.
Divine Names are a late game thing that will only be available to people who did NOT use dyen. There will be a quest to get rid of your connection to dyen if you did use it. (Just to be clear, dyen isn’t bad or evil. It just isn’t seen as okay by those who can tell you about the Divine Names)
Will our dragon reach full maturity in this book?
It will be explained in the story, but Astra/Asteria will not turn into a large creature, which also means we won’t be able to fly on/with them.
Will we be able to have other animal companions along with the dragon?
There will be mounts in future installments, and one of the potential companions and ROs will have their own animal companion. And there will also be a talking cow at some point, but that’s just because I really need to have some Egyptian connection…
Will we be able to choose our party at certain points?
Absolutely! That was one of my main ideas behind this game, and it’s also going to be one of the most annoying things to code…But I’m actually quite excited about it!
What’s your biggest inspiration for this story?
In terms of my general concept? I think I have a post about that on Patreon, but I can write the basic ideas here as well. The main goal was for the game to be more interactive than anything I’ve written before. I wanted to write more by using fewer words and to have less text in-between choices.
I wanted the game to be more interactive, to have more options, and to have meaningful stats. I had no real stats in The Hidden Sanctum, and I felt like something was kind of missing at times.
I also wanted to have more flexible romance options, and that’s why there are six romances, and five of them should be available to all MCs (as you can choose the gender). The last romance is something I wanted to write for quite a while (both in general, and for myself), and it happens to be a gay storyline.
The last three ideas are the journal system, the quest system, and the companion system, and all of these are taken from one of my previous projects that gave the basis for this one.
In terms of what other games inspired me? I think I’m mostly inspired by Baldur’s Gate 1-3, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, Gothic 1-2, Dragon Age 1-3 (mostly 1, tho), Pillars of Eternity (mostly 1), and by The Elder Scrolls (Morrowind and Skyrim).
Can we pet the dragon ever? If not, why are you choosing to be evil?
I think it was possible to pet or cuddle with them in Chapter 1? 
@Custodes There will be 6 romances in the game. 5 will be male or female, and one male only. Four of them appear in Chapter 1. Another one appears at the end of Chapter 2, and the last one is working behind the scenes during the first few chapters.
@SpanishBrEaD I’ve already commissioned portraits for all of the LIs for TEC (I mentioned it in the main post under CHARACTER ART), and the first one will be coming very soon (Amedu/a). You are more than welcome to draw fan art, tho! I’m happy to hear you liked the game enough to even consider it!
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Will you be adding more romances
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@Custodes If he adds to many romantic options they will all have less focus I think the ones we have are enough in my opinion More options mean less focus but not enough ain’t good ether I think this story has a good amount
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Can I make portraits for 1 of ur char? U can check out my twitter @koffitart I mean fan art at least 
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PROGRESS UPDATE
I’m back with a bit of a progress update. I know I’ve been rather quiet in the last few weeks, especially if you exclude answering asks, and there were two reasons for that. First, I didn’t have any big news for you, as I’m still working on Chapter 2, and second, I had a dry week last week, and I didn’t make much progress in terms of adding actual words to the game. (5k instead of 10k)
The total word count for The Elder Crystals is about 64.000 words, but you can add another 3000 if you count the journal.
CHAPTER 2 CHANGES & STRUCTURE
When it comes to structure, Chapter 2 will be much wider than the first one, and you will get two sequences of slots that will lead you to a couple of mandatory scenes, which will then lead you to the end of the chapter. In practice, it will look like this:
- You get a scene with Grandma Telana and Astra/Asteria.
- You have a day and four empty slots, and you can choose what you want to do with these slots. Each slot leads to a different scene, and these are already available in the alpha build. There are ten possible scenes. This is also where you unlock crafting skills.
- The day ends, and the next two days remove a certain restriction that was put in place for the previous sequence.
- Another sequence takes place, and you get two days with two slots per day. These slots lead to longer scenes that might lead to side quests, which can then lead to the first romance scenes.
- The first romance scenes for N, A, C, and D, happen in these slots. (If you miss the scene with your chosen LI, you will still be able to start a romance later.)
- One of the side quests will let you use magic for the first time.
- After these four slots, there will be a scene that will introduce a new love interest and that scene will lead to another scene that will close the chapter and set the stage for Chapter 3.
When it comes to other changes, the update will include more racial interactions. Ciriennian Elves had plenty in Chapter 1, but I recently added some for the Crystal Elves and the Unliving. Also extra bits for the Sunborn. And there will be more!
PATREON UPDATE
Currently, the alpha build includes the first portion of Chapter 2, and that means the first scene with Grandma Telana, the first sequence, and the first slot that leads to a side quest and an optional romance scene with Darion/Daria. The second slot with another side quest and a romance scene for N will be added next week.
There’s also some extra content.
There are lore posts about dragons, love interests, magic, and winter festivals on Sekherion, there’s a childhood flashback for Cerien/ina, and there’s also a post about plans and goals for TEC.
CHAPTER 2 DEMO UPDATE
I should be able to reach about 40-45% of Chapter 2 in December, and that means I might be able to finish it around the third week of January. If that’s the case, the update for the demo will come near the end of the month.
Happy Holidays!
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So will our baby dragon grow up a bit in this story? Also can we get a chance to learn about dragons
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Thank you for the joy and inspiration!
I honestly hope the khopesh returns! Suited my spellsword of Sekhmet perfectly, and in my opinion, is a very underrepresented blade. I’ve just been inspired to make a DnD character who wields an enchanted, flaming one.
Of course, mages should get more love since this title is high fantasy, after all. A crystal magic staff would be cool. Something like a Staff of Dyen that allows you to cast a small range of lower-level dyen spells.
Well, my favorite so far is definitely the Vandrelians. Being a Vandrelian/Elf hybrid is a really enjoyable combination, as Elves are my overall favorite fantasy race to play as. I’ve never thought of a Half-Elf/Half-Orc character before. Just the visual of that is intriguing. You’ve done remarkably well with the races. I’ll post art of my character sometime. He has bright violet eyes that I’m imagining come from innate magical power thanks to his mother.
I’m a sucker for classic magic, so to see that you’re planning on tackling that but with your own unique flair is super exciting. The magic in Endless Night was wondrous and each spell description was completely different from the rest, you really nailed the imaginative aesthetic and mysticism of what it should be, in my opinion.
Are these “seals” runes? If so, that would add a nice bit of variety with both the system and specific choices of spells. The stronger the rune, the stronger the spell variation. You could even implement a spellbook section in the stats screen for us to peek at our arsenal and remind of what each spell and level does. For example:
Spellbook
(1st Seal): Crimson Shock: you touch a creature, and they are momentarily electrified with magical red lightning that courses through their body.
(2nd Seal): Crimson Bolt: you hurl a spear of magical red lightning at a creature. It is stunned and electrified for several seconds. Any other creatures within five feet are effected too, through chain lightning.
(3rd Seal): Crimson Tempest: you summon an ominous and enormous black cloud that crackles with red electricity. You point at a creature and a great magical streak of red lightning crashes down onto the target.
And et cetera.
The seals would be especially fun for summoning spells, especially.
(1st Seal): Summon Wisp.
(2nd Seal): Summon Phantasm.
(3rd Seal): Summon Reaper.
I, for one, can’t wait to see how you let us upcast different things, if you go that route.
Aw, gotcha. Well then, time to make mine purple and picture it as a Havoc Dragon from Pathfinder: WoTR! Hell yeah.
I already know my permanent combination, I think. Two mages (my OC and Cerina), the monk, and the noble archer (if you allow 4)! If I recall correctly, Not Your Mother’s Shire by @dwsnee contains this feature, and it can add so much to replayability.
Ah, I see. All the right stuff, then! 
Huh. Can’t find the option. I know it won’t be the only time, anyways. Getting to feed a dragon egg dark chocolate was pretty wholesome. I noticed the original blurb for the game listed customizing the dragon as a sort of feature in and of itself…does this mean we will get to specify more details later on? Kinda sounds like he grows at least a little bit, @Christopher_Bull!
The art adds so much, I’m excited to hear you’re giving it a go for this piece. Can’t wait to draw mine.
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PROGRESS UPDATE
I’m about 55% done with Chapter 2, and I still plan to have the chapter ready by the end of January (I updated the word count in the main post), but this isn’t the biggest news I have. The news is that the first official portrait for TEC is ready, and it’s for the male version of the Astronomer. I’m going to add the portrait here, as well as in the first post. The artist’s name is Izabela Oliwia, and she’s the same person that made the logo for both The Hidden Sanctum and The Elder Crystals.
ARTIST: Izabela Oliwia
The alpha build just hit 80.000 words and Chapter 2 is a bit over 40.000, which is already more than Chapter 1. And I still have a few pretty long scenes left to write!
Chapter 2 is already over 52.200 words long, and I have about 8.000 words left to write. I can also tell you that we already have 101 choices in Chapter 2. Chapter 1 had 95, and some of them were for CC.
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CHAPTER 2 is out!
NEW IN CHAPTER 2
- 60.000 words of new content, excluding code. 114 choices!
- More racial reactivity (something for every race).
- First romance scenes for 5 ROs.
- First option(s) to use magic.
- Enchanting, crafting, and alchemy.
- Overhaul of scrolls, potions, and powders.
- Option to meet one of the gods.
- 4 (5) side quests.
- 4 new achievements.
- Journal entries for all quests (side, main, companion).
The first portion of Chapter 3 will be available on my Patreon in the first full week of February. A detailed list of race-oriented reactions and options is available in one of the posts there, as well.
I hope you enjoy the new chapter!
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The day where we can read doesn’t seem to include the options to read the books we bought.
I know I wasn’t given the option to read the book of the elvish language, and I’m not sure about the book of magic we bought.
Was that thing about magical barriers supposed to be the book we bought in the bookstore or something else?
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@stsword This isn’t a bug. I meant for it to work like this. There are no actual (full-length) books in the game. The paragraph you get when you buy the book is the actual book in terms of gameplay. You can (should be able to) see all those book fragments in your journal, as well.
The options at the beginning of Chapter 2 simply add more titles to your library, and you need to unlock a certain number of books (overall) to unlock some hidden scenes near the end of the game.
But thank you for the feedback. I appreciate it!
@Max_Jones Thank you for the suggestion! I’ll remedy it right away.
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