After many years on Early Access, we are finally doing the full release of our exploration RTS-like, NovaMundi! If you liked Ananias, you will likely also enjoy this game. So I ask you to please take some minutes to visit its store page, and wishlist if you like it! You can find it at https://store.steampowered.com/app/1370940/NovaMundi/
In NovaMundi, you have to explore a procedurally generated world, finding the safest and quickest way to get from town to town while you also venture into mysterious caverns looking for aid from the spirits of the land in order to complete your mission: To unite the people of the land to stand against the invaders.
Combat is real time with pause, maneuver your units around the battlefield and use the advantages given by your equipment. Use the reputation you gain in combat or by helping people around, to recruit new people into your cause in the towns. With each passing day, the invaders will strengthen their presence in the land; time of essence to survive and complete your mission!

[ 2024-10-05 17:13:47 CET ] [ Original post ]

It has been almost 6 years since the last release of Ananias on Steam. Well, here we are. After recovering control of the tech stack used to build the game, and prompted by our participation in the Roguelike Celebration Celebration Steam Sale (yay!), I am finally able to offer you this long promised maintenance version. It comes packed with a lot of small, but highly valuable changes. And maybe some bugs. Get it now on Steam! Are you ready? Here we go! Lets being with a BIG one, the long requested option to disable weapon degradation. Yes, this is now completely optional and turned off by default and its a complete game changer, you can now use these cool weapons you find without remorse (just be careful of enemies that spit acid, these are still an issue). This didnt come out as a lightly-taken decision. After a lot of discussion I believe its the best for the game given the format of the runs and their difficulty. I figured it didnt made sense to punish the players even further (am I not merciful?)
You will still find weapons of varying quality laying in the dungeon, and the spells and scroll that restore them have been increased in power as well. Note that the setting only applies for New games (you cannot change it for an ongoing game). Then there is a number of small, high impact gameplay changes:

• Alchemy is now safe for all classes. Yes, no more explosions in your face. The elements of the universe have stabilized so alchemy is now more useful!
• Ammunition should be more readily available. Bows (and especially crossbows) should be much more useful.
• Scrolls with magic attacks will now never backfire and they are also much more powerful now (hence more useful!).
• Spellcasting backfire chance when you are not an expert spellcaster has been lowered to 5% (was 20%), thus making spells more useful to all classes.
• However, some tweaks were made to the failure chance when attempting to cast higher circle spells. (20% chance of failure on top of 10% for each difference between spells circle and caster magic power). Note that this is failure change (no effect), not backfire!
• The barbarian can now select combat and hit-points heavenly patrons without any cap, so he doesnt have to spend level ups in useless magic skills.

One area that was often overlooked by players was the fact that depending on the weapon you are wielding, and the material of your target, there are important bonuses applied to the damage caused. This has been addressed by displaying the attack effectiveness along with the damage caused, when there is a bonus. The manual has also been improved with a new complete section on these Damage Multipliers.
Speaking of the manual, several mistakes and omissions on it have been fixed, especially in the Alchemy and Magic sections. The class descriptions were also updated to reflect their current abilities. Finally, another big usability improvement long requested: The inventory window will no longer close after using an item, provided you are in a safe room. This makes equipping and dropping items especially a much smoother experience, but also applies to using items on self and performing alchemy.
This version also inherits the fixes made on v2.4.5, which had a mobile and web-only release on 2022. The most important fixes were preventing friendlies from using skills outside of combat, and handing gifts directly from NPCs if no available room space. Many thanks to SlashwareKnight Stoltverd, who has been pushing for improvements and fixes on Ananias since he joined Slashware, and is constantly testing and spreading the evangelion of Ananias in the net. Ananias is part of the Roguelike Celebration Celebration Steam Sale! We have been selected to take part of the Roguelike Celebration Celebration event, we are joined by speakers both present and past, and a selection of excellent roguelike games of all kind. Go now and check them out! Ananias has a -20% discount in case you still dont have it.

[ 2023-10-20 22:02:32 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello everyone! While the development of Ananias is frozen, and the version that was promised hasnt happened, that doesn't mean we aren't working on stuff! :) Long story short, we were working on the announced update to happen in a couple of weeks; it was going to be small. But when we started working on it we noticed so many areas we wanted to improve, that the backlog grew and grew until it became too big to be feasibly done in two weeks... To be honest, too big to be called "Ananias". To make things worse, some elements of the pipeline of technologies to pack Ananias as an executable has become unstable or require an additional investment of work to make them work again, making producing even minor maintenance released not viable. The current plan is to make a sequel, and we have already worked a LOT on its narrative and gameplay design. That being said, there is no ETA for said sequel, and nothing is set in stone! Our priority as a studio right now is releasing Novamundi; and then pushing forward our Emerald Woods and another secret project in pre-pre-production. So, unfortunately, this sequel is going to take some years to happen. We are extremely happy to know people enjoy Ananias so much that they want to see it developed still, but it's not economically feasible right now, and we don't want to release a half-done update with few visible and unimportant changes. That said, we would love to hear your opinions on what you think needs updating! Maybe it's different from what we think needs work. Hit us up on Discord at https://discord.gg/u8aZDw9 Thank you for adventuring!

[ 2023-08-30 22:30:39 CET ] [ Original post ]

[ 2022-05-02 17:52:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

Congratulations to the winners of the Tournament!

• #1 - Jebidiah, with Sheena the Barbarian. Killed by a Porpworm on level 29 after 81:36. Downed 555 monsters
• #2 - Geist, with MarMi the Alchemist. Killed by a Drogon on level 28 after 308:37. Downed 462 monsters
• #3 - @burdfishdemon, with Red Warrior the Barbarian. Killed by a Guardian on level 17 after 75:57. Downed 270 monsters
• #4 - @moemustaine, with Scalebearer the Barbarian. Killed by a Demonspawn on level 16 after 43:41. Downed 259 monsters
• #5 - Adam Boyd, with Rodney the Monster Slayer. Killed by a Sireen on level 14 after 75:06. Downed 200 monsters

[ 2018-10-22 21:56:03 CET ] [ Original post ]

The Roguelike Celebration 2018 is coming! We are celebrating it with a new Ananias Roguelike tournament with Cool Prizes! are you bad enough to win the tournament? More info here!

[ 2018-10-02 18:17:46 CET ] [ Original post ]

Heres a summary of the changes - Limit usage of stat upgrades to 7 - Make charm effect only work for 10 to 15 turns - Make summon spells create a single monster by default - Allow witch to reach level 8 (start with single spell) - Make befriend monster spells higher level

[ 2018-01-13 23:14:10 CET ] [ Original post ]

Here’s a summary of the changes - Limit usage of stat upgrades to 7 - Make charm effect only work for 10 to 15 turns - Make summon spells create a single monster by default - Allow witch to reach level 8 (start with single spell) - Make befriend monster spells higher level

[ 2018-01-13 23:14:10 CET ] [ Original post ]

It's your chance to get your Ananias Roguelike Boxed Edition, 2nd run! very limited quantities. Includes booklet, steam code and a USB card with the actual game. 25USD + Shipping. If you are going to the roguelike celebration I can deliver it on the spot :)

[ 2017-11-11 16:33:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

It's your chance to get your Ananias Roguelike Boxed Edition, 2nd run! very limited quantities. Includes booklet, steam code and a USB card with the actual game. 25USD + Shipping. If you are going to the roguelike celebration I can deliver it on the spot :)

[ 2017-11-11 16:33:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

Halloween comes with a new version of Ananias including a new class: the Lunar Witch! In addition of being experts concocting potions, they have access to a whole new school of magic: Witchcraft. Witches cast spells (or hexes) sacrificing their own blood. However, if they have a familiar they will share the burden with him, causing him small harm in exchange for much less pain for the witch.
Hurry up and get it now from the halloween sale if you haven't! (If you already have the game, the new class should be available when you update) Other changes include: UX * Allow continuing games from older version, warn game wont be saved. Bugfixes * Prevent issue with sprite positioning when morphing floating enemies * Prevent issue with summons sprites being misplaced * Fix achievements relying on count number of levels * Make sick fountains reduce attack instead of contracting it (allow recovering) * Prevent items from disappearing when dropped and no space

[ 2017-10-31 05:27:28 CET ] [ Original post ]

Halloween comes with a new version of Ananias including a new class: the Lunar Witch! In addition of being experts concocting potions, they have access to a whole new school of magic: Witchcraft. Witches cast spells (or hexes) sacrificing their own blood. However, if they have a familiar they will share the burden with him, causing him small harm in exchange for much less pain for the witch.
Hurry up and get it now from the halloween sale if you haven't! (If you already have the game, the new class should be available when you update) Other changes include: UX * Allow continuing games from older version, warn game wont be saved. Bugfixes * Prevent issue with sprite positioning when morphing floating enemies * Prevent issue with summons sprites being misplaced * Fix achievements relying on count number of levels * Make sick fountains reduce attack instead of contracting it (allow recovering) * Prevent items from disappearing when dropped and no space

[ 2017-10-31 05:27:28 CET ] [ Original post ]

Working back on the game! Version 2.5 should be ready within a coupleof months, just before the 2017 Roguelike Celebration in San Francisco, here's the plan:

[ 2017-10-20 22:44:33 CET ] [ Original post ]

Working back on the game! Version 2.5 should be ready within a couple of months, just before the 2017 Roguelike Celebration in San Francisco, here's the plan:

[ 2017-10-20 22:44:33 CET ] [ Original post ]

Had to release a hotfix because of a fairly naive bug introduced with the Rew Ram spell.

[ 2017-07-11 02:50:18 CET ] [ Original post ]

Had to release a hotfix because of a fairly naive bug introduced with the Rew Ram spell.

[ 2017-07-11 02:50:18 CET ] [ Original post ]

Decided to pack a new version, this one contains small but important gameplay tweaks, seeking to make the Arcane, Hunter and Alchemist classes be more fun to play.
Gameplay - New skill for Alchemist: Can use reagents multiple times - New spell: Momi Gyr (Create Arrows) first circle of Matter magic. Creates a pack of arrows (quantity depends on the magic power) - New spell: Rew Ram (Attack self) first cirlce of Mind magic. Makes an enemy attack himself once (works as a ranged attack for wizards) - Remove separate spells to recover blunt and edge weapons, add weaker variation of repair weapon - Make Hunter start with Momi Gyr spell. - Make Arcane start with Rew Ram spell. - Reduce MP cost of Kam Va (enchant wand) spell. - Change Hunter magic schools to second circle of life and matter. - Change Hunter starting magic power to 1. - Make starting wands have full charge - Cap combat to 13 max Check the full changeset at the blog: https://blog.slashie.net/2017/06/19/ananias-2-4-released/ Plans for the future I won't have a lot of time next month for Ananias, however I have a big revamp in mind related to the structure of the world, and the plot of the game. Also pending are some missing steam achievements as well as fixing the steam overlay and finishing the keyboard command (although 90% of the game is now playable using a keyboard).

[ 2017-06-19 05:24:43 CET ] [ Original post ]

Decided to pack a new version, this one contains small but important gameplay tweaks, seeking to make the Arcane, Hunter and Alchemist classes be more fun to play.
Gameplay - New skill for Alchemist: Can use reagents multiple times - New spell: Momi Gyr (Create Arrows) first circle of Matter magic. Creates a pack of arrows (quantity depends on the magic power) - New spell: Rew Ram (Attack self) first cirlce of Mind magic. Makes an enemy attack himself once (works as a ranged attack for wizards) - Remove separate spells to recover blunt and edge weapons, add weaker variation of repair weapon - Make Hunter start with Momi Gyr spell. - Make Arcane start with Rew Ram spell. - Reduce MP cost of Kam Va (enchant wand) spell. - Change Hunter magic schools to second circle of life and matter. - Change Hunter starting magic power to 1. - Make starting wands have full charge - Cap combat to 13 max Check the full changeset at the blog: https://blog.slashie.net/2017/06/19/ananias-2-4-released/ Plans for the future I won't have a lot of time next month for Ananias, however I have a big revamp in mind related to the structure of the world, and the plot of the game. Also pending are some missing steam achievements as well as fixing the steam overlay and finishing the keyboard command (although 90% of the game is now playable using a keyboard).

[ 2017-06-19 05:24:43 CET ] [ Original post ]

I just did a minor hotfix release fixing some balancing issues. This should make the game more interesting specially on the deeper levels :)

[ 2017-04-28 12:32:08 CET ] [ Original post ]

I just did a minor hotfix release fixing some balancing issues. This should make the game more interesting specially on the deeper levels :)

[ 2017-04-28 12:32:08 CET ] [ Original post ]

A lot of work went into adding support for Steam achievements using the excellent Greenworks library. This version includes 37 achievements and there are 10 additional ones I couldn’t add due to the API for progressive achievements not being available on Greenworks; the addition doesn’t look overly complex, however I would need to set up a complete dev env for it (right now I’m using their precompiled binaries).
The challenges are not steam exclusive, but they are only tracked right now on Steam (that means you’ll still see when you complete them on any other version, but they won’t be added to your profile). I also bumped the version of nw.js to 0.20.3 (I think I had to do it in order for greenworks to work). This increased the size of the downloadable packages for desktop quite a bit. This version also includes some small but important gameplay changes, see below for complete info. - Add support for Steam achievements via Greenworks - Add 19 challenges (all linked to Steam achievements but also tracked on the other versions) - Add 2 steam unachievements - Allow shooting over friendlies - Show health description for enemies on inspector - Prevent levels with far too many “big rooms” - Increase max carry capacity to 30 - Drastically reduce chances for boosted Combat and Strength when fully exploring levels. - Add intro track to intro Full info here: here

[ 2017-04-26 13:26:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

A lot of work went into adding support for Steam achievements using the excellent Greenworks library. This version includes 37 achievements and there are 10 additional ones I couldnt add due to the API for progressive achievements not being available on Greenworks; the addition doesnt look overly complex, however I would need to set up a complete dev env for it (right now Im using their precompiled binaries).
The challenges are not steam exclusive, but they are only tracked right now on Steam (that means youll still see when you complete them on any other version, but they wont be added to your profile). I also bumped the version of nw.js to 0.20.3 (I think I had to do it in order for greenworks to work). This increased the size of the downloadable packages for desktop quite a bit. This version also includes some small but important gameplay changes, see below for complete info. - Add support for Steam achievements via Greenworks - Add 19 challenges (all linked to Steam achievements but also tracked on the other versions) - Add 2 steam unachievements - Allow shooting over friendlies - Show health description for enemies on inspector - Prevent levels with far too many big rooms - Increase max carry capacity to 30 - Drastically reduce chances for boosted Combat and Strength when fully exploring levels. - Add intro track to intro Full info here: here

[ 2017-04-26 13:26:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

Work on achievements is underway, technical setup is done and it works (at least on Mac, gotta check on Windows and Linux). Next up is finish designing them all, putting up the graphics and putting everything together.

[ 2017-03-31 15:39:06 CET ] [ Original post ]

Work on achievements is underway, technical setup is done and it works (at least on Mac, gotta check on Windows and Linux). Next up is finish designing them all, putting up the graphics and putting everything together.

[ 2017-03-31 15:39:06 CET ] [ Original post ]

Version 2.2

A new version is available, it comes with important fixes and gameplay changes, as well as mostly complete keyboard support. Following is the changelog:

Gameplay

• Make pets always obey commands.
• Make enemies check if player is waiting at the other side of the room before walking into it.
• Remove penalty for damage for ranged weapons and wands when low on ammo / charges.
• Reduce power up for boost elemental magic.
• Change MP cost of elemental spells

User Experience

• Remove force sound disable from mobile, make it an option on the launcher
• Preserve preselected layout on mobile if game saved
• Prevent casting spells when character has no magic power.
• Make Portrait be the default mobile mode for browser (Instead of Chibi)

Major fixes

• Prevent extremely long generation times for levels with twisted corridors
• Prevent inconsistent HP value when casting spells with no magic power

Keyboard UX

• Ranged attacks using spacebar
• Using, throwing and dropping items from inventory
• Mixing reagents on the inventory panel
• Scroll entity panel and book panel with arrows
• Use enter key to advance conversation or close dialogs
• Use ESC key to close entity panel, book panel and inventory
• Changing tactics and pet command with keyboard

Ananias at the GDC Expo 2017 in San Francisco

Last week I was at San Francisco at the GDC Expo, where I was able to join 11 other Colombian companies in the ProColombia booth and show Ananias to developers from all around the world.
I got some important feedback for the game and made some good contacts for potential future work. We also had a small roguelike developers meetup where I could share the current status of Ananias to other fellow developers and friends including Glenn Wichman, one of the original developers of Rogue, Tarn Adams of Bay12Games/Dwarf Fortress and Jim Shepard of Dungeonmans.
I also got to meet these people I have never seen in person:

• Kornel Kisielewicz: Developer of DoomRL and Jupiter Hell, and a great inspiration for all my roguelike projects.
• Ashton Morris: the composer of the soundtrack for Ananias
• Björn Ritzl: a long time collaborator for roguelike projects.
• Kike Fuentes: Teravision Games mastermind, lots of gamedev industry experience.

Lord British plays Ananias

I also had the chance to attend the Ultima Dragons 25th Anniversary Bash, four awesome days full of cool Ultima geekness including having Lord British play the game. He said it was fun!

First month on Steam and iOS

We keep doing well in Steam and iOS but we need more reviews! Please post a review there if you like the game, it’s really important in order for more people to notice the game.

Upcoming Features

• Full Keyboard support: We are almost there, following are the pending things which will be tackled in priority order
  • Using multiple selection dialogs
  • Checking player and pet stats
  • Navigating thru menus

Some stuff still pending from last update:

• Steam Achievements
• Detailed GFX for weapons and armor.
• Adding more plot and may be even random stories.

There's been a lot of useful feedback! I keep integrating everything into the list of things to do so keep them comment coming!

First Boxed Edition

A limited run of boxed editions was done and some lucky individuals got to get their hands on them during my trip to California! there were two variants with one of them containing actual diskettes. Due to logistic issues I couldn't get enough diskettes nor save the light Ananias edition on them.

[ 2017-03-09 06:27:21 CET ] [ Original post ]

Ananias is now available for iOS! you can now adventure using your iPhone or iPad.
Note that Cloud saves are not still supported, however you can use your same username in both version to keep track of your scores. So, if you have and iOS device, get it now from here! :)

[ 2017-02-23 22:45:46 CET ] [ Original post ]

Ananias v2.1 is now available! ​This version comes with important gameplay changes making the game much more challenging and making pets more useful. Gameplay

• New default "Follow" command and intent for pets – They'll stick to you instead of charging towards enemies.
• Prevent pets from returning early to rooms almost immediately if commanded to flee.
• Reduce damage rolls for offensive spells from (3 x Spell Level + Magic Power)D3 to (2 x Spell Level + Magic Power / 3)D2
• Prevent Wands damage from being affected by tactics
• Randomize damage minimum damage 1 to 3 after armor absorption
• Add skilled fighter enemies who have more chances to hit unarmored body parts
• Change starting weapons for Sage, add staff instead of Wand

User Experience

• Left click to check monster info
• Prevent items with long names to overlap title with description when examining
• Fixes on combat SFX
• Remember full screen preference

Technical

• Autosave when entering new rooms
• Greatly enhanced request validation for server operations

Check the full news at The blog

[ 2017-02-17 04:58:50 CET ] [ Original post ]

Don't miss the release party, it will be fun!

[ 2017-02-09 03:04:34 CET ] [ Original post ]