Android Almora Darkosen RPG ( Hack and Slash Retro RPG )

Borek

Member










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Hello!

After 9 years I already finished my biggest project made in GM8 + GMS1 + GMS2 ! :) Game is available for mobile devices with Android. In about two months it will be available also for iOS.

Almora Darkosen is a retro style hack and slash, role-playing game set in a fantasy world. Explore the huge Almora Island with different locations:
fields, swamps, forests, dark forests, towns, crypts, caves, desesrt and other... See below for all game features:

Google Play:
Almora Darkosen - Download

App Store:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/almora-darkosen-rpg/id1594920342

Game features:

* Original retro atmosphere.
* Long story of Almora Island.
* Quests: Over 100 Quests, including Main and side quests with a long story line. Gain more experience, reward items and gold from NPCs.
* Items: Over 1500 different items, swords, axes, shields, helmets, armors, pants, boots, gloves, rings, stones, potions, herbals, minerals, keys, tools and many other… Includes: basic items, enhanced, rare, unique and legendary.
* Mining and digging. Search for minerals like iron, silver or gold ores. Dig some hidden chests and explore whole island with hidden places.
* Crafting: Craft Your items, upgrade it to enhanced, rare or unique. Make new mixtures, battle or defensive essences, special keys, discover new items, repair broken gear and more! There is over 300 item combinations.
* Inventory with deposit: (Diablo style)
* Mercenaries: Hire a mercenary and fight with monsters by his side. Keep him alive, share with him potions and upgrade him to higher level. Mercenaries are very helpfull, usually are stronger than you.
* Monsters: Fight with bosses and different monsters with special abilities: flying, crawling, summoning other monsters, casting spells, poisoning, reborning, healing, disappearing and more…
* Boats and portals: If you have enough of walking, you can always use a paid boat. You can travel to places you previously discovered.
* Minigames: Play Almorian mini games for gold and tokens in the Taverns and hidden places. Collect Almora Tokens to craft better gear and items.
* NPC: talk with all NPCs with their stories and quests.
* Skills: Use active and passive skills. You can choose Your skill path, fire or poison, Use the healing skills to heal You and Your mercenaries. Choose what kind of combat do You like, melee or distance.
* Game knowledge book: In-game encyclopedy: List and statistics of all discovered items. Monsters statistics and descriptions. Crafting book with listed all discovered items combinations.
And many others...

Game is free with Ads:
You can turn off the ads by buying the Premium Account. Additionaly there are some extra features with Premium Account:
- No ads in whole game
- Access to mini games
- Access to encyclopedy ( items/monsters/crafting )
- Crafting preview on crafting table

For more information about game, please visit:
https://almoradarkosen.com
https://www.facebook.com/almoradarkosen
 

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fragment

Guest
Oh my god, I remember you released an old version of this years ago where you could kill beetles. So glad to see it lives on, will definitely be playing this.
 
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zendraw

Guest
are you planing on releasing it on desktop"?

nevermind.. ads..
 
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Borek

Member
Oh my god, I remember you released an old version of this years ago where you could kill beetles. So glad to see it lives on, will definitely be playing this.
Yes, that was a lot years ago :) Thank You!

Wow, looks amazing. I'll have to wait for the iOS version though.
Thanks! It will be at october/november 2020.

are you planing on releasing it on desktop"?

nevermind.. ads..
Yes, there will be PC version after iOS.
 
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zendraw

Guest
btw has this game even been made with game maker? it asked me can unity use information or whatever upon install.
 
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Deleted member 45063

Guest
Installed it as it looks good, gonna try it out later after work (download size was much smaller than what I expected).

btw has this game even been made with game maker? it asked me can unity use information or whatever upon install.
I'm guessing because it probably uses Unity ads?
 

dawidM

Member
Deciding if your crazy or amazing. 8 years. Longer than my first two marriages combined.

well done!!
He is definitely amazing. What discipline! In fact, @Borek worked on the first prototypes of this game 15 years ago. This man is a legend. I hope the game will achieve great success, but based on the very good reviews on Google Play, the success is granted. :)
 
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Deleted member 45063

Guest
I still haven't had the opportunity to play much, first run didn't have time to get past speaking to the first guy and on the second run I only managed to have time to go to the tavern (yeah, short runs I know, I thought I'd have more time). There are a few things I can already mention though.

The improvements I spotted so far were concerning four topics:
- Firstly the introduction: it is a lot of text that scrolls by slowly, making it hard to concentrate through it all if you want to read it so I'd suggest either making it a more visual introduction or allowing the player to advance the text at will (showing more than a line at a time).
- Another note is the overall resolution / UI, it seems to be a bit too large for a phone (I think it would work fine on desktop or maybe tablets, but for a phone I feel like it doesn't work very well, at least personally). I mention this because I have a Huawey P30 Lite, which has a decent screen size, but the text is so little throughout the game that it makes it very challenging to read what's going on. Also, the settings menu has all of the options displayed at the same time with the small text, which also makes it difficult to navigate.
- Furthermore, I ticked the "Force Fullscreen" option as the screen wasn't being fully used and it worked as intended, until I closed the game and opened it again. The setting remained enabled but the game launched with black bars on the sides, so I had to disabled and reenable the setting to make it use the full screen space again.
- Lastly, the text throughout the game so far seems to be in a very rough English, which makes the game feel a bit less professional than what the rest of the game assets feel like, so unless that is intended I would suggest having someone do a revision of the text's in the game (ideally a native speaker).

I focused more on the potential improvements so far since I haven't really had the opportunity to explore more of the game yet, but I'll comment back occasionally as I explore more of it. Looks like a really nice product though!
 

Vxss57

Member
Im in a process of deciding whether to go top down as you have or the typical 45deg view. You just convinced me its ok to go top down, thanks
 

breakmt

Member
will definitely play this!
It's because of Unity ADS, game was made in Game Maker Studio.
Borek, please, how do you use Unity ads in Game Maker? I'm banned in Google Ads and looking forward how to deal with it. Which extension do you use?
 
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gkri

Member
Very nice game, I played it a bit. My honest feedback is that it needs some tweaking on UI and user input, nevertheless aesthetically is appealing and the overall gaming experience is very positive. If I manage to play more I hope the rpg elements to be balanced.
 

Borek

Member
Im in a process of deciding whether to go top down as you have or the typical 45deg view. You just convinced me its ok to go top down, thanks
Yes, I never made projects with 45deg view :) I like top-downs :)

will definitely play this!

Borek, please, how do you use Unity ads in Game Maker? I'm banned in Google Ads and looking forward how to deal with it. Which extension do you use?
Extension: UnityAds by Hanul

What a remarkable piece of work! Did anyone help you, or did you do the entire game by yourself?
Thank You! I am alone creator :)

Very nice game, I played it a bit. My honest feedback is that it needs some tweaking on UI and user input, nevertheless aesthetically is appealing and the overall gaming experience is very positive. If I manage to play more I hope the rpg elements to be balanced.
Thanks!
 

Director_X

Member
Looks fantastic! 👍
Suggestion: Perhaps clean up the knight combat animation a little bit? A rotating circular sprite lets the game down. Players will be looking at this character anim for hours and it will get tedious.
 

Borek

Member
I'm surprised, as such complex and polished game got such little interest on GM Community, while it's for sure one of best games released last year.
@Borek did you applied for official showcase with this game already? It should be there! https://www.yoyogames.com/showcase
Oh, I just found Your reply :D I just missed the notification :) Yes, I do, and just got a reply from Ross that Almora will be in Yoyo showcase soon, but he don't know when exactly, because of another games queue :)
Thank You gnysek :))
 

Borek

Member
Almora Darkosen has about 250.000 downloads at Google Play Store!
Thank You Game Maker Community!
This is a proof that we can make a solid game with Game Maker Studio!
I am so glad and happy :) Thank You to all which helped me at this forum!

Screenshot_20210622-155052_Play Console.jpg
 
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Borek

Member
Awesome! Nine years of work, you are very patient and determined. I wish you success!
Thank you so much! :) Yes, that was a really much of work, but worth it! Over 540.000 downloads and a lot of fans :) In next year I will work on expansion pack. So I still have a lot of work to do :)
 

Stra

Member
Over 540.000 downloads and a lot of fans :) In next year I will work on expansion pack. So I still have a lot of work to do :)
That is indeed quite a milestone, congratulations, not to mention the scale of the project and your perseverance! But when you have clear goals and values in your life, being creative is second nature and the results, something to be really proud of.

This is probably classified information and you don't have to answer, but: was that enough to switch to gamemaking as your full time job (if that was your plan). Or was/is it commercially successful?
 

Borek

Member
That is indeed quite a milestone, congratulations, not to mention the scale of the project and your perseverance! But when you have clear goals and values in your life, being creative is second nature and the results, something to be really proud of.

This is probably classified information and you don't have to answer, but: was that enough to switch to gamemaking as your full time job (if that was your plan). Or was/is it commercially successful?
Thanks! Yes, I am going full time job next year :) So, I will have a more time to more work on expansion pack. Google Play is a really tough market, there is a lot of competition. However, Almora has its own vibe that most current games lack, it is not stuffed with 3D graphics and lots of micropayments, people love the retro vibe that reminds them of good old RPGs :) I often read such opinions from players.

At the moment, the advertising of the game is running on its own, Google advertises sometimes better and worse (their algorithms are very strange), but so far everything is moving forward :)

From the video...this looks stunning! How about a Windows version?
Thank you! PC ( on Steam ) is planned, but now I am focused on iOS version, so it's hard to tell when I will start working on PC version :) It's really a lot of work to port the game from mobile to PC, because on PC we are controlling the game by keyboard and mouse, where in Mobile we just click the screen, there is no need the cursor hover system etc. Anyway, It's sure that Almora will be on PC too :)

Thank you guys!
 
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Eugene7A

Member
I played Almora on Android, liked it (a fellow GM developer who spent 9 years on it, it's almost a sin not to like such a game), and left a 5 star review there.

Althought, after a while I stopped playing the game. My personal problem with it was actually the fact that it's mobile, yet to me it really felt like a PC game. It's honestly a very decent RPG and in my opinion Google Play with a ton of casual and very questionable games (like clickers that call itself "RPG", etc.) is not the best place for it, it should be on Steam, etc.

I know the game is very well optimized for mobile, but I just wanted a bigger screen than my phone. Perhaps, if I played from a tablet it would be better.

Also, the level design in the game sometimes felt a bit too closed up for me, as I am a fan of open-world RPGs like Morrowind, etc. It was especially noticeable in cities and towns, where it felt more like Diablo 2 of something like that (yet the space outside of the towns was also quite closed up, when in Diablo 2 it's more open). It would be nice to have a more wide and open spaces in the game (maybe it's somewhere in the mid / late game and I just haven't discover it yet...), but of course making the world too big and open would also be a mistake, especially if the mobile market is still the priority. It's hard to advice something here, I am just sharing a personal opinion and hope that it will be helpful.

It's understandable why you chose to make it mobile and focus on that, a potential income from ads on Google Play can be nice, and it can be tough and very random how the game does on Steam (and almost no way to monetize it with ads), but, again, my personal opinion is that it should be on PC too. It has a very similar vibe to Fallout 2, Arcanum, etc. It would be such a horror to play something like Fallout 2 from a phone.

Big respect to Borek for having courage and power of will to work on one game for 9 years, and all you success is truly deserved!

Keep up the good work and good luck! You are a source of inspiration for me :)
 
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Borek

Member
I played Almora on Android, liked it (a fellow GM developer who spent 9 years on it, it's almost a sin not to like such a game), and left a 5 star review there.

Althought, after a while I stopped playing the game. My personal problem with it was actually the fact that it's mobile, yet to me it really felt like a PC game. It's honestly a very decent RPG and in my opinion Google Play with a ton of casual and very questionable games (like clickers that call itself "RPG", etc.) is not the best place for it, it should be on Steam, etc.

I know the game is very well optimized for mobile, but I just wanted a bigger screen than my phone. Perhaps, if I played from a tablet it would be better.

Also, the level design in the game sometimes felt a bit too closed up for me, as I am a fan of open-world RPGs like Morrowind, etc. It was especially noticeable in cities and towns, where it felt more like Diablo 2 of something like that (yet the space outside of the towns was also quite closed up, when in Diablo 2 it's more open). It would be nice to have a more wide and open spaces in the game (maybe it's somewhere in the mid / late game and I just haven't discover it yet...), but of course making the world too big and open would also be a mistake, especially if the mobile market is still the priority. It's hard to advice something here, I am just sharing a personal opinion and hope that it will be helpful.

It's understandable why you chose to make it mobile and focus on that, a potential income from ads on Google Play can be nice, and it can be tough and very random how the game does on Steam (and almost no way to monetize it with ads), but, again, my personal opinion is that it should be on PC too. It has a very similar vibe to Fallout 2, Arcanum, etc. It would be such a horror to play something like Fallout 2 from a phone.

Big respect to Borek for having courage and power of will to work on one game for 9 years, and all you success is truly deserved!

Keep up the good work and good luck! You are a source of inspiration for me :)
Thank you so much for huge feedback :)

I understand you :) The most interesting thing is that Almora was originally developed on a PC and it was an MMORPG "Almora Online". Unfortunately, there was a problem with the server's performance (the game was created in GM 7.0) :) Later, smartphones appeared that supported better and better games and I fell in love with the fact that I can have Almora in my pocket :) Anyway, as I mentioned in the previous post, Almora will finally get a decent (not so limited) PC version :)

Thank you again and best regards :)
 

Borek

Member
Hello!

The iOS version of the game is available. Feel free to download and I hope there will be no major errors. The version has been tested for several days on different devices and no technical issues were reported.

Things that are still to be fixed / added:
- Cloud save game (currently only available on Android)
- Game pad support
- Screen aspect ratio: This is a more complicated thing to do, but I'm working on it. On some 4:3 tablets the screen is strangely stretched, this can be remedied by turning off the "Force full screen" option, then black bars will be added to the screen, but at least it will not be distorted.

Thank you so much to the testers for their help and I hope you had fun playing :)

If you have any questions, comments or problems, feel free to contact me. Any comments are appreciated and I will try to fix any problems as soon as possible.

iOS version download link:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/almora-darkosen-rpg/id1594920342

F.A.Q:
https://almoradarkosen.com/faq/faq-en

Discord:
https://discord.gg/J8cDhzh
 

Borek

Member
Hello Almorians!

New version is out for Android and iOS. This is one of the last big updates before Almora Darkosen 2. Yes I am working on both - hard life of developer :)
The next step ( because of gamepad support ) is to make GUI 1:1 ( not streched ) and port the game for NintendoSwitch, SteamDeck, Playstation 4/5 and Xbox Series.

What's new?

- GAMEPAD SUPPORT!
- Chinese language added
- Possibility to set the position of the attack buttons
- Possibility to turn off the analog stick
- Function buttons have been made smaller for a better view of the game
- Increased game performance by 20-30% !
- Bug fixes
- Translation fixes

Download Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.GearStudio.AlmoraDarkosen

Download iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/almora-darkosen-rpg/id1594920342
 
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