Even Heroes Die (Demo)

Important Links

• Wishlist on steam: bit.ly/ehd-steam
• Join the discord: https://discord.gg/xgDbx9YmxV
• Follow the game on twitter: bit.ly/3H0zfpA
• Get the soundtrack: bit.ly/3R53j8f

Introduction

Even Heroes Die is an action platforming roguelite with elements from the Metroidvania and Zelda genres.   Your hero has been cursed with a mortal illness, and you must scour the ever-changing kingdom for a cure.

Wait a second, roguelite Metroidvania?  Sounds contradictory? It is- and it's pretty hard to get right. But as someone who loves both genres equally, I'm aiming to do them justice. 

Even Heroes Die is one of the few roguelites I've seen that incorporate movement/ability-based progression that resets & changes on every run.   Some games, like Dead Cells, have this as part of the meta progression, meaning that the upgrades you find are persistent, finite, and spread across many runs. 

In Even Heroes Die, with each run you'll lose all of your movement abilities and upgrades, and you'll discover a brand new set. In one run you might find a wall-climb ability, and in the next you might find a jetpack.

Features:

• Procedurally generated levels that reset every time you die
• Discover new powerups to explore hidden areas and find goodies!
• Every few minutes, death will come for you!  One touch and you're as good as dead. 
• Stave off death with the many "vials" you'll find scattered across the kingdom.  Sound sketchy?  It is.  Watch out for side effects!
• Will you risk death or weaken yourself with side effects?  Pick your poison. 
• Supports keyboard and Xbox controllers, with remappable controls

Demo scope:

There are three areas and a hub to explore.   If you go right from the hub, you'll find the forest and forest dungeon areas, and if you go left, you'll find the snowy mountain area.

The final game will add a dungeon to the end of the snowy area, as well as at least a third branching path from the hub.  You can tackle them in any order you wish,  with each branch having an "overworld" and a "dungeon" area.

Levels are created by stitching together predefined templates.  Many more of these will need to be created (especially unique ones for different areas), so you may notice some repetition in level layouts.

The game contains 5 unique enemies per area (for a total of 15), and about a dozen different powers/upgrades to find.  More will be included in the final version.

There is also now a small form of permanent progression, in that you can save up Voidstones (rare purple stones) between runs and spend them at the hub area to unlock new abilities for future runs.  If you find a Pure Voidstone (white, one per run), you'll unlock a thought/memory from the hero after you die.  The demo includes 3, but there will be many more.

In short, you can expect the final game to have more: areas, level templates, powerups, enemies, NPC interactions, lore, and vials/side effects.

Your feedback is much appreciated.  I'd love to hear from you on the discord server, but you can also leave a comment here, file a bug report in the game, or even take this quick survey.