Tainted Grail takes place on the dying island of Avalon. The ancient guardian stones that once helped people conquer this mythical place are now fading. As their light dims, a malignant power retakes the land inch by inch. Your desperate hometown sent a party of champions to seek help from distant Camelot.

You were not one of them.

Now, the true heroes have failed, the king is dead, and the Round Table is in disarray. The ordinary people of the island, such as yourself, scramble to find safety. Set out on your journey to uncover the secrets behind the legends.

Save Avalon – or simply try to save yourself.

Tainted Grail is a dark, fantasy open-world RPG with fresh turn-based exploration and combat. It is based around a deep, immersive story from one of the best board games (biggest Kickstarter project of 2018!) but introduces a totally new experience crafted specifically for PC. Full of stirring art and incredible, non-linear narrative content, the game will offer a unique mix of discovery, challenge, and exciting cRPG character progression, as well as involved combat and diplomacy systems.

Be a part of an engaging, non-linear story based on the grim re-imagination of Arthurian myths. King Arthur is dead and the Menhirs protecting humans for centuries are going dark, losing their vitality, and beginning to die. Use your wisdom and tactical skills to survive each day. Customize your characters and create unique combos while fighting for your life. Try to stay alive, or you’ll end up as another forgotten hero who died a meaningless death. 

When Tainted Grail launches through Steam Early Access on June 25, 2020 will include not one, but two games.

The first is the beginning of a regular single-player campaign, offering around three hours of gameplay. The second, Tainted Grail: Conquest, is a new game mode combining hardcore RPG mechanics with a dynamic gameplay experience taken from the roguelike genre.

“There’s one main rule we follow when creating our boardgames: gameplay is king. So, we wanted to deliver the same great experience in the digital version of Tainted Grail. Working closely with the community is the only way to achieve that, thus the need for an Early Access release,” said Kamil Krupiński, producer of Tainted Grail.

“At the same time, developing an RPG while people are already playing it has certain challenges, because we’re constantly adding new ideas, features, and gameplay mechanics to the game. This could potentially lead to a situation where you’re dozens of hours into the game, and we add a side quest that can only be triggered through a choice you make during the first couple of minutes of playing. You’d be deprived of a chance to see this new quest, ‘punished’, in a way, for supporting us. We were looking for a way to avoid these kinds of situations and eventually came up with a solution. We decided to deliver not one but two separate games within a game: a fragment of the single-player campaign so that you know what we’re aiming for, and the ‘Conquest’ mode being a unique RPG and roguelike combination, that you can play, well, endlessly.” Krupiński added.

The crucial point here is that Tainted Grail: Conquest will be the main focus of the period we’ll spend in Early Access!

Why, though? Two main reasons

ONE: GAMEPLAY IS KING

Awaken Realms, as many of you probably know, has A LOT of experience as a board game developer. This means that over the years we’ve learned that gameplay is king – and it’s really easy to forget about that when you’re making a video game (being constantly distracted by various systems and mechanics you’re adding to the experience while forgetting about the most important thing: FUN).

We’re confident that we’ll be able to deliver a proper RPG to you because RPGs stand on their storylines – and Tainted Grail is a really amazing, huge, and already developed world from which we're able to draw – but we are pretty sure that your journey through Avalon would feel lackluster if the gameplay wouldn’t be there. This is why we’ve been extremely focused on gameplay for the past months and we are really proud of the results we were able to achieve!

Actually, after a few tests and discussions, we realized that our combat system works really well on its own. After some further prototypes it turned out that this unique mix of an RPG and a roguelike is a really fun game out on its own. Full of neat combos, unexpected quests, and hard, satisfying exploration. This is how Conquest was born.

Sure, our new trailer shows a lot of shiny stuff, bits and pieces of combat, and some locations – it is much harder to see the actual gameplay and the flow of the game, though. We really put in the work so that the whole experience will feel really satisfying to you all – but there are still plenty of details to be taken care of and ironed out (hence - Early Access).

TWO: RPG experienced as a whole

We believe that truly epic RPG adventure should be experienced as a whole, without any breaks or "episodes" and whatnot. This is why we feel like developing an RPG game in Early Access and giving out the storyline bit by bit misses the point. This is why in Early Access you will receive access to about 3-4 hours of the Campaign (just to give you a good intro and taste of things to come) and then you will get an update with the full campaign when it’s done! Meanwhile, you will be getting quite a lot of content for Conquest that will make getting the Early Access version worthwhile!

That’s why Conquest will be the main focus of our Early Access. If you want just the story campaign – we would recommend you to wait for the official release ;) (with one small caveat that the price might be a bit higher).

So, as you see, Tainted Grail: Conquest is our personal take on the roguelike genre – but holy damn, where do I even start telling you all about it?

There were a lot of things we wanted to do with the campaign but for various reasons we couldn’t. We had plenty of neat ideas that wouldn’t work in the context of a traditional RPG or there wasn’t any justification for actually making them happen. However, when we were thinking about Conquest, we realized that by working on two games at the same time we can make them both bigger and better.

What will be unique to Conquest?

MAP GENERATION

map layout but – at least at launch – with the same objective: kill the prince of the Fore-dwellers. Later on we’re planning to add ever-shifting, surprising objectives to every run.

However, all of the paths will contain interesting encounters, surprising locations, and various treasures – and we’re working HARD to make it really fun to explore this world.

At the same time we really do know that “procedural generation” tends to mean “boring shit” in the current video game dictionary. Because of that we’re trying to find ways of surprising you and making sure that even after hours and hours of playing you’re still going to find something new to experience.

(Something different then pure gameplay and various combinations of combat skills and encounters which in itself should make the game fun to play for gazillion hours – but if that was all we’d have to offer, then why bother with the map, right?).

We want you to be finding new stuff even after many hours of playing. There are various ways to achieve this but I’ll give you my personal favorite thing about Conquest (but I’m biased because I’ve been a quest designer for a few years).

What I personally always wanted to see in roguelikes is a storyline that… makes sense? It’s not easy to find one that has it – and for good reasons: why would you care when it’s all about quick arcade runs, right? However, in our case, since we already have the technology to handle a narrative-driven RPG campaign, it would be a shame not to use it. This means that we’re able to add plenty of interesting encounters, characters, and locations to the game, and make sure that once you interact with them, they can change, react, or surprise you over the course of your runs. Won’t spoil more – and I gotta tell you more about...

BASE BUILDING

One of the things we really wanted to have in the game’s main campaign was base building. We made some prototypes of this feature last year but it just didn’t make sense – it’s a problem from the design standpoint because of the inherent conflict of “having a base” and “going on a journey”. Having a base means returning back home and we didn’t want to force players to get back to Cuanacht for resources, to buy stuff, or whatever else.

However, in a roguelike, you constantly die and start over. And you have to start somewhere. That’s where a base comes in really handy – because the village, in our game, will be a way to carry over your passive progress.

During your runs you’ll find people and resources that will allow you to create new buildings - and these buildings will stay with you over the course of all of your runs. They'll function as vendors or rest sites. Some NCPs will allow you to craft various weapons or change your abilities. Some will offer things that you wouldn't be able to access in any different way - while some options will be hidden unless you complete a certain questline... There's going to be a lot of things to discover with this feature and we hope you're going to have a lot of fun with various ways of personalizing your hometown AND discovering how to actually unlock certain buildings!

General Additions

Combat Revamp!

I already said that in our previous post, but it’s worth repeating. Along with the visual overhaul of our combat, we kept the core, but changed a lot of things about the system. So far it’s looking really good and some of our Kickstarter backers are already having a lot of fun with it.

You see, in early 80s, Sid Meier, a genius designer, said that a game is a series of interesting choices, and that’s our core motto when it comes to designing our combat system. On the most basic level we’re operating on five factors: items, attacks, passives skills, runes, and rune upgrades, all of which influence each other, so that you get a real chance at customizing your playstyle – it’s all about giving options to players and letting them create their own killer combos out of various building blocks that we’re offering.

We’re not designing a “cRPG” where your passive skills are like “+5% to fire resistance”. We’re doing our best to include as many game-changing options as possible. Every turn in combat should present you with a meaningful choice – through encounters with tough enemies with crazy attack patterns or through sheer joy of optimizing your possibilities so that you’re a walking killing machine.

But, believe me, the game will be hard. We’re already working closely with our community and every time they tell us that they’ve won a bossfight on their first try is the moment when we make the game 20% harder :D

Fashion Grail!

One of the things we really wanted to add to the game – but couldn’t justify that – was character customization and more options for character development. Since you were playing as Beor or Ailei, we kinda had to stick with their board game archetypes.

Now, by working on Conquest, we decided to add a thing that plenty of players were asking us for in the pre-alpha surveys: say hi to Fashion Grail!

And that’s not all when it comes to improvements and additions… but we need to leave some stuff for later, right? ;)

We’re pretty confident that we’ll be able to deliver a proper early access build by this date and – to reiterate – it will contain two games!

• One game will be the beginning of a single-player campaign which some of you already played in December, but refined, polished, and expanded – offering around 3 hours of gameplay.
• The second one will be the main focus of the time we want to spend in Early Access – that’s Tainted Grail: Conquest. It will be a combination of a hardcore RPG with a roguelike experience.

Key Features:

• EVERY DECISION MATTERS: Written by Krzysztof Piskorski, one of the best Polish fantasy writers, the story will immediately draw you in and keep you engaged, surprised, and invested in the secrets behind Avalon and the ancient Menhirs. 
  Thanks to its complexity, you will be able to directly influence the narrative through numerous decisions. A mature, dark, and unforgiving fantasy setting will make the whole experience even more immersive. However, in this dying world, no decision is easy or morally obvious. Very often, you will be faced with impossible choices. Other times, the consequences of seemingly easy decisions will come back to haunt you when you least expect it. 
• DEVELOP YOUR TEAM AND VILLAGE: Throughout the game, you will continually develop your heroes. From upgrading new items, through leveling and choosing new asymmetric special skills and attacks, up to deciding on evolving archetypes, you will redefine and guide these characters. 
  On top of that, you will take care of your village as well. Creating additional extra buildings will not be easy – often, you will need to solve story encounters and unlock new possibilities through exploration.
• EXPLORE THE UNKNOWN: A huge part of the game happens during expeditions through the land covered by the Wyrdness – an ancient force twisting people, creatures, and even space itself in all manner of horrible ways. You will need to carefully manage your resources and use special items to protect you from the Wyrdness. Choose your paths carefully, as there will be plenty of enemies lurking and waiting to strike immediately. Exploration is the only way to gather precious resources and ultimately figure out what is happening to Avalon, and if the decay of its lands can be stopped.
• STRATEGIC COMBAT: During combat, you must decide what skills to use and try to figure out the best possible combo. Use special power runes to boost your characters. Develop different playstyles for each character while planning tactical encounters. Pick items to aid you in battle and perform special movements. All of this will make each and every playthrough a different and exciting challenge.

Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon is under development for PC, its release date will be announced shortly.