Chaotic Twin-Stick Combat
Shoot, slash, headbutt, and blast through demon swarms with weapons that evolve from basic firepower to full infernal nonsense.

Hellmets With Powers
Find and equip cursed helmets that completely change your playstyle—movement, damage, utility, and survival all shift with each Hellmet.

Seven Circles to Conquer
Descend through portals from circle to circle, each layer introducing new enemies, hazards, modifiers, and rules.

High Mobility
Dash, jump, bash, roll, shield, sprint—stay moving or die. Every circle demands aggressive evasion and precise execution.

Unlockable Characters & Arsenal
Earn resources to unlock new characters, weapons, abilities, and upgrades that expand your toolbox and reshape how each run plays.

Boss-Driven Progression
Every circle ends in a boss fight that forces you to adapt, learn, and improvise under pressure.

Stylized Retro Pixel Art
Punchy, readable, and explosive visuals give the chaos clarity and weight.

Prepare to plunge deeper, fight harder, and swap helmets faster as hell escalates around you. Seven circles stand between you and the Ultimate Lord of the Underworld—gear up, dive in, and bring the pain.

Hello everyone!

It's been a while since I've posted any development updates on the game, but I already have a lot to share. The game has been significantly improved in terms of inventory and icon design, as well as improved shooting and interaction with inventory and equipment.

1. Improved inventory and equipment design.

2. Improved weapon and item icon appearance.

3. Attachments are now displayed on weapon icons.

4. Attachments can be replaced by dragging them onto weapons.

5. Implemented automatic weapon swapping when picking up weapons.

6. Implemented automatic weapon swapping when dragging weapons from the inventory to weapon slots.

7. Implemented automatic equipment swapping when picking up equipment.

8. Implemented automatic equipment swapping when dragging items from the inventory to the corresponding equipment slots.

9. Implemented a system for interacting with the vest. If there is no vest or no magazines in it, reloading takes significantly longer.

10. Implemented a breath-holding system before firing (to improve accuracy).

11. Implemented a slow-motion system.

12. Added icons displaying the type of ammo in the magazine (near the ammo count).

13. Added an icon displaying armor status.

14. Added the ability to run diagonally and sideways.

15. Added camera sway while walking and running.

Stonemaier Games presents Origin Story - a fresh and inventive take on the classic trick-taking genre. Designed for 1–5 players and lasting about an hour, the game unfolds as a story of how an ordinary person becomes either a hero or a villain.

Each player starts with a basic character and gradually builds up abilities, shaping their personal journey. The familiar trick-taking framework gains new depth through character development and role selection. Every trick you play influences not just the current round, but the long-term growth of your character.

The game spans five rounds - five chapters in your legend. Each round, players play cards of four suits that represent traits like Mind, Might, Speed, and Love (the highest suit). At the end of a round, you add a Story Card to your character board, unlocking new abilities. Managing stamina tokens becomes a key strategic layer: spend too much too early, and you may shine now but falter later.

At the start of every round, players decide their alignment - hero or villain. Heroes score points for winning tricks, while villains gain points for avoiding them. This single choice completely changes your playstyle and keeps every game feeling distinct.

By the fifth and final round, the story reaches its climax. Powerful abilities come into play, and your character’s journey - from humble beginnings to full realization - concludes with a flourish. It’s not just the end of a session, but the end of a story you’ve built from the very first card.

Origin Story is a bold reimagining of the genre, blending the dynamic rhythm of trick-taking with the depth of character development. Its simple mechanics take on new meaning as every card becomes a step in your hero’s journey.

The game masterfully conveys a sense of growth - from those first uncertain moves to the moment your character gains true power and personality. Yes, the balance between roles or events could be refined in places, but that hardly detracts from what makes the game stand out. Origin Story gives the genre new life - a sense that every action you take carries weight and contributes to a fully realized story. 

Who is destined to create their own origin:

 - For those who are familiar with trick-taking mechanics and want a deeper experience - with elements of engine-building and resource management.

- It shines best in a group of 3–5 players; there are solo/duo variants, but the main interactivity emerges with a larger group.

- It will suit fans of the superhero theme who are not expecting licensed characters but prefer to create their own story and playstyle.

Try creating your own hero or villain biography on Tabletopia and watch as one card game turns into a personal legend.

• Updated art assets and certain balancing on Mission 3

• Disabled additional functions and plugins to hopefully further offload engine

animation is shiki-shiki https://lit.link/shikix2

We’re beginning the next phase of The Riese Project — Early Access.

Add the game to your Steam wishlist:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4128150/The_Riese_Project/

We will continue developing The Riese Project within Early Access — step by step and openly.
The Prologue will remain available for you, and we’ll keep refining it technically and linguistically.
In Early Access, the story beneath the surface will start to emerge — naturally and in its own time.

Thank you for being with us.

Along with this hotfix, we’re launching a closed playtest. Some of the players who submitted applications will receive an invitation. The playtest will be available for a week, and in terms of content, this version of the game is almost identical to the Demo version.

If you’ve already played the Demo or the previous playtest, you won’t notice any changes.

This playtest is important to us primarily as an opportunity to gather gameplay statistics from new users. This information is extremely useful and necessary for development and improving the game’s quality.

Thank you for joining us!

• Added the “Cancel Movement” mechanic;

• Added skill area preview when hovering over a skill (in combat);

• Added indicators for skills that can be used more than once per turn.

• Improved the display of enemy turn order (via Alt);

• Increased the accuracy of fuel consumption calculations on the global map.

• Added missing skill icons;

• Selecting a team member via their portrait;

• Fixed numerous minor bugs.

Notes: This update introduces achievements and cloud save, several gameplay adjustments and balance improvements, new latte art options, new volume settings, enhanced key rebinding options, and a variety of miscellaneous bug fixes.

Beta 0.3 patch release:

November 14th, 2025

NEW:

• Achievements have been implemented.

• Cloud Save has been implemented.

• After the intro, a few new latte art designs are now unlocked.

Gameplay Adjustments:

• Cleaning empty cups now grants +1 XP.

• Reduced maximum ingredient amounts.

• Increased the chance for big NPCs to spawn during open café hours.

• Customers now have a chance to spawn as small or big, rather than prioritizing big customers only.

• The player hitbox size has been reduced.

• Customers now leave if served an empty cup.

Fixes:

• Patched security issues noted by Unity.

• Fixed camera issue preventing vertical movement in Build Mode.

• Fixed big NPCs not appearing on the second day after loading the game.

• Fixed brewing items being locked on skipping introduction from the start of the game.

• Fixed daily bonuses not working.

• Fixed creatures remaining on tables after café closure.

• Fixed missing controller navigation on the plushie panel.

• Fixed missing matcha mixing navigation in the brewing panel when using keyboard/controller.

• Twitch panel navigation and typing issues have been fixed.

• Miscellaneous UI fixes.

Settings:

• Added ambient music volume setting.

• Added button click volume setting.

• Key rebinding now includes auto-cancel if no button is clicked within the timer.

• Key rebinding now warns if a button is already in use and offers to swap it.

Other:

• Minor dialogue adjustments.