The wait is over! Starting today, the advent season has officially kicked off, and for the next 24 days, a new game will unlock every day! For the full advent experience, check in every day to find what new game has unlocked. Have fun!

Today, start the calendar with an exciting match 3 puzzle game. What new game will unlock tomorrow? Only time will tell!

We have yet another competition for you! This time we ask you to unleash your creativity and give Mr. Riggs a nice, fresh coat of paint.


Plenty of skins to choose from already, but we can always do better. On a side note - we will change the way skin selection works.

We know that players love skins for their in-game characters. It allows them to express their personality and add a degree of customization into the game. Even if you can’t change the color scheme of individual items without modding game files, pre-determined skins still offer an alternative choice. While working on The Riftbreaker some of the most fun things we did was coming up with new skins. Some were inspired by our favorite games (bonus points if you can spot them), while others were completely outlandish ideas we thought could be funny (Mr. Piggs and Caticord immediately spring to mind).


Gold skin is unlocked by completing the game's main campaign. It is one of our favorites. Simple, but effective!

• Come up with a design for a new skin for Mr. Riggs. Look for inspiration in pop culture, your favorite games, series, or your own imagination. Simply design what seems fun to you!
  
• Needless to say, but we will say it anyway - your entry must be in good taste and do not break Steam Terms of Service. No gore, adult-rated material, or mocking anyone's ethnicity, religious or political beliefs.
  
• Create a visualization of your skin idea. Use Paint, Photoshop, or any other image editing software to modify any of the existing Riftbreaker artworks. Alternatively, you can sketch your design by hand and scan it. You don’t have to make a working in-game skin - just a simple image is fine, but bonus points if you do decide to make a working skin 🙂
  
• Do not change Mr. Riggs’ model geometry. You can change everything else. You want to have a giant screen in place of the cockpit visor? Okay! You want to turn the Mech into glass? Also cool! You can go absolutely wild, but the geometry of the mech must stay the same.

The authors of the three designs we like the most will receive:

Last but not least important - we are going to try to turn the top three designs into actual in-game skins. This will only happen if the authors give us explicit permission to use the design in-game and if it does not break any copyrights or trademarks, so go easy on logos.

Upload the visualization of your design to any image-sharing site and submit your entry in this thread for everyone to see here:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/780310/discussions/0/4040354734340685476/

The contest will run until January 10th, 2024. We will announce the winners by January 12th, 2024..


One of the earliest mods for our game - Holy Skin by SenorRagequit. Be the light that shines in the darkness!


[expand type=The legal stuff:]
You must be aged 18 or over at the time of entry in order to enter this competition. No purchase is necessary. You must enter the contest yourself. You must comply with the laws that apply to you in the location where you access the competition from. If any laws applicable to you restrict or prohibit you from entering the competition, you must comply with those legal restrictions or, if applicable, refrain from entering the competition. Prizes are not negotiable, exchangeable, or transferable and have no cash alternative. Physical prizes can only be delivered to locations covered by UPS. If a delivery destination is not covered by UPS, then it will not be sent out by EXOR.

The winner(s) will be selected by a panel of judges based on creativity, originality and the highest quality. The decision of the panel is final.

The Organiser does not claim any rights of ownership in your competition entry. By submitting your entry, you grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free and irrevocable right to use, display, publish, transmit, copy, edit, alter, store, re-format, and sub-license the competition entry and any accompanying materials for our marketing or other commercial purposes.
[/expand]

We can’t wait to see what you come up with!

EXOR Studios

"I can hardly wait for this madcap action RPG that'll let you hypnotize trolls, one-hit kill the beefiest bosses, and then just wind down with some fishin'" --- Read the article here!

Hi Everyone,

Quick update for you today - we're excited to announce we're now Steam Deck Verified! The game should now run great, look great, and control great on the Steam Deck.

While we've been focusing on the console ports for Kingdoms and Castles and on our new game Nova Roma, we've still been monitoring your feedback and bug reports and have implemented a bunch of much requested improvements and fixes.

• Allow carts and ships to deposit resources at stockpiles and docks even if those buildings have their desired amounts set to zero.
  
• Allow carts to pick up and drop off from swineherds and fishing huts
  
• Reduced cost of the Well
  
• Reduced cost of Transport Ship
  
• Increased radius of the Large Fountain
  
• In gamepad controls, disallow selecting empty tile when units are selected.
  
• Optimize catapult target finding
  
• Increase camera zoom range during map select
  
• Increase favor gained when you humor the AI during the joke conversation

• Fixed issue in gamepad controls where building selection did not clear unit selection
  
• Fixed input issue on Steam Deck when using Steam Dock and starting the game with a keyboard and mouse where the game would get stuck in gamepad control mode.
  
• Fixed issue where fires could start too soon if playing with AIs
  
• Fixed person UI and transport ship/cart UI being too small on Steam Deck
  
• Fixed rare bug where AI units could get stuck unloading and loading their troops
  
• Fixed bug where damage calculations for archer units with only the general still alive were wrong
  
• Fixed bug where 'Clear Map' on the map edit mode wouldn't clear fish
  
• Fixed performance issue with UI when looking at an AI owned island
  
• Fixed issue where catapults would stop auto targeting
  
• Other small fixes

Also, while we're on the topic of gamepads, we're excited to announce Kingdoms and Castles will be coming to Xbox Series S/X/One ... today! If you've got friends with Xboxes who wanted to try the game, this would be for them! We'll have more news on other platforms in the future.

Thanks for being fans! And thanks for all your feedback and bug reports!

Until next time,
-Pete, Michael, & Sam

Everyone gets +50% Damage Infected and +35% EXP this weekend!

A more sizeable update before the weekend. I added new fonts in pretty much all places throughout the game (menus, shop, tooltips etc.). This is a first big step towards the improved look-and-feel we're aiming to have ready when Steam Next Fest arrives early next year.


Another super important part of the improved visuals will be brand-new, hand-drawn item graphics. They're not all ready yet, but here's a first teaser:



With future plans touched on, let's get into what the latest demo patch brings right now!

• New shiny fonts everywhere! 🎉
  
• Improved how bonus shot power is displayed on the power gauge by adding a small red “danger zone” overlay to it.
  
• Bombs within the range of an explosion now have a short “ignition time” so follow-up explosions don’t all happen at the same time.
  
• Small improvements to the look of particles.
  
• Hidden feature: When using the keyboard, you can now rotate your aim more quickly via the A/D keys (in addition to Q/E for slow rotation) if you prefer to adjust your aim via keyboard-only means.
  
• Notable fixes:
  
  • Mouse movement detection to switch back to mouse controls is more robust.
    
  • You can now properly aim even when ending your turn at the edge of a hole.
    
  • Turn won’t end prematurely if a ball is still being slowly dragged into a hole.
• Various balancing tweaks and minor fixes.

I sincerely hope you enjoy the latest changes and thank you so much for checking out the demo. If you have any feedback, would like to discuss games and their design, or just want to say hi, please swing by via Discord or Twitter! ❤️

Happy Friday all!

I can't believe we're in December already. Are you guys getting into the festive spirit?
Hope you've managed to get all your Christmas shopping done!


From time to time we receive questions about the weather system in Vahrin's Call, and while many of you probably have a good understanding of what kind of weather the game features, I bet not many of you know what the world of Leyda looked like before this system was introduced.



In the grand scheme of things, the introduction of dynamic weather to world is very new. However, it may suprise you to know that originally not even a day/night cycle was planned to be a part of the game, as the entire story used to take place in a single night.

This was long ago, before we started sharing the game's development with you all, back when the game was still called, "Exodus: Rising". I wonder how many of you remember that name?



Anyway, back to the weather system!

Dynamic weather in Vahrin's Call offers up a breath of fresh air when exploring the world. From bright and sunny, to torrential downpour and everything in between, it's nice exploring these fantastical areas at different times of the day and in different weather conditions.



While the weather in Vahrin's Call doesn't impact gameplay - it's purely cosmetic - one of the benefits of being a semi-open world is that we can more easily cater each area in the game to have specific weather conditions, to better match the atmosphere we're trying to deliver in that location.



We're excited to see you dive into the areas we've been keeping behind closed doors, and unravel the mystery of what has befallen the once great city of Vahrin!



Before I go, as this was more of a laid-back post taking a little look at the weather system in our game, I'm curious as to what your favourite weather conditions are! Do you like it when it's sunny, snowy, rainy, stormy, foggy? Do you prefer certain weather in games, compared to real life? Let me know!



I think next week we'll take a look at our new in-game tutorial, so be sure to stop by and check it out~

Have a good weekend all!

• Renamed India to Bharat
  
• Split Palestine into 2 Countries in De facto

• Fixed saves not loading in

We are pleased to inform you about the contents of the update implemented on November 30.

- Support for implementation of the Nagino Mashiro Resettlement DLC
As it will appear as DLC, it will no longer appear as a tourist.

Updates
Update and correction of the staff roll

Thank you for your continued support.

"You were always the weakest, Konrad. Let me illuminate you."
– Vulkan

The surface of Isstvan V is engulfed by the horrors the Night Lords have brought onto the battlefield, but a light still shines within the darkness. Vulkan enters the battlefield to push back the darkness as the Night Lords receive reinforcements from The Painted Count's company.

Vulkan and Gendor Skraivok join the event as reinforcements! Choose your side and lead the fight on Isstvan as new Warlords. Test the new Night Lords and vote for the cosmetic that you would like to see in the game.