Heaven's Vault 
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Heaven's Vault now supports Steam CloudApr 24, 2024 - Community AnnouncementsGood news! We've added support for Steam Cloud, so your saves will now synchronise correctly between different devices. Enjoy! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/3ca1e48516ac3314728794f0f093dbac474c75ff.jpgHeaven's Vault is 5 today!Apr 16, 2024 - Community AnnouncementsFIVE YEARS ago today, we released Heaven's Vault, which was designed to be our follow-up to our previous narrative game, 80 Days. The game started from a core idea: SPACE ARCHAEOLOGY, that we felt we hadn't seen before; and translation as a mechanic, which we had seen in the 1980s Infocom game Infidel, and in two late 90s indie IF games, The Gostak and The Edifice. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/1f7697fe6de7a536837f02af9361400c8ed27438.png The translation prototype was the first thing we built. We went through about nine iterations which were all dire - too easy, too random, too arbitrary - until we found one with enough internal logic to be compelling. We talked about that process at EGX just before release. For the story, we wanted an adventure with no fail states, no back-tracking, little inventory management, and characters with memories who cared what you did - and when - and how. We talked about our dialogue design ethos at Adventure X a year before release, with a talk that went a little viral with game writers. In terms of the structure, we wanted to improve on the model established in 80 Days. That game was designed around fast play with lots of freedom - and lots of consequence: going this way *always* meant not going that way. For Heaven's Vault we wanted to fold that design into something more linear. That meant creating fewer "episodes" but allowing the player to reach them in different orders, and changing what each meant based on that - with a robust "knowledge model" to track what the characters knew / believed with high fidelity. This knowledge model paid huge dividends - it allowed us to produce a vast array of conversational options, all gated by when they were relevant, so there's always a snippet to suit the particular situation you find yourself in. It also allowed us to do the Story So Far feature... when you relaunch the game, it gives a single page, detailed summary of your adventure to date. (We think it inspired the similar feature at the start of Return to Monkey Island, but that's not been confirmed to us.) It's also the same knowledge model is what makes the characters in Overboard! work - we've used it on every game since. In fact, we designed a whole feature (LISTs) in our scripting language, ink, just to make this work. This model also meant we could hit a design goal - supporting incorrect theories. Most games won't accept an answer to a puzzle until it's correct, because the consequences of a mistake can be far-reaching, and can mess things up for the player and the story further down the line. We wanted to embrace mistakes, to capture the reality of archaeology as a "story-telling science". We wanted people to have answers they were sure of, ones they knew were wrong, and some in between, and preferably have them for the whole duration of the game. Since launch we've had a lot of feedback from practising archaeologists: we were even invited to deliver a seminar about the game at Cambridge University and have seen ...Heaven's Vault e-books out nowNov 30, 2023 - Community AnnouncementsTwo years ago we turned the story of Heaven's Vault into a two-part novel, that reimagines the story and world of the game from the ground up. It's now available in ebook format directly from us. The novels are a mixture of a retelling and reimagining of the game's story, going both deeper and wider, digging into Aliya's past as well as the history of the Nebula. And there's lots of Ancient in them too. May the waters guide you home! Read the first chapter of Heaven's Vault for free!May 17, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsLast year, we turned the story of Heaven's Vault into a two-part novel. But apparently books don't have to be on paper but can be electronic as well. Who knew?!? Thanks to this amazing discovery, we're now able to put up the first chapter of Book 1 as an ePub, so you can join Aliya on her journey into the Nebula right now. The books are a mixture of a retelling and reimagining of the game's story, going both deeper and wider, and there's lots of Ancient in them too.Get 15% off the Heaven's Vault novels this week!Mar 30, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsIt's Solstice Day in the Nebula so all this week Heaven's Vault is on sale, and you can get 15% off the two-part Heaven's Vault novelisation as well: just enter the code NEBULA at the checkout. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/72bf3794c5f6f496850e98f47b7173bfaf312804.jpg The secrets of the Nebula await!Like Wordle? Like Ancient? We have something fun for you...Feb 20, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsIf you've been playing the hit word game Wordle you don't need us to tell you how it works, but this twist on the formula - designed and built by a member of the Heaven's Vault community - is a whole other level of challenge. This is Vaultle. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/1115bd983fa32545023bb3194ed3076cf8587af8.png Can you guess the Ancient word - using only real (known) Ancient words? Incorrect glyphs are grey, correct-but-in-the-wrong-place glyphs are yellow, and correct guesses are green. Just as with the original Wordle game, Vaultle has daily challenges, and you can share your results. Oh, and it's completely free. Good luck! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/c23fded1c1fd6f61729027e29435524d4d48beb3.jpg And remember, if you need more ways to brush up on your Ancient, don't forget that the two-volume novelisation of Heaven's Vault is still available.A new inkle game is coming!Feb 10, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsWe just announced our next released: called A Highland Song, it's the story of teenager Moira McKinnon who lives on the edge of the Scottish Highlands and has decided to run away. A mix of branching narrative, 2.5D side-scroller, survival and rhythm elements, it also features the music of two of Scotlands leading folk bands. You can check out the trailer here: and wishlist it here!Get 10% off the Heaven's Vault novels this week!Jan 14, 2022 - Community AnnouncementsFor one week only, Empress Enkei herself is granting a 10% discount on the two-part Heaven's Vault novelisation. Just enter the code ENKEI at the checkout. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/72bf3794c5f6f496850e98f47b7173bfaf312804.jpg This includes the new linen-bound, dust-jacket hardbacks! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/8f47af333258b9feac9ab73c091ed6024a45b6bc.jpg The secrets of the Nebula await! (Offer ends on the 20th Jan.)Heaven's Vault books are "transcendent"!Dec 16, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsBooks don't come with review pages, but over on the inkle discord people have been receiving, reading and reacting to their copies of the Heaven's Vault book. Here's what they said. - "Gorgeous and glorious and transcendent!" - "The dialogues! The musings! So many wondrous thoughts." - "I was looking forward to a pleasant retread... instead I got my mind blown at every turn..." Also, they've been translating... {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/c23fded1c1fd6f61729027e29435524d4d48beb3.jpg Order your copy now for arrival in January, at !Heaven's Vault is now a two volume novelNov 18, 2021 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunHeaven's Vault is a puzzle game about translating a fictional, ancient language, but it's also a rich narrative game. If you want to spend more time in its world, with its story and characters but without the puzzles (or space-sailing), then good news: Heaven's Vault is now available as a two volume novel from Jon Ingold, the original game's narrative director. Read more Heaven's Vault novels are out now!Nov 18, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsThe world of the Nebula is full of mysteries and ancient secrets, wrapped up in a lost language that reveals itself only to those who can unravel it. Now those secrets can be explored deeper in a new, limited-run two-part novelisation, which is available right now. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/72bf3794c5f6f496850e98f47b7173bfaf312804.jpg Written by the Writer's Guild award-winning narrative designer of the game, these two full-length novels contain new locations, new characters and new surprises that enrich and embellish the experience of the game - while still providing a sci-fi epic that can be enjoyed by newcomers to the world of the Nebula. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/c23fded1c1fd6f61729027e29435524d4d48beb3.jpg And, yes, the books contain lots of Ancient, including two full-page translations which are left for the reader to unravel for themselves! Heaven's Vault Novel Nears CompletionOct 15, 2021 - Community AnnouncementsUPDATE: It's out now! For the last year, we've been exploring the Nebula once again, in a full-length novelisation of the game. And it's nearly done! Split into two ~300 page volumes by the game's award-winning writer, it adapts the IGF-worthy narrative into an archaeological mystery adventure that ranges from the slums of Elboreth to the dusty moons of the Singing Wastes and the lush forests of the Sanctuary. Want to find out more? Let us know that you're interested here! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/31805935/1096b2003e5cc31eb8af30a24c405a87150394f7.jpg Pendragon developers' next game is headed to the Scottish HighlandsDec 21, 2020 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunInkle Studios of Heaven’s Vault and Pendragon fame began teasing their Arthurian strategy game in January this year and launched it in September. For their next outing, they want to be much more open about their development process than they’ve been in the past. So much so that they’ve begun talking about their next game, something set in the Scottish Highlands, just a few months after Pendragon’s launch. Come have a look-see at what they’ve revealed about it so far. (more…) Pendragon developers' next game is headed to the Scottish HighlandsDec 21, 2020 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunInkle Studios of Heaven’s Vault and Pendragon fame began teasing their Arthurian strategy game in January this year and launched it in September. For their next outing, they want to be much more open about their development process than they’ve been in the past. So much so that they’ve begun talking about their next game, something set in the Scottish Highlands, just a few months after Pendragon’s launch. Come have a look-see at what they’ve revealed about it so far. (more…) The 35 best ultrawide games on PCNov 18, 2020 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunUltrawide gaming monitors are the kind of hardware that might seem too excessive, maybe even a bit too gamer to bother with for playing games on PC, especially when their demanding resolutions often require powerful graphics cards to make the most of them. Once you try one, though, there’s no going back. I’ve been a big fan of ultrawide gaming monitors for years now, mostly because supported PC games just look fantastic on them. And that’s why I’ve put together this list of the best ultrawide games on PC – to show you exactly what they look like in the flesh, complete with GIFs and photos of them running on an ultrawide monitor so you can see them in motion with your own peepers. (more…) The 9 best spaceships in PC gamesOct 2, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun One Off The List is our monthly list feature. Is there something you think doesn’t deserve to be on this list? Comment with your reasons why, and next month it may be struck off. Happy Star Wars: Squadrons day, internet. I have nothing to offer but the sneer of a veteran Elite Dangerous pilot. A disdainful scoff as you vroomify your engines in the docking bay, click-clacking your flight checks in the seat of some dusty Y-wing, some classless X-Wing, some bogus B-wing. Who do you think you are? Sitting there in the pilot’s seat of that garish tin can. Only an exponent of the foulest incorrectitudes would indulge a shipyard with all the basic-ass nomenclature of an episode of Sesame Street. Here, you fripperist, you child, gaze upon the true list of the 9 best spaceships in games. (more…) Have You Played… Heaven's Vault?Sep 13, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day, perhaps for all time… Heaven’s Vault is one of those games that manages to occupy every waking moment of your life as soon as you start playing it. It’s an archaeological linguistics mystery that sees you hop between planets and sail across vast, serene space rivers as you work to uncover the secrets of an ancient civilisation through the power of translation, deciphering age-old hieroglyphics so you can understand more about what the future holds for your home region of space known as the Nebula. I couldn’t stop thinking about it when it came out in the spring of last year, and as we inch closer to the release of Inkle’s next adventure, the Arthurian-based Pendragon, I’ve found it’s wormed its way back inside my brain yet again. (more…) Pendragon: New Game Coming SoonApr 22, 2020 - Community AnnouncementsThe year is AD 673. Camelot has fallen. Sir Mordred is due to meet Arthur on the fields of Camlann, and Arthur will surely die. Who can keep the dream of Camelot alive? Pendragon is our next step forward in the world of highly-interactive narrative. An epic Arthurian adventure, Pendragon is a strategy board-game that writes its narrative turn-by-turn around your actions you take. Will you step forward courageously, or cautiously retreat? Will you sacrifice one knight to save another? Will you flee, or triumph? Every move you and the enemy makes driven the narrative forward, one instant at a time - and what happens in the narrative unlocks new possibilities in the gameplay. No two games of Pendragon are ever the same, and with a huge cast of characters to find and unlock, each with their own stories to tell, we think it's shaping up to be something really special. You can check out the teaser video on the Steam page, and wishlist if you like what you see! https://store.steampowered.com/app/1240050/Pendragon/Developers of your favourite games share what they're most proud of makingApr 13, 2020 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunTimes are strange and frightening. But one point of great solace for me has been hearing people celebrating things in their lives. It feels especially important right now to hold on to what makes us all proud about what we do and who we are. And what I really love is people showing off things they’re proud of making. So I’ve been asking a bunch of developers to pick out something they’ve created that brings them pleasure to look back on. And here they are, including Harvey Smith remembering his input on Deus Ex and Dishonored, Derek Yu on one of his first-ever games. There’s pride in doing something for someone else’s game, in the power of details and in little inventions, and ah gosh, shut up, let’s just tuck into a big slice of escapist positivity. (more…) The 11 nicest smiles in PC gamesApr 3, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun One Off The List is our weekly list feature. Is there something you think doesn’t deserve to be on this list? Comment with your reasons why, and next week it may be struck off. The human race evolved the facial expression known as the “smile” because we needed a way to silently communicate satisfaction to other members of our species. So we decided to bare our teeth at one another and squint. This stuck, and now even the characters of your favourite digital storyderby are doing it. It’s sort of disgusting, and yet… you know what, I like it. Here are the 11 best smiles in PC games. (more…)
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