Well, this has been the final day of my latest vacation period. 
I've been in crunch mode for a little while now (=working on a trailer for the game), so if you'll excuse me I'm going to keep it short (yet again) as I jump right back in trying to squeeze as much out of these last few hours as possible.

That being said: the rough trailer draft already seemed to get people excited, so the final results look to be well worth it.
Here's a little teaser of something new that'll be included in one of the shots. 

Progress report:

Code: [Select]

v0.28.002 (1 december 2023)
* Made more progress on trailer (assets)
* Replaced visuals dungeon deep water
* Tweaked and implemented some new mansion garden tiles
* Updated masking in mansion dungeon
* Implemented several new art commissions

v0.28.003 (2 december 2023)
* Made more progress on trailer (assets)
* Implemented new visuals for one more enemy type
* Implemented new visuals for several movable objects

v0.28.004 (3 december 2023)
* Made more progress on trailer (assets)
* Added new visuals for more enemies and areas

And here it finally is:
Demo 2.0 is out on the main Itch page: 
 https://hornofbalance.itch.io/horn-of-balance-pre-ks-demo  (see version 0 28 xxx)

*So what's new?*
- A compact intro area to play through before getting to the demo dungeon
- More world building and characters to meet
- Energetic new music from a new composer
    (Who I may also have redo the earlier dungeon music, so feedback on the new style is welcome!)
- More Murray!!
- A new item: the shovel
- More bugfixes and stability updates
- And of course all the incremental improvements added between demo 1.0 and 1.5

Hope you enjoy! And feel free to leave me your thoughts if you've had a chance to play it.


Oh, and as a little cliffhanger:
More progress has also been made on some locations outside of the demo area, but more on that in near future. 

----

EDIT: Updated the download link/description

Looks good! Well done.

https://youtu.be/41Yg6CbDN0w?si=C-QOmVUaB8Qf3gAJ

Download(s) OneDrive:
Windows - https://1drv.ms/u/s!Antze46_KH6j6xHYvS3RmkIKrdat?e=MrcAOJ
Linux - https://1drv.ms/u/s!Antze46_KH6j6xBM6LHp5WDuRq23?e=ihHUkT

Beta v0.21 Changes
Overworld completely populated.
More positional options for enemy spawns added.
Charged sword when entering area fixed.
Triforce acquired and Level-1 entrance glitch fixed.
Player no longer takes damage when enemies are in frozen state (Boomerang).
Player no longer takes damage when enemies are in hurt state.
In Level save fixed.
Cactus damage added.
Added semi-transparency to Ghini and Ghini Minions.
Ladder and Raft added for testing.

I have a few points of good news:
- The last remaining pixelart for the new demo is now done and implemented
- One of the two remaining music tracks is now done. The other one is being worked on and should (fingers crossed) be done by the 30th.
- Private playtesting is ongoing and can switch to public playtesting next weekend IF the last track is done by then.
- I've finished the storyboard for the game's trailer. Note that it'll be a little while before I can show the finished version publicly (because I want to include more areas compared to the demo), but it will be my next main goal past the demo.

Progress report:

Code: [Select]

v0.27.114 (10 november 2023)
* Expanded mountain tileset with deep water border animated tiles
* Made more progress implementing mountain tileset across the game

v0.27.115 (11 november 2023)
* Finished implementing mountain tileset across the next demo's explorable space
* Tweaked overworld tiling + masking
* Implemented visuals for a series of new containers and pushable objects
* Expanded container respawn requirements
* Expanded code to allow pushing/pulling of objects directly above enemies or containers (= on floor above)

v0.27.116 (12 november 2023)
* Implemented new cave wall lights
* Added new visuals for cave doorways, exits and inner stairs

v0.27.117 (17 november 2023)
* Tweaked menu text to better explain what the smoke pallets do
* Added new visuals for cave stairs within rooms
* Tweaked speed on regular staircases

v0.27.118 (18 november 2023)
* Added new visuals for cave conditional and locked doors
* Made progress spriting the new waterfall tiles

v0.27.119 (19 november 2023)
* Switched over to the demo 2 playable area and dealt with the various bugs and checkboxes resulting from the first playtest sessions

v0.27.120 (20 november 2023)
* Added (hidden) shortcut to make Linden wave to the camera (=ctrl+5)
* Continued tweaking demo 2 based on player feedback
* Made demo dungeon enemies slightly stronger
* Decreased starting health
* Added ability to recomplete demo dungeon multiple times on the same savefile
* Tweaked visuals special pressure plates
* Added new visuals for on-off blocks

v0.27.121 (21 november 2023)
* Put together a very early mockup trailer
* Adjusted some dialogue to better fit the new demo
* Fixed error when turning enemies to stone

v0.27.122 (22 november 2023)
* Spend time reviewing the new music tracks
* Fixed issues when screen transitioning while diving
* Tweaked more NPC dialogue
* Added ability to hookshot towards big trees
* Trees have now become action objects
* Fixed visuals NPC scene in water dungeon
* Fixed issue with one of the “medallion” character actions
* Made the hammer feel more powerful

v0.27.123 (23 november 2023)
* Added more dungeon map boss icons – for fun. Only applies for later dungeons.
* Fixed dungeon map boss animation when on the floor below the boss
* Finished new visuals for waterfalls

v0.27.124 (24 november 2023)
* Implemented new visuals for waterfalls

v0.27.125 (25 november 2023)
* Added various new cave flavour objects
* Updated the Itch page in anticipation of the next demo

I'll give it a try sometime.

This look awesome. I'm literally downloading it as I make this post.

  Thanks for trying our game out!

Legit the only reason I haven't downloaded yet is the point and click design.
Idk how that'll work, and I'm a bit scared. 

I did see this coming with several Zelda fans... Point and click is old fashioned, I know. Since this was our first time creating a videogame (and personally my first time programming anything), a point and click game seemed to me something that I could handle. It did came with lots of scratching my head though... But hopefully managed to create a decent Zelda experience for fans! Thanks for your comment though!

Legit the only reason I haven't downloaded yet is the point and click design.
Idk how that'll work, and I'm a bit scared. 

This look awesome. I'm literally downloading it as I make this post.