Time to unleash my baby on the world and see what everyone thinks.

I've put together what I hope is a novel game that combines a trading card game (think Hearthstone, though there are many differences) with a map-based wargames - you play cards to place units on the map, and can also move units about. It's a 2-person online game played on a small tile-based map - there IS an AI, but it's very crude at this stage.

64-bit Windows only at the moment, though I can do a 32-bit version if anyone wants it. The game IS cross platform though (written in QT/QML), Android version works fine on my Galaxy S3 and you can play PC against Android seamlessly. Mac and iOS versions should be easy enough in due course as well, but I don't want to support anything more than Windows for test purposes.

There's a rough-and-ready website with a couple of images, a relatively full description, and a link to download the software. You'll need a user account to play, but just email me and I'll set one up for you.

http://www.spiers-software.org/KC/index.htm

This is, at present, very much alpha-grade software rather than anything polished enough for real release. That said it's functional, playable, looks pretty good in most places, and I think it's fun. One of the main reasons I'm posting here is that I am trying to find alpha-testers. If you are interested or have any suggestions where I could go to find them, please email me. Feedback as well on whether it's worth me persevering at all would be greatly appreciated, as would any comments/thoughts/suggestions. Obviously until I do get a good few alpha-testers it will be hard to appreciate the game properly as there will be no-one to play against except the aforementioned woefully inadequate AI.

One important caveat is that the images used at present are largely placeholders - I have absolutely no artistic ability, and what I have drawn looks bad. Most of the images are 'borrowed' from the web without me doing the legwork to obtain proper copyright, and will have to be replaced. Needless to say, any volunteers to help with this side of the project would be warmly welcomed!

Mark

markdsutton71@gmail.com

Can do though response times might be erratic as life sometimes gets in the way. Will send you an email to the effect.

User name: Stormynature

email: dgjpike@hotmail.com

If you visit the web-page for King's Conflict I now have a discussion forum set up - this will probably be the best way to pass any comments on the game back to me.

Still waiting for that flood of alpha-testing volunteers... one so far (thanks!), but looking for a bit more of a crowd...

Mark

Still looking for alpha testers - completely free, and should be fun!

The game is now listed on IndieDB, where you can find videos and more description of it.

Get in touch...

And still looking - looks like actually finding people to play this will be tougher than I thought.

It's now 32bit windows and has automated free account generation (i.e. you don't have to email me for an account - just start playing), so feel free to give it a whirl. Would be good to get SOME feedback on it at least :-)

M.

Hi again,

Someone has suggested to me that one reason people aren't volunteering might be that they don't like creating an account and giving personal details... so I'd like to point out that the game DOESN'T ask for your email or any details at all - it just needs a username and password so it can keep track of the decks you build and your card collection. Account creation is VERY quick and easy - just enter a username and password, click a button, type password in to confirm, and you are away.

Thanks,

Mark

You are probably right. I'm working on a proper tutorial that ought to help with this... some very positive feedback from the few playtesters I've had so far, but I need to get enough for people to be able to play online games against each other. Will post back here when tutorial is done, which will hopefully lift it to the next stage :-)

M.

King’s Conflict – big changes and version 0.200!

After weeks of sleepless nights and hard work, King’s Conflict has now been heavily updated and upgraded. The game now has new and improved artwork, a walkthrough tutorial, and many improvements to the interface.

A big announcement is that the King’s Conflict team has been joined by the talented young artist Nikita Kaur - http://nickkaur.deviantart.com/ - who has produced new card artwork and, most importantly, a hugely improved set of map tiles. Nikita is busy churning out more high-quality artwork, which will make its way into future updates

King’s Conflict is still the same great game, but now it looks much better and is far easier to learn. It’s also still free, ready to download and play, and looking for alpha testers. Download and join the fun!

Two images to whet your appetite - the new-look game-screen and some of the new card-art







Full list of updates in this version:

Miscellaneous:
- Tutorial now available from main menu - this carefully walks players through a game against the AI, explaining all key game concepts.
- New and improved art for 'Oakenhearts', 'Spy', 'Armoursmith', 'Mermen', 'Fire Mage', 'Lightning Wielder' and 'Mage King' cards (see credits for artists)
- New set of enormously improved artwork for the map tiles, courtesy of Nikita Kaur
- Log window listing all game events now available, so if you missed something you can scroll back through it to see what happened.
- Two-minute time-limit on turns no longer applies when playing against the computer
- Music volume now automatically drops to 25% during help system audio narration
- Installer now offers a 'start program' option

GUI:
- Units can now be moved by dragging. The old click-and-click movement system still works as well.
- Options and help icons on main menu screen now on top right, player name on top left. Help icon is bigger.
- X and check (tick) icons reversed in all pop-up dialog boxes
- Settings page is now closed using an X icon in the top-right, rather than by clicking on the background. It can still be closed by pressing escape
- Close icon in help system now at top right, not in button row at bottom
- Problem with flickering button text in help system fixed
- Several in-game icons not directly related to gameplay moved to a second column on the right hand side - these are zoom in, zoom out, settings, and the chat icon in multiplayer. Only gold, food and fire icons remain on the left column.
- Fire icon moved to the centre of the left column
- New 'resign' and 'help' icons added to column on right. Resign does same as pressing escape. Help does the same as the help icon in the menus, bringing up the help system
- Mouseover tooltips added for most game-screen controls. These tooltips can be turned off in the settings page.
- Highlighted squares on map (for movement and card placement) are now more strongly indicated with pulsing colour
- The tile into which you are about to move or play a card is indicated with a flashing black-and-white border
- Card translucency when dragging over the map slightly increased to improve clarity of placement point
- Map now scrolls a little slower when 'flicked', and correctly scrolls to the edge. It no longer overshoots and bounces back
- The mouse wheel now zooms the map in and out. Currently it doesn't keep the view central - this is a known bug and will be fixed in future versions
- Info on units now appears when the mouse is hovered over the unit for 1.5 seconds. This previously required a right-click - right click still works as well
- Info on units is accompanied by on-map indication of which tiles the unit can attack
- Info card for units now appears in the play area on the left rather than on the map (to avoid obscuring attack indications). The play area is dimmed to emphasize the card.
- Info on an individual region is now available - hover the mouse over a tile for 1.5 seconds or right-click. This shows the region on the map in a yellow highlight, and provides text giving it's size, value (in gold and food), and ownership. If it is contested it tells you how much health each player has in the region, and it reminds you of the rules
- Food and Gold icons now work with a mouse-hover to show income and food source summaries. The enemy icons work for this as well as yours. Right click also works.
- Hover-info for units, regions, gold and food can be turned on and off in the settings screen. Right click (or long-press) always works for these.
- Card text-box graphics improved

Balance:
- King's Touch raises health by two rather than one

PLANNED for upcoming release(s)
- Messages to tell players currently in menus or playing the AI when there are players waiting for an online game
- Improved patching system - currently new versions require manual download of a new installer from the website. A more convenient patching system is planned.
- Fix bugs with clicking right mouse button while dragging with left (just don't do this for now- I know it doesn't work properly)
- Audio narration for the walkthrough tutorial