A game developed by Mav3r1ck1981
with special thanks to Ghost and Trollbae for their advice

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Welcome to the WIP for HEATHEN: The Paganacht, a crude attempt at creating a magical world in the vein of HERETIC and HEXEN. Updating the magical FPS genre with some additional RPG elements paired with some old favourites, traps, puzzles, breakable environmental items will all make an appearance.

50 years have passed since the last serpent rider was vanquished from the land. The prosperous kingdom of ANDAGALDUR arose from the charred remains of the serpent war and the study of Magik was outlawed to ensure the destruction that had been wrought, could ne’er happen again. For those born with the park of magic, a life of hardship and cruelty awaits. When the magik manifests unbidden from the age of 16, they are bound with cold iron, and removed from their families under the pretext of security, by the votaries of Ma'erK, never to be seen or heard of again. There is one, however, who hides in plain sight, who, through the manipulation of iron day to day, has escaped the interest of the strict religious order. Jax, the apprentice smith, has a secret…….

There are still those within this world who continue to wield and celebrate magik, but these are distant lands that the citizens of Andagaldur know of only as rumours. Indeed, they are almost considered legend by the younger folk. Unsurprising considering that outsiders are few and far between since the wall went up. The Paladins of shattered light hail from the cathedral of Aemis, but as the magik fades from the realm, the order is slowly dying even as they continue to protect the unaware populace of Andagaldur from the shadows. Hektor, a Guardian of the light, is one such man.

Strange things are afoot. Dark shapes have been seen in the forests and swamps that cover the kingdom, travellers bring stories of strange lights seen from afar, 2 headed goats are born during a thunderstorm, and now, as the sky darkens and the clouds gather, the wall begins to fall.

As one of the few remaining humans able to wield magik and defend your home, your task is to uncover how the wall came down, defeat the terrors that threaten your world, and ultimately, to restore the magical balance to Andagaldur and loosen the grip of the religious fanatics that are attempting to destroy magik from the world.

good work Mav.. cant wait to see how ti will evolve

Finally a wip thread

You don't shy away from large areas and big architecture which is commendable Keep us posted!

So as an update, due to some unforseen problems, with the middle portion of HEATHEN, ive moved up some of the build towards the final chapters of the game. The screenshots below are the arena for the final boss battle. It based within a abandoned cathedral, reachable only by boat. The building itself has been corrupted by the malacious forces at work in the world and has become the epicentre of the evil that has nefariously infiltrated the world.

this is a smaller map, as im aiming to essentially concentrate the bulk of the action within a fixed area. Instead, the cathedral is fully enterable, with multiple rooms and multiple levels with a final secret boss and bonus at the very top of the cathedrals tower. This can only be reached via the wobbly scaffold at the centre of the building.

Having had some decent advice from wolf, ghost and pirate Myke, ive been trying to focus on the lighting and ambience of my level design, ensuring that how the scenes are lit, is as important a feature as the other visuals or gameplay.

Due to engine constraints and the announcement that GGMax will not be having any additional underwater updates or features, I am currently rebuilding level number 3, the Swamp! update to follow!


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Just woke up and I am always happy to see this!

Its fun to see how your art evolves over time

Really good art.

Post a gameplay please

Wow! loving the scale you are going with in these interiors!

You've clearly put a heap of work into this. I like what I'm seeing

Due to my lack of skill in optimising a heavily populated level, I had to go back to the drawing board and completely rebuild my 3rd level, based in a swamp. These things happen unfortunately, but by some significant lurking on discord, and trawling through the forum posts, I appear to have learnt enough to pull off a decent swamp level while getting reasonable FPS on my rig.

The premise of the swamp is as a combat level, its a transition between the world outside, and the safety of your hometown and HUB (which is still managing to hold back the forces attacking the world) it is also an opportunity to provide the player with some different enemies and introduce some new magical effects, as well as some more organic, none human made architecture.

Ill be posting a run through video in the near future to hopefully show off the level at its best

Looks pretty sweet there Good luck with this.

Wow! Good work Mav3r1ck1981!

It seems like you were inspired by the elder scrolls games...your screenshots are looking awesome

Evening boys and girls, as its been 2 months since I last updated this WIP I thought I had better stop neglecting it and add some new screen shots and updates.

Its been a pretty weird 2 months I think we can all agree, and with it I haven't spent anywhere near as much time with gameguru and game dev as a whole, but in the past week or 2, I have been back with it and appear to have found my mojo once again.

With 5 complete maps under my belt, one central safe HUB medieval city and some custom enemy Ais finished, I am now looking into how I develop the story further, creating a development into the world as a whole, and how the player experiences the world and the negative forces interact with both the player and the wider world.

As wolf has explained in the past, using "magic" instead of traditional FPS weapons (guns/melee/rockets etc) provides a large barrier to effectively demonstrate a fantastical, magical world, however i am hoping to be able to utilise some of EAis magic from FPSC. Whilst it certainly wont be AAA in its current incarnation, i am hopeful that if GGMax utilises some of the Wicked Engines inbuilt functions (particles/Water/Weather etc) this will be easily rectified come September 2020.

so just a small update this time, but i will sign off with a few screenshots of my current dungeon level.

nice work

wow