A Solo Dev Asked Me to Try the Demo for His Upcoming ARPG
My honest opinion
Before we start, I need you to know that the game we’ll be covering today is an upcoming indie ARPG created by QuestDev Interactive whose lead and solo dev kindly asked me if I could cover it in my channel.
I warned the developer that I’d be 100% honest in my review since that is my responsibility as a content creator and reviewer.
Needless to say, there will be spoilers ahead and you will get my unfiltered thoughts about the upcoming indie ARPG Shadows of Morhaven.
Let’s begin.
According to the dev, Shadows of Morhaven is:
“A game inspired by titles like Diablo, Gauntlet, Borderlands, and Path of Exile which combines looter mechanics, a dark-fantasy world, and fast-paced action for a fresh, yet nostalgic, ARPG experience.”
Out of all the games that inspired it, I’ve only played Path of Exile 2 and Borderlands 2 so these are the games to which I will compare it while keeping in mind that this is an indie title.
With that being said, so far I can see some of the inspiration from these games in the demo of Shadows of Morhaven.
- It is an ARPG with dungeons and monsters
- It has a main story and side quests
- You get to make decisions that impact the outcome of the quests
- You can select between 4 classes: Warrior, Paladin, Mage, and Wizard each offering different playstyles
- There are random loot drops from slain monsters that vary in rarity going from common to unique
- There is a fair amount of variety for spells and weapons
- There is a “bank” where you can store your gold as well as items you don’t need, but don’t want to sell or drop them.
- You can sell or buy gear and spells from different merchants in the town as well as recover health and mana by resting in the inns
It also has a simpler UI than what you see in POE 2 with you having a bar that shows your level, EXP, spells, weapons, and potions that are present on your screen at all times.
Also, its Character sheet is far simpler, but it gets the job done.
As far as I can tell that’s where the similarities end because it does have some unique things that piqued my interest as I was going through the demo.
Now, let's see some of the gameplay elements.
Story
Here is what I got so far from the lore:
You are one of the Kingsguards who help govern the kingdom of Morhaven and the king sends you to Brineclif to deal with a goblin infestation that has been affecting the town.
When you get there you are given some money and are told to talk to the townspeople, especially the merchants to buy some equipment before adventuring into the cavern.
Once you enter the cavern you get to fight goblins collect some loot and level up before you continue deeper into the cavern and find more monsters, better loot, and different exits for you to leave and enter the cavern.
In regards to the monsters, you can mostly find different kinds of goblins and skeletons at first as well as a troll which is the final boss of this area.
At some point, you will find a door you can open by using a key that some skeletons have. Once you open it you can continue forward to an area where you have to jump a few rocks before reaching the boss.
After you beat the boss you are done with the goblin quest.
I didn’t get a notification telling me that I finished the demo but after talking to the NPCs I didn’t get any new dialogue so I think that was the end of it.
Side Quests
At the start, you can do three side quests that you can start by talking to specific townsfolk.
Child of the Wench
You start this sidequest by talking to a woman in the inn called Agathe who is into some…activities.
Here you have to play detective to figure out who is the father of her baby by asking questions and breaking into people's houses for evidence.
You know, the usual.
In the end, you find out that 3 possible men in town could be the father and you get the option to accuse one or none of them. I don’t know if the decision you make here will have any consequences later in the game, but that’s a possibility.
A weird first side-quest not gonna lie.
The Witch of Brinecliff
You start this quest by talking to an old man called Osbern who asks for your help to prove that the town's herbalist is a witch and that she caused the goblin infestation.
However, to do so you have to gather a specific flower that’s inside the cavern and give it to him so he can create a potion that will put her to sleep he can search her house for evidence.
That request was already suspicious, but it's pretty simple to do.
I didn’t get to see what happened next after delivering the flower though, so I’m curious what the consequences of that will be.
Rainalt’s Remains
You start this quest by talking to Wilmunt who is the guard at the entrance of the cavern and asks you to find the remains of Rainalt, a guard who was assumed to be dead after going into the caverns and never returning.
However, as you go deeper into the cavern, you find out that he was captured by the goblins and locked in a cage.
I liked this one the most because it dropped a bit of lore when Rainalt told us about necromancy being illegal in Morhaven which hints that there might be a necromancer boss later in the game.
These were all the side quests available in the demo.
They were interesting, the first one introduced me to almost all the NPCs in the town while the other 2 were things that I could do while I was exploring the cavern.
Either way, all quests reward you with EXP, gold, an item that varies in rarity, and +1 inventory space.
Gameplay
The gameplay is very simple.
You slay goblins and skeletons to level up and become stronger, collect loot to improve your gear, do quests and side quests to unlock rewards and try not to die while you are at it.
Be careful though, because at the start, the monsters are decently strong and those that are currently too strong for you will have an indicator in their health bar.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that you can’t kill them, but they can kill you in just a few hits if you are not careful.
The movement and controllers are easy to understand too.
You use the classic WASD to move around and jump with SPACE while you aim with the mouse and use the left mouse click to melee and the right mouse click to lock in targets for attacking with spells.
Speaking of spells, you can get them by either buying magic books from the town's scribe or as a monster drop. Then you go to your Inventory and click on it to unlock it.
To equip the spell, however, you have to press TAB to open your menu, go to the Magic page click on it, and choose the slot you want to add it to which is either Q or E.
Spells can also be assigned to a Quickslot but it’s not available in the demo.
Also, you only get 3 spells in the demo and they are your classic elemental spells which are pretty useful for taking out enemies at a distance so I’m interested in seeing what are the other spells when the full game is out.
You do need a certain level of intelligence to cast them, so if your guy is as dumb as a brick you might have to stick to using melee weapons.
Lastly, you can replenish your health and mana by consuming potions, which you can get in the brewer’s store or as a monster drop, and you use by pressing C and V respectively.
In regards to the combat, a long-distance fireball followed by a zap spell does wonders for damaging monsters and if they get too close for comfort you can smack them with your melee weapon.
Just remember that if you are using a melee weapon you can’t cast spells because your hands are occupied so you will have to switch first. Unless you are using a staff that lets you cast spells and can be used for melee attacks too.
Exploration
There wasn’t much to explore in the demo of Shadows of Morhaven.
However, there is a fair amount of chests with treasure in the cavern and to find them you only need to look around for a bit. They are everywhere.
The chests also seem to reset every time you leave and enter the cavern so there is always some treasure to collect.
Design
I will admit, I like the aesthetic.
I don’t usually play games that are “blocky”, not even Minecraft, so I was surprised by the design choice but didn’t care because it was oddly fitting and the environment was also very pleasant to look at.
The UI was really nice too. I don’t usually comment about it in games but I like how simple but effective it is.
However, there is ONE thing that disappointed me though.
You see, I firmly believe that sound and music have the power to enhance the experience of every scenario in games, and while Shadows of Morhaven has good sound design for environments, monsters, and actions it didn’t play any music when I met the king, when I was exploring the town, or when I adventured into to the caverns.
All that time I was left alone with environmental sounds and monster grunts which after a while made the game feel a bit plain for me, especially after grinding for a while.
Besides that, I have no other complaints about the design.
What I think could improve or must fix:
Now we are in the section where I share my opinions about what I believe could be changed, removed, or improved.
I don’t know how hard it might be to apply some of these ideas since I’m not a game developer but I do believe they might help Shadows of Morhaven deliver a better experience to its players.
An introduction mission or controls page
By an “introduction mission” or “control page”, I mean a mission that introduces the player to all the mechanics of the game or a page that tells the player how to do something.
At the start, I wasted 10 minutes trying to find out how to shoot spells only to give up and later find out that I needed to acquire the spell first to unlock them and place them in the spell slot.
Having something that briefly shows me how to play would have helped.
Fixing the weapon slot assignment glitch
There was a glitch where I couldn’t assign weapons to the Quickslots because every time I tried doing it I would get a message saying “Assing to Slot” that would stay on my screen unless I went to the main menu and came back.
Thanks to this I couldn’t test the weapon-switching system which I was interested in since it looks like a cool addition.
Maybe the glitch happened because the Quickslots for weapons are only available for the full game like with the spells, but since the option was not greyed out I thought it might be possible.
Improving the magic targeting system
The magic aiming system is a little janky and didn’t always hit my target.
There were times when I was aiming for a little goblin, only for the magic to turn in a completely different direction and hit a big skeleton. The skeleton would then try to kill me or force me to run away, which would attract more enemies.
Kinda funny…a bit annoying at times though.
Make the shields, shield
One thing that I don’t like about the combat is that the shields do not protect you from damage. They increase your defense and let you take more punishment, but you cannot block an attack from hitting you.
Granted, you can dodge attacks by pressing SPACE while holding the right mouse click, but I still would prefer if my shields would protect me in those scenarios when I’m cornered.
I think we can add this by making it so that when we press the right mouse button while holding a sword and shield it blocks enemy attacks from the direction of the shield.
This would make the melee classes and equipment more useful.
Expansion of merchant stock and a gold reset after leveling up
The one thing that I know about ARPGs is that loot and gold tend to be some of the most important gameplay elements.
However, in the demo of Shadows of Morhaven, the merchants would always offer the same items and had a limited amount of gold so once they ran out of gold and I bought everything I wanted they became useless to me for the rest of the playthrough.
Expanding the stock and resetting the gold after leveling up would make the merchants more relevant and useful to the player.
Also, adding another inventory box for the merchants to have the items we have sold to them so we can buy them back would be better than having everything on the same page.
Fixing a key bug
This is a serious one.
At some point when you are exploring the cavern you will reach a big door that requires a special key to open the next section.
To get it, you need to go further into the cavern to find some skeletons that have said key.
In my case, I got the key, left the cavern, and then the game because it was pretty late for me but when I came back the next day the key was not in my inventory anymore, I couldn’t open the door, and I couldn’t get it again.
I have no idea how that happened.
I had to start a new Save Slot to finish the demo losing all my items in the first playthrough.
That was a bummer.
Final Thoughts
Shadows of Morhaven seems like an interesting addition to the indie ARPG space.
From the story to the esthetic, and the gameplay I believe it has all the important areas covered with there being only a few things that need a little more work.
The bug with the key is a must-fix, though since it forced me to start from the beginning and it would suck if that happens to someone further into the game.
With that being said I’m intrigued by this game’s future so I might cover it again once it is fully launched.
If you want to check out the game, you can download the demo and wishlist it on Steam.
Also, Shadows of Morhaven will be showcased in the upcoming Steam NextFest, so make sure to check them out.
Lastly, I want to end by saying that I already reported all these things to the dev, and he mentioned that he was wrapping up a big update, fixing bugs, and adding new features. So, if you try his game by the time this video comes out, some of the issues mentioned might already be solved.
Anyway, that’s all for today.
See you later bros!
If you are an indie or solo developer and you want someone to playtest your game to make sure it works, collect feedback, and report bugs and glitches. I can playtest your game for you. You can save your spot here.
