Cassette Beasts is the in-development title from Bytten Studio (previously Lenna's Inception), which is an open-world monster capture / transformation RPG inspired by Pokemon Fusion.

Being made in Godot Engine , it's a very promising looking game with a fun take on the monster capture genre with the spin that you transform into these creatures using retro cassette tapes. Confirmed to be supporting Linux and Windows at release, check out some of their latest teaser footage showing some open world exploration:

Watch video on YouTube.com

After a slick limited-time demo and a Kickstarter campaign, the dungeon crawling / tower defence hybrid Dwerve has now managed to complete the campaign and get fully funded. It's a blend of genres that's not usually done, you often get one or the other and to see them blended together like this seems like it could work real nicely.

The Kickstarter campaign managed to finish with $53,750 pledged and they went through multiple special stretch-goals, which are funding points for them to confirm certain features like a Mario-styled overworld map, a boss-rush mode, more enemies and so on.

Check out the original trailer:

Watch video on YouTube.com

Dwerve tells the story of a young dwarven tinkerer that adventures into dwarven ruins to unearth the lost technologies of the ancient warsmiths: turrets and traps, the only weapons that can protect the dwarves from Witch Queen Vandra the Wicked and her army of bloodthirsty trolls and monstrous creatures.

Follow it on Steam for release in 2021.

Like hundreds of others, we're tracking Dwerve on our dedicated Crowdfunding Page .

Ink Stains Games have released a major upgrade to the challenging turn-based RPG Stoneshard, one they've been working on for some time now and it's quite the overhaul.

Sounds like it's almost a different game too, all the big main parts of the game have been changed in some way.

Here's the highlights:

• Complete rework of the dungeon generator with lots more variety.
• Basic AI was completely reworked: new decision making system so enemies don't act randomly, new and better pathfinding system, enemies know to swap places in tight spaces, archers and mages will try to keep distance, aggressive animals warn try to warn you away from their territory before attacking, enemies can retreat now and more AI upgrades.
• Animals gained new behaviours too like foxes hunting rabbits and deer will run away
• New content: new secret rooms to find, 100+ new containers, new enemy skills, 25 new undead enemy types and other bits

I really love the artwork in Stoneshard.

Apart from all the new content, generation and AI upgrades they also improved the tech behind the game with a better light rendering system, a new culling system, a new fog of war system, they added fireflies, for new music tracks and some visual updates to the Prologue.

That's a huge amount of work that went into it, lots of new systems going on as you play that make for a way more exciting experience overall. So much new stuff that they're going to be raising the price. They didn't give a clear date as to when but they mentioned the next major update late this Winter or early next year which will add in the first major city and it's surrounding area. Before that's ready though, a few smaller updates will drop. The price will be raising by 30% so you might want to grab it soon.

You can buy it DRM-free on GOG and also Steam .

Never seen it? Check out the trailer below:

Watch video on YouTube.com

Become like the wizard you always wanted to be in StoryArcana, an upcoming wizard school RPG that looks like it could be a huge amount of fun.

It's not another roguelike experience full of random generation. Instead, StoryArcana has a focus on mystery solving, exploration, puzzles and a combat system based around intricate spellcasting. Mixing together a week of learning new spells and exploring your academy to find a secret or two, with running around a big city on the weekends to pick up new quests and perhaps a fancy new broom to fly on.

The story here sounds a little mysterious too, as you're from another world.You play as Clay Quilt, once ordinary and now placed into a new world through an exchange program. As the only wizard from another world, Clay will need to find his place in this mysterious new world, making friends and rivals in school as well as earning the trust the people of Noxrose City.

Watch video on YouTube.com

Feature Highlight:

• Hi-Bit style pixel art graphics and 8 directional characters for smooth animations.
• Fully voice acted dialogues (English) and an original soundtrack.
• Intricate spellcasting system, draw powers from 5 elements by drawing symbols with your wand.
• RPG mechanics like leveling, items, equipments and questing.
• Alchemy system for crafting potions with unique effects.
• Side activities such as an in-game trading card game and an action-packed broom flying sport.

We spoke with the developer of email recently, and they confirmed StoryArcana will be "readily available to play on Linux the same day it launches on Windows and Mac OS". They're building it with the pretty amazing Construct game engine, so everything is built with web-tech.

You can follow StoryArcana on Steam . It's due for release next year and they're currently working on a demo.

Beamdog have released the latest development updates to Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition for everyone, and it comes with some wonderful upgrades.

As we reported on before during the Beta, several noteworthy graphical boosts have been added to it. These can really change and improve the RPG experience found here. Beamdog are absolutely comitted to making it the best it can be, with this update being the biggest since the Enhanced Edition release back in 2018.

What's inside? For starters, a whole new lighting engine with:

• Physically based rendering (PBR), with emulation of specular reflection, surface “roughness”, Fresnel-effects and gamma correction. All in all, this gives a more realistic and “natural” look.
• Tone mapping that prevents color distortion of bright lights and enables overbright.
• Per-pixel lighting rather than per-vertex of the old setup, yielding much more precise light illumination levels relative to distance.
• Full dynamic lighting, supporting up to 32 dynamic lights (previously NWN effectively only supported 6).

Check out a quick example of the difference some of it can make:

Left old / Right new. See a bigger comparison on this dedicated page .

Plus new water rendering, new grass rendering, plenty of other smaller graphical fixes and improvements. There's also some huge pathfinding improvements, getting stuck on random objects should be a thing of the past. Big improvements to modding once again, like access to the full SQLite API to get into campaigns, modules and the player. Loads more to be found in the patch notes .

Really great to see Beamdog continue to make such a great RPG constantly better. Will be very fun to see what else they have cooking up for Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition.

You can pick up Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition from GOG and Steam .

A game where the unexpected hero is an NPC inside a game world that's glitching out so badly the NPC becomes aware of you? GLITCHED sounds pretty wild.

"When a glitch appears in the video game world of Soren, an NPC named Gus becomes aware of you- the player. Travel together to solve the mystery of the glitch and save Gus's friends, hometown, and digital world. As the story unfolds, Gus might start to question what role you play in his world."

The progress idea sounds pretty fun. As you do more and gain experience, you can use that to patch up glitches in the world giving you access to new areas with every activity giving you some form of experience points so there's many paths through to progress the story. Additionally, the way the story goes changes based on if you win or lose fights which the developer said means you should "almost never" see a game over screen. Sounds thoroughly interesting.

Feature Highlight:

• 20+ potential party members
• Raise bebos and enjoy that sweet monster-raising RPG content
• A friendship & romance system for party members
• Tons of achievements
• Every object has unique flavor text (yes, every object. thousands of objects)
• Tons of outfits that change up all party members
• Cool and weird equipment
• Multiple endings
• Frogs

As it turns out, it actually had a Kickstarter campaign way back in 2016 which clearly mentioned Linux support. Since it had been a long time, and it has now appeared on Steam as an upcoming title we reached out to the developer about this. They confirmed Linux support continues, although they will be officially only supporting Ubuntu.

It was originally due to launch late last year but the developer delayed it to ensure they're not overworking themselves, since it's a solo project and to ensure the quality of it.

You can follow GLITCHED on Steam . It should be due to release late this year.

Lenna's Inception, the wonderful top-down Zelda-like action-adventure that takes place in a world that's glitching away has a big first post-release upgrade.

"The Kingdom of ▜̴͈̔▕̴͜͝▯̴̳̈́░̷̪͗▚̷̪̆▒̸̣̓ is glitching. The evil Chairman of the Banker’s Guild has captured the Prince, opening the way for destruction at the hands of the Archangels. With the Hero eliminated, and the world horribly unraveling, reluctant tutor Lenna must step up to save the kingdom. But it won’t be easy--all she has to guide her is the voice of the deceased elder, and he seems to know more than he’s letting on..."

A lot of fun and after releasing in January 2020, it sadly didn't see a lot of interest from players on Steam. It's currently still sat on less than 100 reviews. Considering it's one of the nicest Zelda-style action adventures I've played in some time it's a shame more haven't taken a look. Especially with the ability to switch between 8-bit and 32-bit pixel art styles.

After a bit of a break, they came back with a big update seemingly out of nowhere. So perhaps it's time to take another look if you were on the fence.

Here's what's new:

• Steam Input support, which should allow more different types of controllers to work with the game
• New Game+ mode, which you'll need to beat the game using 1.1 to unlock (although you can do this with an old save file)
• New biomes
• New enemies & minibosses
• New weapons
• Spoiler log generation
• Seeded challenge modes

Watch video on YouTube.com

Feature Highlight:

• Team up with a friend. Make peace with Shadow Lenna to enjoy the game in local co-op multiplayer!
• Play again (and again). With two graphical styles, multiple endings, multiple boss forms, and procedural generation, you won’t see everything in a single playthrough!
• Challenge yourself. Speed through the daily challenge dungeon with no sword, with only three hearts, or without taking a single hit. Show off a GIF of your playthrough on the connected leaderboard afterwards!
• Recruit companions. Will you choose Henrietta, the free-range chicken with a vendetta, or perhaps Gourdon, the sentient pumpkin? (4 to discover)

Lenna's Inception can be picked up from itch.io and Steam for $9.99 / £7.19 / €8.19. Easily worth the price.

While all this is going on, as a reminder Bytten Studio are also working on the open world monster-fusing RPG called Cassette Beasts that's worth keeping an eye on.

Merged together socialising with NPCs spread across a dynamic town with a platforming brawler, Sonzai sounds like it's going to be quite the treat.

"Sonzai is an innovative hand-drawn action-RPG about life, magic, and relationships. The town of Kumotoshi holds secrets; a new life and new people. What threads bind these people together? What is the true nature of magic? Thrown into a new town, form relationships with people around you. Sonzai is the debut game by trailblazing video game duo 2 Odd Diodes, hailing from Kolkata, India, and published by New York-based Top Hat Studios, Inc."

It's easy to be pulled in by Sonzai, with the artwork that's using a clever mix of hand-drawn rough lines, turned into animations with bright generated effects during some of the combat sections. Sonzai really does look like something special. Take a look at the reveal trailer:

Watch video on YouTube.com

Feature Highlight:

Discover the secrets of a magical world

• Explore a vast world.
• Whether it is a burning town right beside Kumotoshi or a civilization underground.
• Each new area has its own aesthetic and beings who reside in them.
• Discover its rich history while also managing your high school life.

Engage in viseral character-action combat

• Experience combo based action with deep customization.
• Passive Runes give you strength if you can fulfil its conditions.
• Actives Runes are devastating spells that you unleash on your enemies.
• Modules are modifiers that you can mix and match, to fine tune your loadout

Form Relationships with the townsfolk

• Each character you meet may or may not like a new face in town.
• Form bonds with them and get tangled in their stories.
• Get stronger through your relationships.

The publisher, Top Hat Studios, have confirmed in a message to us at GOL that Linux will be supported for it. This is a growing list of titles Top Hat are bringing to Linux including LAZR, SteamDolls and plenty already released.

You can follow Sonzai on Steam . We're in for quite a wait though, it's not due until 2022. Always nice to have more to look forward to though of course and Sonzai went right into my personal wishlist.

Releasing early next year, Across the Obelisk has been announced by Dreamsite Games (Empire TV Tycoon) and it looks like another good deck-builder.

"Adventure into the land of Senenthia, an old peaceful land that's been corrupted by a mysterious power. Help villagers, fight evil bosses, claim treasures and travel through an evolving world that will change with every little step that you take!"

Sounds like it's going to be overflowing with content too. Not only will it have singleplayer and multiplayer, it will also have more than 500 cards than can be upgraded, 200 different items and customizable heroes with different builds possible with tons of combinations. You can see some pretty early footage below:

Watch video on YouTube.com

They multiplayer side of it sounds interesting, quite different too for a deck-builder like this. You can play with up to three others where you each control a hero in combat to work together. With 16 heroes to unlock, there's going to be plenty of choice it appears with each having different cards, items and gameplay mechanics.

When asked on Twitter about Linux as it shows on Steam, they made it clear they will be doing Linux like they did with Empire TV Tycoon.

You can follow Across the Obelisk on Steam .