A surprisingly popular indie RPG, Lunacid, is getting downloadable content, despite its creator’s bewilderment at the game’s success. The dark fantasy title has garnered a ‘Very Positive’ rating on steam from over 7,000 reviews.
A King’s Field Revival?
Lunacid stands out from the crowd of Souls-like games by drawing inspiration from FromSoftware’s earlier, lesser-known King’s Field series, which debuted on the PlayStation. It deliberately focuses on exploration and player skill.Lunacid, while inspired by FromSoftware, deliberately leans into the feel of their older, first-person RPGs.
In a Steam post, the developer, Kira, provided an update on the DLC’s progress, stating, “I am still working on the DLC, it’s about 70% done (I feel like it’s been at 70% forever though). I definitely had to big a scope for it, but I have to complete it, even just for my sake.” Kira also briefly apologized for “getting distracted by Halo modding.” A firm release date remains unconfirmed, but the DLC will launch alongside “a few more rounds of bug fixing that will accompany the base game as well.”
- Lunacid is receiving DLC despite the developer’s surprise at the game’s popularity.
- The game draws inspiration from FromSoftware’s King’s Field series, not the more famous Dark Souls.
- The DLC is currently 70% complete, though the scope proved larger than initially anticipated.
- Kira,the developer,briefly paused development to work on a Halo mod.
Kira’s journey with Lunacid has been unexpected. Last year, she released Lunacid: Tears of the Moon, a free spinoff created using Sword of Moonlight, a toolkit FromSoftware released in 2000 for building King’s Field-style games. In a post announcing the spinoff, Kira expressed enjoying the challenge of working within the toolkit’s limitations.
However, she also revealed a desire for anonymity, remarking, “This was supposed to be niche. I thought I’d be a mysterious and unknown artist forever.”
Despite its unexpected success,Lunacid is worth checking out,particularly for fans of FromSoftware’s earlier work or classic dungeon crawlers. Kerry Brunskill reviewed the game in 2023, praising its ability to capture the essence of pre-Demon’s Souls FromSoftware titles. “Lunacid isn’t just convincingly old, it’s convincingly King’s Field old,” Brunskill wrote. “This game captures the design ideology of FromSoftware’s quirky first-person adventure games even better than it does the classic PlayStation aesthetic.”
