EMBERSWORN

The sun went out sixty years ago. Whatever put it out is still hungry.

This morning the Hearthwarden put a living coal in your hands. Carry it through five acts of the dark, down to the furnace beneath the world, and find out what put the sun out.

EMBERSWORN is a single-player action RPG with an isometric camera and real-time combat. Fight through floors laid out fresh on every visit, wear the gear you find (it shows on your hero), and face a guardian at the end of every act that cannot be hurt until you break what feeds it.

• Ashblade: a greatsword fuelled by Fury. Walks in, hits the biggest thing, and gets angrier the longer the fight goes on.
  
• Stormweaver: lightning, frost and falling fire, fuelled by Mana. Owns the room from a distance, but folds if cornered.
  
• Veilrunner: twin daggers and poison, fuelled by Focus. Her ultimate, Thousand Cuts, strikes eight foes from behind while she cannot be hurt.
  
• Gravecaller: raises the dead, fuelled by Marrow. Weak alone; every body on the floor becomes another pair of hands.

• Earn new skills on the road to level 50, up to class ultimates that turn a fight around.
  
• Three talent branches for every class. At level 8 you swear an Oath that opens your branch's deepest skills. Save whole builds and swap between them.
  
• Five rarities, fourteen item sets, relics taken from guardians, and gems for the sockets. The forge brings an old favourite up to your level.
  
• Rare and better weapons, helms, gloves and boots show on your hero; legendary and set pieces glow.

Each act ends with a guardian that stays warded until you break what feeds it. Five realms, five guardians, from the Charred Shepherd in the Cinder Waste to the Quencher on the Sunless Throne.





Nine people still live at Lasthearth, around the last fire anyone managed to keep. They travel with you to a new fire in every act, where they forge, cut gems, brew your flasks and keep a stash your heroes share.

• Companions: a sellsword, a cinder hound, a hedge-witch and a scout. One fights beside you at a time.
  
• Bounties: a named elite, a guarded strongbox or a captive. Rescued captives come to live by the fire.
  
• Puzzle rooms: braziers lit in the right order, weighing stones, weeping statues. The clues are hidden around the room.
  
• Favours: the people at the fire ask for help in every act.

• The Ashen Atlas: after the final guardian, thirty ranks of expeditions down the roads you have already walked.
  
• New Game+: finish the story to open Nightmare (New Game+), then Unlit (New Game++), then One Life (New Game+++): Unlit difficulty, and death is the end.
  
• Ordeals: pick a difficulty that lasts the life of the character. Wanderer and Veteran are open from the start.

A first run through the campaign is built to take around five to eight hours.





The story is told in painted, narrated films: one to open the road, one for every act, one for every guardian's fall, and a last one cut for your own hero. The people of Lasthearth are voiced, and every realm has its own music, with its own combat theme.

Controls

Full controller support, or keyboard and mouse (WASD or the arrow keys, with mouse aim). Single-player.

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