Incremental Fortress
Posted February 7, 2025. Updated February 8, 2025. Played 5939 times for a total of 9360 hours.
description
You are the Commandant of a fortress.
This is a major update. It is not compatible with saves from any of the previous version.
If you've played previous versions, here are the changes you should know about:
- Upgrades are no longer tied to Volcano Breathers and are instead moved into Prestige. So, game progress is no longer tied to real time
- Messengers don't disappear after arrival. You also get an indicator of an estimated time of arrival of the next one
- An additional gambling mini-game has been added which allows the player to spend coins faster while generally receiving the same amount of items (or even more)
- The first run now has milestones which awards the player items which make the first run faster and more pleasant.
- Loads of polish to the game, including a massive re-balancing of many mechanics, prices and item effects, and lots of quality-of-life improvements
newest comments
What does key and keyhole do? I tried combining keyhole with box and it says nothing interesting, which is odd as it usually say max potency 30. But that doesn't make sense either as the key and keyhole both add 10000 potency. I tried box keyhole and key, but when I added key to the mix it went from nothing interesting back to saying max potency 30. What do I combine them with?
Seems like even a decked-out aviary doesn't beat out dwarves (not even close)? Is the balance off?
Oh, well, I was assuming the aviary only applied to wyverns, but if it applies to all creatures, that would make sense.
developer response: Ah, I see. That's a reasonable conclusion. I'll see if I can make it clearer in the UI.
But yeah, Aviary is not massive-massive and is not meant to like explode the rate, but it does help reach the end of the game a bit faster, and a couple of Wyvern fortifications will give quite a boost :)
Very Cool game, how do I get rid of Devil's exhale after unlocking the keep equiped item unlock
developer response: You need to give wine to the mortals so that they riot. Pick dwarves or weaklings!
Addicted immediately. Took a few days which was an enjoyable amount of time. I played almost entirely active, there was always a new milestone just within reach at any given moment and it just kept happening and I was hooked. New multipliers at every turn, fantastic stuff. And by far the most fun I had was figuring out recipes. They have context and indication so figuring some out felt like being rewarded for good detective work, I loved it.
Opinions/Suggestions: Dev, if you're going to keep updating (which I would enjoy), I would have liked a "buy 50" or maybe a "buy next rank/hiring bonus". It would have made the milestone chasing even better. I would have liked to see many more outer wall stones. I would have loved to see more things happening at the necropolis, it felt too slow to enjoy engaging with, it was kind of a chore, although I understand its importance. I'd love to see tower reinforcements have more effects, I only boosted weaklings, dwarves, and wyverns and only a few times with no incentive to boost the others.
I partially agree with others that the hammer is a linchpin, however I still always had something else I could do and so I don't think it should be changed much, if at all.
Here's an FYI, maybe it'll give dev some insight for updates, or players a strategy to work with if they feel stuck. My main rotation for the entirety of my playthrough was "buy 10 / buy 100" to hiring bonuses, stack necro / wine / dragons / giants / birds multipliers, get the dwarves drunk, and then gamble / alchemy / raid until prestige. The hammer popping up was always very helpful, but definitely most of my time was gambling / alchemy with a shadow cart equipped. I didn't complete the treasury, missed maybe 5 items, I'll figure them out eventually.
developer response: Massive thanks for this kind comment!
"I played almost entirely active, there was always a new milestone just within reach at any given moment and it just kept happening and I was hooked"
This makes me very happy! This was exactly how I balanced the prices and exactly how I wanted the game to feel :)
"I'd love to see tower reinforcements have more effects"
I absolutely plan to add more, agreed
"buy next rank/hiring bonus"
Great idea! Won't comment on other suggestions, all sound great, some of 'em I have on my list already!
Since I see that this time the game is doing better, I will then definitely be considering a new version. Apart from improvements, I plan to add enemies: the fortress will occasionally have enemies attack it, and there will be different kinds that can be killed more easily either with certain items or when a certain item is equipped, things like that.
Again, massive thanks for the kind comment, this made my day! <3
You might be thinking it would be cool to craft 16 packs of thunders, and then craft 16 cassowaries, and then spawn 1000 BLTs to make the treasury bonus go wild, but the game can't seem to handle having a 1000 BLTs in the inventory and lags to a stop. Items definitely need to be stackable, sortable, and managed in the back end better. Items also really shouldn't have a use cost that scales with best income. It's kind of silly that an item that I dropped early in a prestige is dirt cheap and then that same item dropped when all my bonuses have been set up and I'm pushing for the next prestige costs more than 100x what I generate per second. I have a feeling the unique costs is what is stopping items from being stackable, so maybe it's an overall good thing to ditch it.
developer response: Good point about stacking, I can think about how to better organize items (perhaps, similar to how I deal with ingredients).
The items cost does go down dramatically with prestige upgrades, and there are a bunch of items that lower it (like Strange and Stranger bottles). Also, use Daggers and Swords.
Once prestige upgrades are applied, items are way more accessible. I am also open to making it cheaper still and working with the balance.
top comments
the sounds THE SOUNDSSS I LOVE THEM
developer response: Ooh, thank you! Spent a lot of time finding and editing sounds, super glad you like them!
I played this in early development, and if I recall, it has the same main problem - namely, that the hammer multiplier boost makes all other progress seem trivial. So you just sort of sit around waiting for that one.
developer response: I would actually disagree on that one, and I worked a lot on the balance to ensure that this is no longer the case.
In the previous versions everything was incredibly slow. You could prestige for the first time in like a day. And so hammer boosts was the only thing that propelled you forward.
In this version waiting for the hammer will not get you very far. Instead, everything is done in a way that you can prestige frequently. In fact, the prices are done in such a way that when you unlock a new area, by the time you explore it, you have already accumulated enough mana to prestige and unlock the next big thing.
And this way the rare hammer boost is just that - a rare bonus that's actually no longer even necessary in the game.
Just make sure to take advantage of the stuff you open. Get items, many of which will add lots of boosts, especially those that provide cool combos like Owl/Frog Rain and Casswary/Thunder. Those can be obtained from normal Cave or Dicebox easily and give you massive boosts.
Cave and Dicebox themselves give you massive time boosts, if that's what you want. You can routinely win 10/20 minute boosts, and at Cave you can sometimes get a 1 hour boost.
You can essentially beat the whole game in 2-3 days if you're playing actively and engaging with stuff. The hammer is not required at all.
Seems incredibly slow. I agree with Mantus that the only progress is hammer boosts, until I found some cannibals. Took me 22 hours to get to the first prestige, and I'm not like...bad at these games. It almost makes me wonder if maybe an old version was uploaded or something?
I also thought I unlocked a bunch of spells when I did my first prestige, but I don't see any spells anywhere and seem to just be doing the same slow climb again without any noticeable improvement. Maybe I'm misunderstanding this game?
developer response: Spells are additional upgrades that you get for units. The first volley of upgrades turns Weaklings into the most powerful unit. A second volley makes Humans the strongest.
how do the they do better when drunk
developer response: I guess their mood improves :D
Rare louigi verona game, not moving for at least an hour
developer response: Yas! I hope you enjoy