Inkarn8: First Pages
A DARK FANTASY ROGUELITE INSIDE A CURSED SPELLBOOK
Every page is a room. Every chapter is a floor.
Choose your own adventure through a living dungeon where your choices shape the path ahead. Draw sigils to cast spells, embrace corruption, and rewrite your fate within the Codex.
A Preview to Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex
Inkarn8: First Pages is an in-development preview of Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex. Content and presentation may change before release.
YOUR FIRST PAGES ARE WAITING
Inkarn8: First Pages is a playable introduction to Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex, a dark fantasy roguelite set inside a living cursed spellbook.
Enter the Codex, learn to draw sigils with your magical quill, make your first choices, face your first enemies, then choose your class and take your first steps into Chapter 1.
Every page is a room. Every chapter is a floor. Every choice shapes your adventure.
IN FIRST PAGES
- Draw sigils to cast spells
- Learn Inkarn8's tactical turn-based combat
- Make choices within the living Codex
- Discover your first artifacts and encounters
- Begin unlocking the mysteries of the Scriptorium
Want to help shape Inkarn8? Join our community to chat directly with the devs, see exclusive sneak previews, and vote on upcoming features for The Cursed Codex
šļø We Want Your Feedback!
Thank you for playing the prologue! As we build Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex, your thoughts are incredibly valuable to us. Drop a comment below and let us know:
- The Vibe & Framing: Did you enjoy the book aesthetic and dark atmosphere?
- The Combat: How did the tactical turn-based gameplay feel to you?
- The Concept: What caught your attention most about the general game idea?
- The Polish: Did you encounter any confusing tutorial moments or bugs?
Download
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Development log
- First Pages is now playable in your browser5 days ago
Comments
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Really cool, art is awesome and concept is awesome, the start feels a bit slow to get going tho the tutorial feels long and if you have to reset it feels bad atm. Super awesome concept though I would be excited to play more
How long have u been developing this bro.... its soooooo good.... AND THE ART IS INSANELY GOOD
Thank you very much, we really appreciate hearing your kind words. We have been working on this for a year now and are working on our steam page launch later this month. It's been a busy time and somewhat nerve racking getting even this small preview build up for the public to play. I'm glad you have enjoyed it because this first pages was just a taste of what Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex has to offer in chapter 1.
cool I will definitely play it when the other pages come... also the animation was insanely good bro
nice
Thanks mate, what did you like the most and what did you like the least?
It's a nice concept, but it's the laggiest game I've ever played, so mixed feelings.
hey that is unfortunate, we added settings to the escape menu. If you lower the quality or press dynamic resolution it should meet your target frame rates. What version did you download?
[softlock (browser version)] On page 806 of the tutorial, when directed to reposition to an offensive placement with the end-round actions, I was able to defy the instructions--which had irked me with their earlier deleterious demands--and choose to do extra damage instead. Upon so choosing, I found myself in a round wherein the tutorial would dictate that I "Go on the offensive," whereas my lack of any offensive seals necessitated elsewise. Hence, I could avail no forward course.
Very nice demo, I do enjoy the concept drawing glyphs to cast spells (or in this case, take actions) and the fact that it takes place in a book is fun! I would hope that in future there are choices to be made on what paths you take through the chapters.
hey thanks for your kind words. That indeed is the case in the full game with choose your own adventure to navigate through the pages in the chapter. Take a look at the teaser content on our website or join the discord/mailing list to keep updated.
Some very impressed gameplay, and just a hint of critique ;)
Thanks for taking the time to play our bite sized preview. I appreciate the feedback and critique we definitely have some of this stuff in mind for the larger game Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex.
Please do join our website + discord and get in touch with me there would definitely like to have you on board for testing the private alpha of Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex as we build towards our full steam demo.
Very cool concept! A game actually plyed inside of a book. I was going through the tutorials. Quite a lot to read and learn for the casual gamer. But I like the design, colors, and gameplay mechanics. I had to lower the quality due to lag, and there were some missed clicks/bugs when trying go to the next page, but maybe that was more of a lag issue.
All-in-all, very good and interesting concept!
Thanks for taking the time to share your experience. The first pages has allowed us to get some good feedback and benchmarks for performance adjustments.
Out of interest what are your pc specs?
The tutorial preview was released as an introduction to our larger game Inkarn8: The Cursed Codex that we are actively working on. So we definitely understand the points around the reading and will adjust the tutorial prior to The Cursed Codex demo.
Glad you enjoyed the game so far, look forward to seeing what you think of the larger game.
I checked out your game and I really liked it! By the way, are you currently looking to hire an animator, artist, or developer for the project?
Thanks, I am glad you enjoyed the game. Currently we are just a small team and aren't looking to expand but I encourage you to join our discord and share some of your work so the team can take a look.
Ohh I see! Btw would you be comfortable sharing your Discord with me so we can connect there?
Yeah for sure, I just realised the link on the game page image wasn't connected properly. Heres a discord link: https://discord.gg/DttWVXRtZy
also if you go check out our game page sign up for to our website and all our links are there. We also will be selecting game testers from people who sign up there.
Thanks for bringing it to our attention that the link was broken.
See you in the community
Iāve joined your Discord server. Could you give me your Discord username so I can message you there and chat with you?
Sure my name is Tim I am the founder of the small New Zealand studio YNG8, my tag in the discord server is Tim | Creator.
Could be cool, but the lag is atrocious.
Did you try adjusting the settings? Dropping to medium or ticking dynamic resolution should help ensure a target framerate is met.
That has helped, I will give it another try. I hadnāt realized there was a settings menu (accessible via āEscā).
Ok, finished the tutorial/demo. I think the full game looks good, though hopefully the tutorial process is less laborious thereā I donāt like it when tutorials force me to take game actions, especially bad ones.
Overall, I think the sigil drawing is fun, though it will slow down combat too much for some people, but I think thatās okay; a game doesnāt have to be for everyone. Although I think the balance is fine, the language used in the tutorial makes me think that you think reserves are hard to replenish, which is false because you can convert unspent blots to ink by default and thereās no time limit on fights so any weak enemy you can leave alive is a full replenishment of your reserves at the end of a fight provided you can heal at all (one negative healing trait is fine, but two stacks would prevent this).
Also the shield slam sigil doesnāt work currently (it does 0 damage when consuming shield as well)
This feedback is excellent thank you for taking the time to give our game another shot after your initial difficulties. Then coming back with this detailed feedback is great for a small team. We would love to get you in our discord as we move into our steam page launch and alpha demo of chapter 1.
Regarding stalling on weaker enemies to heal this is one consideration we have had with the original press the attack resolution and skip action phase. For class's themselves in the full game we have adjusted the resolution actions to be more thematic to each class. In addition to this later enemies and encounters may have scaling mechanics or page corruptions over time. I do think for early encounters I don't mind a bit of safety and stalling but should be balanced with risk vs reward, better loot drops etc.
Very cool concept! I liked the storytelling approach and ink based combat. The stamping of the actions onto the wax adds a lot of flavor and immersion!
At the moment, the drawing aspect seems a bit decorative since there is not pressure that exists to interrupt your drawing focus. Other games I've played before with drawing spells were realtime and therefore had more pressure on the player. I still really enjoyed it though!
The quill and action resource is really creative along with the ink surge concept. I'm looking forward to how it's going to develop and interact with the rest of the game later.
The bookmarking bits were still a little confusing to me as I'm still not sure what effects on the pathing it really had?
I also think it would be cool if the environment outside of the book was a little interactable as well such as putting out the candle lights or some other things, maybe a bit similar to hearthstones boards.
Overall very much enjoyed this little demo and am looking forward to seeing it develop further!
Thank you for the kind words and the thoughtful feedback, really appreciate it!
First Pages is very much a preview of the concept and is deliberately quite on rails. A lot of the things you've picked up on, including the world around the book, the desk and the wider Scriptorium, are intended to become much more interactive in the full game.
The bookmarks also become much more important once the Codex opens up. Each run the book changes and adapts, and bookmarks let you mark pages/rooms you may want to find your way back to. That's where the choose-your-own-adventure side of Inkarn8 really starts to come into play. Unfortunately, as you noticed, that doesn't have much opportunity to shine in this short preview.
The point about drawing pressure is interesting too and definitely something for us to think about as we expand the combat systems.
From your suggestions, it sounds like you're really getting what we're trying to build. We'd love to have you join us on Discord, help shape the game with feedback like this, and potentially get access to testing the Chapter 1 demo as we develop it!