A New Chapter for Emberwake
Hello, Guardians!
I’ve been hard at work on Emberwake, improving the game and adding new ways to play. This update brings a full campaign, direct control over your villagers, new dangers, better saving, game-speed controls, and many improvements throughout the game.
Here’s what’s new.
Follow the Story Through a New Campaign
Emberwake now has an eight-mission campaign following the survivors from their first campfire to their final chance of escape.
Each mission has its own story, goals, starting conditions, and challenges. You’ll begin by gathering supplies and protecting a small camp. As the journey continues, you’ll build stronger defenses, meet unusual characters, face deadlier attacks, and search for a way to save your people.
The eight missions are:
First Fire
Broken Watchtower
The Raider Camp
The Graves Open
The Silent Bell
The Owl Road
The Gate Stones
The Last Portal
Later missions won’t always begin with an empty field. You may inherit part of an old settlement, but its buildings could be damaged and its defenses weakened. You’ll need to rebuild before the next attack arrives.
Step Into the World as a Villager
You can now take direct control of a selected villager and experience the settlement from their perspective.
Walk through the village, gather resources, carry supplies back to storage, pick up equipment, and fight nearby enemies yourself. You can also switch between villagers or return to the usual command view whenever you want.
I’ve spent a lot of time making direct control feel clear and responsive. Nearby resources and equipment are easier to spot, attacks face the correct direction, and villagers return to their normal duties more reliably when you release control.
Be careful when exploring the edges of the map. Wolves may appear from the wilderness and chase villagers who wander too far from safety.
Beware the Minotaur Labyrinth
A new world event is waiting to be discovered.
While gathering stone, your villagers may uncover a buried labyrinth. Once opened, it can release a Minotaur that charges toward your settlement and attacks the nearest defensive tower.
The creature may retreat after its attack, but that doesn’t mean the danger is over. Unless the labyrinth is dealt with, the Minotaur can return.
Will you hunt the beast, reinforce your towers, or seal the labyrinth before it attacks again?
Better Saving and Loading
The save system has received a major improvement.
You can now create manual saves, give them your own names, and see useful information about each save before loading it. Campaign and Free Play also have separate automatic saves, so progress in one mode will not replace progress in the other.
The game now remembers much more about your settlement. Your villagers, buildings, equipment, enemies, world events, and current battles should all return more faithfully when you continue playing.
Play at Your Own Pace
You can now choose between three game speeds:
Normal speed
Double speed
Quadruple speed
Slow things down when an attack begins, or speed up quieter moments while your villagers gather supplies and construct new buildings.
I’ve also improved many parts of the game so they stay in step when the speed changes—from villagers and enemies to weather, projectiles, construction, and invasions.
Smarter Villagers and Better Battles
Villagers now behave more reliably when gathering resources, carrying supplies, returning to camp, equipping weapons, and fighting enemies.
I’ve also improved combat movement, attack direction, weapon animations, and ranged attacks. Spears, swords, bows, and armor should all feel more useful and easier to manage.
Crowded settlements have been improved too. When many villagers return to the campfire, they will spread out instead of becoming stuck because there is no room.
Clearer Tutorials and Menus
The tutorial now does a better job of introducing gathering, equipment, combat, and direct villager control.
I’ve also improved the campaign screen, mission goals, save menus, confirmation messages, and several other parts of the interface. Restarting a game now asks for confirmation, helping to prevent accidental progress loss.
New and updated text has been added across Emberwake’s ten supported languages:
English
German
Spanish
French
Brazilian Portuguese
Russian
Serbian
Swedish
Turkish
Ukrainian
Many Fixes Along the Way
This update also includes plenty of smaller improvements.
I fixed problems with villagers becoming stuck, resources not reaching storage, equipment disappearing incorrectly, enemies and events not returning properly after loading, and mission goals not always updating as expected.
Camera movement, zooming, weather, attacks, buildings, invasions, and the campfire have also received additional fixes and balancing.
Keep the Fire Burning
This update is a major step forward for Emberwake. There is now a longer journey to experience, more control over your villagers, more dangers to discover, and more ways to build the settlement you want.
Gather what you can. Protect your people. Keep the fire alive and prepare the Last Portal before darkness takes the world.
Thank you for playing Emberwake and supporting its development. I hope you enjoy everything this update brings!