The Horror at Highrook news & patch notes

A few minor fixes

• Banned player pausing the game during cutscenes (I think this was occasionally causing bugs)
• Made a bunch of typo/spelling/grammatical fixes
• Changed the way vsynch works to try and cap FPS on high refresh monitor settings
• Added a new source of memories in chapter 8

Additional Notes: The game has been out a week now, and I'm hoping most of the initial bugs have been fixed now. As long as nothing terrible crops up the pace of patches might slow down a bit from now on. Thanks for the feedback and typo spots etc. Its hard to catch everything when you are a solo dev so I appreciate the all the reports and the patience of anyone who waited for a fix or feedback. Thank you everyone for your support!

Fixed a bunch of typos and grammatical errors. Introduced another source of embers earlier in the game Made searching with the divining ring faster Added an experimental fix to try and solve the very rare watchers bug..

Another small patch to ease progression for some parts of the game Burning ritual offerings can now also generate the gift of the rat Greater insight now has a note to inform players to use it on themselves, rather than waste it on a minor task and then be unable to level their characters.

Another small patch, mostly just tweaks to make certain stages of the game easier Made The Watcher Spire moveable (so you can still upgrade tools) Altered the beckoning bell so you cant accidentally miss certain items due to RNG More text tweaks, some more clues to help with various sidequests.

Hi all, The launch has gone pretty well, but as to be expected there were a few bugs that managed to evade me before release. I've listed and fixed those below, I'm also fixing any typos and grammatical errors as I go. Ver 1.02 - quick day 1 patch Fixed the issue where talking to the ghosts in chapter 5 could leave you stuck in an infinite pause loop. This could happen if you paused the game before clicking on the summoned characters. Fixed an issue where a new card appearing could push other progression required cards off the task slots (and therefore make them impossible to complete). Again this woudl often get fixed by a exit and reload, but it shouldn't happen now. Made ember wraiths fixed to their spawn room, but not locked, and also unable to push cards around. They were also the main culprit for the bug above.. Removed an edge case where you could still have a box of wax cylinders hanging about during the ending sequence :) Fixed some typos and apostrophe errors

Hello Investigators, I'm delighted to announce that The Horror at Highrook will launch on 1st May 2025 - Watch the Trailer now! https://youtu.be/oQIOF6rQfQQ As a huge fan of cosmic horror fiction and RPGs, The Horror at Highrook had been bubbling away at the back of my mind for some time. The last few years have been pretty turbulent for indie developers, but I've been lucky enough to be able to keep working on Highrook and bring a long term game dream to life. Now I'm finally on the home stretch and looking forward to sharing the results with you all! It's been fun developing the characters and hearing theories in the Discord from those who have played the demo and beta tests. As if in some grand cosmic coincidence of announcements The Horror at Highrook is also one of the game featured in the Lovecraftian Days festival - starting today! Even though the full game wont be out until the start of May the demo is still available, and the festival gives me another good opportunity to drum up some attention before the launch! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/44958602/b21ecbb61fef2707a92efa334edea9daecefda8b.png Thanks for all the support so far, can't wait for you all to get your hands on the game! Much love, Tom

Hello Investigators, I'm proud to announce that The Horror At Highrook will be taking part in the 2025 Lovecraftian Days Festival on Steam {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/44958602/b21ecbb61fef2707a92efa334edea9daecefda8b.png Its a week long festival ( 14-21 April ) of weird occult gems organised by Fulqrum Publishing. Highrook is included with a demo, a new trailer and a special announcement! There aren't many opportunities to showcase cosmic horror games and Lovecraftian influenced projects, so if you are into the weird horror or just enjoy some good spooky ambience its worth checking out what's on show! Tom

Greetings Investigator, Next Fest is upon us, and I'd like to welcome you to the hallowed halls of Highrook Manor. You will be managing your team of intrepid investigators to uncover what happened to the Ackeron family. Highrook has been a labour of love for me. It's a game that I've always wanted to make and I'm enjoying each layer of polish that I've been adding over these past few months especially. We most recently ran a playtest in December, and I was able to add a whole bunch of recommendations from the community, so huge thank you to everyone who took part! For those of you who have played previous demos, there's some new things you might like to see!

• New Board Design - The Board of Highrook has been overhauled with unique art. I'm really chuffed with how it looks
• New Visual Effects - Atmospheric events and transformations
• Dialogue and text overhaul - Less spelling mistakes (I hope)
• Tutorial Improvements - Made some tweaks to the tutorial to help with some onboarding!
• Quality of Life Improvements - Better guidance, UX and tips

If you have any feedback, drop a comment in the Steam Forums or you can join other investigators in the Highrook Discord. I hope you enjoy the demo and thanks very much for playing! Tom

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/44958602/02dd8467c43098c9076f6b825f5499a613d7b805.png Greetings Investigators, Happy New Year! We have now entered launch year and we enjoyed some time off over the festive season. Despite battling colds and various other ailments, we are all geared up for the months ahead. We really appreciated all the feedback from our private beta where participants received access to the first three chapters. We're happy with the overall feedback, and it also highlighted some areas that we're going to be smoothing out. Here's where we've been directing our attention over Christmas and for the next few weeks.

• Creating new music tracks
• Implementing new art for the board
• Finishing up the last remaining chapters
• Working with an editor to go over all the text

The goal for the first couple of months this year is also spreading the word of Highrook, and we'll taking part in Steam Next Fest in February! For those who have yet to step through the threshold, you can join our Discord and chat with other investigators! May this letter find you well, and all the best for the year ahead,

Hello Investigators, I'm delighted to announce that The Horror at Highrook has been selected to be part of The Game Awards for Games Who Can’t Afford the Game Awards (TGAGWCAGA) 2024 Showcase! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/44958602/b3a91022b490b59045c765b6ebb01d26e7a143f7.png TGAGWCAGA is a brand new showcase designed to spotlight incredible indie games that truly deserve more attention—while also poking a bit of fun at the exclusivity of The Game Awards. Catch the Highrook trailer (and possible award!) during the TGAGWCAGA showcase! Date: Friday, December 13 Time: 5:00 PM UTC / 6:00 PM CET / 12:00 PM ET Subscribe to the YouTube channel and don’t miss it! https://www.youtube.com/@TGAGWCAGA Join today, tell your friends and wishlist your favourite titles!

Greetings Investigators, A call rings out from the grounds of Highrook Estate. The doors of Highrook Manor shall open this December for you to explore more of what is coming. We're running a Private Beta in early December, and we'd love for you to take part and give feedback on the game! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/44958602/3174f83f223a9572d45a7b338024e69c7f099d46.png You will be given access to the first 3 chapters for approximately one week. This will be via a beta key delivered via our Discord (So be sure to join!) If you would like to take part, fill in this form: https://forms.gle/psdSj3pEPBWzWgRx8 Join the Discord: https://discord.gg/XJ42PFC2DV Follow on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/highrookhorror.bsky.social

Greetings Investigators! I've got some exciting news to share with you all today regarding the development of Highrook. OuterSloth is an indie game development fund created by Innersloth, developers of Among Us. OuterSloth is already funding seven projects, including new games by the developers of Venba, Thirsty Suitors, and I Am Your Beast. And today, I'm delighted to share that Outersloth have also decided to fund The Horror at Highrook! This is fantastic news as it's been a rough few years for indies, well, for everyone in the industry really. The Horror at Highrook actually arose as a result of another larger project deal falling through, and it's been a real passion project of mine that had been bubbling away for a few years. I sent a build of the game to OuterSloth, and it was such a refreshing experience chatting with them. After their success with Among Us, it's reassuring to see a successful indie game re-investing in their own field, especially when the industry seems so unstable. It gives me hope that things might be changing for the better! I'm making good progress with development, and I'm closing in on the last remaining chapters before polishing begins! We'll have more on that sooner than you might think, but in the meantime you may wish to join the Highrook Discord and give us a follow on Bluesky for more updates! Discord Invite: https://discord.gg/XwFcswu4YZ Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/highrookhorror.bsky.social Will get another one of these written soon! Cheers, Tom

Its spooooooky season! And I'm happy to announce that "The Horror At Highrook" was selected to appear as part of the STEAM SCREAM Festival. Obviously there's no discounts or sales, because the game isn't out yet! But there's a demo available for folk to try out the first chapter of the game, and wishlist/follow the project! Have a fund spoooooky season everyone!

Festival Time Again!

I'm thrilled to announce that The Horror At Highrook is part of the Official Selection for the Tiny Teams 24 festival! This runs on steam from 08/08/24 to 15/8/24. you can see the main festival page here https://store.steampowered.com/sale/tinyteamsfestival2024 its an honour to be included in the Tiny Teams Official selection alongside so many other amazing games. The festival is also an opportunity for me to present an UPDATED DEMO of the game, so people can experience the first chapter of the game and check out a few of the new mechanics in development! In addition to being part of the official selection, Highrook is scheduled to be played onstream by some of the Yogscast crew at the time below! SATURDAY 10TH 2PM-5PM BST - ZYLUS & RYTHIAN The stream will be viewable on twitch.tv/yogscast, https://www.youtube.com/@yogscast, and the Tiny Teams Steam page. And if that's not enough! I have also updated the main game TRAILER with more up to date clips of the game in action.

Happy to announce that The Horror At Highrook has been selected as one of the Develop 2024 showcase in Brighton UK. At Develop:Brighton each year there's a dedicated area within the Expo called the Indie Showcase featuring 10 independently developed games that have been shortlisted by a panel of industry experts. One of these 10 games will be judged overall Indie Showcase Winner by the judging panel and there will also be the chance for all attendees to vote for their favourite game during the event in the People's Choice Award. Develop is an industry facing conference (mostly aimed at developers, studios and publishers) but they do have a small selection of public events/talks and games on show. See https://www.developconference.com/ for more details

I've updated the live demo with a number of bug fixes. I've also added a bunch of features/changes that are part of the main game development so that the demo keeps in line with the rest of the project. Some of the changes/updates are as follows. Added larger UI option: Available from the main in game options menu you can now select a larger UI scale to help people playing the game on smaller screens. Added a character placement slot for room tasks: As pointed out in player feedback, since all tasks require a character card, I've made a specific square in each room for that character. This makes it easier to determine exactly who is carrying out a task. Card Inspector re-design: a slight redesign of how card info is displayed. This makes it easier to see what type a card is, and where you might be able to use it. Usage hints and better game guide: Most task items now have a highlighted line at the base of their description, Helping players to work out where to use that task item. The game guide now also features some diagrams/images and reworded text to help explain the mechanics better. Altered room and Tasks: The Entrance Hall is now The Courtyard, It is still the arrival point for investigators, but it also provides a new primary task "Plunder the Soil" which lets players dig for herbs and other items in the courtyard garden. This change has also effected some of the quest chains for the first chapter.. (mostly to do with how dreams are generated). Hopefully these changes will make demo even easier to follow and give players a updated idea of how the main game is developing! Thanks for playing, and as usual all feedback is appreciated.. (either on the forums here or via the discord)

Hey all, Just a quick update to say that the chat between the developer (me!) Tom Betts and occasional collaborator Jim Rossignol is now on youtube. The interview was originally screened as part of the LudoNarracon steam festival during May 2025 (hence the banner running at the base of the video) Its just under an hour of us discussing the various design considerations that have gone into making the game, along with examining some of the influences that fold into it. There's also a bit of chat about how the game started up and my approach as a solo indie developer. Hope you find it interesting! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZlFbAQtb64

This is the first time that players can open the doors to the cursed manor and start their investigation! The demo features the opening chapter of the game and will allow players to explore early parts of the story and experience the game's many mysterious mechanics. The Horror at Highrook is an occult card crafting RPG. Explore a haunted mansion with your team of investigators, summon dark entities, craft powerful protections, uncover the fate of a missing family, and choose your own path through the darkness. This demo is from an in-production build and does not reflect the quality of the final product. It is intended to give you small a taste of the characters, world and gameplay mechanics As we continue to develop the game new features will be added and alterations made to existing systems. If you enjoy the demo please consider wishlisting the game. You can also offer feedback and keep up to date with the development on our discord - follow the links in game or on the store page to join. Thanks for playing!

A friendly chat between the developer Tom Betts occasional collaborator Jim Rossignol. We will be talking about the game and its inspirations. Prepare for some insights into weird design mechanics and a bunch of literary and tabletop references! I'll try and keep this stream looping after the first broadcast, so it will be available to watch throughout the festival.

I'm really happy to announce that The Horror At Highrook is part of the Official Selection for the LudoNarraCon 24 festival! Ive been a big fan of Fellow Traveller as a publisher for years, and its an honour to be included in their Official selection alongside so many other amazing games. The festival is also an opportunity for me to present the first playable demo of the game, so people can finally try their hand at the games first chapter and experience the early part of the tale. I'll also be doing a fireside chat during the festival with occasional collaborator Jim Rossignol. We will be talking about the design inspirations for the game and the various literary works that influenced the worldbuilding and tone.