Over the past month, the team has continued driving development forward across every area of Depths of Erendorn, delivering improvements that expand gameplay systems, strengthen visual quality, and prepare the project for future testing milestones. From new character assets and environmental workflows to deeper progression systems, combat refinements, and technical optimisations, each discipline has contributed towards building a more complete and cohesive experience. Major advancements have been made across the game's core foundations, including the expansion of player abilities, improvements to multiplayer functionality, enhanced world creation tools, and continued refinement of the visual elements that bring the world to life. These combined efforts continue to push Depths of Erendorn towards its next stages of development, while establishing stronger systems and workflows to support the ongoing growth of the game. As always, join us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit for daily updates on Depths of Erendorn. Alternatively, join our Discord for all the latest! - now let’s get into it!
3D Modelling
Over the past month, the 3D Modelling team has continued expanding the character roster of Depths of Erendorn while completing a major milestone in the redevelopment of the Vaznarite. The team finalised the creature's texturing phase and implemented its dynamic lava flow shader within the game engine, combining painted lava channels with animated effects to create the appearance of molten rock moving beneath the surface and further reinforce its volcanic identity. Following the completion of the Vaznarite, development shifted towards the creation of the Tavern Master, with the team progressing from the initial body and facial sculpt through to detailed clothing, accessory, and equipment refinement. Additional sculpting passes introduced profession-specific details such as a tankard, keychain, dish rag, and coin pouch, helping establish the character's role within the settlements of Depths of Erendorn. With the high-resolution sculpt now complete, the Tavern Master provides another fully developed NPC foundation ready for the next stages of the production pipeline.
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
Set Piece Design
Over the past month, the Set Piece Design team has continued expanding the environmental toolkit of Depths of Erendorn while developing new systems and assets to improve world-building workflows. Significant progress has been made on fortified settlement assets, including the completion of modular city wall segments, bridge pieces, and improved blueprint tools that provide greater flexibility when creating defensive structures and connected layouts. Alongside these additions, the team has enhanced environmental detail across key locations through quarry rope detailing, the development of procedural rope and ivy generation tools, and continued set dressing work for the first outpost. Further improvements were also made to waterfront environments through the creation of a new boat motion shader, providing more natural movement and strengthening the visual authenticity of coastal areas. These combined updates continue to improve both the efficiency of environment creation and the quality, variety, and atmosphere of locations throughout the world.
.png)
Programming
Client
Over the past month, the Client team has continued expanding and refining player-facing systems across Depths of Erendorn, with a strong focus on integrating new abilities, improving progression, and strengthening combat feedback. Significant progress has been made on the implementation of the new level three class abilities, including the creation of client-side blueprints, ability descriptions, interface integration, and extensive testing alongside the Server team to ensure each skill functions correctly. Several complex issues were resolved during this process, including fixes for persistent visual effects, stat multiplication interactions, and ability-specific behaviours affecting skills such as Shadow Dagger, Spiderling Implant, Comet Calling, Chain Lightning, and Zeal. Alongside ability development, the team continued improving the player progression experience through updates to tooltips, level-up presentation, and the introduction of an ability swap system that provides greater flexibility when customising character builds. Additional refinements to event handling and player notifications are now underway, helping ensure new abilities provide clear feedback and a consistent experience as they move closer to full implementation.
Server
Over the past month, the Server team has continued strengthening the core systems that support gameplay progression, multiplayer functionality, and long-term stability across Depths of Erendorn. Major improvements have been delivered across combat, inventory, crafting, and progression systems, including the introduction of individual corpse-based loot generation, improved loot balancing controls, and expanded item management features such as overflow-to-stash functionality. The team has also advanced multiplayer experiences through improvements to party travel, late-join support, session synchronisation, proximity chat, and the introduction of an in-game voting system for group decisions.
Combat reliability has received further attention through fixes to ability interactions, healing system refactors supporting mechanics such as Grievous Wounds, stat multiplication improvements, and continued balancing of the newly introduced level three abilities across multiple classes. Alongside these gameplay updates, new crafting and achievement systems have been implemented, providing deeper player progression through equipment customisation, milestone tracking, and improved item generation. Further refinements to backend tools, world systems, navigation data, and editor workflows continue to strengthen the foundations of the game while supporting future content development and testing milestones.
Environment Art
Over the past month, the Environment team has focused on improving both the technical foundations and visual quality of Depths of Erendorn, delivering major advancements across optimisation, rendering, and world-building workflows. Extensive performance profiling has led to significant improvements across the game's rendering pipeline, with upgrades to upscaling, animation handling, lighting, shadows, and asset processing helping to greatly improve frame rates while maintaining visual quality. Alongside these optimisations, the team has resolved key Unreal Engine 5.5 workflow challenges, including improvements to Procedural Content Generation and HLOD systems through the development of new internal tools and pipeline fixes.
Environmental standards have also been further formalised through ongoing art direction documentation, establishing clearer guidelines for asset creation, performance targets, materials, lighting, and optimisation across multiple platforms. In parallel, the landscape system has undergone a major redevelopment, introducing improved procedural terrain blending, enhanced biome transitions, more detailed shorelines, and greater surface variation through advanced texture techniques. These combined improvements provide a stronger foundation for future world expansion while delivering more detailed, consistent, and efficient environments throughout the game.
Animation
Over the past month, the Animation team has continued expanding the range of creatures being brought into active development within Depths of Erendorn, with a focus on integrating the Arcane Giant into the game’s animation pipeline. The team has worked on implementing the creature’s movement systems and behavioural animations, ensuring its actions translate correctly within the game engine and provide a strong foundation for future combat encounters. This process has helped establish the Arcane Giant as a fully functional addition to the growing roster of enemies, while supporting the continued development of larger and more complex creatures across the world. These ongoing animation improvements contribute towards creating more varied and engaging encounters as the game continues to evolve.
Visual Effects
Over the past month, the VFX team has continued expanding and refining the visual language of combat across Depths of Erendorn, with a focus on improving ability presentation, clarity, and gameplay feedback. The team has carried out further enhancements to existing effects, ensuring abilities feel more impactful while maintaining clear visual communication during encounters. Alongside these refinements, development has progressed on the Arcane Giant’s area of effect ability, with new visual elements being created to define its influence on the battlefield and reinforce the creature’s arcane identity. Additional work has also focused on supporting the growing number of player abilities, helping establish a stronger foundation for future combat effects and ensuring each skill continues to feel distinct within the expanding gameplay experience.
That’s it for this week’s devlog, but have you seen our monthly roundup of June yet?!
