It's hard to wrap my head around it. I've been working towards this moment for so many years and I'm super excited to finally get the game into your hands!
To celebrate the release I wanted to talk a little bit about the development progress of the game, what inspired me and show a little bit of concept art and work in progress pictures:
The beginning
I started working on the game back in 2019 when I came fresh out of school. I had just finished making a small highscore-based game and wanted to create something bigger. Zelda was always a big inspiration for me. I grew up playing Ocarina of Time and I wanted to make something similar. The design of those big interconnected dungeons with puzzles and boss fights always fascinated me. There are still remnants of this initial design idea in the game. The temples that each give you a power of the gods, which is then used for puzzle solving and combat is directly inspired by those early Zelda titles.
(My concept sketches for the Cliffs of Hope)
(Placing basic shapes to get a feel for level design)
Getting fascinated by FromSoftware
It took quite a bit of development until I really found what the essence of the game would be. My brother introduced me to the Fromsoftware games in 2020 and they fully consumed me. I was so pulled into those games like I hadn't been in a long time. Something about the Souls-formula clicked with me and I knew that's where I wanted to take my game. Around that time I also had the idea that you could learn new moves from enemies you kill. I didn't know yet that this move-stealing would become such a large part of the game, I just experimented a lot and had fun trying different things.
(A very early version of the Combat Art menu)
The Soundtrack
I was also always really into making music. In a way making games was almost an excuse to write some cool music to accompany it. I grew up in a very musical family and I was making boss-themes for imaginary boss fights when I was already a little kid. The soundtrack is something I'm incredibly proud of. There's a lot of recurring themes and details and I had a lot of fun putting it all together.
(Advanced Protection Unit work in progress)
(The Watcher concept sketch)
When the vision was locked in
I'd say around 2022 I really had a strong vision of what I wanted False Hero to become. At this point I had played through most Fromsoftware titles and had developed an understanding of what I loved about their games, and what I cared less about and wanted to do differently. I wanted the boss design and feeling of accomplishment when mastering a boss. I wanted the interconnected level design and feeling of "ohh this is where I am" when looping back around somewhere. But I also wanted to allow players to experiment with everything and not have them lock themselves into a certain build. I cared about how armor pieces look, but I never once looked at the stats. In a way I think False Hero is a version of the Fromsoftware Souls game that just focuses on the specific parts I personally enjoy and tries to build on them.
(Goddess Birth concept sketch)
(Work in progress Noah model)
Polish
A large challenge towards the end was polish. Developers usually say the final 20% is 80% of the work and after going through the polish phase I know what they mean. Content wise, the game had been finished end of 2025, but since then I worked on improving animations, performance, game feel, sound effects and a lot more. I think this was one of the most important periods of the development process because it actually made the game feel good to play. My publisher also helped a lot during this time. They helped me organize playtests and compiled all of the player feedback into really useful actionable points that let me work way more efficiently.
I'm incredibly thankful to all of my friends and family and all of you who supported me on this journey!
I hope you all enjoy False Hero, and if you want to talk more about the game you can join the Discord server: https://discord.com/invite/yHUdDcYJZ6
