Bladeweaver Demo
Orphaned at birth under mysterious circumstances, you are adopted by two Masters of the Bladeweavers' Order - an institution of elite warriors and weaponmasters as ancient as the very cities they are based in. When cataclysm strikes, the Order is left scattered and broken, and you are left aimless in a hostile world, without purpose.
In your search for it, what else will you find?
Bladeweaver is a text-based grimdark fantasy interactive fiction game developed in Twine, focusing on your customizable player character as they grow up and navigate their way through a crumbling world wreathed in esoteric magic, dark secrets and murky morals, loosely inspired by the late medieval/early Renaissance periods, with a heavy touch of a more fantasy/steampunk influence. Customise your Bladeweaver - their appearance, gender and personality are yours to choose. Master your chosen weapon, make friends (or perhaps more?) and enemies along the way as societies rise and fall, as alliances strengthen and collapse, and loyalties are strained to their breaking point.
Bladeweaver is a mature game with heavy themes and content, including but not limited to violence, strong language, possession, mental issues, drug use, discrimination against a fictional race, gender roles, kidnapping and abuse.
Current wordcount (incl. code): 402k
Here's a link to the tumblr for Bladeweaver: Bladeweaver (tumblr.com)
I'll be posting updates on Discord, too: https://discord.gg/bWGefvYFrF
This is an in-progress demo version of Bladeweaver. Once completed, this demo will conclude at the ending of Chapter 7 out of 16 in the full, planned game. Content found within is liable to change until the full game is released.
Development log
- Demo Update (25/12/2025)11 days ago
- Update on progress and a delaySep 02, 2025
- Demo Update (11/03/2025)Mar 12, 2025
- Demo Update (07/12/2024)Dec 07, 2024
- HotfixSep 22, 2024
- Demo Update (21/09/24)Sep 21, 2024
- Demo Update (14/04/24)Apr 14, 2024
- Bladeweaver APK Now available!Apr 06, 2024
Comments
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Eu sou do Brasil Obrigado por não abandonar o jogo eu realmente gostei desse jogo e ele ainda tem tanta coisa para acontecer eu espero ainda estar vivo para poder aproveitar cada pedaço dele e suas atualizações futuras
I love this SOOO much!!! 😍😍😍 Also, will we meet that noble boy again? I lwk want him LMAO 😭 With that out of the way, I really like the story 🤭 I'm so sad it's not finished yet but no pressure! I wish you luck, dear author!
I love this game so much!!! It immediately grabbed my attention and kept it throughout - I’m so so excited to read the rest! Your writing has become my favorite in all of interactive fiction - in a lot of books it can be difficult to select options when we don’t have a predefined MC/we are not given much to go off of. Here, getting to play through who they are and to eventually get to play as that adult of the prologue - this is honestly the ideal experience to me. We will know this character as much as you CAN know a character; I love playing an MC from the ground up. Thank you so much for creating!!! 💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗
Found an error
Turn 285
Uncle Callen laughs, "Well, lass. I'll be sure to fill ye in on what goes on, eh?"
The witch invites him in with a wave of her hand. "Come now, young man. There are fortunes to be read today. A warning, though. The nature of your ... mark," Uncle Callen's smile quirks into a knowing frown as she says this, "may jumble the reading. Just a forewarning, of course."
He follows her in, waving you goodbye before he steps through the black curtains.
(i was previously with aunt Sonia. Idk what happened but somehow i am suddenly with uncle Callen)
And before that, there's multiple answer tht we can go with but two of them leads to swapping aunt Sonia with uncle Callen
+there's an answer with error too i think
You'd prefer your guardian went first.]
this is one of the routes where aunt Sonia is swapped with uncle Callen btw
Thanks for this! It's all been fixed in Twine and will be pushed out in the next update :)
The worldbuilding is interesting, the characters are fun and colorful to read, and there are elements of mystery that keep you going forward. But I must emphasize the massive pile of missed potential that this story is.
So the game starts with the MC in a seriously troubled place, where they purposelessly wander the lands and wallow in their sorrow. It is a cool starting point and it makes you wonder how they ended up in this situation and what they will do now. But instead of continuing the story from here and giving the answers about MC's past as the story progresses, it pulls the rug under you and sends you back to MC's birth, from where you play as the MC is first five, and then eight years old. And I only assume that as the story goes on, we'll spend more time with MC's childhood and adolescence.
Don't get me wrong, these two chapters aren't too bad to read. But they nowhere near make it worth the narrative taking you away from the way more interesting state that the MC was in early on. There's just so much that this story could've told in the MC's lost and miserable state than their childhood does.
I agree.To be honest i was hoping that the backstory will be told to us through small flashbacks as the story continues in the present.Although i dont particularly hate the way the author has taken this i just feel i got bamboozled by the prologue.
I expect it is to make the readers more emotionally invested in the tragedy than simply being told there is one. As long as it's done right, I have no problem with it.
I was thinking the same thing!!! The writing is good but I couldn't help getting bored halfway through... and it may or may not be because of my poor attention span
...I'm going to be quite honest, I just think you-and those agreeing with you- have different preferences that the game never said it would cater to. the prologue with the mc as an adult was never meant to be the only version of the mc you play as, nor did the game ever state that was to be expected.
the reason you flash back in time to play as a child is to grow more entrenched in the world and to build up to the mystery of what will happen in the future, the events mc is reacting to in the prologue. *that* is what the game is building up to- and the reason the mc is an adult in the prologue- not for you to be an edgy 30 year old or wtv in the countryside.
and the story is barely even past the second chapter yet- you don't even know half of the plot, much less the reason why mc was so miserable in the first place. you're meant to experience it along with the protag. you're creating ideas of what's more 'interesting' based off of some tepid idea of what the adult plotline would be like rather than an actual analysis of the existing content so far in the story.
it just doesn't seem like you enjoy playing games that have childhood sections. that's not a moral failing, but to be quite honest, your 'criticism' of the story and assertion that it has lost potential is nonsensical. you, aemonisbck, and masoada, just do not like this genre of game. and as a result, you've made judgements and evaluations that are entirely nonsensical and reaching for something to critique, when your dislike is purely subject to what you enjoy in if, not to any actual fault in the writing.
First of all; let's stop talking like your idea is the objective truth and the best scenario in the world. Just like I speak based on my preferences and what I believe is the best, so do you.
Second of all; "the story just has two chapters" argument doesn't work here. In an average book, that still would not be acceptable, because, unless you're a widely popular author like Sanderson or G.R.R.M. then, never mind the first two chapters, you only have the first three pages to hook your audience in. It especially doesn't work here, because while a book's first two chapters are 10k words at most, the story we're presented here is 350+K words, equal to two and a half novel. If you trim all the alternative texts in the story, it would still make 150K+ words at worst, equal to one big novel.
Third of all; I do like child protagonists. If done right, they can add a different nuance to a story. What I don't like is how little they always have going on compared to an adult protagonist in almost any story. They have very little agency to sustain the reader for a long period of time, and they can only explore a little variety of topics as opposed to an adult protagonist that can go through many directions. And when a story tries to put a child protagonist into the shoes of an adult one, it most often goes with an even more bizarre taste.
Fourth of all; agency. Agency is the one thing that will keep you actually interested in the protagonist of a story. When you read a story, you expect the protagonist to do some shit, preferably cool shit. But when, like in many cases of child protagonist, the protagonist loses the agency they have due to their age or some other reason, the story becomes a chore to go through in order to reach the cooler stuff instead of being something that you can enjoy thoroughly. You wouldn't want to follow a character who's basically a cameraman, would you? Well the childhood portion of the story is where the protagonist is a literal cameraman.
And fifthly; the "tepid" idea presented in the prologue is much more interesting than the childhood portion of the game. Sure, you can like the other one more, but I would rather have a character who goes through an intriguing period of their life instead of a child with very little agency and have just boring slice-of-life childhood sections that nowhere near deserve 350+K words.
Oh and you can add the whole "growing more entrenched in the world" and "building mystery through smaller flashbacks" thing without stealing the entirety of a story as well. That's called good writing. Shoehorning it into the story through an insufferable amount of time isn't that.
I absolutely adore this IF sm, the writing is PEAK and I love Sonia and Callen's friendship
I did notice a coding error however on turn 280 when MC and Callen are going through crowds
The first option shows the second ones scene and the second shows the first ones scene
absolutely amazing!! one of the best stories i've come across. AND OVER 350K WORDS???? THATS LIKE THREE-FOUR NOVELS
also will the full version be free? and as another commenter mentioned- please let us get our
momaunt a girl lmaothis is so peak!! i love it!!
the only thing i will ask for is for an option to get my (not) mom a girlfriend lmao
found a broken page. turn 185, decided to leave dinner with sam and willem, then decided to say goodbye to sam. three separate error messages, including for going to the next page
Error: cannot find a closing tag for macro <<if>>Uncle Callen joins in. "She's just a bit tired, Sam. S'been a long day for the lass, y'see. Even before meetin' you out in the forest, I had 'er trainin' for a good hour."
Error: child tag <<else>> was found outside of a call to its parent macro <<if>>Aunt Sonia comes to your rescue. "Isabel's had a bit of an arduous day. I had her swinging a sword around for about an hour before she even came and met you, you know." She explains. His expression shifts to show understanding, and a little bit of shame for being so disappointed initially. "Oh! Right ... well," he looks back at you, now smiling, "I hope you sleep good, then!" "Thanks..." You smile sheepishly. "See you later, Isabel." The boy smiles, giving a flappy wave.
Error: <<if>>: bad conditional expression in <<if>> clause: unexpected token: string literalI miss my wife tails, I miss her a lot.
anyways OMG IT JUST STOPS THERE??? I WAS GETTING SO INTO IT TOO OMGGG
I LOVE THIS AAAAAA (my brain cant form anything right now.)
anyways, I CANT WAIT TO SEE HOW THIS WILL GO!! I AM SO DRAWN TO THE CHARACTERS, AND WHAT WE'RE GONNA BECOME (and not to mention that strange entity in our dreams WHO ARE YOU)
and also the side story in our dreams (omg is that gonna be relevant somehow? WHATS GONNA HAPPEN??) (my theory is that it might have to do with the thirteenth god) (maybe maybe)
also NOOOO UNCLE CALLEN-- I ALMOST THOUGHT HE WAS GONNA DIE (luckily he didnt, I would sob and then collapse) I love him so much, hes so girldad. so babygirl (omg im so sorry for using such words DASFJNJBJH)
aunt Sonia tho?? PLEASEEEE LET THIS GIRL HIT. SHES FUMBLING SO BADDD (no but I love her too, shes so cool, and funny and shes trying her best I love her I LOVE HER RAAAHHH)
but then again, it did say that she was going around with woman in the past so maybe she actually is charming (I dont know if I'm wrong, sorry if I am, but I JUST ADORE HOW SHE FOLDS AROUND WOMAN AHAAAAA)
(because thats so real.)
also why doesnt she speek with lizzy anymore?? what happened?? :((
please dont tell me something bad happened--
anyways. I LOVE THE STORY!!! (get some rest if you need to, btw, dont feel pressured TAKE CARE MWAH MWAH)
You've got yourself a new fan!
Just to let you know, there are a handful of coding errors, but I can't complain, I'm not even good at Harlowe yet, and this looks to be a more Sugarcube style game.
I adore it! I love Archer's character especially. Amazing job!
Im a huge fan! But if im an introvert, does that mean i have to be unfriendly? Cuz im trying to create a shy but kind MC for this play
You don't! My apologies if the dialogue for being more closed-off has read that way so far. I'll take a bit more care to make things seem more balanced - I've just been playing reactions up for a (currently) young MC.
Lovely story, lovelier characters and great layout! I love the skillchecks and stuff throughout, truly filled with potential!!
ALSO! on turn 390 the off-put and disgusted choices are swapped! eg; I pick off-put for my reaction to the crowd and it shows me the disgusted screen, and vice versa! it could be confusing for someone who was set on one choice, and wasn't trying to decide between both of them by looking at both! lovely game!!:D
spoilers, I warned u :3
IM SMOKING YOU HAVE TO SELECT THE OPTION TO WHISPER IN SONIA'S EAR ABOUT WEARING TO GET BACK AT THE GUY WHO HURT HER TO GET THE OATH OF REVENGE THINGThank you for pointing out the error! I'll take a look at it :)
And I'm not sure if your last part is also pointing out an error haha, but you can swear the oath earlier. To get it in that moment, though, you do have to whisper it. I might add a silent option in that scene too, for less impulsive MCs. Thank you for the feedback and praise! It means a lot.
NO IT WAS JUST N OBSERVATION BCZ I WAS SO CONFUSED WHEN I PICKED THE CHOICE THAT GETS US LECTURED BY ARCHER
AND YOUR WELCOME!! I'm happy you even care abt my opinion lol I'm not an IF connoisseur, but I really like his work either way!!!
OH SORRY IF ITS TOO MUCH TO ASK BUT TO GET THE SCENE WHERE YOU CAN LIKE KILLAGUY DO YOU HAVE TO BE COLDER & MORE VIOLATE??Good to know! 😆
I'll take any feedback that comes my way. I like knowing what people think.
If you're referring to the prologue, you have a few ways of going about things, from accidentally killing him to very intentionally doing it. It was an intentional choice on my part to make those options a little bit sadistic to show off the MC's deteriorated psyche at this point in their life.
WAIT NO LIKE HOW DO U GET THE SCENE TO KILL EM AT ALL IT NEVER SHOWS UP FOR ME 😭
There are lots of options to do it in the prologue. The second option as you find the altercation is an instant kill, as are the second and third options for the option after that (there's a lot of branching here lol).
If you choose to talk to the guy or throw him down first, there are also options that state MC's intent to kill him. You can't kill anybody else in-game--yet.
Very ambitious. Pleasant enough UI. The story reminds of Wayfarer, another excellent IF.
Nicely written except for some jumbled bits where it muddles or disregards choices. Many code errors. All granted for a demo.
Other than that, well set to be one of the better IFs. Good luck!
As far as I am, the story is well fleshed out, and wonderfully written. But I cannot for the life of me read "Weaver" without thinking of Taylor from Worm, LMAO
This is definitely going in my top five IFs, it's absolutely incredible!! I'm so excited for the next few chapters :DD
This has to be one of my top three IF demos, the dialogue is written beautifully and I am so excited to see where this story goes, thank you conrif!!
Dunno if you knew about this error or not but when I pressed “Have you been to anything as big as this before?” You ask to Aunt Sonia. It comes up as this in Chapter 2. I think the other choice may also not be accurate on turn 272.
I've found this bug and fixed it. It'll be gone in the next update :)
I love Archer so much, can't wait to see where this day out with them goes!
I noticed a slight error in the end of Chapter 2, where it presents your personality. It said I was more cautious than confident, despite my character sheet saying the opposite and me not picking a single cautious option throughout!
I'll look into this, thank you!
Absolutely loving this! Your writing is delicious ❤
<333 It's amazing :D
Is there a downloadable version of this game?
My browser refuse to run it.... >_>
(Although it seems to run downloaded browser based games just fine. I have no clue why. o_O )
There's an android .apk version available for download (albeit outdated at the moment) but I don't have the files for the game publicly available to download, sorry.
Followed this Game for about more than half a Year now and just come back to it every month or so just to replay it!
Its genuently Phenomenal, the revised Prologue is one of the best i have read yet, it immediately caught me in the story and i cannot wait for the next Chapters to release, ill be here waiting patiently!
Same!! It really allows you to get invested in the characters, and you immediately get to impact the world around you. I tend to return when I'm itching for a witcher-esque game!
Got me so invested fr. The plot seems quite intriguing, especially since the beginning revealed how things went down. I love how we get the chance to kill and be cold rather than being forced to settle with few choices. I'm looking forward to MC growing up and hopefully we get to make more friends other than Sam.
really like this cast, can’t wait for them to break my heart
In various ways 💔
I don't think that I'll ever get over how absolutely outstanding the opening scene is where you can kill a man in cold blood, awkwardly hand the victim your blade to defend herself in the future with and then rob the corpse for change so she can buy herself a meal down the road--all because you can't comfort a person normally.
Especially since the woman is both terrified and baffled but just goes along with it anyway. Lol.
Honestly, this is one my my favourite IF's, but that scene??? It is definitely my favourite over any other I have EVER read. Well done. And thank you for sharing this masterpiece. It's good to see you back again.
Okay, I was gonna just add this to be tbp but y'know what? I decided to glance at the comments, and purely because of this comment I am playing it immediately.
REAL, this is why i read comments first otherwise i'll forget to play the games that looked interesting but weren't what i was in the mood for at the moment
Yesss!!! Exactly!
I wrote it all quite seriously but seeing it all explained this way cracked me up a bit, haha. I'm happy you like the game so far! I put a lot of time into the revised prologue and it's good to know that work has paid off.
Just binged through it and wow! Absolutely loved it, especially the banter between Callen & Sonia
(the scene where Callen puts on his armour and does a jig made me crack up real hard lmao)
And the innocent budding crush between mc and Sam is just adorable 🥰
Definitely looking forward to updates, as I desperately need to know what happens next!
Just wanted to let you know (I may also send this in on Tumblr so if you see a repeat of the issue it may be me) but during the festival the guardian who is battling switches often. My normal gameplay would have Sonia as the fighter and Callen as the escort but during certain paragraphs that switches around or Callen will be given she/her pronouns. I think this may be messing with the relationship stat to? My Sonia relationship went from 77 to 64 (the same as Callen) during the festival when I've chosen all positive interactions.
Thanks, I'll take a look at this section before updating. I think I caught most of it before but evidently there's still some parts I didn't manage to catch.
Just experienced the same issue.
Hi, please send me some screenshots of the places you're seeing this issue in a tumblr ask at https://bladeweaver-if.tumblr.com/?source=share
I've looked all over for instances where this happened but it seems I still haven't found them all, so having some idea of where I've gone wrong would be a big help!
I’m sorry but I only kept my save from the end of the demo. I loaded it up and went back as far as I could go, and unfortunately I can’t seem to go back any further than Gwyndon’s arrival to the prep-room.
The scene where this issue was most notable for me was shortly before this when Sonia was gearing up. There were only several instances throughout the whole story prior to this; where it seemed to swap them in a singular mention, but for this gearing up scene a page or two of text swapped Sonia for Callen entirely.
Oddly enough, theflightlessone mentions Callen being given she/her pronouns but I don’t remember that happening for me.
Maybe I’ll try to speed through and see if I can replicate it.
Edit: I sped through again and was able to reproduce it and take pictures. I’m not familiar with tumblr though and am unsure where to send them.
That's alright. Just click this link Bladeweaver and click the 'Ask me anything' button. You should be able to simply upload the images there where I'll be able to see them. You could also DM me if you make an account :)
I believe I fixed the instance where Callen had the wrong pronouns (you go girl?) in a previous patch so that'll be why you aren't seeing that, though I'm now looking at the other places you've mentioned.
dumb question but how are you supposed go back to the game after opening one of the menus on the left?
You can use the back buttons in the sidebar to return. I'm going to improve this system in the future, where all submenus will open in a pop-up so you can just click them away to get back to playing, but this is the temporary solution until I get around to that. Sorry!
all good. was just confused if i was missing something
YOU COME BACK AND KILL MY AUNT!? (I love this IF so much, looking forward to how it continues.)
Update seems to be...Just a blank screen?
If it helps, I'm on mobile, but going to a desktop site I still just got an endlessly scrolling blank screen.
I've just put out a fix for this. Twine likes to remove the starting point for the story sometimes, so I had to fix it. Sorry! It should be fine now.
Thanks, that was really fast!
Glad to see an update
Heyyy! I know you're on a break, but I still thought you might've wanted to be notified about errors, soooo
Still, I'm loving this IF and I'm really enjoying the prose, it manages to be both really funny and witty but also vivid in its descriptions. Also I'm already soooo invested in the characters it's actually not funny 💀💀
Thanks. I'll take a look at this once I'm back! For reference, does this still happen later into the game? This can also be an issue if you haven't restarted since the last update, since I changed the names of those variables specifically.
Honestly, as soon as I saw this error I didn't continue the game for fear of failing something due to the missing numbers in the variables lol
I'll start the game again and let you know if this problem persists, thanks for the reply!
Problem solved! You were right, all I had to do was restart the game. Thank you for the help!
Great game! Love the mc's adoptive parents!
Hi! First of all, i'm loving the story for now! I'm so excited to continue to reading! The plot and the world is very interesting.
Also maybe you know about this but, just in case, in chapter 2 when Callen is scolding you for coming home alone with Sam the third option gives some type of error.
I played it with high and low relationship with Sam, but it seems the error stays.
Hey, I've just put out a hotfix for this, though it includes a few other fixes that mean you'll need to start from the beginning. Sorry!
awesome! I love it >3> so cute ......but the cliffhanger really XD?
the story is just chef's kiss omg
Thank you 😄
I love it, gonna wait for a lot of slaying 😍
this is so so gooooood