Vapourware Seven Dragon Saga - Gold Box spiritual successor from SSI veterans

[ProphetSword]

Wow. I hate you for even exposing me to this...

 

[Darkzone]

Lou Reed was good and Metallica has also made 4 very good records at the beginning, but together....

 

[Alchemist]

Wow. I hate you for even exposing me to this...

Hehe... sorry, man. Yeah I should have warned it can cause possible sanity loss.

Lou Reed was good and Metallica has also made 4 very good records at the beginning, but together....

Yeah - I actually like Lou's Velvet Underground stuff. But he didn't age well.

 

[ProphetSword]

Wow. I hate you for even exposing me to this...

Hehe... sorry, man. Yeah I should have warned it can cause possible sanity loss.

That's an understatement.

Somehow, I had managed to miss this release completely, and I now know that I was happier for not knowing it existed.

 

[Zombra]

Mailing list lore dump:

The Dragonkin
Lore and early artwork
The world of Seven Dragon Saga is populated with a wide variety of beings; humans, humanoids, monsters, dragons and many strange creatures that defy categorization. For instance, the Firewind Coast is noted for its dragonkin.

Dragonkin is a broad term that covers any living creature that has some proportion of dragon blood flowing in its veins. Dragons are highly inquisitive beings, driven by brilliant intellect and strong passions. They love to use their shapeshifting powers to mingle and breed with the humans, humanoids and beasts of the Firewind Coast. As a result, they have spawned many a unique and often bizarre breed of creature. Two such monstrous dragonkin are the Drakes and the Wyrms. Drakes are airborne whilst Wyrms are earthbound, yet their individual strengths and weaknesses can vary dramatically depending on the concentration of dragon blood in their veins.

Feydri, Drakyri and the Dragonspurn

The Feydri and the Drakyri are humanoid races that are native to the Firewind Coast. Both claim varying degrees of dragon ancestry, although it tends to manifest more prominently in the Feydri.

The Drakyri

These resilient dragonkin have dwelt underground since a tragic conflict with their dragon ancestors drove them from the surface, many centuries ago. Seldom growing over five feet in height, they tend towards a light and agile build, a physicality best suited to subterranean living. Their skin is pale and their eyes have grown accustomed to dark conditions.

The Drakyri live in small, tight-knit clans ruled by a patriarch. They subsist on a combination of fungus farming, and hunting and fishing in chthonian lakes. Their economy is based on mining, and they would do reasonably well out of the ore trade if it weren’t for their hostile Feydri neighbors who block any Drakyri attempt to trade with the greater empire.

The Feydri

These taller and more heavily built cousins of the Drakyri dwell on the shores and in the forests. They are strong and hardy, and have swarthy, weathered complexion that is well suited to harsh climatic conditions of the wilderness.

The Feydri are organised into large, loose-knit clans that are governed by a council of matriarchs. Hunting and fishing are their staples, supplemented by a fairly lucrative lumber trade. They have been the sworn enemies of the Darkyri ever since their cousins’ dark transgression against their shared dragon ancestors.

The Dragonspurn

A single monarchy once ruled over Drakyri and the Feydri. Every king in that royal line was required to be of both Drakyri and Feydri blood, and so there rose a ruling class of half-castes. They came to be known as the Dragonborn. But when the last Dragonborn king led a enacted a dark betrayal of their dragon ancestors, the Darkyri and the Feydri parted ways. To lessen the fury of the Dragons, Dragonborn became known as the Dragonspurn, and fled into exile. The Dragonspurn now dwell in the desolate highlands that separate the Drakyri and Feydri lands, surviving on hunting, gathering and banditry. While the Drakyri still hold loyalty to the actions of their last king, over the generations, they have come to despise the Dragonspurn as much as the Feydri do.

Wyrms

Wyrms tend to be bulkier, stronger and more heavily armored than their airborne counterparts. These ferocious dragonkin prefer to lair underground where the darkness and confined spaces may hinder their prey’s vision and mobility.

They like to get ‘up close and personal’ in combat, and often have earth magic and special powers (fire breath, poison breath, launchable spines) to back up their formidable physical attacks.

Drakes

These smaller, airborne dragonkin nest in the mightiest trees and the most isolated rocky outcrops. A Drake’s favored hunting strategy is to soar high in the air, using its sharp eyesight to locate prey. It will then dive and strike in a startling display of speed and agility. While a Wyrm might be willing to grind its prey down through brute force, a Drake needs to finish the fight swiftly before its wings tire or it incurs injury. Possessing thinner scales than a Wyrm, a Drake will favor special attacks (fire, poison or lightning breath) over close-quarters combat.

Advice to Adventurers, regarding Dragons – from Baljeet Glimmertooth, Explorer and Profiteer

Dragons might make terrible parents, but they still care for their offspring, after a fashion. What I mean is, they’re happy to abandon them to look after themselves, but they get mighty temperamental when others slaughter their offspring or lay waste to their homes. Not to mention the risk that the tipsy Drakyri barmaid you’re about to take advantage will turn out to be a full-blown dragon in shapeshifting guise, one who has just popped in for a bit to see how the kiddies are doing.

So here’s my advice, for what it’s worth. Dragons make bloody fine allies and bloody awful enemies. Even if you are one of these Touched jokers, waving your imperial decree in a dragon’s snout is only going to get you crisped. Treat dragons and their kin with respect and you might just have a long and fruitful life here on the Firewind Coast.

 

[Dorateen]

TSI website has some of the early art work

Drakyri

Spoiler

Aqua Wyrm

Spoiler

 

[Infinitron]

What, a video?

 

[RPGGameLover]

http://nichegamer.com/2015/05/seven-dragon-saga-introduces-a-new-race-dragonkin/

 

[;]

Who gives a shit
Make a secret ninja page like PS:T

 

[m_s0]

From the newsletter:

Announcing Lee Dotson, our new Art Director

Hi There!

So things have been pretty quiet here news wise and that's largely my fault. I joined up with the TSI about a month and a half ago to take over the art direction on Seven Dragon Saga. Since then I've read several hundred pages of community comments on the previous iteration of the games visuals along with digesting the exhaustive documentation for the games world and gameplay mechanics so I can feed all of that into our new look which is what we're ready to talk more about today.

But before we get into that I should give a little background on myself. I'm Lee Dotson, I've been making art for games for about 18 years now covering almost every genre of game out there including games like Anachronox, Star Trek Online, and Diablo 3 but classic RPG's are what make me want to create games in the first place so 7DS's open ended storylines and rich X-Com like tactical gameplay makes this a total dream project for me.

Enough about me, here we have a small example of where we've been and where we're going with the style and look of 7DS. The goal here is to push for a look that merges the sense of fantastic realism found in classic fantasy paintings by the likes of Brom or Easely with the rich colors and clear designs from classic dungeon crawlers like Eye of the Beholder so there's a feast for the eyes when zooming in on characters while keeping everything legible from far away. For me this is particularly key because while it’s important to have a clear view of the game on a tactical level I love being able to immerse myself in a game’s world and see changes in my character.

There's also a ton of work that here that's not really immediately obvious, an engine change, armor that's designed in a modular format for player customization, animations for the cover system and a lot more but we'll have to save that for future updates.


In the meantime let us know what you think about this first tiny glimpse into the new direction. We’re super excited about how things are coming together and we hope you are too. I know a lot of people have a thoughts on 3d vs. classic pixel art, isometric vs. classic first person views that we're happy to discuss our thoughts on over in the forums, Facebook, Twitter or wherever it is that you like talking.


Lee Dotson
Art Director

 

[AbounI]

What does it mean when he talks about an "engine change"? Is it the Unity upgrade from v4 to v5, or will they move toward the Unreal Engine 4, or is it simply some improvements for the others tools they can use?

By the way, from the offcial website of this guy, there are some nice works that are shown

 

[Morality Games]

Hehe... sorry, man. Yeah I should have warned it can cause possible sanity loss.

Sanity loss is determined by a d100 roll.

My Game Master's dice says he lost 56 sanity and must now go to the insane asylum (in Codex parlance, prosperland) where he will lay in a catatonic state for six months.

After that, we'll have to get a poster with a high psychoanalysis roll to begin treating him.

 

[Roguey]

I like how UE4 going free stuck a fork into Unity.

I'll be surprised if it isn't.

 

[Themadcow]

Official Seven Dragon Saga page http://www.tsi-games.com/seven-dragon-saga-tsi-games/ still links to the dead Kickstarter, four months after it failed.

No actual 7DS related tweets since June 4th. Last post on their forums over a month ago (and not about 7DS)...

Lets hope it's not as dead as they're making it look.

 

[prodigydancer]

Lets hope it's not as dead as they're making it look.

 

[SausageInYourFace]

Work still continues.

Spoiler

Meet the Slyth Warden, one of the many dragonkin who vie for dominance in the mountains of the Firewind Coast. Suspicious of the empire, they are likely allies, but with the right inducements, they could be powerful allies. It’s all a matter of player choice, as they adventure deep into the Drakelands, in service to their emperor.

We are proceeding along developing different elements of the game. In Engineering, we’ve been running various elements of combat and movement through prototyping. Checking out how best to implement multiple targets, area of effect attacks, and persistent things like zones. On the movement side, Seven Dragon Saga has a number of methods to move, and we want them to feel different and work clearly. Mystic Leap allows characters to leap up onto areas others can’t, and gain height advantage. Special thanks to junior engineer Sebastian for taking point on the prototype process.

Up next is how best for the game to recognize cover, then determine if it is half or full, and convey this in an intelligent manner to the players. Then there are Attacks of Opportunity and the Retaliate ability to work out. Lots of little details where frequent prototype iterations works wonders.

In design, we are creating flow charts for story progression, depending on which factions the player is aiding, and which he’s harming. David Shelley pushes a strategic vision, while Edwin McRae drives things from an NPC and story arc viewpoint. This all feeds into the locations we need, and hence the environmental art required.

In systems, Paul Murray and David Shelley are running through a first draft of the various crafting methods, beginning with Alchemy. Again, this affects other elements, such as the skills system, and especially the economy (meaning what players find as loot, as well as, in stores). While single player game economics has a bit more slop allowed than in multi-player games, we still need valuable items to feel valuable and achievable. All the glittery things scattered on the ground after battle should have some meaning.

The art team is busy as ever, since we revamped under our new art director, Lee Dotson. The animation and rigging team is moving from player characters to the first batch of enemies. The new environments are moving from concept to implementation. And we’ve squeezed in a revision to our main user interface — with much discussion with the designers over what the scribbled wireframes really mean for functionality. Meetings can be noisy, but very positive.

David Shelley

Sounds bredy gud.

 

[Infinitron]

Are they reading this thread? >_>

 

[Dorateen]

The second sentence about the Slyth Warden should read that they are likely enemies. It was corrected on the website. But good update!

 

[SausageInYourFace]

Are they reading this thread? >_>

Since they explicitely mentioned the Codex as a 'hotspot for discussion' during their KS I think its save to assume that they check this thread every now and then.

 

[Sitra Achara]

I think they have a plant here too (RPGGameLover )

 

[Morblot]

Good to know they haven't given up. Fuck overly epic plots, I'm looking forward to securing that trade route for the empire

 

[LESS T_T]

TSI - Tactical Simulations Interactive We are considering going to Kickstarter again, along with some other funding options. We like KS for the close link it provides to future players, but it does require strong marketing acumen to be successful there. We'll keep you updated when we have concrete plans.

https://www.facebook.com/TSIGames/p...1.1073741828.633782083386232/816992775065161/

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

I didn't back the first time around due mostly to KS fatigue and was sad to see their campaign fail. Hope it works out for them, it would be awesome to see Goldbox evolution.

 

[Zombra]

They're still on the case! Mailing list update:

A servant of the dark, hungry for life’s energy. One of the many less savoury beings which inhabit the shadowy corners of the world in Seven Dragon Saga.

Working through the summer
We continue heads down through summer, though it does look pretty seeing the blue sky out through the windows. We are pushing forward until we have sufficient material for the game to really feel like something of quality and polish.


The design team completed a draft on the various types of crafting, and Paul is taking a new pass at looting, merchants, quest rewards and the economy in general, in light of ingredients and recipes. The goal is to get the characters not too rich and not too poor, as well as distributing items throughout all the regions.


On the story side, David and Edwin have broken the world down into seven regions, each with an average of four major points of interest. From this, we can fill out the details on factions and important NPCs, and how the whole game should play out. Starting to tally up asset requirements, and working with the art team to confirm it will all fit within their budget.


Sebastian has completed the basics for combat and movement in the prototype, and is now laying the groundwork to import the new player character models, and their whole range of animations. As that wraps up, we expect Amanda of the art team to start delivering full quality environmental assets. And the animation team should also be set to deliver the first batch of fully rigged and animated enemies, such as the Slyth we showed last update.


Once all that is implemented, the prototype will still require new visual effects and audio to finally feel like the first draft of the revised combat experience. Then the design team has a list of dozens of abilities to implement and test.


Lee has been turning designer scribbles into beautiful UI designs, both for combat (and later implementation in the prototype), and for character creation elements, such as Goals. He also continues to oversee all the other artists to keep the vision unified and top quality.


The rest of engineering continues to work with low level elements for the actual game: data structures and handling, inventory, reviewing the crafting designs, and a thousand other niggling details. Nothing pretty yet, but the key is to make the code robust.

David Shelley, Lead Designer

 

[Dorateen]

David and Edwin have broken the world down into seven regions

I like the thematic resonance.

And further, I like the sort of bravado these accumulating monthly updates seem to project. Kind of like, "well, our kickstarter failed, but we're making the game anyway!"