Fallen Gods - upcoming Norse saga-inspired roguelite from Wormwood Studios

[Technomancer]

Give me a break! I changed it from a suggestion to a hypothetical question

 

[MRY]

Maxie The god cannot marry but he can woo many women and be wooed by them. This includes damsels in distress, aggressive daughter of a jarl, a hideous witch, a widow fending off a wizard, an ellepiger out to steal your strength, and more!

Alpan I guess what I’d say is that course changes are impossible but plenty of room for small suggestions, balance adjustments, minor additions (for instance, we could probably add a new item even at this stage). Sometimes there are small changes that have a low cost but a high impact, and I might be missing those from having lived so close to the project.

I would guess that every run could be won with perfect knowledge. But with the actual way they play out, I lose much more often than I win. There’s no way I can be sure whether the runs I lost could’ve been won.

Balance is not as important to me as fun. I’m less worried about unwinnable runs and more worried about how sometimes in the early game there’s nothing apparent to do and you just feel stuck, or how sometimes it can get so easy you just start cruising along in the late game.

It’s a very tough game to design because it needs so much content for world gen to work, you can’t tell if some element works or not until years into the dev cycle.

 

[Quantomas]

Balance is not as important to me as fun. I’m less worried about unwinnable runs and more worried about how sometimes in the early game there’s nothing apparent to do and you just feel stuck, or how sometimes it can get so easy you just start cruising along in the late game.

That's not intractable. If I can find the time to participate in your playtest (and you would accept me partaking), I can figure out how things work and write a bit of code that tells your worldgen how difficult a starting position is. Something like a number between 0 and 100 (easy < 25 < ok < 75 < hard), with the option for the player to select an acceptable difficulty range.

 

[MRY]

Infinitron I attached the image

 

[MRY]

I'm plugging away on "The Woman and the Wurm," and enjoyed writing this node. I think it's a decent taste (har har) of the style, and it also shows some of the reactivity. This is what happens if you wake the wurm up and have both a maiden and a berserk in your party. If you had a maiden but not a berserk, you would be able to pursue this line of bargaining.

As the wurm wakes and shakes off the shock of your shout, he smiles to see that his guest, too, has a toothsome maiden in tow. “Have you come as a fleshmonger, sky-thief?” he hisses. “For if you're here to sell, I will set aside the bygone blows our kinds have struck, and buy her for a hint of how to fell the worst of your foes and first of my kin.” His whole hide seems to tremble, for he knows no brother of his could ever best the boast of making a meal of two such sweets. But before you can even offer an answer, your berserk leaps forth and roars that you trade only in blood, not flesh. The time for words, alas, is over.

 

[MRY]

Now working on "The Lord of Thieves," another dungeon culminating event.

Here's one path through, which shows that nothing is worse than to mix foolish boldness with shameless cowardice! (Also not yet edited, and I feel like the first sentence is likely to be pared down.)

Slowly a far-off rumble becomes the sound of men, and then, after one last bend, the shapeless stone gives way to a hall carved from the cave, a haven for outlaws sworn to the Lord of Thieves. Here are his wives, bringing wine to two-score fighters, and there are his hounds, begging scraps from the feast. Above them all, as befits a leader, sits a berserk mad and mighty enough to make these murderers heed him. He spots you at once, and laughs so loud the very walls ring. “Can it be?” he calls. “A god’s slid down the Songbridge to bring me a blessing?” As his men stop and stare, he shouts, “Come, lay your hands on my head and tell these good folk how I stand right with Orm and his kin!” His hard eyes belie his grin, and you can see he means to raise himself yet higher among the bloody throng.

[Dare him to fight instead.]
[Fail Speech check.]

Your sharp tongue cannot scratch the thief’s thick skin, and he laughs off such bluster. “Why would one who leads forty fighters cast his lot in such a lonesome match?” These hardly seem the words of a berserk, but perhaps he tamed his own wild heart while making outlaws heed his lordship. “I asked but the blessing I earned with such deeds as won Orm his crown. Now, I ask no longer. I tell. And here in this hall, when I speak, you do or die.”

[Yield and bless him.]

You are brought to your knees before the Lord of Thieves, and by his will, you bless the soles of his feet with a godly kiss. When this same shame is done for his foremost cur and best-loved bride, you are at last let go, with the hoots and howls of his men driving you from the cave. This, alas, is a tale that many ears will hear.

 

[Technomancer]

Damn it, all of that just makes me want to play it right now.

 

[MRY]

You call on your hype… and all goes well!

 

[Darth Roxor]

You are brought to your knees before the Lord of Thieves, and by his will, you bless the soles of his feet with a godly kiss. When this same shame is done for his foremost cur and best-loved bride, you are at last let go, with the hoots and howls of his men driving you from the cave. This, alas, is a tale that many ears will hear.

JarlFrank

 

[Technomancer]

A god’s slid down the Songbridge to bring me a blessing?

How do they know it btw? Our god is a celebrity of sorts and only one among ormfolk who is trying to get back at the moment? Or he has some telltale unnatural features? Hard to see on the portrait, he just looks like a generic viking warrior, but I think those are glowing eyes?

 

[MRY]

A fallen god who still has his divinity is immediately recognizable; it's a kind of charisma (in the classical sense). A fallen god who has lost his divinity is still recognizable, but less so.

 

[Alpan]

This is more of a design-related question than gameplay: Are choices in events all associated with specific items, or are there situations where the god can access options solely by virtue of having a specific "type" of item?

For instance, "The Woman and the Wurm" checks specifically for Wandering Shoes... are there other kinds of shoes, and do you have situations where having any kind of shoe equipped grants you an additional choice?

 

[MRY]

Occasionally an option is gated behind a class of items but that is usually when you are giving or trading the item rather than using it. Most uses employ the item’s magical effect, and those are unique.

Only one pair of shoes.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

A fallen god who still has his divinity is immediately recognizable; it's a kind of charisma (in the classical sense). A fallen god who has lost his divinity is still recognizable, but less so.

Is this something that could happen for player character during gameplay, or is fallen god who has lost his divinity someone that can be met in game?

 

[MRY]

If it happens, you lose.

There are a few other fallen gods you can meet, some of whom you can recruit.

 

[Technomancer]

There are a few other fallen gods you can meet, some of whom you can recruit.

Those function like unique companions with special content? Or they still use general follower types, like berserk, maiden?

 

[MRY]

General follower types with special stats. They don't have any other behavioral differences.

 

[MRY]

Shoot me a message if you want to test. Initially we're going to keep the numbers quite small, but I'm sure we'll broaden them as we go.

 

[MRY]

Thanks to everyone who volunteered. About ten years since the game went into production, it is finally being played by people outside the team! Frankly very nervous, but it's exciting, too.

 

[MRY]

Testing has been going pretty well. Local folks who played can share their own impressions, but I've found the response generally affirming (as far as such things go) and helpful. We're making pretty good headway, too, on at least some fronts.

 

[Lhynn]

Thanks to everyone who volunteered. About ten years since the game went into production, it is finally being played by people outside the team! Frankly very nervous, but it's exciting, too.

Relax, just remember that old, wise mantra "Everything is shit."

 

[lukaszek]

Shoot me a message if you want to test. Initially we're going to keep the numbers quite small, but I'm sure we'll broaden them as we go.

im bored, any room for someone coming later than your gf period?

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

I would really like to finish it within 2022.

Anno Domini?

 

[MRY]

It is possible but doubtful that we will ship this year. That said, we are making progress on gameplay at a much faster pace than ever before thanks to a new coder. I hope to get the testers a new build relatively soon; the last runs I’ve done have been very fun, some of the most fun ever. It’s not so much that the gameplay is changed but we’ve done some QOL features that make the experience smoother and changed one form of reward (information about where to find things) in a way that makes it much more useful, allowing a more strategic style of play.

 

[MRY]

Met a cave bear; while I wrestled it, discovered it was a man in a cursed bearskin; pulled it off him, breaking the curse, yielding a loyal fighter follower and Bearleather armor; gave him back the armor to turn him into a berserk, but his heart burst from the strain; a berserk I’d recruited earlier laughed and quipped that not everyone is cut out for his line of work. Good times.