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

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
http://www.wormwoodstudios.com





MRY I offer you a home outside the Primordia thread.

http://www.wormwoodstudios.com/2015/12/auld-lang-syne.html

Finally, Fallen Gods continues creeping forward. I'm hopeful that as Torment work wraps up in early 2016, and I'm able to give full attention to FG, the pace will pick up. In the meanwhile, let me tell you a little bit about the game.


This runestone serves as the main menu (options not visible) and part of the opening cinematic.

Its roots lie in two old, non-computer games from my childhood: Barbarian Prince and Lone Wolf. I rediscovered these back in around 2006, and I was simply blown away at the things they accomplished without the assistance of a computer. I loved the ways in which BP created this reactive, complicated game with very simple tools. And I loved that choices and skills in Lone Wolf felt meaningful. I was coming off having played a lot of computer RPGs where improving a stat, gaining a feat, picking an option really did not feel significant at all. In Lone Wolf, by contrast, each of the special abilities just felt . . . well, special. And you got to use them in these great ways, with great frequency.

I then launched into a massive project to hybridize these games with Weird Worlds, a procedural "coffee break" game. The game was called Star Captain. I read about 100 space opera novels, watched hours of space opera TV and movies, studied a ton of space opera P&P games, and churned out a 250-page design document. I was very close to signing a contract with S2 Games to co-develop the title (at the time, I was doing writing for them), but it fell through, and I switched gears to make Primordia. Then I discovered that Mass Effect had largely preempted my narrative concept (cannibalizing the space opera canon) and a slew of games, most prominently FTL, had seized on the same gameplay structure. Well, shit.



Around the time Cloudscape died, I was reading Beowulf to my kids and The Long Ships to myself, and fell in love with Anglo-Saxon language and Norse fatalism. I embarked on a long reading journey, which took me through most of the Icelandic sagas, the eddas, the Tain, the Exeter Book, and lots of history books. So immersed, I realized that I could take Star Captain back closer to its Barbarian Prince roots, and thus Fallen Gods was born.


Many missing tiles, and the ! is placeholder. (Also a lousy screenshot.)


Here are just a few of the missing tiles, and sprites that replace the ! icons.

The basic gist of the game is that the player is one of the eponymous "Fallen Gods," who must win his way back to the Cloudlands -- our Asgard -- by hook or crook. I don't want to spoil too much at this point, but basically it is a bleak game that blends Norse mythology and Icelandic folklore (and European folklore more generally) with a rather bleak worldview that fell upon me when reading a series of books about the aftermath of various revolutions (Russian, French, Bolivarian, and anti-colonial wars of liberation in Africa). The current pantheon of Fallen Gods successfully overthrew the indifferent, and even cruel, primordial gods who ruled before them (a blend of titans and animistic prehistorical gods). Despite this signal and perhaps noble victory, the new gods, led by Orm the Trickster, have proven fairly inept as divinities and catastrophe has befallen the world: political, ecological (I was also reading, among other things,The Earth Without Us and The Sixth Extinction), and spiritual.

Anyway, the "hero" -- more anti-hero, or let us just say, player character -- has a fixed number of days to make his way back to the Cloudlands, lest he become mortal forever. The game plays out through three systems: the world map (depicted above), events (which are still coming together from an interface standpoint), and combat (which is still in the mockup stage).

Here's a look at some of the combat art:

A bogwight in its native environment.


A troll. In theory, at least, the far background will be contextual to the map.

It's a shame that I don't have a great pic of the warband facing off against some of these foes. I can only say that the artist -- Daniel Miller -- is simply amazing. These are true pixel art, drawn dot by dot, each frame drawn from scratch.

Finally, here are a few examples of events:

So this is a look at how they actually work: text with options.

A draug in "The Dead Hand." (How the images look as standalones.)


"The Lights of Skyhold"


Some still worship the old gods.


The corpse of Karringar, one of the defeated Firstborn.

The first three images are by the amazing Ryan Cordin. The next two are by the equally wonderful Zoltan Tobias.

Anyway, I can't wait to share more about the project and its League of Nations-esque international team, but for now, I'll just wish everyone a happy New Year! Thanks again for all the support!
 
Last edited:

Renevent

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Messages
925
"I was very close to signing a contract with S2 Games to co-develop the title (at the time, I was doing writing for them), but it fell through, and I switched gears to make Primordia"

Wonder what game this was for (for S2 Games)?
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,236
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
"I was very close to signing a contract with S2 Games to co-develop the title (at the time, I was doing writing for them), but it fell through, and I switched gears to make Primordia"

Wonder what game this was for (for S2 Games)?

Uh, Star Captain. It's written right there.
 

Renevent

Cipher
Joined
Feb 22, 2013
Messages
925
"I was very close to signing a contract with S2 Games to co-develop the title (at the time, I was doing writing for them), but it fell through, and I switched gears to make Primordia"

Wonder what game this was for (for S2 Games)?

Uh, Star Captain. It's written right there.

Yeah...skimmed over that part, thanks for the correction.
 

MRY

Wormwood Studios
Developer
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Aug 15, 2012
Messages
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Location
California
Seems somewhat Thea'ish in terms of the mythological backdrop---good.
I don't know Thea, so I can't say. I guess I'd tentatively say that Darklands and KoDP are probably the closest in mythological feel, but that seems presumptuous. :D
 

CryptRat

Arcane
Developer
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Sep 10, 2014
Messages
3,548
I'd never heard of Moonstone before -- what an awesome looking game! Does it play well?
Yes. The turn-based system is a good idea (the battles are real time), especially for multiplayer. You need to spend your turn properly, buy stuff, distribute xp points. You need to learn enemy patterns, at the beginning you'll often get one-shot. The 4 different starting points are a a very good idea. It's particularly good with friends. Most of all the game is very atmospheric.

Good luck with Fallen Gods, it looks very good.
 

MRY

Wormwood Studios
Developer
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Aug 15, 2012
Messages
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California
I feel like kids who grew up with Amigas had a charmed existence that can never be replicated. . . .
 

udm

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Make the Codex Great Again!
Animations and art look sweet. I hope the UI in Fallen Gods ends up being as sexy as Star Captain's mock-up :bounce:
 

roshan

Arcane
Joined
Apr 7, 2004
Messages
2,426
The basic gist of the game is that the player is one of the eponymous "Fallen Gods," who must win his way back to the Cloudlands -- our Asgard -- by hook or crook. I don't want to spoil too much at this point, but basically it is a bleak game that blends Norse mythology and Icelandic folklore (and European folklore more generally) with a rather bleak worldview that fell upon me when reading a series of books about the aftermath of various revolutions (Russian, French, Bolivarian, and anti-colonial wars of liberation in Africa). The current pantheon of Fallen Gods successfully overthrew the indifferent, and even cruel, primordial gods who ruled before them (a blend of titans and animistic prehistorical gods). Despite this signal and perhaps noble victory, the new gods, led by Orm the Trickster, have proven fairly inept as divinities and catastrophe has befallen the world: political, ecological (I was also reading, among other things,The Earth Without Us and The Sixth Extinction), and spiritual.

MRY - Sounds like a blend of Banner Saga (bleakness, Norse theme, vanished gods) and SITS (play as a god trapped in mortal form who must return to astral plane.)

Suggested change of name: Cougar in the Cloudlands
 

markec

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Codex 2012 Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Dead State Project: Eternity Codex USB, 2014 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
Looks really cool and this announcement is a great way to start a year, I wish you best of luck.
 

Neanderthal

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Jul 7, 2015
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Granbretan
Like what i'm hearing, always thought that Lone Wolf had some bloody good ideas for roleplaying and i've used em in a few games. The money pouch for instance, 50 gp and thats your lot, gold became something you wanted and tried to collect and was bloody useful. Always remember Ragadorn in Fire on Water, short but so fucking sweet and full of choice, amazing amount of work put in to that and the follwoing coach ride and assassination.

Good luck man.
 

Beastro

Arcane
Joined
May 11, 2015
Messages
7,952
Shame that space game wasn't made.

A few tweeks and the UI and shit could have turned into a neat looking take on a Star Flight type game.
 

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