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KickStarter Graywalkers: Purgatory - turn-based strategy RPG - now available on Early Access

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
Oct 29, 2013
Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dreamlordsdigital/graywalkers-purgatory
Kickstarter 2: https://www.kickstarter.com/project...walkers-purgatory-turn-based-post-apocalyptic
Steam Greenlight: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=191653077


https://www.graywalkers.com





This is my first post here so I hope you guys will go easy on me. I'll keep all updates in this single thread.

Graywalkers: Purgatory is an Emergent Strategic & Tactical Turn-Based RPG set in a Supernatural Post-Apocalyptic World where Heaven & Hell merged with Earth

Kickstarter Page

Screenshots

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a51cc25be188573fc1760f4539353b86_large.jpg


bf52bf06cc370af10c77a2ad26eeda7e_large.jpg


5ae4fbe4dfce87af877956f6f988e1e6_large.jpg



Concept Art

orcus.1.jpg


Texas.jpg


tainwing.jpg


12_gun_terry_colored.jpg
 
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SuicideBunny

(ノ ゜Д゜)ノ ︵ ┻━┻
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May 1, 2007
Messages
8,943
Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Torment: Tides of Numenera
so how is it different from that post-apocalyptic tb rpg where haven and hell merged with earth browser game the goons liked to play a few years ago?
 

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
Oct 29, 2013
Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
so how is it different from that post-apocalyptic tb rpg where haven and hell merged with earth browser game the goons liked to play a few years ago?

Well, we're working on bringing a Mount and Blade type of metagame where you can exploit the economy or politics to your advantage. There's different factions at play that you can ally with or fight against (think Freelancer).
 

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
Oct 29, 2013
Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
Actually I just wrote an update regarding that:

So why are we tacking on another one of those buzzwords in our pitch? Actually this idea came separately from the Graywalkers game.

Before, I was thinking of making an action RPG where depletion of food sources actually matter. To pull that off, you'd need a working model of supply lines, just like what you'd see in a real-time strategy (RTS) game.

And from there, you'd need everything else an RTS uses: harvester units, resource-providing structures, resource storage structures, etc.

Imagine such things in an RPG.

Well, sure, you do see farms and farmers in your typical role-playing game. But they're just for show, right? They don't really do "work" work.

So I thought, why not make them really work, like an RTS would? But still play the game as an RPG?

In effect, you'd be playing the game as an RPG character, where other AI (that is, some NPCs) are effectively the "RTS players" in that world. Those "RTS players" would probably be a king, or a town governor, perhaps.

So, in essence, you'd get to play an RPG where:

1. When sieging a fortress, you could just let the defenders starve instead of making a costly attack.

2. You can destroy a faction's supply lines to disrupt their economy, thus weakening their city for an invasion.

3. When factions wage war with each other, you'd see territorial lines shift back and forth as they struggle.

I pitched this idea to Russell and he was pretty excited about it. So far, we have a working plan on how to merge it properly to the current design for Graywalkers. We've also been drawing inspiration on how other games do it, notably Mount and Blade.

I also did a bit of research on making a believable economy in fantasy settings, and two books I found helpful were Farm, Forge and Steam - A Nuts and Bolts Guide to Civilisations, and Grain Into Gold - A Fantasy World Economy, at least for a start.

So, it's not like this is innovative; certainly it's been done before by other developers (and with quite an amount of success I might say). But we do think it's rarely done, and kind of a missed opportunity that most game developers aren't catching on.

The "Emergent" Part
The "emergent" part is the fact that many of the quests won't be pre-generated by us game developers (in a manner of speaking).

Quests would come out when a faction leader can't pull off something that they want done, so they ask for outside help (i.e. you).

That something-they-want-done can be anything that's relevant to what the faction's long-term goal is.

Perhaps a faction wants to annex the lands of another faction? So the missions they post are all about capturing the territories of that other faction.

Or perhaps a small settlement wants to capture an abandoned stronghold? But to get there, they need to travel through a pass infested by werewolves. Having no expertise in dealing with these creatures, they post a mission (i.e. quest) to clear that pass of said monsters.

So if you complete that quest, they may eventually capture that stronghold as their territory. If you fail the quest, perhaps they will find another way to capture it, or perhaps they won't be able to after all.

In effect, every mission you fulfill (or disregard) will have consequences and repercussions, sometimes far beyond what is immediately apparent.

Contrast that with the typical RPG, where quests are really only about getting more loot, experience points, or advancing the linear story. Here, missions will (in addition to those aforementioned rewards) affect the political landscape, the economy, even the wildlife population, for better or for worse.

The Challenge of Being Procedurally Generated
Now, these kinds of procedural-heavy games are not without their faults. Among the common criticisms I hear are steep learning curves, little direction due to lack of story, NPCs who say the same thing over and over, repetitive quests, repetitive looking towns, and so on.

Steep Learning Curve

This is actually a consequence of having a procedural system under the hood. There's a detailed working model of economics running behind the scenes, but only because it's needed to pull off the experience we want. Still, we wouldn't want to require the player to have a good grasp on economics before they can appreciate the game.

We'd like to strike a balance where players who just want to concentrate on the turn-based tactics and the RPG aspect can have a good experience, but still allow them to exploit the economics and politics of the game's world to their advantage, if they want to.

Lack Of Story

Russell comes into this situation prepared. The whole story and lore of Graywalkers is his brainchild, and he's got a pretty detailed world he's worked on for a long time, from the history to the quirky characters you'll meet along the way.

However, there's a certain conflict with bringing in a linear story to a sandbox type of game, and we've seen games out there that have their own ideas to address this.

I know Russell has a particular tale he wants to tell in Graywalkers, and it's my job to make sure that fits within the "emergent", dynamic world I'm setting up.

First of all, we're going to separate the "pure" sandbox experience into a separate mode we call Freeform Mode. In Freeform, you are not pressured into completing story objectives, if we even decide to put those in at all. This is a "do all the crazy things you want" type of game mode. Heck, you can be a bad guy if you want.

In contrast to that, we have our standard Campaign Mode. This is where the story is sure to happen. There's still going to be the sandbox-type of gameplay, but some parts will be "locked" to ensure certain things will happen. For example, the game may occasionally inject some preset events into the world--events that jive with the story that Russell has prepared. We've also made it that the main quest is pretty loose about how it's supposed to be done. Your end-goal in the story is to unite the warring factions to fight against the demon horde. But we'll let you decide which factions to ally with, and which ones to fight against.

Repetitiveness

It's certainly going to be dull if all the buildings look the same, if the NPCs look the same, if they all talk the same way. There's really no silver bullet to solve this, just a lot of dedicated hard work. From the world that Russell's written, we'd like to give a distinct personality to everything: what the cities look like for each faction, what their inhabitants look like, how they talk, the kinds of missions they give, and so on.

It'll be a lot of work, so the least I can do to alleviate the stress from the artists and game designers is to build editor tools to let them prototype all that content rapidly into the game. The Unity game engine's given us a lot of power in this regard, and it's one of the things I appreciate about the game engine we chose.
 

Indranys

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Illepsum
Exploit, metagame?? Those are usually the words that I've avoided in my games.
And IMHO it's pretty goddamn important to make sure that the RTS stuff won't be tedious to the people who just want to play RPG without any weird RTS sessions between it.
If the RTS thing is only played by the AIs, that's cool. Just don't force the player to play Dune 2 minigame for hours just to complete a quest or something.
Sorry, did I tell you that I hate all things hybrid and mishmash clusterfuck abominations?
Well, M&B and Expedition Conquistador are OK I guess. Those games manage to focus on their core features rather than the weak part, the epic hack and slash combat for M&B, and TB combat for EC.
That's why I play M&B in the first place, not because to complete some generic quests or to meet those generic characters in generic castles.
Whatever you do I hope you the best man, and yeah I'm not too sober right now. :oops:
 

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
Oct 29, 2013
Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
Exploit, metagame?? Those are usually the words that I've avoided in my games.
And IMHO it's pretty goddamn important to make sure that the RTS stuff won't be tedious to the people who just want to play RPG without any weird RTS sessions between it.
If the RTS thing is only played by the AIs, that's cool. Just don't force the player to play Dune 2 minigame for hours just to complete a quest or something.
Sorry, did I tell you that I hate all things hybrid and mishmash clusterfuck abominations?
Well, M&B and Expedition Conquistador are OK I guess. Those games manage to focus on their core features rather than the weak part, the epic hack and slash combat for M&B, and TB combat for EC.
That's why I play M&B in the first place, not because to complete some generic quests or to meet those generic characters in generic castles.
Whatever you do I hope you the best man, and yeah I'm not too sober right now. :oops:

The game's like Jagged Alliance/Fallout where you control squads of mercenaries travelling a world map, you visit specific areas and it goes to a more zoomed in view (i.e. the screenshots in the first post), and it goes to turn-based when in combat. You don't really get to control worker units or other RTS stuff. Sorry about the confusion.

Your party members have character progression, they level up, and you manage their inventory. They're not nameless, expendable people like RTS units would be.

The RTS stuff is the fact that the NPCs (and the factions) fulfill a role in the economy/politics simulation of the world. The kind of non-combat activity you'd probably take part in, if you want, is a dopewars/taipan kind of thing (i.e. buy low, sell high).

tl;dr think of playing FF tactics in the world map of Civilization
 
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DarKPenguiN

Arcane
Joined
Oct 6, 2012
Messages
1,323
Location
Inside the Hollow Earth
Exploit, metagame?? Those are usually the words that I've avoided in my games.
And IMHO it's pretty goddamn important to make sure that the RTS stuff won't be tedious to the people who just want to play RPG without any weird RTS sessions between it.
If the RTS thing is only played by the AIs, that's cool. Just don't force the player to play Dune 2 minigame for hours just to complete a quest or something.
Sorry, did I tell you that I hate all things hybrid and mishmash clusterfuck abominations?
Well, M&B and Expedition Conquistador are OK I guess. Those games manage to focus on their core features rather than the weak part, the epic hack and slash combat for M&B, and TB combat for EC.
That's why I play M&B in the first place, not because to complete some generic quests or to meet those generic characters in generic castles.
Whatever you do I hope you the best man, and yeah I'm not too sober right now. :oops:

The game's like Jagged Alliance/Fallout where you control squads of mercenaries travelling a world map, you visit specific areas and it goes to a more zoomed in view (i.e. the screenshots in the first post), and it goes to turn-based when in combat. You don't really get to control worker units or other RTS stuff. Sorry about the confusion.

Your party members have character progression, they level up, and you manage their inventory. They're not nameless, expendable people like RTS units would be.

The RTS stuff is the fact that the NPCs (and the factions) fulfill a role in the economy/politics simulation of the world. The kind of non-combat activity you'd probably take part in, if you want, is a dopewars/taipan kind of thing (i.e. buy low, sell high).

tl;dr think of playing FF tactics in the world map of Civilization

Sounds quite interesting...

Though my 'Kickstarter funding money' is gone right now (I am backing like four projects atm and until one is actually completed I am not donating another cent) I will be keeping an eye on this and its certainly something I would purchase if/when its completed. I think many (me anyhow-) have 'Kickstarter Burnout' right now since there really hasnt been much to talk about in the way of released games and alot of games in 'limbo' or barely being updated after meeting the goals (or not...).

That said, this is the type of game I would like to play. Loved JA2 and think the more automated RTS idea sounds interesting.

-Good luck and please keep us posted.
 

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
Oct 29, 2013
Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
Yeah I get what you mean, it wasn't really my idea to go to Kickstarter for this, but my partner wanted to dive in already. I guess we're just getting tired of doing outsourcing for other people.

Actually the RTS analogy is probably not the best. It's more of there's an automated 4X strategy (or is it grand strategy) thing going on when you travel the world map.

Thanks for the interest!
 

Indranys

Savant
Joined
Nov 24, 2012
Messages
486
Location
Illepsum
The game's like Jagged Alliance/Fallout where you control squads of mercenaries travelling a world map, you visit specific areas and it goes to a more zoomed in view (i.e. the screenshots in the first post), and it goes to turn-based when in combat. You don't really get to control worker units or other RTS stuff. Sorry about the confusion.

Your party members have character progression, they level up, and you manage their inventory. They're not nameless, expendable people like RTS units would be.

The RTS stuff is the fact that the NPCs (and the factions) fulfill a role in the economy/politics simulation of the world. The kind of non-combat activity you'd probably take part in, if you want, is a dopewars/taipan kind of thing (i.e. buy low, sell high).

tl;dr think of playing FF tactics in the world map of Civilization
Thanks, looks much clearer now.
Then by any means please carry on.
Yeah the term emergent RTS + RPG game is pretty misleading IMO, it's better to say that each faction has a dynamic AI to fulfill their roles and goals or something.
And why the post apoc setting man?? I think it's only the kwans and the yurops who are obsessed with apocalyptic stuff.
I for one, itching to play a proper CRPG in a proper historical setting, or at least a decent low fantasy one. The Black Company or Malazan universe as a setting will be glorious indeed.
I need to see much more before I pledge anything though, I'm broke and can't spent too much money in this.
 

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
Oct 29, 2013
Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
Mmm, love the sweet smell of self-promotion!

I'm not denying that. I know it really sounds like I'm begging for money. I preferred that we have released details of our project way before this Kickstarter, but I'm not the one calling the shots.



Umm. There is a distinction between TB and RTwP. Which is it?

Yeah, I think we'll have that edited. We're really going for "I go, then you go" turn-based.



Q. Is $100k USD enough to make such an... ambitious game?

Well, the biggest factor is that our development studio is based in Manila, Philippines. To give you a sense of perspective, 30% of our goal is allotted for wages: $30,000 which is actually about 1.2 million Philippine Pesos. That's really a lot for us over here. Standard monthly wage here give or take is 15,000 to 30,000 Pesos, so you can think of that 1.2 million Pesos to be worth 40 to 80 months of wages.

We're also funding partly out of our own pockets, using plugins to save us time and money, doing "crowd content", basically anything to make ends meet.



Yeah the term emergent RTS + RPG game is pretty misleading IMO, it's better to say that each faction has a dynamic AI to fulfill their roles and goals or something.

Yeah, I get what you mean. I'll keep that in mind.



And why the post apoc setting man?? I think it's only the kwans and the yurops who are obsessed with apocalyptic stuff.
I for one, itching to play a proper CRPG in a proper historical setting, or at least a decent low fantasy one. The Black Company or Malazan universe as a setting will be glorious indeed.
I need to see much more before I pledge anything though, I'm broke and can't spent too much money in this.

Well I'm not the one doing the story on this one. I'm actually only one of the programmers in the team. To be honest I personally do prefer medieval fantasy, LOL.

You can check out this pet project I'm doing: http://www.indiedb.com/games/tactics-ensemble-victis It's high fantasy but set in a pseudo-gunpowder age. It's only a pet project though, so I don't think I'll be able to work on it as much.
 

funkadelik

Arcane
Joined
Jul 30, 2010
Messages
1,496
orcus.1.jpg
I think his wings are on upside down.
You gotta love what passes for Fantasy art nowadays.

Also just saw the "women" sketches. Do we really have to dress all the women in video games in bras as if they were wearing realistic clothing in their setting we wouldn't know they were women?
 

Anomalous Underdog

Dreamlords Digital
Developer
Joined
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Messages
21
Location
Makati, Philippines
You gotta love what passes for Fantasy art nowadays.

Also just saw the "women" sketches. Do we really have to dress all the women in video games in bras as if they were wearing realistic clothing in their setting we wouldn't know they were women?

Doesn't make sense to me either, especially since this is post apoc (practical clothing???). The rest of the team don't seem to have a problem with it.
 

Zewp

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Joined
Sep 30, 2012
Messages
3,566
Codex 2013
Also just saw the "women" sketches. Do we really have to dress all the women in video games in bras as if they were wearing realistic clothing in their setting we wouldn't know they were women?

I actually agree with this. I don't even care for the gender politicking behind the sexualisation of females in games, but I just find this kind of art style for females rather tiresome. Can't they do something... new, for a change? When you've got such generic, bland artwork and characters it really doesn't make me more interested in your game. It's not attractive, it's not aesthetically pleasing and it simply doesn't make sense.

It's lazy, generic, uninspired and pretty fucking shit overall. How about some interesting female character designs for once?
 

Night Goat

The Immovable Autism
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Codex 2013 Codex 2014
The outfits might make sense, if the game starts in a strip club. I know that most strippers don't carry that many guns, but maybe it's in Texas.
 

A user named cat

Guest
Combat has potential if they'd add in aimed shots or something to spice it up tactically, otherwise looks pretty bland and boring. I've seen more strategic variety in Nippon Ichi games which are dime-a-dozen themselves. How about doing something different?
 

Bester

⚰️☠️⚱️
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bf52bf06cc370af10c77a2ad26eeda7e_large.jpg

>dose fire particles detached from the sword mesh...

I guess you guys aren't exactly what's called perfectionists.
 

agris

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Messages
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Grid-based combat (boo!) and some of the concept art has an anime flavor. I'm skeptical.

Anomalous Underdog are the battles more set-piece in nature, or can they break out anywhere in a map ala JA2?

edit: that martialist..
2772a4142e6f17153a336c8b7919dbbf_large.jpg
 

HiddenX

The Elder Spy
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Divinity: Original Sin Shadorwun: Hong Kong
Only gfx fags around? This game features gameplay elements from Jagged Alliance 2 and X-COM. Who the hell cares about gfx-design?
 

Lhynn

Arcane
Joined
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Messages
9,825
Oh wait, people ITT are seeing those women outfits in a negative light? Most women players i know pick that style of outfits in the games they play, be it mmo or single player. Honestly dont see whats wrong with those.

Not like i give a fuck.
 

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