Indie Lair Of The Leviathan - old school turn-based RPG based on classics such as Baldurs Gate 1 and 2, Phantasie, Ultima and the SSI Goldbox games.

[cyborgboy95]

 

[cyborgboy95]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

 

[almondblight]

Don't really see Baldur's Gate inspirations but it does look endearing.

Probably the bad combat.

 

[cyborgboy95]

 

[The Decline]

Looks cool and it has nice art style. The sprites being faceless is a plus, it gives the same level of abstraction as the Fallout and BG sprites.

 

[Habichtswalder]

The interior looks like an edit of RPG Maker-assets, everything about it seems extremely familiar.

But overall nice artstyle, especially the toned-down color palette.

 

[cyborgboy95]

Character creation and customisation
Premade or created characters?

Over the past 3 weeks Oliver and I have been working on character creation for the game. A lot of people wanted to create their own character and potentially their entire party while many people said they preferred having a premade set of party members.

So we thought, ok why can't we do both? And if so, how can we do it to the level of creating a truly custom set of characters along the lines of the SSI Goldbox games where you create not only your characters but also their appearance?

Then we took it a step further and decided you can also customise not only the in game combat sprite but also the character portrait too.

How it works?

First off, this is all very WIP. Things will change as we get further along.

We have a system where you choose your basic sprite and then choose from a variety of parts: from heads to hair, weapons, helmets. Everything can also be recolored. Everything is tied to the class of the character so you will have different options for a spellcaster compared to a martial class.

The portrait system works the same. You have your basic face and then customise from a list of parts, eyebrows, hair, beards, even the clothing you want on the portrait.

If you want a deeper look Oliver has an in depth video on his Youtube channel that also goes into how things work behind the scenes in Godot.





Further customisation

I'll write more about the skill part of character customisation in the future but if you have watched Oliver's video above you will see there will be things such as choosing a background and character personality traits along the usual skills, all of which will play a part in how the party interacts with the world.

Your background along with giving some skill bonuses might also mean certain events triggering in the world providing either more flavour text or interactions making things feel a bit more like a role playing game based on who your characters are.

We hope this will help really get players immersed in the game and offer a lot of replay value as well.

 

[Gandalf]

Looks like it is made in Godot. That's pretty interesting.

 

[Infinitron]

Lair of the Leviathan is an open world RPG inspired by classic RPGs of the past. This is the second teaser showing some more of the combat and exploration.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

 

[Gandalf]

I think the left one looks better.

 

[cyborgboy95]

Top down or side view, which do you prefer?
Greetings, adventurers!

This is Oliver Joyce from the Lair of the Leviathan team. Since our last update, David from Nostalgic Realms has been working hard on the game's location art. From dank, oppressive swamp towns to cozy taverns with crackling fireplaces, David is putting together a ton of art for the game, one pixel at a time.

Meanwhile, I've been working on the game engine itself. I have created a pretty powerful in-game editor, where I can do everything from add lights, points of interest and set the weather for the realm, I can also create encounters, conversations, link locations and more. I've also got the character creator fully built too. Next up for me is most likely the 'skills creator' so I can prepare for building combat in the game.

I've got party chatter conversations going in the game too. Although you custom create your own hero ( and you'll have to create up to 4 other custom heroes to join you), there will be the option to have pre-made heroes join the group too. These heroes will have their own personalities and comment on things they see and experience through the game.

Right now the in-game editor is just for David and I to use, but at some point if the game does well, I'd love to open it up to the public to allow people to make their own modded adventures for the game itself.

Last week I started linking encounters created in the Editor with the actual game itself. I've just uploaded a video which shows this off, check it out.

What you see above is the five heroes ( all just using a 'dwarf' figurine right now but they will all have unique and animated figurines to move) walking around the first town in the game, Stoneward. The heroes have full pathfinding, so they can navigate their way around buildings, go behind trees and find the most optimal path to where they are going. Both mouse and keyboard will be supported ( and gamepads too) as we are planning on hopefully porting the game to Switch and PS5 at some point.

Also in this video, two characters having a quick conversation. One of them rudely remarks the town stinks, and the other tells him he'll feel right at home. This kind of little banter will appear all through the game but won't interrupt game flow ( and I may even have an option to turn it off for players who want totally silent party members )

However, with all this built, we now turn our attention to the town itself! Notice how the town is using a "Top Down" view, same as the overworld view. This works for exteriors, but we've been experimenting wtih a potential 'side view' ( antfarm, dollhouse etc) for building interiors.

This is the TOP DOWN view of an interior:

This is the SIDE VIEW of the same interior:

There are some practical reasons for switching to a side view for interiors.

• It's faster to create art on the side view perspective
• We don't have to worry about Y Sorting everything in crowded buildings ( where players can walk behind tables etc, this kind of pathfinding issue can be challenging to solve in interiors
• It cuts down on the constant 'walking' in the game - less dead time. Meaning, on the side view, you'll just see icons above the blacksmith for 'Repair", or above the tavern patrons for "Rumours" and so on.

Exteriors, overworld, dungeons and combat will of course remain top down view.

What do you think of the proposed side view for interiors? Also, we'd love your feedback on how the game is coming along so far. We're realistically 9 months away from a decent playable demo, but we're hoping to have one out sometime in 2025. It takes a long time to put together a decent game engine and toolset , but once we have it all working robustly, the game's content itself should come along quite rapidly.

Cheers!

Oliver and David
Whiskeybarrel Studios / Nostalgic Realms

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Some one tell that guy to take it top down.

 

[holla_cabezas_de_mierda]

That is a lot of names dropped.

Looks like Phantasie/JRPG fighting system.

Menu towns

Overland travel map

I can't see anything Gold Box or Baldur's Gate there though.

some of the art looks gold box for sure

 

[Maxie]

Lair of the Leviathan is an old school rpg based on classics from the past such as Baldurs gate 1 and 2

they dare to post this crap and then present a dime a dozen turn based pixel slopfest jesus fucking christ such a shameless bunch

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Lair of the Leviathan is an old school rpg based on classics from the past such as Baldurs gate 1 and 2

they dare to post this crap and then present a dime a dozen turn based pixel slopfest jesus fucking christ such a shameless bunch

Bg1 and 2 was pixel art too bruv

 

[Modron]

Lair of the Leviathan is an old school rpg based on classics from the past such as Baldurs gate 1 and 2

they dare to post this crap and then present a dime a dozen turn based pixel slopfest jesus fucking christ such a shameless bunch

You're positively pixillated about pixels.

 

[Maxie]

Lair of the Leviathan is an old school rpg based on classics from the past such as Baldurs gate 1 and 2

they dare to post this crap and then present a dime a dozen turn based pixel slopfest jesus fucking christ such a shameless bunch

Bg1 and 2 was pixel art too bruv

are you dumber than you look? do you have cerebral palsy? you are just pretending to be retarded, right?
compare this soulless phone game

with baulders

 

[Maxie]

Lair of the Leviathan is an old school rpg based on classics from the past such as Baldurs gate 1 and 2

they dare to post this crap and then present a dime a dozen turn based pixel slopfest jesus fucking christ such a shameless bunch

You're positively pixillated about pixels.

I am indeed on the verge of vomit when I am blasted day after day with pixel crap

 

[Doktor Best]

This looks more like a jrpg with western artstyle than anything close to BG. But i always wondered if a mix of crpg and jrpg would work so consider me intrigued.

 

[Maxie]

This looks more like a jrpg with western artstyle than anything close to BG.

correct

But i always wondered if a mix of crpg and jrpg would work so consider me intrigued.

fucking lol. you have dozens of this shit, ranging from CHROMA SQUAD, SMALL SAGA to fucking COSMIC STAR HEROINE and similar such soulless nonsense

do you even play rpgs?

 

[almondblight]

compare this soulless phone game

Kind of reminds me of this:

 

[Maxie]

compare this soulless phone game

Kind of reminds me of this:

The picture you've posted is in low resolution, now isn't it? Could be because pixels then were the logical result of cost vs. fidelity and nothing better was on the market..
There's absolutely no need whatsoever for the pixel shit cargo cult to exist if games like Lair of the Leviathan are to have 4k natively. It reeks of blatant and obnoxious poseurism. The pixel 'art' renaissance of the last decade has to STOP and keep being STOPPED.

 

[Spike]

compare this soulless phone game

Kind of reminds me of this:

The picture you've posted is in low resolution, now isn't it? Could be because pixels then were the logical result of cost vs. fidelity and nothing better was on the market..
There's absolutely no need whatsoever for the pixel shit cargo cult to exist if games like Lair of the Leviathan are to have 4k natively. It reeks of blatant and obnoxious poseurism. The pixel 'art' renaissance of the last decade has to STOP and keep being STOPPED.

I mostly agree with you but this game in particular doesn't look too bad. Looks good for pixels.