KickStarter Monomyth - A first person action RPG/dungeon crawler - now available on Early Access

[Viata]

Damn, the hype just keeps increasing.

 

[RatTower]

RatTower, who (or what) is this little guy supposed to be?

He's one of the game's main traders. You meet him in several locations on your journey through Lysandria.
What's under that helmet I'll leave to your imagination.

His alpha dialogue is done. Currently finishing his animations/textures.

Wanna give any hints on story or premise? Going off the name, I assume it's about a tale -- maybe even the tale -- that everybody knows whether they're aware they know it or not.
Cool project.

Thanks!
I can give this much away: While the title is deeply rooted within the story, it may not be as obvious as it seems.

I need this game in my life, how long do I have to wait? Is there any way to support the development?

Not yet. I've been asked a few times for patreon/kickstarter infos. The thing is, there are quite a few tax issues to work out before any of that could be considered (and of course the alpha should be done).
I'll probably come back to that in a while.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

RatTower, who (or what) is this little guy supposed to be?

He's one of the game's main traders. You meet him in several locations on your journey through Lysandria.
What's under that helmet I'll leave to your imagination.

What's under the helmet...

Spoiler

No but seriously, now that you brougth attention to that, I would say an undead or some kind of monster.

If you make mod tools for Monomyth, the first thing I am going to do is put the RE4 merchant voice on this little guy.

 

[RatTower]

Pretty much finished the merchant's alpha storyline today.
Also made the texture earlier this week:



With that I guess all subquests are implemented. In the course of doing that I was also reworking parts of the dialogue system.
Conceptually nothing changed, but I added a couple of commands here and there that let me play with various global conditions as well as character values.
Basically I can make characters switch locations now. This guy spawns next to a savepoint after you finish his quest line somewhere else:



Unfortunately I couldn't keep the early february alpha date due to surprise deadlines (hooray).
It's coming along relatively well though. I hope I can finish what's left wrt design work until the end of the coming week, then finish up details and have some people test it for the first time.

 

[HarveyBirdman]

I can give this much away: While the title is deeply rooted within the story, it may not be as obvious as it seems.

Got my gears turning now. Game is looking great.

 

[Sinatar]

Pretty much finished the merchant's alpha storyline today.
Also made the texture earlier this week:



With that I guess all subquests are implemented. In the course of doing that I was also reworking parts of the dialogue system.
Conceptually nothing changed, but I added a couple of commands here and there that let me play with various global conditions as well as character values.
Basically I can make characters switch locations now. This guy spawns next to a savepoint after you finish his quest line somewhere else:



Unfortunately I couldn't keep the early february alpha date due to surprise deadlines (hooray).
It's coming along relatively well though. I hope I can finish what's left wrt design work until the end of the coming week, then finish up details and have some people test it for the first time.

Gavlan wheel, Gavlan deal.

 

[Wysardry]

If this turns out to be about a spinster with a lisp, I'll be disappointed.

 

[RatTower]

Polishing that combat a bit.



Not pictured here: Nearly getting killed by the archer in the back because I ran out of stamina.
Menus still have to be done, as well as some item and enemy placement.

The question is, where to go from here. I've been approached concerning a kickstarter campaign several times now. Not just for financial reason, but also to get the project out there a bit more. The alpha seems to be a good opportunity for that.
Besides, there are a couple of things that could be financed through it - musicians first and foremost. I actually found two very good ones that understand the tone I'm trying to go for with Monomyth.

The thing is: You can't just do a kickstarter campaign without a company - or better yet: You shouldn't, due to tax reasons. Where I live there is a progressive tax on regular income and - from how I understand it - kickstarter cash would be taxed as such, meaning I'd have to drop a hefty 34-43% (since I'm also employed and the lower tax classes are already occupied by the money I get from there). I can't imagine backers would like that. So the alternative is a company, where kickstarter money falls - again, to my knowledge - under the corporate tax (which is between 10 and 30% , depending on where you live).

Unfortunately establishing a company ain't so easy (or cheap) around here, but that is a problem I have to deal with sooner or later anyway. To put things into context: Where I live you pay a "minimum corporate tax rate" per year. Which is essentially a fine of up to 1700 euros if you don't make any cash. Then we got state-run unions for business owners for some reason. That is another 400 buckaroos. So you get to pay at least 2100 euros a year, just for having the audacity to exist. That ain't really a good starter package for sustainability - which is of course what we are looking for. And we haven't even talked about costs for lawyers as well as the primary deposit yet (which eventually has to sum up to 35.000 euros, that will always remain within the company account).

Whoopsy-doo, well that is a lot of money just for getting some limited liability within an international market. Isn't that swell?

Anyway, the alternative is to go for something like an Ltd in the UK. The thing there is a) I need an accountant that navigates non-residents through the english tax system and b) Brexit's lurking somewhere around the corner. I don't see much of an issue with the latter, but knowing how things will be handled after everything's done in that regard would be nice. The earlier is actually the bigger problem. If the accountant charges me 700 pounds for an annual closure, that's pretty hefty too (local costs are around half of that).

So those are a couple of things I had to look into lately. Again, that's all stuff I have to face sooner or later anyway.
I guess the core question is still, whether the alpha should be used as some sort of a PR stepping stone.
I don't wanna sit down and write a post-mortem in two years, analyzing how Monomyth was a financial failure, cause I didn't do any marketing.

I wanna sit down and write how it was a financial failure, because it was too challenging for popamole brainlets!

 

[DJOGamer PT]

I can't be of much help regarding these financial shit, but I'll still give you my opinion for whatever it's worth.

I do think using a well polished Alpha, as a demo is a good way to market the your game for it's target audience (also there's bound to be some people wanting wash their mouths of the taste the recent Underworld failure left them with).
And instead of using Kickstarter, how about Patreon?

 

[V_K]

Summoning our resident Mexican accountant Mustawd

 

[Mustawd]

Summoning our resident Mexican accountant Mustawd

I don’t do taxes. This guy needs a tax/business consulting person to guide him through the process.

 

[Viata]

So taxalot?

 

[taxalot]

I'm sorry, I only audit rich hot babes.

 

[Zer0wing]

Open a company in mother Russia. It's cheap around here.

 

[V_K]

Open a company in mother Russia. It's cheap around here.

You forgot to budget the bribes and kickbacks.

 

[Zer0wing]

You forgot to budget the bribes and kickbacks.

Your small company that uses one office had to give bribes and kickbacks left and right every month I presume?

 

[Trans-Financial-Man]

Open a company in mother Russia. It's cheap around here.

I found the perfect accountant. And he'll ward off the tax man with his steely attitude towards life.

 

[Invictus]

Its amazing how that combat feels so kinetic and weighty in an alpha; reminded me of Condemned Origins

 

[Zer0wing]

V_K so what business in Russia you're managing that you've got your balls in the grip of the goverment? What laws are you trying to avoid?

 

[Feargus Jewhart]

This game looks so amazing, it is beautiful and I love the NPC design this far. I also just learned about substance painter thanks to you and just damn. I have learned so much about useful development stuff thanks to RatTower !

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Polishing that combat a bit.



Not pictured here: Nearly getting killed by the archer in the back because I ran out of stamina.
Menus still have to be done, as well as some item and enemy placement.

The question is, where to go from here. I've been approached concerning a kickstarter campaign several times now. Not just for financial reason, but also to get the project out there a bit more. The alpha seems to be a good opportunity for that.
Besides, there are a couple of things that could be financed through it - musicians first and foremost. I actually found two very good ones that understand the tone I'm trying to go for with Monomyth.

The thing is: You can't just do a kickstarter campaign without a company - or better yet: You shouldn't, due to tax reasons. Where I live there is a progressive tax on regular income and - from how I understand it - kickstarter cash would be taxed as such, meaning I'd have to drop a hefty 34-43% (since I'm also employed and the lower tax classes are already occupied by the money I get from there). I can't imagine backers would like that. So the alternative is a company, where kickstarter money falls - again, to my knowledge - under the corporate tax (which is between 10 and 30% , depending on where you live).

Unfortunately establishing a company ain't so easy (or cheap) around here, but that is a problem I have to deal with sooner or later anyway. To put things into context: Where I live you pay a "minimum corporate tax rate" per year. Which is essentially a fine of up to 1700 euros if you don't make any cash. Then we got state-run unions for business owners for some reason. That is another 400 buckaroos. So you get to pay at least 2100 euros a year, just for having the audacity to exist. That ain't really a good starter package for sustainability - which is of course what we are looking for. And we haven't even talked about costs for lawyers as well as the primary deposit yet (which eventually has to sum up to 35.000 euros, that will always remain within the company account).

Whoopsy-doo, well that is a lot of money just for getting some limited liability within an international market. Isn't that swell?

Anyway, the alternative is to go for something like an Ltd in the UK. The thing there is a) I need an accountant that navigates non-residents through the english tax system and b) Brexit's lurking somewhere around the corner. I don't see much of an issue with the latter, but knowing how things will be handled after everything's done in that regard would be nice. The earlier is actually the bigger problem. If the accountant charges me 700 pounds for an annual closure, that's pretty hefty too (local costs are around half of that).

So those are a couple of things I had to look into lately. Again, that's all stuff I have to face sooner or later anyway.
I guess the core question is still, whether the alpha should be used as some sort of a PR stepping stone.
I don't wanna sit down and write a post-mortem in two years, analyzing how Monomyth was a financial failure, cause I didn't do any marketing.

I wanna sit down and write how it was a financial failure, because it was too challenging for popamole brainlets!

Move to Ukraine, register as a sole proprietor, enjoy paying between 5% and 15% (if you somehow manage to make >~$185k a year) each quarter as well as ~11000 UAH (~$408) fine per year into the retirement fund.

As an added bonus you get me, myself and my entire collection of Slayer albums as your friendly neighbors, not to mention hot girls on every corner.

 

[Viata]

Move to Ukraine

I don't think his country is that bad that he needs to move to Ukraine, man.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Move to Ukraine

I don't think his country is that bad that he needs to move to Ukraine, man.

So having old ZZ as your neighbor is not a good selling point?

 

[Viata]

Life is really hard in Ukraine if you need to sell yourself. Good luck, ZZ!

 

[Slimu]

I heard a popular choice is to apply to Estonia for e-Residency and register your business there. https://e-resident.gov.ee/start-a-company/