KickStarter SKALD: Against the Black Priory - retro RPG inspired by Ultima - coming May 30th

[SkaldRPG]

Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/scapeit/skald-against-the-black-priory
Indiegogo: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/skald-against-the-black-priory#/

https://www.skaldrpg.com




https://af.gog.com/game/skald_against_the_black_priory?as=1649904300

Spoiler

Hi,

SKALD: Against the Black Priory is an indie CRPG of dark, grounded fantasy with a strong retro look and feel!

The game draws heavily on "golden era" titles like "Ultima", the "Gold Box series" and the "Magic Candle series". It features party-based, story driven, roleplaying that mixes traditional tile based exploration with menu based combat and "choose your own adventure" style sequences.

The game is in late Alpha development and is fast approaching Kickstarter! This project lives or dies by the interest of the indie-RPG fanbase so I really hope to connect with some of you!

Please check it out at www.skaldRpg.com and reach out on Twitter for more info!

 

[Bester]

Looks great, however, can you put Co-op and HD textures into it, pls? Thanks!

 

[grimace]

SkaldRPG Barely Literate

Joined:
Yesterday
Messages:
1
Location:
Norway

I offer my shilling services to you.

 

[SkaldRPG]

SkaldRPG Barely Literate

Joined:
Yesterday
Messages:
1
Location:
Norway

I offer my shilling services to you.

I don't even know what that means but it sounds amazing!

 

[SkaldRPG]

Looks great, however, can you put Co-op and HD textures into it, pls? Thanks!

I just have to put in "in app purchases" and "pay to win" first

 

[d1nolore]

What platforms are you looking to release to? And do you have any plans for the music?

 

[Sukhāvatī]

Looks super sweet!

Infinitron

 

[SkaldRPG]

What platforms are you looking to release to? And do you have any plans for the music?

The SKALD engine is built in Unity so I can do any platform!

My first priority, however, is PC via Steam. I'll release for mobile down the line but that's more of a "phase two" for now.

Concerning music that will depend on if I manage to raise any funding. It might be anything from free assets to commissioning an artist. I have a lot of respect for the effect of music- and sound design BUT I have no musical talent myself so it's either "pay someone" or find free stuff

 

[SkaldRPG]

Looks super sweet!

Infinitron

Thank you Hope you'll check out the full game when it's out!

 

[grimace]

SkaldRPG

Is there a playable demo available?

 

[SkaldRPG]

SkaldRPG

Is there a playable demo available?

Hi! No, not for the moment! Working on it thou and hope to have one ready before May and the KS campaign!

 

[mondblut]

Pretty nice. I wish the screen real estate would be used more wisely though. I mean, even back in C64 days a menu of 9 buttons did not occupy one quarter of the screen.

 

[SkaldRPG]

Pretty nice. I wish the screen real estate would be used more wisely though. I mean, even back in C64 days a menu of 9 buttons did not occupy one quarter of the screen.

Hi and thanks for the feedback!

I agree 100%! I will need to tune it as the game comes closer to publishing! The reason its like this for now is that I have been testing it for both PC and tablet during development and the chunky button UI lends itself nicely to touch

 

[DavidBVal]

I see many promising tactical elements, like taunt, stun effect. Do I need to purchase a 4:3 CRT monitor to play it? If yes, I'm sold.

I recommend releasing a short demo to motivate/gain the trust of potential pledgers.

 

[SkaldRPG]

I see many promising tactical elements, like taunt, stun effect. Do I need to purchase a 4:3 CRT monitor to play it? If yes, I'm sold.

I recommend releasing a short demo to motivate/gain the trust of potential pledgers.

Haha yes the CRT monitor will be required ;-)
In all seriousness I'm experimenting w a CRT filter that I'll leave in if it doesn't hurt performance and stability

Yes a demo is a great idea before going to KS It might not be of the actual "Against the Black Priory" storyline but might be a short "one-shot" style vignette using the SKALD engine and look!

 

[Agame]

tablet

But seriously looks great, love the muted "retro" color scheme. I wish you the best of luck Sir!

 

[d1nolore]

He said PC first but it would be great on tablet. I don't have a lot of time for gaming these days so getting something to play before I sleep or on the shitter is a blessing.

99.9% of mobile games are trash. I don't know why they don't just make classic adventure games an stuff with classic graphics for mobiles. Rather than the fugly copycat eyesore style graphics they use now.

 

[SkaldRPG]

He said PC first but it would be great on tablet. I don't have a lot of time for gaming these days so getting something to play before I sleep or on the shitter is a blessing.

99.9% of mobile games are trash. I don't know why they don't just make classic adventure games an stuff with classic graphics for mobiles. Rather than the fugly copycat eyesore style graphics they use now.

A big part of me deciding to go all in on this was playing Gurk - the 8bit RPG on my phone and thinking I can do this better So it's for sure coming to phone/tablets but I just need to get my sea-legs w the PC release first

Like I said before, it's all built for cross-platform release so publishing for Android etc is basically on push of a button ;-)

 

[SkaldRPG]

tablet

But seriously looks great, love the muted "retro" color scheme. I wish you the best of luck Sir!

Thank you The project really fell into place once I realized that the C64 color scheme was the way to go

 

[MRY]

Looks great -- not used to seeing that era's graphics so well done.,

 

[Ysaye]

Looks good! - I will keep an eye out for the Kickstarter and best wishes to you!

The mention of Magic Candle reminds me of games I miss from my childhood; I only played Magic Candle 2 but I have fond memories of having a team of mainly magicians (Rimfiztrik, Eflun, Madir I think?) and having to find and research the various "named" spellbooks. Magic was very powerful in a tactical sense but also somewhat costly to invest in from a time perspective - altogether it feel it was probably more balanced and fun then it's implementation in many modern CRPGs.

On that, it was interesting to read your bit on magic systems - I agree that there should in general be a penalty for more powerful magics - I think what is also often missing is an ethical element to the use of particular types of magic (Destructive magic should come at an exponential cost to the user both in terms of how society views them and also the impact to them as a user). I am not sure however that I agree with you that it should be the domain of the wealthy or the powerful; more it should be the domain of the clever (who may in turn end up being more wealthy, or forgo wealth for more academic pursuits). Anyway....

I also noticed on your website you discuss a review of book on procedural generation - is that going to be something that is part of this game or something that you will use as a tool to assist development? Or is all the content going to be fixed and created manually?

 

[d1nolore]

How'd you do the graphics?

I'll support Kickstarter if you invest in some nice music:

https://youtu.be/VRcprUCjwDc

 

[SkaldRPG]

How'd you do the graphics?

Looks great -- not used to seeing that era's graphics so well done.,

Thank you so much! Pretty happy w the look myself. An advantage of working w the C64 color palette is that it lends itself very nicely to bleak, dark environments

I do my own graphics using paint.net. The terrain is tile-based.

I'll support Kickstarter if you invest in some nice music:

https://youtu.be/VRcprUCjwDc

Concerning music I'm 100% onboard w music being very important for the tone of the game and I love the example of the HoMM2 soundtrack ;-) However the amount and quality of the sound and music will depend on the funding. That being said, there's a LOT of really good free music and sound FX assets out there so there WILL be awesome music one way or another!

 

[SkaldRPG]

Looks good! - I will keep an eye out for the Kickstarter and best wishes to you!

The mention of Magic Candle reminds me of games I miss from my childhood; I only played Magic Candle 2 but I have fond memories of having a team of mainly magicians (Rimfiztrik, Eflun, Madir I think?) and having to find and research the various "named" spellbooks. Magic was very powerful in a tactical sense but also somewhat costly to invest in from a time perspective - altogether it feel it was probably more balanced and fun then it's implementation in many modern CRPGs.

On that, it was interesting to read your bit on magic systems - I agree that there should in general be a penalty for more powerful magics - I think what is also often missing is an ethical element to the use of particular types of magic (Destructive magic should come at an exponential cost to the user both in terms of how society views them and also the impact to them as a user). I am not sure however that I agree with you that it should be the domain of the wealthy or the powerful; more it should be the domain of the clever (who may in turn end up being more wealthy, or forgo wealth for more academic pursuits). Anyway....

I also noticed on your website you discuss a review of book on procedural generation - is that going to be something that is part of this game or something that you will use as a tool to assist development? Or is all the content going to be fixed and created manually?

Hi and thanks for the reply! The Magic Candle games and Bloodstone were my primary influence! I also grew up playing them and have great (if somewhat romanticized) memories of them.

Concerning magic, I think what I'm going for is the Empires tendency to attempt to use magic as a means of societal control through the creation and enforcement of laws and institutions (outlawing and persecuting non-sanctioned magic use etc.). Think of the role of organized religion vs paganism in medieval European monarchies

As for procedural content I intend to create the main backbone of "Against the Black Priory" by hand but might include some procedural content as a means of adding content. For instance certain dungeons might create part of their layout proceduraly. As for PCG in general I follow the field with interest - thus the review

 

[SkaldRPG]

Reworked the GUI to allow for a bigger overland map etc. I think I'm happy but might also just be the change

Have a great Saturday!