Game News Sovereign Syndicate is an upcoming Victorian steampunk RPG inspired by Shadowrun

[Isaac (Crimson Herring)]

Good luck with your project! The setting seems cool, hopefully the game turns out to be fun and finds its niche audience.

Thanks! Yep we're trying to be as clear as we can about what we're building so we don't set false expectations, let people decide for themselves if that's something they'll enjoy or not. We definitely think there's an audience for it.

I love Shadowrun and i was hoping that with Cyberpunk release we could see more about it. We all know how that when tho...

Anyways looking to play this one, Good luck.

Thanks for your support!

The combat and UI felt much smoother than the earlier Shadowruns, but the storyline was utterly 'meh' compared to Dragonfall.

Eh, I think that the story was decent (and I personally think that it had a better companion rooster narrativewise than DF). Main issue with HK is that you were being flooded with too much dialogue between missions.

Agreed the UI changes and improved matrix were good, just too much dialogue for my tastes between missions, and I just didn't enjoy the main story arc as much.

How about just customise character name looks and gender but still with a predefined backstory

Thanks for your feedback, I think to do character customization properly the art asset costs would be too high for our budget. Hoping to do something more like that with a later project, but for now we're trying to be realistic with our scope and budget.

 

[MicoSelva]

Youtube games reviewer/pundit Tarmack is also involved in this game. He worked at Bioware at some point (some low-tier job) and has a thing for gnomes.

 

[Septaryeth]

Good luck with your project! The setting seems cool, hopefully the game turns out to be fun and finds its niche audience.

Thanks! Yep we're trying to be as clear as we can about what we're building so we don't set false expectations, let people decide for themselves if that's something they'll enjoy or not. We definitely think there's an audience for it.

Respect for being honest and not overpromising your first product.

I suppose one would think that as a consumer we're not obligated to buy a particular product that is lacking in some aspects due to its creators being indie, which is fair, but at the very least you communicated and allowed them to make informed choices.
That would at least save me the heartache of buying into the hype, only to see a project has overstretched itself then has to cut the second half short, in order to meet the promised release date.
And the screenshots so far actually look pretty neat.

Agreed that there needs to be more shadowrun or games within that setting, I don't know why but the dystopian futuristic design meshed with magic is just so oddly.. bizarre and fun.

 

[Van-d-all]

Looks rather bleak. While steampunk games aren't that common, the genre itself became so fucking generic it's hard to tell their setting apart aside from location. It should have just been a kind of technological cap on the world pushing it towards a certain solutions and overall aesthetic, but it became an entire copy-paste cosplay-like theme park. I'd rather have more games in other -punk settings, like raypunk or dieselpunk.

 

[Isaac (Crimson Herring)]

Respect for being honest and not overpromising your first product.

I suppose one would think that as a consumer we're not obligated to buy a particular product that is lacking in some aspects due to its creators being indie, which is fair, but at the very least you communicated and allowed them to make informed choices.
That would at least save me the heartache of buying into the hype, only to see a project has overstretched itself then has to cut the second half short, in order to meet the promised release date.
And the screenshots so far actually look pretty neat.

Agreed that there needs to be more shadowrun or games within that setting, I don't know why but the dystopian futuristic design meshed with magic is just so oddly.. bizarre and fun.

Exactly, I think a lot of the disappointment we see in gaming today is due to overhype and the developer / publisher setting unrealistic expectations in the market about the product they're making and/or trying to be something for everyone to maximize the size of their potential audience. They're probably also making assumptions about refunds and post-release support where not everyone who wants one pursues a refund and the cost of supporting a game after release and having a "make it what we said it was going to be in the first place" roadmap for 18-24 months after release is actually more profitable because of cost of capital than delaying release until the product is "ready." It's a sad state of affairs that I don't support so I'm trying to be as clear as I can about how we communicate what the game is and isn't.

Looks rather bleak. While steampunk games aren't that common, the genre itself became so fucking generic it's hard to tell their setting apart aside from location. It should have just been a kind of technological cap on the world pushing it towards a certain solutions and overall aesthetic, but it became an entire copy-paste cosplay-like theme park. I'd rather have more games in other -punk settings, like raypunk or dieselpunk.

Yeah, it was important to me to write a steampunk game that didn't whitewash the reality of the Victorian era, poverty, wealth disparity, social issues, substance abuse, sanitation issues, slavery, imperialism, etc. I tend to like science fiction that has a strong basis in reality, HG Wells, Jules Verne, Isaac Asimov, etc. so it was important to me that the story respect the reality of the setting as much as possible given the fantasy elements.

We're definitely trying to keep our steampunk tropes to a minimum, this is a good reference to keep us from getting carried away lol. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2qWCMVRzNk

 

[gurugeorge]

As others are saying, appreciate you mucking in here, respect.

While the setting and the art style look quite attractive, games without combat have to work hard to convince me to play them, but I'll keep an interested eye on this, for sure.

I'm sure you've already thought about this, but one thing that I like a lot as an alternative to combat, and I would recommend, is liberal use of "storybook" sequences. They're a good way of implementing a whole host of non-combat skills, and telling chunks of story that won't find good representation in a game engine. Have a good artist who can do characterful steampunk style art, and Bob's your uncle, you've got a way of doing a lot of non-combat stuff that I think most people have found quite congenial since the Pillars of Eternity games (and latterly Pathfinder: Kingmaker) made liberal use of it.

 

[Isaac (Crimson Herring)]

As others are saying, appreciate you mucking in here, respect.

While the setting and the art style look quite attractive, games without combat have to work hard to convince me to play them, but I'll keep an interested eye on this, for sure.

I'm sure you've already thought about this, but one thing that I like a lot as an alternative to combat, and I would recommend, is liberal use of "storybook" sequences. They're a good way of implementing a whole host of non-combat skills, and telling chunks of story that won't find good representation in a game engine. Have a good artist who can do characterful steampunk style art, and Bob's your uncle, you've got a way of doing a lot of non-combat stuff that I think most people have found quite congenial since the Pillars of Eternity games (and latterly Pathfinder: Kingmaker) made liberal use of it.

Thanks, that's a great idea! We definitely have some sections that we wanted to include from a narrative perspective but were difficult or not cost effective to implement in game. I like how Pillars does it, could certainly be an inspiration for us as well.