Welcome to an interview with Aleksandrs Cernavskis, the writer and combat designer for the developer team
Atom Team. Aleksandrs and the rest of the Atom Team are currently running a
Kickstarter for their upcoming low-fantasy RPG
Swordhaven: Iron Conspiracy. However, these guys are not some random rookies concerning making games. In their portfolio, you will find the well-liked and popular isometric
Fallout-inspired RPGs:
ATOM RPG: Post-apocalyptic indie game and
ATOM RPG Trudograd.
Who are the Atom Team?
We’re just a bunch of guys scattered across Europe.
We met each other on game development forums, discovered we shared similar interests, took the plunge into indie development, and now here we are.
What is your and your team’s background in making games? What inspired you specifically to go down this path (making a career of it)?
We were all fascinated by game development, more or less. I remember making
Half-Life mods as a school kid, then playing around with RPGmaker and such.
Other guys actually had professional careers in gamedev, having worked on
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,
World of Tanks,
XENUS, etc.
But at the end of the day, we all liked RPGs. It doesn’t matter if it’s pen and paper, CRPGs, JRPGs—you name it. So,
ATOM was just a hobby for us—something to do after work—before it quietly and discreetly
became our work. Then again, nobody minded
What are some of the favorite games you have played, modern and from the past?
I think
Baldur’s Gate was my first proper RPG. Then I was introduced to
Fallout 1–
2 and became a fan after the first play session.
I also loved
Arcanum; later
Torment became my favorite game for a while. Then
VTMB,
ToEE… The usual suspects.
Jeff Vogel is an icon of indie development done right.
Iron Tower Studios and
Stygian Software are GOAT. The list goes on! Again, I’ll hardly surprise you with my list of good RPG’s.
FromSoft is cool for their world-building. You know—
King’s Field,
Elden Ring, with
Dark Souls 1 probably being my favorite.
I also like Goichi Suda, who developed
Killer7,
No More Heroes,
Killer is Dead, etc. I’m not completely in love with the games themselves, but that guy is an inspiration and a real punk.
I’d say the same about Yoko Taro, who made
Drakengard and
Nier. I don’t always enjoy his games, but the man himself is an auteur.
Right now I’m fascinated with
Battle Brothers and
Crusader Kings 3. These two can really suck me in for an unhealthy amount of time.
Have you been a writer and combat designer for all of Atom Team’s released RPGs?
I was one of the writers for
ATOM RPG, a writer AND assistant combat designer for
Trudograd.
Swordhaven is the first time I get to design combat right from the start. Only time will tell if it was wise of the guys to let me do that… But so far so good!
What inspires you regarding the writing – any specific themes or moods that run through the games?
I like to write about things I know and reference things that are important to me. I don’t do it for the “haha get the reference?” aspect, but rather to honor the authors, people, and events that have impacted me. However, I understand how it might appear from the outside, so nowadays I try to make references more subtle.
My other passion—if you will—is the “dark underbelly” trope. I enjoy incorporating references to a larger, hidden narrative unfolding in the background. When you delve deep into any of the games I’ve participated in, you may sense that there is more to the world than meets the eye—like a terrifying cosmic dimension teeming with inexplicable and mind-bending, lurking just out of sight.
Have your style changed, or maybe even improved over the years?
Yeah, I’d say it did. Language is a tool and the more you use it the better you tend to get.
While I do like the writing in
ATOM RPG, some of it is a bit
too cringy at times…
Trudograd felt somewhat dryer, but way more professional; and
Swordhaven is the most ‘normal’ so far. I wonder what we will write next!
Is there any kind of writing traps to avoid? Have you “walked” into any yourself?
My main no-nos are:
- Making too many references to things I like. Everyone will just think it’s nostalgia-milking, or attempts at Family Guy humor. Even though it’s not! For the most part…
- Try not to use anti-humor. I love anti-humor, basically jokes which are funny BECAUSE they are horribly unfunny, giving you that cringe laugh, but the reader will just think you wanted to be funny and failed.
- Don’t write sentences that don’t feel right. I can’t really explain this one because I don’t know anything about writing theory, but sometimes sentences just sound off. That’s why I always re-read what I wrote.
You double as a combat designer. What is your background in designing combat – boardgame related, or strictly a PC/console gaming affair?
I’m pretty much a novice at that. I created a combat system for a board game that my friends and I developed back in school. I also work on hobby games that I keep to myself, as they are mainly for practicing coding.
While these are not the biggest accolades, I think it’s working for the time being.
What inspires you as a combat designer?
I like combat in
Battle Brothers,
Underrail,
War Tales and the stuff they had in Infinity Engine games. Smooth, easy to grasp systems—not mindless, but not overly complex either.
What do you prefer, a more abstract type of turn-based combat based on specific rules, or something more simulated based on real life?
I like the middle ground. My favorite kind of combat has strict rules: everyone has a specific turn order and you can’t skip ahead, all actions cost AP, etc. but also some chaos is out there, like baiting for monster infighting, ragdolling a character and watching them flail around damaging their own allies… Crazy stuff that exists just because it’s fun.
What’s the hardest – the writing or designing gameplay?
I’d say balancing. I designed the whole combat system in a few days, but balancing out the pros and cons and DPS of specific weapons and techniques… That’s not something I even did properly for
Swordhaven’s demo, because I know I can’t do it without player suggestions.
Our team depends on feedback in general, but it’s doubly true for combat. We’ll balance it out together, me and the players.
Now for the games. ATOM RPG also started as a Kickstarter project. How come? Was there no publisher interest, or was it something you wanted to avoid? Was Kickstarter the only way to inject money into the project?
Honestly, the Kickstarter just kind of happened. I don’t remember if we had discussions about it or not, but it seemed like the only obvious way to go forward.
That campaign ended up spreading awareness of our game in a way that we could never achieve on our own, as nobody on the team really knew (or knows) how to market stuff.
Of course the actual game cost us ten times more than what was gathered using Kickstarter, but since we still had our day-jobs almost until the full release, it didn’t really matter.
What inspired the team to make this kind of game? Fallout is a clear inspiration, anything else?
The first
Wasteland,
Quest for Glory, good old euro-jank RPGs like
The Fall: Last Days of Gaia, Another War, and all that jazz.
Authors like Strugatsky brothers, Sorokin, Shalamov, and many others. All kinds of stuff, really. It’s pretty hard to pick something specific since
ATOM was always a hodgepodge of different ideas and influences.
What was the process from going from a cool idea, to actually making the thing and setting up a Kickstarter?
We worked on
ATOM even before Kickstarter, so development-vise not a lot has changed. But the campaign was a tough experience, that’s for sure. Tough, but also rather fun!
I think everyone can pull this off. Might just take a while and unless you like canned food, you’ll fail!
Anything you or the team regret about making the first ATOM RPG?
There are a lot of things that I would have done differently: improve the English translation, remove some parts, and add something else. However, I can say the same about
Trudograd, and I’m 100% sure that I will say this about
Swordhaven once it’s completed.
Other than that, I regret nothing!
Then a couple of years later, you guys made ATOM RPG Trudograd. From what I understand it started as a DLC or some sort of expansion for the original ATOM RPG, what changed?
You’re absolutely right, it started as a basic DLC, but then we got carried away
There were too many changes, fixes and improvements for it to be a simple addition to the base game. So we decided to make
Trudograd a classic expansion pack, sort of like
Throne of Bhaal for
BG2. Just not requiring you to own the original
ATOM.
What changes did you make from the first game? Were the changes based on community feedback, or stuff the team didn’t think turned out so good? Maybe both?
Yeah, a bit of both, with a slight tilt towards community feedback.
The most obvious changes would be the addition of new abilities, considerably better graphics, QoL features not present in
ATOM, weapon modifications, special armor… The name is Legion.
Do you and the Atom Team have more post-apocalyptic stories in you for the ATOM franchise? Or is it a done deal, considering the shift to medieval fantasy?
Trudograd ends on a cliffhanger so we’re obliged to create at least one more ATOM game. But a palette cleanser is required first
ATOM 2 will probably be our next project, and it will be the best in the series, I’m sure of it.
And now finally for the main event – the Baldur’s Gate I inspired RPG Swordhaven: Iron Conspiracy.
This is your second Kickstarter, is it still a tense deal? If the worst happens and the Kickstarter fails, will the game be benched? Will the company itself be in trouble?
I don’t think we’ll fold if the Kickstarter fails, but it will be hard(er), that’s for sure.
We mainly need Kickstarter for things like new animations, additional polish for the game’s visuals, new features that we otherwise wouldn’t have time to develop properly, and all that good stuff.
What prompted you as a team to go from the post-apocalyptic wasteland to the medieval lands of a low-key fantasy adventure?
We wanted to try something new, and since fantasy and medieval-esque fiction in general have always appealed to us, it was a no-brainer what setting we wanted to use for our next game.
What’s the main pull for gamers who enjoy a good RPG romp?
Depends on the gamers in question
For us, it’s a mix of attention to detail (the more meticulous, the better) and a good old swashbuckling adventure. A bit of political intrigue, a pinch of sword and sorcery—the stuff of legends, as one bald fella with a hamster used to say.
After testing the demo, I was surprised at how good the game felt already, inevitably there is stuff that needs to be improved. What are the things on your immediate list?
Bug fixes are our top priority! We will also be adding missing portraits for characters who do not currently have them. Additionally, we may tweak some aspects such as sounds and visuals. But that’s our task for this demo.
When the Kickstarter campaign is over, our first action will be implementing a new and better pathfinding system.
What kind of adventure from a writing aspect do you have in mind for Swordhaven? The word conspiracy in the title tells me that it will be something more than just a heroic tale filled with valorous deeds – is there something to this?
I really wanna hint at some spoilers, but alas, I can’t.
What I can do is talk a little about our inspirations: history (Northern Crusades and colonization of Hokkaido by Imperial Japan, etc.), fables, classic adventure literature from the XIX and XX centuries (for example, Alexandre Dumas), the stuff they published in pulp magazines… Our usuals.
For me personally, a lot of inspiration comes from Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian, but also H. P. Lovecraft and Robert W. Chambers, meaning there will be a hard to find cosmic horror subplot, just like I mentioned earlier.
This time however, it will be less Cthulu and more King in Yellow, and maybe some of Arthur Machen’s “Shining Pyramid”.
The demo felt very free-form in its approach, meaning you can kill, steal, and pickpocket whoever you want. How will you make sure the game can be completed with that kind of freedom? It gets me thinking about this line from The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind: “With this character’s death, the threads of prophecy have been severed. You may load a saved game, or persist in this doomed world that you have created“.
The line you mentioned was used as one of the death screens before we went public with the demo
It’s not easy, that’s for sure, but we managed to maintain that free approach in both
ATOM and
Trudograd without making them unbeatable, and even acknowledging some of the more unorthodox player decisions in-game. So, it only felt right to make
Swordhaven in the same vein!
It’s a different game, yes, but that doesn’t mean that it should be a downgrade from the
ATOM series. Quite the contrary!
The CGI intro looks very nice, however, this isn’t the first time you guys have made impressive mood-setting CGI cinematics. I assume these are time-consuming to make, which makes me wonder if all that extra work is worth it considering even AAA game developers seem to ditch them nowadays. Are these videos important for the atmosphere? (Mind, I like them and miss them from games in general).
You answered the question for me!
We also enjoy them. Sure, cinematics do take time, but again—they
feel right for us. Come to think of it, a lot of what we do is dictated by the fact that it just
feels appropriate or cool. But not bike-riding-sunglasses-wearing-cool, more like nerd cool.
We even shot a short movie with a real actor as a starting cinematic for
Trudograd. Now that was something!
Swordhaven will both have turn-based and real-time combat, how come? Wouldn’t it be easier to focus on one gameplay style? Can you switch between them at will?
It would definitely be easier! However, there are a couple of reasons why we’re going with two systems this time. First of all, a Real-Time with Pause combat stylistically fits an Infinity Engine-inspired game.
Secondly, the pacing. To me, every turn-based combat sequence feels like a significant event. It’s the moment when the game signals to the player, “Hold on a second. It’s time to strategize like a commander!” So it’s a mood killer when this intense experience pops up when your party of Level 50 characters meets a random rat.
For such occasions, you can now seamlessly switch to real-time mode, watch your party smash that proverbial rat in 2 seconds, and then return to exploring without interrupting the game’s pace.
However, it’s important to note that turn-based gameplay remains our top priority. We won’t even consider implementing real-time elements until we make turn-based gameplay shine!
Going by the demo, it seems to be a party-based RPG. Will you be able to create your party, or will your companions will be set characters with their own agenda in the world?
I do love games like
IWD where you make the whole party at the start of the adventure, but this time we went with a more ludonarrative approach where you get to meet all sorts of colorful characters, and
kill them add them to your party.
Then again, many similar games to ours offer the option to create your own party in-game by hiring characters in a tavern or a mercenary guild. So I believe we’ll also add this option.
What engine does Swordhaven run on? Is it the same engine that the Atom RPGs run on? Is it a good engine for the purpose of making RPGs?
Swordhaven is the third time we’re using Unity. Our first games were created in it, so we decided not to reinvent the wheel and go for it with
Swordhaven as well.
We have a whole infrastructure of homebrew scripts, shortcuts, even whole systems built on top of the vanilla editor and these are invaluable in making development quick and easy for us.
How large will the world be? Will you be able to explore everything from level 1, if you so choose, or will there be restrictions?
We like the free, open-world approach, similar to what we had in
Atom. So yes, players will be able to visit most locations right from the start. However, whether they can withstand all of the challenges at the beginning is a different story.
Size-wise, it will be bigger than
Trudograd, but probably a bit more condensed than
ATOM. It depends on the funding, really.
I noticed some voice acting in the demo, however, it was very spartan. Is it a wish to one day have full voice acting, or do you think it might limit or make the game harder to make? Any thoughts about voice acting from a gaming perspective when it comes to RPGs?
For sure, one day we’ll have a game that’s fully voice-acted. But since it’s a very costly and labor intensive process, we’d need our studio to grow big time before we even attempt that.
What’s the plan for difficulty – will combat be the only test of your mettle? Are there puzzles, or perhaps other things that depend on more than just combat skills?
I’m very excited to make some non-combat challenges for the players. Puzzle dungeons, obscure hints that lead to secret quests and locations, little hidey-holes you need to use specific items on to reach the loot. I hope to have all that by the time the game is finished.
What’s the one feature you think will get the most attention from the gaming public?
Oh, I don’t know. Fun exploration? A certain plot-twist that I can’t disclose?.. We’ll just have to see.
When do you think the game will be released if the Kickstarter is successful?
We’re aiming for Early Access in Q4 2024, and full 1.0 release in Q4 2025.
Is there anything you want to add about Swordhaven, the Atom Team, or maybe something about yourself?
I’d just like to use your platform to once again thank our players for the amazing support!
RPG fans and communities, like the
Codex, are what makes or breaks development studios, depending on their reaction, and they have been kind, helpful and accepting towards us.
I also like to thank you for the ability to share my thoughts. You have an awesome blog and like I told you privately, I really appreciate you following that tradition of blogging about games independently in your own corner of the internet.
My hope is that it one day becomes a trend again!
I want to give Aleksandrs and the Atom Team a huge thanks for answering all my questions and for the kind words. I also want to wish them luck in their Kickstarter endeavors. Let’s hope it all goes well, and that we soon get to play
Swordhaven. Because who doesn’t want to slaughter rats and wolves like the good old days of roleplaying? If you haven’t backed already, do so now so we get the best possible RPG!
Thanks for reading.
So based on my most recent backing there is a 50% chance the game will be good
