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Tags: The Boar Studio; Titan Outpost
Last year we posted about Titan Outpost, a combat-free hard sci-fi isometric RPG created by veteran Codex poster Frank "MF" de Boer and set in a mining outpost on the sixth moon of Saturn. Titan Outpost's Steam page was launched in December and in May MF produced a cinematic trailer, informing us that release was imminent. The game was actually supposed to come out on August 1st but suffered an unexpected delay, which is probably for the best considering how many other titles were released that day. It's finally out today, so here's the latest & greatest version of the trailer and an excerpt from MF's release announcement:
Titan Outpost, our first RPG, is now available. Curious? Stick around.
What is Titan Outpost?
It is an RPG with survival, base building and adventure elements set on Titan, the 6th moon of Saturn. It is traditional, true to PnP roots and old-school in some ways, and innovative in others.
How does it work?
The dialogue and negotiation systems, the temperature-based survival aspects, the base construction and the world map all feature gameplay that is either completely unique or a combination of tried-and-true things that have never been tied together before in this way.
At the core is the game’s character system. Most RPGs focus on combat and combat related skills, but Titan Outpost is different. Your character sheet contains ‘science’, ‘construction’, ‘negotiation’, ‘exploration’ and ‘hacking’ skills, for example. You can gain experience points, level up and increase these skills like in any other RPG, but the way they affect what is happening in the game world is different.
You know how, when you talk to people in an RPG, it is always the same tree-based conversation? You ask a question, and the NPC gives you an answer. In Titan Outpost, you’ll feel right at home if you like this sort of thing, but whenever you start negotiating, it becomes more involved. You can interject with leverage, you can change the goal of your conversation, you can select pushy responses or backpedal and you can influence the dialogue in other ways. You can finally cover the flanks in a battle of words instead of always taking it head on with a couple of options.
Getting around on Titan is difficult. The average surface temperature is −179 °C (−290 °F), so you drive around in a heavily isolated and heated rover, and when you absolutely have to traverse anywhere on foot, you do so in a specialized suit. Time is the currency here: Every minute spent outside drains your suit's charge. Limited nutrition, your oxygen supply and other elements combine to provide a tense survival atmosphere.
You can expand the Outpost as you would in a base builder game, with resource management and a top-down interface. Your character skills partly determine how you can go about this. You can be a curious scientist, a savvy entrepreneur, a ruthless ecowarrior, a smooth-talking diplomat, a stoic engineer, an intrepid explorer or anything in between.
The announcement is quite thorough and descriptive, so you should definitely read the entire thing. If you like what you see, Titan Outpost is available on Steam now for $25.
Last year we posted about Titan Outpost, a combat-free hard sci-fi isometric RPG created by veteran Codex poster Frank "MF" de Boer and set in a mining outpost on the sixth moon of Saturn. Titan Outpost's Steam page was launched in December and in May MF produced a cinematic trailer, informing us that release was imminent. The game was actually supposed to come out on August 1st but suffered an unexpected delay, which is probably for the best considering how many other titles were released that day. It's finally out today, so here's the latest & greatest version of the trailer and an excerpt from MF's release announcement:
Titan Outpost, our first RPG, is now available. Curious? Stick around.
What is Titan Outpost?
It is an RPG with survival, base building and adventure elements set on Titan, the 6th moon of Saturn. It is traditional, true to PnP roots and old-school in some ways, and innovative in others.
How does it work?
The dialogue and negotiation systems, the temperature-based survival aspects, the base construction and the world map all feature gameplay that is either completely unique or a combination of tried-and-true things that have never been tied together before in this way.
At the core is the game’s character system. Most RPGs focus on combat and combat related skills, but Titan Outpost is different. Your character sheet contains ‘science’, ‘construction’, ‘negotiation’, ‘exploration’ and ‘hacking’ skills, for example. You can gain experience points, level up and increase these skills like in any other RPG, but the way they affect what is happening in the game world is different.
You know how, when you talk to people in an RPG, it is always the same tree-based conversation? You ask a question, and the NPC gives you an answer. In Titan Outpost, you’ll feel right at home if you like this sort of thing, but whenever you start negotiating, it becomes more involved. You can interject with leverage, you can change the goal of your conversation, you can select pushy responses or backpedal and you can influence the dialogue in other ways. You can finally cover the flanks in a battle of words instead of always taking it head on with a couple of options.
Getting around on Titan is difficult. The average surface temperature is −179 °C (−290 °F), so you drive around in a heavily isolated and heated rover, and when you absolutely have to traverse anywhere on foot, you do so in a specialized suit. Time is the currency here: Every minute spent outside drains your suit's charge. Limited nutrition, your oxygen supply and other elements combine to provide a tense survival atmosphere.
You can expand the Outpost as you would in a base builder game, with resource management and a top-down interface. Your character skills partly determine how you can go about this. You can be a curious scientist, a savvy entrepreneur, a ruthless ecowarrior, a smooth-talking diplomat, a stoic engineer, an intrepid explorer or anything in between.
The announcement is quite thorough and descriptive, so you should definitely read the entire thing. If you like what you see, Titan Outpost is available on Steam now for $25.
