WEEKLY UPDATE! - The game has a story, but how will it play? (Patreon)

Hello all! Here we are again. A week has gone by and our doc has changed quite a bit thanks to some amazing feedback. Last week I translated what we've written so far about the story. Those parts haven't changed as much, so this week I'm going to talk about our plans for the gameplay!

The game is going to be a 2d top down (j)rpg, with turn based combat, but lets dive into the specifics!

As last week, first the screenshot, followed by an english translation. And if you have thoughts & comments, please leave them below! We want this doc to be the best it can be, in order to maximise our chances of getting the funding, which would be extremely cool.

The game follows the structure of a 2D retro (J)RPG, where we'll follow a team of edventurers that explore the world and fight enemies to progress their skills.We use this classic structure to then make some original gameplay choices that fit the game, its narration & the cross stitch/embroidery universe.The player starts from a traditional & familiar game to find the strangeness hidden underneath.

The 3C (a common game design term meaning Controls/Characters/Camera):

Controls: standard controller, with optional mouse/keyboard support

Characters: our team of heroes, chosen by the player. The composition of which can be adjusted whenever the player chooses.

Camera: (3 options, either UI, during menus, lateral 2D during fights, and top down during exploration)

EXPLORATION

The exploration happens in a classical jrpg manner. With a top down or slightly isometric camera, and the player can interact with many scenery elements & characters that fill the world to set off various animations or dialog scenes. Enemies will be visible during exploration, and it will be possible to avoid them, or attack them first.

Distinctive feature: The Backside of the tapestry (the "Anderekant"), where the movements will be based on a mish mash of threads. The goal will be to choose the right path by trying to guess where you are, and where you'll end up.

PROGRESSION

You'll get xp points by completing missions or winning fights, which will unlock new skills & better the stats of every fighter.The progression tree will be a big frieze (that's what the internet tells me the english word for it is at least), on which the heroes move to unlock the new skills. All classes will share the same grid, but starting at different points, and the player will be able to have their characters choose to either follow their class' path or diverge and learn some skills from other classes. This system is inspired by Final Fantasy X's sphere grid.

COMBAT

Classes

The game will feature 5 classes, that apply to both heroes & monsters. Each class has its own strengths & weaknesses, and some special characteristics. Classes, as almost anything in the game, use dutch words as a naming convention.

-Schaar ("scissors")close combat fighter, with 2 blades, dealing physical damage-Draad ("thread")long distance fighter, using projectiles & being able to immobilize the enemy-Speld ("pin")magic, using a wand, using poisons & plant-based attacks-Naald ("needle")magic, using a sceptre. repair (=heal) & buffs the player characters-Haak ("hook")close combat fighter, high defense, can change position & make the enemy change position

Those 5 classes are used to classify the enemies as well and can be inferred from their appearance. Some enemies might have 2 classes, to diversify the bestiary and combat situations.

Each class has weakness against 2 classes and is strong against 2 other ones.

Distinctive feature: the combats are puzzles to solve, combining mastery of the Fil Conducteur ("main thread"), positionning & class weaknesses to win. Each combination of enemies will pose a different challenge and can be solved in various ways, depending on the player's team choice.

Fil Conducteur

The fil conducteur ("main thread") is a list of actions (chosen on combat start & based on each fighter's speed stat. That list will inform the turn order for each character's action. The thread will be visible for the player.Each skill will have a specific cost in AP, which will take a certain number of turns to be launched. (1 for basic attacks, 2 for medium, 3 for heavy, 4 for extreme). the stronger a skill, the longer it will take to prepare.Some classes will have skills to change the turn order, delaying, advancing, or deleting turns. This will enable the player to set up various strategies (for example: paralysis will cause an fighter to lose their next turn, making the other fighters go first)

Moreover, there will be a positioning system, where fighters can be "near" or "far", which will impact the amount of damage taken & dealt by physical attacks.

Here's a mockup of what those fights might look like

And there you have it! There's a lot of work to be done, and stuff might evolve over the course of the development, but here's the idea.

Myu has been hard at work making the first visuals, that we'll hopefully be able to show off next week! Just in time to send in the files to the CNC.

There will not be a stream tomorrow, so we'll see you all hopefully next week!