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Game Design Document
The executive summary:
- A fantasy/sci-fi game similar in spirit to Adventure of Link with inspirations drawn from Super Mario World, Metroid and Elden Ring with a focus on exploration, swordplay and action adventure elements.
A very brief description of the theme and setting of the game:
- In an isolated fantasy world with a buried technological past, a guard stumbles upon an ancient existential threat facing their world.
A few bullet points introducing the main features:
Sheriff of Town1: I don't have any name or characterization for Sherrif of Town1 yet but I want them to be an interesting character, may base them on an old boss of mine or something since I want to make it feel like you're on the job. -Ryan
Judgelord1 Judgelord of County1. I don't know much about this character yet either. -Ryan
Judgelord Boarheart: Judgelord Boarheart is Judgelord, a Holy Judge of the Church of Balumbawa and one of the nine Judges presiding over the Sheriffs of the various counties of Wudragar. They are the highest political and religious figures in the land, formally called Judgelords. Boarheart believes himself to be the true incarnation of the Boarheart of ancient legend and sees it as his duty and purpose to reform the traditions of the church and the laws of the land in his image. He is ultimately deranged and obsessed with divine power such that he begins to see himself as a prophet of Galungawa and writes an entirely new volume of the Divine Teachings himself. This creates a political divide in the land of Wudragar wherein some people embrace his new teachings and others don’t, even amidst the nine Judgelords. Lord Boarheart and his supporters form a splinter branch of the Church of Balumbawa as well as a new political party to challenge the church’s ancient traditions. He will appear as a late game boss (most likely the final Judgelord) after it's been established that the player's goals do not align with the goals of his new order.
The game opens with the Player character starting his/her first day of work as the new Deputy of Town1. They will meet their new boss, the Sheriff of Town1, who will give them a brief 'training session' to explain controls, make them feel like it's their first day on the job and give them a general sense of their objective which is to patrol their jurisdiction looking for anything out of place and helping citizens in need, then they'll be set loose into the initial tutorial sector of the map where there will be a few points of interest within the region to go to such as an old ruined temple, a rocky area with a cave, some forests and a farm or two. They are now free to explore any of these areas including Town1 but will be told it's not within their jurisdiction if they attempt to leave the County (tutorial area) at this point.
There will be a number of townsfolk to talk to and a number of things that may be observed that will indicate to the player that things have been amiss lately. Problems such as people having trouble with monsters on their farms, seeing or hearing strange things in woods, a villager that has gone missing and was last seen in a frantic state heading into a cave and strange noises coming from within the ruined temple. Doing these quests will introduce the basic low level monsters and threats that the player will be facing throughout the game and will also help set up the story.
Going to the ruined temple will reveal some Deputy guards that tell the player they're not permitted to set foot in the temple and they have to get written authorization from the region's Judgelord to be allowed to enter. Judgelord1 [don't have any ideas for name or characterization yet] will be found in Town1 in a church or civic building. The Player gets an audience with Judgelord1 and is laughed at and harshly denied access to the old temple. This introduces the character Judgelord1 and may also trigger a sudden event in town [haven't worked out all the details] that distracts and leads the player back to the ruined temple where we find that the guards are no longer there so there's nothing stopping the player from entering.
The Divine Texts as interpreted by the Church
Divine Text I – Creation of the World
- Once our world was a lawless place in an endless empty plain resting beneath a great void, where dwelt no living thing until the Architects raised a cradle of mountains around the land and built the blue sky. The Architects then called upon the life-giving power of Galungawa and gave the land reason and purpose, and thus our world, Wudragar, the first of the nine worlds, was born.
- When they saw that Wudrugar was flourishing, the Architects built eight more worlds in the same fashion and called them Tildarin, Ylgwyl, Gwyndol, Gremdalor, Winri, Tak, Zirzor and Zo; and together the nine worlds comprised the great nation of Faerark and thrived in harmony and abundance; yet still the Architects sought to calm the restless plain beyond. Calling upon the life-giving power of Balumbawa, they gave the endless plain reason and purpose, and they called this place Galgathar.
- The Architects saw the living creations of Balumbawa inhabiting the once barren land of Galgathar and they were pleased and intended to build their great kingdom there, but Chaos sent from the void an orb of metal which touched Galgathar with a great fire and sickness that corrupted and angered Balumbawa and turned its creations into demons who sought to unmake the nine worlds of the Architects.
- To save the people of Faerark from the demonic forces of Balumbawa, the Architects sealed the Divine Gates at the ends of each of the nine worlds, never to open them again, and the great nation of Faerark was no more and the nine worlds became forever estranged.
- The disciples of the Architects righteously followed their Divine Teachings for many generations after the fall of Faerark, and Galungawa rewarded them with abundance and long life until a scourge of blasphemers and heretics rebuked the Divine Teachings and tried foolishly to destroy the scrolls of light which contained them, but the righteous people of Wudragar stood against the heretics with sword and spear and the world came to be ruled by Chaos for a dozen generations until Galungawa became restless and the sky became hostile and the soil infertile.
- When an impoverished farmer named Boarheart saw that his field was barren and his animals were starving, he begged Galungawa for mercy and salvation for the embattled soul of Wudragar, and Galungawa was merciful and sent unto Boarheart a blessing in the form of a glorious violet fowl whose immense feathered tail shone with ever shifting colors the likes of which Boarheart had not seen, and the fowl looked into his bewildered eyes and spoke unto him a language his ears had not heard yet his mind understood: ‘Boarheart, scour all of the regions of this world and seek the ruined temples and salvage from their depths what remain of the scrolls of light which contain the Divine Teachings of the Architects of old and with their great wisdom calm the restless spirit of Galungawa and unify the people of Wudragar, lest the land should eventually become death.’
- So Boarheart left his farm and embarked across the lands of Wudragar and for sixty-six years searched for the scrolls of light until he had found each of them and learned to understand the words of the Architects inscribed therein and taught them to people who would become his disciples and go unto their own tribes and villages and share with them the revelations of the Architects.
-These are meant to be individualized lore nuggets found and read one at a time as 'scrolls of light' which are ancient altars found in churches or something like that. - Ryan
Adderlily: A carnivorous vine that contains the ‘berserked’ gene. Some varieties are poisonous.
Landlouse: Landlice are parasitic arthropod type creatures who carry the ‘berserked’ gene. They are small, quick, carnivorous and aggressive in their larval form when they hatch from their eggs which are carried in the bodies of adult landlice. When fully mature, adults develop fertile eggs asexually and then bury their entire head in the ground (like a tick does on skin) and start drinking nutrients straight from the soil. This can kill plants and trees and may sometimes destroy crops or gardens. As it drinks it grows and will more than quadruple in size before its death at which point it will explode into goop and its eggs will drop, hatching quickly and releasing multiple aggressive larva at once.
Scuttler: Scuttlers are the descendants of people who became ‘berserked’ long ago. Over time berserked humans were mostly eradicated on the surface world but many had been driven into the deep, dark and unfathomably huge cave and maintenance tunnel systems beneath the bubbles. For thousands of years they have lived and reproduced and writhed in the darkness below the bubbles, evolving and changing genetically to reflect their berserked and deranged state physically as well as mentally. They are blind as their eyes are not needed in the dark but they can hear and smell exceptionally and are very fast when climbing or ‘scuttling’ though dark caves.
Initially, the game will release as a digital PC/Mac standalone version available through common retailers such as Steam, GOG, etc.,.
Could add console support (through e-stores, perhaps no physical release?) in the future.
Consider the following engines: Unity 3D
For project management use JIRA. Use Github for storing code and assets.
TBD properly in Technical Design Document.