Azure Domain™ Windows game

Azure Domain™

Proud Cipher Media Group | Released Mar 2022

The world is dying. A shroud of heavy, toxic clouds blankets the lands, choking and killing everything underneath. In a last ditch effort to save themselves, mankind has taken to the skies. Atop floating platforms built with the latest technology, and with increased advancements in the field of air travel and transportation, humanity managed to escape its doom.

But all was not well. The once-powerful nation of Solbourne, that had united the people under the auspices of the Sun Goddess, had broken into pieces. The new nations now fight amongst each other for precious resources, and Solbourne itself has succumbed to the corrupt rule of the Solar Ecclesiarchy, almost completely usurping the mantle from the Priestess. With little hope left, the reigning Solar Priestess, Tali’dah et Sol, is secretly launching a campaign to bring the nations back into the fold. Tapping into her loyal followers, she seeks to spread a message of peace even as the world burns. But she has made little progress, and Sol, the Sun Goddess herself, is nowhere to be found.

Amidst the war and chaos of this shattered world, a new evil is brewing that threatens to erase humanity once and for all. An extermination 200 years in the making, a being known only as Ginuun is harnessing the extradimensional powers of the fabled Outsiders, entities that transcend life and death, to carry out global extinction. His targets are the floating platforms that are humanity’s lifeline, and one such platform in the far corner of the world, New Horizons, will be the first to meet that fate.

Thus begins our story…

The game’s primary focus will be a single player campaign spanning the world of Azure Domain. Initially, the levels will progress in a linear fashion, then after a certain threshold in the story, a world map will open up to the player (think Super Mario Bros. 3) and the player can tackle missions and side missions as they see fit. Additionally, there will be enemy encounters on the map involving pirate squadrons, militant factions, and, later in the game, Outsiders. Completing story missions will open new sections of the map, as well as new areas. Players can revisit areas they have completed to tackle side missions and enemy encounters. Another aspect of the game is Threat Level. This is a sort of difficulty mechanic for side missions and enemy encounters. These aspects of the game adjust to the player’s Threat Level. A higher threat level will pit stronger enemies against the player, as well as adjust the types of enemies in the mission. Completing side missions will raise the threat level, whereas failing them will lower it.

In combat, the player will have to think both short-term tactical and long-term strategic. A large portion of the combat will be enemy fighters, fast and agile, keeping the player on their toes. They will also have to attack a variety of highly dangerous targets, such as airships and the defenses of a city-platform. As they bob, weave and dive in the air, they will also have to manage their wingmen, directing them to protect or attack a selected target, escort the player, use abilities and more; all to manage their battlefield presence. If poorly managed the player may become overwhelmed. Lower difficulty levels mean their wingmen will better manage themselves and let less skilled players focus on what’s in front of them. Higher difficulty levels mean the player will have to be more diligent with their wingmen and their abilities, as they will be less independent. When in a fight, the player’s skill will be tested as they perform high-speed maneuvers dodging missiles and gunship fire to attack a target, requiring quick thinking and fast reflexes. Between missions, the player will be able to take control of Marcus himself and will be free to walk around and explore their home base in Solbourne. Later you’ll have the option to visit other small hub areas in other city states, interacting with people providing information about the lore, unlock or buy modules, weapons and even aircraft; all these interactions help to move the plot forward. He’ll be able to grow his relationship between his wingmen and Tali’dha by speaking with them during these segments.

The flow and pace of the game is important and the player’s level of engagement is carefully controlled in an attempt to prevent “burn-out”. During missions things are intense and require high levels of focus and thought, but between missions the player is encouraged to relax, explore the environment and have conversations with the NPCs. This lets the player wind down, lowering their required focus, but keeping their engagement by giving them interesting characters, good dialogue, beautiful scenery and great music. The intention is to present the story and gameplay as we envisioned, but remain mindful of the fact that this is for a player, not for us. We want to provide a story that will keep them invested, provide a game that is fun to play without undue frustration, and hopefully give the player an experience they’ll always remember.

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Dev Diary: Pre-Alpha v0.1.11 - Climbing the Mountain

Mar 1 2021 News

Dev Diary: Pre-Alpha v0.1.11 - Climbing the Mountain

So...yeah. Things have been real rough for us. The pandemic hit us so hard, some of our members have decided to move on and focus on their primary careers. We wholeheartedly respect their decision, after all, we aren't making any money with this right now and passion can't pay the bills (sadly). They might come back to us someday, if things improve for them. They're still hanging around in our Discord server, keeping and eye on progress and keeping us company.

Has that stopped us? No. It got uncomfortably close there for a little while, but we rallied together and pulled through. Things are improving and we're finally getting back to work. Feels like I say that a lot, but hopefully those ups and downs are finally going to smooth out. I, personally, have finally moved in with my fiance. Gordon, our lead dev, is getting his own place soon too. Now that our daily lives are chilling way the hell out, we've got time and energy to spend on Azure Domain again! Let's walk through some of the stuff we've got going on.

New Gameplay Video - v0.1.11 on YouTube

We've included a start-to-finish gameplay video of the Carrier Assault mission on YouTube. This was actually originally put up to help show what we have to try and attract some new team members. I'll go into that a little later if you're interested in contributing to the project.

Azure Domain is now available on Steam!

That's right! We've finally gone live on Steam. If you want the latest updates for Azure Domain, sign up for the pre-alpha playtest! It's free!

While we are going to continue posting news and other updates here on IndieDB, the automated update process that Steam provides makes getting the latest builds out to our testers so much faster and easier. I should also note, I can't say for certain exactly how long this playtest will be live on Steam. While we know we don't have nearly enough completed to go 'early access' to get some kind of revenue for our budget, that is a goal of ours. That's a little while off, however, so enjoy the playtest in the mean time! Even once we go early access, we're going to ensure there is always a free build of AD for people to play.

Multiplatform Support - Mac and Linux

Oh yeah, baby! Thanks to Unity's excellent compiler, we were able to port AD to Mac and Linux with relatively little stress. If you're a Mac or Linux gamer eager to try out Azure Domain, get it on Steam! Mac and Linux builds are automatically updated too!

Graphical, HUD and UX optimizations and upgrades

There are new models, effects and shaders in place to help improve AD's visuals. Additionally, a great deal of time was spent in optimization since high framerates are important to the game's feel. We wanted to ensure as many people as possible were able to play it the way it's meant to be played. So, we've also included some graphics presets to help players tune the visuals to ensure the best performance.

We've also made some changes to the HUD to try and make things clearer, more comprehensible and provide more information without adding too much clutter. It still needs quite a bit of work but it's to the point now that it's fairly easy to get used to.

New Mission - "Beyond the Veil"

Now, I can't show you any screenshots of this yet, but...

You might have noticed in the gameplay video there is a new mission! In "Beyond the Veil", this demo mission will serve to introduce the Outsiders to the player. The Outsiders are the extradimensional beings being used by the corrupt sun goddess Sol, and an Outsider Archmind with grim plans for Humanity's future. You'll get to meet two new enemy types and a new boss enemy: the Alicorn, a huge Outsider Alpha-type that changes your understanding of how fights in Azure Domain will go. Don't expect to be able to pull off simple strafing runs, or the Alicorn will swat you out of the sky.

I'm currently putting together a teaser video for the new mission, so keep your eyes on the news feed for that one.

Help Needed - Unity/C# Dev and Unity Environment/VFX Artist

Currently, we require a Unity/C# Developer and a Unity Environment/VFX artist. As you can see from the gameplay video, we still have a lot to do. If we want to attract positive attention and build our community, we need to polish this up a lot more. The current goal is to get the first four missions of the game done plus a hub area to walk around in. Once that's done, we can proceed with more aggressive crowdfunding opportunities like Kickstarter.

If you think this project might be fun to work on, please reach out to us either on our Discord server or by commenting here or DMing me.

Conclusion

So, there's not quite as much to show off as I'd like, but like I said keep an eye out for that teaser!

Pre-Alpha v0.1.11 is expected to become available in the next two to three weeks. Hopefully a lot sooner if things go our way for a change. I'd like to sincerely thank everyone for their support during these difficult times. Knowing there were people out there who genuinely wanted more Azure Domain helped keep the fire of our drive alight. Thank you so much, and I hope we'll get some more smiles out of you yet!