Finance Your Own Trip to Hell: Kickstarter Launching to Fund Salary Man’s Showdown with the Underworld
As a low-level software engineer for Questionable Technologies, Tom endures long days of suffocating cubicles, vainglorious middle managers and skin-bleaching fluorescent lights. But when an experiment goes wrong in the company’s underground weapons lab, Tom and the rest of the company are thrown into an entirely new kind of hell: the real one.
So begins Tom vs. the Armies of Hell, an indie PC title currently in development by one-man studio Darkmire Entertainment. After getting mauled by a monster and left for dead in the men’s bathroom, Tom wakes up to find his life saved by an imp of mysterious intent—and his left arm replaced with a demon’s in the process. Now, Tom must battle his way through robots, demons and more in a 3D isometric shoot-em-up rife with fast-paced action and comic mischief.
But Tom’s fate depends on more than just the player: Darkmire has turned to Kickstarter for the $20,000 it needs to make sure the game lives up to its potential.
“I’ve been doing everything myself up until this point, everything but the music and a little environment art,” says Sean Burgoon, who as Darkmire’s sole member is responsible for the game’s programming, art, animation, design and business responsibilities. “But there's a limit to what any one person can do. This Kickstarter is to help bridge that gap, and make sure the gave ends up as awesome as it has the potential to be.”
Burgoon brings years of experience in the entertainment industry to the title, having worked as an animator and technical director on projects like the movie Transformers 3 and the game Tomb Raider. But he founded Darkmire in order to go on his own and apply his art and tech skills (and pretty much all his life savings) into Tom vs. the Armies of Hell.
The game sees Tom blast his way through office ruins, top-secret government labs and eventually hell itself. Players battle through the hordes by combining Tom’s newfound demonic powers with an arsenal of Questionable Technologies’ most advanced weapon prototypes (keyword: prototypes). But the forces of hell are numerous, and Tom will have to mix-and-match a diverse set of upgrades to tweak his weapons in order to stay alive.
One of the most distinguishing features of Tom vs. the Armies of Hell is its humor: Satire and wit permeate the game’s Office Space-meets-Army of Darkness setting from start to finish. Your imp companion delights in the inhumane torments of office drones grinding away at their desks in hell, themselves totally unaware they’ve been displaced from their corporate workplace. And the last words Tom’s boss utters to the player in his dying throes are “Don’t… bill this… as overtime!”
“If you’re like most people, you’ve had a job like Tom’s,” says Burgoon. “and while working in a job like that, who hasn't fantasized a way out? Sure, an open Hell Rift has it's downsides, but at least Tom will have a valid excuse for missing the bi-weekly 'stand-up' meeting inevitably still takes two hours and thus defeats the entire purpose of standing to begin with... but I digress.”
The Tom vs. the Armies of Hell Kickstarter will go live July 31st, 2014 at 9:00am PST and last until August 29th, 2014 at 9:00pm PST, seeking a goal of $20,000. Backer rewards range from early access to the game to having your own NPC in your likeness added to the final product. Funds raised will go toward voice acting, additional art assets, quality assurance, and other expenses necessary to make the best experience possible for the player.
Press Kit and Press Copy Request Form available at Darkmire.com
