Part #2: Game design.
Part #3 Character design.
Hello! Today we publish the first part from the diary of our new project development. In this part, we would like to describe the game itself – Neverliria, how the idea of this game was originated and what distinguishes our survival sandbox game from the variety of other games in this genre.
From the beginning, our studio was known among indie gamers for its dark post-apocalyptic or mythical games with an atmosphere of abandonment and fear.
We decided that it was time to get out of depression. So we tried to do something completely different – light and colorful, somewhat less serious. Another important change in the style of our studio was the removal of the story-based game concept (this time).
Actually, as we consider (and many players would agree), the main disadvantage of our previous games was an excessive orientation on the plot and atmosphere rather than on interactivity and game mechanics. We decided to take this into account, so the game of Neverliria focuses entirely on mechanics. This time you will have to extract, build, create, destroy, survive, defend, and all this over and over again, unless you have the power and resources to сompletely overcome the hostile environment and fulfill the main task.
Minecraft inventory system
However, we would never deviate from the basic idea that underlies our studio and unites us as developers. This idea is to make games that would not be like others, to contribute something new to the world of indie games. One of the main embodiments of this idea in this game is the development of the mechanic with a physical representation of all available resources. We do not think that this world needs another game with a boring inventory in the form of a grid interface.
Instead, we decided to build a gameplay on manual collection of resources. In Neverliria, the player can directly interact with the extracted resources, transfer them from place to place, put in special chests (which can also be carried with them) and add to the buildings.
Enemies in Neverliria may also interact with most objects, steal resources and destroy buildings. This makes the game more complicated and slightly similar to the Tower Defence genre.
How can you protect yourself from hordes of creepy shadows? The answer is simple – light. It overcomes the darkness, so you have to build and keep the light active with various sources in order to protect yourself, your resources and buildings.
Actually, these two game mechanics are the basis of Neverliria gameplay process. But everything is not so easy!
At the moment, our team of testers has already received an alpha-version of the game, which has more than 15 types of buildings, 6 types of enemies and even the opportunity to lead their small army!
The development of the game is in full swing, we have planned many important innovations, and we are going to open the game for Early Access at the end of the summer. For now, you can try the demo version of the game – we welcome new players and feedback!
In the next part of our small developer’s diary, we will describe the game mechanic in more details, talk about the features that are already implemented and those that are under development.
Thank you for your interest and stay with us!
