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[saj]

Ahoj!

At some point it's a continuation of The Temple of the Monolith.
But the project has changed so much, that I think it's better to start a new thread.


So, here's Hoyfjell. Open-world, Industrial-Fantasy RPG with turn-based combat.










More images and WIP stuff at my Pixelfed.
More updates on Mastodon and Twitter.
Music: soundcloud.
Patreon: patreon.com/hoyfjell

[ThemsAllTook]

Cool! I like the look of this. Looking forward to seeing where it goes.

[MegaTiny]

Ever since I played Arcanum I've been a big industrial fantasy fan. This looks very cool, good luck with it!

[ComradeCupcake]

Neat! Looks like Temple of the Monolith was more fantasy than industrial. Did you end up just dropping that setting? Sad to lose all the good WIP screenshots of exploration and UI in that thread though! Hope you plan to add some to the OP post here.

[Alexei_ost]

Hey there! Game looks sick!

I'd love to send you some of my music and SFX. I'd love working with you on a game like this. Is it ok if I share some of my work with you?

Ciao!

[Jasmine]

Gorgeous game! Really looking forward to learning more. What are your goals for this project? Keep it personal, push for commercial? Self-fund?

[litHermit]

Really like the look of this, curios to find out more about lore and mechanics

[saj]

Thank you very-very-very much for all the feedback and kind words!
Really, thank you!

ThemsAllTook, thank you!

MegaTiny, thank you!

ComradeCupcake, thank you! I actually recorded a video of the Temple gameplay:




Even though, Høyfjell is different, it wasn't a sudden change. I think I just reached a certain threshold when I switched to turn-based mode. Many of the characters and locations that were planned for TOTM are still planned for Høyfjell. But you are right about industrial / fantasy relationship.

Some ideas that I used in the Temple GUI are in Høyfjell as well:


Alexei_ost, thank you very much for your interest! Well, I actually started working on the soundtrack for the Temple and recorded couple tracks (added link in the starting post). So, yeah, the soundtrack is going to be in-house, so to say. But I appreciate the interest!

Jasmine, thank you! Uhh, well, that a good question. I left my job to work on the game full time, so I have to figure out something about the funding. The game is going to be released as pay-what-you-want, so I'm not sure what route I want to go.

litHermit, thank you! Well, as I have more screenshots to share I think it would be natural to assume mechanics and gameplay of the game. That's good you mentioned the lore, since I'm interested in what people think: should I share the lore bits as I'm talking about the game, or leave everything for the player to explore themselves?

[saj]

   

[saj]

[saj]

   

[saj]

Winter tileset.

[saj]

Ahoj! I wrote a post where I go into the detail about Høyfjell design.

Here's a link to the full post: What is Høyfjell?

But here are the key points:
• Høyfjell is set in Industrial-Fantasy world where you get to explore abandoned military bases along with haunted castles. Ever wanted to play a wizard-sniper?
• Non-epic. You are not saving the world from a super-bad-guy, but you are not evil either.
• Open-world game. No quest markers, no level scaling. Most of the world is available for exploration right at the start.
• Turn-Based RPG. You control the main character in non-combat mode, during the combat you control the turns of every party member. Character system is quite traditional and has no classes.
• Respect player's time is one of my core values. For the lack of a better words I call it "Free-Pace Gameplay".

[saj]

Here's a consecutive update, where I share my thoughts about the development schedule for the game.

Highlights:
• I'm targeting to utilize a gradual release. That means there will be multiple sub-releases at different stages of development.
• I want to share the builds with the public early on.
• Pre-Production is the first stage and it is complete.
• My next focus is on a Preview stage, which is mostly about implementing systems. The amount of content at this stage is just enough to properly test these systems.
• The next stage is an Early Acess. The first part of the Early Access is to decide the right size of the game. The second part of the Early Access is about polish and optimization.
• After Early Access comes the actual Release. Don't release until it's done!

And here's a link to the full post: Development Schedule

[saj]

This is Part 2 of What is Høyfjell?. Here I'm going to provide more details about the gameplay and design. I will repeat some things that I mentioned in the Part 1.

Summary:
• Non-epic
• Main focus on side-adventures, not on the main quest
• No level-scaling
• No quest markers
• No achievements system
• Hand-placed loot
• Quest items are just regular items. There's no special Quest Item marker in the game
• Every NPC can be killed
• Different builds - different power level
• No dice-skewing
• Hidden dialogue options are hidden
• *There might be mature content
• *No tutorial
• *Reduced inventory management - inventory is unlimited and shared across whole party
• *No traps skill

Points that I may revisit in the future are marked with an asterisk.

As usual, more details in the full post.

[saj]

Interior tiles.

[msmagala]

The game looks gorgeous and I really like the concept of no "you must save the world the chosen one" plotline - completely flips the genre on it's head!

[Robo_Chiz]

I'm really digging the art style of the overworld! It's so clean!
Keep up the awesome work!

[saj]

msmagala, Robo_Chiz, thank you very much for such kind words!


Found this model in my WIP folder. I think I've started making it even before the game had any name (but I don't remember exactly). It's interesting how the project has changed since it's start. But I don't think it's alien to people on this forum.



So, I wrote a post with some background on the project, how it started and all that. It's too long to post it here, so here's a link:
The Road to Høyfjell