Game News Empyre: Lords of the Sea Gates is a phase-based RPG set in flooded Neo-Victorian New York

[Iskramor]

If the music is supposed to say anything about the setting, I'd say the game is about some jive brother, on a quest to find himself some nice booty, drinking jive cocktails, while fighting the tyranny of "the Man".

Elric of melnibone?

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

Silly MRY everybody knows the 19th century is in the 1900s that's why it's called the 19th century you know

XIX century takes place between 1789 and 1914 or 1918.

 

[MRY]

All I want is to unlock the Sachem achievement.

 

[Imperialist]

Don't see it on Steam

 

[YES!]

players, there’s a new twist in that the game uses a hybrid Real Time/Turn-based System.

How is it phase based if it can be played in RT? RT systems are RT, regardless if based on a round like the IE games, Kotor, whatever. It isn't phased like Wiz8. Real examples of actual round/phase based systems would Riddle of Steel or Burning Wheel.

Does the combat play out in continuous RT if I don't pause and select actions? Or does it automatically pause so I can select actions and it plays out in that round or phase? The video obviously only shows the planning/pause option and then shows the combat, but it looks like it keeps going. Also, the info blurb states "can enter." In which case if we take that as the truth then the game is RT, period. No and, ifs, or buts. RT is RT is RT and will never be anything other than real time. It can be RT twitch, RT based on a round or ridiculous use of the term phase (which would be planning phase and execution phase, which is not true in RT systems). Phase only makes sense when there has to be a phase such as planning and execution. If I CAN pause and enter into a planning "phase" that is not phase based or entering a phase, it is RTwP.

Looking at the attacks it seems like it is actually round based with one attack per round per character. If we assume Wiz8 uses actual phase based combat and used the term correctly then this is not phase based. The only other correct use of the term would be from P&P systems which have a planning and execution phase. I've never played the game you listed as an example because I have no interest in almost all non-rpgs but I unless the planning phase was required and you could not give orders in RT it is a RT game. Just because you guys hate rpgs and love hipster shit doesn't give anyone the right to redefine everything. Just like all the people who retardly claim the IE games and games like it are TB or can be played like a TB game. No, they aren't and no they can't. For shame. For shame.

 

[YES!]

Don't see it on Steam

It says it is planned to be released in the fall.

 

[LESS T_T]

From Youtube trailer's comments:

Hi Starfarts! We are better known as turn based grid combat PLUS. You get all that all that turn based goodness (planning and coordinating etc) plus you get to see it all happen simultaneously. See the planning and execution phases in the video and come and visit us at empyrethegame.com.

 

[aratuk]

"Oh, cool! so I see you're making a steampunk game."

—"No. Actually, it's Neo-Victorian. It takes place in New York in 1911."

"1911? But wouldn't that be …Edwardian? Neo-Edwardian…"

—"NO. NO. NO. NO. NO."

"And wouldn't either term refer to English history, not American? In New York wouldn't that be the Progressive…"

—"NO! IT WOULDN'T! IT'S MY WORLD! SHUT UP!"

"Anyway, it really looks like a steampunk game."

 

[Fenix]

Hilarious.

 

[YES!]

From Youtube trailer's comments:

Hi Starfarts! We are better known as turn based grid combat PLUS. You get all that all that turn based goodness (planning and coordinating etc) plus you get to see it all happen simultaneously. See the planning and execution phases in the video and come and visit us at empyrethegame.com.

So, you are saying for certain there is a forced planning phase? The "can enter" a planning phase was wrong on the game's official release blurb?

 

[Grumpy Grognard]

From Youtube trailer's comments:

Hi Starfarts! We are better known as turn based grid combat PLUS. You get all that all that turn based goodness (planning and coordinating etc) plus you get to see it all happen simultaneously. See the planning and execution phases in the video and come and visit us at empyrethegame.com.

So, you are saying for certain there is a forced planning phase? The "can enter" a planning phase was wrong on the game's official release blurb?

I assumed it was a slightly ambiguous choice of words, but that the combat system requires you to plan each turn. Can't be 100% sure though.

 

[YES!]

It would be nice if the devs stated explicitly what the system is. I'm getting either way but as of right now I expect not much from the game or the devs. Also, watching the video again I am almost positive it is RTwP. If there is a forced pause it must only be at the start of combat so a planning phase and then the rest being RTwP is still RtwP in my book since combat isn't really a phase - it is the full event.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

Love how new games are popping up everywhere

 

[Saduj]

Neo Victorian isn't a reference to a specific period of time.

"Neo-Victorian is an aesthetic movement which amalgamates Victorian and Edwardian aesthetic sensibilities with modern principles and technologies. A large number of magazines and websites are devoted to Neo-Victorian ideas in dress, family life, interior decoration, morals, and other topics."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Victorian

The devs are on their own with 1911 being 19th century though.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

The devs are on their own with the 1911 being 19th century though.

Christ. XIX century ends during the First World War. Half of people in this thread seems to not understand this.

 

[Saduj]

assumed it was a slightly ambiguous choice of words, but that the combat system requires you to plan each turn. Can't be 100% sure though.

That's what I'm assuming too. It will be interesting to see how well they avoid the possibility for AI abuse. But at the very least, it will be different AI abuse.

Christ. XIX century ends during the First World War. Half of people in this thread seems to not understand this.

Really? I don't see a single post that indicates anyone doesn't understand this.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

Really? I don't see a single post that indicates anyone doesn't understand this.

Then I may misread your previous post, but even then, there are people on the first page who seems to think that.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

What is the point of Wego-system if everybody just melee during combat?

 

[Genghis Cohen]

That's the

Silly MRY everybody knows the 19th century is in the 1900s that's why it's called the 19th century you know

XIX century takes place between 1789 and 1914 or 1918.

That's Hobsbawm's "long" XIX century, as opposed to the "short" XX century.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

Could be interesting.

 

[Tigranes]

That's the

Silly MRY everybody knows the 19th century is in the 1900s that's why it's called the 19th century you know

XIX century takes place between 1789 and 1914 or 1918.

That's Hobsbawm's "long" XIX century, as opposed to the "short" XX century.

Looking at their various descriptions, I really wonder if they were referencing Hobsbawm.

Not that I mind, even. There's something kitsch and pastiche about using 'Neo-Victorian' as a setting anyway, so it's not a huge problem for me if it's mixing labels and tropes a bit.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

You don't need to have ever heard about the Hobsbawm to know about the long XIX century. It's a high school knowledge

But I do agree that pastiches are fun.

 

[mondblut]

Somehow I felt it's going to be some kind of hipster trash just from thread title. Wow, dudes invented steampunk and phase-based

At least it's not that "bikepunk" hilarity that tried to announce itself a year or so ago. Now that was crashing through the bottom. I suppose it went nowhere after the only coder there was fired for being a fucking white male?

 

[MRY]

This thread makes me grin ear to ear at the sheer ingenuity of Codexers. It's like the explanations for why Han Solo's "parsecs" aren't a result of the screenwriter not knowing that parsecs measure distance, not time.

Possibility One: This game is basically going to have Lionheart-level of "historical research," where, like, you have a mission to rescue Thomas Nast from a torture chamber so that he can get back to satirizing Tammany Hall, you have to steal Boss Tweed's brooch, the prohibition on bringing water into Neo-New York is denounced in a cartoon with a turtle grabbing a thirsty man crawling toward an oasis, "This cursed OGRAMBE!" etc., etc., much of which will skirt the tricorner boundary between "so dumb it's funny," "so dumb it's miserable," and "pretty dumb but it makes me feel smart to smirk at it." Basically it will be a generic steampunk RPG except that quest givers will have names taken from the list of names you're supposed to know to pass the AP US History exam. Could be fun, but it's not going to be The Last Express or something.

Possibility Two: The game is made by geniuses whose every mistake is actually an instance of invoking a concept too sophisticated for us to grasp at first pass. "The small number of parsecs is because he had to get close to a black hole!!!"

 

[torpid]

Even in a neo-Victorian setting, wouldn't they be able to scale up steam desalination facilities when dealing with mass flooding threatening their water supply? Some top hat-wearing monopolist could even try to rule the city through his control of fresh water production. Out of all the goals they could give the player, finding a water source seems pretty meh. Even just thematically, regardless of the tech required to obtain fresh water from seawater, it seems like a better fit for a desert or wasteland setting like Fallout.

Obviously, the game might still be good even with that macGuffin.