Development Plans for Ergi Chapter 3
Added 2022-10-06 01:56:37 +0000 UTCHi everyone,
Thanks for the patience and support in helping us roll out chapter 2. A big shout out to kireban, JammerDodger and those who have been helping others with the game. There is a nice vibe to the Ergi community and I hope we can stay that way.
Just to share some of our development plans for Ergi, and how we hope to bring this game forward.
You may have realised by now Ergi is a game about managing resources and building your stats. How the story develops and at what pace, depends on how you build your character. So far Chapter 1 and 2 focuses on familiarizing the game mechanics - crafting (Ch1) and combat & puzzles (Ch2). Upgrading is the third mechanic that will play a more prominent role in Ch3, (e.g. Bountiful Harvest, Automated harvesting, electric fences, hot showers etc). Fast travel was supposed to be an upgrade in Ch1, but we had to can it because of budget constraints. The story for Ch3-9 will primarily revolves around the 2 bad choices and 1 wishful aspiration at the end of Ch2. You can choose to enhance your base production or your stats/combat abilities to solve Ergi's main problem.
Ch3 onwards, you will also get to choose the quest (by production or combat) to move the story forward. There will still be all combat and crafting elements for each quest line, but the emphasis will be lesser. So over the remaining chapters, you can slowly shape Britt into a diplomat (admiration scores/charm are impt for this), administrator (high will and production upgrades are impt) or a warrior (high will, fitness and combat upgrades are impt). Just make sure you don't get too skewed or you will struggle in later games.
Some of you have certain (lusty) relationship aspirations with your love interests. We might not be able to accommodate too many permutations. There are 9 characters, and 3 main story endings and 3 relationship endings for each character. We do our best to avoid tropes/cliches, but character behaviours need story time to develop. Allowing them to behave out of context breaks immersion.
Before this turns into a full blown riot - Yes, you get to top Jorgen eventually, but the story needs to develop consistently for him to behave that way (taboo in his society and not what he enjoys). So these require tremendous amount of resources for the writers to flesh out and for us to fit the plotlines into the game. Nothing is cast in stone at the moment, but our priority is to make this an immersive, character driven game.
Comments
Upgrading is not exactly new mechanics, but it adds a layer of complexity to how you want to develop Britt and solve problems. After that, players just need to deal with more complex scenarios incrementally over the chapters. There will also be more trade off choices (e.g. choosing 1 bonus over at the expense of the other). We try not to include too much gratuitous sex in the game as it distracts the story and character development. When included, it should serve a point to tell something about the culture or the character, or the dynamics between them. One of the main theme for Ergi is to explore pre-Christian sexual expression and identity. A lot of modern constructs like romantic love and gay identity didn't really exist for the most part of human history. So we imagined how the world today will be like if the old culture and values still exists. For some characters like Erland, deviant sex scenes are included as it is inherent to his character growth. He has a nihilistic/destructive streak and that reflects in his taste and how his story arc will unravel. Jostein relationship with Britt and Filippa is based on Native American culture where men takes on a 'two-spirit' as a second wife. Meanwhile Henrik and Ander's relationship are based on pederasty practices. Not sure if you consider them as fetishes.
KKCHar
2022-10-07 06:10:20 +0000 UTCit all sounds very sensible. It seems that there will be enough permutations to have a lot of replayability but not too much to disperse the creative energies. I must say that I like the resource managing/puzzly side of the game (I don't even find it too grindy, which was one of my worries in chapter 1), it makes it different from being yet another visual novel. So I appreciate the idea of introducing new mechanics step by step. Will upgrading be the last new mechanics or there will be others in the following chapters? Also I was wondering, will any fetishes be explored in this or that relationship?
LukaM
2022-10-06 23:05:34 +0000 UTCIt sounds very convincing and rewarding. Thanks a lot!
Pilgrim
2022-10-06 20:55:28 +0000 UTC
